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Summary
Summary
Henny is a chick who's just a little different from everyone else in the barn--and who learns to embrace her special gift in this whimsical and charming picture book debut from Elizabeth Rose Stanton.
Henny doesn't look like any other chicken she knows. Instead of wings, she has arms!
Sometimes Henny likes being different--she enjoys the way her arms flutter like ribbons when she runs--but other times...not so much. She just can't do things the same way as the other chickens.
But doing things the same as everyone else is overrated, as Henny comes to realize in this warmhearted story, sweetly told and illustrated with fresh, expressive artwork that celebrates the individual in everyone.
Author Notes
Elizabeth Rose Stanton began her picture book writing and illustrating adventure a few years ago, after a brief career as an architect, and long career as a parent and fine artist. Her debut book, Henny , was awarded an American Library Association Booklist star and was named as one of the best books of 2014 for children by The New York Public Library. School Library Journal called her second book, Peddles , "quietly wonderful," and the illustrations, "a thing of beauty." Elizabeth grew up in New York and now lives in Seattle with her husband and a trio of Scottish Fold cats.
Reviews (5)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Readers will do a double take at the confident chicken who waves hello from the cover of Stanton's debut. Instead of feathery wings, Henny has skinny pink human arms and hands. Although "Henny's mother... loved Henny anyway," the other farm animals stare and even chortle. Henny frets, albeit in non-chickenish ways: "She worried about being right-handed or left-handed.... She even worried about things she didn't quite understand-like tennis elbow, and hangnails, and whether she might need deodorant." Henny eventually discovers a talent for farm chores and starts "to imagine all the other things she could do," from hailing a cab to flying (a plane). In gentle pencil-and-watercolor sketches on an eggshell-white ground, Stanton scatters moments of quiet humor like chicken feed-Henny tries to "fit in" with a common chicken pose, folding her arms back like wings, and she bends those same elbows when she covers her ears to dampen a rooster's crow. It's a somewhat facile story of difference, but Stanton's artwork marks her as a talent worth watching. Ages 4-8. Agent: Joanna Volpe, New Leaf Literary & Media. (Jan.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Horn Book Review
Chick Henny was born with human arms. "Sometimes Henny liked having arms and sometimes she didn't." She worries about sleeves, hangnails, and needing deodorant but also discovers the many benefits of being different. Though this debut's themes are well-worn in picture books, the gentle humor in the matter-of-fact text and in the soft pencil and watercolor illustrations on roomy white pages makes it stand out. (c) Copyright 2014. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* This Henny is no regular sky-is-falling chick. She has arms! (A helpful chart compares a normal chick with Henny: wattles, yes; combs, yes; wings, uh, no.) Henny has mixed feelings about her arms. They can flutter but they can also drag. Should she be left-handed? Or right-handed? Should she use deodorant? All ambivalence disappears, however, when Henny gets a taste of working on the farm. Milking cows and feeding chicks empowers her, and she begins to consider all the other things she might be able to do, including picking up her grain with chopsticks and combing her comb. Ultimately, all these possibilities lead to maybe a career as a pilot. The plot is thin, but the premise is clever, and the execution is hysterical. In part, this comes from Stanton's expert depiction of Henny as fair, round, bemused, and rather feminine (except for those long hairy arms). And in part it comes from the clever, unlikely scenarios in which she places her heroine. The matter-of-fact tone of the text elevates the weirdness of the juxtapositions. For those who want a little more meat on their drumstick, this does have a good message about making the best of one's circumstances and looking on the bright side. But mostly, it's just funny.--Cooper, Ilene Copyright 2010 Booklist
School Library Journal Review
PreS-Gr 2-Born with skinny human arms instead of wings, Henny is one extraordinary chicken. Though her mother loves her unconditionally, Henny struggles with her peculiar appearance. She vacillates between enjoying having arms and worrying about fitting in. One day, as she follows Mr. Farmer around the farm, she catches an egg that he drops and embraces her uniqueness at last. Stanton's airy watercolor and pencil illustrations on expansive white backgrounds deftly capture the chick's range of emotions, from sadness about being teased by other animals to triumph when picturing herself flying a plane. The droll depictions of her activities, however, are somewhat unsettling-Henny milking a very confused cow, eating bugs with chopsticks, or crossing her arms are equal parts funny and uncanny. Giles Andreae's Giraffes Can't Dance (Orchard, 2001) and Mo Willems's Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed (among many others) present more developed, yet still humorous takes on the subject.-Yelena Alekseyeva-Popova, formerly at Chappaqua Library, NY (c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
Henny is a chicken but with human arms. (Best not overthink the hows and whys.) She likes being different from her fellow chickens when she's climbing a tree, but she doesn't like being different when the other farm animals laugh at her. In other words, she is Everychicken. Henny's disproportionately long, spindly, pinkish human arms are particularly creepy to behold, partly due to the soft, delicate nature of the debut author/illustrator's pencil-and-watercolor illustrations. They allow her certain luxuries foreign to her species, such as hugging her mother and helping Mr. Farmer with his chores. And, somewhat unsettlingly, "She liked it when they fluttered behind her like ribbons when she ran." (Sometimes her arms are shown as boneless, sometimes not.) In time, the barnyard bird begins to imagine hailing New York taxis, ice-skating, even flying a plane. Unfortunately, there's no cohesive narrative here, mostly just abundant illustrated examples of what can be accomplished with arms and hands. As Henny worries about tennis elbow and hangnails, imagines pointing or "mak[ing] a point," plugs her ears or carries a purse, readers may stop caring what Henny can or can't do. Whether or not children find a friend in Henny, this picture book needs a storyline. (Picture book. 4-8)]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
