Heart-y Reading: A String of Hearts by Laura Malone Elliott

TOMORROW WAS THE CLASS VALENTINE'S DAY PARTY.

"MAKE A VALENTINE FOR EVERYONE," SAID SAM'S TEACHER, MRS. WRIGHT.

"WRITE SOMETHING SPECIAL ABOUT EACH CLASSMATE."

For young bear cub Sam, this is a daunting assignment. What do you say to Nicole about a skunk's "special" quality, especially after she'd said his new light-up sneakers were dumb? The one classmate he really wants to honor, however, is Tiffany, the most popular girl in the class. Tiffany is always surrounded by friends and admirers, and Sam is too shy to have ever spoken a word to her, but now he hopes a special Valentine will be the way to get her attention. But arts and crafts are not Sam's long suit.

"WHAT'S WRONG?" SAID MARY ANN.

"I NEED TO MAKE A REALLY GOOD VALENTINE." SAID SAM.

"REALLY?" MARY ANN SMILED. "WHO FOR?"

"TIFFANY."

MARY ANN'S FACE FELL.

Sam's old friend, Mary Ann, obviously had hoped the special Valentine might be for her, but she swallows her pride and offers to help him make their Valentines at her house anyway. Sam readily agrees and manages to come up with something personal about all of his classmates except Tiffany. All he really knows about her is that, since she dresses in purple every day, it must be her favorite color. With Mary Ann's artistic advice, he decorates her Valentine with lots of tiny purple hearts.

"IT'S THE NICEST VALENTINE I'VE EVER SEEN," MARY ANN SAID QUIETLY.

But on the day of the party Sam is devastated. His special Valentine is ignored by superstar Tiffany among the many fancy ones her admiring fans have made for her. Meanwhile, Sam finds in his coat pocket a beautiful string of hearts from Mary Ann, each with something special about him that she admires.

Suddenly, Sam realizes that while he knows nothing special about Tiffany, he can think of lots of good things about his real best friend.

"I COULD THINK OF HUNDREDS OF THINGS TO WRITE ABOUT MARY ANN." SAM REALIZES.

Laura Malone Elliott's brand-new A String of Hearts (Katherine Tegen Books, 2010) has much to say about what it takes to be a true friend. Noted artist Lynn Munsinger's cheery illustrations skillfully portray the emotions of the young students--skunks, raccoons, bears, and cute kitty Tiffany--in their facial expressions, but she gives squirrel Mary Ann the best supporting actress role in this pleasing and meaningful story of true friendship realized.

This short and sweet Valentine's Day story pairs especially well with Diane DeGroat's equally apropos Roses Are Pink, Your Feet Really Stink and, of course, Marc Brown's now "classic" Arthur's Valentine (An Arthur Adventure).

I'm Going on a Fly Hunt! Tiny Little Fly by Michael Rosen

MY, OH, MY.
TINY LITTLE FLY.

TINY LITTLE FLY.
GREAT BIG TOES.

TINY LITTLE FLY
SITS ON ELEPHANT'S NOSE.

Fly may be tiny, but he thinks BIG. Slipping away from Great Big Elephant's lusty swat, he flies on to new challenges. There's Great Big Hippo, who may not have a trunk, but has the heft to squash Tiny Little Fly. Except Fly is too fast for him, too.

Then there's the tempting clawed toes of Great Big Tiger just ahead. Just the place to light. But not if Tiger has anything to say about that maneuver...

GREAT BIG TIGER WINKS ONE EYE, SAYS
"I'M GOING TO CATCH THAT FLY!"

Michael Rosen, author of the classic toddler participation tale, We're Going on a Bear Hunt (Classic Board Books), in his latest, Tiny Little Fly (Candlewick, 2010) works with Irish illustrator Kevin Waldron to produce a clever little tale of the underdog who takes on the great big beasts of storybook land. Little ones will easily identify with the tiny protagonist in this simple tale. Waldron's beasts are BIG, filling up the page with color and self-confidence as they pursue the little guy with all their power, but Tiny Little Fly exuberantly has the last word:

"SEE YOU ALL SOON.
BYE, EVERYONE, BYE!"

