Insects from Outer Space

And the King and Queen Bug of the Ball goes to.....
This is a very interesting book. Judging by the cover there is no way you could guess what the book is about inside. It is about bugs, what else, that are attending their annual Bug Ball. It just so happens that they are invaded by outer space insects. They make friends right away with these alien bugs and they help determine who the King and Queen of the Bug Ball are. It is just a happy go lucky story with not much conflict. There are a few humorous lines about rubbing antennae and shaking feelers or something of that sort.
But where the book excels is in the illustrations. These pictures are gorgeous and cover the entire page. There are borders around each picture that make the illustrations even more interesting. I never thought insects could be cute but these pictures do a pretty good job of making them look good. There is so much detail and color to ever picture. I first thought this would be a book that boys would like with bugs but I soon figured out that it is a very girlie book about a dance. The outer space insects would maybe grab the boys' attention a little bit more.
One last thing that I liked was that the story was told in first person by the insect who just so happens to win King this year at the ball. It adds another dimension to the book that I really liked.

Zathura

So I didn't know when I picked this book out, that it was in a way a continuation of Jumanji. I remember seeing that movie for the first time in the theaters. I was so scared. I didn't like all the animals running a muck. I fortunately liked this book at my age now than I liked the Jumanji movie when I was younger.
In this book, instead of animals, the boys endure things like meteor showers, no gravity, and crazy robots. It is also a good story about brothers and their relationship. In the beginning they were fighting and on each other's nerves and in the end they became closer through playing this game.
Our in class discussions have made me think about different things I have been reading. In this book I noticed that even though the pictures are done in pencil and are in black and white, you can tell the boys are Caucasian. They live in a nice house and in a nice neighborhood. They are also dressed nicely. I have been thinking about this a lot lately in how our perception of what is normal is really shaped by all of these things and subtle messages. No where in the text does it say that the boys are white or that they have a nice house or anything like that but the illustrations depict that. It makes me wonder now if that really is true for the majority of children in this world. I really liked the book and the illustrations but it just made me wonder a bit. I think this is a great book for the science fiction genre as well.

Benny and Penny in the Big No-No

So this is my graphic novel. I am going to be honest and say I really wasn't too excited to read one of these types of books. I really had a bad attitude about it because I thought for sure I wouldn't like the style of writing. I was so wrong. I really enjoyed the movement and the pictures and all the dialect the story had.
It didn't hurt that the story was about two little mice. They were brother and sister and had the stereotypical brother/sister relationship. The brother is older and he picks on his sister but at the same time he is protective over her. He looks out for her and tries to show her the difference between right and wrong. The little sister is also very curious and almost on the edge of mischievous. They get a new neighbor and the story is about them meeting her and having a little problem at first. In the end they make a new friend with this new neighbor. I think it is even more cute because they are little talking animals.
The illustrations are done in colored pencil. They are really simple and mute colors. But the pictures add so much to the story. It is crazy to be able to see emotion on a little critters face like you can in this story. Definitely changed my perspective of this style of writing.

Jack and the Meanstalk

Everyone has heard the story Jack and the Beanstalk. Well this is a play on that story. Jack is a scientist in this book who loves to garden. He decided that he wanted to impress all of his gardener friends by having the fastest growing plants. So he went into his laboratory and got to work. Eventually his plant became enormous. It started creating problems like wrecking homes and towns with it's roots and blocking all the sunlight with its leaves. So the animals got together and destroyed the plant by chewing through its roots. I didn't enjoy this book as much as I thought I would. I really liked the original version so I thought maybe this one would be good. It was a little dull.
I really wasn't a fan of the illustrations either. They were a little weird to me. The colors of the meanstalk and the colors and pattern on the monster were just not my taste. I think the reason this book is considered science fiction would be because of the enormous plant of course but also there are talking animals in the book. Probably not going to remember this book.

The Christmas Adventure of Space Elf Sam

What do you do when Santa cannot deliver all the Christmas presents to the children who have moved to outer space? Well create a Space Academy for elves of course. This is a delightful non-traditional Christmas story about Space Elf Sam. He is chosen for one of Santa's missions to outer space because you graduated from the academy with flying honors. When Sam decides to take a short-cut, he ends up crashing on the wrong planet. This planet full of aliens does not know what Christmas is so Sam has to teach them to true spirit of Christmas. In the end, Sam teaches the aliens about Christmas and gets all the presents delivered on time.
The illustration in this book are awesome. They remind me a bit of animated pictures. In fact, Sam looks an awful bit like Buzz Lightyear from Toy Story. Again I think this is a great science fiction book for children. It really sparks the imagination while continuing with a story line they are familiar with. I liked the creative space words as well. They weren't renaming things children already have names for but new things, outer space things. I think children won't be as confused this way.
I will definitely keep this book in mind when Christmas rolls around.

