Review of Chooch Helped, by Andrea L. Rogers, illustrated by Rebecca Lee Kunz

Award Winners, Contemporary, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

Chooch Helped

by Andrea L. Rogers
illustrated by Rebecca Lee Kunz

Levine Querido, 2024. 48 pages.
Review written February 5, 2025, from a library book.
Starred Review
2025 Randolph Caldecott Medal Winner

Chooch Helped wasn’t on my radar except to order library copies – until it won the Caldecott Medal. The Caldecott Medal is given to the artist for the illustrations, but it’s an award for the picture book, so the story is always wonderful, too. It’s not hard to see why this book was chosen this year.

The story is about a big sister and her baby brother. Here’s how it begins:

This is the baby.
We call him Chooch.

The word for boy or son in Cherokee is atsutsa (ah-choo-ja)

However, the plot thickens on the next page, when we read:

Chooch isn’t really a baby, anymore.
We just celebrated his second birthday.

Still, whenever Chooch makes a mess, everyone says,
“He’s just usdi (oos-dee). Let him help.”

It seems to me, Usdi Chooch
just gets away with everything.

From there, each spread shows Chooch “helping” another member of the family. Each family member’s name is given in Cherokee, and most of the time, we can see that Chooch’s help is distinctly unhelpful. At the back of the book, the author tells how the different tasks they are doing are part of Cherokee culture.

Finally, when Chooch messes up the clay pot Sissy is making, she yells at him. So he cries, and her parents yell at her, “Shouting is no help!”

But when Sissy goes to her room and cries, Chooch helps her feel better. He really does help! And the parents apologize before the end, too. And there are lessons about how when she was usdi, her help was a lot like Chooch’s. And it all ends with Sissy helping Chooch to make his own pinch pot.

The two spreads of back matter (not too common in a picture book) reveal the Cherokee traditions woven throughout the story and art of this beautiful book, as well as instructions for making a pinch pot, and more on the Cherokee words used.

So this book ends up being a beautiful tribute to Cherokee culture – but also a classic story of a “helpful” younger sibling that any big sibling in the world will be able to relate to. Truly a distinguished picture book. (And wow! I see from the back flap that this is the illustrator’s debut picture book. You go! Awesome!)

treeoflifestudio.net
andrealrogers.com

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Review of Touch the Sky, by Stephanie V. W. Lucianovic and Chris Park

Contemporary, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

Touch the Sky

by Stephanie V. W. Lucianovic and Chris Park

Carolrhoda Books, 2024. 36 pages.
Review written January 15, 2025, from a library book.
Starred Review

Okay, this is a picture book that needed to exist. It’s wonderful. It’s perfect. It’s about learning to pump and make a swing go.

Our hero is Vern, a kid with long hair (the better for streaming out behind him) who loves to twist and spin on the swings, but doesn’t know how to pump. Some of the other kids laugh, but finally a girl sees him trying and offers to help.

It takes a lot of explaining and lots of encouragement.

It feels hard until you get it, and then it’s not.

And yes, we see all of Vern’s struggles – his awkward twists, out-of-sync movements, and even falls. And maybe there’s somebody out there who learned to pump on their very first try, but I, for one, was transported back to childhood and remember how hard it was before it was easy.

And the illustrations! Those transported me back, too. The swooping! The gliding! That feeling when your toes touch the sky! It’s all captured here on the page.

This picture book isn’t a how-to manual for learning to pump a swing, but it does offer plenty of tips. And most of all, it models persistence, along with taking and giving a helping hand. And the glorious joy of a new skill and the ability to touch the sky.

stephanielucianovic.com
chrisdpark.com
lernerbooks.com

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Review of Pop! Goes the Nursery Rhyme, words by Betsy Bird, pictures by Andrea Tsurumi

Delightfully Silly, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

Pop! Goes the Nursery Rhyme

words by Betsy Bird
pictures by Andrea Tsurumi

Union Square Kids, coming in March 2025. 56 pages.
Review written November 19, 2024, from an Advance Reader Copy.
Starred Review

This is one of those delightfully silly picture books that simply begs to be read to a child. Full disclosure: I’ve served on a committee with Betsy Bird and have read her blog for years, so I consider her a friend.

