Ah! Summer Reading Time: Check Out This Common Sense List

Schools are out (or coming down the home stretch) and soon long summer days will stretch out ahead of students.  There are lots of great things to do in the summer, but one of the best is having time to flop down on the front porch, on that hard bunk at camp, on a beach towel, or in bed at night with chirping crickets and distant lightning outside the window and just--read a good book.

Common Sense Media offers summer reading aplenty for kids from two to seventeen years old.  Divided into three main sections--ages 2 to 6, 7 to 12, and 13 to 17--the recommendations are subdivided into categories for each age group: bedtime stories, read-alouds, and beginning readers' books for the youngest; funny stories, fantasy and science fiction, coming-of-age-stories, and mysteries and adventures for the middle readers; and coming-of-age and classics for young adult readers.  There are familiar oldies-but-goodies and recent best-selling hits in these lists, with something for almost everyone.

Check out Common Sense Media's suggestions by following this link.

Bully Me Not! A Big Guy Took My Ball! by Mo Willems

"GERALD! said Piggie.

I FOUND A BALL AND IT WAS SO FUN!

AND A BIG GUY CAME

AND... AND... AND...

HE TOOK MY BALL!"

The emotional Piggie has a problem, and, as usual she takes it to her friend Gerald the Elephant.

And then it becomes Gerald's problem, too.

Gerald may be a born worrier, but he IS a big guy. After all, he is an elephant and the biggest guy on the playground. Piggie is sure that Gerald can get the ball back from the big bully who took it from her.

Gerald immediately goes into instant righteous avenger mode.

WHAT MAKES THOSE BIG GUYS THINK THEY ARE SO BIG?" Gerald says.

"THEIR SIZE?" squeaks Piggie.

Manfully he sets out to right the wrong, whatever it is, following Piggie to the scene of the crime. But when they find the alleged thief, holding the ball in question, Gerald comes to a halt, gulps, and backs up a few steps.

Piggie's "Big Guy" is really, really a BIGGY. Way bigger than GERALD!

He is a BLUE WHALE.

Mo Willems' latest Elephant and Piggie easy reader, A Big Guy Took My Ball! (Elephant and Piggie Book, An) (Hyperion, 2013), finds Gerald the Elephant confronting a downright anxiety-provoking situation. Gerald is not big enough to confront this big guy physically. It's going to take brains, not brawn, Gerald thinks. This is one Piggie problem in which discretion is indeed the better part of valor. And when Gerald tentatively questions the big guy, he learns the truth. It IS his ball, and Big Guy confesses he's just looking for someone brave enough to play ball with him.

"WELL, I AM BIG." he admits.

"SO BIG NO ONE WILL PLAY WITH ME.

LITTLE GUYS HAVE ALL THE FUN."

Mo Willems' award-winning beginner books, the Elephant and Piggie series, use Willems' remarkable comic illustrative style and unrivaled insight into the relationship problems of early childhood  to make every one of his  Elephant and Piggie books an irresistible must-have for emergent readers. Willems uses speech balloons to tell the entire tale, and as always the body language and facial expressions of his characters tell most of the story in emotional language that any child can "read." As Kirkus Reviews puts it, "This morality play in false assumptions and relativity unfurls with Willems' customary command of visual pacing; gags are spaced just right to keep the pages turning and readers giggling."    Way to go, Mo!

Robber Rat: The Highway Rat by Julia Donalson

THE HIGHWAY RAT WAS A BADDIE,
THE HIGHWAY RAT WAS A BEAST.

HE TOOK WHAT HE WANTED AND ATE WHAT HE TOOK.
HIS LIFE WAS ONE LONG FEAST.

With his swash well buckled, this highwayman rides the road in search, not of gold, but of goodies. No pastries or sweetmeats are safe in his territory.

All travelers live in fear of this gallante, riding, riding, riding along the highway, and the good country folk cringe at the sound of hoofbeats.

THE CREATURES WHO TRAVELED THE HIGHWAY
GREW THINNER AND THINNER AND THINNER.

WHILE THE HIGHWAY RAT GREW HORRIBLY FAT
FROM EATING UP EVERYONE'S DINNER.

Rabbit is down to his last wilted clover, the ants are left with leaves for lunch, and the good folk of the land obviously have need  of a hero when Duck comes waddling down the pike. Rat has run out of victims, and informs the fowl that he's next on the menu.

"I HAVE A SISTER WITH GOODIES YOU MIGHT PREFER," says Duck, thinking quickly.

This Duddley-Do-Right Duck is ready to right some wrongs, and his plan (cleverly riffing on that story of the three billy goats) just might work.

He sells the Robber Rat on his story of his sister's distant cavern just stuffed with a stash of sweets. With the Rat's mustachio whiskers all a-twirl at the thought, Duck guides him to the dark cave, and offers to hold his horse while the Highway Rat, faint with greedy goodie lust, ventures inside and falls prey to the old "echo in the cave" trick.

..."TAKE THEM... TAKE THEM... TAKE THEM..."

