Different Strokes for Different Blokes! Digby Differs by Miriam Koch

DIGBY WAS A SHEEP--A VERY SPECIAL SHEEP.

AND IT MADE HIM FEEL VERY ALONE.

Digby, with his two-toned fleece, certainly stands out in a flock. His stylized red stripes certainly make him a singular sheep. So when a red-striped hot-air balloon sails by in the sky, Dixby takes it for a omen and follows it over hill and dale.

Digby takes heart when he comes to a town.  There's an awning with wide red stripes a-la-Digby, although it doesn't seem to offer him much of a welcome  Similarly, a warning sign, a trash can, and and unrecycled red-and-white paper cup share his colors but offer no companionship. But when a streamlined train with a red stripe along the side of its cars pulls into the station, Digby decides to give it a try and hitches a ride in the baggage car loaded with red-striped boxes of mail.

"I WONDER WHERE THESE BOXES ARE GOING," HE SAID.

"SOMEWHERE DIFFERENT?"

When Digby wakes up, he finds his box on the doorstep of a lighthouse on the coast, a red-and-white striped lighthouse. Maybe he has found a place to fit in at last.

Miriam Koch's Digby Differs (Peter Pauper Press, 2013), like its died-in-the-wool hero, is definitely a different book, squat and long, designed to show off the various horizontal landscapes through which Digby follows his fortunes. Koch's light-touch artwork is charmingly executed, the naive but hopeful Digby following his own version of color coding. Bright touches of Digby red draw him across the the linear landscape, from hillside pasture to cityscape to sandy seaside shore, all invitingly drawn and colored with what the New York Times reviewer calls "... hues a catalog copywriter might describe as oxblood, flan and café au lait, with a mushy-pea green added for the vitamins." Definitely a different drummer book.

Prehistoric Takedowns: Dino-Wrestling by Lisa Wheeler

WHAT'S THE SPORT WE CAME TO SEE?

IT'S THE DINO-WRESTLING JAMBOREE.

ATHLETES TRAVEL MANY MILES.

COMPETE IN IN DIFFERENT WRESTLING STYLES.

It's the Wide World of Dino-Wrestling Olympics--with all forms of wrestling showcased.

There's the no-holds barred Free Style matches, the traditional Folkstyle falls,   the classic Greco-Roman rumbles, the loco Latin Lucha Libre, Tag Team tussles, and for the real heavyweights, the Sumo dinos thump on the dohyo.  There's a match for every fan, and the grunts and thwacks abound with all the takedowns.

Stego takes on T. Rex in Greco-Roman style, while Iguanodon deals with El Diable (Tarbosarus) in Lucho Libre form.  The Pterodactyl Twins soar in Tag Team, and of course the really big bad boys--Triceratops vs. Gigantosaurus--are the bullies of Sumo.

YES! OFFICIALS CALL FOR QUIET.
FANS JOIN IN. NOW IT'S A RIOT!

Lisa Wheeler's latest dino-sport entry, Dino-Wrestling (CarolRhoda Books, 2013), goes to the mat with her comic verses,  and artist Barry Gott's blazing muscular illustrations put the full Nelson on this fun tale for any dinosaur fan, whether they favor wrestling or not.  Wheeler and Gott have all the right moves in their dinosaur sports series, which include Dino-Football (Carolrhoda Picture Books), Dino-Soccer, Dino-basketball, (Carolrhoda Picture Books) and Dino-Baseball and judging from the broad hint on the final page of this one, the coming dino-sport attraction is going to be all about skateboarding.  OLLIE-UP, dino-skate fans!

Getting to First Down: Fall Ball by Peter McCarty

In the fall leaves whirled past the windows of the big yellow bus.

"Football in the park in ten minutes!" Bobby calls.

Promising his mom to be back before dark, Bobby drops off his books at home and dashes back to meet his teammates. Jimmy is snared by his parents to rake leaves, and sadly watches the others gathering for a game as he struggles to corral the swirling leaves into something like a pile.

But getting off a scrimmage isn't that easy. There isn't much in the way of an offensive line, and when Bobby goes back for a pass, his dog Sparky thinks he's the intended receiver. He makes a good catch, but runs a little out of bounds, right into the center of Jimmy's hard-earned leaf pile!

But just as Bobby gets his ball back, he hears an unexpected call for time out!

"Time to come home!" call the parents.

"Already?" says Bobby.

And then, to underline the futility of fall football, it starts to snow.

Game over!

But at least there's a big game on the tube after supper, in Pete McCarty's nostalgic new book, Fall Ball (Henry Holt, 2013). McCarty's stylized little ballplayers, their hair blown straight up in the breeze, amid the whirl and swirl of falling fall foliage and set in the center of heavy creamy pages, gives this story a sturdy, homey feel, right down to the old-fashioned television set decorated with fall pumpkins on top as the kids settle down cozily for a little football after all. A pleasant slice-of-life story as warm as a piece of autumn apple pie, McCarty's story makes the most of autumn ambience. "A likable ode to the perennial pleasures of autumn and friends," says Kirkus Reviews.

