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Benjamin Bear in Fuzzy Thinking by Phillippe Coudray - review

There is a giant, bulging slob of a penguin in the refrigerator on the front cover of this book. A giant bulging penguin who has apparently eaten everything in the refrigerator. A bear and a bunny confront the penguin. They are deadpan, silent - are they coming face to face with the consequences of a previous bad decision? Is the penguin a nightmarish symbol of some kind, a living, breathing reminder of our greedy id?

I don't know. I haven't read the book yet. I was just so struck by the cover that I had to sit and gaze at it for a little while. These colors are wonderfully sophisticated - the walls and floor are three different shades of khaki tan, the bear and bunny are two edible browns, and the interior of the fridge is light blue with a lot of gray in it. This is a cotton pencil skirt, a man-tailored ice blue silk shirt, and a very nice leather belt, perhaps from Façonnable. Ok, on my budget, maybe J. Crew.

 

Apple Pie ABC by Alison Murray - review

Well, I've been on something of a YA kick this summer, as all both of my regular readers could tell. I'm preparing to be a facilitator at Books for the Beast this fall, in the Horror/Suspense category (join us, won't you?), and so there have been a lot of cannibals and nail-biting (do cannibals bite their nails?) around my house lately.

 

Maybe that's why I responded so warmly to this dumpling of an ABC book that I found on the New Picture Books shelf. It has pie! A girl in ponytails! And an extremely winsome dog of the beagle-y terrier-y variety. WHAT could be more wholesome than that?

The beagle's name, I find out from the book's website, is Georgie. And the little girl in the blue jumper is Grace. A is for apple pie, and B C and D are the verbs Grace uses to bake it, cool it, and dish it out. After that, it's all Georgie, finding a crumb on the floor and then obsessing over that fat pie, plotting and pining in a realistically single-minded puppy way. Alison Murray's text is cool and simple and perky, getting around the tricky letters so smartly that I had to go back and look - what did she do about X?

The art features a subtly unusual palette of navy blue, blood red, burnt orange, and the slightly off pastels that are produced when those colors are watered down. This scheme results in contrasts that are graphically strong - the navy blue jumper against a watery blue background, for example - while maintaining color harmony.

This looks to me like good confident ink and brush drawing on top of chunky, forthright shapes done in some kind of print process - silk screen I guess, given the texture. The ink still looks sticky, which is an effect I love for children's books. After watching dozens of kids visually reverse-engineer the illustrations in dozens of picture books so that they can try to duplicate a style or effect, I am partial to art techniques that reveal process or bear the imprint of the materials used.

More of this Scotswoman's art is on her blog, called everything is pattern.

 

Electronic Thursday - My Dad Drives a Roller Coaster Car

My Dad Drives a Roller Coaster Car by Crab Hill Press

 

Zoomy! Dad drives a roller coaster car, Aunt Frizzy drives a spinning teacup, Grandpa drives a log flume - but young Hank is not allowed to drive any of these things! Retro illustrations by Daniel Guidera are vivid and poppy, and even the action is kind of retro - each of the exciting, silly vehicles will take off if you touch them and pull back, just like the classic spring-loaded cars, trucks, jets, nuns, and frogs that we've been annoying the cats with for decades.

My co-reviewer, three-year-old Baby A, delighted in making the vehicles go, but didn't pay much attention to the text. I myself was very amused by the multitude of sound effects and surprises that reward exploratory screen tapping. Tappity tap! Also, Mom and Aunt Frizzy have pink hair - my kind of family!

Trailer on YouTube.

Also reviewed on I Education Apps Review.

 

Electronic Thursday: The Three Pandas by Valerie Mih and See Here Studios - review

 The Three Pandas by Valerie Mih and See Here Studios

Little Mei Mei goes walking in the forest and smells something yummy. Why, it's the three bowls of bamboo porridge that Mama, Papa, and Baby Panda left on their table while they took a walk! Mmm, that baby panda's porridge is 只是权 (just right)!

Layered photo collage is the medium for the gorgeous but friendly illustrations. Not too flashy, with homey interiors featuring Chinese furnishings and decor, and lovely misty exteriors depicting a sunny clearing in the bamboo forest. Mei Mei is adorable, with a giant toothy smile, and the pandas are just the giant balls of fluffy fur that pandas always are. I like the unobtrusive music, all tinkly piano and clarinet notes, though I confess I might have wished for more Chinese instrumentation.