The Anti-Pink Proclamation: Not All Princesses Dress in Pink by Jane Yolen and Heide Semple

NOT ALL PRINCESSES DRESS IN PINK.

SOME PLAY IN BRIGHT RED SOCKS THAT STINK.

BLUE TEAM JERSEYS THAT DON'T QUITE FIT.

ACCESSORIZED BY A BASEBALL MITT

AND A SPARKLY CROWN.

Ever since Jane O'Connor's Fancy Nancy came upon the scene to make the world safe for girly girls, the picture book genre has been plastered with plenty of piquant pinkanista heroines. Now comes Jane Yolen and Heidi Semple with a simple rhyming plea for ordinary girls, those for who eschew their ball gowns for baseball jerseys or carpenters' aprons as well as those who combine their haute couture with handygirl craftmanship:

SOME PRINCESSES WEAR THEIR JEWELS
WHILE FIXING THINGS WITH POWER TOOLS.

Caldecott-winning author (for Owl Moon) Jane Yolen links up with daughter Heidi Semple in this rhyming tribute to those "princesses" among us for whom those royal trappings are a minor consideration. These princesses do keep their crowns, wearing them proudly while they pursue their own interests, whether carpentry, soccer, pumpkin-growing, or jousting in chain mail, reminding us that all our girls can sparkle in their own way, whatever they do.

Not All Princesses Dress in Pink (Simon & Schuster, 2010) is a light-hearted little spoof of the many pink princess wannabe books that even the spiffy Nancy Clancy would enjoy, unself-consciously illustrated by Sophia Longuentin, and crowned with the simple theme that in the real world what you can do is more important than what you wear.

Puppy Love: Smooch Your Pooch by Teddy Slater

SMOOCH YOUR POOCH TO SHOW YOU CARE.

GIVE HIM A HUG ANYTIME, ANYWHERE.

It's easy to please your pooch in Teddy Slater's beguiling little rhyming tribute to puppy love, his new Smooch Your Pooch (Scholastic, 2010). Artist Arthur Howard, properly appreciated for his delightful dogs in such noted books as Mr. Putter & Tabby Write the Book, Cosmo Zooms, and Bubba and Beau, Best Friends, offers up his usual illustrious illustrations of a variety of kids and their pooches, as Slater describes in bouncing verse all the many ways to woo your dog.

TOSS HIM A BONE. FEED HIM SOME KIBBLE.
OR BETTER YET PIZZA. GIVE HIM A NIBBLE.

This book works well as readaloud storytime treat for dog lovers. Pair it with Emily Gravett's equally funny Dogs reviewed here), Robert Neubecker's I Got Two Dogs: (Book and CD), or Karen Beaumont's Doggone Dogs for a comic canine romp.

Love Bites! Smelly Bill: Love Stinks by Daniel Postgate

Bill is a pooch who loves to nosh on trash, a habit which has rightfully earned him the name "Smelly Bill." But when Cupid's arrow finds its mark, everything changes.

When Bill saw Peachy Snugglekins
Come trotting past the rubbish bins,
His knees felt weak, his eyes grew wide.
He felt all gooey inside.
He dropped his bag of rotting stuff.
He'd seen enough.
He was in LOVE!

It's obvious that Peachy's mistress, Great Aunt Bleach, is not going to look with favor upon Bill in his current garbage-grungy state, so the next morning Bill's family awakens to a brand-new sight (straight out of Harry the Dirty Dog)--Bill in the bathtub, scrub brush in his mouth, begging for a bath.

The bath doesn't do much for Bill's looks, but he smells so good that his owners decide to enter him in the town's pooch parade, competing for the "Best Dog" Prize. Bill is thrilled; it's his chance to woo the lovely Peachy Snugglekins and make a better impression on Aunt Bleach as well.

But alas, Bill without the smell is still Bill, not exactly a winningly winsome sight with his long, pointy snout set off with snaggly teeth. The parade viewers are not kind:

"He's like a walking toilet brush!"