Our  Do-Good Duck dashes off on  the brigand's steed, and the Robber Rat gets his just desserts inside the dank empty cave, in Julia Donalson's latest rhyming frolic, The Highway Rat (Scholastic, 2013). Comic quatrains and sprightly humorous illustrations by artist Axel Scheffler set off this jolly tale of justice done. "This well-paced, rollicking tale is a guaranteed storytime treat," says School Library Journal.

Donalson's and Scheffler's other best-selling tasty treats include The Gruffalo, Stick Man, and Charlie Cook's Favorite Book.

Who Says?: Bella's Rules by Elissa Haden Guest

BELLA KNEW THE FAMILY RULES BY HEART.

BELLA LIKED HER OWN RULES BETTER.

MUCH, MUCH BETTER.

Her family's rules are sensible--eat a healthy breakfast, take a bath every night, and be in her pj's by bedtime.  Oh, and no climbing up the bookshelves, either.

Bella prefers candy for breakfast,eschews shampoos at all costs, and stays up as late as she likes whenever she can..

It's not just a matter of preference. Bella persists in her choice of behaviors even when she has a babysitter. Poor Sammy watches as Bella sleds down the staircase, uses her mom's china for building blocks, and finally announces to Sammy that he can forget about bedtime:

"I NEVER SLEEP!"

But help for Bella's beleaguered parents is at hand. Granny blows into town with a surprise gift for Bella, a puppy!

IT WAS LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT!

Bella loves, loves, loves her puppy--at first. But she soon realizes that this puppy hasn't a clue how to behave.

He jumps right up on the counter and takes Bella's cupcake. He leaves muddy footprints on Bella's favorite old blankie. And horror of horrors, he piddles on her floor right in front of her. And when Bella finds herself in an ear-ripping tug-of-war with Puppy over her beloved Teddy bear, Bella has an epiphany.

Rules look a bit different when the behavioral shoe is on the other foot, as the rambunctious Bella learns in Elissa Haden Guests' new little morality tale, Bella's Rules (Dial Books, 2013). Guest's droll and well-paced narrative and artist Abigail Halpin's playful illustrations of this determinedly mischievous bad girl keep the message light, with just a touch of a lesson that there might be some good reasons behind all those family rules.

Frosted Friendship: Just Grace and the Trouble with Cupcakes by Charise Mericle Harper

OUR FAIR IDEAS AND WHO THOUGHT OF THEM

1. SUPERPOWERS (There could be games about different superpowers.) ME

2. CANDY (Every game could have something to do with a different candy.) MIMI

Candy was the best idea on the list. Best and favorite are not the same thing. My idea was still my favorite, but I knew candy was the idea our whole class was going to go crazy for.

THE PROMISE

I looked at Mimi and said, "If everyone likes your idea best, I'm not going to try to make my idea be the winner." Mimi smiled and said, "I won't say another word about my idea either."

"Pinky swear?" I said.  "Pinky swear," said Mimi, and we made it official.

It's almost school vacation and Just Grace is happy.  Grandma is coming for a weekend visit, and it's almost time for the high point of third grade, when Miss Lois' class gets to choose the theme of the school carnival. Grandma bustles in with the recipe for the "best cupcakes in the world" and she and Grace make up a huge batch.  Everyone, even Grace's best friend forever, Mimi, agrees that that they are the best cupcakes ever. Grace is sad when Grandma has to jet off for her tour of Paris, but she consoles herself with a secret breakfast cupcake and thoughts of planning the Fair with Mimi.

As  predicted, the class goes crazy over the idea of a candy-themed fair.  Mimi is smiling happily. But with cupcakes in her lunchbox and cupcakes on her brain, Grace can't believe what she does when Miss Lois calls on her.

Suddenly I thought of a new idea. It was something better than my superpowers idea.  It was something people loved maybe even more than candy. Without thinking about it, I put my hand in the air and shouted out what I was thinking.

"WHAT ABOUT CUPCAKES?"

Immediately Grace realizes what she has done. She's broken her promise to her best friend. Mimi will never trust her again.  Of course, the class joyfully jumps on the cupcake bandwagon, everyone, that is, except Mimi, who looks sadly down at her desk.

Grace is devastated at what she's done.  Mimi won't answer her calls, or walk to school with her, and Grace finds herself assigned to the planning group headed by Owen 1, her un-favorite boy in the whole class.   Now the wonderful school fair is ruined for her and she's stuck trying to think up a cupcake-themed carnival game with three people who aren't even her friends, while Mimi is laughing and and having fun with another group.

Grace has only one hope.  She carefully writes a letter of apology to Mimi and puts  it in a pretty box along with the last two of Grandma's World's Best Cupcakes.  She takes it over to Mimi's house, puts it by the front door, rings the doorbell, and runs away.  Now she has to wait and see if Mimi understands how sorry she is for breaking her promise.  But at school the next day, Mimi is still ignoring her. Can the school fair and the whole summer vacation ruined by three thoughtless words?