AND IT'S BILINGUAL. Why does not every single dang iPad app give the user multiple language options? (Note: IT'S EASY.) The Chinese narration is clear and expressive. My picture book app review buddy, four-year-old Baby A, got a big kick out of listening to the app in Chinese and telling me the story, as if she were translating.

 

Electronic Thursday: Fox in Socks by Dr. Seuss and Oceanhouse Media - review

Speaking of my grandmother and non-sequiturs, it's Dr. Seuss's birthday.

Before marrying my grandfather, my mother's mother was a librarian in Springfield, Massachusetts, not far from where Theodor Seuss Geisel grew up. Family lore is that she was working at a branch on Mulberry Street when his first book, And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street, was published.

 

Why, there's Grandma! Looking very soignee in her cloche hat and two-tone wingtip Oxford shoes.

(My other grandmother, by the way, was a page in the public library system I currently inhabit. I wasn't fully aware of all this heritage until I was halfway through library school - and it was the nail that sealed the coffin on any notion that I was some kind of rebel. You can wear all the motorcycle boots you want, but if you are in the same profession as both of your grandmothers, you are an acorn that has not fallen far from the tree, and there is nothing punk rock about acorns.)

Astroblast! Code Blue by Bob Kolar - review

I always say that Beginning Reader books have the hardest row to hoe. They need to reassure the new reader, they need to give the new reader a lot of achievable challenges, they need to do it in seven words per line or less, and on top of all that, they need to reward this stalwart little reader with a laugh, a surprise, superior art, or hopefully all three! You gots to give that kid SOMETHING that makes her want to keep at it. Learning to read can be hard.

Bob Kolar (how do you know that name? Maybe from Big Kicks, the one about the big bear playing soccer; or AlphaOops!: The Day Z Went First. Love those!) solves this puzzle with... puzzles! Every page of this jazzy little number has a visual puzzle: a what's wrong with this picture, a spot the difference, a maze, etc. Not only does this reward a little guy or girl who has struggled through the lines of text on the page, it keeps that kid's eyes ON the page, developing skills that are useful when learning to read.

There are even more puzzles at the end, encouraging the kid to go back through the book again. Smart. Repeat exposure to the same text is a useful strategy.

The art is bright and clean, but harmonious and rounded, with a strong palette of deep colors that prevents the funny animal characters and their outer-space hijinks from slipping into frenzied Hanna-Barbera-land. Here's a Beginning Reader series that I hope to see about twenty of. Hope you're not busy for the next couple years, Kolar!

Kids go! by They Might be Giants, illustrated and animated by Pascal Campion - review

Kids go! by They Might be Giants, illustrated and animated by Pascal Campion

Here is my review:

 

If that didn't have you bouncing a little in your seat, well then I don't think I can help you. If it did, then you'll have to either get the book or buy the animated short on iTunes to see the full version. Go!

Today I Will Fly! by Mo Willems - review

Today I Will Fly! by Mo Willems
It is obviously completely superfluous for me to review this book. I have lauded the Elephant & Piggie series frequently on this blog. I have personally handed Elephant & Piggie books to dozens of parents, some of whom have actually sought me out later to tell me that little Susie didn't think she was "a reader" until Gerald and Piggie showed her that she was. Heck once I even hired a skywriter to fly over a teaching convention and spell out "GERALD & PIGGIE TAUGHT ME TO READ!!"

But today, my six year old son sat down and read this book to me, cover to cover, sounding out the words. I didn't know he knew how to read. When I told him that, he said, "Neither did I!" We are so proud, and so is he. When I asked him what he wanted to read next, he instantly responded, "Percy Jackson and the Olympians".

In all fairness, I did hear him sort of struggle through Time to Pee! last night with his dad, but I was half-asleep and literally thought I had dreamt it.

What do you hear in your dreams? If it's not a six-year-old reading Mo Willems, you're doing it wrong.

