Bound To Stay Bound

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Booklist - 12/15/2009 In this wordless picture book, a boy moves to a new neighborhood and goes to a park, hoping for a chance to join a baseball game. The young players don’t notice him, so he settles on a bench with four geezers. The action follows the boy through each day of the week, as he tries to fit in with the old guys, eventually dressing in plaid pants, glasses, an old brown hat, and a bow tie. Sensing that things are heading in the wrong direction, the old guys change their ways by playing in the park and starting a baseball game that the boy joins, ultimately giving him the confidence to take part in the neighborhood kids’ ball game. A series of retro-style pictures tell the story in a minimal palette of few colors with cartoon images set against a background of white space and some quick watercolor brushstrokes. Adults may find this more humorous than kids do, but it’s good for some all-ages chuckles. - Copyright 2009 Booklist.

School Library Journal - 01/01/2010 K-Gr 2— On Tuesday (the only words in the book are the days of the week), a new boy in the neighborhood wants to play baseball with the other kids but is too shy. He glumly sits on a park bench that is occupied by four very diverse men. On Wednesday, he goes back to the park bench. The old men are puzzled about why the child is there. Thursday, he returns with gray streaks in his hair and old-man clothes. Friday, the men are gone, and now the boy is puzzled. He sees them romping on the playground equipment. Saturday, he finds a bicycle by the park bench and sees the men riding around on children's vehicles. So far, the boy is missing all the clues that the men are leaving for him. Sunday, the men come to the park with baseball equipment. They go off to play, leaving a bat, ball, and cap on the bench. The boy finally gets the hint, picks up the equipment, goes to the diamond, and hits the ball out of the park. That gives him enough confidence to ask to be included in the next kids' game. The cartoon gouache and ink illustrations are crisp and clear on the white space, but the story line will be hard for kids to follow. The message is more for adults than kids.—Ieva Bates, Ann Arbor District Library, MI - Copyright 2010 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.

Bulletin for the Center... - 04/01/2010 Our protagonist in this nearly wordless picture book (the only text provides the days of the week) is a little blond tyke who heads out to the city park to play baseball once the moving truck disgorges his bat and ball. Once at the park, he’s daunted by the prospect of joining the group of strange kids on the diamond, so he sadly retires to a park bench. Sharing his bench is a quartet of grandpa types, on whom our hero decides to pattern himself (complete with pink plaid pants and pretend cane). The grandpas have a cunning plan, though, luring the boy into baseball practice and developing his skills and confidence, so he’s finally able to join the park kids on the field as his erstwhile tutors cheer him on from the bleachers. The plot is a little more wishful than believable, but it’s an entertaining little reality-based fantasy; audiences will need to pay close attention to the images to decode the story (including usually missable sections such as the copyright page), but that will add to the book’s utility as a discussion prompt, and even kids who miss a few of the details will grasp the entertaining silliness of the proceedings. The spirited ink and gouache illustrations evince a neo-retro flair, employing a classic Golden Books palette of gleaming tomato reds, sunny yellows, and sweet turquoises startlingly shadowed with coal black. White space and sweeps of pigment constitute the backdrops, giving the figures dominance; the grandpas are especially amusing, a multicultural, multi-sized, knobbly-faced, and often grumpy collection of manhood. Ultimately, this has appeal as a puzzle (“What do you think is happening here?”) as well as a story, and audiences will get a particular kick out of the senior-citizen support group. DS - Copyright 2010 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois.

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