Picture Books

Jake Goes Peanuts: Sticky Silliness

| Tasha

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Jake Goes Peanuts by Michael Wright

This third Jake book is a yummy choice.  Jake was a kid who didn’t like a lot of foods.  In fact, he only liked one.  Peanut butter.  It’s all he wanted to eat for any meal.  So his parents hatched a peanut-buttery plan to fix the situation.  For an entire week, everything that Jake ate would have peanut butter in it.  It sounded like a great plan to Jake!  There was peanut butter roast, peanut butter pancakes, peanut butter soda cooled by peanut butter ice, peanut butter turkey.  Even Jake’s dog got to try peanut butter dog food, but his bowl got stuck on his head.  But even peanut-butter loving Jake could not take one more bite by the end of the week.  Though he only ate one or two lima beans and his mother’s tuna casserole is still frightening.

Written with a big dose of humor, this book is jaunty and great fun.  Written in rhyme, the book bounces along without ever getting stuck in a peanut butter jam.  Wright’s illustrations are modern and add to the humor.  The expressions of the parents are priceless, often with eyes half-lidded and apparently stunned.  Wright is not afraid to take the scenario to an extreme, which will delight young children, especially the comment about peanut-butter poop. 

A very funny peanut butter romp, this book is appropriate for ages 3-5.

Reviewed from copy received from Feiwel & Friends.

Also reviewed by Kiss the Book.

Gumption!

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Gumption! by Elise Broach, illustrated by Richard Egielski

When Peter’s favorite uncles asks him to join him on an African safari, Peter is eager to accept.  Once in Africa, Uncle Nigel decides that they will search for the Zimbobo Mountain Gorilla.  Their trek takes them through a dense thicket.  When Peter has trouble, Uncle Nigel declares that all it takes is “a bit of gumption.”  While Uncle Nigel pulls out his knife, Peter is helped out of the thicket by a friendly snake.  Uncle Nigel then notices a snake skin on the ground and tells Peter to “look sharp” there are snakes about!  This pattern continues through the book as they reach one obstacle after another, gumption is needed, Peter is helped by another animal, and Uncle Nigel remains fairly oblivious to it all.  Children will delight in the clueless but brave adult and the hijinks he is missing out on. 

Broach has captured just the right feel with her text, hearkening back to the days of exploration with little phrases like “I say!” “That’s ace!” and “Are you zonked?”  Her prose has a nice bounce and style, demanding to be read aloud.  Egielski’s illustrations are bright colored and filled with action.  The places where the animals help Peter are done in almost wordless two-page spreads that have four picture panels to show the action.  Egielski has incorporated borders on the illustrations made from twining vines that bloom by the end of the book.

Add this one to your preschool storytime stack right away.  It’s a natural fit with any adventure story time, and can also be used for gorillas, elephants, crocodiles, and snakes!  Oh my!  Appropriate for ages 4-7.

Reviewed from copy received from Atheneum.

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Sivu’s Six Wishes: A Modern, Traditional Tale

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Sivu’s Six Wishes by Jude Daly

A retelling of an old Taoist tale, this is the story of Sivu, a stonecarver.  Sivu could make amazing things from stone but despite his skill, he never made a lot of money and turned bitter.  One day, when carving a statue for a wealthy man, Sivu dreamed of how great that man’s life must be.  Suddenly, Sivu was the wealthy man.  He had plenty of power and wealth, but everyone despised him.  Then Sivu was stopped by the mayor’s procession and he dreamed of being the mayor with all of his power.  Suddenly, Sivu was the mayor.  But again, everyone hated him.  Sivu looked out over the gardens and saw the sun.  He wished he could be the sun, and he was.  He shone down, far too fiercely, and created a drought.  Then a storm cloud came over the sky and Sivu the sun could not move it.  He wished he could be the powerful rain cloud, and he was.  Now he rained too harshly and caused a flood.  Eventually, the wind blew him out to sea.  Sivu wished he was the wind, and he was.  He blew and blew, until one day he came across something that he could not move.  He wished he could become that, and he did.  He was a huge rock, completely unmovable until one day…

This is a story that makes the themes of power, wealth, and desire come alive.  Daly has created a very readable text that moves briskly from wish to wish, examining each one and then going on.  She has set the story in the present day, making it all the more accessible to modern children.  This is both an old story and a new one, vibrant across time.   Daly has illustrated the book with modern illustrations that are bright colored and busy.  They convey both the hustle of the modern day and the timelessness of the story with ease. 

Recommended as a way to get children talking about envy and contentment, need, wealth and power, this book leaves nothing to wish for.  Appropriate for ages 6-9.

Reviewed from copy received from Eerdmans.

