Three's A Crowd! Norman Didn't Do It! (Yes, He Did!) by Ryan T. Higgins

Norman the porcupine is not really a normal porcupine.

NORMAN'S BEST FRIEND WAS MILDRED.

MILDRED WAS A TREE.

They spend a lot of time together, playing baseball and chess, and birdwatching. (Birds like Mildred, too.) Norman even reads her bedtime stories. They are a perfect pair.

Until one day, Norman noticed a seedling sprouting.

"WHO IS THAT?"

"IT WAS ANOTHER TREE!"

Their perfect pairing was no more. And as the little tree grew, he and Mildred grew close and closer. NOW it was a threesome. And one ominous day, Mildred and the other tree touched branches. Norman is jealous!

THIS IS THE LAST STRAW!

By dark of night, Norman digs up the other tree, deposits him, root ball and all, into a wheelbarrow and pushes it through darkness until he comes to a lake. He rows to an island far out in the middle of the lake, where he digs a hole and re-plants the tree all alone.

THE OTHER TREE WAS GONE.

Norman and Mildred are a twosome again. But their easy companionship is gone. Mildred seems droopy. And Norman knows why.

"WHAT HAVE I DONE?"

"WHAT IF IT WAS THE WRONG THING TO DO?"

Norman also worries that his perfidy might have been seen by someone else. It was dark, very dark, and he saw no one, so who could have observed his dastardly deed?

OMG!

"OH, NO! THE TREES!"

Norman knows what he must do and he does it, in Ryan T. Higgins' latest, Norman Didn't Do It! (Yes, He Did).

Author Higgins' reformed hero even finds that a treesome threesome can provide a good place to hang his hammock! Ryan T. Higgs is a prolific source of comic hits for the primary set, such as Mother Bruce (Mother Bruce, Book 1) (Mother Bruce Series, 1) and We Don't Eat Our Classmates! (Penelope).

Says Publishers Weekly in a starred review, "...an astute and endearing story of displacement anxiety.... Higgins knows exactly when to go in for a close-up and focus on Norman's comic sturm und drang. The porcupine is a protagonist that readers should find deeply relatable: reveling in unconditional love, prone to impulsiveness and rumination, and absolutely capable of self-redemption."

Five Senses and Feelings: If I Were a Tree by Andrea Zimmerman

>

IF I WERE A TREE, I KNOW HOW I'D BE.

I'D STAND TOWERING TALL, HIGH ABOVE ALL.

Two children, brother and sister, set off with their parents on a camping trip into a forest. So many trees! How does it feel to be a tree?

I'D FEEL NESTS IN MY BARK, BATS HIDING TILL DARK.

THE CLIMBING OF BOOTS, AND WORMS BY MY ROOTS.

And what would they taste if they could be a tree?

PEBBLES AND STONES, OLD BURIED BONES...

What does a tree smell? . . .

HONEY AND BEES, SKUNK ON THE BREEZE?

But what does a tree hear?

FAR THUNDER'S LOW GROWL, THE HOOT OF AN OWL?

Under the tall trees, the two realize that the trees, living creatures like them, sense their world both differently and the same, in Andrea Zimmerman's elegant, evocative verse. In a complex stanza form, beginning and ending in the same question, the author inserts a quatrain with appealing internal rhymes that reveal how a tree senses its environment. With the lovely color print illustrations of Jing Jing Tsong, noted writer Zimmerman's If I Were a Tree (Lee and Low Books, 2021) unites child and tree, filling up their senses with the beauty of sensing the world like a tree. This poetic book is a natural for across-the curriculum science for fall, with its emphasis on the seasonal changes and a wonderful review of the five senses, and also offers an intense lesson on the sensory system of trees, an experience of sharing and being at one with the world all around, seeing ...

HILLS MISTY WITH FOG, THE LIFE IN A LOG.

Says Kirkus' starred review, "Enjoy and observe nature with all your senses."

Like Magic! Tap the Magic Tree by Christie Matthewson

THERE'S MAGIC IN THIS BARE BROWN TREE.

TAP IT ONCE.

TURN THE PAGE TO SEE.

The book is not magic, but that bare, brown wintry tree is, because spring is coming. And with one page turn, the tree spouts four soft, green leaves.

A warming rub from the readers' fingers brings the tree to full leaf, and just a touch on the next page shows seven pink buds which turn into a tree filled with full-blown blooms.

GIVE THE TREE A LITTLE JIGGLE.

The tree drops its petals all over the ground, and the reader is asked to brush them away and to blow the tree a tiny kiss.

Voila'! Nice red apples appear on the tree, and a knock-knock on the trunk brings down six beauties. Kerplop!

A gentle pat on the leaves help turn them yellow, and orange and brown leaves appear only to drop to the ground, too.

The tree is bare and brown again, but with a little help from its friends (blowing a wish), beautiful sparkling snowflakes fall to adorn the tree through its winter sleep.

Are the readers out of a job then?

DON'T GO!!

With a little help, dear readers, it's time for bluebirds to return to work their magic, so that the cycle can begin all over again, as green leaves begin to bud, in Christie Matthewson's Tap the Magic Tree (Atheneum Press, 2014).  Author-illustrator Matthewson's art is sparklingly styled to reveal the essence of the iconic tree, lovely and inventive. Using the currently popular device of the faux interactive book to involve readers in this narrative of the changing seasons. Matthewson's text plays with the idea of the reader's magical touch setting off the changes of the season rather than the more technical explanation of the lengthening and shortening of the sun's rays, making this book a just-for-fun look (no battery recharging required) at the life of a tree through the seasons.

Kids less fascinated with trees and more turned on by the fantasy of interacting with a book will love Herve' Tullet's innovative Press Here and Bill Cotter's similarly premised Don't Push the Button! (read reviews here).