Children's Book Reviews: Week of 9/3/2007

Human babies have been growing up for thousands of years now, but it's still an amazing phenomenon—at least to the babies and their parents. Peddicord (Night Wonders) marvels at how one baby girl in particular started out “very soft and very new”—why, she “could not walk or even count to two.” Buoyant rhymes describe her impressive feats— she “bobbled in the bubble bath beneath a sudsy do./ That baby splashed and sprayed and played/ and made a floating boat parade”—in between choruses explaining how the baby “grew and grew and GREW!” So (Moonbeams, Dumplings & Dragon Boats) proves an ideal partner for Peddicord's jubilant voice. Her infant heroine is as wide-eyed as they come, and kids will find her scenes of pint-size bliss familiar. The illustrator's colors have a gorgeous clarity and vibrancy—the oranges and yellows glow, the reds burst off the page. But even more important, this special little baby looks wonderfully ordinary: a bit lumpy in infancy (in one spread, her diaper is hilariously exaggerated), she becomes full of beans in toddlerhood. Attentive readers will have fun spotting parallels: a spread in which the baby gazes at a kitten precedes a picture in which the now older girl and her father sport painted-on cat faces. Preschoolers will adore seeing themselves become so mature—and so will their parents. Ages 3-7. (Sept.)

As this straightforward, genial tale begins, Hedgehog discovers Mouse covering himself with leaves, trying to hide from their friend Snake. Why? “Fox told Skunk and Skunk told me that snakes are very dangerous to mice,” Mouse explains. Although Hedgehog dismisses the news as “silly gossip,” Mouse continues to worry and, distracted, stumbles into a deep, narrow hole. For various reasons, Squirrel, Rabbit and Hedgehog cannot help their fallen friend, but trusty Snake devises a way to retrieve Mouse without scaring him. Although the story holds no surprises, the banter feels fresh. Keller's (Farfallina & Marcel) eye-catching, highly textured illustrations, which she identifies as collographs, or printed collages, balance toy-like depictions of the characters with almost lifelike renderings of the variegated green vegetation. Encircling or framing the text, poking through white space or suddenly changing the page orientation from horizontal to vertical, the art gives this book an irresistibly insouciant spirit. Ages 3-8. (Sept.)

In a sumptuous companion to her A B C, Jay takes readers on an enchanted journey from 1 to 10 and back again, with help from fairy tale figures. A quartet of self-satisfied frog princes impressively embody the number 4, while a plate of gingerbread men—including one poised for escape—represent the number 6. (Other counting opportunities abound in the backgrounds.) As in the previous book, Jay unspools a story-within-the-primer. “One little girl,” who has fallen asleep while reading, is transported to the magical landscape on the wings of the Goose That Laid the Golden Egg; this same bird serves as her chaperone as she visits the subsequent scenes as an amazed onlooker. At number 9, the goose is reunited with her precious-metal eggs, and the girl finds herself cast as Little Red Riding Hood and other heroines as the numbers reach 10 and head back to 1. Close attention will reveal other links; for example, the view of Jack's beanstalk (created from seven magic beans) also includes one of the eight rats who figure prominently in the following spread, inspired by the Pied Piper of Hamelin. The pictures are a wonder to behold: Jay's flattened perspectives, gently faded colors, crackle-glaze finishes and lean, angular characterizations vaguely evoke the dreamy, ambiguous narrative qualities of medieval art. And yet the pictures never feel like museum pieces—rather, they're like missives from a universe where it's Once Upon a Time 24/7. Ages 3-up. (Sept.)

Louise is a pigtailed, pint-size alligator with “new gleaming-white baby choppers”—which, unfortunately, give her a “tendency to... how to put it? Gnaw. On everything. Everyone. Everywhere.” (A bite-size “hole” on the jacket suggests that it, too, has succumbed to Louise's insatiable maw.) In wryly well-bred cadences that are a hoot to read aloud, Palatini (Piggie Pie) goes on to chronicle how Louise's biting manages to drive everyone around her to the brink, including an entire beach full of day trippers (“Louise was sorry. She was really, really, truly quite sorry”). Reinhart (the Encyclopedia Prehistorica pop-ups) gleefully records the mayhem with nicely nutty watercolor-and-ink cartoons that take full advantage of Louise's propensity to go for the gluteus maximus. The story looks like it's headed down an overly familiar lane when Grandmama Sadie positions herself as the only gator who truly understands Louise (“This is only a phase my little joy is going through,” she avers, chucking Louise under her scaly chin). But instead of the expected heart-to-heart, Louise takes a chomp out of Grandmama too. Lots of fun—and certain to be the object of repeat-reading demands. Ages 4-7. (Sept.)

