At Your Fingertips: Press Here by Herve' Tullet

READY?

PRESS HERE AND TURN THE PAGE.

At a touch of the forefinger and a flip of the sturdy page, the one yellow dot has become two.

Who could stop now?

Another firm press and the two become three. Then a gentle rub on the one on the left and presto! The yellow dot on the left is now a RED dot. Well done! Now, an equally gentle rub on the yellow dot on the right and...it is now BLUE. Three dots, Red, Yellow, Blue, now await the next command.

Five quick taps on the yellow button brings a new vista: three rows of five dots, one yellow, one red, one yellow. one blue. Perfect!

But wait, there's more. Shake the book and you get a random arrangement over a double-page spread. Tilt the book and the dots slide to the top, to the bottom, and from side to side of the two pages. Wipe the page and the following double page is black.

No problem. Press all the dots and the lights come back on. Clap your hands--not too loud!

WHOO-HOO! KEEP CLAPPING!

Herve Tullet's innovative Press Here (Chronicle Books 2011) has snowballed into a runaway best-seller since its publication earlier this year. A deceptively simple-appearing board book with thick bright pages ornamented with a series of almost round dots which take on a life of their own, proving that flat pages which inspire the imagination can be truly interactive, while achieving a conceptual sophistication which teaches both number sets and color along the way. As recent picture books have shown, the genre is far from dead, taking elements freely from electronic media and going them one better! It's not MAGIC. It's a BOOK!

"Without so much as a single tab to pull or flap to turn, this might be the most interactive picture book of the year," said Booklist in its review.

For a glimpse of the magic, see the book's trailer here.

Thinking Outside the Box! Gingerbread Girl Goes Animal Crackers by Lisa Campbell Ernst

WE'RE WILD ANIMAL CRACKERS.
HEAR OUR FIERCE ROAR!
YOU CAN'T CATCH US!
WE'RE OFF TO EXPLORE.

When the little old man and woman who baked her give Gingerbread Girl a special "bake-day" gift, she is delighted to discover that it is a fine box of animal crackers. She's always wanted "someone like me" to play with, and she can't wait to see her new friends.

But when she opens the box, BLAM! The animals pop out with their own pent-up declaration of independence and dash off to explore the big world with reckless abandon. Ignoring the cries of "Wait! Stop!" from Gingerbread Girl, they scurry, lope, and leap away across the countryside. The Girl gives chase, but the herd flees through the landscape, soon chased by concerned bystanders--sheep, cows, farmers, a cat and dog, a flock of chickens, and a troop of Scouts in the woods. Their independence is admirable, but their impudence and lack of prudence--not so much!

I'M QUICK AND I'M NOISY.
I TRUMPET AND RANT!
YOU CAN'T CATCH ME.
I'M THE CRACKER ELEPHANT!

But we all know where this one is going--the danger ahead, namely a river too wide for baked goods to cross, and a feisty fox all too willing to offer to ferry them over at a price they are too naive to guess. Having lost her much-lamented brother, Gingerbread Boy, to that "Snip, Snap" fate, Gingerbread Girl knows she must make it to the river with a plan before her new friends meet the same, er, dead end!

Lisa Campbell Ernst's newest, The Gingerbread Girl Goes Animal Crackers (Dutton, 2011), is the latest in her cracked-up, fractured fairy tale creations, the companion book to her earlier The Gingerbread Girl. Ernst keeps the catchy cumulative structure of the traditional tale which will have kids joining in on the refrain, guessing the type of cracker by matching the rhyming word, providing a little language lesson along the way. With charming pastel palette, gingham-checked backgrounds and frames for the pages, and a gutsy girl heroine to the rescue, this tale is a fun run for the preschool and primary set.

Kirkus Reviews has its own serving suggestion: "The girl heroine, large trim size, catchy rhymes and repeating refrain make this one sure to be a popular choice for group readings...just don't forget the animal-cracker snack."

Look Again! Treasure Ship (Can You See What I See) by Walter Wick

I SHALL RISE AGAIN!

Walter Wick's latest in his photo puzzle series, Can You See What I See?: Treasure Ship: Picture Puzzles to Search and Solve (Candlewick, 2011) is another masterpiece of photography, a gorgeous example of the visual puzzle virtually created by Wick and his former rhymester partner Jean Mazollo, and an all-around bit of picture book fun for all ages.

In this one we first see a closeup of a gold coin, "The Coin of the Bountiful," in which the reader is given a list of items on the coin to spot. The second spread shows this coin along with a golden cup, suggesting that both are part of a treasure trove.

