ALA Booklist (Sat Sep 01 00:00:00 CDT 2018)

For Harriet, brown-skinned and endearingly freckled, costumes are an everyday affair, so it comes as no surprise to her dads when she puts on a penguin outfit and bow tie for their shopping trip. This birthday-party supply run becomes quite the adventure when Harriet wanders into the store's freezer section and finds a large group of penguins. Swept up in the waddling black-and-white mass, Harriet gleefully follows the penguins through the city to a field, where several candy-striped hot-air balloons wait. She joins some penguins in a basket but isn't far into the Antarctic journey when she realizes she'd rather be back at the store with her dads. And so the adventure home begins. Sima's (Not Quite Narwhal, 2017) soft Photoshop illustrations radiate Harriet's joie de vivre and imagination, whisking readers along through paneled spreads and dramatic scenes. The primarily purple palette surrounds the action with warmth, as does the obvious love Harriet's dads e black, one white, and both wearing wedding bands ve for their daughter. A sweet celebration of family, individuality, and costumery.

Kirkus Reviews

Thick purple outlines in illustrations in predominantly lavender shades, coupled with an imaginative storyline, bring to mind Harold and the Purple Crayon.Here, a young girl in a multiracial family headed by two dads is reminded to not get "carried away," which will sound familiar to energetic, inventive young readers and listeners. Harriet herself presents as black or possibly biracial; one dad appears to be black, the other white. Harriet loves costumes and dress-up play, which will be the theme of her upcoming birthday party. She even dresses as a penguin when she goes shopping for preparations. Fantasy takes flight when she meets actual penguins in the ice aisle at the store, and she's literally carried away in hot air balloons with her newfound friends. A litany of adventures follows, including a ride on an orca and being carried away again, this time by pigeons who bring her back to the city, where her dads are still waiting at the deli counter. The flat, cartoon-style illustrations employ varying perspectives: a scene in a subway car is framed by a subway window-like border; the city is a double-page panorama shown from the sky when Harriet is carried by the pigeons; and so on.Fancy and whimsy continue in the last spread: party guest Olivia attends in a wolf suit, accompanied by a pack of real (nonscary) wolves, all clearly getting carried away. (Picture book. 5-8)

Publishers Weekly (Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)

Dress-up-loving Harriet wears costumes everywhere; in one early scene, Sima (Not Quite Narwhal) shows her in the dentist-s chair, opening her mouth wide while inside an equally toothy dinosaur outfit. Dressed as a penguin, Harriet-who has dark skin, curly hair, and two fathers-heads to the grocery store with her dads before her birthday party, where she discovers a group of actual penguins replenishing their supply of bagged ice. Before she knows it, Harriet is aloft with them in their hot-air balloon, headed back to their polar home. Readers who fear that Harriet will be marooned or miss her birthday party will relax as an orca and a flock of pigeons help bring her back to the store, and the party goes off without a hitch. Harriet is a resourceful city child, the kind of girl who has no problem negotiating with an orca (she trades her red bow tie for a lift). The narrator-s offhand, unruffled voice (-So Harriet called in a favor from some friends she knew-) makes Harriet-s intrepid adventure a delightful readaloud. Ages 4-8. Agent: Thao Le, Sandra Dijkstra Literary. (Mar.)