In her forthcoming latest in her best-selling Just Grace series, Just Grace and the Trouble with Cupcakes (The Just Grace Series) (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013) shows the importance of trust in a friendship and how easily it can be lost.  The breach of a close friendship is one of the rites of passage in the elementary years, and with her usual light comic touch and black-and-white cartoon drawings to tell the story, Charise Mericle Harper takes her early elementary readers along with her as Grace and Mimi work their way through this broken-promise-premise in her fifth beginning chapter novel. Harper handles the growing pains of third graders with the deft fictional touch that puts her series right up there with Beverly Cleary's pesky Ramona Quimby, Paula Danziger's redoubtable Amber Brown, and Megan McDonald's changeable Judy Moody.

The Whole Truth and Nothing But! Puffin Peter by Petr Horocek

PETER AND PAUL WERE THE BEST OF FRIENDS.

Two puffin pals, Peter and Paul are inseparable, fishing and swimming in the waters around their rocky little island in the ocean.  Although they look just alike--with big, banded colorful bills, big eyes, black and white feathers, and webbed feet--Peter thinks Paul is the boisterous, funny one.

Then one day when they are swimming, a huge storm arises and a rogue wave sweeps Peter away and when he revives, he finds himself being supported by a big blue whale who wants to help. Peter tells him he is looking for his friend.

"WHAT'S HE LIKE?" the whale asks helpfully.

"OH, PAUL IS FUNNY AND NOISY!"

"I KNOW JUST WHERE TO LOOK!" says the whale.

The kindly whale takes Peter on his back and swims off to a warm, tropical island where colorful parrots are calling raucously in the trees

Sadly, Peter tells the whale that Paul is not that sort of bird. He's more... black and white.

The whale knows just where to look for funny, noisy, black and white birds--way down south closer to the South Pole, where he shows Peter some loud birds with formal black and white feathers.

"PAUL IS NOT A PENGUIN!" protests Peter.

Peter points out that Paul is black and white and funny and noisy like the penguins, but Paul also has a big colorful beak. The patient whale takes Peter to a shore where there are some raucous birds with huge colorful bills--a whole flock of toucans! Black and white, loud and funny, with colorful bills, but not Paul! Peter is beginning to despair of ever finding his friend.  But then, as they swim by a rocky, little island in the middle of nowhere, suddenly--there's Paul!

"WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME?" cried the whale.

"TELL YOU WHAT?" asked Peter.

"THAT HE WAS A PUFFIN JUST LIKE YOU!"

Petr Horachek's latest, Puffin Peter (Candlewick, 2013). brilliantly illustrated in the glowing colors of  exotic birds, is a little play on the the timeless question, what is truth? In this humorous little parable, all of Peter's statements are true as far as they go, but are not of much value without the whole truth and nothing but!  Horocek's faithful illustration of these featured feathered friends is a delightful little lesson in avian varieties, and the funny story of this ocean-going good Samaritan points out that sometimes it's important to tell all!

Cat-itude: I Am Cat by Jackie Morris

I AM CAT.
AT NIGHT I PROWL, BUT IN THE DAY I SLEEP, CURLED IN WARM PLACES, AMMONITE TIGHT.

AND WHEN I SLEEP I DREAM.

This glowing ginger tabby sleeps spiraled tightly, tail to head on its oriental collage cushion, lost in a dream of his feline cousins, each different, in diverse places, but each clearly partaking of the essence, the archetype of cat.

I DREAM THAT I ROAM DEEP IN THE JUNGLE, BRIGHT FLAME CAT STRIPED LIKE THE SHADOWS, SUN-SCORCHED.

Like this tiger, some of the cats portrayed are familiar. The lion, "sun tangled in my mane," lounges through the heat of the day with its pride, with only the energetic cubs awake and playing.  The cheetah, the "sharp-eyed running cat, fast as the wind," brings down an antelope after a brief chase. But some of the felines are few, unfamiliar to most readers, like the Scottish wildcat:

...THE SECRET CAT, WILD IN THE MOUNTAINS, ANCIENT, ALMOST A MEMORY. 

Another, the amur leopard, seems to sing its own death song, "...almost the last of my kind."

In its new American edition, I Am Cat (Francis Lincoln Childrens Books, 2013), Jackie Morris' lyric free verse narration is set off by stunningly, elegantly beautiful large-format watercolor illustrations of ten cats in their natural environment, including the dreaming marmalade cat cozy on his favorite cushion. Not intended purely as a nature study book, this one does offer a close look at each species of the cat clan, each specific, with its own characteristics, but each clearly feline, with the lithe shape and gaze that is pure CAT. This lovely volume invites lingering over each of its pages, each featured member of the feline family faithfully but artistically portrayed in all its comely cathood. "... Rich in language and eye appeal," says School Library Journal. "A lovely hybrid," adds Kirkus Reviews.

Battle of the Imaginary Buddies: Pingo and the Playground Bully by Brandon Mull

IN SECOND GRADE CHAD OFTEN PLAYED WITH HIS IMAGINARY FRIEND PINGO DURING RECESS.

SEVERAL OF HIS CLASSMATES HAD IMAGINARY FRIENDS AS WELL.

