Big red lollipop /

IT'S not just any big red lollipop. It's the biggest, sweetest treat in the first take-home goodie bag from the first birthday party Rubina has ever attended. That makes it a treasure to have and hold as long as possible - well, overnight in the fridge, anyway, for enjoying the next morning, after a night of happy dreams. Rubina is new to birthday parties because her family is new to North America (the author's bio for Rukhsana Khan, who immigrated to Canada from Pakistan at 3, lets us know she has some of her material first hand). Rubina's mom, her ami, isn't clear on the concept at first. "Ami says, 'What's a birthday party?' 'It's when they celebrate the day they were born.' 'Why do they do that?' 'They just do! Can I go?' " Yes, Ami says, but only if Rubina takes her little sister Sana too. Sana wants to go, and is throwing a fit. This is a problem: Sana wasn't invited. Rubina is mortified at having to call her host to ask for a second invitation. She knows this will be considered weird. Ami has no idea. It gets worse at the party. Whiny Sana has to win every game, and wails when she falls during musical chairs. But it's Rubina who feels like the odd girl out - the only guest with a sibling attached. After the party, Sana immediately plunders her goodie bag. The lollipop she wolfs in the car; the toys she breaks by bedtime. In the morning, she finds Rubina's lollipop and devours most of that, too, leaving a sorry little triangle on a stick. The sisterly battle now reaches its peak of fury, though the book saves the real emotional punch for the ending, which closes the story on a note of forgiveness and unexpected grace. I smiled at the reversal of fortune; so will you. "Big Red Lollipop" is a delight, a simple story with considerable depth. Young readers will recognize some universal truths: the brattiness of young siblings, the great unfairness that birth order wreaks on the world. They will also see truthfully rendered social awkwardness, and learn something of the uneasy spot in which young children of immigrants often find themselves, obliged to obey their parents while also instructing them in the mysterious ways of their adopted land. Khan has an ideal collaborator in Sophie Blackall, whose Chinese ink-and-watercolor drawings convey exquisite detail and precise emotion. Like all the best picture books, "Big Red Lollipop" amply rewards close examination. Look at Rubina's slumped shoulders at the news that Sana is tagging along to her party: they are a definitive depiction of preadolescent dismay. Rubina, with her tidy ponytail, is all responsibility and deferred gratification. Sana is the untamed middle one, her hair a Ramona mop, sprawled asleep beside her goodie-bag rubble. ANOTHER fine picture book about siblings braving new surroundings, set in a world that young readers will find both familiar and strange, is "Busing Brewster," by Richard Michelson. Its collage, ink and watercolor illustrations, by R. G. Roth, call to mind Ezra Jack Keats, but with their own distinctive look and emotional power. Brewster is a black child growing up in a segregated city neighborhood in the early 1970s. He climbs on chain-link fences and swings a stick to be like Hammerin' Hank Aaron. He is not dreaming of a way out, only of starting first grade next year with Miss Evelyn, a teacher who is either mean and demanding or nice, depending on whether it's his older brother or mother talking. But Brewster is not going to find out which it is, because his mother just told him he and his brother are going to a new school, an hour's bus ride away. Brewster's brother angrily punches his pillow all night. "Central's the white school," he says. "I ain't waking up at 6." Their mother stresses the positive. "'Don't you worry, Brewster,' she tells me. 'You're going to like Central. They've got rooms for art and music and a roof that doesn't leak. There's even a swimming pool inside the building and a real library bursting full of books.' " She's right, but first the boys have to get there. On their first day, a rock shatters their school-bus window. A white kid they nickname Freckle-face greets them with insults and a shove, prompting a confrontation that lands them all in detention, in the library. Here Brewster meets Miss O'Grady, the librarian, who, like Brewster's mother, tells him he can be anything he wants - even president. The book, written before Barack Obama's ascent, includes a helpful note at the end on what busing and segregation were all about, evenhandedly describing busing as a imperfect solution to an intractable problem. I loved the illustrations in "Busing Brewster": the '70s clothes and hairstyles and other sly period references, like the inside-cover images of a librarian's rubber checkout stamp. I loved even more its understated honesty, the way it introduces violence without melodrama, and avoids the easy ending. Busing is an opportunity. It is also a pain. No one is immediately converted away from racism and prejudice, but the book does not reject the possibility of redemption - even for Freckle-face. Recent news accounts suggest that some parents have lost faith in the picture book. "Big Red Lollipop" and "Busing Brewster" could change their minds. To say these books offer timely insights on immigration and segregation is accurate, but that loads them down with off-putting significance. The stories of Rubina and Brewster, told with simplicity and subtlety, ring bright and true. Lawrence Downes is an editorial writer for The Times.

