This is Book 5 in the Zapato Power series. Freddie isn’t sure if his super-powered sneakers will work in the snow of the March blizzard, but he soon finds out they do. Super fast Zapato (shoe- in Spanish) power clears a path in the snow to all the apartments in his complex. Then Freddie cheerfully helps Mr. Vaslov, the apartment manager, by clearing a path in the snow to the school where the people of Building D have been evacuated to the gym because the furnace in Building D isn’t working.  Then, someone has robbed mean Erika’s abuela’s purse while they are temporarily camped out in the school gym. After the police come to investigate the missing purse, Freddie uses his ‘super sneakers’ to snoop (by bouncing high enough to look in through the windows) in 3 suspect houses near the school of the stolen purse. Then Freddie and his friend Maria set a trap for the purse thief using Maria’s giant pink purse. Maria’s pink purse is also stolen from the gym, but not before guacamole has been accidentally spilled onto it. Freddie is able to track the thief by following the green globs of guacamole in the snow. When Freddie catches up to him Freddie runs circles around him. “Just like a snowplow, I pushed enough snow to lock him into a snow jail.” (p. 80)  The police come to arrest the thief. The following morning when the children go sledding, Erika is kinder to Freddie and his friends because “” ‘ I owe you one’  she said…” for helping her abuela.

Miguel Benitez’s numerous black and white full-page, half-page, and quarter-page  illustrations help carry the text as it flows smoothly forward carrying the reader along with it.

Tallulah goes to dance school, but now her dream of being in a real ballet with a “real ballet company in  a real theater” has come true. The rehearsals take up most of her time, she lets everyone know it, and soon comes opening night. Tallulah overcomes her nervousness, but creates a domino effect on stage when she steps on another mouse’s tail. Down they fall. Later, off-stage the dance master, Clara, and the Sugar Plum Fairy all recount their own past on stage ballet mishaps. Now feeling better “the dance master, ‘in ballet, embarrassing things happen all the time, but a REAL dancer keeps right on dancing. And that’s just what you did…’ ”         Happy ending.

PJ is a 5th grader who believes his father is a private investigator away on assignment. The story is a series of PJ’s letters he writes to his father telling the events of his life. PJ decides to make a magnetic pickle for the school science experiment, hoping to win first place. However, the first place trophy turns up missing and PJ is accused of taking it. Although misfortune follows PJ wherever he goes, PJ decides he must solve the mystery. This book is written in the same style of Diary of a Wimpy Kid books. This book is quite silly which kids will love!

Nino, a little firefly, talks to his mom about his dream to shine as bright as the moon to earn the respect of all the other jungle animals. Well, the moon overheard this conversation and decided to help out by asking Nino if Nino could cover for him one night so he could take a break. Nino calls all the fireflies together to gather as one producing a very big, bright light as they slowly rose in the sky together. The fireflies, working as a team shone brighter than the brightest moonlight. The animals were amazed. Two morals of this story exist, follow your dreams, and together anything is possible! Beautiful illustrations increase the attraction of this book with gold foil “lights” on each firefly.

This informational book introduces the mystery of why the little brown bats were dying in large numbers. The book continues with investigations of pesticides, climate changes and virus as possibilities. White fuzz was found to grow on the infected bats’ noses. This was determined to be a fungus. Is the fungus to blame? The little brown bats start to help themselves through this issue. Great, detailed photos accompany each page spread. Each photo is related to the information found on its page. I especially am pleased with the high number of women scientist involved in the investigation as well as in the photos. This book contains a table of contents, an author’s note, bat facts page, bat help efforts page, a glossary, an index and further research page.

Sophia Grace and Rosie decide to sign up for the talent show together. Then they decided they have to make their performance a showstopper. They secretly let their classmates in on the plan. When the talent show begins and the two girls step on stage, they sing their song about lions, eagles and other animals. That is when all of the girls’ classmates enter the stage dressed as different animals. The audience loved it. The winner of the talent show was EVERYONE! The illustrations are very attractive for young readers. The authors, Sophia Grace Brownlee and Rosie McClelland, are two young British girls.

Ruby brings home a little kitten which causes Lovebird to get quite jealous. When Valentine’s Day arrives, both the kitten and Lovebird try to outdo each other to show Ruby how much they love her. Valentine’s day gets very messy until Ruby explains that there is room in her heart for two. This is a cute story about a friendship triangle that turns into love for all. Illustrations are very sweet and very pink!

A lonely little boy talks to the moon asking the moon many questions as if to find something they have in common. Soon, the boy asks the moon if it ever gets lonely and then consoles the moon telling it not to ever get lonely because he is available to to talk anytime it wants. Then they both fall  asleep. This story is very sweet with cute, colorful illustrations.

