Hard Lessons! Samantha Hansen Has Rocks In Her Head by Nancy Viau

"Aaargh! Samantha Hansen! Get your stupid rocks out of here. I want them gone!"

It's just Jen, my big sister. Jen likes to boss people around. So what if I'm ten years old? I don't need a boss who's fifteen. I rush to the bathroom to make sure Jen didn't touch my rocks.

"Rocks can't be stupid!" I yell back to Jen. "They don't have brains!" I peek inside the egg carton. They were touched, all right.

"Sam!" Mom calls from down the hall. "Stop yelling!" Jen does her eye-roll thing--and grins. My sister loves when I get in trouble.

I know my mouth has a mind of its own. I can't help it.

Sam admits that she has rocks on her head most of the time. She loves their different textures and colors, she loves that some can even be fluorescent under special lights, and she loves being the expert on rocks in her class. Her special rock assortment is carefully nestled in its egg carton and she's hoping her teacher will give her an A+ on her science project. She's even planned a production on fluorescent minerals with special lights that show off their glow-in-the-dark properties for her entry in the grade-level talent show. But her temper sometimes gets ahead of her.

And then Mom has a big announcement--a mini-vacation to the Grand Canyon.

"It would be good for you and me and Jen to get away. Just us girls," Mom says. "But you have to learn to put a lid on that temper of yours."

The Grand Canyon is like a dream come true for a rock scientist like me. I'm going to need a very tight lid. And quite possibly a different sister.

It's a rocky week for Sam, trying hard to control her angry words, but she and Jen pull off a surprise early birthday party that softens Mom's mood, and at last they are there, actually hiking with backpacks together down Bright Angel Trail!

The canyon is huge! The rock layers sit on top of each other like Mom's layered cake, but here each layer is a different kind of rock The colors bounce off my eyeballs. Maybe I'll find a rare mammoth fossil named for me.

Sam's petrological knowledge impresses their guide Chad, and she sparkles like a mica specimen when he asks her to be his assistant. But that night in their camp, Sam is awakened by her mom. Jen is missing, and Mom needs help finding her sister in the dark at the foot of the canyon, and in the course of that stormy night Sam uncovers a lot about her Mom and how her Dad died suddenly, and even how much she cares about her sister.

In Nancy Viau's Samantha Hansen Has Rocks in Her Head (Schiffer Publishing, 2019), Sam learns a lot about the science of geology, but, to her surprise, something about human psychology, too--that feelings are like rocks--there's often a lot about them buried below the surface. There's a lot to learn out there, and the likable Samantha Larsen is about to learn how to dig it all. Viau's page-turning middle-reader novel is what Beverly Cleary called "funny-sad," a chunk of real family life, with its everyday conflicts and its victories, and, as rock lovers might put it, it's a really gneiss summer read! And readers should keep their eyes out on the trail for Nancy Viau's Samantha sequel, Something Is Bugging Samantha Hansen, forthcoming August 28, 2019.

Glad to Meet You! Hi! My Name is... How Adorabilis Got His Name by Marisa Polansky

Early one morning, when all the fish were tucked away, a new creature arrived in the deep-sea tank.

He was very tiny, with great big eyes and eight little tentacles.

As all the denizens of the deep awake, they discover their new resident. They've never seen anything like him. Filled with curiosity they gather around. Yeti Crab is first to welcome their new neighbor, and Anglerfish turns on her light to get a better look.

"I wonder what they will call you?" she inquired.

Call me?" the creature answered.

"Everyone has a name here!" said Mimic Octopus.

To demonstrate how she got her name, she shows off changing shapes to look like other creatures A big-headed fish smiled with a mouthful of sharp teeth to show why he is named Fangtooth. Six-Gill Shark shows off his six gills.

The little creature is crestfallen. He can't compare with the others. He doesn't have big orange stripes like Clown Fish, and he can't glow in the deeps like the Moon Jellyfish, and he surely can't compete with Giant Squid's size. Then he remembers something he CAN do.

"I'm an excellent parachute!"

He demonstrates how he can spread his little tentacles and float slowly down to the bottom of the tank. Still, "Parachuter" doesn't quite have the ring of the proper name the others are looking for.

Then a couple of scientists stroll by and one greets the new acquisition.

"How are you doing, Adorabilis?"

Of course! He is adorable, and Adorabilis is his new name, in Marisa Polansky's Hello, My Name Is . . .: How Adorabilis Got His Name (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2018). Polansky's lighthearted look at aquarium tank wildlife introduces youngsters to the looks and behaviors of some of the diverse and curious creatures to be seen on a field trip, and this peachy pink little octopus is cute enough to live up to his scientific name of Opisthotautis adorabilis. Author Polansky offers a brief appendix in the form of a scientific note which gives further facts about this lovable-looking sea creature, and artist Joey Chou renders all the deep-sea specimens with enough realism to make them recognizable but with charm and personality that will make them memorable to young students. As Booklist puns, "Little ones will eagerly dive into this all-around adorable first glimpse at ocean fauna.”