All is well with Chad and his friends. Even their pretend pals have complementary superpowers: Tiffany has Awesome Girl; Gary has Sparky the Robot at his command; and Dustin had Mr. Bob, the world's smallest super guy residing in his pocket at all times. With characters like that, the four kids share some unique adventures on the playground every day.

But one day, after an bizarre battle with the Lava Monsters, the four friends begin to boast about how their "special friends" are the best, and an epic conflict arises, with each imaginary alter ego besting the others in his and her own own way. To Chad's dismay, Pingo is a perennial second place in every match. Finally, Chad's pal steps in to broker a truce.

"THIS IS SILLY!" PINGO SAID. "CONTESTS ONLY PROVE WHO IS BEST AT CERTAIN THINGS."

But while the four friends are considering this piece of wisdom, they face a new adversary--their classmate Jeremy and his faux friend Grunt. Grunt is a hypothetical hero who mirrors his human creator--long on muscle and short on subtleties. Jeremy and Grunt lean more to a philosophy of pounding rather than persuasion. If Pingo is, as Chad still maintains, the BEST imaginary friend, can he figure out a way to psych out Jeremy and Grunt before everyone gets bested in a playground putdown?

Brandon Mull's latest book in Pingo series, his Pingo and the Playground Bully (Shadow Mountain, 2012) offers primary graders a look at how to co-opt a bully into becoming a buddy. Brandon Dorman's illustrations give this picture book its punch and pizzazz, especially in his illustrations of the competing fictional friends. While inviting the bully into their team of buddies may not work in the upper grades, it's a plausible plot line for second graders, and the use of their alter egos as expressions of their personalities and aspirations offers readers some insight into the primary grade social scene.

Stealin' Wheels: Ben Rides On by Matt Davies

NOW THAT HE HAD THE BICYCLE OF HIS DREAMS, BEN LUKIN LOVED GOING TO SCHOOL.

WITH HIS GLEAMING NEW MACHINE, HE COULD TAKE THE LONG WAY,

OR PERHAPS THE VERY LONG WAY.

At last Ben Lukin has wheels and his first ride to school is a bit of extreme biking which encourages a trip through a drainage tunnel and an exuberant Evel Knievel jump over five school buses!

But Ben's new wheels catch the eye of the wrong guy, the official class bully:

SSADLY, ADRIAN UNDERBITE, PERHAPS THE WORLD'S LARGEST THIRD GRADER, DIDN'T SEEM TO LIKE BEN VERY MUCH.

With a evil, gleeful look that dares Ben to do anything about it, the enormous Underbite appropriates Ben's new bike and rides off on it gleefully, leaving the crestfallen Ben to hoof it home, with only a pesky crow for company.

But as Ben trudges along, he hears a loud WWWGGRRAAWWWWWWW!

Following the wretched cry, Ben peers over the edge of a cliff and sees his bike bent and broken at the bottom and a terrified Adrian Underbite clinging precariously to the limb of a tiny tree growing not far below the edge of the precipice.

"HOW EXTRAORDINARILY TERRIBLE!" grins Ben in mock horror.

Satisfied that Adrian Underbite has gotten his just desserts, Ben walks away.

But after few steps Ben's conscience kicks in and he reconsiders the situation.

JUST WHEN ADRIAN THOUGHT HE COULD NOT HOLD ON ANY LONGER, A VERY FAMILIAR GREEN-AND-WHITE HOODIE APPEARED.  ADRIAN REACHED UP AND GRABBED FOR DEAR LIFE.

Does the rescued Underbite have a change of heart? Does he beg for forgiveness from his rescuer? Are the two set to be best friends forever? Well, no. He grabs Ben's beat-up bike and lumbers off on his size 10 feet with it. Sadly, Ben slogs homeward, believing that indeed, as they say, no good deed goes unpunished.

But there's an unforeseen and redeeming ending to Matt Davies' delightful little morality tale, the just published Ben Rides On (Roaring Brook, 2013).  Pulitizer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist Davies makes his debut with this engaging picture book that offers literal cliff-hanging suspense and scratchy-lined, comic illustrations, with its hero Ben all attenuated long limbs and large head, the hulking bully Underbite, loutish and lumpen, and even a nosy, crabby crow who pitches in to help Ben haul Adrian up over the cliff's edge. While Davies' drawings are highly stylized, his body language and funny facial expressions add to the humor that permeates this book which surprisingly ends on an upbeat note, promising many pedaling adventures ahead for Ben.

"Facial expressions, gestures, postures, perspectives: all conspire, with a ragged, raucous elegance, to make Ben Rides On an exceptional, and exceptionally likable, tale," says School Library Journal.

Consumer Reports: The Three Little Pigs and the Somewhat Bad Wolf by Mark Teague

When the fickle finger of fate causes three pig siblings to lose their jobs,  the farmer, retiring to Florida, gives them severance pay and sends them out to seek their fortunes.

"LET'S BUY POTATO CHIPS," SAID THE FIRST PIG.

"LET'S BUY SODY-POP," SAID THE SECOND PIG.

