2/20/2017 1 Comment My Baby's Book ReviewsThe Very Hungry Caterpillar |
This is Mr. Carle’s claim to fame. Its timelessness is owed to the incredible freedom it exhibits within a three-act character arch. Admittedly, I’m quickly won over by the inside cover page’s colourful and graphically congruous chaos. But the naturally presented stages of change, the exploration of food, the bold colours, and the inevitable pay-off at the end of the story is magnificently satisfying. To say little of the artfully understated interaction of story and form, Carle even hides a pun in the two pears. The Very Hungry Caterpillar presents multiple routes of exploration while maintaining a clear and active through-line. Classic! Five Toes ooooo https://shop.carlemuseum.org/very-hungry-caterpillar-board-book-ornament-set |
The Very Lonely Firefly
By Eric Carle
The title makes no qualms about the clear imitation Carle is making of his previous success. Rather than delivering the digestibility of Hungry Caterpillar, The Very Lonely Firefly presents a stilted narrative that cannot seem to settle on a protagonist. The title character turns out to be more of an observer and undergoes no true growth throughout the tale. With Eric Carle, one might expect solace in the striking style of his trademark artwork. But the dark background of the nighttime fails to contrast with still-dark cameos that are made throughout. Almost as an admission of failure, the last page settles on a gimmick with small lights that are embedded in the back cover. This renders the book about as timeless as a small disposable battery. One Toe o https://shop.carlemuseum.org/very-lonely-firefly-board-book |
Love and Kisses
By Sarah Wilson (words) and Melissa Sweet (illustrations)
This charming farmyard rhyme follows a kiss sent from a child to her cat. The kiss travels from the cat to a cow and to other creatures. If not for returning to the cow, before the cat, before the child at last, Love and Kisses could be a great classic. The kiss’s perennial approach to these same bookending characters suggests that the creatures met in the middle may not have the stability of the girl and cat. It also suggests that the kiss does not belong to these middle characters—though they partake in it. Surely the kiss must return to the little girl to achieve the intended moral but if it meandered more thoroughly and less anachronistically, we might have a healthier image of the lengths and borderless abounds of the kiss’s effect. Though Sweet’s illustrations are clear, approachable, and playful, Wilson’s story could use another draft. Three Toes ooo http://www.candlewick.com/essentials.asp?browse=Title&mode=book&isbn=0763673919&bkview=p&pix=y |
Counting (Baby Curious George Edition)
Based on characters created by Margret and H.A. Rey
Illustrations by Greg Paprocki and Patterns by Margret McCartney
Curious George meets various animals, the number of animals increasing with each step. Number 2 sees George meet one rabbit, thus beginning a confusion of continuity: though George and the rabbit make two, we are focused on the rabbit, who is one. Number five amplifies this as we see one chicken, three chicks, two eggs, and one monkey. This is not the best way to learn numbers. In the middle of the book an extra-thick page holds wooden beads across a horizontal peg. The execution of moving the beads to assist counting is completely obliterated by the act of turning the page that harbours them. There is no story because there is no author: an extreme example of discrediting one’s audience. One Toe o http://shop.pbskids.org/curious-george-counting-my-first-book-of-numbers-book |
Hop On Pop (Bright and Early Board Books Edition)
By Dr. Suess
In all senses of the word, this is a sublime example of the rule of thirds in comic narrative. There is no narrative. But the continuity of rhythm and rhyme as Dr, Suess briefly moves you from chapter to absurd chapter creates a language of acceptable insanity. Suess’s tell-tale madness remains rooted in truth as the established nuance of the story forces us to ask how these apparitions can be! Never has an immense height of ludicrousness been so structurally appealing. Five Toes ooooo http://www.seussville.com/books/book_detail.php?isbn=9780375828379 |
Mr. Brown Can Moo! Can You? (Bright and Early Board Books Edition)
By Dr. Suess
The Doctor does it again! This little board-book starts with a gambling maturity: the first page has a whopping 19 words on it! Quite a lot for the form Mr Brown inhabits. Delivering the promise of a complex-but-digestible rhythm and rhyme we’ve come to expect, this books moves through various sounds, gradually building in bombasity while inviting the audience to participate. Following the mightiest crescendo of thunder and lightning Suess immediately asks us for the softest whisper. The effect is akin to erupting the reader into the stratosphere and then handing us the feather of an angel. Perhaps not as artfully economical as Dr. Suess’s other Bright and Early Board Books, it does not disappoint. Four Toes oooo http://www.seussville.com/books/book_detail.php?isbn=9780679882824 |
Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb (Bright and Early Board Books Edition)
By Al Perkins (words) and Eric Gurney (illustrations)
