Reviews for Dan Yaccarino's Mother Goose
Book list
From Booklist, Copyright © American Library Association. Used with permission.
PreS-Gr. 2. This stylish nursery rhyme collection is the second this year to envision Mother Goose as a city dweller. But unlike Nina Crews, who set The Neighborhood Mother Goose 0 BKL D 1 03 0 in modern-day Brooklyn, Yaccarino dresses his version in the garb of Manhattan circa 1935, when men wore hats and women--even those unfortunate enough to dwell in pumpkin shells-- wouldn't be caught dead without their best handbag and gloves. Among the 34 rhymes here, readers will find some surprising new interpretations: the "pretty maids all in a row" in "Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary" are uniformed housekeepers bearing mops and brooms, and shepherdess Mary's little lamb follows her to school in a yellow cab. Kids may not find these tweaks as humorous as their parents do, but they'll surely respond to Yaccarino's boldly contrasting colors and crisply defined shapes, which nod to both organic forms and streamlined machine-age design. A fine introduction to nonsense rhymes for children weaned on Yaccarino's own Oswald 0 and other cartoons in the hip, retro mode. --Jennifer Mattson Copyright 2004 Booklist
Publishers Weekly
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Yaccarino's (Bittle) inventive, sharp-contoured images of city life unify this assortment of 34 nursery rhymes, which would have benefited from a more organized design. The contents range from such standards as "Humpty Dumpty" and "Pat-a-cake" to lesser-known work. For a preachy schoolroom verse ("May we, like the clock,/ Keep a face clean and bright,/ With hands ever ready/ To do what is right"), Yaccarino pictures a diligent boy unaware of two classmates holding a slingshot and peashooter. Just as Rosemary Wells offers ironic visual information in her more elaborate Mother Goose volumes, Yaccarino creates one illustration per poem and adds playful details unspoken by the rhymes; polite men in suits doff their hats and prim women wear fifties dresses in his retro-urban tableaux. When the "Hickory, dickory, dock" clock strikes one, the mouse takes a nose-dive toward a sleeping man's open mouth. The beatnik cat of "Hey, diddle, diddle!" plays his fiddle on a park bench, oblivious to the cop chasing a dish with a purloined spoon. The smooth-edged, stylized images expand on the concise verse, yet no drop caps (except on the first page) or page borders lend closure to individual poems, and no index or table of contents serves as a guide. Since some spreads offer one poem and others feature two rhymes per page, it makes for an awkward progression through this collection. Ages 2-5. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
You've never seen Mother Goose like this before: in Yaccarino's world, the fiddling cat of ""Hey, diddle, diddle"" fame is a beatnik street musician, Jack Sprat and his wife eat at a fifties-style diner, and Mary's lamb follows her to school in a taxi. Kids will find the images illustrating the familiar rhymes refreshing and funny; appreciative adults may find them playfully subversive. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Yaccarino casts 34 traditional Mother Goose nursery rhymes into an unconventional urban setting. A sassy Mother Goose wearing sun glasses soars above a congested traffic jam astride her high-flying gander. Cool dude Peter Piper carries an overflowing basket of pickled peppers down the street while a beat cat in black turtle neck and beret fiddles for his supper on a bench as a cop chases a dish running away with the spoon. Old Mother Hubbard gazes into a modern kitchen cupboard and Mary's little lamb follows her school bus in a yellow taxi. The stylized illustrations in flat, bright colors evoke a retro fifties mood that definitely gives a humorous new look to some very familiar rhymes. Mother Goose reinterpreted lives on. (Picture book. 2-5) Copyright ŠKirkus Reviews, used with permission.
School Library Journal
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
PreS-Gr 1-Yaccarino lends his unique style to an up-to-date urban Mother Goose with great success. His strongly colored, stylized cartoon figures fill the pages with fun: this goose wears hip sunglasses; Tom the piper's son is a cool clarinetist; the Old Woman and her shoe live in a city of skyscrapers not far from a certain pumpkin; and Mary's lamb follows her in a taxi to school. Included are several less-well-known rhymes, in addition to the old familiar ones. The book ends neatly: "The Man in the Moon/Looked out of the moon/And this is what he said, `'Tis time for all children on earth/To think about getting to bed!'" The little piggies that went to market, had roast beef, etc., are outlined on the blue endpapers. Well conceived and certainly well worth adding to nursery-rhyme collections.-Judith Constantinides, formerly at East Baton Rouge Parish Main Library, LA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
