A holiday title worthy of even the most reticent feline companion.
Having survived snow and sleep, Flubby faces his most dire opponent yet: heart-shaped holidays.
Right from the start, Flubby’s owner, a brown-haired child with brown skin, declares that since today is Valentine’s Day, they intend to show Flubby some love. Flubby, a stubby-legged white cat with gray markings, reacts as any cat would—which is to say, he couldn’t care less. Cards, fruit baskets, and flowers all prove insufficient gifts for an insufficiently interested cat—he can’t read, he doesn’t like to eat fruit, and the flowers make him sneeze. Fortunately, where gifts fail, good old-fashioned hugs are always a welcome choice. Any cat-owning kid reading this story may instantly recognize Flubby’s very catlike instincts to curl up in an empty heart-shaped box or try to sit in the fruit basket. Humor is conveyed in Flubby’s complete lack of facial expressions, more than anything else. The simple text, ideal for new readers, shines through, illuminating the heart within the story. As holiday titles go, this one sticks to the rudimentary basics of what it truly means to love your pet. Child readers may also find that they identify sometimes with the child owner, and sometimes with the preternaturally self-possessed Flubby.
A holiday title worthy of even the most reticent feline companion. (Early reader. 5-8)Pub Date: Dec. 26, 2023
ISBN: 9780593523421
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: Sept. 9, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A first-rate sharkfest, unusually nutritious for all its brevity.
Buzz and his buzzy buddy open a spinoff series of nonfiction early readers with an aquarium visit.
Buzz: “Like other fish, sharks breathe through gills.” Fly Guy: “GILLZZ.” Thus do the two pop-eyed cartoon tour guides squire readers past a plethora of cramped but carefully labeled color photos depicting dozens of kinds of sharks in watery settings, along with close-ups of skin, teeth and other anatomical features. In the bite-sized blocks of narrative text, challenging vocabulary words like “carnivores” and “luminescence” come with pronunciation guides and lucid in-context definitions. Despite all the flashes of dentifrice and references to prey and smelling blood in the water, there is no actual gore or chowing down on display. Sharks are “so cool!” proclaims Buzz at last, striding out of the gift shop. “I can’t wait for our next field trip!” (That will be Fly Guy Presents: Space, scheduled for September 2013.)
A first-rate sharkfest, unusually nutritious for all its brevity. (Informational easy reader. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-545-50771-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Feb. 17, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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