Bill Pottle doesn’t mind being called the dump man, because that’s his job and he loves it. He finds treasures all the time: a rocking chair, a globe, a weather vane and, most of all, books. The town’s children understand—they don’t want to throw their books away either—and are delighted when Mr. Pottle creates a dump library with mismatched shelves and no late fees. When the books start mounting up, Mr. Pottle takes them out on the road, filling a grocery cart and heading to the town’s nursing homes and back alleys. Then one day, Mr. Pottle is missing. The children find him in a ditch with a broken ankle, and when they visit him in the hospital they discover something surprising—Mr. Pottle can’t read. The grown-up townspeople are uncomfortable, but the children know exactly what to do! Plourde’s feel-good tale of recycling and community moves slowly, but Mr. Pottle’s obvious love for what he does holds great appeal. Owens’s soft, realistic watercolors nicely complement this gentle tale. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-89272-725-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Down East
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2008
Categories: CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
One more myth dispelled for all the students who believe that their teachers live in their classrooms. During the last week of school, Mrs. Hartwell and her students reflect on the things they will miss, while also looking forward to the fun that summer will bring. The kids want to cheer up their teacher, whom they imagine will be crying over lesson plans and missing them all summer long. But what gift will cheer her up? Numerous ideas are rejected, until Eddie comes up with the perfect plan. They all cooperate to create a rhyming ode to the school year and their teacher. Love’s renderings of the children are realistic, portraying the diversity of modern-day classrooms, from dress and expression to gender and skin color. She perfectly captures the emotional trauma the students imagine their teachers will go through as they leave for the summer. Her final illustration hysterically shatters that myth, and will have every teacher cheering aloud. What a perfect end to the school year. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2006
ISBN: 1-58089-046-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Charlesbridge
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
Categories: CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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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