Stevens, author of a novel for adults (Angel, Angel), endows her imaginative debut picture book with well-developed characters, plenty of noise and enough humor to keep readers wanting more. Beginning with the “ta-ta-ta tweeeeeet!” of a small bird, sounds travel from one house to the next, awakening the porcine denizens of Fish Street in a domino effect. The bird rouses Mr. Krudwig at #2 Fish Street, his dog Leopold disturbs Mrs. Musky at #3 Fish Street, and her whistling teapot flusters the tardy kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Depolo at #4 Fish Street, and so on. Hills's (Duck & Goose) witty watercolors depict action and facial expressions with equal ease, and they target both children's and adults' sensibilities. For the seven Darjeelings, who sleep together in a huge bed and whose cat wakes them by repeatedly slamming the screen door, he offers a frontal view of the glassy-eyed family, all with identical helpless stares; their nightstand contains the books Whose Bed Is It Anyway? and Train Your Cat. Especially delicious is his characterization of Mrs. Depolo as she literally “throws on her clothes, races down her stairs, and dives out the door.” The story could easily do double-duty as a counting book, and with its punchy prose, unexpected plot turns and surprisingly sweet ending, it's a cinch for a read-aloud treat. Ages 4-8. (Sept.)

Featuring similarly spare paintings as Jeanette Winters's The Tale of Pale Male: A True Story, McCarthy's (Aliens Are Coming!) book covers much of the same turf—and air space—as that spring release. McCarthy concisely chronicles the true, reportedly unprecedented occurrence of two red-tailed hawks' construction of a nest in the cornice of a swanky apartment building on Manhattan's Upper East Side. From nearby Central Park, a group of bird-watchers who called themselves “the Regulars” vigilantly followed Pale Male and Lola's every move and rejoiced when two chicks hatched. The other headline-grabbing aspect of these hawks' tale—the building's residents, irked by the birds' messy habits, successfully lobbied to get the nest removed, then, in response to passionate protests, reversed their decision—is explained in a lengthy author's note. Combining vibrant and earth tones, McCarthy's unadorned acrylic illustrations have a puckish quality, both her human and winged characters incarnated as amiable bug-eyed creatures who express themselves through the slant of their mouths (or tilt of their beaks). A portion of the proceeds from sales of this book will benefit New York City Audubon. Ages 4-8. (Sept.)

There's nothing flashy about Wummer's (The Incredible Peepers of Penelope Budd) solid watercolor-and-ink cartooning or debut author Gruska's breezy prose, yet they effectively convey what it's like to be a boy who jetés to a different drummer. Without wearing their empathy on their respective sleeves, the author and illustrator allow readers to understand both Tucker's artistic exhilaration (dancing “feels right to him. Like breathing”) and his painful ostracism at school. It's too bad, then, that the story is saddled with a credibility-stretching, “everybody wins” ending: Tucker gets drafted into a pee-wee football game and saves the day with his ballet-instilled agility, thus winning over not only his former persecutors (who promptly sign up for ballet class) but also his loud-mouthed, macho Uncle Frank. That may be a comforting message, if unimaginative (all Tucker has to do is show he's one of us), but it smacks of inauthenticity. Ages 4-8. (Sept.)

