Coyote Moon

Starred review from June 13, 2016
Quietly poetic text and show-stopping artwork create a tense account of a coyote's nocturnal search for food. Gianferrari (the Penny & Jelly books) instantly establishes an atmospheric setting, opening as "Coyote wakes in her den,/ a hollowed-out pine in a cemetery." Ibatoulline's paintings, always impressive, are downright astonishing in this book. He opts for a worm's-eye view in this opening scene, showing Coyote padding along as tombstones loom beside scraggly pines, moonlight filtering eerily through cloud cover. Paying near-photographic attention to the modulating light as daybreak approaches, as well as Coyote's feathery fur and the suburban neighborhood she prowls, Ibatoulline (A Little Women Christmas) follows the predator's failed attempts to secure a mouse, rabbit, and geese eggsâincluding a dramatic, startling "pounce!" sceneâbefore finally capturing a turkey to feed her family. Structured like verse, Gianferrari's crisp sentences are simultaneously graceful and matter-of-fact in their observations ("Coyote threads through rusty reeds"), and a closing section of "coyote facts" goes into greater detail about how and where the canines live. Ages 4â8. Author's agent: Ammi-Joan Paquette, Erin Murphy Literary. Illustrator's agency: Gallt and Zacker Literary.

Starred review from June 1, 2016
By the light of the moon, a coyote quietly prowls through a suburban neighborhood, hunting for food for her family.This simple, lyrical text stresses the senses: Coyote listens, she sniffs, she looks. Short sentences and long pauses, indicated by page turns, mirror the animal's stealthy progress and sudden attacks. Ibatouilline's shadowy paintings enhance the tension. Each detail of fur, feathers, and foliage is clearly delineated, yet almost all the action takes place in the near-dark. Finally, just as the sun comes up, Coyote successfully takes a turkey. Watched through the window by a curly-haired, light-brown-skinned child, the hunter sings, "Yeeeep-yip-yip-yoooo!" Two pages of "Coyote Facts" at the end offer further information about these wolflike predators' ubiquity and flexibility in food habits and habitat and suggest further reading and websites. The dark illustrations and potentially upsetting subject matter make this title more suited for lap-sharing than storytime, but the author and illustrator have handled the predator-prey encounters sensitively. A striking double-page spread shows the coyote leaping on a mouse--"POUNCE!"--but the mouse escapes. The turkey's feathers obscure his final moments in the coyote's mouth. Even collections that include Cheryl Blackford and Laurie Caple's Hungry Coyote (2015) will want these incredible illustrations. "Yip-yip-yip-yip!" indeed, for this sympathetic portrayal of a not-often-celebrated creature who shares our world. (Informational picture book. 4-8)

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Starred review from July 1, 2016

K-Gr 2-A captivating and atmospheric title about a mother coyote on the hunt through a suburban landscape. Readers join the coyote as she leaves her pups in the den and travels through a neighborhood, a golf course, and a lakeside-all in pursuit of a mouse, a flock of geese, a rabbit, and, finally, one unfortunate turkey. The text is spare, with a focus on the coyote's movement and use of her senses: she listens to the scratching of the mouse, sniffs the air and smells the geese, lunges, slinks, pounces, and much more. With the arrival of the sun and the success of her hunt, the coyote lets out a celebratory "Yeeeep-yip-yip-yoooo" before heading back to feed and snuggle with her young. Readers looking for straightforward facts won't find them within the text; the dynamic and richly detailed illustrations are what tell the story here. Ibatoulline uses color, shadow, and dramatic angles to portray the coyote's athleticism, her hunting style, the flight response of her prey, and the passage of time (the narrative begins at night and ends with dawn). Back matter expands on the coyote's origin in the United States and its habitat, territory, diet, physical abilities, communication, and family structure. VERDICT Simple text and remarkable artwork make this a great selection for read-alouds and parent-child bonding.-Kelly Topita, Anne Arundel County Public Library, MD

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