*Starred Review* Siblings everywhere will see themselves in this story, even though it is rooted in the experience of an immigrant family. Rubina is invited to a birthday party, and her little sister Sana screams, I wanna go too! Their mother, Ami, insists that Sana be taken along, despite Rubina's vigorous protests, and the party turns out as badly as Rubina worries it will. To add insult to injury, after eating the lollipop in her goody bag, Sana almost finishes off Rubina's. When Sana comes home with her own invitation to a birthday party, their littlest sister wants to attend, and now it's Sana's turn to protest. But fair is fair, Ami decrees. In a clever turnaround, Rubina, though sorely tempted to let Sana suffer the embarrassment she did, persuades their mother to let Sana go alone. Khan is of Pakistani descent, and this tale of clashing cultural customs is based on an incident from her childhood. The story (and its lesson) comes to life in Blackall's spot-on illustrations, which focus on the family, their expressions, and body language. Though the sisters wear western clothes, Ami dresses in more traditional garb, a subtle reminder of how assimilation is transformed from generation to generation. At its heart, though, this is an honest, even moving, commentary on sisterly relationships, and the final rapprochement is as sweet as the lollipop Sana offers Rubina.--Cooper, Ilene Copyright 2010 Booklist

Khan (Silly Chicken) delivers another astute and moving story, ostensibly dealing with sibling rivalry, but actually about hard-won lessons emerging from clashes of identity and assimilation. When Rubina receives her first invitation to a birthday party, her mother, who readers are left to infer is an immigrant, is first perplexed ("What's a birthday party?... Why do they do that?"), then insistent that Rubina take her annoying younger sister along, even though Rubina pleads, "They don't do that here!" The result, in Khan's characteristically direct prose, is devastating: "I don't get any invitations for a really long time," says Rubina, and Blackall's (Wombat Walkabout) subtly textured ink portrait shows every nuance of the girl's sense of social failure. But Khan's remarkable gift for balancing emotional honesty and empathy, and her keen understanding of family dynamics, keeps defeatism from swamping the book. Rubina turns her experience into wisdom and gains her mother's respect as a mediator between cultures. It's an ending worthy of a novella, and once again signals that Khan is one of the most original voices working in picture books today. Ages 4-up. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Gr 2-4-This sibling-rivalry story compares well with Kevin Henkes's Sheila Rae's Peppermint Stick (HarperCollins, 2001). When Rubina comes home with a birthday-party invitation, her mother asks why people celebrate birthdays, as her culture does not, and insists that Rubina take her little sister along despite the older child's insistence that "they don't do that here." Sana is a brat par excellence at the party and steals Rubina's candy. It's a long time before Rubina is invited to another one. Expert pacing takes readers to the day when Sana is invited to her first party. Whereas the embarrassing scenario could be repeated with the girls' younger sister, Rubina convinces her mother to reconsider, and Sana is allowed to go solo. The beauty of the muted tones and spareness of the illustrations allow readers to feel the small conflicts in the text. The stylistic scattering of East Indian motifs from bedspread designs to clothing communicate the cultural richness of the family's home life while the aerial views, especially the rooms through which the siblings chase each other, are priceless. The book is a thoughtful springboard for discussion of different birthday traditions and gorgeous to the eye.-Sara Lissa Paulson, American Sign Language and English Lower School PS 347, New York City (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

When Rubina is invited to a birthday party, her sister Sana wants to go. Their Pakistani mother doesn't understand American party customs and insists that Sana tag along. When Sana receives an invitation of her own, the tables are turned: the girls' baby sister demands to go too. The expressive illustrations bring this simple sibling rivalry/immigrant story to life. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.

Dynamic visual design distinguishes this tale of sibling conflict in an immigrant family. Running home from school, Rubina tells Ami (mom) the thrilling news of a birthday-party invitation. This concept's new to Ami, but the real problem is younger sister Sana, who demands to attend as well. Ami agrees. Pouting all the way, Rubina takes Sana, who not only disrupts the games but eats both her own and Rubina's big red lollipop party favor. Blackall's peppy watercolor-and-pencil illustrations hum with vibrancy and a wonderful sense of children in constant motion. Every page shows fresh composition and scale. When the justifiably resentful Rubina chases Sana around the house, the pair of wee figures shows up eight times on that spread, racing from spot to spot like Hilary Knight's Eloise. Then Sana receives an invitation herself and Ami almost makes her take even-younger sister Maryam alongbut Rubina's intervention prevents that, and Sana brings Rubina a big green lollipop in gratitude. They're friends now, though it's unknown whether the invitations that Rubina stopped receiving due to Sana's antics ever recommence. Charming and spirited. (Picture book. 3-5) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.