Beneath its handsome William Morris–like cover art, this inspired retelling blends many versions of Cinderella into a single, extraordinary tale. As Newbery Medalist Fleischman's (Joyful Noise) strong storytelling voice incorporates sometimes small details from different traditions, text and illustrations nimbly morph from one Cinderella story to the next, creating this brand-new version. Paschkis (Yellow Elephant) makes use of folk art and textile patterns throughout the world in the clever background paintings behind each of her vibrant panel illustrations, and she helpfully and unobtrusively labels the country from which relevant borrowings originate. Generally, each page focuses on a single country's contributions, but even when details from several countries share a spread, visual harmony prevails and characters remain recognizable despite their costume changes. When Cinderella has nothing to wear, for example, “a crocodile swam up to the surface—and in its mouth was a sarong made of gold [Indonesia]... a cloak sewn of kingfisher feathers [China]... a kimono red as sunset [Japan].” Even the last line of text is patched from several sources: “Such a wedding it was, and such an adoring couple [Iraq]... and such a wondrous turn of events [Korea]... that people today are still telling the story.” Paschkis emphasizes the storyteller's voice by beginning and ending the narrative with illustrations of a mother reading to her daughter—a daughter who, appropriately, looks much like Cinderella herself.Ages 5-up. (Sept.)

The titular dragons in this lavishly produced tale of ancient China are a far cry from the genial Puff-the-Magic-Dragon type. As painted by Ping, the young hero, these are fearsome creatures, with bulging eyes, tentacle-like whiskers, sinuous bodies of gleaming gold, and scary scales of flaming red. But while Ping impresses everyone with his artistry, bravery and industry (he literally covers his house with the beasts), he harbors a secret: the dragons actually represent his fears. Finally outed by the Heavenly Dragon, Ping goes on a dragon-studded quest to discover his courage and learn to bring “all the power and wisdom of the dragons inside.” Demi (One Grain of Rice) may be offering too much of a great thing: her sprawling, gorgeous dragons, set against backgrounds of Chinese brocades and rendered in dazzling metallic inks, constantly threaten to overwhelm the story (and that's leaving aside the two gatefold spreads). But for those who don't mind occasionally hunting for the text when it's obscured by the visual extravagance, there is much lovely writing to savor and wisdom that the audience will recognize. Ages 7-10. (Sept.)

Animal lover Hodgman ushers readers into her basement “barnyard,” home to finches and canaries, three guinea pigs, a large three-legged rabbit and two smaller bunnies (one of whom growls), a prairie dog, a hamster and 26 pygmy mice. Also in residence are two miniature dachshunds (one's breath “smells like thousands of dead lobsters”) and three cats. After introducing her menagerie, the author offers a hodgepodge of anecdotes about past and present pets, plus tips on caring for an assortment of animals. Some of the information shows a light touch: she lists the “worst things my dogs have eaten” (including a boxed, wrapped and hidden handmade Christmas ornament; underpants; and the head of a dead mouse), discusses names her pets have been given (relatives object to her daughter's naming a hamster Mary) and offers tongue-in-cheek directions for cutting a rabbit's nails “in thirteen impossible steps.” But only hardcore enthusiasts will be interested in the author's details of cleaning out her mice's cage and ailments of various pets and their treatments by the vet. Those who do share Hodgman's devotion to animals, however, will be swept up by her breezy style (“Ducks do not belong inside a house. Most people probably know this already. But it took me six ducklings' worth of training before I learned it myself”); for these readers, the book will be a ticket to, er, hog heaven. Ages 8-up. (Sept.)

When the unlikely hero of Selfors's assured debut, a luckless sixth grader named Boomerang “Boom” Broom, inadvertently brings home a baby mermaid instead of cheap seafood from the fish market for dinner, he sets off a madcap chain of events that turns his house bright pink, transforms his bathroom into a tropical beach replete with banana tree and monkey, puts his little sister Mertyle's life in grave danger, and miraculously heals his dysfunctional family from the sudden and bizarre loss of his mother. The baby mermaid, the ill-tempered antithesis of Disney's Princess Ariel with razor-sharp teeth and green-seaweed hair, possesses powerful magic that, at first, makes Mertyle's unwitting wishes come true; but the merbaby also brings with it a deadly curse that soon afflicts Boom's sister in the form of a bizarre white fungus. With time running out, can Boom find a cure for his fuzz-covered sibling? Featuring some outlandishly funny characters (among them the villainous, “big-butted” principal Mrs. Prunewallop and Halvor, the family cook who models himself on Erik the Red), Selfors's adventure also subtly explores serious themes like grief, adversity and misfortune. In a nutshell—or, more fittingly, a conch shell—her nimble fantasy is about Boom's journey of self-discovery and the feeling that comes from achieving a seemingly unreachable goal. A few unresolved plot threads, notably to do with the mother, point to a sequel. Ages 8-12. (Sept.)

