The Adventure of Optimism! The Weaver by Quian Shi

All spiders lead a life of adventure.

Once they are born, they wave goodbye to each other and hitch a ride on the wind.

It's true. Newly hatched spiderlings spin little parasails and go "ballooning" to find their own places in space.

Stanley the spider floats down to his perfect place, where he spins his web between a clover and a twig and sets out decorating it with his favorite precious things.

No, not the shells of captured beetles, nor the wings of butterflies snared. He fills it with lovely leaves of maples and lindens and gingkos and bits of feathers and bottle tabs. Stanley loves his collection.

But then the rain comes ...

And all but for one bright maple leaf, it washes his treasures away. Stanley tries to secure the leaf safely, but a big breeze blows it away, too.

Stanley has lost everything...

Or has he? He works all night , repairing his web strung strong between two tall weeds, by the light of two fireflies, recreating his memories of his precious things, spun into the fabric, the design of his web itself. His memories are not lost, even when it is time for Stanley to start another adventure, in Qian Shi's love parable of art and memory in her The Weaver (Anderson Press, 2018).

In her delicately stylized illustrations and spare poetic text, author-illustrator Qian Shi affirms that, although all sorts of winds blow and rains fall, art and memory remain with us in our own history. As a study in the graceful way to handle loss, Stanley's story carries a surprising amount of emotional heft, says Kirkus, and Booklist adds, Though the concept of ephemera may be somewhat esoteric for younger children, the underlying, sympathetically portrayed message of finding ways to cope with losing beloved things is one readers may relate to and appreciate."

Arachnophobes Anonymous: I'm Trying to Love Spiders by Bethany Barton

I KEEP TELLING MYSELF

"SPIDERS ARE COOL!"

I WANT TO LOVE SPIDERS.

I THINK IT'S WORKING...

AHHHHHHH!!
IT'S MOVING!!

SQUISH IT!!

SPLAT! Well, that's that.

THAT DIDN'T WORK OUT.

Our little arachnophobe is trying to appreciate the coolness of spiders--eight eyes, eight legs, spinning spider silk webs as strong as steel--funnel webs, spiral orb webs, sheet webs--and tiny hairs on eight legs that stick things so they can walk up walls and (OMG!) across ceilings. . . .

SMASH IT! RIGHT NOW! 

Their whole family is a gross-out group. Spiders, scorpions, mites, and ticks. Ick! Some of themcan make us sick! Seriously. Most of them a a trifle venomous, and not a few can cause diseases and other gross stuff.

Mind you, there are 40,000 species of spiders. Only a few (e.g., the black widow and brown recluse) can ruin your day. And many are part of that honorable group called BENEFICIAL spiders.

A SINGLE SPIDER CAN EAT OVER 75 POUNDS OF BUGS IN A YEAR!

That's all fine for me--if not for the critters that make up their dinners. And some spiders can weave a web with a heart in the center. Is that sweet or what?

Wait! What's that?

AHHHHH!

COCKROACH!

Where's that big spider when you need one?

When it comes to creepy crawly critters, it's always something, in Bethany Barton's I'm Trying to Love Spiders (Viking Press, 2015). With a nod to the inevitable arachnophiles out there, Barton's discourse on the downside of spiders is more than a little tongue-in-cheek. Her little spiders tend to be cute and comic, although the squished splats on several pages are appropriately yucky!

Along the way, though, curious kids can cull quite a few facts about the hard-to-love creatures shown in this light-hearted look at arachnids. Her watercolored drawings, hand-painted red and black text, and skillful page design add comic drama to the pages, and her similarly illustrated endpapers present more than several varieties of curious arachnids--the diving bell spider, happy face spider, peacock spider, spiny-backed orb-weaver, bird-dung crab spider, and the (Oh, my gosh!) giant golden bird-eating spider.

THINK OF THEM LIKE BUG NINJAS!

The careful curating of animal science and creepy critter pyschology make this one a natural for a readaloud for arachnid nature units and cross-the-curriculum literature and biology study for primary students. "The skillful juggling of scientific fact and emotional truth make this a winner," says Publishers Weekly starred review.