The idea for the book is simple, and a note at the back reveals that it springs out of her family’s traditions in reading nursery rhymes. The book is a series of nursery rhymes, beginning with Pop! Goes the Weasel, but when it’s time for the last line of each other rhyme – the weasel pops out there as well.

And to make it complete, we’ve got a fussy secretary bird overseeing the action and hysterically scolding the weasel at every turn.

The idea is simple, but illustrator Andrea Tsurumi’s execution brings it to brilliance. I love the exuberance of the weasel popping out and the visible frustration of the secretary bird.

This host starts relatively calm, progresses to confused, and has a lovely page with a total breakdown:

That’s it!

That’s IT!

No more weasels!
No weasels in the sky
or in cakes or rolling down hills or any of that!

NO.
MORE.
WEASELS.

Just do a rhyme without a weasel in it. Just one!
PLEASE!

The next rhyme – “One, Two, Buckle My Shoe” progresses over eleven pages before the grand Pop! – with tension building all the way (and the thought bubbles of the bird adding to that tension). [And can I just say that showing a bird getting a popsicle for “Pick up sticks” and throwing the sticks away for “Lay them straight” is absolutely brilliant?]

But it all ends happily with all the animals from earlier in the book showing up and celebrating the weasel.

As it says in Jon Scieszka’s blurb on the back, I really do need to find a kid and read this book to them.

afuse8production.slj.com
andreatsurumi.com

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Review of Don’t Think of Tigers, by Alex Latimer

Delightfully Silly, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

Don’t Think of Tigers

by Alex Latimer

Random House, 2024. 32 pages.
Review written December 17, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

The cover of this picture book is brilliant – one look and you know what’s going on. And you’re absolutely thinking of tigers.

Sure enough, the author sets up the premise that whatever you picture in your mind, he will draw on the next page. He starts with a picture of a cow doing ballet to show it works. After that, we get these instructions:

But before we start, I’ve just got one thing to ask you.

I really, really can’t draw tigers, so whatever you do, please

DON’T THINK OF TIGERS!

All right – now picture ANYTHING you like.

(Just no tigers.)

You guessed it, there’s a tiger on the next page, and, sure enough, it’s not a very good picture of a tiger.

And so the silly book goes, trying more and more silly things to keep the reader from thinking of tigers and showing more and more silly drawings of tigers, though they’re getting a little better as it goes.

At the end, he asks the reader to think of every part of the tiger – stripes and whiskers and eyes and tail – and the result is a beautiful picture of a tiger walking out of the jungle. And he finishes up by asking the reader to draw what he’s thinking of.

And then – there’s a note at the back. There’s a small picture of an ugly painting of a kid, and he tells about when he was in school and painted a picture of himself and an older kid saw it and told him he better not ever try to be an artist.

I felt horrible. And so from that day, for a very long time, I stopped painting or drawing or sketching. I’d love to tell you that the boy was wrong and that I was actually an artistic genius.

But do you know what? My picture really was terrible. It really was a very, very bad painting.

(I had tried to use all of the colors to paint my face, and it ended up messy and lumpy and my eyes were askew and my nose looked like a moldy mushroom.)

But I just wish someone had told me back then that making bad pictures is part of learning to make good ones. It’s the same with riding a bike or learning to swim. No one on Earth has ever been very good the first time they tried anything.

Every artist out there has made tons of awful paintings and hideous drawings and horrible sketches.

So I want to encourage you to make bad pictures! Let’s make lots and lots of stinkers!

Because that’s the only way to make good ones.

Now, I don’t necessarily like books where the point has to be spelled out. But the main part of this book is so much silly fun, I don’t mind a serious Author’s Note at the end with a really great message.

So there you have it: Delightfully silly fun combined with overcoming fear of doing something poorly. Now to just find a kid to share it with.

alexlatimer.co.za

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Review of Mama and Mommy and Me in the Middle, by Nina LaCour, illustrated by Kaylani Juanita

Contemporary, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

Mama and Mommy and Me in the Middle

by Nina LaCour
illustrated by Kaylani Juanita

Candlewick Press, 2022. 32 pages.
Review written November 18, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review

I read this book for Capitol Choices, and it’s an absolutely sweet picture book about missing a parent when she’s away on a work trip.

