All Aboard the Magic School... Shuttle? Field Trip to the Moon by John Hare

What are the rules for a primary-grade field trip to the moon?

Rule One is familiar: Stay with the group!

But when this class, clad in their spacesuits, climb onto the big yellow school shuttle and zoom off for a field trip to the moon's surface, as we might predict, one little space scholar stops off to do some sketches of moon rock specimens and dozes off while the class hikes off into the moonscape.

And when sleeper awakes and hastily follows the class's footprints in the moon dust, she arrives just in time to see the big yellow space bus already heading back to Earth! Oh, no!

Dejected, the visitor sits down and pulls out a big yellow box of markers and begins to sketch a hopeful rainbow while waiting for rescue. But, what is that with the one big eyeball scoping out their visitor from behind a chunk of moon junk?

The curious moon creatures are fascinated with the concept of drawing, so the marooned kid passes out markers, and they all begin to create colorful self-portraits on the gray moon rocks.

And when the yellow shuttle returns for the little lag-behind moon scholar, the teacher hugs her and then makes her scrub the rocks clean from what looks like lunar graffiti.

Not since Ms. Frizzle took her class for a little moon stroll in The Magic School Bus Takes a Moonwalk (Scholastic Reader, Level 2)) has there been such an an intriguing field trip in earth's orbit. In John Hare's terrific debut picture book, Field Trip to the Moon (Margaret Ferguson/Holiday House Books, 2019), his illustrations tell the story wordlessly, setting the whole field trip off in shades of moon gray with spots of color, particularly in the big yellow box of markers, set against the deep black of space beyond. Even preschoolers can "read" the body language and the pathos of the little left-behind student, in a "story" that will be a favorite. "A close encounter of the best kind," says Kirkus Reviews.