Earth Hounds as explained by Professor Xargle

This book would be considered a part of the science fiction genre of children's literature. The book is about a teacher who is teaching the class about dogs. He refers to them as Earth Hounds. I really enjoyed this book. It had a lot of subtle humorous things throughout the entire book. But I do not think children would pick up on these. I really think this would be great for getting children to use their imagination though. Thinking about other nonhuman life being in class just as they are would really get them going.
My only concern about this book would be that children would have troubles getting around the terminology that the author uses. She uses words like earthling to refer to humans, moohorn to refer to a cow, and sniffer to refer to the nose of the dog. I think it is cute and creative to use words like this but I think that a child would become very confused and may not understand.
The illustrations are hilarious and well done. They add to the parts where the words are not enough. Overall it is a very good book for the science fiction genre.

Dear Mr. Henshaw

Beverly Clearly is a well know children's literature author and for good reason. Her books were some of my favorite growing up and are still popular among children. Dear Mr. Henshaw is no exception. This is a great story about a young boy trying to grow up through some adversity. His parents have gotten a divorce and his dad isn't around much because he is a truck driver. Leigh gets assigned a project in school to write to an author. Somehow the boy finds relief in writing to someone about so many things. In the beginning of the book the author sends questions back for Leigh to answer. He finds this very difficult and doesn't really care to answer them because no one had ever really cared or asked before. The author in the book also suggested that he keep a diary. So the entire book is Leigh's letters and diary. I really like the format of the book. It keeps things interesting and it is told from Leigh's perspective and in his words. It kind of leaves room for your imagination to take over. Also I feel like the emotions are more real. Instead of just saying "Leigh's mad" it would have the angry words he is thinking.
After our discussion in class I began thinking about the race and gender and social status of many of the characters I have been reading about. In this book the main character is male and white (according to the picture) but he lives with a single parent in a small home. His mom always says something about it being all the can afford. I like the fact that this book is addressing divorce and the reader can try to relate to the emotions and ups and downs that go along with a child experiencing it. The other thing we talked about was the dog. This character does have a dog. It just goes with is father on the long hauls to keep him company. I feel like it is symbolic of Leigh actually having a piece of himself with his dad at all times through the dog. I liked the transformation that Leigh went through in the book as well. I mean he misses his dad and will always miss him, but in the beginning all he wanted was for him to come home and for everything to be the same again. In the end he realizes that it willi never be the same and that it is better off this way.
Great book.

So I will have to admit the reason for choosing this book was because of the title. I thought that it would be a fun book to add an accent to when reading to a child. I tend to like to say the word pizzeria by rolling my tongue at the 'r'. With that being said, this book is a cute little story about a family run pizzeria. The son of the owner is sad when his father decides to open a bigger restaurant because the son is always in the way and no longer able to help is father. But the story ends with the father going back to his little pizzeria and naming it after his son. It is a cute story about probably most kids' favorite food, pizza. The pictures are not my favorite. In some of the illustrations, there is a lot going on and the pictures are very busy. It is hard to determine where one person ends and the other person begins. Definitely not what I expected it to be but the storyline ends up being a lovely story.

A Gift From the Sea

This is a very deep book. It is not necessarily my kind of book but it had good intentions. The gift from the sea is actually a rock that a little boy finds on the beach. The story goes on to tell the history of the rock and how it got to where it is now. The rock had survived all the eras of history including when dinosaurs lived and the ice age. In essence, I think the story has a good purpose to expose children to those times in history. I am just not sure that a child would understand this purpose. The pictures are dark and appeared to be painted. I feel like this book wouldn't grab the attention of a child unlike some other picture books I have read. And with that... I have not much more to say about this one.

Bad Kitty

Can you say adorable! That lesson in class was perfect to have before reading this book! I found myself going through all the different aspects of the picture book that I had never thought of before.
Starting with the dust jacket: this adorable black kitty had gotten into some purple paint and has made paw-prints all over the cover. There is even a paint can tipped over on a dogs head. The title is in paint that looks like it is dripping down the page. Cover= success.
Endpapers and Title page: so there are more paw-prints continuing across the page showing the path the little kitty took through the book. The title page is a clever illustration showing the disaster the kitty made throughout what looks like the living room and the author/illustrator is creatively placed in a picture on the end table. All the dedications and copyright stuff is on the back of the title page in pictures on the wall which have also been tortured by the kitty.
Internal Design: The font used is different in different place which really catches your eye. The kitty in the story is hungry so it goes through the alphabet with a healthy food choice for each letter. Each letter of the alphabet is red compared to the rest of the word in black text. It is also bigger and bolder to make it stand out. I wish I had learned my alphabet this way.
The book goes through the alphabet four different times each in a clever way.
The illustrations to this book are a delight to look at. They are humorous along with the text and follow the silly plotline. I would recommend this book to any child especially when learning the alphabet. Two Thumbs Way Way Up!!!!

