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Summary:
In this thought-provoking
tale reminiscent of Seuss, Farmer McPhee finds a red lemon in
his orchard and cries, "It's red as a stop sign! It's red
as a rose! I can't have red lemons where yellow fruit grows!
Imagine a world where lemonade's red? Where once-yellow cupcakes
are crimson instead?" As he tosses the red lemon across
the water, he can't imagine that it will land on a small island,
sprout a seed, and someday bring forth an orchard of lemon trees...where
people will travel to from all over, to try the red lemons that
are "six times as sweet!"
 Sample image from book (above)
The New
York Times Book Review:
 It's good to be different. That's true in science
and art, and it's the message at the heart of Bob Staake's latest
book, "The Red Lemon." His other works include the
goofy "Hello, Robots" and the comically dark, decidedly
not-for-kids picture book "Struwwelpeter and Other Disturbing
Yet Cautionary Tales by Heinrich Hoffmann." "The Red
Lemon" lacks the grotesqueness of "Struwwelpeter"
(no burning flesh in this one), but the illustrations share a
bright, funny and relentlessly geometrical style.
"The Red
Lemon" tells the tale of jolly Farmer McPhee, a perfectionist
who one day finds a red lemon, a freak of nature, in his pristine
orchard. He hurls the offending fruit onto a nearby deserted
island. Little does McPhee know that he has just planted the
seed that, long after his own orchard has gone to weed, will
be the foundation for the thriving tourist destination Red Lemon
Island. We see the island 200 years in the future, complete with
its own Air Red airline and Bitter End discothèque. Young
children will enjoy the bouncy, rhyming prose, as when a horrified
McPhee exclaims, "When people bite into a fruit that they
chew, they count on it being the right-colored hue!"
But Staake's
quirky and engaging art is the book's true protagonist. Staake
portrays two worlds: McPhee's simple, orderly farm and the funky,
futuristic Red Lemon Island. McPhee's realm is built almost entirely
from symmetrical shapes - circles for his roly-poly body and
for each tree in his vast orchard, and rectangles for his boxes
of perfect fruit. Most images of the lemon trees are symmetrically
divided with a different shade of green on each side. Busy darker
green swirls inside the trees provide dimension. By contrast,
the island is a hip, angular metropolis; though its inhabitants
still have impossibly circular heads, their bodies are stylishly
lithe and always on the go. Where McPhee lived a simple life
among circles and right angles, the island is exploding with
colorful buildings squished and stretched into unlikely distortions.
For readers
who doubt the artistic advantages of the digital medium, it's
time to reconsider. Staake's entertaining Web site, BobStaake.com,
reveals some of his trade secrets. Working digitally, he can
adjust background shading or produce a grove of identical lemon
trees with a few clicks of the mouse. (The same lemon tree even
made a sneaky appearance in "Hello, Robots.") The effect
is an über-orchard of flawless fruit as far as the eye can
see.
"The Red
Lemon" is a buoyant read reminiscent of Dr. Seuss, but with
a modern panache. The sad part, of course, is McPhee's short-sightedness
in tossing the odd lemon away. But perhaps the uncomplicated
McPhee would not have liked a red-lemon world so much anyway.
Publishers
Weekly:
A perfectly
rotund farmer sings the praises of his latest lemon crop: "There's
nothing like lemons./ This fruit isn't mellow./ They're tangy!/
They're tasty!/ They're tart / and soooooo/ yellow!" In
these pages, Saake's (Hello, Robots) retro-style graphics exude
giddy happiness: Farmer McPhee bounces about his orchard in a
state of exhilaration. In his comically manic reveries, he imagines
all the delicious things his lemons will be used to make. ("Lemons
for sherbet and lemons for pie!/ Lemons for drinks on the Fourth
of July!") Children should get a kick out of seeing how
Saake manipulates simple shapes into cool, cartoon-like images.
But the story takes a darker turn when McPhee spies something
shocking in one of his trees: a single red lemon. "I can't
have red lemons/ where yellow fruit grows!" fumes McPhee,
as Staake covers the scene with a wash of smoldering red. He
hurls the red fruit into the ocean, where it lands on a deserted
island, germinates and, after a few centuries (the passage of
time is symbolized by a vaguely disturbing, post-apocalyptic-looking
view of the orchard), the produce from the red lemon orchard
becomes a sought-after gastronomic treat. One man's lemon is
another's lemonade? The moral may pass over youngsters' heads,
but the pictures will keep them enthralled. Ages 4-8.
School Library
Journal:
Farmer McPhee
delights in his grove of lemon trees. Each perfect lemon is tasty,
tart, and, most importantly, yellow. His pride fairly bursts
off the page, as does his outrage when he discovers a red lemon
on one of his trees. He cannot imagine a world in which lemonade
is red and cupcakes are crimson. In a fit of anger, he hurls
the offending fruit across the sea to a distant island. Two hundred
years pass and McPhee's prized lemon tree groves are replaced
by weeds. But on the island, a vibrant city has grown up around
a grove of red lemon trees. As it turns out, these lemons are
six times sweeter than yellow ones, and now people travel across
oceans and seas to get them. Bold, enticing illustrations dominate
the pages. Staake creates a fun, dynamic world reminiscent of
Dr. Seuss's in its sweeping arcs, bright colors, multicolored
cartoon people, and effortlessly rhyming text. The circles used
to create Farmer McPhee and his trees give the book a polished,
graphic-arts feel.
Kirkus Reviews:
Wildly colorful
pages filled with geometrically shaped figures tell the tale
of Farmer McPhee and his lemon orchards. The rhyming story begins
conventionally, with an ode to tart, yellow lemons and their
many delicious uses. One day Farmer McPhee, as round as his trees,
is shocked to spy a red lemon. Imagining terrible havoc created
by a differently colored lemon, McPhee quickly throws it over
to an island. Two hundred years pass. The farmer's land is gray,
sere and empty. Meanwhile, the island has become a wonderland
of red lemons. A quirky city has evolved with an economy based
on these fabulously sweet red lemons, attracting people from
all over the world. Staake uses a wide color palette with exaggerated
shapes and people; his geometric forms are vividly cartoonish
and exuberant, yet deceptively simple. Imaginative use of perspective
and the multihued, varying sized text add flair. The energetic
city is filled with visual and verbal humor, and the important
message is subtly conveyed. Pair with some lemonade and perhaps
a muffin, and enjoy the depth of meaning behind this computer-enhanced
visual feast. (Picture book. 4-9)
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