"LET'S BUY BUILDING SUPPLIES," SAID THE THIRD PIG.

The third sibling, a rather prissy and practical girl pig, is obviously focused on long-term goals, while her lazy brothers just want to feed their faces.

The three pigs part company to follow their bliss.  The practical pig heads for the home improvement store and spends her money on bricks and other durable building materials and soon is busy with bricklaying and gardening chores. The other two pigs settle for the fairy tale version of shacks, building their domiciles from dirt-cheap straw and sticks.

Everybody's happy, until a somewhat bad and very hungry wolf blows into town. Denied service at Do-Nut Dan's, Hot Dog Hal's, and Pete's Pizza Parlor, Wolfie decides he'll have to find food on the hoof, er, trotter. The two lazy sods scarfing down chips and soda look like easy marks, so he does the Huff 'n' Puff thing on their down-market dwellings.  It's instant domicile devastation!

"I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT WORKS!" THE WOLF SAID.

But when the two pigs flee to their more provident sister's house,the now very, very hungry wolf follows to the third piggy-scented house. This one is solid and somewhat intimidating, even to a wolf of proven windiness. He decides to try their doorbell first, but when they refuse to answer, he falls back on huffing and puffing--all to no avail on this up-scale residence.

"DO YOU THINK HE'S STILL THERE?" SAID ONE PIG.

THE THEE PIGS LOOKED OUT THE WINDOW AND SAW THE WOLF COLLAPSED ON THE LAWN.

"LOOK AT THE POOR GUY," SAID THE LAZY PIGS.

"MAYBE HE NEEDS SOME POTATO CHIPS," SAID THE FIRST PIG. "MAYBE HE NEEDS SOME SODY POP," SAID THE SECOND PIG.

"NEVER MIND THAT STUFF," SAID THE THIRD PIG. "DINNER IS ALMOST READY."

There's more than one way to win over a wolf in Mark Teague's new fractured fairy tale version of the classic, titled The Three Little Pigs and the Somewhat Bad Wolf (Orchard Books, 2013).His tongue-in-cheek text is set off perfectly with Teague's trademark comic illustrations, with plenty of clever visual jokes for the sharp-eyed reader, including the farmer's cat, duck, and goose who are also squatters at the practical pig's house. Teague's frequent shifts in perspective keep the familiar story line moving along in this twist on the old tale in which the wolf becomes a well-fed member of the pig household, happy and no longer hungry ever after.

An "entertaining and refreshing adaptation of the classic tale," says Publishers Weekly. But if kids still haven't gotten their fill of fractured fare, add a side dish of Lane Smith's award-winning The True Story of the Three Little Pigs and Eugene Trivizas' The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig for a trio of tasty rib-sticking, rib-tickling spoofs of the classics.

Can't Help It! I Dare You Not To Yawn by Helene Boudreau and Serge Bloch

YAWNS ARE SNEAKY.

THERE YOU ARE, MINDING YOUR OWN BUSINESS, BUILDING THE TALLEST BLOCK TOWER IN THE HISTORY OF THE UNIVERSE... WHEN SUDDENLY...

YOUR MOUTH OPENS WIDE, YOUR TONGUE CURLS BACK, AND ... mmmm-MMM.

Yawns are known to be infectious, even when you're not even sleepy. But the yawn is not the problem. As every kid comes to know, at a certain time at night parents are on red alert for any signs that a kid might be ready for bedtime.

That's when it is important to stifle even the thought of a yawn--at all costs. A simple yawn means getting the bum's rush through bath and tooth-brushing, pajamas and bedtime stories, goodnight hugs, and--Geez Louise! The next thing you know, it's LIGHTS OUT. There you are, eyes wide open, lying there in a dark room and wondering "How did I get here?"

Bedtime avoidance strategies are complex, but any savvy nighty-night veteran soon learns the ropes. Avert your gaze if your baby brother or dog begins to yawn. Those things are contagious! Keep your distance from fuzzy stuffed animals, especially any with which you have been known to sleep! No sheepy sleepy-time tunes either. And watch out for any song that Mom used to use to sing you to sleep when you were little! Look deeply engaged, keep a low profile, and...Good luck!

Helene Boudreau's newest, I Dare You Not to Yawn (Candlewick, 2013), wisely makes a wary bedtime avoidance champ the narrator of this little mock cautionary tale, and veteran picture book artist Serge Bloch contributes his truly comic talents to those funny illustrations which take this story over the top. Cagey parents will do well to make this one part of their bedtime routine and yawn a lot while they read it!

Wardrobe Rhymery: Button Up! by Alice Schertle

TANYA'S OLD T-SHIRT

I live in a bucket shoved under a stair.
They call me a dust rag!
I don't think it's fair.

I'm still the same size as when I was new.
I didn't shrink--
it was Tanya who GREW.

Alice Schertle is a veteran author whose way with a rhyme have lightened up many a folktale re-telling and fractured fairy tale.  Here she turns her skills to versatile verses which explore the relationship between clothing and those who wear it. No garb, from footwear to headgear escapes her scrutiny.