Bill is crushed.

But then danger strikes. A huge hound of horror, Vesuvius, begins to erupt in a frenzy of snarls and barks, and Aunt Bleach's little darling is pursued into the mucky swamp deep in the middle of the forest. Only Bill has the right stuff to rescue the imperiled Peachy and win her heart as well. Pretty is as pretty does, and even Aunt Bleach sees Bill's inner beauty just in time.

Daniel Postgate's second doggy drama starring his canine hero Bill, Smelly Bill: Love Stinks (Albert Whitman, 2010) is a jolly rhyming canine variant of Beauty and the Beast which will please primary-grade pooch lovers everywhere. Pair this one with Rob Scotton's tale of his love-smitten kitten, Love, Splat (Splat the Cat) for a pair of pet lover-pleasing love stories for the upcoming Valentine season.

Daniel Postgate's first Bill story is Smelly Bill.

Born to Wear the Badge: Griff Carver, Hallway Patrol by Jim Krieg

Just then the custodian walked by, rolling that oversize garbage can. I tossed the trumpet into his pail.

"Look like I'm ready to commit?"

The captain looked me over. If he was impressed, he wasn't going to show it. "Name and grade?"

"Carver," I said. "Seventh."

"Experience?"

"Six years," I told him, "four on the street, two inside."

That nearly got a reaction out of him. Junior crossing guards were relatively easy to come by. But an experienced Hallway Patrolman, that was something different.

"Where?" he asked, still not impressed.

"Saint Finbar's," I told him.

"Carver, Griffin Carver?" he asked, suddenly interested. "The Griff Carver?" "Dang," he said, "everybody's heard of you. Maple and Third. They still talk about you at Junior Police Camp."

Burned out after being on the force since first grade, Griff Carver has promised his Old Lady he's out of law enforcement, going to become a jolly trumpet-playing bandie at his new school, Rampart Middle. But when he sees that card table with the hastily printed SAFETY PATROL sign, sees the usual cop types hunched together around Capt. Delane, he feels again the pull of that plastic badge. The Brotherhood of Officers. The Call to Duty.

Carver is assigned to second-period hall patrol with Tommy Rodriguez, a supernaturally cheerful and devoted Boy Scout with every badge known to Scoutdom, and as he makes his first round on the beat, he sees all the usual types, the Student Govies, headed by the slick, teeth-whitened Marcus Volger, perennial class president, the Jocks, the Straight As, the Gamers, the Hair Girls, the Self-Imposed Outcasts, even the Ace Girl Reporter, Verity King, already news-hounding for the Rampart Middle Liberty Bell. And then Griff collars his first perp, a runner named Dover Belton, who instantly sets off the buzzer on his well-honed cop radar:

"You always carry your backpack to the boys' room?" I asked.

Belton smiled weakly and shrugged.

"What do you make of his hall pass, Rodriguez?"

There it was. I saw a tiny droplet of sweat drip out of Helton's hairline. Bingo.

"It's a fake," I said.

Griff Carver soon learns that underneath the squeaky clean halls of Rampart Middle, there's a Dark Side, a protection racket fueled with fake hall passes manufactured in the Wood Shop, fronted by Marcus Volger and abetted by his band of cupcake-pushing girl groupies and eighth grade glandular goons, a syndicate which even controls the Coke machines right under the nose of the clueless Principal Sprangue. Tommy, too, despite his initial buy-in of Volger's squeaky-clean persona, begins to see the sleazy underside of school when Volger's goombahs treat him to a swirly in the latrine to keep him quiet.

Carver is afraid to report what he knows to Patrol Chief Delane, suspicious that he, too, might be on the take from Volger. His only allies, it seems, are the talkative Tommy, the scoops-hungry Verity, and the shadowy janitor who sees all and becomes Griff's informer. But a good cop does his duty, and Griff drafts Tommy to join him in a take-down of the hall pass forgers in action at their lathe. Crawling through the HVAC shafts one night while the parents meet in the auditorium, the two lawmen make it to the air vent above the woodworking shop and find all the usual suspects assembled, ripe for arrest--if the two good cops can handle Volger's entire gang.