McCarty is the author-illustrator of the Caldecott-winning Hondo and Fabian.

Manmade: The Human World by Jon Richards

Lots of books teach kids about the natural world, the land, the oceans and rivers, the air, and living creatures who make it their home.

But what about the human world, what humans have built and what they do on the surface of the earth, below the surface, and even in the space above the earth? That overlay (and underlay) is the subject of Jon Richards' just-published The Human World (The World in Infographics) (OwlKids Books, 2013), a book in the publishers Infographics series which seeks to portray the facts and figures of human activity in a variety of icons, pictograms. and colorful graphics.

Using bright backgrounds and a rainbow of colorful symbols, author Richards and artist/designer Ed Simkins set out to show middle readers some of the fascinating facts about human makers and shakers on the earth.

For example, a pictogram shows the silhouette of one car with the icons of eleven humans to show how many cars there are in relation to people on the earth. On another page a line graph shows earth's population at 791 million in 1750, rising slowly until 1900, to 1.6 billion, and then rising like a rocket to a predicted 9 billion by 2050. A companion infographic shows a human icon standing on his share of earth's surface, 0.03 square mile, in 1900, and the human individual standing on his 2050 share of land, 0.006 square mile.  A color co-ordinated world map shows where those people live--5.09% in North America, 10.61% in Europe, and 60.31% in Asia, with the populations shown by colored circles of related size.

And a lot of these people get around in cars. An array of car icons show the relative size of car production, with China, at the top with 13,897,083 cars produced in 2010, and the U.S. at the bottom of major producers with 2,731,105. A similar graphic shows that all of these automobiles produce 15.9% of earth's carbon dioxide emissions, while electricity generation produces 43.9%. A series of different-sized air control towers shows that Atlanta in the U.S. has the heaviest annual air passenger count, followed by Heathrow, U.K., Beijing, China, Chicago, U.S., and Tokyo, Japan.

Richards provides many more facts in show-not-tell infographics format--annual vacation lengths represented by different-sized beach chairs, relative work weeks shown by decreasing-sized workers at their laptops, and even the six most-popular tourist destinations, led, surprisingly, by France. Final sections deal with communications and the digital world, including the amazing fact that there were 5.3 billion cell phones (in 2010), with one and a half billion  of those in China and India.

Richards and Simkins provide an eye-catching glossary, with white text and bright icons set off against a black background, and an brief but useful index.  There's a (human) world of information to tempt students to find further facts in other sources. Other books in The World in Infographics series include The Human Body (The World in Infographics), The Natural World (The World in Infographics), and Planet Earth (The World in Infographics) (see reviews here).

Up All Night!: Simpson's Sheep Won't Go to Sleep by Bruce Arant

FARMER SIMPSON WORKS ALL DAY.

HE PLANTS HIS CORN AND BEANS AND HAY.

EACH NIGHT BEFORE HE GETS HIS REST,

THE FARMER TRIES HIS VERY BEST

TO GATHER UP HIS FLOCK OF SHEEP 

AND TELL THEM THAT IT'S TIME TO SLEEP.

The good farmer's call for lights out works just fine with the rest of the barnyard.  Ducks quack softly and hens cluck quietly and then they are off to dreamland. Ditto for the cows and pigs. But the sheep, those folkloric icons of dreamland?  They are a different story.  There's no rest for the weary with this fretful flock.

THEY ALL HAVE EXCUSES WHY THEY CAN'T LIE DOWN, OR EVEN TRY.

THEY NEED A DRINK, THEY WANT A SNACK. THEY HAVE TO "GO," THEY LIKE TO YAK.

The sheep grumble and toss and turn. Their pasture grass is too wet, the ground is hard and lumpy, something doesn't smell so good! On and on and on. Farmer Simpson can't catch his forty winks because of his wakeful sheep's constant complaints. He staggers through his daytime chores, eyes half closed, and it's the same story every night.

But then, when he drags himself to town to get a birthday gift for his good wife, he sees something that just may solve his insomniac sheep problem. Soft fuzzy blankets--on sale! Anything for a good night's sleep, Simpson figures, and he brings the blankies home.

And it works--for "each cuddly lamb ... and ewe and ram."

How Farmer Simpson pulls the wool over his sheep's eyes at last is the rhyming plot of Bruce Arant's new sheepy-time tale, Simpson's Sheep Won't Go To Sleep! (Peter Pauper Press, 2013). Arant's verses are as lively as his  wide-awake flock, and the contrast of the sheep with their wide-eyed insomnia and the droopy-lidded farmer tell the tale with great good humor.  School Library Journal says "Parents will sympathize with Farmer Simpson, and children will totally understand where the sheep are coming from. Great fun for everyone!"

Places, Everyone? The Table Sets Itself by Ben Clanton

IZZY AND HER FRIENDS--DISH, FORK, KNIFE, AND SPOON, CUP, AND NAPKIN--HAD BEEN WAITING FOR WHAT FELT LIKE A BIGILLION YEARS TO SET THE TABLE THEMSELVES.