In succeeding layouts, the "camera" zooms out, revealing the cup and coin as part of a pirate's treasure chest, which is in turn revealed to part of a shipwreck, then as part of a deep underwater seascape, then as a detail in a ship in a bottle, and thence part of window display of toys, trinkets, and tchotchkes, which is in turn revealed to be part of a seaside souvenir store.

In a continuing wide-angle view, Wick shows that the store is a ship-shaped replica of good ship Bountiful itself, with a porch-side display of postcards, on one of which the whole scene is reproduced. The final zoom out is too delicious a surprise to spoil, but suffice it to say the whole book is a joyful exploration of incredible detail within the framework of a photographic essay on the power of point of view in art. Wick is a wonderful artistic technician, working with digital photographs, an incredible assembly of objects in all sizes, carefully constructed miniature and full-sized sets, all put together with the eye of a master book designer. "Readers" can spend hours on this book and not see it all. Too good to miss!

Publishers Weekly asserts, "The entrancing, detail-rich visuals and ingenious twist will likely stir readers' imaginations." And that's an understatement.

Vive La Difference: No Two Alike by Keith Baker

NO TWO SNOWFLAKES ARE ALIKE.

ALMOST, ALMOST,

BUT NOT QUITE.

Two playful young birds frolic through a wintry landscape, superficially the same in its ubiquitous covering of white snow, but filled with things that are each unique within their similarity--nests, leaves, trees, forests, foxes, fences, even the two little playmates themselves.

AMONG US ALL! ARE WE THE SAME--JUST ALIKE?

Listening preschoolers will be chiming in with the rhyming response evoked all the way through the text, "Almost, almost, but not quite." in Keith Baker's No Two Alike (Beach Lane Books, 2011). A quietly humorous book, in which the two mischievous little birds play at making things different, knocking snow caps off of fence posts and pecking out snowflake patterns in brown oak leaves, their red plumage and jaunty mobility a standout difference in the sameness of the snowscape done up in digital media that somehow is both soothing and cozy.

But even the two protagonists have a difference in their plumage, as we see when two of their tail feathers float down, one all red, one with a telltale black spot at the base, almost, but not quite alike. Baker uses what appear to be photos of real objects, such as a red toboggan cap, set against the smooth whiteness of his winter woodland landscape, as he works in his simple but telling text into the theme of differences between things that are at root two of a kind.

A great book for those seasonal concept units dealing with snow and winter with a quiet message that there is order in our similarities and beauty in our differences. As Booklist's reviewer summarizes it all: "Baker’s seamless combination of well-worded rhymes, evocative landscapes, and playful protagonists make this a standout title for reading aloud, especially in winter."

Just the Facts, Ma'am: Detective Blue by Steve Metzger

MY NAME IS BLUE--DETECTIVE BLUE.

YOU MIGHT KNOW ME AS LITTLE BOY BLUE.

AT ONE TIME I BLEW A HORN AND LOOKED AFTER COWS AND SHEEP.

THAT'S IN THE PAST.

Little Boy Blue is now Gumshoe Blue, a hard-boiled sleuth. It's another day in the city, and Detective Blue is already pounding the pavement on what may be an abduction case--the Dish has purportedly run away with Spoon. And no sooner has the collar been put on Dish when Blue is off on the trail of a perp on a stolen identity case, Mary's Lamb, a repeat offender, whom Detective Blue apprehends, disguised in toboggan cap and a student's misappropriated backpack, trying to sneak in--yet again--into the local grade school

"YOU CAN'T PULL THE WOOL OVER MY EYES," SAYS BLUE.

It's all in the daily grind for our gumshoe, until Jack Sprat raises a hue and cry!

"MISS MUFFET IS MISSING!"

"DON'T WORRY. DETECTIVE BLUE IS ON THE CASE," BLUE MUMBLES LACONICALLY.

Clues are few at the scene of the crime. Miss Muffett's usual haunts among the tuffets reveals a dropped bowl of curds and whey, which Blue examines ("YUCK"), and a spiderweb. Pretty skimpy physical evidence! Blue begins to interrogate the eyewitnesses at the scene.

"WE DIDN'T SEE A THING!" SAY THE THREE BLIND MICE.

Blue questions Humpty Dumpty, who does have a good vantage point on the scene from his wall. Dumty suggests that Miss Muffett often visits Jack Horner's Pie Shop down the way, but when Blue appreciatively slaps Dumpty on the back for his tip, he leaves his tipster all cracked up.

Horner hasn't seen the missing lass, but pudding-seller Georgie Porgie suggests he question King Cole down at the castle, where Blue picks up a hot clue from Spider.