We are the jammies that Joshua wears,
not jammies for elephants going upstairs.
Hippopotamus can't get us over his head.
We're JOSHUA'S jammies. We're going to bed.

Swimsuits, bike helmets, hats, galoshes, Halloween disguises--all get Schertle's discriminating attention, the article of costume often reflecting the personality of the wearer, as in this little show-off, proud of her big-girl underwear, in "Emily's Undies."

We're Emily's undies,
with laces and bows,
Emily shows us
wherever she goes.

Likewise, in "Bertie's Shoelaces," the laid-back Bertie's lack of up-tight (or even tied) sneakers are reflected by his shoelaces, who lazily say as they drag along the ground...

We're hang loose laces
and we don't do bows!

Suitingly illustrated with Petra Mathers' artwork that fits the text like a glove, Schertle's updated Button Up!: Wrinkled Rhymes (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013) is all dressed up  in a spiffy new paperback edition, and is a real bargain, all-star glad-rags for the reviewers and readers, as cozy and welcome as the subject of her poem "Hand-me-down Sweatshirt."

I'm a hand-me-down sweatshirt
with a zipper and hood.
I'm everyone's favorite
and still looking good.

Quirky Critters: Lazy Daisy, Cranky Frankie by Mary Ellen Jordan

THIS IS MY CHICKEN.

SHE'S CALLED LIZZIE.

SHE SHOULD LAY EGGS,

BUT SHE'S TOO BUSY.

INSTEAD SHE'S DANCING IN THE AIR.

IN HER PURPLE UNDERWEAR.

If you feel you've found the funny farm, you're right.

All the critters here seem somewhat crazed. In addition to dizzy Lizzie, there's Daisy the cow who's too lazy to graze, and Fancy Nancy the pig who spends her days gazing at herself in the mirror. Then there's sheepdog Frankie, too cranky to round up a slew of silly sheep that litter the landscape.

Fortunately, there is one thing that these deranged domesticated goof-offs do well--sleep!

And that's a good quality, at least for characters in a bedtime story, and Mary Ellen Jordan's Lazy Daisy, Cranky Frankie: Bedtime on the Farm (Albert Whitman, 2013) brings it home in a tickle box turnover tale that will encourage shut-eye in little listeners. Jordan's easy-reading rhyming text and artist Andrew Weldon's large cartoon animals, done up in black line and flat pastel watercolors on bright white pages, give kids scads of silliness, from Chicken Lizzie roosting in her purple tighties on the clothesline to a top-hatted, roller-skating sheep, as they work their way down to the right time to hit the hay on this hilarious funny farm.

Holding On! It's Mine! by Tracey Corderoy

LULU HAD COME OVER TO PLAY WITH BABY BEAR.

"I'M PLAYING TIGER WITH RORY," SAID BABY BEAR.

"I LOVE TIGERS!" CRIED LULU.

A friend of my friend is my friend, right?

Baby Bear's fuzzy orange tiger toy is his best friend,  Lulu approves of his choice, and for a while all goes well with the playdate. But when Baby Bear gets rumbly in his tumbly and goes to fetch some goodies, things take a turn for the worst when he comes back with a snack:

LULU WAS PLAYING WITH RORY!

BABY BEAR GRABBED RORY'S LEG.  LULU HELD ON TIGHT!

Suddenly the playdate isn't working out so well! Lulu is in tears, and when Mom tells Baby Bear to share, he tries to placate Lulu with a zebra toy. It's got stripes, too, right?

But Lulu is having none of that. It's Rory or nothing.

So Mom steps in, takes charge of Rory for the moment and suggests a diverting trip to the park.

Grudgingly the two tots set off, but the playground is enticing. Studiously avoiding each other, Lulu tries playing solo on the see-saw, and Baby Bear sits down on the swing. Neither one of them seem to be going anywhere with their plans. See-saws that don't go up and down by themselves, and swings that don't swing are NO FUN! Lulu needs a partner, and Baby Bear needs a push! Hmmm!

Luckily, Mom knows how to facilitate a quiet compromise in Tracey Corderoy's It's Mine! (Good Books, 2012). Artist Caroline Pedler's sweetly rounded little bears are beguiling, and the use of bright orange flocking on her illustrations of Rory Tiger make the little bears' rivalry for the  fuzzy toy totally understandable. Sharing a beloved toy is hard (think having a friend over who demands to take your brand-new car out for a solo joyride!), and learning to share fairly is a big step in the preschool years. Pair this one with Anna Dewdney's latest best-selling Llama story, Llama Llama Time to Share (see my review here), which covers the same premise, managing to offer quite a bit of character development while sticking to a demanding but appealing rhyme that makes this life lesson go down sweetly.

Whatchamacallit? I Am Blop! by Herve' Tullet

BLACK BLOP

WHITE BLOP

 !POLB REVOCSID

BLOP is a blob--a four-lobed blob, a shape that can be almost anything the mind can imagine--a flower, a cloud, a butterfly, a Blop family, a classroom of blops in neat rows, what-ever-you-want blops.

