32 Pages

My name is Donna McKinnon. I live in a cold, northern city and I spend a lot of time in bookstores trying to stay warm. In fact, I used to work in an independent bookstore where I fed my passion for beautifully illustrated children’s picture books and poverty.

Recent Blog Posts

The Rock from the Sky
Posted
The Rock from the Sky is loopy, seriously loopy, and it is Jon Klassen’s best book.     With his usual, but elevated signature qualities – the desert dry humour, the entirely original and occasionally subversive storytelling, the shifty-eyed critters – The Rock from the Sky is...
Published at 32 Pages
King Mouse
Posted
A few months ago, when I first saw an illustration from King Mouse, the new book by Cary Fagan and Dena Seiferling, I knew it would be one of the most beautiful books published this, or any year. In that one illustration of a tiny, pointy-nosed mouse sporting a crown, I was immediately transporte...
Published at 32 Pages
Nobody Hugs a Cactus
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Many years ago, a former boss gave everyone on her team a cactus just before the Christmas break. It was an unusually pointy gift, and my suspicion about its inherent symbolism was confirmed a year later, when we all received knock-off Swiss army knives. Stay away – I am prickly. The fact t...
Published at 32 Pages
The Honeybee
Posted
  I love bees. I may have begun another bee book post this way, but the sentiment remains true. I love bees, and I love books about bees. The Honeybee by Kirsten Hall and Canadian illustrator Isabelle Arsenault would make me fall in love with bees even if – gasp – I hated bees. Instead, this...
Published at 32 Pages
A Perfect Day
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I bought this book for the bear. That was enough. The bear with the corn-cob grin. I remember when A Perfect Day was announced in 2016. I said, this will be my favourite book of 2017. I can’t say whether this will prove to be true, but I can say this – the illustration of […]
Published at 32 Pages
Um…yeah.
Posted
So I’ve been away from this blog for…I’m afraid to count the days. Months? No solid explanation other than life. Busy, busy life. I aim to do better. I want to do better. Children’s picture books mean everything to me (as does hyperbole), and just because I’ve tempor...
Published at 32 Pages
Rutherford the Time-Travelling Moose
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  “I rhyme/To see myself, to set the darkness echoing.” – Seamus Heaney, Personal Helicon Heaney’s statement, about the act of writing, also resonates for me as a reader. We read to see ourselves – to illuminate our present and our past – to set the darkness echoing. ...
Published at 32 Pages
Marguerite’s Christmas
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  Marguerite’s Christmas isn’t for everyone. The story of a fragile, elderly woman alone on Christmas Eve will leave some wondering if this is appropriate subject matter for children. Others will wonder if its appropriate subject matter for adults, given its juvenile format. But it is a book...
Published at 32 Pages
The Most Amazing Creature in the Sea
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When Brenda Z. Guiberson met Gennady Spirin, the picture book gods and godettes smiled. Since their original collaboration Life in the Boreal Forest, the talented twosome have been creating THE most beautiful, non-fiction picture books around. It’s not possible to pick a favourite, although...
Published at 32 Pages
The Dark Art of Halloween (updated for 2015)
Posted
October is but a mere few hours away from November’s hostile takeover and I’ve yet to post reviews of new Halloween books for 2015, mostly because I have only one. I’m sure there are more, but I’ve been bereft in my picture book trolling. Nevertheless, Leo: A Ghost Story i...
Published at 32 Pages