"SHE WAS TIRED OF CURDS AND WHEY. I TOLD HER WHERE SHE COULD GET SOME DELICIOUS PORRIDGE!"

Blue knows right where to find plenty of porridge and arrives at the scene of an in-progress home invasion just in time to rescue the would-be porridge sampler Miss Muffet from some "beary" angry members of the family Ursidae, in Steve Metzger's newest, Detective Blue (Orchard Books, 2011). Award-winning artist Tedd Arnold's googly-eyed characters are just right for this tongue-in-cheek detective tale, and his cleverly-inserted background nursery rhyme spoofs will crack up readers, who can also use Metzger's appended "index" to sleuth out the allusions which humorously spice up the story throughout. Readers who are well grounded in their nursery rhymes and nursery tales will find this book a treasure trove of allusionary fun and grownups who are lucky enough to read this one aloud will "get" the hard-boiled humor even more.

Interplanetary Penpals: Earth to Clunk by Pam Smallcomb

TODAY MR. ZOOKIAN SAID I HAVE TO WRITE MY PEN PAL.

"HIS NAME IS CLUNK. HE LIVES ON THE PLANET QUAZAR," SAID MR. ZOOKIAN

I DON'T WANT A PEN PAL NAMED CLUNK FROM THE PLANET QUAZAR. I'M NOT WRITING A LETTER.

I'M SENDING CLUNK MY BIG SISTER. THAT WILL TEACH HIM.

Our unwilling little correspondent packs up his bossy sister, pictured yelling angrily through the box, and ships her off to Clunk, feeling sure that she will disabuse Clunk of any interest in terrestrial life posthaste.

Apparently not. By return mail comes Clunk's offering, an amorphous Quazarian named Zoid, who resembles a fuzzy smiley face and who annoyingly follows our boy everywhere he goes. Our narrator decides to reciprocate with a packet of overripe lasagna from the back of the fridge. But back comes a thank-you note and another of Clunk's offerings--a trio of tubular Forps. Hunh! Back to Quazar goes a package of super smelly socks. And the potlatch is on!

Gradually, though, our boy becomes a bit fond of Zoid and even the Forps, and when the shipments from Quazar suddenly cease, he begins to feel a bit lonely and deserted by a friend he didn't even realize was a friend.

NO PACKAGE.

NOPE. NADA. ZIP.

Then at last he gets a box from what he is coming to think of as his friend.

INSIDE IS A DISGUSTING BLOB OF SOMETHING.

AND MY BIG SISTER. "YOU ARE SO DEAD!" SHE SAYS.

Obviously our boy and Clunk have one thing in common--their aversion to his big sister. Soon our narrator invites Clunk for a sleepover, and an intergalactic friendship is bonded when they build a fort in the basement and repel an invasion from a very grouchy big sister.

Pam Smallcomb's latest Earth to Clunk (Dial, 2011) is a genuinely funny fantasy tale of an unlikely friendship, illustrated wryly by English artist Joe Becker in a pleasant retro style which conjures up both Norman Bridwell's simplistic cartoon tales and Bill Watterson's Calvin & Hobbes comics. Pair this one with Claire Freedman's Aliens Love Underpants and/or James Marshall's classic tale Space Case (Puffin Pied Piper) for some storytime fun that's, well, out of this world!

Diaper Derby: Catch That Baby! by Nancy Coffelt

TIME TO GET DRESSED NOW, RUDY!

Them's fightin' words, Ma'am. At least if you're toddler Rudy, just out of his bath and sleek and slippery as a seal. Before Mom can slap a Pamper on that cute little patootie, Rudy is off and running, and the race is on.

Of course it's advantage, Rudy as he dashes through the house, under tables, over tables, behind furniture, eluding everyone in the family, hustle, bustle scoot--Dad, siblings, grandparents, even an perky pup who joins in the pursuit after him. Rudy even taunts his pursuers with gleeful giggles and his own liberty battle cry:

NUDIE RUDY!

Everybody gets the giggles as Rudy continues to give them the slip. Where did that baby go? Buddy the dog is pressed into service as their own search-and-rescue hound.

WAIT! HAS BUDDY GOTTEN TO THE BOTTOM OF THIS MYSTERY?

Buddy points the way to Rudy's room. Is the diaper derby in the home stretch at last?

It's a familiar family scenario, that fleeing just-bathed baby, but Rudy gets the last and best laugh as he emerges from his room, having attired himself in a Rudy-mental way--his shirt on his legs, socks on his hands, and his pants on his head, as he victoriously crows...

"CUTIE RUDY!"

