Common Denominator: Pirate,Viking, and Scientist by Jared Chapman

PIRATE WAS FRIENDS WITH SCIENTIST.

SCIENTIST WAS FRIENDS WITH VIKING.

VIKING AND PIRATE WERE NOT FRIENDS.

Scientist has a problem. His birthday party is coming up soon, and he'd like to invite all his friends. But Viking and Pirate can't stand each other. And these two can cause some major mayhem when they get together.

But Scientist believes in the scientific method. There's got to be something they can enjoy together.

Birthday cake?

The cake doesn't survive the fight over it between the two.

Party games?

A furious free-for-all follows!

Results of the experiment are negative. But before Scientist scraps his hypothesis, he decides to try again to find common ground between the warring factions: he asks three questions:

"DO YOU LIKE BOATS?"

"YES!" SAID PIRATE. "YES!" SAID VIKING.

"WHAT DO YOU KEEP UNDER YOUR PILLOWS?"

"A SWORD!" THEY BOTH ANSWERED

"WHAT'S YOUR FAVORITE WAY TO SPEND SATURDAY MORNING?"

"PILLAGING AND PLUNDERING!" THEY SHOUTED!

Bingo! Scientist has his conclusion. With common ground established between Pirate and Viking, it's time for something else they both like--ice cream, in Jared Chapman's Pirate, Viking, and Scientist (Little Brown and Company, 2014). While pillaging and plundering are not exactly recommended weekend pastimes, Jared Chapman's goofy little tribute to the scientific method does establish the value of negotiation to get even these ruffians to YES. Chapman's zany cartoon characters are over the top in a way that makes his point that almost any antagonists can find something to agree upon, and he does so in a way that hits a couple of curriculum targets as well. As Publishers Weekly puts it, "... it’s great inspiration for classroom science units or at-home Venn-diagramming."

Slipping the Scaffold! Wild Rover No More (A Bloody Jack Adventure) by L. A. Meyer

THE BOSTON PATRIOT
Nov.10, 1809--Special Edition

NOTORIOUS PYRATE AND BRITISH SPY JACK FABER HANGED

THE CONDEMNED SHOWED NO REMORSE AT END OF LIFE.

Protesting her Innocence to the last, the Criminal Jacky Faber, also known as Bloody Jack, the Scourge of the Caribbean; La Belle Jeune Fille Sans Merci; the Lily of the West; and the Belle of Botany Bay was hanged today by the order of the State of Massachusetts, having been Convicted of High Treason against the United States. Incriminating Documents concerting detailed plans of the Fortifications at Fort McHenry had been found in her possession.

The beauteous and bold Jacky Faber, still only a lass of nineteen, has sailed both oceans as a privateer, amassed a fortune as head of Faber Shipping Enterprises, posed for a famous scantily-clad portrait painted by Goya, flatboated down the Mississippi, and undertaken various undercover espionage for assorted governments, seems to have come to the end of the road.

It  had seemed things were going well for the wily Jacky. Having vowed to have nothing further to do with men and live single, amassing an even larger fortune from legal merchant trade, Jacky is unexpectedly reconciled with her love, Jaimy Fletcher. But when jealous conspirators plant a map of Fort McHenry in a British diplomatic pouch with Jacky's name on it, she becomes a traitor hunted down by her state and country. But Jacky always takes care to know where the back door is, and, disguised in her well-worn midshipman's sailor's togs, makes an escape in her sailboat Morning Star and, leaving Boston Bay behind. makes for the port of Plymouth in a howling gale.

In Plymouth Jacky looks about for a job that will allow for deep cover and, as Annabelle Leigh, she takes employment as a governess. But a snoopy Plymouth postmaster reads her mail, and soon the federals on on her trail again. By chance, Jacky encounters a traveling circus troupe and hires on, using the skill she exhibited during her Paris sojourn, as Princess Natasha Annasova Romanoff, Aerialist. Garishly made up and costumed in spangled tights, high on the tightrope wire, she feels safe for the moment as the circus continues its travels toward Provincetown.

But Jacky's fabled luck seems to fail her this time, and she is discovered and returned to Boston, summarily tried as a British spy, and slated for hanging as soon as her scaffold is completed.

I sigh and look about me. All my thoughts of escape have been in vain. There is a lock on my shackle, a lock on the cell door. I have no metal to fashion a key. No, I am truly lost. This is one cage that Jacky Faber will not get out of... until, that is, they take me out for the final time.

"All right, boys, let's give 'er a try," I hear one of the carpenters say outside my window. There is the rasp of a lever being thrown and the sound of something falling with a whump.

