A blog of my running thoughts while reading. *Warning: Spoilers*
I enjoyed the story with the little girl and the giant robot. It was full of wonderful emotions and expressions. The story with the woman on the bike, however, left me with mixed emotions. I liked her riding freely and experiencing things as they came, but why did what made everything better have to be getting kissed by a boy? Seriously? She doesn’t need to be depressed anymore because a boy kissed her? That’s just stupid.
I’m not sure how I feel about this book. I like that they’re pointing out the hypocrisy in the body-image message from the fashion industry, but all of the name dropping is weirding me out and everything seems designed to show how awesome Violet’s life is, despite her protests that it isn’t. I think that it’s just a bit too wish-fulfillment-ish for me. I’d have more appreciation for the attempt at a positive body-image message if Violet wasn’t constantly judging the women around her by how they look!
So far this is pretty good. We got to see Copper again (he seems to have a really interesting world to live in). I loved the art in the kite story! The story “I Wish…” was interesting and I really liked the ending. I loved the “Hugo Earhart” story too! So far, this has been fun!
So far I’m not sure crazy about this book, but since Readergirlz hasn’t steered me wrong yet, I’ll have faith. I like Violet in many ways, but the model thing kind of weirds me out. I’m also kind of having issues with all of the brand name dropping. For some reason I just find books filled with detailed descriptions of designer clothes kind of creepy.
This was a good book full of interesting animals, but I did wonder if they all lived in the same area or if Osborne stretched things a little so that the kids could meet them all. Why is a mango one of the spell components? They could have bought that at the grocery store and saved themselves the dangerous trip to the Amazon! Oh well, I guess we’ll find out how the spell works out in a future book.
This is a very sweet Berenstain Bears book. It’s got a good plot and, for a change, has as much to say to parents as to kids. The artwork is awesome. I loved the details - all the cool stuff in the attic was great! The plot flowed nicely and didn’t particularly feel preachy, even though there were definitely lessons there. I very much enjoyed this book. It was fun and well done!
This is a very cute Biscuit board book. Nothing especially happens, but Biscuit and the girl have fun in the snow, showing some of the things you can do on a snowy day! As always, the illustrations are adorable and I loved Biscuit’s red sweater. This is just a cute, sweet book. Perfect for a snowy day!
This is a fairly cute beginning reader, but it definitely subscribes to the ‘Dick and Jane’ school of storytelling. At least Little Monster is a hell of a lot more interesting than a couple of white middle-class kids, even if he isn’t doing anything particularly radical. Monsters are just naturally more interesting. The illustrations are really cute. They were definitely the best part of the book. I loved how the monsters looked. This is a cute book and much better than I expected.
This is actually a really good book about friendship and related issues for really young kids. It discusses a wide range of topics intelligently and simply with clear, simple illustrations. The examples include all types of children (even a number of handicapped ones) and speaks very respectfully of childhood friendship issues. Even the endpapers are helpful with kid suggestions for how to be and not be a friend! This is simply a wonderfully done book and I’m extremely impressed!
This is a cute story. It was nice that although it was easy to predict in very general terms how it would turn out, the book remained surprising in the specifics of how it got there. The art is pretty, but I wasn’t actually terribly fond of it because it didn’t always represent the events of the story very well. I enjoyed this book overall, but didn’t feel that it was especially amazing.