Labels: age: Grade1 and up, animals, Beginning Reader, funny, superstar books

Stinky by Eleanor Davis - review

Pirates prefer comics, a conversation with Captain Kid

Captain Kid: Avast! Who goes there?
Your Neighborhood Librarian: Why look! it's my old friend Captain Kid! How's it going, Captain? It's me, Your Neighborhood Librarian!
CK: You again! I just be here to be usin' the computer.
YNL: Well, sure, we'll sign you up for the computer, but your mom, I mean, Commodore... uh, AtHerWitsEnd, asked me if I could help you pick out a book.
CK: Ta read?
YNL: No, to use as a Frisbee. Yep, we'll find a fun book to read. I bet you're the kind of pirate that likes books about princesses.
CK: Belay that bilge!
YNL: Barbie?
CK: Nay, ye seaweed-haired trollop!
YNL: Why, Captain, where are you learning that kind of language?
CK: Wiggles.
YNL: Oh.
YNL: Ok, so no Barbies and no princesses. How about... a funny book?
CK: I guess.
YNL: How about... a funny comic book?
CK: What?
YNL: No, seriously, look, it's got a hard cover like a book so your mom, er, the Commodore, won't think it's a comic book, but look at this inside: it's a comic book! Look at this purple monster, what's his name?
CK: SSSSS... ST.. IN.. KEE. STINKY!
YNL: And he lives in a swamp, and that's his room - look at all the other animals, they've got clothespins on their noses, why do you think that is?
CK: Because he smells so bad!
YNL: Why do you think he smells?
CK: I bet he farts all the time!

And... my job just got a lot easier.

A long time ago, maybe 20-25 years ago, comics stopped being for kids. I'd blame Alan Moore, but you can't blame Alan Moore for everything. (Love Alan Moore, by the way. I would never have started reading comics if it weren't for V for Vendetta.) It's not a tragedy that people started taking the illustrated medium seriously - no way - but along the way, as beautiful autobiographical works and creaky experiments and pustule-plagued dark junk became the norm, people stopped making comics for kids. Any superhero worth his tights gained a conscience and a dark side. Even the Spider-man strip in the newspaper isn't for kids anymore - it's just TOO DULL AND NOTHING EVER HAPPENS. Seriously, when there's more plot in Apartment 3-G, you know it's time for new personnel on a strip.

So when Francoise Mouly and Art Spiegelman, creators of the original RAW "graphix magazine" (and, you guys, I still have my original copies, if you ever get to Baltimore and feel like signing stuff), started making books for children - actual comic books (although the produce of RAW JUNIOR is hardbound, as I note above), they were bridging a really big gap.

I have finally gotten my hands on their first three books... briefly. My sons, 5 and 7, took off with Mo and Jo, crawling into a corner, the big one reading it to the little one. He would have read it again (he went for it again this morning as soon as he was out of bed), but I wanted to read Jack and the Box together. I love the shapes of Spiegelman's characters.

So that left Stinky. I don't know the artist, and it's not about superheroes. But Eleanor Davis's way with color and detail won me over. She uses page and panel composition masterfully to set tone and pace, but her pages aren't so complicated that a kid will lose track of the sequence. Plus, the story is a charmer and the dialog fresh.

"You were afraid of me? Don't monsters eat kids?"
"What? YUCK! No way! Ha, ha!"

Captain Kid: But... aren't all comic books full of heartbreak and zombies and women with big boobs?
Your Neighborhood Librarian: What? YUCK! No way! Ha, ha!

Labels: age: Grade1 and up, Beginning Reader, boy books, funny, graphic novels, superstar books

Elephant & Piggie by Mo Willems - review

Mo Willems, god of line and shape, has an I Can Read series (yay! hooray! if he can get my one kid toilet-trained, he can surely teach the other one to read!). Called Elephant and Piggie, all titles are recommended. Not since Hop on Pop ("The simplest Seuss for youngest use") has there been such entertaining fare for the youngest readers.

I paged through Today I Will Fly! with one of my librarian colleagues, and she said, "This reads just like the play I saw last night."

"Which play?" I asked, thinking, dude, that might be a play I'd like to see.
"It was called Betrayal," she answered.
"Betrayal? The Pinter play?!"
"That's the one!" she said.

So, happy me, I get to be probably the first to proclaim Mo Willems' dialogue "Pinter-esque"!

Labels: age: Grade1 and up, Beginning Reader, funny, superstar books