From Publishers Weekly
First-time picture book artist Berkeley makes a splashy debut with a series of puckish acrylics that bring to mind Mark Teague's artwork, for Wallace's (Think of an Eel) sprightly story of an unusual girl. Born with a face "as red as a beet," Scarlette Beane possesses not only a green thumb, but green fingertips as well. Heedless of their daughter's odd appearance, her doting parents foresee a bright future ("She will grow tall and strong and do something wonderful," predicts her mother), and indeed, Scarlette has an affinity for gardening that's nothing short of magical. Her fingertips glow and flash and sparkle when she digs in the earth, and her first garden sprouts carrots "as huge as tree trunks" and parsley "as thick as a jungle." Her pi?ce de r?sistance is a vegetable castle, a vast improvement on their cozy garden shed home. Wallace spins this winsome tale with picturesque similes ("The moon hung like a pearl in the sky"), while Berkeley goes to town with the garden motif. From a baby blanket decorated with carrots and pea pods to a bed whose four posts support potted plants, he ties in the story's overriding theme with ingenuity, and his characters, with their perpetually surprised expressions and eccentric hairstyles, inject the pages with a droll edginess. Ages 3-7.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From School Library Journal
PreSchool-Grade 2-When Scarlette Beane is born, her face is as red as a beet, and the ends of her fingers are green. Her parents are convinced she will grow up to do something wonderful. Since there isn't much room in their small house, the family spends most of its time outdoors in the garden. On Scarlette's fifth birthday, she receives a garden of her very own, complete with a set of tools and a wooden fence. Overnight, her carrots, onions, and parsley grow to an enormous size, and her family invites the whole town over for soup. Then Scarlette sets her sights on something bigger; she grows a huge castle made of vegetables. Berkeley's cartoonlike acrylic illustrations done in earthy hues on textured paper capture the wonder of this gentle fairy tale and bring to life such details as the cucumber towers and turnip turrets of the castle. Indeed, the most fascinating aspect of the book is the detail, from the forklift used to carry the enormous onions, to the concrete mixer Mrs. Beane uses to make soup, to the green sparkles at the end of the child's fingers when the vegetables grow. Pair this vegetarian's delight with David Wiesner's June 29, 1999 (Clarion, 1992) or any version of the giant turnip for a storytime of amazing proportions.
Kathleen M. Kelly MacMillan, Carroll County Public Library, Eldersburg, MD Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