They have completed the gallows and are testing the trap that will fall from beneath my feet.

I crawl into bed, my ankle chain rattling on the bedstead as I do it.

Oh, was I ever so bad as to deserve this?

But while Jacky Faber is bravely composing herself to meet her maker, she has friends hard at work to help her yet again cheat the hangman, in the rousing conclusion to L. A. Meyer's just published, series-concluding Wild Rover No More: Being the Last Recorded Account of the Life &Times of Jacky Faber (Bloody Jack Adventures) (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014).

Meyer's characters are crisp and true to the times, the plotting is gripping but never improbable, and Jacky Faber herself is a wondrous heroine, fearless and intelligent, a strong woman born out of her time who does not scruple to use her beauty, quick wits, and endless energy to find adventure all of over the globe. A fine fictional character with the combined qualities of such historic femmes as Cleopatra of the Nile, Mary Queen of Scots, pirate queen Anney Bonney, spy Mata Hari, and exotic danseuse and World War II spy Josephine Baker, Jacky's rip-roaring escapades never fail in this twelfth book of the much lauded Bloody Jack Adventures series. Says Kirkus in their starred review, "Meyer offers an impressively accomplished heroine, suspense as taut as a hangman's rope and a satisfying conclusion. A solid and sentimental entry in an underrated series."

Fare ye well, and a fair wind to your back, Jacky Faber!

Buccaneers' Booty: Pirates Love Underpants by Claire Freedman

THESE PIRATES SO LOVE UNDERPANTS,

THEY ARE ON A SPECIAL QUEST

TO FIND THE FABLED PANTS OF GOLD

FOR THE CAPTAIN'S TREASURE CHEST.

Run up the Jolly Knickers flag to the masthead, hang the colorful underwear semaphores from the rigging, and steer the buccaneer brig Black Bloomers by the Captain's treasure map!

These pirates are bound to add the fabled Pants of Gold to their booty.

But, Avast! When they reach the treasure island, they find that some renegade brigands have already arrived. There are footprints in the sand and the trail leads over Long-John Bridge to their redoubt, where the treasure rests surrounded by a crew of privateers, in their underbritches, encircling the Pants of Gold which are clearly bound for their hold.

Their rivals lie sleeping soundly around their campfire, with the desired booty booty chained in the center of the camp. What to do?

The seamen of the Black Bloomers turn to their leader:

THE CAPTAIN HAS A CUNNING PLAN.

"GRAB THEIR FANCY UNDERPANTS AND...

CUT THROUGH THE ELASTIC!"

It's hard to wield a cutlass with your knickers around your ankles, and soon the Black Bloomer's buccaneers in briefs overcome their foes, seize their booty, and make for their longboats, in Claire Freedman's latest, Pirates Love Underpants (The Underpants Books) (Aladdin, 2013). Author Freedman makes the most of the guaranteed giggles that a combination of pirates and their drawers offers, buoyed up by artist Ben Cort's zany illustrations, replete with parrots and peg legs and silly seamen wearing, like Superman, their bright-hued briefs on top of their trousers.  This story calls for reading aloud with plenty of "talk like a pirate" aplomb, heavy on the Ahoys and Arrrrs.

Freedman's other underpants sagas include her opening opus, Aliens Love Underpants, as well as Aliens in Underpants Save the World (The Underpants Books),  Dinosaurs Love Underpants (The Underpants Books), and, pants-perfect for the upcoming season, Aliens Love Panta Claus (The Underpants Books.

Primary graders will happily park their pants in the story circle and learn a few new words for underwear along the way in these funny undie tales.

Where Is My Wandering Boy Tonight? Pirate Boy by Eve Bunting

DANNY SAID, "MOM, WHAT IF I WANT TO BE A PIRATE AND SAIL AWAY ON A PIRATE SHIP?"

Mom and Danny have just finished reading a story coincidentally called Pirate Boy.  Sailing under the Jolly Roger looks pretty good to Danny--at first.

"OKAY, BUT MOM," DANNY ASKED, "WHAT IF I DON'T LIKE IT ON THE PIRATE SHIP?

AND I WANT TO COME BACK HOME?"

Mom is calm, as she replies that she'll catch the next friendly dolphin out to the ship and bring him back.

But the more Danny thinks about this buccaneering, the more it seems like risky business. He wonders aloud what will happen if no friendly dolphin is available? What if there a two sea monsters about to eat him?

Mom assures him that she'll swim right out to that ship with magic minty spray and those monsters will be shrinky dinks in no time.