The Berenstain Bears and The Spooky Old Tree

So after I had picked up an Arthur book, I began to think more about the books I was picking out rather than randomly picking books. I started to think back to the books I remember reading and enjoying and for some reason they were all mostly apart of a series. The Berenstain Bears is another one of those infamous series that everyone has heard of and everyone loves. I remember even having The Berenstain Bears movies. So of course I had to find a book.
This one in particular is one of those types of books that you really need both the pictures and the text to get the story. The text has very limited vocabulary. But has a cute rhyme and rhythm to it. The story is about the three little bears journey through a spooky old tree. The pictures add so much to the story that the words don't even hint too. The illustrations are a little dark but I think that goes well with the spooky theme. The words are easy to find in the illustrations and they even follow the path of the bears on a couple of pages. I think this is a great book to read to a child that doesn't read yet so they are more inclined to look at the pictures instead of the words so that they understand the underlying story.

Arthur Lost and Found

So everyone knows the Arthur books. This is just another one of the books of the series. I remember reading these books when I was younger. I loved that there was even a television show that went along with it that I would watch in the mornings while eating breakfast. Reading this book made me want to have a bowl of cereal.
This time Arthur and his best friend Buster take the city bus to go to their swimming lesson but fall asleep and miss their stop. The rest of the story is about their problem solving and getting home. I think this is a common fear among children that ride the bus. I think this is a good way to address how to stay calm and to logically think through the problem.
I really like these books for the older children to read. The content is more difficult reading and really pertains to events going on in many kids' lives. I think it is enjoyable for a child to follow a family like Arthur's and continue on the many journey's they have. The illustrations are also very good. They are water color, I would say, but are very detailed and cover the entire page. Sometimes the text is hard to find. But I love the personality of the characters and the book and series would be great for the young reader.

What Would You Do If You Lived at the Zoo?

First off this book has cut outs. I LOVED that when I was a child. I don't know what about it but it made books so much more interesting for me. The book is about all the animals at the zoo. I like the overall aspect of the book introducing all the different animals, and I mean all. I think it is a great way to get children to learn the different animals.
I only have 2 beefs with this book though.
1. The pictures are so abstract that I think children get a distorted picture of animals they may not know very well. To me the pictures are fun, but I already know that a seal isn't purple and a pony blue. That is confusing to me in my 21 year old mind.
2. The sounds that the animals make in this book are ridiculous. If I were to say to you, "What animal makes the shizu-ziwu-ziwu sound?" I don't think you would have a clue?? Again not teaching the child listening or reading this book the sounds you would expect to hear is a bit trouble again to my 21 year old mind. I suppose they are a little bit fun to try to pronounce, but might not be so fun for a struggling or even new reader.
I guess I can look at it from my speech and language point of view... they are being introduced to a ton of phonemes.

Gertrude, The Bulldog Detective

What child doesn't like a mystery? Better yet what child has never thought of being a detective? Well this book has the best of both worlds! Gertrude (gotta love the name) is a bulldog that wants to be a detective. She starts off her career by following and spying on her friends. They get a little annoyed with her (what friends wouldn't?) and decide to play a little, innocent trick on her to teach her a lesson. They strategically place notes with directions on them from a gang to lead Gertrude on a wild goose chase so she will leave them alone. Turns out the museum that they had Gertrude staking out was actually the victim of a theft at the exact time Gertrude was there. Gertrude ends up solving the mystery and catches the thieves. She is the hero and the police are looking for the rest of the gang that wrote the notes. Funny little pay back to her friends who tried tricking her.
The illustrations are are quirky and match the text perfectly. This book would be great for the more advanced readers. Those of which would also appreciate the more mature illustrations.
One side note that I wanted to mention: At the end of the story the POLICEWOMAN caught the thieves with Gertrude's help. I love the female term used for a commonly thought of male dominated profession.