Jim Krieg's first novel, Griff Carver, Hallway Patrol (Razor Bill/Penguin Group, 2010) is a smart and witty spoof of the hoary police procedural novel and TV cop show, with an unlikely hero with a jaundiced but sharp eye for the middle school scene ("Politicians. Kids looking to score a few points on their magnate high school application.") Krieg deftly tells his tale through a series of incident reports and debriefings, with plenty of humor and action to keep the pages turning all the way.

"A hero ain't nothin' but a sandwich. Usually baloney," he humbly and gruffly remarks about his reputation as a junior crime fighter, but however unlikely, Griff Carver is a savvy hero kids will go for. Devotees of Jeff Kinney's Diary of a Wimpy Kid series will recognize the usual middle school suspects here, and fans of Adam Canfield, ace middle school investigative reporter of The Slash, hero of Michael Winerip's Adam Canfield books, will likewise take Griff Carver, the boy behind the badge, into their hearts.

Hearty Matters: Happy Valentine's Day, Mouse by Laura Numeroff

MOUSE IS MAKING VALENTINES FOR FRIENDS.

HE WANTS EACH ONE TO BE JUST RIGHT!

That jolly, overall-clad mouse has all the supplies for festive homemade Valentines--colored paper, scissors, ribbon, and the all important (Yipes!) red glitter to sprinkle over the gluey hearts.

It's a housekeeping nightmare, but Mouse is determined that Dog, Bunny, Cat, and Pig will have just the perfect Valentine for that all important day for showing your friends that you care about them.

And the gang knows that as well, with the final two-page spread showing them, loaded down with their own creations, rushing in to give Mouse a rousing happy Valentine's Day greeting as well.

With its theme of the fun of planning a surprise for others, Laura Numeroff's little board book Happy Valentine's Day, Mouse! (If You Give...) (Balzer & Bray, 2009) from her ever-popular If You Give a Mouse series, makes perfect use of Felicia Bond's wonderful illustrations, set off against a bright white sturdy board background, to inspire preschoolers to do their own personalized Valentines for the big day. Happy Valentine's Day to you, too, Mouse!

Whose Reality Is It, Anyway? Luka and the Fire of Life by Salman Rushdie

"In the real world there are no levels, only difficulties."

Luka's mother Soraya means well when she delivers her down-to-earth warning to her video-game-loving son, but her wisdom is ignored in the premise of Salman Rushdie's latest, Luka and the Fire of Life: A Novel (Random House, 2010), a sprawling novel which can be as tediously tantalizing as the video games it mocks with its fantastic characters and twisting levels.

Fourteen-year-old Luka's father, Rashid Khalifa, is known to the family as the Shah of Blah for his storytelling, his endlessly convoluted fairy tales of the World of Magic, but when Luka's curse upon a cruel circus master comes back to strike his father down in a deadly sleep from which he cannot be wakened, it is those magical tales, those eternal riddles planted in Luka's mind, that are eventually his salvation.

A visit to his unconscious father's room one starry night convinces his son that his father is doomed unless he can be awakened. Gazing out his window, Luka is amazed to see a figure which seems to be his father, but when he runs outside, accompanied by his pets--a bear named Dog and a dog named Bear, he finds that midnight doppelganger is a magical avatar which is stealing his father's essence, growing stronger every minute. In his father's warm voice this "Nobodaddy" explains to Luka that his father will inevitably fade from being and that his only salvation lies in Luka's braving the World of Magic to steal the Fire of Life at its center.