At first Izzy and her table mates are only too pleased to put everything in its proper position on their place mats. But after what seems like a bazillion times, the bunch are bored with the sameness of their settings. Cup is fed up.

Izzy begins to improvise with the her settings. Some of her ideas are cute in conception but lousy in layout:

SOME OF THEM WERE RECIPES FOR DISASTER!

Spilled milk is a minor matter, nothing to cry over, but Izzy should have known what was going to unfold when she put the spoon in the dish instead of beside it. True to tradition, the Dish runs away with the Spoon, and the whole family has to cope with the elopement. Their mealtime pattern is broken, and the thrill is gone: Place Mat feels flat, Cup feels empty inside, and Knife's life is dull. Everyone is upset by the breakup of the set. It's not even heart-warming when they begin to receive predictable postcards from the two, honeymooning in the Far East:

"FINE CHINA IN CHINA!"

Even the pot is steamed, the teapot is steeped in dismay, in this unsettling tale of tabletop tragedy! There's many a slip between cup and lip, but there's hardly a blip between pun and fun in Ben Clanton's lighthearted look at chore time in his latest, The Table Sets Itself (Walker, 2013). Wordplay abounds in this tale of table setting gone awry, done up in Clanton's comic watercolor illustrations that are as light and silly as this story itself.

Up and Away! Elecopter by Michael Slack

HERE SHE COMES TO SAVE THE DAY!

ELECOPTER IS ON THE WAY!

Sorry! Wrong theme song. But if the tune fits, wear it, and Elecopter, the latest hybrid rescuer created by Michael Slack, is a robo-morphed elephant fitted out with 'copter rotors and skids on her feet, the better to protect and serve the animals of the preserve.

SHE SCANS THE SAVANNAH FROM HIGH ABOVE,

PATROLLING THE SKY, IT'S A LABOR OF LOVE!

And there's a lot of rescuing to be done! A rhino has to airlifted from a ravine! She has to drop her ladder to a marooned cheetah and a stranded baboon! And then there's that too-tall giraffe, surrounded by some hungry hyenas.

REV THOSE ROTORS! GO, ELECOPTER!

Preschoolers who like to think that help is always at hand will love cute blue Elecopter, who zooms to the rescue of hapless animals. Michael Slack has as much fun as a barrel full of monkeys with the digital illustrations for this jolly picture book, even using a vertical two-page spread to fit in the rescue of the long-necked giraffe, while a sudden forest fire is duly doused with a super spray from Ellie's handy hose nose, all in in Slack's community helper contraption series, Elecopter (Henry Holt, 2013). Publishers Weekly points out that this book is like a Little Golden Book on steroids, and the New York Times says, "Fierce in the face of danger and always kind, this motherly elephant gives parenting a good name."

This one pairs perfectly (and inevitably) with Slack's previously published Monkey Truck (Christy Ottaviano Books).

The Pullet Princess! Cinders: A Chicken Cinderella by Jan Brett

Snow on the outside, feathered friends on the inside...

Jan Brett's newest, Cinders: A Chicken Cinderella (G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2013), sets the scene, a Russian chicken coop with ornate towers, settling into a deep winter snowfall, with Tasha, the little girl who cares for the chickens inside, temporarily snowed in with her flock for the night. Largessa,  the old biddy who rules the roost, struts about clucking importantly as she makes sure that her proud daughters Bossy and Pecky, have the best place in the pecking order, as Tasha sits in the straw near the warm stove and offers to tell the drowsy hens a fairy tale.

Settling down, Tasha pulls little Cinders, the much pecked and put-upon little Cochin pullet, into her lap as she begins her story.  But Tasha, too, drifts into a dream-like state, and a story begins to unfold before them all.

... Largessa pulls out a letter from the Ice Palace, inviting all the young hens to a ball.

"Darlings! Prince Cockerel is sure to be looking for a princess bride! Time to get ready!

Summoning little Cinders, the chicken sisters order her to fetch warm water to bathe and fluff their feathers and clean their claws. As sisters primp and preen, Largessa summons Cinders to help dress and adorn Bossy and Pecky in their best finery before they set off for the Ice Palace. Little Cinders longs to go, but she knows she has absolutely nothing to wear to such an elegant event and no way to make her way through the snow to the grand ball.

But Tasha has promised a fairy tale, and Cinders' fluffy-feathered fairy godmother appears in a sudden flare of the stove and provides a silver sarafan dress and crystal slippers and turns a pumpkin into a glorious sleigh, with barn mice for footmen and a handsome pair of gray geese to pull her to the palace.

Brett sticks to the traditional story line, with its warning that the magic ends at midnight, and Cinders enchants Prince Cockerel just as the magic wanes, leaving a crystal slipper behind. Bossy and Pecky are properly put down when their unfortunate feet fail the slipper test, and Cinders rides off with Prince Cockerel to the Ice Palace to feather her nest with her silver eggs and presumably live the poultry version of happily ever after.

