Review by Booklist Review
Rhoobart is a robot made up of spare parts living something of a sad existence. When his secondhand heart gives out one day, he knows he needs a new one, and he hauls himself over to go to the Spare Parts Mart. He forages through scrap metal but can't find anything useful, and even an encounter with the junkyard dragon fails to get his heart up and running. A hopeless Rhoobart lays down and gives up. Enter Sweetart, An energetic bit of metal / With just the right amount of tarnish, who declares, You don't need a new heart, / you just need a jump start! She obliges, and, fully functional again, Rhoobart remembers, THIS is what matters! The text is a bit hodgepodge in places, and the rhyme scheme sometimes clunky (although the robots are as well). Some of the more nuanced aspects of the story may be too abstract for younger readers, but they'll be drawn in by the chaotic, energetic collages of rusty Rhoobart and the other robots (and robot parts) he encounters.--Reagan, Maggie Copyright 2015 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Somewhere in a ramshackle, all-robot world that looks a lot like a post-human junkyard Earth, Rhoobart is having an existential crisis: "Tarnished and tattered,/ He felt nothing mattered." Thinking he needs to replace his secondhand heart, Rhoobart goes to the Spare Parts Mart, but not even an encounter with the gruff owner's version of a junkyard dog-a robotic dragon named Mozart-can make him feel less meh. What finally works is the company of a girl robot named Sweetart, who has "just the right amount of tarnish" and a can-do attitude. "You don't need a new heart, you just need a jump start," she tells Rhoobart before administering a literal shock to his system. The father-daughter Emberleys' (The Crocodile and the Scorpion) mechanized, industrialized world is weirdly beautiful and inventive, composed with a saturated palette and graphic elements in the shapes of jagged scrap, loose gears, and other flotsam (Rhoobart's facial features are made from a camera's iris, a rotary phone, and a zipper). But, robotic natures aside, the characters never really come to life. Ages 3-7. (Nov.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 2-Rhoobart is a melancholy old robot made of spare parts. One day his secondhand heart won't start, so he visits Spare Parts Mart to pick up a new one. There, Blaggart, who smells of old socks, asks, "Whadya want?" Rhoobart is too timid to express himself clearly, so he wanders off to forage for himself. "Rhoobart dug into the rubble and he rummaged through the junk." He finds an abandoned jukebox and gets a scare from a robot dragon named Mozart, but no spare heart. Then along comes Sweetart, an energetic bit of metal, to give him a jump start. The book ends, "We're all spare parts. We've got secondhand hearts, it's true. We go together like pickles and glue. You stick to me, I'll stick to you." The artwork reflects the signature digital collage style of the Emberleys: full of playful details but with muted colors. Backgrounds are gray and taupe, while the characters are rust and brown. VERDICT While fans of the Emberleys will be happy to see a new offering from the award-winning team, this one is less than the sum of its parts.-Amelia Jenkins, Juneau Public Library, AK © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
At the Spare Parts Mart, lonely Rhoobart meets fellow robot Sweetart, who says, "You don't need a new heart, / you just need a jump start!" She does the honors, leading to a fast friendship. The endlessly resourceful Emberleys' intermittently rhyming ode to oddity features collage-style art, here foregrounding found-object body parts: a rotary-dial eye, a scissors leg, etc. (c) Copyright 2016. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Robot love. Because he can't get his secondhand, gear-driven heart started one morning, lonely Rhoobart hobbles off on mismatched mechanical limbs to the Spare Parts Mart in fruitless hopes of finding a replacement. Eventually, hope gives way to despair, and he collapses: "His zipper lips chattered, / He rattled and clattered. / Now he was sure NOTHING mattered." Enter Sweetart, "an energetic bit of metal / With just the right amount of tarnish," who assures him that "you don't need a new heart, you / just need a jump start!" So it proves, as sparks fly, and with Rhoobart's heart thumping and rattling again, off they go together, singing a silly love song: "We're all spare parts. / We've got secondhand hearts, / It's true. / We go together like pickles and glue. / You stick to me, / I'll stick to you." Harmonizing with the brief narrative's clanky rhymes, this plainly metaphorical encounter is set in a junkyard composed of jumbled masses of bent machinery, loose gears, and torn flat bits bearing obscure strings of numbers or battered words. Though likewise loose, the robotic figures are anthropomorphic enough for younger viewers to pick them out against the broken backdrop. Children aren't really the natural audience for this heartfelt tale of second chances; save it for over-40s just starting out again. (Picture book. 4-8) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
