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From Horn Book

January 1, 2018
Rollicking verse relates the misadventure of Billy Bloo, mired in a green blob, and the fates of his would-be rescuers, including a cowgirl, four acrobats, an inept wizard, and a host of other unlikely characters. Billy is finally unstuck, but what of the others? Zany candy-colored cartoons perfectly reflect the wild romp.

(Copyright 2018 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

From Publisher's Weekly

May 22, 2017
Never mind how that giant heap of green goo got there, or why little Billy Bloo ignored the sign (on the title page) that reads "Whatever you do... do not go in the goo!" Now he's stuck and so is everyone who comes along to extract him, an oddball assemblage that ends up including "Four acrobats, the cowgirl too/ the octopus, the wizard (who/ just conjured up a talking ewe)/ the pirate, and the noble crew." (The crew consists of a queen and 17 loyal knights.) Everyone is unwilling to give up the struggle, but even the queen can't help wondering, "What happens if I need the loo?" Suddenly, a startled octopus inadvertently frees everyoneâ€"briefly. Burach's (I Am Not a Chair!) loosey-goosey illustrations contrast the glistening, almost three-dimensional goo with a flattened, high-energy cartoon cast that looks as though it sprang directly from a child's imagination. And Hamburg's (Monkey and Duck Quack Up!) freewheeling verseâ€"which includes lots of "goo" rhymes and direct addresses to readersâ€"gives readers plenty to linger (and laugh) over. Ages 4â€"8. Author's agent: Jennifer De Chiara, Jennifer De Chiara Literary. Illustrator's agent: Lara Perkins, Andrea Brown Literary.

From Kirkus

April 15, 2017
Altruism runs amuck--or at least into muck--in this glutinous outing.In rollicking rhymed verse that really begs to be read aloud, an entire cavalcade of would-be rescuers, from a pirate to a queen with 17 nobles, joins a careless lad mired in a large and expanding mound of glutinous green glop. "Dear friends, how very kind of you / to try and get me out of goo. / I do admire all your pluck. / Just thought I'd point out... / I'M STILL STUCK!!!" In his rambunctious cartoon illustrations Burach miscounts those "nobles." Still, he not only nicely captures the frantic slapstick of the gooey goings-on, but also steps out of what is still, sad to note, the picture-book mainstream by depicting Billy and the other human members of the popeyed cast, except for a wizard and a purple acrobat, as brown-skinned. The goo itself has a pleasingly disgusting and shiny look to it. A mouse's sneeze at last causes a large pink octopus to jump out with all the rest in tow--but Billy loses a shoe, which everyone else immediately jumps back in to fetch. Hamburg leaves readers with a question: "What would you do?" Besides chortling at such gleeful, errant nonsense, that is. (Picture book. 5-7)

COPYRIGHT(2017) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

From Horn Book

January 1, 2012
Floyd's kite is stuck in a tree. He throws his shoe to knock the kite loose, setting off a humorously absurd chain of events. A random assortment of increasingly larger objects gets tossed up in his attempts to knock down the previous item. Jeffers's spare illustrations have plenty of kid appeal, meshing nicely with the comical story line.

(Copyright 2012 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

From School Library Journal

Starred review from December 1, 2011

PreS-Gr 2-Floyd has a problem: his kite is stuck in a tree. Employing kid logic, he throws his favorite shoe to dislodge the wayward object-to no avail. The imaginative hero fetches a host of other items: a friend's bicycle, the kitchen sink, a long-distance lorry, the house across the street, a curious whale ("in the wrong place at the wrong time"). Alas, each item joins its predecessors, lodged in the foliage. Jeffers's deadpan descriptions and the ludicrous scale of Floyd's selections are laugh-out-loud hilarious. As the child carries the house on his head, his neighbor leans out the window, commenting, simply: "Floyd?" Then there is the incongruity between expectation and reality. When he retrieves a ladder, firemen, and finally a saw, readers will surely expect climbing or cutting, but no. Everything gets pitched up, including the light bulb that hovers over the child's head, just before he achieves success. The tree, which continually changes color (and therefore, mood), is a dense, scribbled, layered specimen, perfect for harboring the odd assemblage. The text appears to be hand-lettered, as if written by a youngster. In concert with the quirky, mixed-media caricatures, supported by stick legs, it yields a childlike aesthetic sure to tickle the funny bones of its target audience-and of the adults who share the story with youngsters.-Wendy Lukehart, Washington DC Public Library

