Look Up!

April 1, 2024
Grades K-3 A pigeon in New Orleans named Fontaine organizes the other birds in a fight against cell phone overuse in this comic urban fable. Although the author does not make this explicit, the pigeon seems to be named after Jean de La Fontaine, the famous seventeenth-century French poet and author of animal fables. The opening, in which people in a crowded street scene are all looking down at their phones, is followed by a bird's-eye view of the downturned heads. Fontaine and the other birds on the power line are disgusted by the way humans ignore their surroundings. An emergency avian meeting leads to a dive-bombing campaign, during which bird droppings cause people to drop their phones. The color-washed illustrations have a vintage look, and sharp angles of perspective and unusual page layouts emphasize that something very strange is happening. By book's end, people realize they've been watching their screens rather than living their lives, and they gather outside to listen to music and visit. Phone addicts may heed the targeted message.

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April 29, 2024
Avian allies find an inventive way to disrupt screen time in this uneven picture book. On the streets of New Orleans, “Everyone was looking down.// All around, faces faced the ground,” and when humans try to look up, “RING DING BUZZ/ their heads got stuck” in their devices. From the power lines above, roosting birds, many wearing human accessories, wonder “what happened to the world they loved.” Change is soon on the wing when pigeon Fontaine, who sports an orange beanie, “got so tired of all the insanity./ He dreamed up all the ways/ he could wake up humanity.” He soon enlists the other birds, and the group determines that “each time one of them saw a screen,/ they all let loose/ a natural stream.” Following Fontaine’s cry of “VIVA LA REVOLUTION!” the birds nail their targets until a child suggests, “I think these birds want us to give these phones a rest.” Verse lines by Gondolfi don’t always scan in this lengthy work of fowl play, but Romanick’s fluid, black-lined illustrations lend a street-smart tone to the cautionary tale. Humans are portrayed with various body types and skin tones. Ages 5–7.

June 1, 2024

Gr 1-3-The kids will not see this coming. Start the story hour with any of Mo Willems's "Pigeon" books, then show them what pigeons can really do-especially when they collaborate. Fontaine, the pigeon, is dismayed by the hordes of people below his perch staring into their screens and ignoring the fabulous teeming life all around them. Fontaine "got so tired of all the insanity. He dreamed up all the ways he could wake up humanity." It's actually just one way: He organizes all the other pigeons to do what they do best-perfect for gross-out loving children-in a targeted effort to take out the screens, one by one. The gloppy mess they fire, with astonishing accuracy, makes one person suggest that perhaps the birds are trying to tell them something. Lesson learned, and there is dancing in the streets. This tale is told in Gondolfi's casual rhyming text; the goal is not perfect scansion but the compelling idea, its execution, and the revolution itself. Romanick's art offers many hilarious moments, with a diverse street crew, a wide array of birds/comrades, and suspense as the first "bomb" is dropped. VERDICT Pure silliness, this is sure to be popular with the early elementary set.-Ginnie Abbott

Copyright 2024 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

August 1, 2024
Poo on you! Literally. Fontaine the pigeon is fed up with screen-obsessed humans' obliviousness to the world, so he convenes a meeting of the birds. Their unanimous decision: Drop poo on malefactors who glance down at their phones. "Targets" will be forced to look up after bombardment! Following the first "hit," a mother quickly glances up, curious about "that bizarre scream," because Fontaine has issued a battle cry--"VIVA LA REVOLUTION!" No screen remains untouched because, when someone glances down, "a glob of bird poop" knocks their phone to the ground. Finally, a child says, "I think these birds want us to give these phones a rest." Everyone realizes they've forgotten nature, the importance of using their words--and each other. The moral: Thank the birds, and "when you are outside, keep your phone in your pocket...and your eyes up and wide." Children will giggle at this tongue-in-cheek rhyming tale, set in New Orleans, and will hopefully get the point, which applies to adults, too: Screen time should be minimized and engaging with the world optimized. While the consequences outlined here are mined for exaggerated humor, this serious idea should spark conversations. The colorful, graphic novel-like illustrations are appealing and incorporate creative typefaces and speech bubbles; human characters are diverse. Much-needed encouragement to look up and see the world!(Picture book. 5-8)

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