But Danny's "Okay, But, Mom..." scenarios keep coming. What if the pirates on the ship like him so much they won't let him leave, even with his mom. What if....

But Mom has all the answers, even if the two of them have to become the crew and sail that ship to their favorite beach. And... when they get back home, Daddy will probably be there with milk and cookies for his two weary corsairs.

Eve Bunting's inventive mom has it all figured out, despite her worrywart little would-be seafarer, in a bright new edition of her Pirate Boy (Holiday House, 2013). While pirating has its pitfalls, the message here is that pluck and perseverance can go a long way in problem-solving. It's a successful fantasy voyage, illuminated by Julie Fortenberry's charming textured artwork which catches the perky wit and pleasant predictability of this storyline to a P (for Pirate).

There Goes the Neighborhood! The Pirates Next Door: Starring the Jolley Rogers by Jonny Duddle

Matilda lived in Dull-on-Sea, a gloomy seaside town.

Too busy in the summer, and in winter it shut down.

Dull-on-Sea is a dull and boring place, only outdone in seaside soporificity by its French sister-city, Ennui-sur-Mer. Neat cookie-cutter houses located in the exact center of immaculate lawns stretch down the identical streets, a vision of real estate sameness--except for the house next door to Matilda's.

That house had been for sale as long as Matilda's memory stretched back, and Matilda, a different drummer sort, had secret hopes for that house:

She hoped a family would move in, with a girl her age, or maybe...
A boy! A PIRATE boy!

And then, one day a veritable pirate ship on wheels rolls down that sleepy street and pulls into the drive of the vacant house. It's a new family, all right, the Jolley Rogers, complete with peg-legged dog and salty parrot, and best of all, a boy just her age, named JimLad!

It seems even privateers need some downtime in drydock, and the rumor mills of Dull-on-Sea grind into overtime as the town takes in the idea of a set of scurvy buccaneers putting down roots in their sedate city. Back fence gossip buzzes with dire warnings of a pirate takeover of the town:

Before you know it, there'll be more--
We'll all have pirates right next door!

But Matilda and JimLad take to each other like salty seadogs to a seabiscuit. While the rest of the class are giving JimLad, nautically speaking, a wide berth, Matilda invites him to put down anchor in the desk next to her at school, and soon she's, er, showing him the ropes of landlubber life. JimLad himself is grateful and returns the favor by teaching her the ways of the sea.

Just as the restive city is roused to take action against the whole bunch of buccaneers, the Jolley Rogers finish refurbishing their ship, and one morning the town awakens to find them gone. That ship has sailed, all right, but the Jolley Rogers seem to have left a surprising thank-you--a treasure map of Dull-on-Sea with an X marking the spot of mysterious digging in each front yard. Could those part-time citizens have left part of their pirate treasure behind, along with a promise to Matilda from JimLad to cast their anchor again in the cove at Dull-on-Sea?

Jonny Duddle's latest pirate tale, The Pirates Next Door (Templar, 2012) follows last year's buccaneer blockbuster, The Pirate Cruncher, both of them carrying a cargo of jolly rhyming text and buoyant acrylic artwork on board that will cause pirate-loving readers to run the Skull 'n' Bones up the mizzenmast and salute. Put these salty sagas with Melinda Long's and David Shannon's How I Became a Pirate and Pirates Don't Change Diapers for some gloriously silly tales of those who sail the briny!

Sleep Hearty, Ye Buckos! Charlotte Jane Battles Bedtime by Myra Wolfe

I LIKE TO GET ALL THE JUICE OUT OF MY DAY," CHARLOTTE JANE WOULD SAY.

BUT BEDTIME WAS NOT JUICY.

"NO ONE CAN BE HEARTY WITHOUT IT," SAID HER MOTHER.

CHARLOTTE JANE DID NOT AGREE.

ONE DARK NIGHT SHE DIDN'T GO TO BED AT ALL.

But although the swashbuckling Charlotte Jane would like to celebrate sending bedtime to the bottom of the briny, her morning doesn't dawn with as much oomph as usual. Her customary breakfast of cackle fruit doesn't tempt her. Cutlass competition with her bear, One-Eyed Tom, is, shall we say, dull. Treasure hunts are, well, a yawn, and Fantastic Feats of Derring-Do are a snooze.

"ARR!" SAID CHARLOTTE JANE. "MY OOMPH'S WEIGHED ANCHOR."