Copyright 2011 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

From Booklist

December 1, 2011
Preschool-G Floyd's kite is stuck in a tree, so to try to knock it down, he throws up first one shoe and then another. Stuck and stuck. Gradually, he throws increasingly large and unlikely objects at the tree to try to retrieve his kiteall to no availand when a fireman stops to offer assistance, Floyd throws him and the fire truck up, too. In the end, Floyd has an epiphany that releases the kite, but he fears that he is still forgetting something. With smooth pacing, Jeffers organizes the action into theatrical scenes, more than once suggesting the climax only to snatch it away and hurl ever more stuff into the burgeoning treetop. The humor is well calibrated to its intended young audience, who will happily grab at the red herrings and delight at the subsequent surprise turns. Jeffers' scribbly gestures and buoyant composition set a tone of whimsical hysteria, while the color palette reflects Floyd's alternating industry and frustration. With deceptive simplicity and sophisticated illustration, this comic look at problem solving will have wide appeal.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)

From Kirkus

Starred review from October 15, 2011
Everything but the kitchen sink gets tossed up a tree to help Floyd retrieve his kite--oops, there goes the kitchen sink too! Floyd has one approach, and one approach only, to kite recovery: Throw something up to knock the kite down. He flings up a bucket of paint, the milkman, real trucks, a full-size lighthouse and "a curious whale, in the wrong place at the wrong time." Everything sticks. Jeffers' light-handed illustrations are hilariously droll. Some pages symbolize mood with a single color, boy and tree both murky brown with irritation or red with frustration. The text is handwritten in a childish yet legible scrawl, with liberal use of uppercase letters. The comically deadpan narration never overtells, moving straight from "Floyd fetched Mitch" (a cat) to "Cats get stuck in trees all the time, but this was getting ridiculous." Sometimes Floyd verges on solutions, but he always lapses into the familiar pattern: "Floyd fetched a ladder. He was going to sort this out once and for all… / … and up he threw it. / I'm sure you can guess what happened." Finally, Floyd fetches a saw, holds the blade carefully against the tree trunk--"and hurled it up the tree." The giggle-inducing conclusion leaves some stuff, um, up in the air. Floyd's stubbornness and the smorgasbord-filled tree remain funny through repeated readings, offering kids the special glee of knowing more than the protagonist. (Picture book. 3-6)

(COPYRIGHT (2011) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

From Publisher's Weekly

October 10, 2011
In an exuberantly absurd tale that recalls the old woman who swallowed a fly, a boy named Floyd goes to ridiculous lengths to remove his kite from a tree. Floyd tosses his sneakers, then his cat, into the leafy branches, and when they get stuck, too, he fetches a ladder. "He was going to sort this out once and for all... and up he threw it. I'm sure you can guess what happened." Each spread pictures Floyd pitching another item into the tree and growing increasingly frustrated: a bike, a kitchen sink, the milkman, a fire truck, and "a curious whale, in the wrong place at the wrong time... and they all got stuck." Jeffers (The Incredible Book Eating Boy) pictures the extravagant accumulation in abstract pencil-and-gouache doodles, with hand-lettered text to set a conversational tone. The tall, narrow format reinforces the tree's height in comparison to small, stick-figure Floyd. Jeffers's droll resolutionâ€"the kite comes down, although afterward Floyd "could have sworn there was something he was forgetting"â€"is testament to the boy's single-mindedness and the chaos he leaves in his wake. Ages 3—5.