Luka's quest is the heart of the novel, a journey through many strange places which evoke Alice in Wonderland, the Wizard of Oz, The Hobbit, and every other childhood hero quest of literature. In his journey Luka must take great leaps of faith, decipher eternal riddles, acquiring allies, the Insultana of Ott and her flying carpet and two elephant birds with infinite memories, and face down every manner of fantastical being. Winning and expending lives as in his favorite games, he moves up the River of Time to Level Nine, the final confrontation with the restive and half-forgotten gods of history--Norse, Mayan, Chinese, Greek, and the rest, where he suddenly comes to understand a great truth and reveals it to his revengeful foes:

"It's my turn to speak now," Luka hollered. "You see, I know something you don't know about the World of Magic...it isn't your World! It doesn't even belong to the Aalim, whoever they are. This is my father's World. I'm sure there are other Magic Worlds dreamed up by other people. Wonderlands and Narnias, and Middle-Earths and whatnot, and I don't know, maybe there are some such Worlds that dreamed themselves up--but this one, gods and goddesses, ogres and bats, monsters, and slimy things, is the World of Rashid Khalifa, the fabulous Shah of Blah.

And the plain truth is that if I don't get the Fire of Life to him before it's too late, he isn't the only one who will come to an end. Everything here will vanish, too."

Luka wins over the mythological community, but then must face the Aalim, those immortal weavers of the Loom of Days:

"Can't you see it? The calamity of this whole World? Don't you want to save it?" Luke argues. "That's what I'm trying to do."

"It is of no consequence to us whether his World lives or dies," came the reply.

"All things must pass. Only Time itself endures. Happiness, friendship, love, suffering, pain, are fleeting illusions, like shadows on a wall. Only this knowledge is Wisdom."

But Luka fights back with his own very human existential Wisdom:

"Give me a break. The Future is a dream, and nobody knows how it will turn out. The only sure thing is that we--Bear, Dog, my family, my friends and us--we will make it whatever it is, good or bad, happy or sad."

Luka and the Fire of Life: A Novel, companion book to his earlier Haroun and the Sea of Stories, nearly defies description. The multiple-award-winning Rushdie brings almost more to the table--encyclopedic literary history, wordplay, over-the-top magical realism--than the reader here can assimilate into a meaningful whole. Luka's mission is part Nintendo-style gaming, part philosophical allegory, and part a literary scherzo which plays hide-and-seek with the many quest tales of literature.

There is plenty here for readers on many levels to laugh at, squirm through, and ponder over on the way to Luka's conquest, but as Luka's mother points out, ultimately our daily lives still must find a way to deal with those same "difficulties," even when, as Rushdie observes, his young readers, like "Luka live in an age in which an almost infinite number of parallel realities has begun to be sold as toys." As reviewer Mark Athitakis of the New York Times concludes, "The book offers many reminders that those difficulties will be hard to shake, no matter how digitized our unmagical world becomes."

The Cat Will Play: When Martha's Away by Bruce Ingman

Ever wonder what your cat does all day while you're away? Martha is sure her ginger cat Lionel cat naps the day away, but Lionel's agenda would hold a few surprises for his mistress if only she knew!

At ten o'clock I set up my easel and paints and Gladys from Apartment 34 stops by to pose for me.

I cook myself some lunch. My favorite is a nice bit of salmon washed down with a cool saucer of milk.

Lionel is one busy dude: he reads the daily CAT NEWS from front page headlines to back page ads; works out to keep one step ahead of the dog next door; and lets Flash Harry in the backdoor with his secret suitcase of, er, hot cat treats. Lionel even finds time to squeeze in a few cat cartoons and even a wee nap before it's time to slip into his tux and perform some piano pieces for his fans in his weekly afternoon concert.

After taking the car out for a quick spin, Lionel is ready for the really BIG performance of the day--the one where he dashes downstairs just in time to pretend to be snoozing on the sofa when Martha gets home from school. Whew!

Lionel is quite the cat about town in Bruce Ingman's charming little kitty catalog of a day in the life, When Martha's Away (Candlewick Press, 2010). While his mistress is out, this cool cat has quite an active life, and Ingman sets his simple, matter-of-fact text off against pleasingly detailed illustrations, a bit reminiscent of the earlier books of Tomi Ungerer and Bernard Waber, which tell the true story of the secret life of cats.

AND NOW YOU KNOW.

'S No Mystery: Tracks in the Snow by Wong Herbert Yee

JUST OUTSIDE MY WINDOW

THERE ARE TRACKS IN THE SNOW.