Aye, her swashbuckling style has sailed. Her pirating parents offer to mount a mission to find her oomph. But it's definitely not in the bathtub or linen closet. It's not to be found in the fridge and nowhere in the neighbor's recycling bin. Charlotte Jane wearily climbs the suddenly steep steps to her room in the fo'c'sle to search for her juicy joie de vivre.

AND THERE WAS HER FEATHERBED.

BEDTIME WAS NOT JUICY. SLEEP WAS FOR LANDLUBBERS.

BUT DREAMS...

CHARLOTTE JANE'S DREAMS...

...WERE RIP-ROARERS!

All's well that sleeps well, and with a good night's rest under her buccaneer's belt, Charlotte Jane finds her oomph restored in Myra Wolfe's bodacious debut book, Charlotte Jane Battles Bedtime (Harcourt, 2011), forthcoming September 6. This is a hearty corsairing bedtime tale, bejeweled with artwork by Maria Moneschillo, whose stylized seafaring illustrations sets our jibs just right to catch the wind. It seems we can never have too many pirate yarns in the picture book market, and this one, perhaps paired with Andrew Kramer's Pajama Pirates (recently reviewed here) will help young pirates get their YARR-YARRS out without too many bedtime battles. A sleepy-time treasure!

Get Yer Yarr Yarrs Out: Pirates of the Sea by Brandon Dorman

"No cryin.'
No dyin.'
No brushin' yer teeth!
No stealin.'
No squealin.'
No eatin' Parrot Pete!

No nappin,'
No scrappin.'
No wimpy moans or groans!
No veggies.
No wedgies.
No disobeyin' Cap'n Bones!"

Cap'n Bones runs a tight ship, but with his very motley crew on board, the Dragonfish of Doom sails off to be the scourge of the seven seas, with would-be buccaneers like Sourpuss Sam, Twitchy Billy, Peg-Leg Magee, Smelly Fred, and Sea Slug Nate sworn to uphold the Pirate Code.

All is well until a financial crisis looms. This ship needs a quick stimulus package! The treasure chests are down to their last doubloon, and the boys need to ramp up their piratin' fast. But the high seas are no place for sissies, with evil mermaids who want to lure them to wreck in their lagoon, sharks who want to chomp them, and sea monsters ditto. If Cap'n Bones' seadogs can't find a galleon to plunder on the high seas, maybe they can find some other pirate's buried treasure on the shore. Every man Jack into the longboats and start diggin' in the sand!

Brandon Dorman's latest, Pirates of the Sea! (Greenwillow, 2011), offers plenty of pirate talk, zesty verse, colorful characters aplenty, and with the author's comic digital illustrations, this one provides a lot of fun for a corsair storytime. Pair this one with Johnny Duddle's hit, The Pirate Cruncher, (Templar, 2010) for a double-doubloon pirate party.

Bedtime Buccaneers: Pajama Pirates by Andrew Kramer

THE MOON BEGINS ITS EVENING SHOW.
PAJAMA PIRATES YELL, "OH, NO!"

LET OTHERS SLEEP;
THEIR DAY IS DONE.
THE TREASURE HUNT HAS JUST BEGUN.

Three kids are ready for bed in their tower bedchamber, pajamas on and beds turned down, but they are definitely not ready for sleep. It's time to escape into their own fantasy adventures, pirates all!

The braided rug morphs into ocean waters, their beds become rowboats, and their brooms become oars, as the three row out to their waiting ship to begin their night's adventures.

And what adventures their imaginations afford them! A nearing ship turns out to be a marauder's man o' war and the attack is on. Cannons roar, swords flash; and it doesn't go well for the pajama pirates.

"YE BE SHARK BAIT, SWIM OR SINK!"
PAJAMA PIRATES STOP TO THINK.

Quickly the youngsters cover their shattered mast with their mainsail, and in the fog the pursuing privateers perceive a giant ghost advancing on them and begin to retreat in terror.

Just as the pajama pirates batten their hatches, hoist anchor, and pull away from their foes, they hear the dreaded order to go to sleep floating up from downstairs.

"JUST FIVE MINUTES MORE, PLEASE!"

But there's nothing for it except for the pajama pirates to walk the plank, as their seven seas become the sky and their ship again becomes their room, and one by one they fall into their own waiting beds.

"G'NIGHT, MATEYS! SURE WAS FUN!"

Andrew Kramer's latest, Pajama Pirates (Harper, 2010) features easy-reading verse in a charming fantasy adventure for pirate fans. The text is greatly extended by the delightful illustrations of Leslie Lammle, done with plenty of deep blues to suggest the nighttime setting, and rounded childlike figures which suggest the work of author-illustrators Astrid and Ingrid Lindgren of earlier times, giving the book a pleasant old-fashioned feeling. A fine bedtime story for imaginative young buccaneers who are not quite ready for sweet dreams.

