Official Review: Dede's Adventures by Anne Doetschman

[bookowlie]

[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Dede's Adventures" by Anne Doetschman.]

---

2 out of 4 stars

---

Share This Review

---

Dede’s Adventures by Anne Doetschman is a children’s book about a little white bear. The author also drew the illustrations for the eleven stories contained in this collection. Dede lives near the mountains and forest and enjoys outdoor activities such as hiking and fishing. He goes on a series of adventures such as the zoo, fishing, and going on a vacation. There is a useful lesson or thought-provoking question contained in each adventure.

Dede is a fun, likeable character that I think young children would enjoy. The individual plots are light-hearted and often include various steps involved in an adventure. I particularly enjoyed Dede’s choice of vacation, the treehouse in the backyard. It’s a place that children would be able to relate to, as opposed to a faraway vacation. The descriptions are vividly written. I could picture the treehouse with the table, bed, and outdoor balcony.

The artwork is colorful and appealing, depicting a bear that is drawn like a bear/little boy wearing human clothing. The pictures of Dede’s activities would inspire children to use their imagination when playing with toys.

The writing style is sometimes confusing. There are switches between third person narration and comments that are directed to the reader, such as “Where do you think that is?” and “Do you like going on vacation?” These asides in the middle of the text interrupt the flow and make the plot difficult to follow at times. It’s as if a parent stopped and asked a child a question or two in the middle of reading a story aloud.

While the book was entertaining, the formatting could use improvement. Each story is told in its entirety on one page, with one accompanying illustration. There are several paragraphs of text with different steps and settings related to the particular event. In “Dede Goes to the Zoo,” one page includes several actions and settings before Dede arrives at the zoo. All of this text is next to one picture of Dede at the zoo. In “Dede Goes Fishing,” the page includes Dede’s preparations the day before the fishing trip and various steps on the day of the outing. The only illustration for these activities is Dede fishing at the lake. This format seems ill-suited for younger children. They may be overwhelmed with too many actions and settings on one page, with only one picture. If each story was separated into a few pages, the illustrations might reflect a better match with the plot.

The font is extremely small and might not appeal to young children. Although the book’s length is listed as 26 pages, the small font makes it feel like a book at least twice that long. The title of each adventure is also written in the same, small font, although highlighted in bold. There are also other lines bolded within each adventure. Since only the first word in each of the titles is capitalized, there is nothing to distinguish it from the other bolded lines in the stories. It would have been clearer if each title had been displayed in a larger font or, at the very least, capitalized.

There are several errors in this short book. The most glaring one is that the identical story is printed twice in succession under two different titles, “Dede Finds a Squirrel” and “Dede, the Most Courageous Bear in the World” and different illustrations. Based on the second title and accompanying picture, one can assume there is a missing story that belongs in place of the duplicate squirrel adventure. There are also a few instances of incorrect word usage (for example, “seat” instead of “sit” and “new” instead of “knew”) and one line of dialogue written with incorrect structure.

I rate this book 2 out of 4 stars. There is much potential here, but a bit of polishing and editing is needed. I also wonder if the content would have worked better as individual short books within a series, instead of one page of long text with one illustration each. I would recommend this book to young children ages 2 through 6, certainly those who own well-loved stuffed bears.

******
Dede's Adventures
View: on Bookshelves

Like bookowlie's review? Post a comment saying so!

[gali]

A pity the book did not live up to its potential, as it sounds like a cute book for kids. Thank you for the insightful and well-written review.

[chytach18-]

Bookowlie, you wrote, "I also wonder if the content would have worked better as individual short books within a series, instead of one page of long text with one illustration each." I agree. More pictures and less text (and the text should be easy to understand) works much better for younger children.

[bookowlie]

A pity the book did not live up to its potential, as it sounds like a cute book for kids. Thank you for the insightful and well-written review.

Thanks Gali. I was frustrated by this book because I saw so much potential. A few tweaks would make this a very appealing series.

-- 13 Dec 2015, 09:30 --

Bookowlie, you wrote, "I also wonder if the content would have worked better as individual short books within a series, instead of one page of long text with one illustration each." I agree. More pictures and less text (and the text should be easy to understand) works much better for younger children.

In my draft review, I had included a similar observation as the last line in your comment. I edited it out, among other lines, as the review was really long. It's still long, but I hope that the author takes my comments as constructive criticism.

[Levi]

You have been doing really well with your children's book reviews bookowlie. This one is no exception. Very insightful without being rude or picky. You mentioned things that most any reader would notice, not just petty grievances. I think that the author will be delighted. Meanwhile, I can only think of tree-forts....

[bookowlie]

You have been doing really well with your children's book reviews bookowlie. This one is no exception. Very insightful without being rude or picky. You mentioned things that most any reader would notice, not just petty grievances. I think that the author will be delighted. Meanwhile, I can only think of tree-forts....

I think I either did no children book reviews or maybe one before the onslaught recently. I don't agree with you that the author will be delighted, but I hope the comments are taken as constructive. Tree-forts - . There are many topics in these adventures that a child would relate to.

[bookowlie]

[quote="bluemel4]Well- written and thorough review. I liked that the vacation you mentioned from this book is in a treehouse. There is something very wholesome and relatable in that vaction destination[/quote]

Thanks. I also thought the treehouse vacation was relatable. It made me think of when kids put up a tent and go "camping" in their own backyard.

[bluemel4]

Well- written and thorough review. I liked that the vacation you mentioned from this book is in a treehouse. There is something very wholesome and relatable in that vaction destination.

I also agree that having the stories put into a series of individual books instead of one would be less confusing for little kids.

[bookowlie]

Thanks Bluemel. There is definitely a solid foundation here for a cute children's series. Dede is such a likeable little bear!

[adoetsch19]

This is only volume one, volume 2 is already written and volume 3 is on the way.

[bookowlie]

Good luck with the future installments of this series.

[bookowlie]

Hi and welcome to the forums! A good place to post your question would be in either the General Reading Discussion or Introduction sections. Good luck with your book search.