by Deborah Blumenthal & illustrated by Ted Rand ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 20, 2003
For so wondrous a spectacle, even upon the book’s bedrock of hope, trust, and community, Blumenthal has concocted a deeply quieting and reflective story of the Lake Saranac Ice Palace. A young girl tells about the palace, delivering her tale with all the pacing of a plough horse, in the mood of the slow but sure construction. The girl notes that one of the prisoners from a local minimum-security prison working on the palace is her uncle. Though “the partnership between the local community and the prison population means a great deal to both groups,” there are few smiles in evidence on either side of the fence (and despite the dazzle of the palace, it’s as though Rand has been ordered to keep things somber). Meanwhile, Blumenthal beats the drum of ephemera, reminding readers more than once that “the ice palace . . . gets smaller and smaller and finally melts away.” Like prison sentences, by golly—and us, too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Oct. 20, 2003
ISBN: 0-618-15960-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2003
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by Ralph Fletcher & illustrated by Kate Kiesler ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 22, 2003
As atmospheric as its companion, Twilight Comes Twice, this tone poem pairs poetically intense writing with luminescent oils featuring widely spaced houses, open lawns, and clumps of autumnal trees, all lit by a huge full moon. Fletcher tracks that moon’s nocturnal path in language rich in metaphor: “With silent slippers / it climbs the night stairs,” “staining earth and sky with a ghostly glow,” lighting up a child’s bedroom, the wings of a small plane, moonflowers, and, ranging further afield, harbor waves and the shells of turtle hatchlings on a beach. Using creamy brushwork and subtly muted colors, Kiesler depicts each landscape, each night creature from Luna moths to a sleepless child and her cat, as well as the great moon sweeping across star-flecked skies, from varied but never vertiginous angles. Closing with moonset, as dawn illuminates the world with a different kind of light, this makes peaceful reading either in season, or on any moonlit night. (Picture book. 6-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 22, 2003
ISBN: 0-618-16451-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2003
Categories: CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S | CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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by David Wiesner ; illustrated by David Wiesner ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 2020
Robo-parents Diode and Lugnut present daughter Cathode with a new little brother—who requires, unfortunately, some assembly.
Arriving in pieces from some mechanistic version of Ikea, little Flange turns out to be a cute but complicated tyke who immediately falls apart…and then rockets uncontrollably about the room after an overconfident uncle tinkers with his basic design. As a squad of helpline techies and bevies of neighbors bearing sludge cake and like treats roll in, the cluttered and increasingly crowded scene deteriorates into madcap chaos—until at last Cath, with help from Roomba-like robodog Sprocket, stages an intervention by whisking the hapless new arrival off to a backyard workshop for a proper assembly and software update. “You’re such a good big sister!” warbles her frazzled mom. Wiesner’s robots display his characteristic clean lines and even hues but endearingly look like vaguely anthropomorphic piles of random jet-engine parts and old vacuum cleaners loosely connected by joints of armored cable. They roll hither and thither through neatly squared-off panels and pages in infectiously comical dismay. Even the end’s domestic tranquility lasts only until Cathode spots the little box buried in the bigger one’s packing material: “TWINS!” (This book was reviewed digitally with 9-by-22-inch double-page spreads viewed at 52% of actual size.)
A retro-futuristic romp, literally and figuratively screwy. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-544-98731-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: June 3, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2020
Categories: CHILDREN'S FAMILY | CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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