A punny cautionary tale about a nondescript office drone who mistakenly believes that the clothes make the man. Bored, friendless, and invisible in his busy city office, Fenwick studies a magazine and decides, ``Maybe it's the way I'm dressed.'' At a tailor shop, he happens upon a bright yellow suit with a windowpane check; once dressed, Fenwick begins to strut with self-confidence. In fact, the suit wears him out. The next morning, it leaves for the office without him. On the third day, Fenwick follows his suit to the office and discovers just how insignificant his role is in the suit's fabulous life. Determined to capture his wayward clothing, Fenwick gives chase through the streets: ``Legging it up the street the suit threaded its way through the crowd . . . Fenwick collared [it] . . . and hemmed it in, but just when he thought he had things all buttoned up, the suit cuffed him back. Both were panting for breath.'' In a spectacular finale, Fenwick escapes the suit's clutches, returning to his dull life sadder but no wiser. Small (Hoover's Bride, 1995, etc.) renders extraordinarily witty watercolors of a bristling, bustling New York City and a suit that just won't quit. It's too easy to deem this book—with its puns and wry tone—as aimed at adults; the plot depends on readers believing that having an animated suit is a problem. Actually, it looks like fun. (Picture book. 4-10)
Pub Date: Sept. 16, 1996
ISBN: 0-374-32298-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
Continuing to find inspiration in the work of Virginia Lee Burton, Munro Leaf and other illustrators of the past, Long (The Little Engine That Could, 2005) offers an aw-shucks friendship tale that features a small but hardworking tractor (“putt puff puttedy chuff”) with a Little Toot–style face and a big-eared young descendant of Ferdinand the bull who gets stuck in deep, gooey mud. After the big new yellow tractor, crowds of overalls-clad locals and a red fire engine all fail to pull her out, the little tractor (who had been left behind the barn to rust after the arrival of the new tractor) comes putt-puff-puttedy-chuff-ing down the hill to entice his terrified bovine buddy successfully back to dry ground. Short on internal logic but long on creamy scenes of calf and tractor either gamboling energetically with a gaggle of McCloskey-like geese through neutral-toned fields or resting peacefully in the shade of a gnarled tree (apple, not cork), the episode will certainly draw nostalgic adults. Considering the author’s track record and influences, it may find a welcome from younger audiences too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-399-25248-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2009
SEEN & HEARD
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists.
How to raise money for a coveted poster: put your friends to work!
John, founder of the FUBU fashion line and a Shark Tank venture capitalist, offers a self-referential blueprint for financial success. Having only half of the $10 he needs for a Minka J poster, Daymond forks over $1 to buy a plain T-shirt, paints a picture of the pop star on it, sells it for $5, and uses all of his cash to buy nine more shirts. Then he recruits three friends to decorate them with his design and help sell them for an unspecified amount (from a conveniently free and empty street-fair booth) until they’re gone. The enterprising entrepreneur reimburses himself for the shirts and splits the remaining proceeds, which leaves him with enough for that poster as well as a “brand-new business book,” while his friends express other fiscal strategies: saving their share, spending it all on new art supplies, or donating part and buying a (math) book with the rest. (In a closing summation, the author also suggests investing in stocks, bonds, or cryptocurrency.) Though Miles cranks up the visual energy in her sparsely detailed illustrations by incorporating bright colors and lots of greenbacks, the actual advice feels a bit vague. Daymond is Black; most of the cast are people of color. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists. (Picture book. 7-9)Pub Date: March 21, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-593-56727-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023
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