Yasmin’s Hammer: Poetic and Important

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Yasmin’s Hammer by Ann Malaspina, illustrated by Doug Chayka

In Dhaka, Bangladesh, Yasmin rides to work in the morning in her father’s rickshaw.  Though Yasmin longs to go to school, she has to help earn money so that her family can eat and her father can someday purchase the rickshaw.  Yasmin thinks about the quiet days in her village before the cyclone forced them to move to the noise and bustle of the city.  Now she must work breaking bricks for use in building roads and buildings.   Even Yasmin’s little sister must work in the brickyard so the family can survive.  Yasmin comes up with a plan of how she can both help her family and make sure that she can be educated too.  Each day she works harder and faster than anyone else, and the boss gives her extra coins.  These she saves for her secret plan that no one in her family knows about.

Sprinkled with Bangladeshi words, Malaspina’s text is poetic and strong.  She captures the city and the country in tangible ways, through colors, sounds and smells.  This is a book about child labor, though it is not overly dramatic.  It is a quiet story of desperation in the face of poverty.  The focus is on the importance of education for children and the struggles that a family must overcome to offer it. 

Chayka’s illustrations are filled with warm light.  They capture the hustle of the city streets, nicely contrasting it with the quiet of the countryside.  Bright colors, enliven his paintings that invite readers into this story.

This is an important book that offers a glimpse of children living in very different circumstances than we see in our part of the world.  It is one that will spur discussions and also have children realizing how well off they are to not have to work and to be able to go to school.  Appropriate for ages 5-8.

Reviewed from copy received from Lee & Low Books.

Shadow: Simple and Sparkling

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Shadow by Suzy Lee

This book is all about the power of imagination and creativity.  A little girl heads up to the attic where the light creates shadows.  She starts out with just her own shadow, then creates a bird with her hands. As she plays, a jungle grows in the shadows with a sharp-toothed wolf.  Other animals appear and so does a princess until an entire shadow world is created.  Then the wolf escapes from the shadow world and jumps at the little girl.  But the other animals work together to teach him how to play nicely.  At the end, a voice calls that dinner is ready and everything returns to normal, or does it?

Lee’s illustrations tell this almost wordless story.  Her use of fine lines for the objects in the attic, thicker lines for the little girl, and deep blackness for the shadows is particularly effective.  The book is done in just two colors: black and yellow.  The yellow is particularly spectacular, showing the color of imagination at work.  Lee uses the middle gutter of the book to separate the shadows from real life, so the book is read sideways, just as the cover is shown. 

This book is simple and very evocative.  It is a stunning, sparkling example of a wordless book that children everywhere with relate to effortlessly.  Appropriate for ages 3-5.

Reviewed from copy received from Chronicle Books.

Disappearing Desmond: Shining Look at Shyness

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Disappearing Desmond by Anna Alter

Desmond and his entire family didn’t like to be the center of attention.  He’d much rather disappear and be ignored.  Sometimes even his teacher could not find him!  But things changed when Gloria came to his school.  Gloria liked to be the center of attention.  After a bit, something strange happened and Gloria said hello to Desmond even though he was hiding.  No one had ever seen him when he was hiding before.  And it just kept happening, Gloria kept on talking to him until one day they read together for the entire morning.  The two of them started playing together all the time, until Desmond came to school on a Monday morning ready to be noticed.  Later, Desmond heard a sound in the bushes and found a kid hiding there.  The three of them played all afternoon, but there were many more kids hiding around the playground.

This is a very nice book about shyness and wanting to be ignored.  Alter found a great solution to the shyness issue by having a once-shy child make overtures to another shy child.  That is the magic in this picture book.  Readers will also enjoy the ending where the large number of other shy children is revealed.  Alter’s illustrations have a similar feel to Nancy Carlson’s Harriet series.  They have simple lines, bright colors, and animal characters. 

A successful book about shyness without the focus on the painful nature of it, this book offers a hand of comfort and friendship to shy children hidden everywhere.  Appropriate for ages 4-6.

Reviewed from copy received from Random House.

Snook Alone: A Book of Faith, Silence and Connection

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Snook Alone by Marilyn Nelson, illustrated by Timothy Basil Ering

Abba Jacob lived on an island with his dog, Snook.  Each day their routine was the same.  They got up at dawn, prayed, worked together, and spent time in companionable silence together.  Sometimes there were visitors or Abba Jacob headed off to town in his car, but Snook was always there waiting for him.  Until one day, Snook and Abba Jacob headed out in a boat to help catalog plant and animal species on the islands.  Snook was along to help catch the rats and mice that were disrupting the birds and animals of the islands.  It was great micing!  It was so good that Snook got too involved in his work, so when a storm blew up, Abba Jacob was forced to leave Snook behind on the deserted island.  All alone, Snook found his own rhythm of silence, catching food, finding water, silence and waiting.  Sometimes he thought he could hear Abba Jacob’s voice on the wind, but no one came for him.  Snook spent a long time alone on the island, never forgetting his friend, Abba Jacob.  Until one day, a fishing boat returned to the island with Abba Jacob aboard!