Lupica (Miracle on 49th Street) again relays fast-paced basketball action in this involving first volume of the Comeback Kids series. The narrative moves equally sure-footedly off-court to explore the dynamics of 10-year-old Billy's family. His parents have recently separated, and his father, Joey, has moved to another house. Joey is also Billy's demanding, hot-headed basketball coach, constantly criticizing his son for shooting rather than passing during games. Billy's well-intentioned mother works long hours as a lawyer and travels frequently. Younger brother Ben, as passionate about the piano as Billy is about basketball, becomes increasingly withdrawn and, alarmingly, begins to skip piano lessons. Billy comes to Ben's rescue when a school bully picks on him, but resents feeling that his often-absent parents expect him to take care of his vulnerable brother. Tensions peak when Ben's piano recital and Billy's championship game occur at the same time; their mother is called out of town, and their father refuses to miss the game for Ben's recital. The resolution is pat, but pleasing—although not as pleasing as the sports writing. Lupica moves to the gridiron in the series' Two-Minute Drill, due the same month. These should score big with middle-graders looking for alternatives to Matt Christopher's titles.Ages 8-up. (Sept.)

Crowley, the mother of a teenager on the autism spectrum, shows an astute understanding of her characters' psychologies but tries to encompass too much in this first novel, narrated by a girl with Asperger's syndrome. Merilee Monroe, a 13-year-old who is obsessed with dragons and filled with “astonishing” words she cannot express out loud, finds a soul mate in Biswick, an eight-year-old damaged by fetal alcohol syndrome, the son of a visiting poet. Merilee's growing affection for Biswick is beautifully drawn, but subplots regarding other citizens of Jumbo, Texas, their eccentric behaviors and the emotional baggage they carry, grow burdensome. The novel's slow-moving plot and shifting focus present other potential obstacles. On the other hand, both the dialogue and Merilee's unique thought process come off as authentic, compensating for some of the novel's weaknesses. The town of Jumbo—home to famous “ghost lights” that appear in the middle of the night and the legendary “conquistador tree,” under which a treasure is reputedly buried—adds an aura of mystery that coincides with a theme about miracles. The biggest miracle of all is the one Crowley handles with the greatest skill: the change that occurs in Merilee as she ventures at last beyond her “very ordered existence.” Ages 10-up. (Sept.)

Bloor (Tangerine) shows top form with a gripping novel, set 30 years in the future, that works as both a thriller and a commentary on the dangerously growing gap between America's rich and poor. Thirteen-year-old Charity Meyers lives with her father, a dermatologist whose wealth has survived the World Credit Crash, and her stepmother, a noxious “vidscreen” personality. Despite all the precautions within the Meyers' high-security housing development, Charity is kidnapped on New Year's Day 2036—the “taken” of the title, also a chess allusion to a didn't-see-it-coming plot twist. Because child-snatching is a major growth industry in South Florida, Charity has been trained to handle the stress and she knows what should happen. Within 24 hours, her parents will empty their home vault of its currency, and she will be freed. Pacing the narrative so readers can feel the clock ticking, the author fills in Charity's back story—the ironic death of her mother to skin cancer, her days at “satschool,” where education comes beamed in from an elite Manhattan academy, her home run by Albert and Victoria, the butler and maid whose very names are regulated by Royal Domestic Services. Bloor, whose gimlet-eyed view of modern society has occasionally pushed his narratives to extremes, reigns in the satire to concoct a plausible-enough scenario of the not-too-distant future, adding just the right measure of consciousness-raising in the dialogue between Charity and a teenage abductor. Deftly constructed, this is as riveting as it is thought-provoking. Ages 12-up. (Oct.)