Herve' Tullet's latest, I am Blop! (Phaidon, 2013) explores what can be done with a faithful shape like the blop. Blue blop teaches colors with an acetate overlap of yellow which yields a green blop which works both ways, forward and back. Pink and purple overlays play with a touch of red.

There are blops with faces, blops becoming animals, broken blops, measled blops, even invisible blops, blops as famous paintings, blops seen on a mirrored page. There are fill-in-the-blank blops and even punch-out blops that kids can take away to put into their own blop stories.

Herve' Tullet's books play with the very idea of the book, extending the two-dimensional page into the non-dimensional world of the imagination, as he did in in his 2011 best-seller Press Here (see my review here) and his equally imaginative The Book with a Hole. Tullet's little books have broken new ground--genre-breaking, interactive books with deceptively simple art on traditional white pages which nevertheless become interactive when mixed with the imagination of the child.  This one is no exception.

 Publishers Weekly puts in "... even the format is a novelty," and Kirkus Reviews quips "Tullet will intrigue children and encourage them to think outside the blop."

The Other Odd Couple: Wooby and Peep: A Story of Unlikely Friendship by Cynthia Liu

WOOBY LOVED HIS GOLDFISH WENDY AND HIS HUMBLE HOME.

HE LIVED ON A QUIET STREET WHERE THE NEIGHBORS MINDED THEIR OWN BUSINESS.

UNTIL ONE DAY....

Wooby and Wendy are happily living in Dullsville until Peep, the new next-door neighbor, blows into town like a tropical storm.

Peep is Wooby's opposite number. Her pet is Ricardo the iguana. Her lifestyle is loud and rowdy.

"WOW, RICARDO! I HOPE THE NEIGHBORS WON'T MIND MY SOUND SYSTEM!"

But it's not just her bass and tweeter that have even the backyard squirrel exclaiming "Oh, nuts!" Peep's idea of ingratiating herself with the neighbors is inviting everyone to her high-decibel housewarming:

"ALL-DAY PAR-TAY!"

All the neighbors nix the event.  Sheep says "Bah!"   Panda has to practice Zen meditation.  Kangaroo has a boxing match, and Cow remembers she has a moo-sic lesson. .  Wooby wants to stay away from the par-tay, too, but he's too polite to take a pass and finds himself the unfortunate only guest at Peep's festivities.  Peep tries to be the life of the party and winds up spilling Wendy's goldfish bowl, knocking down Wooby's 547-year-old shade tree, and, trying to make amends, she finally brings down the house--Wooby's house--all by herself. Oops.

Not an auspicious start for a friendship, but two lonely people find a way in Cynthia Liu's  Wooby & Peep: A Story of Unlikely Friendship (Sterling, 2013).  How Wooby and Peep become a "party of two" is a sweetly comic story that will charm kids completely, thanks in part to Mary Petersen's appropriately silly illustrations and Liu's light touch with her theme of friendship found in funny places. "Surprisingly affectionate," says Kirkus Reviews.

On the Other Side: The Zebra Forest by Adina Rishe Gewirtz

Here are my three real wishes:

1. Get tall.
2. Have an adventure.
3. Meet my father.

It is the last day before summer vacation in Mrs. Roberts' sixth grade class, and Annie is ready with three fake wishes for the predictable essay "Three Wishes I'd Like to Fulfill over Summer Vacation." Gran has always said that if you were going to lie, be a good liar, and Annie's essay has three plausible wishes that she knows are all lies that aren't going to happen.

And Annie knows her real wishes aren't going to happen either. She's short like Gran, the tiny town of Sunshine is perennially short of adventures, and as for her third wish...

"...that was the unlikeliest wish of all.  Because even if I drank a magic elixir and sprouted a few feet, and even if angry revolutionaries suddenly stormed the streets of boring old Sunshine, wish number three was impossible.  I could never meet my father.  My father was dead."

But in Adina Rishe Giwirtz's debut novel, Zebra Forest (Candlewick, 2013), all three wishes are granted in a way Annie could never have predicted.

Ever since her mother dumped Annie and her younger brother Rew off with Gran, saying simply, "they were his idea, not mine," Gran has told them that their father is dead, killed by an anonymous "evil man" in a fight, and the house on the edge of the zebra forest, a woods of white birches and black oaks, has been their whole world. Gran is loving but unpredictable and depressive, and her days of withdrawal to her room have become more and more frequent.  Annie has learned how to do the shopping, pick up mail from their box at the post office,  pay the bills, and be a good liar whenever people inquired about Gran's health.  There are plenty of  her father's old books to read, especially their favorite Treasure Island, and  Rew loves the adventure stories that Annie makes up about their father as a famous spy, a pirate, always a hero.

But then a prisoner revolt and mass escape at the nearby state penitentiary makes Sunshine the top item on national news, and Annie's summer adventure begins when an escapee breaks into their house and holds them hostage, threatening her and forcing Annie to lie convincingly to the police who search the countryside around the prison. As several weeks pass, Annie begins to suspect that their captor knows more about her family than seems possible, and finally she guesses that he is her father, her father who was not the victim but indeed the killer in that struggle.