In Nancy Coffelt's latest runaway romp, Catch That Baby!, (Simon & Schuster, 2011) her brief text is charmingly augmented by the illustrations of artist Scott Nash, who coyly figleafs the runaway nude modestly while letting this "nekkid baby" have his fun run with his adoring family. This one belongs right up there with the rubber duckie as a bathtime classic.

Baby Tooth Blues: Bear's Loose Tooth by Karma Wilson

FROM A CAVE IN THE FOREST
CAME A MUNCH, MUNCH, CRUNCH.
BEAR AND HIS FRIENDS
ALL NIBBLE ON THEIR LUNCH.

BEAR SAVORED EACH BITE.
HE GULPED AND HE GOBBLED.
THEN THERE--IN HIS MOUTH--
SOMETHING WIGGLED AND WOBBLED.

IT WAS...BEAR'S LOOSE TOOTH!

It's that early childhood rite of passage--the first loose tooth. Bear is taken aback. Nothing in his mouth has ever changed before. What does this mean? How will he eat?

The usual suspects, Bear's forest friends, fill him in on the whole mammalian dentition thing. Even little mouse has been through it, and he assures Bear that when the loose tooth comes out, a brand new grown-up tooth will slowly appear to fill its place.

Bear is reassured at last. But what to do about this wiggly, wobbly old tooth still in his mouth? As usual, Bear's buddies are all too eager to offer help with that. The gang gathers round while Bear stretches out and opens wide, and everyone peers at the affected tooth, Owl perching right on Bear's big nose to get a better view. Little Wren steps up to the job of dental assistant du jour:

WREN PERCHED ON BEAR'S LIP
AND HE GOT A GOOD GRIP.
ON BEAR'S LOOSE TOOTH.

Wren's tiny beak is a precision tool, all right, but his tiny tugs lack the essential torque to uproot the loose tooth. Undeterred, though, Bear's bigger friends give it a try: Owl, Badger, and then Hare pull and twist and yank, but the tooth resists all their efforts.

Bear himself finally gives a mighty push with his tongue and the loose tooth at last breaks free! The group whoops it up in celebration, and that night Bear has a surprise visit from the Tooth Fairy, who leaves an appropriate bear-y toothsome treat, a big bowl of blueberries.

And when the gang gathers for their usual brunch, Bear shares his prize with them all. And then Bear gets another surprise.

BEAR GULPED AND HE GOBBLED,
AND HE FELT SOMETHING WOBBLE...

BEAR'S LOOSE TOOTH!

Author Karma Wilson's and artist Jane Chapman's latest in their best-selling Bear Snores on series, Bear's Loose Tooth (Margaret K. Elderry Books, 2011) follows the familiar format, with verse bright with internal and ending rhymes and soft acrylic illustrations of young woodland animals reinforcing the theme of mastering the small milestones of early childhood with the help of supportive friends. Their first new entry since the 2008 hit, Bear Stays Up for Christmas, this latest will pair well with Lucy Bate's and Diane deGroat's charming classic tooth tale,Little Rabbit's Loose Tooth, to ease the transition from baby tooth to new tooth for youngsters facing their first big change.

Roundup! Swirl by Swirl: Spirals in Nature by Joyce Sidman

A SPIRAL IS A GROWING SHAPE.
IT STARTS SMALL
AND GETS BIGGER,
SWIRL BY SWIRL.

It's not every day that a new book makes a reviewer jump (or in this case swirl) with joy. But Joyce Sidman's and Beth Krommes' new Swirl by Swirl: Spirals in Nature (Houghton Mifflin, 2011) is such a book. Newbery winner (for Song of the Water Boatman and Other Pond Poems (Caldecott Honor Book, BCCB Blue Ribbon Nonfiction Book Award))) Joyce Sidman provides a lyrical text which only adds to the striking beauty of Caldecott artist (for The House in the Night) Beth Krommes' lissome illustrations, gloriously done on bright white in amazingly detailed scratchboard and watercolor wash, inspiring wonder at the beauty and function of the nature's amazing spiral.

IT TWISTS THROUGH THE AIR
WITH CLOUDS ON ITS TAIL.

IT STRETCHES STARRY ARMS
THROUGH SPACE.
SPINNING AND SPARKLING,
FOREVER EXPANDING.

From the protected curl of a hibernating snake or chipmunk, to the unfolding wonder of a fiddlehead fern, from the tactile and visual beauty of a spiral seashell to the delicate tendrils of a growing vine, the spiral is one of nature's finest architectural creations, one which protects the threatened hedgehog and gives the New World monkey his astonishingly strong prehensile tail.

