All Kinds of Best Friends: Izzy in the Doghouse by Caroline Adderson

ISABEL AND ZOE WERE EACH OTHER'S FAVORITE FRIEND--MOST OF THE TIME.

They make each other friendship bracelets and wear them until they are gray and brown. At school they hang their coats in side-by-side cubbies so that their sleeves are in each other's pockets.

"OUR COATS HANG OUT SO MUCH THAT THEY HATE TO SLEEVE EACH OTHER!" JOKES IZZY.

But Izzy tends to take her ideas a bit over the top. They get into trouble as, with toilet paper streaming from their waistbands, they twitter like lizards running down the halls at school, and when at recess she tries to get a Kindergarten boy to pretend a pinecone is cookie and take a bite, both girls find themselves on the carpet in the principal's office.

Zoe blames Izzy for getting her in trouble and chooses a less rambunctious playmate after school. Bernadette turns Izzy down: Patty has piano lessons after school; and Nima says she has soccer practice. Izzy has a dull afternoon at home with her nanny Rosa, who wants to watch her soap opera in peace, and to make it worse, Mom is away on a business trip and won't be home until late. Izzy sleeps downstairs waiting for mom to get home and when she does, Izzy gets more bad news: Mom has an important business meeting the next day, so they can't have their usual Hooky Day and stay in their PJs together all day.

IZZY IS IN THE DOGHOUSE.

But when the next day Mom declares a Make-up Hooky Day, she has another great surprise for Izzy! They are going to adopt a puppy! Since Izzy herself is adopted, she is delighted. But when they bring Rollo home, she realizes that it takes a lot of thinking ahead to take care of a baby puppy.

"HE COULD CHEW CORDS THAT AREN'T UNPLUGGED OR GET STUCK UNDER SOMETHING. OR KNOCK SOMETHING OVER AND GET SQUASHED!"

And when Zoe asks for a playdate so she can see Rollo, Izzy forgets to lock his crate when he naps, and she's horrified when they can't find him anywhere!

"ZOE! WE HAVE TO FIND HIM. YOU CAN'T LEAVE A BABY ALONE! SOMETHING TERRIBLE COULD HAPPEN!"

But then Izzy realizes that she is the one who knows exactly how to find Rollo, in Caroline Adderson's Izzy in her Doghouse (Kids Can Press, 2020). In her new series for early chapter book readers, author Adderson has a character who is even more "over-the-top" than Beverly Cleary's Ramona Quimby. Adderson goes bravely into the weeds of an unusual family with a more rambunctious and less perceptive young heroine, but catches the moment when the impetuous Isabel suddenly discovers what responsibility to others means.

This is a endearing story, with an infectuously funny character that promises to equal Adderson's beginning chapter success with her Jasper John Dooley: Left Behind series, and Kelly Collier's funny line drawings break up the text and enrich and advance the story line with pazzazz that just fits Izzy. Says Kirkus Reviews, "An endearing, energetic take on chapter books for transitioning readers.