And yes, the family portrayed has two moms. And they’re a mixed-race couple. But that’s not what the book is about, which is refreshing, and any kid who ever misses a parent will relate to this story.

The book goes through the days of the week, beginning very early on Monday, when Mommy wakes up the little girl (she looks to be about four years old) and the family makes pancakes together. When they sit to eat them, it’s “Mommy and Mama and me in the middle.” But then Mama and the little girl wave goodbye to Mommy.

I like the spread that happens on Tuesday:

During circle time I say, “My mommy is on a work trip.”
Mr. Henry ask, “Is anyone else missing someone they love?”

Olive misses her sister, away at school.
They used to build block towers.

Miguel misses his papa, in a faraway country.
He wears a necklace to remember.

Chloe misses her cat
who ran away.

As the week goes on, there are sweet and cozy moments with Mama. But there are also many moments of missing Mommy.

“I miss Mommy. I miss her as deep as a scuba diver down in the ocean and as high as an astronaut up in the stars.”

“That’s a lot of missing.”

When Mommy comes home on Sunday, they gather a surprise for her.

But something else I love about this book is that the little girl has a moment of anger, when she remembers those tough moments that week of missing Mommy.

But that feeling is acknowledged, and the book finishes with a big cozy hug, with Mama and Mommy and me in the middle.

ninalacour.com
kaylanijuanita.com

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Review of Leaves to My Knees, by Ellen Mayer, illustrated by Nicole Tadgell

Contemporary, Mathematical, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

Leaves to My Knees

by Ellen Mayer
illustrated by Nicole Tadgell

Star Bright Books, 2022. 32 pages.
Review written December 23, 2022, from my own copy, purchased via amazon.com
Starred Review

This is a very simple picture book about raking leaves — which intentionally incorporates early math concepts. I read it for the Mathical Book Prize, though first thought of it simply as a nice story for Autumn. There’s a note at the back to parents and caregivers about the mathematics of measurement you’ll find here — and yes, it uses all of those concepts in a natural way that adds to the story.

The story is simple and lovely. A girl named Camille is bundling up with her Daddy and toddler brother to rake leaves. She plans to rake a pile of leaves that’s up to her knees.

The pictures of the family raking are joyful and bright. Each family member has a rake appropriately sized for them and makes a matching pile. The raking sounds they make are swush, swish, and sweeeeee.

There are obstacles to Camille’s plan — twigs and acorns clog up the rake. Her little brother steals leaves from her pile. And the wind comes with a big whoosh. But Camille progressively makes a pile that comes to her ankles, to the tops of her boots, and finally up to her knees — perfect for jumping into!

The complete package is a sweet story that will get your preschooler thinking about comparing and measuring.

ellenmayerbooks.com

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Review of Lemonade in Winter, by Emily Jenkins and G. Brian Karas

Contemporary, Mathematical, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

Lemonade in Winter

A Book About Two Kids Counting Money

written by Emily Jenkins
illustrated by G. Brian Karas

Schwartz and Wade Books (Random House), 2012. 36 pages.
Review written October 4, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review
2023 Mathical Honor Book, age 5-7

Okay, here’s a super fun story that also teaches kids how to count money — exactly the sort of thing we look for in the Mathical Book Prize.

It’s a freezing cold day in the neighborhood. Everything’s covered with thick snow, and icicles are hanging everywhere. Inside, big sister Pauline gets what she thinks is a brilliant idea: Let’s have a lemonade stand! Her little brother John-John gets excited, too, and wants to help.

Both parents discourage the idea: “Don’t you see it’s freezing?” “Don’t you hear the wind?”

But the kids gather all the quarters they can find:

“Each time you get four quarters, that’s a dollar,” says Pauline.
“Four quarters, that’s money!” says John-John.

They buy lemons and limes for a dollar each, sugar for two dollars, and cups for two dollars. I like the way the picture shows the quarters laid out on the counter in front of each item.