No Baths for Buccaneers! Pirates Don't Take Baths by John Segal

NO, NO, NO!
I'M NOT TAKING A BATH!

NOT TONIGHT. NOT TOMORROW. NEVER!
I'M A PIRATE, AND PIRATES NEVER TAKE BATHS!

When a piglet tot with piratical pretensions puts his trotter down, Mom knows it's time for a little preschool psychology. She points out that our tot can't be a pirate, because he always gets seasick!

It doesn't work. The piglet changes his persona, presto-chango.

YEP. I'M A RANGE-RIDING, CATTLE-DRIVING COWBOY!

The piglet may be imaginative, but Mom is practical.

"COWBOYS DON'T MIND SLEEPING ON THE HARD GROUND. DO YOU?"

Hmmm! Maybe home on the range is not so cushy.

"FINE! I'M AN ESKIMO. THEY CAN'T TAKE BATHS. IT'S TOO COLD!

Mom counters this ploy by pointing out that Eskimos also have to eat lots and lots of whale blubber.

The game is now seriously on. How many hydro-phobic personalities can our dirty little piglet come up with to get out of his bath? How about an astronaut? No bathtubs in space, right? Well, no, Mom agrees. But "going to the bathroom" is a bit, um, problematical in zero gravity as well.

Oh, yeah.

But this mom finds a way to get her preschooler piglet into the suds, even if he does don flippers and snorkel to do it, in John Segal's latest, Pirates Don't Take Baths (Philomel, 2011). Bathtime battles are part of being a parent and being a preschooler, and Segal's charming illustrations make getting that little landlubber into the briny a little bit more fun.

X Marks the Spot: The Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Treasure Hunt by Megan McDonald

"Name's Cap'n Weevil," said the pirate. "But my friends call me Scurvy Sam...." "Folks 'round here call it Pirate Island, on account o' Blackbeard himself haunted these parts back in the day,"

"Listen up, all ye scumbuckets and scallywags," Scurvy Sam announced. "This be the weekend of the Third Annual Pirate Island Treasure Hunt. Fun and mayhem start first thing in the morn."

At first Judy Moody is in a show-me mood about the family's vacation on Ocracoke Island, but when would-be pirate Stink informs her that they may be the descendants of pirate Christopher Moody, Judy begins to feel the excitement just as the ferry draws near what Stink calls "Artichoke Island." And as the newly named "Scurvy Stink" and "Mad Molly O'Maggot," learn that they can win real gold doubloons and a ceremonial sail around the island on a pirate ship, it's YO HO HO and away we go for Team Stink and Judy on the trail of the eight clues.

But blimey, there are bloody tough buccaneer rivals out there. Judy and Stink soon notice another pair of sibling competitors, whom they christen Tall Boy and Smart Girl, who seem to be knocking off the clues right on their heels, and the race is on to the final hiding place of the silver coin which will win the contest. Along the way Judy acquires a new respect for her brother's powers of deciphering rhyming riddle clues and his forethought, including packing along Morse code, flashlight, and a spyglass. For her part, Judy's powers of observation come in handy as she picks up some pivotal cues from their their competitors.

It's a race to the final clue between Judy and Stink and Tall Boy and Smart Girl, with both finally zeroing in on clapper-less bells on a promontory of Ocracoke Island. Luckily, Judy takes off for the old bell outside the Coast Guard station, while their rivals check out the antique bell in the museum, and Judy and Stink are the first, by a pirate's whisker, to the prize. Realizing that they profited from the efforts of their rivals, the Moodys generously invite Tall Boy and Smart Girl to join them on the celebratory circumnavigation of the island on the Queen Anne's Revenge II.

In her latest, Judy Moody & Stink: The Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Treasure Hunt (Candlewick Press, 2009), author Megan McDonald proves that the quality of the perennially popular Judy Moody series is more than holding its own among beginning chapter books. With the addition of little brother Stink in the "Judy Moody and Stink" sub-series, McDonald gains a spunky new boy protagonist, a dedicated jokester more ebullient and adventuresome than the moody Judy, who contributes added verve to the Moody family adventures.

With believable characterizations, rhyming riddle clues just right for early elementary readers to solve, and stand-out full-color illustrations by artist Peter H. Reynolds generously placed throughout the text, this Judy Moody is a real treasure!