WHO MADE THE TRACKS?

WHERE DO THEY GO?

Who could resist following those mystery tracks? Not our little girl, bundled up in her red snowsuit, boots, and cap, off to explore a snow-transformed world.

The tracks lead her off through the trees as she considers the clues. These tracks too large for a rabbit's, and the bears are all asleep for the winter. A hippopotamus? Nope. That big white shape ahead is just a snow-covered bush.

The little girl stops to make a few snow angels as she gazes up at the bare branches of the trees and comes across the opening to a hibernating woodchuck's burrow, but the tracks continue on.

WHAT'S THIS?

SOMEONE'S LOST A MITTEN!

The girl's excitement rises as she finds this clue and feels she's finally closing in on the quarry of her quest. Although her feet are cold and she's a little tired, she picks up her pace and stays with her trail. The mystery track maker must be near!

WAIT--I KNOW WHERE THESE TRACKS GO!

Yep, you guessed it. She's been following her own tracks from another day, and they have led her right back to her own house, where thankfully inside there are hot tea and cookies waiting.

Gentle, feathery illustrations, as soft as a snowflake, give Wong Herbert Yee's Tracks in the Snow, (Henry Holt, 2010), fresh as new-fallen snow in its new paperback edition, a charm and eye appeal reminiscent of Ezra Jack Keat's classic The Snowy Day. in this charming winter's tale of a small child experiencing a white-clad outdoor world alone.

Fooling Fox: Brownie Groundhog and the February Fox by Susan Blackaby

ON THE SECOND DAY OF FEBRUARY, A
GROUNDHOG NAMED BROWNIE WOKE UP.

It's time to get up and off to work for Brownie, as she sleepily heads outside, toting a basket of snacks, on her annual search for signs of spring.

Her first sight, however, is not a bluebird or a budding blossom; it's a red fox, not exactly the sort of leading indicator she's hoping for.

"I DON'T SUPPOSE YOU'VE NOTICE ANY SIGNS OF SPRING?" SAID BROWNIE.

THE FOX'S TUMMY GRUMBLED. "YOU,"

But it's not meteorology on Fox's mind. It's breakfast, and he sees Brownie as a possible item on his menu.

But Brownie is now wide awake, and she quickly comes up with a ploy to fool the fox. Too late; it's way past breakfast time, she points out and manages to trick the naive fox into whetting his appetite with a bit of ice skating on the pond first. When Fox finally tires of this activity and wants to return to the main course, Brownie points out that it's now way past lunchtime and Fox will have to wait until dinner.

"I WANT TO EAT YOU NOW!" SAID THE FOX. "NO MORE WAITING!"

Brownie sympathizes, pointing out that groundhogs know all about waiting, as she leads him over to a tree and helps him get settled for the feast. Quickly she ties him to the tree with her red scarf and bids him a cheery goodbye.

"AAAAAAAAA!"

Fox sobs and whimpers pitifully, and Brownie sees that this may be a window of opportunity for a negotiation that will make her safe from Fox whenever she emerges from her burrow. Opening up her goodie basket, she makes him an offer she knows he can't refuse.

Susan Blackaby's new Brownie Groundhog and the February Fox (Sterling, 2011) offers a change of pace in groundhog stories. Brownie is no shy and shrinking spring violet, and Fox is not your usual wily trickster in this cheerful Groundhog Day saga. Blackaby's snowscape illustrations are deftly accented with touches of red, giving this slender tale of friendship found a warm and inviting look just right for midwinter story times.

Weird Science: Mythbusters Science Fair Book by Samantha Margles

It's back to the grind, and with the holidays behind, it's that time--science fairs loom ahead for schoolkids. What to do with the reluctant amateur scientist who'd would rather spend a weekend researching Genghis Khan's boot camp?