Take a traveler as reluctant as Anne Tyler's accidental tourist and add the number of misadventures found in The Out-of-Towners, and you have the recipe for Cornwell's hilarious, adventure-packed first novel. Valedictorian hopeful Vassar Spore has her summer all planned out when her bohemian grandmother somehow blackmails her Type A parents into letting her take Vassar backpacking through Malaysia, Cambodia and Laos. So instead of enrolling in AP courses in summer school, Vassar finds herself hiking through jungles with Grandma Gerd and an Asian cowboy chaperone, and battling food poisoning, venom-carrying critters and primitive tribes (one of which holds Vassar hostage). The more humiliations and unwanted surprises Vassar endures, the more likable she becomes, shedding pride and primness along with her obsessive reliance on routine. Her rapid succession of crises, while jaw-dropping, appears more plausible than the family secret that is revealed bit by bit during the course of their travels. Although readers will probably figure out the mystery long before the protagonist does, the exotic settings and the wacky predicaments will exercise a strong enough grip to hold readers' imaginations. Ages 12-up. (Sept.)

Funny writing, a favorite theme and a feel-good ending take the onus off a formulaic plot. Lekich (Liar's Club) starts with a risky move, introducing a bullied, über-nerd narrator desperate to climb the high school social ladder —except that readers will right away see why other kids want to avoid him. Tenth-grader Raymond Dunne can't help that he faints for no discernible reason (“I am also a bleeder and a sneezer,” he adds), but why does he like hanging out with the vice-principal and collecting keys to the school supply closets, and how come he's so proud of manning the school's lost-and-found booth? The story gains momentum after super-cool Jack Alexander transfers to Raymond's school, discovers a secret room and comes up with a business plan to create an “underground social club” that will turn a profit and make Raymond popular. Lekich builds in explanatory details to camouflage the hoariness of the secret-room device and the implausibility of the boys' friendship, and his fearless exaggeration of the authority figures in Raymond's life creates an agreeably zany backdrop. Teen readers should like this light, geek-makes-good story and its easy delivery. Ages 12-up. (Sept.)

Brooks's (True Confessions of a Heartless Girl) keenly observed novel interweaves the lives of three generations of women overshadowed by secrets. While the narrative focuses on Odella, whose mother leaves the family (and the country) with a lover, then unexpectedly dies, the author also rotates through the perspectives of other characters. It falls to Odella's great-aunt Gloria as much as to Odella, the oldest of three sisters, to give readers a sense of Sally, Odella's guilt-ridden mother. Mistik Lake plays an important role: Sally alone survived a tragic accident on the lake as a teenager, and the small Canadian community, where both Gloria and Sally grew up, serves as the backdrop for the major revelations in the book. Readers may have trouble tracking all the ways various characters connect; the grandfather of Odella's first love, Jimmy, tells her, “We are all related, one way or another, if you go far enough back,” and it certainly seems to be the case given how the characters' histories intersect. But all of the characters seem distinct and real, thanks to the author's exceptional skill with details (Odella watches Jimmy's grandmother prepare breakfast: “She begins to move around her kitchen—silently, like a ship with sails. I can see the ancestors in her face”). Everyone suffers, but the momentum remains steady and, in the end, it is the author's ability to convey the characters' love for one another, as complicated as it often is, that floats to the top. Ages 14-up. (Sept.)

When Josh was a 12-year-old seventh grader, he was sexually abused by his history teacher, the young, beautiful (and married) Eve, who manipulated him into believing they were in love. Carefully crafting a narrative structure, Lyga flashes between that traumatic time and the present, when Josh, now a senior (at the school where The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl took place), learns that Eve is being paroled. The author handles heavy material with honesty and sensitivity, capturing both the young Josh's excitement and his realization that his “pleasure brought its own sort of guilt.” Years later, he still struggles: he flies into rages (he punches a baseball coach in an opening scene), and he experiences “flickers,” brief moments which feel like actual immersions in the past. Josh also has trouble pursuing Rachel, who seems like a perfect match, because he cannot trust his physical instincts; he is, as his psychologist puts it, “afraid to do anything at all because it might be the wrong thing.” Details like Josh's obsession with calculating baseball statistics round out his character; the statistics speak to his intelligence and, more tellingly, to his attempts to control his world. Even his inevitable face-off with Eve proves a revelation. Readers may find the ending too neat, given the extent of Josh's problems, but in their richness and credibility the cast—Eve included—surpasses that of the much-admired Fanboy. Ages 16-up. (Sept.)