A joy-filled celebration of an exciting and even nurturing urban landscape. The narrator, Emi, launches on the endpapers her story of the ``longest walk,'' a trip she made with her father and her best friend, an African-American girl named Martha. From their friendly, familiar Chinatown block in New York City they travel up to Washington Square Park, past the Flatiron building, up to the Empire State Building``Martha swore you could see King Kong.'' They pass 52nd Street where ``Bird and Diz and Monk'' once played. They visit the Museum of Modern Art. Finally they reach Central Park and ride the carousel. Emi's father sketches the boat pond and makes paper boats for all the children; he folds paper cranes during the bus ride home as the lights come on in the buildings around them. The paintings form an appealing view of the big city: colorful, pulsing, filled with child-pleasing details and shifting points of view. This is no golden, lost childhood (although the bus ride seems to cost them 5õ each). As was true in the early works of Ezra Jack Keats, the child-heroes welcome every adventure before them; Hamanaka makes the journey uplifting and the road home safe. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-689-80288-9
Page Count: 36
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1995
Sloat collaborates with Huffman, a Yu’pik storyteller, to infuse a traditional “origins” tale with the joy of creating. Hearing the old women of her village grumble that they have only tasteless crowberries for the fall feast’s akutaq—described as “Eskimo ice cream,” though the recipe at the end includes mixing in shredded fish and lard—young Anana carefully fashions three dolls, then sings and dances them to life. Away they bound, to cover the hills with cranberries, blueberries, and salmonberries. Sloat dresses her smiling figures in mixes of furs and brightly patterned garb, and sends them tumbling exuberantly through grassy tundra scenes as wildlife large and small gathers to look on. Despite obtrusively inserted pronunciations for Yu’pik words in the text, young readers will be captivated by the action, and by Anana’s infectious delight. (Picture book/folktale. 6-8)
Pub Date: June 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-88240-575-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2004
Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your dreads! Isadora once again plies her hand using colorful, textured collages to depict her fourth fairy tale relocated to Africa. The narrative follows the basic story line: Taken by an evil sorceress at birth, Rapunzel is imprisoned in a tower; Rapunzel and the prince “get married” in the tower and she gets pregnant. The sorceress cuts off Rapunzel’s hair and tricks the prince, who throws himself from the tower and is blinded by thorns. The terse ending states: “The prince led Rapunzel and their twins to his kingdom, where they were received with great joy and lived happily every after.” Facial features, clothing, dreadlocks, vultures and the prince riding a zebra convey a generic African setting, but at times, the mixture of patterns and textures obfuscates the scenes. The textile and grain characteristic of the hewn art lacks the elegant romance of Zelinksy’s Caldecott version. Not a first purchase, but useful in comparing renditions to incorporate a multicultural aspect. (Picture book/fairy tale. 6-8)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-399-24772-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2008
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