“We have twenty-four quarters, and that’s six dollars,”
Pauline tells John-John as she counts out the money.

When they’re getting ready to go out, their parents are still discouraging, but they make the lemonade and limeade and set up their stand in the snow in front of their house. They’re selling for fifty cents a cup.

When no one comes, they decide to advertise, and sing a catchy song about lemonade and limeade for fifty cents a cup. (Perfect for reading aloud at storytime!)

Every time they sell a cup, Pauline explains the amounts to John-John:

Fifty cents, that’s two quarters,” Pauline tells John-John.
“Two drinks is four quarters — and that’s a dollar.”
She puts the money in a green plastic box.

They try entertainment — John-John does cartwheels. They keep singing their song. When there still aren’t many people about, they decide to have a sale. Now it’s twenty-five cents a cup. Then they add decorations. And keep singing their song.

When they empty both pitchers, Pauline diagrams out how many cups they sold for how many quarters and adds it all up. When she realizes they only made four dollars, she starts to cry. They started with six dollars!

But John-John has the perfect solution of what to do with their hard-earned four dollars.

After the story, there’s a page at the back with the heading “Pauline Explains Money to John-John.” There’s a wonderful explanation of pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, and dollar bills.

I love this book because it’s a truly delightful picture book story, and it’s super good practice counting quarters and how much they’re worth. As well as introducing the concepts of profit and loss. But with a happy ending, despite the loss.

Tremendous fun!

emilyjenkins.com
gbriankaras.com
randomhouse.com/kids

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Review of My Two Border Towns, by David Bowles, illustrated by Erika Meza

Contemporary, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

My Two Border Towns

by David Bowles
illustrated by Erika Meza

Kokila (Penguin Random House), 2021. 36 pages.
Review written September 30, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review

Here’s a joyful and brightly-colored picture book about a boy who lives in Texas not far from the border with Mexico and goes back and forth between the towns on either side of the river with his father often. I’ve heard the award-winning author speak at library conferences and award celebrations about growing up near the border and about liminal spaces.

This book tells about the boy and his father getting up early, getting a list from his mother, and spending a day on the Other Side.

This town’s a twin of the one where I live, with Spanish spoken everywhere just the same,
but English mostly missing till it pops up like grains of sugar on a chili pepper.

The have an errand at the boy’s aunt and uncle’s jewelry shop, and he plays with his cousins while his dad takes care of that. The boy had brought a special bag with things for his “friends,” and when they work on the shopping list and prescriptions for Mamá, they pick up more things for them.

On the way back over the border, the line is long, but Dad pulls over to the side.

A line of people camp along the edge, entire families from the Caribbean and Central America.

Refugees, Dad calls them. Stuck between two countries.

The U.S. says there’s no room, and Mexico says it can hardly look after its own gente.

Élder sees me and rushes over. His hair is longer than when we first met, almost six months back.

They share their special handshake and the boy shows him the stuff he brought. They have medicine for Élder’s mother, too.

He wishes Élder and his family could go back and forth across the border like they do with their passports.

“Soon, m’ijo,” Dad says. “It’s unfair to make him wait, since our country has room for his family right now.

“But when they get their chance at last, we’ll welcome him with open arms.”

All the way home I imagine a wonderful day,
when all my friends from the Other Side
can go back and forth
between my two
border towns,
just like me.

This book tackles a tough topic, but leaves the reader with an entirely happy message. It gives me a window — I don’t really know anything about what life is like near the border. But it also leaves me in awe of this family who matter-of-factly care for those who need it and don’t see it as doing the needy a favor, but as joyfully sharing with friends.

davidbowles.us
penguin.com/kids

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Review of How Do You Spend? by Cinders McLeod

Animal Characters, Mathematical, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

How Do You Spend?

A Moneybunny Book

by Cinders McLeod

Nancy Paulsen Books (Penguin Random House), 2024. 32 pages.
Review written October 31, 2024, from a book sent to me by the publisher.
Starred Review

How Do You Spend? is a perfectly pitched introduction to spending money for very young children.

Here’s how it begins:

Carrots are money in Bunnyland,
and Bun has saved a lot!

