Bound To Stay Bound

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Bulletin for the Center... - 03/01/2015 Candlewick’s venerable natural history picture-book series draws now from Australia, in volumes that treat one of the continent’s most famous animals and one of its least known. Saxby’s overview of the red kangaroo follows an adult male named Red from the sunset of one day to dawn of the next, as Red and his mob (the technical term for a group of kangaroos) find food and water and Red fends off challenges to his leadership. Wignell’s treatment of the bilby follows a female as she gives birth in her burrow to Baby Bilby, who eventually grows big enough to emerge from his mother’s pouch and then the burrow; above ground he learns from her how to dig for food and to evade predators, and soon he’s on his own. Big Red Kangaroo is the more successful of the two: its prose moves effectively from casual to poetic, and the close time frame keeps things immediate. the digital and charcoal art is simply stunning, with a smudgy angularity reminiscent of the late Glen Rounds but an immersive, otherworldly earthiness all its own, and both the main text and the secondary explanatory text stand out strongly against the sandy pages. The expressionistic paintings of Bilby are often dramatic, and the little animal is definitely undertreated in American literature. However, the colors tip occasionally into the lurid, key concepts-like the location of the bilby’s pouch-are left unillustrated, and scale is difficult to determine; the serviceable text doesn’t quite muster the appeal to overcome these deficits. Together, though, these are an evocative southern influence in early biology, and they’ll appeal to youngsters not quite ready for Nic Bishop Marsupials (BCCB 11/09). Each book includes an index. DS - Copyright 2015 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois.

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