Another classic, Perkins and Gurney create a vivid world of musically chaotic monkeys. If this sounds unnerving to you, you’re in good company. The rhythm is transfixing: an absolute page-turner. The urgency of its reading progresses the audience through a world of obsessively contagious music-making. This becomes truly surreal as the book’s continuity rests on the extreme proliferation of monkeys as long as the music continues. This hyper-generates until an ominous ending where we are left with a single monkey, staring greedily into the reader’s soul as it repeats the incessant beat with nothing but it’s thumb. A necessary addition to any pscho/horror-enthusiast’s library. Four Broken Toes pppp http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/129589/hand-hand-fingers-thumb-by-al-perkins-illustrated-by-eric-gurney/9780394810768/ |
Animal Farm
By George Orwell
I pulled it off the shelf today and began ravenously chewing its ominous cautionings after hardly a page’s deliberation. Not the most poetic member of this library but a still-relevant classic for the ceaseless reprise of political tides. Each thousand words paint more than a picture. Four Toes oooo (Found at your local bookstore) |
Little You
By Richard Van Camp (words) and Julie Flett (illustrations)
Little You is a parent’s love letter to their baby child. The words and images alike are poetic in their simplicity. It is also extremely refreshing to have Métis characters illustrated in a genre otherwise colonized by a landscape of blonde Caucasian pink. The firm elegance of the images catch any audience’s attention but the story seems to be directed more towards the parent than the child. This may be a shortcoming but succeeds in capturing my sentimentality. My one structural criticism is that the final page doubles the amount of written information than what is presented on all the previous—as if Van Camp had more content to offer than Flett. Nevertheless, in an overexcited library, Little You is an absolute breath of fresh air. Four Toes oooo http://www.orcabook.com/Little-You-P827.aspx |
I Went Walking
By Sue Williams (words) and Julie Vivas (illustrations)
Here we have two important literary devices framing an educational piece on animal recognition. One device is handled with the enviable precision of masters at flow, the other seems a grossly fumbled afterthought. With episodic familiarity, we are shown a small clue as to what the next page will bring; a beautifully implied guessing game brightens the hero’s whimsy and amplifies the book’s educational element. Then somewhere in the middle of the book, the main character starts undressing—not inappropriately but incongruously. There is no continuity about the rate or selection of the strip and, by the climax and denouement, seems completely ambivalent to moral or instruction. This is no classic but Williams and Vivas may prove a team to watch out for. Three Toes ooo https://www.scholastic.com/teachers/books/i-went-walking-by-sue-williams/ |
In My Jungle
By Sara Gillingham and Lorena Siminovich
When it comes to character and story, minimalism and simplicity can be overstated. The telling of a nonchalant journey home leaves the reader wanting explanation. The images balance this with beautiful composition and a modest attention to creative detail. To say absolutely nothing of the interactive dimension of the protagonist themselves, there is something alluring about the shape of this book … something mysterious yet drastically familiar in the curve of the pages’ cut. Needs further exploration. Two Toes oo http://www.chroniclebooks.com/titles/in-my-jungle.html |
Each Peach Pear Plum
By Janet and Allan Ahlberg
This book employs a wide cast of classic fairy-tale characters to demonstrate the multifarious relationships of a utopic community. While almost everyone seems to be richly flawed they manage to coexist with humour and ease. The artwork is nostalgic and detailed but busy enough to divert the reader’s attention in too many directions. The continuity of rhythm, however, manages to elevate a simple and nearly-obvious conclusion to surprising satisfaction. It is full of mysteries—as it should be! Each Peach Pear Plum is as worth returning to as the world it exhibits is worth striving for. Four Toes oooo http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/293553/each-peach-pear-plum-by-allan-ahlberg/9780140506396/ |
Chicka Chicka Boom Boom
By Bill Martin Jr and John Archambault (words)
Lois Ehlert (illustrations)
This book is an ambitious attempt to personify the entire English alphabet. It owns moments of great creative integrity inside a frustratingly uncommitted rhythm. It’s a wonder that it took two authors to build an obtrusive lack of rhythmic continuity. Or perhaps two authors is the cause of this shortcoming. Ehlert’s illustrations must be praised for their incredible clarity. However, at times, the two-dimensional representations run the risk of appearing more a designer’s equation than an artist’s expression. This book may be good for frequent study but need never be read to its conclusion. Two Toes oo https://www.chapters.indigo.ca/en-ca/books/chicka-chicka-boom-boom/9781442450707-item.html |
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