The long subtitle—``A Counting Story in Reverse (A Tale of Wickedness—and Worse!)''—explains it all: Ten toothy fuchsia piranhas (``Each a slippery schemer, with a dozen dirty tricks'') ogle and menace and, one by one, devour each other; the last is snapped up by a crocodile. The violence here is considerable, but tastefully implicit; the beady-eyed Amazonians in Chess's brightly tropical river scenes (intriguingly displayed in over/under cross sections) simply disappear, while the author also leaves their gruesome demises to the imagination. Wise's rhymed verse has a catchy rhythmical beat that propels it as persistently as the predatory fishes' hunger. Readers of a certain sort will relish this mightily. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: May 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-8037-1200-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 1993
Categories: CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS
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A charmingly prolix tall tale of a boy so word-obsessed that he collects new words on slips of paper. They bulge from his pockets, float around his head and fill his world. Classmates nickname Selig “Wordsworth” and give him a word for his collection: “oddball.” The discovery that his purpose in life is to share his carefully chosen words with others leads to success and love. And, “if, one day, . . . the perfect word just seems to come to you . . . you’ll know that Selig is near.” Schotter’s words are enlivened by Potter’s distinctively naïve figures, all placed in settings in which words and labels are scattered about in a way that invites close inspection and promotes purposeful inquiry. It all adds up to an *exultant encounter, chockablock with tintinnabulating gusto (*see tantalizing glossary appended). A gift to precocious children and teachers as well. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: March 28, 2006
ISBN: 0-375-83601-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2006
Categories: CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Listeners will quickly take up the percussive chorus—“Dump it in, smash it down, drive around the Trashy town! Is the trash truck full yet? NO”—as they follow burly Mr. Gilly, the garbage collector, on his rounds from park to pizza parlor and beyond.
Flinging cans and baskets around with ease, Mr. Gilly dances happily through streetscapes depicted with loud colors and large, blocky shapes; after a climactic visit to the dump, he roars home for a sudsy bath.
Part of a spate of books intent on bringing the garbage collectors in children’s lives a little closer, this almost matches Eve Merriam’s Bam Bam Bam (1995), also illustrated by Yaccarino, for sheer verbal and visual volume. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: April 30, 1999
ISBN: 0-06-027139-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1999
Categories: CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S TRANSPORTATION
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