One-Dog Canoe

Grab your paddle and jump aboard this cute little red canoe story. Then grab your friend, and his friend, and her friend and the story continues.
The story starts with a little girl and her dog. But as they head down stream they add an assortment of other creatures to her little red canoe. The rhyming text flows along nicely until the tongue-twisting list of all the animals that have joined in the party.
The canoe stayed afloat even through bear and moose jumping in but once frog decided to hop in, all of the canoe's passengers went for a swim. The little girl ended up leaving all her new friends in the end in her one-dog canoe.
The illustrations are great! They are so detailed and the emotion on the faces of all the different animals are perfect. It is interesting to see their facial expressions change from page to page. There are a lot of little details in the illustrations as well if you look closely. Definitely a title I will keep in mind!

The Featherless Chicken

This is an adorable story of a chicken that is being left out because he doesn't have any feathers. All of the other chickens are beautifully adorned with "feathers". The featherless chicken ended up falling in some mud and getting plastered with some garbage by the wind. As the story goes along, the end reveales that all the chickens were featherless. It is a great story about fitting in and some of the hardships that accompany that. The book is written in a humorous manner. There are many fun, unique words that are used throughout the story. This book reminded me of "The Ugly Duckling" which is a more recognizable story.

I felt that the pictures were a bit bland and wouldn't catch the eye of a child. But the more I looked at them the more I started to appreciate them. The water color and the same details that I didn't notice the first time through grabbed my eye the second time while I was trying to analyze them.

In the end all the chickens are the same and become friends as expected.

Old MacDonald Drives a Tractor

So this book is a spin off the original, the classic Old MacDonald. This book is just about farmer MacDonald and what he uses his tractor for on the farm. I am not such a fan of this version though. I mean what kid needs to know what a plow, cultivator, seed drill, etc. are? I feel like this book is too specific to an audience of little boys either growing up on a farm or one that is completely interested in a farm. I grew up on a farm and know this stuff only because my little brother went through his "I want to be a farmer" stage. Other than that I have no reason to believe that any child, especially a girl, would need to know (or have the desire to know) the types of machinery that a tractor pulls. Needless to say, the original version covers a broader range of children all of whom need to know their animals while fitting it into a cute, rhyming song.
The illustrations of the book look like clay models which is really cool. But other than that nothing more out of the ordinary. I maybe would have enjoyed this book a bit more if the words would fit to the tune of the real Old MacDonald.

The Boxcar Children

When I found out we needed to review a book from a series, I begin to think about the books I read in elementary school. I remembered that I loved the Boxcar Children's books but couldn't remember what they were about exactly. I went to the lab and looked up to see if they had any of the books. It turned out that the only one they had was the first one. I thought that this was the best one they could have had because I hadn't remembered the exact story.

The book is about four brothers and sisters. Their parents passed away and they are just trying to survive. They know they have a living grandpa but they think he doesn't want them. The book is about their adventure and survival on their own. In the end they find their grandpa and realize he is a good person and has been looking for them the entire time.

I think this book is great for any child looking for adventure. I think it is a great plot line for a series because the children have so much growing to do. Their story could continue on with their grandpa and the reader would enjoy to continue on the journey with the four children. Each of the four children have completely different personalities and so I think any reader would be able to relate to any of them.

Sable

Sable is a great book for any young child learning to read. This book is about a little girl named Tate who doesn't like to do traditional girl things. She would much rather hang out with her father in his furniture shop than help her mother in the kitchen. One day this dog shows up on the porch. The story is about Tate's friendship with this dog that she names Sable. The dog was a stray and her mother wasn't so keen on keeping the dog. I feel like this is a classic story about a child and their best friend. The story goes on to tell about Tate becoming responsible to take care of this dog.

I feel this is a great story for children because I think at that age, many children have a pet that they are really close to or want a pet and have the same feelings that Tate had in the beginning. Tate goes through some hard times in trying to keep Sable as her own dog which also shows children perseverance.

There are a few illustrations in this book. They are pencil sketches that occur at the right moment to highlight certain points of the story. This novel is intended for children in the 3rd-5th grades, which is around the age that I remember one of my first dogs. I feel that this heart-warming story of determined friendship is a great read.

The Three Billygoats Gruff and Mean Calypso Joe

So everyone knows the story of the Three Billygoats Gruff. This is a fun retelling of the familiar story. This version of the three billygoats takes place in the Caribbean Sea.

I think it is so cute that the mean Calypso Joe has a Caribbean accent in this book. It makes it fun to read in his dialect. Also many of the comparisons in the book are made to island things such as coconuts and seaweed. The illustrations are perfect for the book. There are crabs, and coconuts, and palm trees making it feel tropical. The only thing is that the troll doesn't look like a troll to me? I maybe have the wrong idea of a troll though.

I would recommend this book to anyone who has or hasn't read the original version. It follows the same story line but has just that hint of the islands. The book is recommended for ages 3-7 but any age would enjoy it.