The story remains the same; only the names have been changed, but Jan Brett's elaborately styled gouache art, especially the four-page gatefold which features all of the feathered revelers swirling in their colorful finery at the ball, tells the tale in her special style, raising this Cinderella spinoff to the top of the princess tale pecking order. Virtue and hard work are rewarded at last, even in the chicken coop and the old story still has all its magic, set off in this stunning new version by one of the modern masters of picture book art. As Kirkus Reviews writes, "A captivating addition to the "Cinderella" canon."

Time of the Tiger: The Sultan's Tigers by Josh Lacey

The pagan shrine was no more than a few golden bricks built around a hole in the ground.

I had already wrapped my tiger in my second-best shirt. Now I pushed aside the bricks and lowered myself into the hole.
I found a place to hide the tiger. No one will find him. No one but you, my sweet wife.

If you are reading these words, my dear Susanna, then I shall have been buried here, in the Hindoos' soil. Please remember this: as I slipped away, I had only thoughts of you.

Your beloved husband,
Horatio Trelawney

Tom is a true Trelawney, the descendant of Cornwall smugglers and a long line of  crooks and bandits, but only he and his ne'er-do well Uncle Harvey seem to have inherited the Grandpa's risk-taking Trelawney genes. Assembled in Ireland with his family when Grandpa is found mysteriously dead in his cluttered house, Tom has an encounter with the gun-and-knife-wielding Marko, who offers 2000 euros if he will he hand over the bejeweled tiger taken by his ancestor Horatio from an Indian sultan in 1799. Tom immediately begins a search of his grandfather's house and finally uncovers a series of letters from his great-great-great-great-great-grandfather which explains why Marko thinks the Trelawneys have the priceless tiger, sought by the Indian billionaire Jalata Jaragami.

So now I understood what Grandpa had been selling. And now I knew why Marko was here. These letters were worth a lot more than two thousand euros.

Tom knows his boring by-the-book father will simply hand over the letters to the authorities, so he takes his find to Uncle Harvey, who, as usual, is in grave need of funds. With a handshake the two skip town together and take off for India in hopes that Horatio's tiger, the last of a set of eight stolen in the Hindu wars, is still in its hiding place.

With Marko in pursuit, the two Trelawneys arrive in India and make their way across the sub-continent by train, taxi, scooter rickshaw, and finally on foot, along the way meeting up with the billionaire collector J.J. who ups the offer to five million dollars.  But for the treasure-hunting Trelawneys, that's too easy, and besides, they have first to actually retrieve the tiger, a detail they are loathe to reveal. At last they reach the area where Horatio plundered Tipu Sultan's treasures, and while Uncle Harvey is chatting up an attractive tourist, Tom spots a temple on top a likely-looking hill and discovers that in the center of the temple room is a large hole which the priests claim is the home of their local god. Tom is sure that there is something else down that hole that has been keeping the god company for the last 200 years:

This was my chance.

I ran into the inner sanctum. I pulled the planks from the hole. I looked down.

A rock jutted out there. And another. I lowered myself down.

Now I could see what was around me.  I could see holes and bits of rock and a bundle of something, covered in dirt and dust. My fingers brushed away what remained of some cloth. My ancestor's shirt had decayed into dust. But it had done its job, protecting the treasure.

But finding the tiger is only the necessary first half of their quest, with the murderous Marko and the unprincipled J.J., who keeps the other seven Tipu tigers in a museum surrounded by a moat filled with real tigers, still ahead for the intrepid Trelawneys, in Josh Lacey's just-published The Sultan's Tigers (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013). It's a non-stop, flat-out adventure story, a thrill-a-minute road trip with two Indiana Jones-type protagonists, filled with local color and engaging characters who help the two along the way. And even if they can outwit Marko and J.J., dodge being dumped into the tiger pit, and make the best of their booty, Tom still has his problems to deal with when he returns, triumphant but still AWOL, to his parents in Connecticut. A perfect guy-type road story, with exotic locations, perfect stock villains, and plenty of humor, this one is a worthy successor to the first book in the series, Island of Thieves. Kirkus Reviews says "Lessons both social and geographic are laid on lightly in this rip-roaring adventure."

Thankful: Pete the Cat: The First Thanksgiving by James and Kimberley Dean

PETE TOOK HIS PLACE AT THE FRONT OF THE GIANT SHIP THAT HIS CLASS HAD MADE OUT OF CARDBOARD.

PETE WAS A PILGRIM ON THE MAYFLOWER. 

The "it's-all-good" Pete the Cat is just a little anxious about his class production of the Thanksgiving story for their parents in Dean and Kimberley Deane's new lift-the-flap book, Pete the Cat: The First Thanksgiving (HarperCollins, 2013).

But with flaps to help tell the story of the Pilgrims's first year in the New World, youngsters will be able to reveal the story step by step, beginning with the first page in which Pete, Pilgrim hat and all, boards their ship, the Mayflower, sails furled, and by lifting the flap, they can see the ship under sail, bounding over the waves toward North America, in calm waters and then in rough seas.