From a delicate orb spider's web to the power of a breaking wave, spirals are everywhere, present in the terrible beauty of the tornado and the star-studded structure of the Milky Way galaxy which is our place in space. The spiral serves us, fills us with awe, and with its curvaceous form delights the human eye with its mathematical perfection.

Swirl by Swirl: Spirals in Nature is a unique and magnetic picture book, one bound to be in contention for medal honors, and one deserving of an honored place in any collection, private or public.

Shell Game: Marcel the Shell with Shoes On: Things About Me by Jenny Slate

My name is Marcel. And I am partially a shell.

This is my Breadroom.

It's a bedroom but I sleep on a piece of bread, so I just call it my Breadroom.

Forget curious little monkeys and perky pig girls in red-striped pajamas, French-loving fashionistas, rambunctious retriever puppies, even jolly old St. Nick, and all the rest of the usual storybook suspects this season. The media superstar is Marcel. A univalve mollusk seems a strange protagonist for the holiday season, but in her sudden best-seller Marcel the Shell With Shoes On: Things About Me (Razor Bill, 2011) Jenny Slate and her talented graphic media magician Amy Lind prove once more than imagination trumps all.

Marcel has one big eye, a mouth, and wears orangy "shoes" with which he somehow achieves locomotion of a most primitive sort. Marcel mostly likes himself and his cozy lifestyle. He lives on a bureau top, in his Breadroom (two slices of bread inside which he snuggles when it time to got to bed), his "Aquarium" (a standard-issue goldfish bowl), an amusement park (an assortment of plastic toys and other objects), with a view of the monuments (a shelf of sports trophies), and his very own devoted pet:

My one regret in life...is that I'll never have a dog.

But sometimes I tie a hair to a piece of lint and drag it around.

His name is Alan.

He doesn't know any tricks or anything.

Tell him to roll over.... See?

Marcel makes do with found objects to amuse himself. His favorite thrill? Scaling a platform sandal, wearing a pistachio shell as a protective helmet, and sliding down from heel to toe. His favorite theme park ride? The Ladle. The worst ride? The scary Salad Spinner It's an exciting but exhausting life for Marcel, causing him to repair to his refuge, the Breadroom, for a rest.

Could you shut the book, please?

I'm trying to go to bread!

After having become a viral internet star and taking prizes at the Sundance and New York International Children's Film Festival, Marcel the Shell and his famous shoes have, er, left their footprints in the sands of, um, media stardom and ventured forth to scale (or whatever sea snails do) the last challenging height, the world of picture book print.

Marcel's deadpan voice is just as unique, and artist Lind plays with perspective, using both long and close-up "lenses" in her droll portrayals of her snail-like hero which intrigue the eye. The book begins with a nostalgic long view of a doorway, a comfy room beyond with a traditional child's chest of drawers sporting a fishbowl, the usual kid toys haphazardly topping it, a magnifying glass, and a small ... something in the center. As the illustrations "zoom in," the something is seen to be the loquacious and self-revelatory Marcel in his round, orange-accented "shoes," ready to take us on a narrative tour of his imaginative world. It's all great fun, and kids, whose imaginations are perhaps less jaded than those of adults, will "get" Marcel right away. The understated humor and matter-of-fact absurdity of the whole premise has proven to have a fresh appeal that has made Marcel a mollusk media sensation!

Kirkus Reviews puts it perkily and persuasively: "The sky's the limit for this winning, winsome, wee mollusk."

Here Comes Trouble: The Fox in the Dark by Alison Green

Rabbit runs home.

Darting left and right. Scampering, scrambling.

Back through the night. His ears flapping, his
tail bobbing.

It's going to be night. He's chased by a fox!

Bang! goes his door!

Who's afraid of the big, bad fox? Well, any sensible rabbit foolish enough to be caught out after dark and far from home. But Rabbit is lucky this time. Safe inside his cozy burrow, a strong door between him and danger, he lights his candle and wipes his brow. Safe at last.

But what's that?

Can that fox have traced him to his own door? But the frantic knocker is not the fox. It's Duck, equally afraid for his life, with the fox, he says, not far behind. Rabbit hates to unbar that door, but what else can he do? In comes Duck, and Rabbit ruefully makes room for him in little bed.

But that's not the end of it. Soon Mouse and Lamb also appear at the door, all being pursued, they say, by Fox in the dark, and all begging to be let in to save their very lives. Reluctantly, Rabbit takes them all in, and they squeeze into his little bed and try to find some sleep.

But then comes another RAT-A-TAT-TAT! Finally Rabbit opens his door just a crack.

"That was unwise," remarks Duck.

It is Fox--or, at least, a very little fox kit, tired, timid, and obviously lost in the dark. What else can Rabbit do? He lets the little fox in to pass the night.

