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Summary
Summary
The kiss Mama blew to her little girl goes merrily astray, slipping and sliding and sashaying from cheek to cheek . . . until it finally lands just right where it belonged. Told in jaunty verse, award-winning Jane Yolen's clever fantasy offers warm and witty affirmation that it is indeed love that makes the world go round.
Author Notes
Jane Yolen was born February 11, 1939 in New York City. She received a bachelor's degree from Smith College in 1960 and a master's degree in education from the University of Massachusetts in 1976. After college, she became an editor in New York City and wrote during her lunch break. She sold her first children's book, Pirates in Petticoats, at the age of 22. Since then, she has written over 300 books for children, young adults, and adults.
Her other works include the Emperor and the Kite, Owl Moon, How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight? and The Devil's Arithmetic. She has won numerous awards including the Kerlan Award, the Regina Medal, the Keene State Children's Literature Award, the Caldecott Medal, two Nebula Awards, two Christopher Medals, the World Fantasy Award, three Mythopoeic Fantasy Awards, the Golden Kite Award, the Jewish Book Award, the World Fantasy Association's Lifetime Achievement Award, and the Association of Jewish Libraries Award.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (5)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Although the title suggests sentimentality, that notion disappears with the first look inside this snappy square-format book. Yolen's jaunty rhymes are short and sweet; debut illustrator Baxter's droll, cartoonlike pictures practically jump from page to page. Mama's kiss, shown as a winged pair of lips, is first tossed across the bedroom at her daughter, but misses and "sails off toward Baby Brother. Baby burps, the kiss goes wide,/ Through the window and outside./ Catches Dog upon the nose." Subsequently traveling through the neighborhood, transferred from creature to creature, including a family of bears, the kiss eventually lands on a runner "jogging home to help his wife,/ The one he's loved for his whole life"--Mama. The traditional poetic meter creates a reassuring effect, and both words and pictures deliver plenty of giggles. Ages 3-6. (Dec.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book Review
What happens to kisses that miss their mark? Yolen offers her answer in bouncy (occasionally stumbling) rhymes: "...Catches Dog upon the nose, / ...and smacks Cat who climbs a tree, / Where the kiss bumps into Honey Bee." Baxter's illustrations follow Mama's winged kiss indoors, outdoors, and home again with lipstick-pink motion lines encouraging readers to track its path. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
The silly invisibility of thrown kisses is of constant amusement to children (and some adults, too), and this well-conceptualized book takes advantage of the phenomenon. Mama smiles and throws me kisses, Yolen begins. Most land right, but one kiss misses. The array of thrown kisses is illustrated in many forms lipstick marks, XOs, even of the Hershey variety. Then a pair of winged lips overshoots sister and is burped out by her baby brother, chased by the dog, stored in honey by a bee, and sneezed by a bear before reattaching itself to Daddy and landing right back where it belongs. The rhymes are simple and funny and perfectly metered for reading aloud, and though the art battles a bit too much between foreground and background, young readers and listeners will love tracing the swirling loop-de-loops of the meandering smooch. The final sentiment, that a kiss can come back to where it should be found, has a nice pay-it-forward message.--Kraus, Daniel Copyright 2008 Booklist
School Library Journal Review
PreS-K-Mama throws a kiss, depicted as rosy lips with cupid wings, but it misses the curly-haired narrator. It travels via breezes, sneezes, and a runner from baby brother to family pets, Honey Bee, and bears to end up that evening back where it belongs, on the little girl's cheek. "A kiss can go the world around,/And come back where it should be found." Yolen's text is verb-rich with burps, bumps, and spins to keep the action rolling. Baxter's pen-and-ink drawings trace the kiss's journey with pink arrows flowing amid varyingly detailed scenes that match the pace of the text. A cheerful palette and autumn scenes further enhance the appeal of this cozy lap-sit selection.-Gay Lynn Van Vleck, Henrico County Library, Glen Allen, VA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
When Mama throws her curly-headed little girl a handful of kisses, "Most land right, but one kiss misses. / Mama says she'll throw another, / It sails off toward Baby Brother." This begins a peregrination that takes that wayward kiss through the neighborhood, into the woods and back (via "a runner's hair"Papa, the reader sees) to the little girl it was meant for, spreading affection wherever it lands. Yolen's meter never falters, providing a rollicking counterpoint to Baxter's drolly energetic cartoon vignettes, the winged-lipped kiss tying all visually together. Sweetbut not saccharinegood-hearted fun. (Picture book. 3-6) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