This book is such a  delight.  It is a book with such depth, such quiet, such silence that its power builds during those quiet moments, creating a magnificent longing.  It is a book that celebrates the simple, the quiet, the profound in our lives.  It is a book about enduring friendship, continued connection, and at its heart: love.  Nelson writes with such a beauty here that some lines make you stop and you have to remember to breathe again.  They are moments just like in the book itself, moments of simple clarity, embedded in the writing.  This is a book that will be a grand choice for a class to discuss, perfection for advanced students who will enjoy the language but will also enjoy the illustrations.  It is a book to be shared.

Ering’s illustrations echo the themes of the book with their delightful mix of cartoon and painting.  Abba Jacob is a round, merry soul shown in cartoon lines.  Snook on the other hand can be funny and cartoonish, but is also depicted as a noble beast in paints.  The illustrations work exceedingly well to show simple life, the vistas of the sea and the island, and the warmth of the connection between man and dog.

A masterful book about faith and friendship, this is an outstanding picture book that deserves plenty of recognition on best book lists but more importantly a spot in school and public libraries.  Appropriate for ages 5-9.

Reviewed from library copy.

Also reviewed by 100 Scope Notes.

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Fleabag: Heartwarming Boy Meets Dog Story

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Fleabag by Helen Stephens

Fleabag was a city dog with no name and no home.  He liked to visit the park and see the other dogs with their families.  How he wished he had a person too.  Everyone ignored him until one little boy threw a ball and Fleabag caught it.  The little boy and the dog became friends, playing together when his mother wasn’t watching because she was busy with his little sibling.  Then the little boy found out that he was moving away, leaving Fleabag behind.  The night before they were moving, the boy looked out his window and saw Fleabag waiting there.  So he decided the solution was for them to run away together.  But Fleabag knew that something was wrong.  He refused to go and even woke up the family to the danger.  Now what is a family to do with a dirty dog that saved their little boy?  You know exactly what!

Stephens has written a book with a very classic feel to it right down to the illustrations.  Her text uses subtle repetition to build moods and connections.  It reads aloud effortlessly thanks to the repetition and the clear flow of the story line.   One piece I appreciated was that the boy and the dog build their friendship up over the course of time.  It is a testament to the strength of their connection that it did not happen immediately.  Stephens’ illustrations are filled with soft washes of color.  They have a vintage feel with modern lines and use color to great effect.  She also plays with white space very effectively, using it to isolate but also to be expansive.

A dog-gone good book, this is one friendly pooch that will have young readers cheering him all the way home.  Appropriate for ages 3-5.

Reviewed from copy received from Henry Holt.

Pecan Pie Baby: Warm and Sweet

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Pecan Pie Baby by Jacqueline Woodson, illustrated by Sophie Blackall

Gia is not looking forward to the new baby coming.  In fact, she is sick and tired of hearing about the “ding-dang baby” all the time.  That baby is copying her and her mother’s love for pecan pie.  It’s going to take all of her old outgrown clothes.  So when Gia is told that the baby will come with the first snow of the year, she wishes a secret wish for no snow at all.  Her friends at school want to talk about the baby coming just like her aunties, who don’t have the time anymore to play tea party with Gia.  Finally, Gia has had enough and yells “I’m so sick of that ding-dang baby!” at Thanksgiving dinner.  She is sent to her room and when her mother comes up to talk with her, Gia finds out that her mother too will miss all of their special times alone together. 

Woodson’s writing skills translate finely into the picture book format.  She has created a very readable, very engaging book for all of the new siblings out there.  The depth of Gia’s feelings are an important piece of the story as are her worries about her entire life changing because of this interloper.  Nicely, Woodson does not feel a need to “fix” Gia’s feelings, instead she validates them and allows her the anger and concern.  In fact, the lack of a baby at the end and the resolution of Gia’s feelings is not here.  That makes it a much more powerful book.  Though snow has begun to fall as the book closes.

Blackall’s art is warm and rich, depicting a loving relationship between mother and daughter.  This relationship is at the heart of the book and is celebrated on almost every page.  Additionally, the multicultural children and adults make for a book that has a very inclusive feel to it.  

A warm and lovely book, this is an honest look at the conflicting feelings of expecting a new sibling.  Appropriate for ages 3-6.

Reviewed from copy received from Putnam.

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