But where there are little foxes, there are liable to be big foxes, and sure enough, the next time the door rattles, Rabbit opens his door to the dreaded sight of...

A FOX IN THE DARK!

But, of course, in Alison Green's The Fox in the Dark, (Tiger Tales, 2010) there's a happy ending to this chase tale, as Mama Fox is reunited with her baby and all the animals snuggle down for a peaceful night. Deborah Allwright's lovely illustrations make this little bedtime tale a soothing experience: bugbears are vanquished, and as all bedtime stories should, this one concludes with everyone tucked in for the night--this time in Mama Fox's luxuriant warm fur.

Puppy Treat: Marley: A Thanksgiving to Remember by John Grogan

MARLEY WAS SO EXITED!

TODAY THE FAMILY WOULD PREPARE A HUGE THANKSGIVING FEAST. THERE WOULD BE MANY DELICIOUS THINGS TO EAT.

MARLEY COULD HARDLY WAIT.

But after seeing the mess and mayhem the excitable puppy has made of Christmas and Halloween preparations, maybe the Grogans should have opted for dinner at Grandma's this year. But the Grogans, as we know, are either eternal optimists or lacking a bit in short-term memory, and so, with little Marley in the middle of everything, they forge on to procure and prepare their family feast.

The best-selling John Grogan's newest, Marley: A Thanksgiving to Remember (Harper Festival, 2011), features this unflappable family in a new flap book entry.a design device which turns Thanksgiving morning into a game of hide-and-seek, to the delight of Cassie and Baby Louie.

First, Cassie has to find Marley's leash, hidden under the pup's turkey chew toy, and then all the Grogans stop everything to look for the car keys (under the doormat flap) and Mom's all-important grocery list (in the laundry basket), courtesy, of course, of Marley. They get no further than the car when Baby Louis misses his blankie, but this time it's Marley to the rescue, and when the front door flap is opened, Marley has it all ready for him, as if he knew Louie couldn't go anywhere without it.

Back home, there's a search for the bag of stuffing mix, hiding in the pantry with guilty parties Baby Louie and Marley. Marley continues his "help" right up to the point where the table is finally loaded with the feast and the family begins the ritual of telling each other what they are most thankful for.

"PUPPY!" SAID BABY LOUIE.

With the exception of the cover illustration (Marley doesn't actually stick a foot in the mashed potatoes in the text), artists Richard Cowdry and Rick Whipple do a journeyman job of providing lively illustrations for Marley: A Thanksgiving to Remember, and this inexpensive little paperback offers a bit of flap book fun which isn't too off-the-mark for families with a rambunctuous retriever pup determined to "enjoy" every aspect of an exciting holiday.

Did Someone Say Pie? Seed, Sprout, Pumpkin Pie by Jill Esbaum

HAVE YOU PICKED YOUR PUMPKIN?

Whether you "pick" your pumpkin from your own backyard, the local pumpkin patch, or from the display at your favorite grocery store, that jolly orange orb is THE symbol of fall, a fine fruit which nurtured the founding fathers' families, which as our beloved Jack-o'-lantern inherited the English tradition of scary, carved vegetable lanterns, and a versatile vegetable that appears as a staple of our Thanksgiving table.

Jill Esbaum's Seed, Sprout, Pumpkin, Pie (Picture the Seasons) (National Geographic Kids) takes the young reader from the spring day when those rounded pumpkin seeds go into the ground through the first sprouting, the vines which leaf out in their characteristic curlicues, the gorgeous pumpkin flowers that bloom in summer, and the tiny green balls that increase rapidly into the giant globes we know and love.

THE PUMPKIN IS A KIND OF SQUASH.

THEY CAN BE GREEN, RED, TAN, YELLOW, WHITE, OR EVEN BLUE.

THERE ARE TALL PUMPKINS, SHORT PUMPKINS, SMOOTH OR BUMPY PUMPKINS.

WEE ONES ONLY INCHES WIDE, OR GIANTS YOU CAN SIT INSIDE.

Seed, Sprout, Pumpkin, Pie (Picture the Seasons) is filled with National Geographic's trademark full-color photographs of pumpkins--pumpkins growing, pumpkins harvested, pumpkins carved in many ways, and the delicious foods prepared from the pumpkin's flesh and its delectable seeds, even pumpkins carved into actual boats!

In easy-to-read minimal text, the author even shows the annual Jack-o'-lantern makers how to prepare the seeds as a snack or dry them for planting themselves for a showy landscaping plant with a golden bonus, not to mention fodder for animals or the useful composting material that Jacks past their prime provide for gardens. The book ends with a poignant photo of a pumpkin patch receiving its blanket of winter snow, showing that the traditional pumpkin is indeed a plant for all seasons.