Ten years ago, I’d say this novel would not be on the shelves of my high school library.  Boyfriends with Girlfriends is the story of two sets of boy and girl friends: Sergio and Kimiko are best friends that will be juxtaposed with Allie and Lance.  Each has character flaws that make them real teenagers dealing with their sexual identity.  Even today, I’m a little hesitant to add it to the collection, but here is why I will.  Alex Sanchez created characters with such unique identities.  And I’m not talking just sexual identities.  Lance is proud of being gay but doesn’t believe someone could be bisexual.  Despite his confidence, he’s never been in a relationship…yet.  His best friend Allie is in a lengthy relationship with  her boyfriend Chip, but she is starting to feel like it doesn’t right.  Kimiko is sure she’s a lesbian, but hasn’t come out to her parents and also hasn’t been in a relationship…yet.  Finally Sergio knows he is bisexual, was tragically dumped by his previous girlfriend, and is afraid to get into a relationship again.  Yes, the sexual identity issues are a huge piece of the story, but the reality is they are for every teenager.  Should I get into a relationship?  How far am I willing to share myself both physically and emotionally?  These are questions on every teenagers mind, despite their sexuality.  Add in the pressures from parents and school and this is very much a mainstream young adult novel.  Still, librarians need to know there is tension as the teens do explore each other physically.  In particular a scene between Sergio and Lance with very heavy petting.  But Sanchez gives voice to a group of students in our schools who are not represented in literature.  American society is becoming more aware of LGBT issues of late.  If you have a LGBT group that meets in your school, then this book should be on your shelves.

Strange things are happening at Suburban High School. Celia Balustrade is a shy, “not-it” sophomore, friendless in a new school.  With inclusion in the mysterious group, The Rosary, Celia finds security and acceptance by dressing in black, acting aloof and hanging with the select group.  Dangerous accidents begin happening to girls on the day before their sixteenth birthday.  Celia questions the coincidences and uncovers a conflict between the supernatural forces of the Kind and the rising power of the Unkind. Is Celia the cause of the curse or the does she have the special power to stop the accidents?  Romance, intrigue, danger and a death occur as Celia discovers her special gifts. Imaginative powers such as being able to travel through the pages of a book are an unusual twist  in this enjoyable read from Nathan Kotecki.  Recommended for high school and public libraries.

Kids are interested in robots, especially young boys.  This book specifically addresses some of the robots used in the space program, and there are many.  At the end of the book are questions for critical thinking skills which use the common core, a great help for teachers.  The text is simple and directly explains the photo on the accompanying page.  I hadn’t realized Voyager 2 has been travelling through space for over 35 years–it’s amazing.  Students will enjoy this book and it’s photos and, who knows, it may lead to the creation of a future space robot.

Brach is a famous magician who owns and performs in the Abracadabra Hotel. However, the Great Theopolis challenges Brach to a magic contest, and the winner gets ownership of the Abracadabra Hotel. The Great Theopolis does an extreme magic trick, and if Brach can’t figure it out, then he will lose his hotel. With the help from Charlie and Ty, Brach gets the help he needs to keep t

The book is factual, but in a random way. The premise for the story is Ms. Patel’s primary grade class is going to have a visitor from a raptor center at school that day. Ms. Patel introduces her class to eagles by using a one dollar bill. The students are familiar with the U.S. symbol of an eagle in the Great Seal on the back of the dollar bill. From there, chapter one is more about symbols than about eagles themselves. Chapter two is about the eagle visitor in the classroom from the raptor center. It also answers the title question by saying,” ‘Didn’t you say he was bald?’… The bald part of its name comes from the word piebald. It means ‘having white marks. ‘ ” (p.15)  Chapter three has the class learning  “bald eagles live only in North America.” (p. 18)

The story text is written in an irregular font to represent a person’s handwriting. The sidebars , which give most of the factual information in this book, are in a test font, much like TIMES.

This should be a hit with your dinosaur lovers who have a sense of humor.

“Dear Santa, What did you use to pull your sleigh before you had reindeer?  Love, Jilly   X   X   X, ” so begins this humorous, totally preposterous account of Santa using dinosaurs to pull his sleigh before the days of reindeer. With each of the twelve page turns a different type of dinosaur is hitched up to Santa’s sleigh, while displaying comically a characteristic of said dinosaur. Dinosaurs include: Triceratops, Parasaurolophus, Pterosaurs, Velociraptors, Giganotosaurus, Tyrannosaurus rex, Maiasauras, Styracosaurus, Stegosaurus (my favorite- with their back plates strung with Christmas lights and tinsel garland ), Gallimimus,

Apatosaurus, and Ankylosaurus, Zephyrosaurus, Nodosaurus sharing the last page.

