Big Truck, Little Island

January 1, 2022
This story of cooperative problem-solving begins on a crystal-clear summer day as a massive tractor trailer is delivered via barge and tugboat to a small coastal island. Van Dusen's dynamic color-saturated gouache illustrations capture the excitement of the out-of-the-ordinary event, with varying gull's-eye and on-the-ground views. The real drama, however, happens soon after the truck takes to the island's main road: at one particularly tight curve, it jack-knifes, completely blocking the road. (Readers witness the accident, first from inside the cab along with the cartoonily shocked driver, and then harrowingly from the side of the road within inches of the gigantic wheels.) The blocked road is a problem for the four cars in a hurry (two headed north, two south) that can't move around the truck. Van Dusen is in full command of his rhyming text, using rhythm and sound to set the pace and convey mood. His expressive characters add humor to the situation. While the grownups in the cars "stew and steam," the four kid passengers come up with a genius solution -- temporarily trading cars -- that's a testament to island ingenuity and neighborliness. Everyone gets where they need to be -- including the truck with its mysterious load, which is later revealed on a festive nighttime double-page spread. In his author's note, Van Dusen tells the real story about a truck accident on a Maine island: "I changed a few of the details and added some new fictional characters, �but] this is overall a true story." And it's one that is given life by a skillful storyteller.

(Copyright 2022 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

Starred review from May 1, 2022
This story of cooperative problem-solving begins on a crystal-clear summer day as a massive tractor trailer is delivered via barge and tugboat to a small coastal island. Van Dusen's dynamic color-saturated gouache illustrations capture the excitement of the out-of-the-ordinary event, with varying gull's-eye and on-the-ground views. The real drama, however, happens soon after the truck takes to the island's main road: at one particularly tight curve, it jack-knifes, completely blocking the road. (Readers witness the accident, first from inside the cab along with the cartoonily shocked driver, and then harrowingly from the side of the road within inches of the gigantic wheels.) The blocked road is a problem for the four cars in a hurry (two headed north, two south) that can't move around the truck. Van Dusen is in full command of his rhyming text, using rhythm and sound to set the pace and convey mood. His expressive characters add humor to the situation. While the grownups in the cars "stew and steam," the four kid passengers come up with a genius solution -- temporarily trading cars -- that's a testament to island ingenuity and neighborliness. Everyone gets where they need to be -- including the truck with its mysterious load, which is later revealed on a festive nighttime double-page spread. In his author's note, Van Dusen tells the real story about a truck accident on a Maine island: "I changed a few of the details and added some new fictional characters, [but] this is overall a true story." And it's one that is given life by a skillful storyteller. Kitty Flynn

(Copyright 2022 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

April 15, 2022
Grades K-2 Spinning a tale based on a real incident that occurred on the island town of Vinalhaven in Maine, Van Dusen portrays what happens when a really big flatbed truck carrying a mysterious, covered load across a small island gets stuck on a tight curve and blocks traffic in both directions. In shiny, lightly caricatured scenes, he opens with the truck wheeling off its barge and a detailed aerial view of the island. Then he peeks inside the stopped cars, each of which contains a child who needs to be somewhere: "Barry was already late for ballet. / He needed to practice his battement frapp�." As the driver (and readers) look on in amazement, the island residents get together and decide to switch cars temporarily. Everyone gets where they're going, an outsize tow truck later rolls up to clear the road, and the author saves a final bright surprise for those wondering what was under that humongous tarp. A salutary case study in how trust and cooperation can turn a big problem into no problem.

COPYRIGHT(2022) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Starred review from May 15, 2022
Island residents in Maine figure out a novel, neighborly solution to a traffic jam caused by a large stuck vehicle. A big truck and trailer are carried across the water on a barge to a small Maine island. There, on its way up a curving, narrow road, the truck loses its grip on the road, its wheels stuck in mud. This creates a problem: Cars on each side can't get through to their destinations. Kids carried in those cars are missing swim meets, ballet practice, and school projects, among other appointments. The solution is simple if the residents, who are racially diverse, trust one another: Swapping cars allows the families on either side to get to their destinations. Eventually, the truck is rescued, delivering its precious cargo to the town: all the parts needed to make a carnival. Van Dusen reveals in an author's note that the book is based on a real story he heard about that took place in the island town of Vinalhaven. Told in verse, the narrative, which seems at first to simply be about a truck's glacial journey to its destination, turns out to be an excellent lesson in kindness and problem-solving. The alternative wouldn't have been so bad; Van Dusen's sun-drenched images of the truck making its way across the reach are stunning, as are the overhead views of the town, with its postcard-perfect farmhouses and tree-lined cliffs. It makes Maine a place readers will want to visit, just not in a truck that might struggle on narrow curves. (This book was reviewed digitally.) A perfect little slice of life with a unique take on kindness and compromise. (Picture book. 3-7)

COPYRIGHT(2022) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Starred review from February 21, 2022
In his signature art style, Van Dusen (the Mercy Watson series) opens with an expansive bird’s-eye spread of a tugboat headed across a northerly bay on “one bright summer day.” Readers can almost taste the salt air as the tug hauls a barge, on which sits a semi with an “extra large” covered load, to the titular island. Once on land, the driver “came to a switchback, terribly tight,/ then felt the whole payload shift off to his right,” blocking the island’s single road and necessitating a rescue. But instead of focusing on extracting the jackknifed truck, Van Dusen turns his attention to the island’s residents: four children of various skin tones stuck in vehicles on either side of the semi. Blocked from getting to their respective outings, and noting that the adults seem more frustrated than action-oriented, the kids briskly confer, and then “quickly decided, as friends, what to do”: “Listen,” one says, “let’s all exchange cars./ We’ll borrow yours, and then you borrow ours.” The crisply rhyming, economic text underscores both the protagonists’ cut-to-the-chase ingenuity and the story’s deftly delivered core message: when community and trust run deep, life’s inevitable obstacles are a lot easier to work around. An author’s note details the story’s origins on Vinalhaven, Maine. Ages 3–7.