National Book Award 2011--Young People's Literature

At the National Book Awards Presentation on November 16, hosted by John Lithgow, the award for Young People's Literature went to Thanhha Lai for Inside Out and Back Again (HarperCollins, 2011). The author begins her story with a strange revelation:

No one would believe me but at times I would choose wartime in Saigon over peacetime in Alabama.

Being a stranger in a strange land is always hard, but when, as part of the "boat people," Ha and her family flee Saigon at the end of the Viet Nam War, she finds herself an alien in an alien world, seen by the small town families and her classmates as the "enemy." It takes only a few months to move a world away, but much longer to find herself a new person and the strange world around her a home.

Taking the award for adult fiction was Jesmyn Ward for her novel Salvage the Bones. Stephen Greenblatt was the winner of the adult nonfiction prize for The Swerve: How the World Became Modern, and Nicky Finney was the 2011 poetry award winner for her Head Off & Split.

Crime and Punishment: Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever by Jeff Kinney

I finally got home around 5:00 p.m., and there was a note on the front door. When I read it, I almost passed out.

TOWN POLICE DEPARTMENT

We came by but no one was home.
We will be back.
---Sgt. Peters

Greg Heffley is a wanted man.

With Christmas coming, Greg and his bud Rowley have decided to show a little capitalist initiative and make some easy money. They set up a neighborhood Christmas bazaar in the backyard and tape some posters advertising their event around the area, including on the convenient walls of their middle school.

But it starts to rain right away, and when the boys see their work later, it is all faded, the washable marker letters running and illegible. And when they remove the posters--GACK! They see that the colored posters have faded dark green all over the school walls. When someone yells at the supposed vandals, the two grab the incriminating evidence and run for it. But the next day they see that they've made the headlines in The Daily Herald:

VANDALS DEFACE MIDDLE SCHOOL

The article features a couple of bad composite sketches of the alleged perps, and Greg is sure they're safe from detection. But then that ominous note appears on his front door. The long arm of the law has found him. That dreaded knock on the door could come at any moment.

But then Greg hits a lucky streak--or so he thinks. That afternoon it starts to snow big time and it's still coming down the next day. School is cancelled and the streets are impassable. He's safe from incarceration.

But a few days of being snowed in with Rodrick, Manny, and Mom change his mind. Manny gets hold of the remote and disables the TV so that it only works for Mom's exercise videos. Manny screws up Greg's Net Kritters online game so that he has no Kritter Kash to fund the game; the downstairs floods from the snow melt, and since Dad is snowed in downtown in a luxury hotel, Mom and the boys have to bail the basement with Manny's sand pails. Food is running dangerously low, and when the power mysteriously goes off, Mom and the kids are forced to huddle under blankets together to stave off hypothermia.

A warm cell and three squares of pork and beans a day would be an improvement. Jail is beginning to look good to Greg!

Jeff Kinney has done it again. The fifth book in his Diary of a Wimpy Kidseries, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever (Amulet Books, 2011), published November 15, is another drop-dead funny outing, already a #1 best-seller status 24 hours after publication. I myself bought it and took it along to while away the time waiting in a doctor's office and suffered two uncontrollable giggle sessions sitting alone in a chilly examination room! This time around Kinney spends little time on the middle school scene, devoting most of this book to the home front right before Christmas with hilarious results. Read it and rejoice.

Monkey Shines: Happy Thanksgiving, Curious George by Cynthia Platt

PARADE HORNS BLOW!
DRUMS BEAT LOW.
THE PARADE IS HERE, OH, MY!

Charlie Brown has done it. Biscuit has done it. Even Arthur has been there and done that, too, and luckily we have the mischievous monkey Curious George in on the celebration as well. George might have been an immigrant from afar (the manuscript for the first book fled the Nazis in H.A. Rey's suitcase on the boat to America), but, hey, so did the Pilgrims, and so who could be better than he to join the festivities at this most American of holidays.

George wakes early on Thanksgiving Day to delicious smells from the kitchen where the Man in the Yellow Hat is already at work creating the traditional feast. George pitches in on the preparations, with the usual mixed results, heads outside to watch the local parade pass and gets in on the clowning and juggling. He makes handprint turkey decorations for the table, staggers with a precipitous stack of plates for the table, and remembers to be thankful for the blessings of the day.

