Fortune cookies != magic.
It makes it seem like fortune cookies are real, but it doesn't explicitly say that. Instead of saying her fortune came true, it just says, "And guess what?" But the message basically boils down to fortune cookies being real.
Fortune cookies are real, as far as I can tell.
Why do birds have feathers? This book doesn't know.
There's no moralizing to it, but also no indication of why this happened to the birds. Just that at some point they didn't have feathers, and then they had feathers. Ta-da.
None.
Watching the text play across the page.
There's not a lot to it, but it doesn't seem like it's trying to be more than it is. It kind of has a dreamlike quality to it, as the words swirl around the pages, and the images are almost like sketches rather than full-on realism.
None.
That guy is so much tastier than me.
I don't even know where this book is going. I think it's trying to say that school is important, kind of? But it's also just one of those stories where it keeps one-upping itself in a really annoying, repetitive way, and then at the end the boy is in over his head. If he had only shot the rat.
School is important. Or, it's okay to kill talking animals.
Gosh darn these kids and their newfangled realism!
I seriously doubt that, as she says, "The barn that Jesus was born in would look like a cave to us." I'm pretty sure it wasn't a cave, but was a structure built by humans. People living in the time and culture of Jesus were not living in caves.
Gregorian music is the best music ever.
All koala bears look alike. (“That's racist!”)
What. This is a weird book. It feels like it should have a moral, but it absolutely does not. There's no way I can get a moral out of this, but it feels like it's moralizing about something. Maybe it's just a moral I can't see.
Parties are awesome?
Might be better as an art installation.
This is a weird book. It kind of shows opposites and comparisons. It kind of rhymes in parts, but not everywhere. Only sometimes, when it feels like it.
Even if you don't like everything about someone, you can still love them?
Blurring the line between fantasy and reality since 1944.
It could be real. It could be a nonfiction story as far as I know. It's just really confusing, really wordy, really long.
None.
Insert joke involving bagpipes, cows, and deer.
The style of the illustrations isn't very modern but they're pretty. There's not much to it. It's just another book where somebody turns out to have hidden talents they weren't expecting to have.
Put your strengths to use. Or, don't be prejudiced against your neighbors.
The earth goes around the sun. In lots more words.
It's kind of cool, because it's fairly scientifically accurate, but it's not done in a very interesting way. It has good facts in it, but it's not very engaging, especially to kids nowadays because it's so wordy.
Teaches about the sun and the earth.