And gradually, as Annie comes to know him, he begins to seem less like an evil man and more like a man who could have been, and is, their father.  Rew still plots escape, but Annie finds herself somehow drawn to Andrew Stone and calculating to prevent their father's discovery, understanding more and more about her family's strange history as the summer passes.

While Annie grows little in the physical sense that summer, she does grow and mature emotionally in this new coming-of-age novel. Like the zebra forest which changes with the seasons, the birches shedding their white bark and the oaks greening over, Annie comes to see that things are not so black and white as the younger Rew sees them.  Giwirtz's debut is impressive, with a slow but suspenseful exposition, part mystery, part suspense story, part character-driven novel that becomes increasingly compelling as layers of family history are peeled away like birchbark and a new family story, one without lies, emerges.

Above us the bare branches crisscrossed the sky, the white ones nearly disappearing against the clouds. I thought how much I liked winter in the Zebra when you could see the intricate pattern of those branches. 

But then, I like all the seasons, and I like that they'll come round next year, too.

It's nice to know, though, that some things really do change.

Kirkus Reviews says, "Gewirtz's emotionally intense debut novel about the complications of families offers a perceptive heroine and poetic, impressive prose."

One Lump or Two? Tea Rex by Molly Idle

DEAR MR. REX,

IT HAS BEEN SO LONG SINCE I HAVE SEEN YOU.

DO DROP BY ON FRIDAY AFTERNOON FOR A CUP OF TEA.

YOUR FRIEND,

CORDELIA

Cordelia is a brave girl who clearly does things by the book--Emily Post's Guide to Etiquette, that is. She is also quite courageous, considering that mixing dainty teacups with cretaceous critters is not generally well advised.

In Molly Idle's latest teatime confection, Tea Rex (Viking, 2013), she sets up a delicious tongue-in-cheek irony in her text, which consists solely of decorous directions for conducting a proper afternoon tea, while the prim but revealing colored pencil illustrations, within tidy borders, show all sorts of mini-mayhem about to break out as her prehistoric guest courts disaster. With the parlor chair straining under Mr. Rex's generous bottom, Cordelia shudders as her guest snatches her flowery straw chapeau to serve as his commodious teacup and sloshes the entire pot of tea into it, shockingly dunking her little brother's Teddy bear into it and opening wide for this unwonted tea pastry.

IT'S GOOD TO HAVE EXTRA CUPS AND NAPKINS ON HAND....

BUT A GOOD HOSTESS MEETS THESE LITTLE CHALLENGES WITH A CHEERFUL SMILE.

The Teddy is rescued and the party ends with dancing and toothy smiles from her guest, and as we see by the closing endpapers, a polite thank-you note to Mr. Rex, who has appropriately returned the favor by inviting Cordelia to his next dino tea party.

DEAR MR. REX,

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR HAVING US TO TEA.

YOUR FRIEND,
CORDELIA

An unusual juxtaposition of crumpets and the cretaceous,  this book has wide appeal.  "Sure to be enjoyed by tea-party enthusiasts, and even dino fans with no use for a teapot will find themselves drawn to this clever tale of a not-entirely-civilized beast of the past," says Kirkus Reviews.

Big Dipper: I Scream Ice Cream by by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Sergio Bloch

PRINCESS CAPE?

PRINCE ESCAPE!

Those mischievous pairs of words or phrases which have absolutely nothing in common except that they sound exactly the same--known pedigogically as homophones-- are the verbal landscape around which author Amy Krouse Rosenthal builds a playground of spoken wordplay with what she calls "wordles."

Assisted by the illustrations and book design of internationally-known artist Sergio Bloch, I Scream! Ice Cream!: A Book of Wordles (Chronicle, 2013) is a bunch of fun that even beginning readers can get into.  Bloch designs the book so that one phrase is introduced page right, giving the reader a chance to come up with the other part of the pair, as in the evergreen I Scream and Ice Cream before reading the other sound-alike on the next page. Each page becomes a clever captioned cartoon which leads to the following page's alternative.  A group of spooked Reindeer yield with a flip of the page to a solicitous mom proffering an open umbrella to her child as the rain begins to shower down, with the caption Rain, Dear!

Other simple wordles follow:  Meek...  Loud! and  Meek Cloud and  Pants...Knees, followed by an out-of-breath, allergy-ridden dog with the caption... Pant!  Sneeze! Fairy tale heroines get into the act with a drawing of Sleeping Beauty saying "A nap'll do me good!" and Snow White looking askance at the witch's poisoned fruit, saying "An apple'll doom me good!" There's even a triple wordle for the intrepid: "Uh, not her!...A knotter?...An otter?

Amy Krouse Rosenthal is the wordmeister of  elementary grade wordplay, and I Scream! Ice Cream!: A Book of Wordles shows kids how to have fun with their native tongue, or as Kirkus Reviews alliteratively puts it, "Witty wordplay guaranteed to tease and tickle."  Pair this one with Rosenthal's 1derful wordplay-with-numbers book Wumbers (see my review here) for gr8, cre8ive fun with figures 4 kids!