At their destination each page reveals Pete and his fellow students as colonists building cabins, shivering through the hard winter, learning about corn, beans, squash, and especially pumpkins from Squanto, and finally inviting the Wampanoags to join them in thanksgiving for their first harvest.

Using a tablecloth flap, youngsters will see the long table being readied, and with a lift of the flap, see the bounty from their harvest spread on the board for the Pilgrims and their guests.

"WOW! I NEVER THOUGHT HOW HARD IT WAS BACK THEN!" said Pete, as he and Callie Kitten take their  bows.

For fans of Pete the Cat it's fun  to see Pete, walking in his Pilgrim shoes, and learning about the first Thanksgiving in one of those Pilgrim celebrations that are familiar to most early childhood education classes.  The familiar icons of the holiday are there--Pilgrim hats, corn and pumpkins, turkey and berries, and those important Native American guests for the first Thanksgiving--to help give young children a sense of the flow of the holiday's history with each lift of a flap.  Kimberley Dean's familiar flat, faux naif drawings fit right in with the target audience's own classroom artwork, and the story of the class play will help kids in their first presentations feel right at home with Pete performing along with them.

Pigeon Peril: The Mesmer Menace (Gadgets & Gears) by Kersten Hamilton

WALTER'S HAIR WAS ALL STANDING ON END WHEN HE WOKE ME TO DEMONSTRATE HIS INVENTION.

"IT IS FINISHED, NOODLES," HE SAID, HOLDING UP A SMALL VEST WITH BAT-LIKE FOLDING WINGS.

I TRIED TO SHAKE THE SLEEP OUT OF MY EARS AS HE BUTTONED ME INTO IT.

"YOU'RE AMAZING!" WALLY SAID.

I WAGGED. THE WINGS FLAPPED UP AND DOWN!

"YOU CAN DO IT, BOY!"

MY WAGGER WENT WILD.  SUDDENLY, I CAME FULLY AWAKE TO FIND THAT I'D RISEN TO THE CEILING.

Dachshund Noodles believes that the problem is not with his loyalty, but his acrophobia.  I mean, not even a devoted dachshund can keep wagging when his wagger is all that keeps him aloft over an abyss!

But life is pleasant, if a bit wacky living with a family of eccentric inventors, until Wally Kinnewickett opens the door of the Automated Inn to a hobo and things take a turn for the outright bizarre.

"HOW CAN WE HELP YOU? " CALYPSO KINNEWICKETT ASKED THE HOBO KINDLY. "BREAKFAST, PERHAPS?"

"WE'VE NO TIME FOR THAT," THE HOBO SAID. HE TOOK OFF HIS COAT AND HAT.

WALLY GASPED. "THEODORE ROOSEVELT!"

MR. PRESIDENT!" OLIVER KINNEWICKETT EXCLAIMED. "WHAT AN UNEXPECTED HONOR!"

"THE COUNTRY NEEDS YOUR AMAZING BRAINS, KINNEWICKETTS," SAID THE PRESIDENT.

It seems a nefarious gang of magicians plan to use their powers to mesmerize the leaders of the country, gain mind control over them, and take over the nation, if not the world. T. R. urges Wally's parents, Calypso and Oliver, to turn their inventive minds to espionage to avert the coming catastrophe. The senior Kinnewicketts quickly pack and prepare to leave in disguise with the President, leaving Walter to manage their Atmospheric Electron Collector designed in collaboration with Nikola Tesla, aided by their staff of automatons, Gizmo the housekeeper, Knives the cook, and dozens of automated Dust Bunnies who keep the Automated Inn clean.

But no sooner do the President and his two new covert operatives disguise themselves and take the train to Washington, than the chief Mesmer of them all, in the form of the so-called Mr. Potts and his mustachioed assistant Mr. Slade, arrive at the Inn, pretending to be pop corn purveyors visiting to view Mrs. Kinnewickett's invention, the surplus electron corn popper.

But with them comes a peculiar pigeon, Iron Claw, who has one spinning eye capable of mesmerizing anyone who gazes at it. Wally soon sees through the ruse and invents for himself some special spectacles impervious to the pigeon's stare, while everyone else falls under its spell, even Wally's supercilious cousins Prissy and Melvin and the entire automatonic staff.  Wally realizes that he must get word to the telegraph office asking Mrs. Roosevelt to contact his parents to return and foil the plot, but with Potts and Slade watching his every move, the young Kinnewickett realizes that his only hope lies in Wally's wag-powered wings to carry the message to the town telegraph office. It's all up to Noodles' wagger to power his flight, but can a dachshund hampered by a deathly fear of heights manage a long flight and a sustained wag?

