Kid's Book Blog

by Deborah Heiligman
PreSchool-Grade 2
Tinka, a golden retriever, is "a joy dog,/a boy's dog,/a chews-a-brand-new-toy dog." She loves her boy and doesn't like being left at home when he boards a bus on a fall morning. When Mom isn't looking, the "spring-and-sprint-and-streak dog" races to school, runs through the halls causing mayhem, and ends up finding her boy in his classroom. Although she makes the teacher unhappy by messing up the room, the students are delighted by Tinka's presence and find that the pup loves a read-aloud. In the end, she's "a please-come-every-day dog."

Bowers's vivid acrylic illustrations are full of expression, from the pup peeking through a screen door while waiting to make her move to the smiling children and teacher waving good-bye at the end of the day. Youngsters will like learning with each turn of the page just what makes this dog so special.

by Nancy White Carlstrom
Pre-K to Kindergarten

Annie Claire is worried about her first day of school. What if she is too tired, spills her milk, falls asleep, etc. Annie Claire's mother talks her through each situation and then gives her an explaination why that isn't something to worry about.

Soothing watercolors, outlined in pen on cold press paper, create soft illustrations that emphasize the fun, excitement, and positive aspects of this milestone. The animal classmates, teachers, school staff, and Mom and Annie Claire are portrayed with subtle facial expressions and gestures that support the text.

What gives this tender title depth is the relationship between mother and daughter. The mother's comments are messages of love and encouragement. Annie Claire poignantly brings the story to its conclusion with a question about what her mother's day will be like when she is at school. This is a great book for kids heading off to pre-school, kindergarten, or day care.

By Alison Jay

Grades Pre-K to 3rd

This is a colorful book that uses well known nursery rhymes to introduce color. Colors are only part of the story in this lively, handsome picture book that dramatizes 20 nursery rhymes with wild magic realism. Young children will enjoy spotting characters and scenarios from the rhymes that they know, from five pink piggies and Little Bo Peep's white sheep to a little teapot, short and stout.

Not all the featured nursery rhymes are sweet and merry. Miss Muffet is afraid of the big black spider for good reason; even though he only wanted to sit beside her, the picture shows that he is huge and scary. Something not very nice is happening to the three bespectacled blind mice, who leap across the double-page spread, away from a knife-wielding woman. Humpty Dumpty offers a sunnier view: it looks as though the king's horses and men may be able to help.

We often focus more on nursery rhymes rhythm and beat than on the sense in the words, and even older readers will have fun with these wry, literal looks at familiar rhymes and the stories they tell.

By Louise Bonnett-Rampersaud
PreSchool-Grade 1

"If you're having a bear over to play,
There are things you should know,
There are things you should say.
I'll tell you the rules--
Numbers one up to ten.
Then have Mom or Dad read them...
Again...and again!"

This cautionary guidebook provides readers with 10 important rules to follow when having a bear over to play. Bears are rambunctious, messy, and wild. The young boy's animal playmate behaves like a 400-pound toddler. This boisterous romp is good for reading aloud but explores no new ground.

The illustrations are full of movement and energy as they spill across the page. The bear's uninhibited strength and great size are conveyed through the illustrations use of perspective. Nearly every scene contains an object in midair and thus a sense of the bear's naivety regarding the rules.

If you like Laura Numeroff's If you give a mouse a cookie...then you will LOVE this one.

By Linda Ashman
Grades 1-5

What’s bored 13th century royalty to do? If you’re the Earl of Daftwood, you throw a party complete with a grand feast and jousting. And if you’re the Earl of Daftwood’s staff (steward, herald, cook, cleaning servant, farmer, knight, squire etc), you groan and fret because nothing is more troublesome than a party.

Using various rhyming schemes, Ashman begins with the Earl and then shifts the point of view to his various underlings as each describes their preparations, and in doing so give a sense of what it was like to live in a thirteenth-century English castle. The rhymes have an appropriate leisurely pace energized by clever couplets such as this sentiment from the Cleaning Servant: “Scatter the rats. Now it’s perfectly clean— / Or at least good enough; we’re not serving the Queen!”

The intricate artwork portrays monastic illumination on each page and also hints at the caligraphy in the font that is used. This is a pretty realistic look at life in the 13th century in all levels of life. And the illistrations are stylized to look like many of the pictures in the manuscripts of the time. This is very different than the Disney Sleeping Beauty picture of the middle ages.

I am not sure I agree with the reviews on this title because they indicate that a first grader can and should pick up this book and read it. It has some difficult words, lots of words on a page, many pages, and difficult to read fonts. The first grader who would read this book would have to be very advanced. But I could see this as being picked up by an older kid and enjoying it (3rd-5th).

Quirky, sarcastic, and educational, this is a great first introduction to the way people lived before ipods and combustion engine.