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Library | Call Number | Status |
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Searching... Silver Falls Library | JP COLFER | Searching... Unknown |
Searching... Monmouth Public Library | COLFER | Searching... Unknown |
Searching... Salem Main Library | JP Col | Searching... Unknown |
Searching... Salem Main Library | JP Colfer | Searching... Unknown |
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Summary
Summary
The debut picture book from #1 New York Times bestselling author Chris Colfer
Once upon a time, there was a little girl who didn't quite fit in. When she runs away, she happens upon a curvy tree who helps her understand the importance of being different! This picture book stands alone, but also plays an important role in the Land of Stories series--making this a must-have book for fans and new readers alike!
Author Notes
Chris Colfer is a #1 New York Times bestselling author and Golden Globe-winning actor. He was honored as a member of the TIME 100, Time magazine's annual list of the one hundred most influential people in the world. Brandon Dorman has created hundreds of book covers and over 20 picture books, including Pirates of the Sea!
Reviews (4)
School Library Journal Review
PreS-Gr 2-A girl runs away to the forest and eventually collapses in tears at the foot of a curvy tree. The tree asks the girl why she is crying, and she tells him that the other children in her village are mean to her despite her kindness. They mock her appearance, glasses, speech, and intelligence. In an effort to cheer her up, the tree tells her his own history. Once the other trees teased him for being different, but when loggers came to the forest, they cut down all of the other trees. Being different saved the curvy tree. He was lonely but eventually grew tall enough that he could see other curvy trees in distant forests. From his branches, the girl sees the other trees, and in each one there is a child like her. The tree teaches her that life will improve as she grows and looks outward. The digital artwork is romanticized, befitting the story's tone, but the message is a bit over-the-top and saccharine. VERDICT The well-intentioned story is held back by awkward phrasing and cloying illustrations.-Laura Hunter, Mount Laurel Library, NJ © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Horn Book Review
Ostracized for having glasses and other ostensible markers of social pariahdom, a girl flees to the forest, where a tree with a spiraling trunk explains how its unique look once proved redemptive. Readers may be lured by the almost caricaturish digital art, but the writing is unimaginative and the ham-handed message isn't subtle. (c) Copyright 2016. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
A child with ostracism issues finds a timber tutor in this illustrated spinoff from the Land of Stories series. Waking from his afternoon nap to find a lass weeping on an adjacent stump, the Curvy Tree enquires as to the cause of her distress. She whinges: "I'm never going to find a friend," because the village's mean other children "say that I talk funny, I'm not pretty, and I'm not smart." In response, the tree informs her that his twisted limbs saved him from loggers years ago, and then he lifts her up to see more curvy trees all around, each with a child in its branches. You'll find friends aplenty, he assures her, when you grow up and leave townor, as he puts it, "look past the horizon." The narrative is not only trite, but contradictory, as the child sees the tree on one page and on the next "didn't even notice it." Dorman endows the golden-brown Curvy Tree with kindly features, dominated by a ski-shaped nose, that slide freely up and down the trunk. Though an evergreen in the Land of Stories novels, here it looks much more like a hazel, with sparse foliage and corkscrew boughs. The child displays no such signs of physical unattractiveness; on the contrary, her cute, gigantic spectacles and woolly blonde mane make the "not pretty" business sound more like peer envy than teasing. Pure corn syrup. (Picture book. 6-8) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
This picture-book addition to Colfer's The Land of Stories tales will immediately attract young readers with its eye-catching double-page spreads. The lush landscape almost overwhelms our heroine, a little girl who has run away from her village because she has been bullied. Boxed text, with a purple background and gold borders, gives this an old-fashioned fairy tale feeling, and the little blonde girl even looks like a princess except for the large glasses that dominate her face and are, along with her exceptionally curly hair, the cause of her misery. After being teased, the girl escapes into the roots of a wise tree. He is different from other trees: roots, trunk, and branches all loop and curl and he talks to her. Offering comfort and support, the curvy tree lifts her high enough to see others like herself and reminds her to look past the horizon. The computer-generated images emphasize the swirls of the tree, and the varying perspectives are done in earthy tones, suggesting the healing power of nature. Sweet and uplifting.--Ching, Edie Copyright 2015 Booklist