How will Bun spend her carrots?

The following spreads show how Bun spends her carrots. Each page has the format across the top, “Sometimes Bun spends…” with an adjective. The picture shows that day’s spending, and across the bottom you have in a child’s print: “Today I spent x carrots.” with the x filled in with the number spent. I appreciate that on every page, you can see and count the carrots spent.

I appreciate that the book starts with adjectives a young child is more familiar with – Fast (and a picture of Bun running with a shopping cart that is filling up) and Slow (and Bun taking a ride on one of those stationary rides in front of a grocery store).

But the book does go on to pairs like Expensive and Cheap, Ordinary and Exciting. And I like the pairs For Tomorrow (showing piano lessons that cost 2 carrots per month and 24 carrots for a year) and For Today (buying Bunny Hop tickets), and On Herself (ice cream), and On Others (flowers she gives to another bunny).

It’s just a super simple conversation-starter for a young child, ending with the question, “How do you like to spend?” So simple, but so engaging. Basically, you can talk about feelings or the physical act of spending or about numbers – or anything that enters a child’s head.

This book is part of a series. Our library already has one, and I’m planning to order the rest.

Moneybunnies.com
CindersMcLeod.com

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Review of The Dictionary Story, by Oliver Jeffers and Sam Winston

Delightfully Silly, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

The Dictionary Story

by Oliver Jeffers and Sam Winston

Candlewick Press, 2024.
Review written October 18, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

This is probably the first picture book I’m recommending for the sake of the parents, not so much the kids.

Sure, the story for the kids is fun – we’ve got a dictionary that’s jealous of all the other books that have stories inside. So she decides to bring some words to life, and an alligator gets loose and starts going after a donut, which doesn’t want to be eaten, so they start racing through the pages and causing chaos. It’s got Oliver Jeffers’ zany illustrations and silly straight-faced sense of humor.

The illustrations show the characters frolicking through a standard dictionary’s pages – or so I thought until I paused to read the fine print. And that’s when the true brilliance of the book hit me.

I started with the “How to Use This Dictionary” page pictured toward the beginning, was enjoying its quirkiness and noticed that the editors are “Woliver Effers & Jam Spinston.” Then I had to read every single visible entry. (The endpapers are filled with definitions, and there’s also a column of them running along the bottom of most pages.) This meant that it took me much longer to read this book than an ordinary picture book, but I also gained lots of laughter.

I’ll list some of the quirkier definitions:

ajar – A word to describe something as slightly open. Not to be confused with a jar (which works best when mostly closed).

author – The writer of a book, poem or news. They move tiny black marks around (see letters) to discover what interesting shapes they can make in people’s heads (see stories). Sometimes this results in writers being paid. (See good times, donuts and coffee.)

dream – A word for things people see while asleep. Dreams are the brain’s way of showing you that you’re a lot more imaginative than you think. In the day, we fill our heads with sensible things, but dreams prefer to create strange images, such as glow-in-the-dark marmalade and inflatable chicken’s teeth. Some dreams happen when we are awake: Martin Luther King Jr. had a great one. We’ve been studying dreams for ages, and we still don’t really know what they are.

hippopotamus – A very large mammal with short legs that lives near water in Africa. Hippopotamuses are vegetarian. Their idea of a good time is not wearing clothes, floating in water and wallowing in mud. (See spa.)

minnow – A very small freshwater fish that lives in rivers, streams and sometimes lakes. They feed on insects, among other things, and often dream about a time when they will rule all known galaxies.

tall – Above the average height. Which can get quite complicated because a tall turkey is tiny in comparison to a tiny tiger, and a tall tiger is tiny compared to Thailand.

zero – Zero is a word that means nothing. Nothing is a word that means nothing. Even though zero is a different word for nothing, both mean nothing. This definition has just told you nothing.

And here are some excerpts that are especially delightful and completely won my heart:

words – Even though they are small, they are great at making the inside of your head big.

library – Libraries are a bit like forests; they are enchanted places to get lost in.

story – Books carry stories around until someone like you finds them a home in their imagination.

May you find a home for this story in your imagination.

oliverjeffers.com
samwinston.com

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