Sandra Margles' forthcoming Mythbusters Science Fair Book (Scholastic/Discovery Press, 2011) may provide just the jolly little paperback guide for the task. Margles knows her prospective readership and leads off in Chapter I (Sweet Secrets) with what must be the most ubiquitous do-it-yourself "experiment" in the pop culture--the Mentos/Diet Coke lift-off. If they haven't seen it, most kids have at least heard of this one, and the author does a good job of describing the scientific method and guiding kids through this relatively safe procedure. But more importantly, she provides alternative directions for trying out other combinations of liquids with those five or six Mentos candies--water, regular Coke, lemon-lime soda, and the real deal, phosphoric acid from the hardware store--with instructions for measuring the ensuing chemical reaction for height and length of reaction and charting findings for that requisite project display and writing the all-important conclusion.

Junk food + explosions! What kid could resist an excuse to try out this one?

Margles skillfully plays on this "hook" to lead kids through related experiments, first the common belief that soaking in Coke shines up a dirty penny and the old chestnut that Coke will disintegrate a piece of steak overnight. How about the old household tip that Coke will loosen immovable rusty nuts and bolts? And then there's the myth that eating Pop Rocks with Coke will cause a deadly stomach explosion? (This one is tried out with a pop bottle and a balloon, not the kid's tummy.) And then there's the perennial question that has plagued mankind for, well, quite a while: Does toast ALWAYS fall butter-side/jelly-side down?

Although these "experiments" themselves won't change the world, they appeal to the inherent curiosity of kids while promising some real fun along the way. Materials required are inexpensive and readily available, and safety reminders are built into all procedures (including for the Mentos experiment, the final step in the instructions--"Run!") Margle's Mythbusters Science Fair Book provides the proper framework--hypothesis, materials, procedure, observation, and conclusion--to give foot-dragging kids a little push toward putting together their own scientific investigations in time for that deadline.

Just Another Walk in the Park: Chalk by Bill Thomson

Lover of literary language as I am, this is one stunningly illustrated story which needs no words.

Three youngsters, sharing an umbrella, head into the park, desperate for some outdoor diversion on what has obviously been a drippy day. The wet sidewalks reflect their rain-geared figures as they approach the first piece of climbing equipment, a bright green dinosaur. But unaccountably, there is a pristine gift bag hanging from his fanged mouth, embellished with stars and crescent moons, and inside, a collection of fresh colored sidewalk chalks.

The little pig-tailed girl can't resist and grabbing a bright yellow chalk, draws on the sidewalk just what the three restless kids want to see--the sun. Suddenly the sky is a preternatural blue and the park is flooded with sunshine. Out of the bag comes a peach-colored chalk and the next child draws butterflies all around the sun. And amazingly, one wing at a time, the Monarchs pull themselves away from the concrete and take wing all around the bedazzled kids.

Then the crew-cut boy impetuously pushes forward, and grabbing a piece of green chalk, boldly sketches a dinosaur, fangs and all.

OOOPS!

Suddenly an all-too-real T. Rex is towering over the three, looking nothing but hungry. The kids flee to the questionable shelter of a curvy slide tower. The little artist cringes inside the opening of the slide as the dinosaur bends over and leers up at him greedily. This is more reality than the three little artists ever dreamed of!

Not to worry. There is a potential solution to their situation already foreshadowed in Bill Thomson's amazing Chalk (Marshall Cavendish, 2010). In an entry into the magical realism genre, Thomson's wonderfully realistic acrylic and colored pencil drawings, detailing even the individual hairs on his subjects' heads, rival those of David Weisner in his Caldecott Award-winning Flotsam. Moreover, unlike Weisner, Thomson's illustrations remain purely realistic, heightening the drama of this wordless tour de force. The children's body language and facial expressions, alternatively delighted and horrified, are likewise just what the situation would evoke, and the resourceful boy's solution to their confrontation with his carnivorous creation is both a witty and a peculiarly logical one, a satisfying surprise ending that will leave reader-viewers not frightened, but amused and empowered, reassured that they, too, can take charge of their own imaginations whenever they choose.

In Chalk Thomson takes the premise of Harold and the Purple Crayon (Purple Crayon Books) to a new level, making superb use of light, color, and perspective in a masterful bit of non-verbal storytelling that needs to be seen to be appreciated and that surely merits all the attention it gets.