Toddlers who are fans of the Curious George books, H.A. and Margret's originals and the subsequent spinoffs, will get a preview to the traditions of Thanksgiving and will be excited about taking part themselves when the big day rolls around. Cynthia Platt's and Julie Bartynski's Happy Thanksgiving, Curious George tabbed board book (Houghton Mifflin, 2010), with its easy rhymes and faithful illustrations, is a good way to begin the thankful season.

State of the Nation: Gooney Bird on the Map by Lois Lowry

"Mrs. Pidgeon" It was Gooney Bird.

"Yes?"

"Remember I had an idea starting, and it was just in small pieces? Well, I've put it together. It's a completely ready idea now."

The second-graders all grinned with excitement. They always did when Gooney Bird Greene had an idea.

It's February. Snow covers the playground and freezes hard every night, and the class is restive with the February Can't-Wait-Till-Vacation blues. But this class has two special assets--Gooney Bird's lively ideas and Mrs. Pidgeon's inventive teaching strategies--to keep them on their toes.

Mrs. Pidgeon is the queen of seize-the-teachable moment, and when Gooney Bird points out that President William Henry Harrison (who, Gooney points out, also had a February birthday) only lived for one month into his term and deserves a moment of silence, Mrs. Pidgeon jumps on the chance to observe frequent Moments of Silence with her talkative class. And when Beanie, Barry, and Ben keeps bragging about their exciting February break trips to a Vermont ski lodge, a Hawaiian resort, and Disney World, she has them pull out their dictionaries and look up the word "gloating." Then she pulls down the big map of the United States and helps them locate Vermont, Florida, and Hawaii. But when the rest of the class admits that they are spending their February break at home in Watertower, the staycationers grow even glummer. "It's a bummer," Tyrone says and offers to write yet another rap song about the problem.

But Gooney Bird has a better idea. She makes a quick visit to Principal Leroy's office to get clearance for her plan and mysteriously passes out pieces of the U.S. map jigsaw puzzle to the students. Keiko gets Kansas and Kentucky, Tyrone gets Texas, Tricia gets Tennessee, Nicholas hits the jackpot with Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, and North Dakota, and when the 50 states are passed out, it just so happens that Beanie, Barry, and Ben are the only ones without a state of their own. Their gloats are now definitely on hold.

But Gooney Bird's plan is far grander than just giving the gloaters their comeuppance. Before they know it, the custodian and Mrs. Pidgeon have laid out a large map of the U.S. in the snow with spray paint and each child is assigned to do a research report in the library with a little-known fact about their state, and before the state-less trio can start to complain, they are given the job of narrators for a school program showing off the group's knowledge at a performance on the last day before the break.

Two-time Newbery author Lois Lowry is in fine form in this, her fifth book in her best-selling Gooney Bird series, this one aptly titled Gooney Bird on the Map (Houghton Mifflin, 2011). Again illustrated with Middy Thomas' full- and half-page pencil illustrations, this latest, forthcoming this month, is bound to be a timely mid-winter read-aloud or beginning chapter read for fans of Gooney Bird Greene and her lively classmates.

Good Art: The Artist Who Painted A Blue Horse by Eric Carfle

I AM AN ARTIST AND I PAINTED A BLUE HORSE ONCE.

Eric Carle's newest, The Artist Who Painted a Blue Horse (Philomel, 2011) goes on to show the artist, a tousled-haired boy in the red striped jersey of the artist at work, giving us in turn a red crocodile, a yellow cow, a purple fox, a black polar bear (!), and a multi-colored spotted donkey, all crafted in Carle's signature bright paint-and-paper-collage style set against his trademark bright white page. Present-day adults and current kids who cut their reading teeth on Martin and Carle's Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? My First Reader will find nothing unusual in Carle's beautiful blue horse, and his simple affirmation in the closing,

I AM A GOOD ARTIST

will find few objectors these days.

But as we learn in Carle's afterword, the artist of whom he speaks is not himself, but Franz Marc, a post-World War I expressionist whose work was banned as "degenerate art" by the Nazis, who tried to suppress any art but the Aryan heroic realism they favored. As Carle relates, as a student he was discretely shown copies of the banned work by his own art teacher and was influenced tremendously by Marc's inventive use of color, particularly his painting, "Blue Horse," reproduced in the author's note in the informativ e backmatter of this book.

Germany's loss was America's gain when Carle brought his penchant for color and mixed media to our shores in iconic picture books such as The Very Hungry Caterpillar and his illustrations for Bill Martin's Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear? and Baby Bear, Baby Bear, What Do You See? (My First Reader). Carle's latest book honors Franz Marc, imparts a little bit of art and world history, and is thoroughly engaging on its own as picture book art.

Don't miss this book's trailer, a brief but telling visit with national treasure Eric Carle here.