Kersten Hamilton's first in a projected series, The Mesmer Menace: Gadgets and Gears, Book One (Clarion Books, 2013), has all the trappings of sci fi fantasy adventure, a  pair of evil magicians, a family of famed wacky inventors who put the kabash on evil while perfecting an unlimited (and carbon-emission-free) source of electricity to power the world.  Wally is the quintessential kid genius inventor, and his dachshund Noodles is the, er, dogged narrator of this comedic introduction to the quirky Kinnewicketts for young readers who like their fantasy on the spoofy side.

"Steampunk with training wheels for the chapter-book set!" quips Kirkus Reviews.

Sophie's Choice: Sophie Hartley and the Facts of Life by Stephanie Greene

"I HATE MY HAIR!"

Sophie took a pair of socks out of her top drawer and counted to herself silently. One, one thousand... two, two thousand...

"I HATE MY HAIR!" Her older sister, Nora, shouted, louder this time. Even her hair dryer sounded furious.

The old Sophie would have tried to cheer Nora up by saying something dumb like "I have curly hair, too, and I like it." Sophie couldn't believe how much she'd matured in two short months. Since Nora had moved up to the attic and Sophie had turned ten, Sophie had started seeing things in such a new light that she felt she could easily be eleven. Or even twelve.

The thing was, Sophie wasn't in a rush to be eleven or twelve. It would bring her that much closer to being fourteen.

The facts of Sophie Hartley's life is that there is way too much puberty in her family. Her sister Nora is sure that only her wavy hair stands between herself and her crush, Ian Bishop. Her sixteen-year-old brother Thad is paying a lot of attention to his hair now that he is going out with Emily, his latest girlfriend. Nora grumps about everything, and Thad makes himself scarce, especially at chore time. Her mom is beyond frazzled, so tired of teen-aged drama that she jumps at a chance to fill in for her boss at a conference for five days, leaving Dad in charge of the hormone-charged household.

And as if that is not enough adolescent angst, at school the class gossip, Destiny, is gathering the fourth grade girls around to whisper that she knows all about the movie, the famous video on puberty that the fifth graders are going to see. Destiny promises her furious followers a secret meeting to reveal all.

"We don't care about that stuff," Sophie told Destiny.

Destiny looked pointedly at Sophie's friend Alice and said, "Alice does. Hailey's older sister saw the movie last year and said it was disgusting."

But in a move to keep her two best friends from being sucked into Destiny's circle, Sophie hears herself promising to sneak the book on adolescence that her mom bought Nora out of her sister's room and explain all to Alice and Jenna. And when Alice blabs about the meeting to some of the other girls, Sophie finds herself the purported girl guru of P-U-berty, with a fourth-grade following who expect her to tell them everything, even the disgusting parts.

Turn back, turn back, O Time in thy flight! Make me a kid again, just for ... well, at least until Mom gets back, thinks Sophie Hartley, in Stephanie Greene's latest Sophie story, Sophie Hartley and the Facts of Life (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt/Clarion, 2013). Just-turned-ten Sophie is happy with herself at last and would just love for things to stay the same in her family, thank you very much. But Time--time, and P-U-berty--wait for no one, and it's up to the Hartleys and Sophie to figure out how to live in their new family with two teenagers and a ten-year-old who knows only too well what's coming next. Sophie Hartley is a terrific protagonist, one who is the new Ramona Quimby for today's readers, one we know will make good choices with her sense of self and humor intact, in a typical family which is, as Ramona described her own, "a good, sticking-together family" despite it all. Greene does middle elementary characters with realism and insight and a knack for comedic writing that keeps the inevitable angst in its place. Growing up is hard to do, but Sophie Hartley is on her way.

Stephanie Greene's other Sophie stories include Queen Sophie Hartley, Sophie Hartley, On Strike, and Happy Birthday, Sophie Hartley.

The Vogage of the Aurora Australis: Sophie Scott Goes South by Alison Lester

Woohoo! I'm going to Antarctica!

That's right, me. Sophie Scott. I'm nine years old and I'm going to Antarctica with my dad.

He's the captain of the Aurora Australis. It's an icebreaker. We're delivering people and supplies to Mawson Station. We'll be the last visitors there before winter comes and the ocean freezes.

Most kids dream of adventures, and Sophie Scott finds herself in the middle of real thrills and real chills. Although the ship seems big in port, longer than a football field, and her berth with its own curtains and reading light seems snug, it is only few days until Sophie sees that the hardships of this adventure are for real. Storms strike and even moving about the ship is dangerous.

I've missed a couple of days of my diary because the sea has been so rough. Last night the ship was rocking and rolling like crazy. Anything not tied down goes flying and I have to hold on all the time. Sometimes a wave bashes the ship so hard it feels as though we've hit a rock.

The dining room portholes go underwater every time the ship does a big roll. It's like we're eating inside a washing machine.

I'm so cold I can hardly type. There was a wild blizzard and I couldn't sleep.  I was sliding up and down like a yoyo.  This morning the decks were covered with ice and snow and it was too dangerous to go outside.There were loud BONGS as icebergs just below the surface bashed into the ship's hull.