Young readers will learn pictorially and through easy text the difference between ‘before’ and ‘after’ in this part of the Exploring Opposites series.

Two or three sentences appear on the 9″ X 11″ left page opposite the full page photo on the right hand page. This occurs seven times, then the reader is given two attempts to correctly fill in two blanks using the word ‘before’ or ‘after’ in the four pages entitled – “You Try It: Before and After?”

Includes: facthound.com

word count:116

As three old ravens sat on a branch, completely bored, one of the ravens remembers back and tells the story of how he had teased and bullied a newly hatched little raven, sharing his regrets about his choices as he spoke. He explained how he challenged the little raven to fly to the moon, and how he watched the little raven fly towards the moon, wishing he had stopped him. He stated how the ravens found the little raven the next morning lying in a hedge and how they hoped to see signs of life in him. When the raven regained consciousness, the old ravens invited him to play and noticed he had a silver feather from the moon. With bully awareness being a significant issue in schools, this book would be a great read-a-loud.

There is a focus on popular, interesting and unique birds and their many facts contained in this book. Facts such as birds physical description and the function of each description, nesting, eggs and chicks, as well as record breaking facts, makes this book quite intriguing. What makes this book unique is the comparison of different birds beaks, feet, eggs, etc. Color photos cover each page spread. A table of contents, glossary and index are included as well as a free digital companion book about birds to download.

Readers will be very informed after reading this book from scientific classifications and physical description of killer whales to their pod life, echolocation, sleeping and dangers encountered. One full color photo page accompanies each page spread.

This book does a great job of delivering basic and fun dolphin facts from their classification, pod life, hunting and eating to baby care and play activities. Color photos dominate each page spread. This book contains a table of contents, glossary and index. A free download about dolphin rescue stories is available.

This biography in the American Icons series from Enslow Publishers is a pretty standard issue, 90 page read.  One formulaic piece that is debatable about its effect is the introductory chapter that outlines the whole story.  This may have been directed by the publisher, but author Marty Gitlin basically tells the story of the book in the 1st chapter.  The rest of the book continues in a chronological order with quite a few more details, but if a student only reads the 1st chapter, they will get to know the bulk of Tyler Perry’s story.  This reader became bored because I already knew what was going to happen next. Unlike other publisher’s biographies, there are no glossy pictures woven throughout.  This is 90 pages of text.

The choice of the publisher to do Tyler Perry was a good one.  Perry had a very hard life as a child and chose to forgive and work hard to accomplish all that he has attained.  This message is a constant backdrop in the story.   As Perry found more success with his writing and performing, he branches out into different venues – from stage to movies to television shows.  He is presented as a very passionate man.  The controversy around his character of Madea, whom Perry himself plays while cross-dressing as a woman, is interesting because not all of his African-American audience liked this strong, religious, blunt woman figure that shows up in so many of his plays and movies.  Some feel it is low-brow humor but most feel it adequately represents the mothers and grandmothers they themselves grew up with.

Ultimately, schools with larger African-American populations should see this biography circulate.  But even those that don’t have that population can purchase this for an example of a contemporary star who continues to push himself despite such a horrible past.  Messages of forgiveness and perseverence will be remembered.

Four of V. Woolf’s books are critiqued in this book.  Each book’s synopsis is given, and then a type of criticism is employed:  historical criticism for Mrs. Dalloway, feminist criticism for A Room of One’s Own , biographical criticism for To the Lighthouse and gender criticism for Orlando.  Each chapter helps the student learn and examine how to critique a book.  Includes a biography and timeline of her life, glossary, resources, source notes, index, and photos.

The prayers are selected from the Bible and from the heritage of the Christian faith.  Both written and compiled by Mary Joslin

A compliation of three dog stories for the preschool crowd.  Molly brings a young girl safely home from being lost in the woods.  Ginger gets lost while exploring on a family outing.  And Yuki, who after her owner dies, forms a close bond with a young boy whose famly is struggling to make ends meet.  The soft, beautiful illustrations compliment the gentle tone of the short narratives.  I also appreciated the ethnic and socio economic diversity in the stories.  Here are three bedtime stories, in one book, that the wee ones will ask for time and time again.

Pig loves to play Princess where she is granted any wish she has by her friend Twig who is playing a fairy mouse.  Pig gets wish after wish until finally Twig wants a turn.  Pig says no and Twig turns to leave.  When Pig sees that Twig is serious, she relents and trades places.  The whole story is focused on words using the short voweli.  Pig and Twig are adorable wool felt animals with a setting of found objects.   The 3D look is different and attractive.  Young students who are beginning readers are able to sound out the words and feel confident being able to read a story.  This book should be in every primary grade classroom.