I Can Open It for You

July 1, 2023

Baby-Toddler-One day while home, Akira goes to open a chocolate package. He has a hard time opening it. He feels defeated and goes to his mom to open it for him. Akira in thought begins envisioning getting older one day, where he will be able to open anything he wants. He begins imagining becoming a special person who can open anything for anyone. The illustrations depict Akira opening safes, a sewer grate to retrieve a lost key, stone age rocks; he finds dinosaur bones, stops robberies, and even opens things in space with his magical star opener. This quirky, inspiring book teaches children that they can do anything as they grow up; it also shows a beautiful loving interaction between parents and child. Yoshitake has great sense for kid-friendly comedy; in one scene, Akira comes upon a housing complex where people are sleeping or on the toilet, perhaps not expecting their doors to be opened. VERDICT A great addition to the children's collection.-Annmarie Braithwaite

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Starred review from July 24, 2023
In another lucidly conceived flight of imagination, Yoshitake (I Can Be Anything) considers the power to open things—an act that’s often, due to packaging or supervision, denied to young children. The narrator, clad in red overalls, grimaces and scowls while wrestling with the foil wrapper around a piece of chocolate before taking it to their mother, who opens it with a practiced flick of the fingers. “When I get a little bit bigger... I’ll be able to open anything,” the child muses, and the book is off to the races, pushing the notion of opening powers into the zone of the improbable. The now-powerful child runs down a queue of people of all ages who need assistance, and several spreads show bottles, tins, and packages opening one by one, accompanied by onomatopoeia rendered skillfully by translator Wilcut: “phssst” “shwoop” “shwifft.” More momentous events follow as the child brandishes a star-tipped wand, opening a bank safe, a rock revealing a giant fossil, a scary costume (unveiling the human inside, the better to reassure a crying child), an entire house, and more. The diagram-like clarity of Yoshitake’s line drawings contributes a distinctive pleasure to this humorous small-scale superhero adventure about personal autonomy and growing up. Characters read as East Asian. Ages 3–5.

Starred review from August 1, 2023
Preschool-Grade 1 *Starred Review* Akira is small, and though he'd love to be able to open any package, jar, or box by himself, he often needs the help of an adult. The child's frustration leads him to dream, "When I'm just a little bit bigger, I'll start a business opening all kinds of things." Freeing wild animals from cages, opening a locked safe, and exposing a thief by unlatching a suitcase filled with stolen jewels are just a few of ways the young boy, imagining using a magic wand, plans to open things when he's older. Until the boy is bigger, though, his father promises to work with him to open a variety of items. Onomatopoeia plays a major role here, as the sound effects of opening a multitude of containers make up the entirety of the entertaining text on some pages. Yoshitake presents simple pictures on plain white backgrounds, allowing the cheerful colors to stand out. The bright spot illustrations will easily keep the attention of young readers. The tale ends on a high note as little Akira discovers there is something he's able to open all by himself that brings joy to others. Young readers will empathize with his dilemma as they witness one of the frustrations of being small.

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Starred review from October 1, 2023
A frustrated child dreams of the day when opening packages and jars won't be so hard. Here's a theme to which any young person, and plenty who aren't that young, can relate. Defeated after mighty, comical struggles with a small snack package that Mom tears open without apparent effort, an overalled tyke dreams of a time when--TA-DA!--the child, too, will be able to open anything with ease. Yoshitake festoons the simple cartoon illustrations with dozens of visualized items, from familiar bottles and cans to a heavy safe, a thief's suitcase, a cage full of wild animals, a self-important grown-up's zippered fly, and even a house and a whole planet...all of which will flip open like magic with an appropriate "blurp," "phssst," or "shwifft" someday. Until then, Dad promises, he will help, and together they'll open all sorts of things--something he's happy to do because, as the child becomes more independent, Dad won't be needed as much. "But I'm still small, and can't open anything yet." Oh, that's not true, responds Dad, who invites the little one to hold a cookie in front of his face. Young audiences will share the child's delighted "Oh!" at the result: "I opened your mouth!" (And, as a silent final image reveals, the trick works with Mom, too.) The characters have skin the white of the page and brown hair. Cozy, droll, perfect. (Picture book. 3-6)

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