But in moments of calm, despite frozen toes and fingers, Sophie is excited to spot her first icebergs, seals, and, at last, penguins. Even dressing for the Antarctic is an adventure, with eight layers plus boots and gloves. After thirteen days at sea, the ship reaches the Antarctic port of Mawson Station.

After breakfast we climbed down a rope ladder to a barge waiting below.  It was scary, trying to hang on, with the ship moving up and down.  As soon as I got inside I felt sick and dizzy... the building was heaving up and down.  I was seasick on land!

But soon Sophie ventures outside to see more seals and many penguins, to take pictures of sunrises and sunsets and to hack off a piece of Antarctic ice to take home to her little brother Alfie. She takes a ride on the diesel ice crawler, the Hagglund, which sometimes seems to be slipping scarily back down the slope toward the sea. The wind becomes so strong that she cannot stand without an adult between her and its force, and Sophie is stranded by a sudden Antarctic blizzard, a whiteout, using the safety ropes between buildings to locate the safety of the Red Shed, where she sleeps to the recorded sound of a seal singing under the ice. At last she wakens to a calm day and gets a rare and spectacular view of the southern lights, the aurora australis.

Alison Lester's true account of a real-life adventure, Sophie Scott Goes South (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013), provides a kid's-eye view of a terrific journey that will be memorable to young readers just as it was for Sophie. Lester's line drawings have a natural appeal to youngsters, with schematic illustrations as well as nature drawings, and even a polar projection map is included, along with a glossary of terms--Katabatic Winds, krill, GoreTek, and monkey deck to name a few.

Oh, and Alfie's Antarctic ice makes the voyage all the way back to Hobart in its own cooler!

Sweets to the Sweet! Little Sweet Potato by Amy Beth Bloom

ONCE UPON A TIME THERE WAS A LITTLE SWEET POTATO WHO LIVED IN A GARDEN PATCH WHERE THE EARTH WAS RICH AND BROWN AND THE AIR SMELLED SWEET AND SPICY.

Life is good for Little Sweet Potato in his home patch, until an earthquake shakes things up and he finds himself bouncing over the fence and right into terra incognita.

Sensing that the middle of the road is not a good place, unless your goal in life is to be a mashed sweet potato, the little tuber sets out to locate a better place to put down roots. Ah, there's a patch of green growing things just ahead.

It's a carrot patch. Reasoning that other root veggies will be welcoming, Little Sweet Potato hopes he can plant himself with them. But no!

"WE THINK NOT!

YOU'RE LUMPY, DUMPY...AND WE HAVE TO SAY IT...

YOU'RE BUMPY! YOU DON'T BELONG!" the carrots shout, pointedly.

A proud crowd of satin-skinned purple eggplants look down their smooth noses at Little Sweet Potato and tell him to scram! A planting of flowers are not so sweet either.

It's a jungle out there!

Poor Little Sweet Potato. Being lumpy is his thing. He can't change who he is to fit in with flowers, either, so he sadly continues her search for a better patch. Rejection is everywhere until he finally hears a welcoming voice.

"HEY, YOU! LITTLE SWEET POTATO!

YEAH, YOU! BUMPY, BUMPALICIOUS! YOU'RE SWEET!" called a big potato from a big patch.

"I'M HOME?" sighs the relieved little tuber.

"IT'S NOT ALL MULCH AND SUNSHINE OUT THERE," agrees the big yam.

Little Sweet Potato finds that this garden is a roomy patch with a place for all varieties, even egalitarian eggplants and kindly carrots, and happily plants herself in a new patch. Life is again sweet, in Amy Beth Bloom's Little Sweet Potato (Katherine Tegen Books, 2013), a veggie tale with a gentle message of the virtues of savoring the differences between us all. Illustrator Noah Z. Jones obviously has fun with his sly portrayals of conceited carrots, supercilious zucchini, cliquish grapes, and egocentric eggplants, all social types that even primary readers may well recognize among their own personal patches.

Publishers Weekly points out that "the ending has just enough drollery to leaven the story’s didactic message about diversity."  And Kirkus Reviews writes. "A tale of rejection and acceptance with echoes of "The Ugly Duckling." Not bad reviews for a little side dish root veggie.

Thankful: Thanksgiving Day Thanks by Laura M. Elliott and Lynn Munsinger

"THANKSGIVING IS COMING," SAID SAM'S TEACHER MRS. WRIGHT.

"WHAT ONE SPECIAL THING ABOUT THE HOLIDAY WOULD YOU GIVE THANKS FOR?"

As the extroverts in the classroom start blurting out their favorites--football, sweet potatoes with marshmallows,shopping the sales--Mrs. Wright offers a group assignment as well.

"HOW SHOULD WE CELEBRATE THANKSGIVING IN OUR CLASS?"

Jeffrey advocates a special classroom Pilgrim feast. Tiffany is excited about wearing costumes. But Winston has what seems at first like an odd idea--his grandmother's yarn Thanksgiving turkey!

"EEEWWWW! YOU EAT YARN TURKEY?" shouts one class comic.

"NO. ITS A DECORATION. WE WRITE WHAT WE'RE THANKFUL FOR ON A PAPER FEATHER AND STICK IT IN THE TURKEY," Winston explained calmly.

Mrs. Wright loves Winston's idea and Winston promises to bring the yarn turkey for their celebration, and the rest of the kids soon get busy on their own projects. Nicole irons bright autumn leaves inside waxed paper for placemats, Winston makes a miniature Mayflower from popsicle sticks, and Mary Ann makes a Indian beaded headband and practices with her toy bow and arrow.

But Sam is a a kid who takes a long time to make up his mind about things. While everyone else is bubbling with ideas for the celebration, he is stumped. What is he most thankful for? What special thing about Thanksgiving is his favorite? Time is running out. But at last Sam has one idea he thinks his classmates will like a lot.

On the day of their celebration, Sam arrives at school with his project, four helium balloons--a dog, cat, frog, and a turkey-- to reproduce the Thanksgiving Day Parade on television. He ties them to a tree outside the classroom so that they will be a big surprise for his class. When it's time, he slips out to get his project and the kids are excited as the colorful balloons pass by their window, but before Sam can get them through the door, a powerful autumn wind pulls the strings out of his hand and they float away. Oh, no!

But acting quickly, his best friend Mary Ann rushes out with her bow and sends a suction cup arrow on a string up to stick on the dog balloon and pull it down. Sam is grateful, but he is despondent that his project is reduced to a one-dog parade, until Mrs. Wright asks him why the Thanksgiving morning parade is so special for him.

"MY WHOLE FAMILY WATCHES IT TOGETHER. GRANDPOP TELLS ABOUT GOING TO NEW YORK CITY FOR THE PARADE WHEN HE WAS LITTLE.

WE LAUGH A LOT."

And suddenly, Sam knows what he going to write on his two feathers--that he is thankful for his family and for friends like Mary Ann in Laura Malone Elliott's second Sam story, Thanksgiving Day Thanks (Katherine Tegen Books, 2013). As in the first book, A String of Hearts, hesitatin' Sam learns a little more about what is in his own heart, and his class and young readers learn a lot about the history and customs of our historical holiday along the way. Author Elliott appends two sections, "A Note about Thanksgiving," and "Other Thanksgiving Facts" which cover the history of our Thanksgiving observance from the very beginning right down to the traditional opening day of Christmas shopping customs.

Veteran artist Lynn Munsinger, famous for her charming young animal cartoon characters in classics such as the Tacky the Penguin books and the Hooway for Wodney Wat stories, vividly portrays the varied personalities in Sam's classroom and the qualities each brings to the mix in a way that young readers will recognize. As Booklist's reviewer says, "Bolstered by warm watercolor cartoon illustrations, this book is a perfect delivery system for a wealth of knowledge about Thanksgiving, with the story suggesting that family and friends are the main things to be thankful for."

For pre-Thanksgiving readaloud sessions, this one pairs well with Marc Brown's similarly themed classic Arthur's Thanksgiving (Arthur Adventure Series).

Inside Story: The Human Body by Jon Richards and Ed Simkins

Three billion of your body's cells die every minute!

A body contains enough carbon to fill 900 pencils.

You lose about 50,000 flakes of dead skin every minute.

The surface area inside the lungs is 754 square feet... the same as half a tennis court.

An adult has up to 62,137 miles of blood vessels--enough to stretch around the world 2.6 times.

Bacteria found inside the gut outnumber human body cells ten to one.

Science author Jon Richards packs his latest, The Human Body (The World in Infographics) (OwlKids, 2013), in his noted nonfiction series The World in Infographics with a tsunami of wow-inducing fascinating science facts that are aimed at hooking the elementary reader. Using eye-catching double-page color spreads in an attractive layout of pictograms, graphics, and icons designed by Ed Simkins, this book uses both awe-producing (the brain contains 1,000,000,000,000 nerve cells) and arrgghh-producing (the mouth makes about 4-6 cups of saliva per day) fascinating facts about the human body.

Richards' thirteen major topics give a once-over to the major body systems such as the skin, respiratory, circulatory, and digestive systems, separating some into double sections such as the sensory organs and the nervous system and the reproduction system and growth from gestation to maturation. Visualization is the guiding theme here, and Simkins uses a different background color for each section to make his factoids pop from the page, with some spreads represented vertically to provide variety.

Not intended as a substitute for an in-depth look at the human body, The Human Body (The World in Infographics) is a slim, unintimidating book which seeks to fire readers' interest in human biology by hitting the points of particular interest to elementary students. The text is snappy and succinct and the graphics succeed well in illustrating each fact in a way that all learners can grasp. There's certainly room for gee-whiz science books in this STEM-conscious educational environment, and Richards and Simkins know how to deliver with a browsing book well aimed at inspiring future biological scientists.  Few kids will make it through this book without a "Hey! Listen to THIS!" aimed at anyone near.  A short and snappy appendix includes a glossary, list of web site sources, and an index.

For a review of the author's first book in this series, see my recent review here.