When sister and brother, Susi and Bobby, are outside playing one day, they discover a yellow butterfly that sings.  They are so amazed that they share their experience with their grandfather at dinner, who in turn shares a legend that says that yellow butterflies are magical and can grant wishes, if those wishes come from the heart.  Bobby and Susi immediately start plotting and planning what they’d like to wish for, and spend days trying to catch the butterfly.  When they finally catch it in their net, they start spouting their wishes, but get no response and notice that the butterfly is in distress.  Unable to convince her brother to set the butterfly free, Susi wishes the butterfly free, and so it happens.  In gratitude, the free butterfly decides to grant them both a wish, and the story ends there, asking the reader, “What would you wish for?”  It reads aloud well, and would make a great conversation starter, as so many kids love to ponder the ending question, and it has a good message to offer about unselfish actions getting rewarded in the end, but that message is a bit muddled in that Bobby gets granted a wish, too, even though he was the one arguing to keep the butterfly captive.

Animal lovers will find plenty of information in this book.  Each title is in question form which encourages learning by inquiry.  Each spread includes a full-page photo of the animal, three or four sentences for younger readers, a colored box with more information for more fluent readers, and a smaller related photo insert of the animal.  Words to know for new readers and for fluent readers are introduced in the front of the book.  Pronunciation is provided for some words.  Twelve animals are represented.  Books recommended for further reading are of a similar reading level as this book.  Three websites are mentioned.  Two are very good and one did not work at the time of this review.  Index included in the back with the photo credits.

Spanish and English are mixed in the text, as the author tries to adapt the traditional Twelve Days of Christmas carol to count in spanish, naming gifts from her own Mexican-American traditions.  In the back of the book are notes from the author and illustrator describing how they crafted the book, along with a glossary describing the traditional gifts and translating the numbers.  Unfortunately, the song itself is hard to sing, as the rhythm is somewhat thrown off with the new word choices at times, and I fear that there may be some stereotyping or over-gereralization happening, as many Latin-American cultures vary in their traditions, and one Hispanic friend I consulted was unfamiliar with some of those listed here.  Also, I don’t like the way the two languages were jumbled together.  I will say that the illustrations are bold and colorful.

A sweet (though perhaps a bit cotton-candy-sweet), story of a boy’s little stuffed lamb who is curiously poking about Santa’s great big bag when Santa stops by on Christmas Eve, and accidently falls into the bag.  Throughout the rest of the evening, as Santa continues on his rounds, Lamb visits with the other toys in the bag, calming their fears and offering the wise council of an experienced toy.  At the end of the night, when Lamb is the only toy left in Santa’s bag, he fears Santa may give him away to another child and wonders how he will get home to his own boy, but of course Santa knows better, and Lamb finds himself safely returned home.  A good addition to Christmas collections.

In this book of food, author Jen Green includes much information about the history, climate, culture, traditions, and religions of the islands that make up the Caribbean.  A map shows the location and names of islands in the Caribbean, also known as the West Indies.  Green colored boxes on many pages provide additional information.  There are 3 recipes for traditional favorites with measurements in both American and metric systems written for children to follow.  Other recipes and further information can be found in recommended books and websites.  Photos are well chosen and captions offer additional information.  Also included is a glossary and index.  This book is a good resource for those looking for a variety of information on the Caribbean.

In a family full of folks who are expert multi-taskers, always in a rush, Fiona is a slowpoke who likes to take her time.  One day when her dawdling has made her miss the bus one too many times, her mother insists she attend Speed School.  Then Fiona finds herself multi-tasking with the best of them, rushing through life with her head spinning so much one day it gets stuck.  When she can’t take it anymore she makes a deal with her parents that she will be on time if the rest of the family will attend Slow School, where she teaches them to slow down and taste their food and notice flowers.  It’s a simple easy-reader book with a nice message we can all relate to on one end of the story or the other.  I just wish the internal illustrations were in color.

The Alden children, Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny, decide to enter their dog, Watch, in a competition to star in dog food commercials.  Watch’s main opponents are Ninja, the star in a TV show, and Buffalo, owned by a boy.  As the story unfolds, there are a couple of mysteries about the contest for the children to solve.  This is book 121 of t he Boxcar Children series created by Gertrude Chandler Warner.

Author Ann Malaspina tells of an incident that connects General Washington and poet, Phillis Wheatley.  In 1775, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, General Washington was guiding his rag-tag group of men and boys into becoming soldiers to fight the well-disciplined British troops.  At the same time, Phillis Wheatley sat in Providence, Rhode Island, struggling with her own thoughts about the British, the colonists, and freedom.  Looking for a way to support the colonists’ desire to be free of British tyranny, on Oct. 26, 1775, she wrote a poem to encourage General Washington.  Her words remained with Washington as he and his men struggled to prepare for battle.  In Feb. 1776, Washington sent her a letter thanking her for her words of encouragement and admiring her talent as a poet.  A month later, Washington aimed real and pretend cannons at the British in Boston.  Surprised at the supposed strength of the Continental Army, the British retreated and the Army won its first victory.  No one knows if Washington and Wheatley ever met and their lives then followed different paths.  This short picture book tells details from the lives of two important people at one point in the history of our country.

This book is intended for very young, pre-school audiences.  It has only a few words per page, sometimes only a phrase, sometimes a couple sentences.  It tells of a three-year-old proclaiming all he can do now that he is three.  The problem is that many of the things he declares he can do would be things he could do before he was three (e.g. cuddle, wiggle, flop, giggle).  The colors in the illustrations are rather drab, and they don’t always clearly support the text:  it took the second reading of the book before I could even figure out the picture on the “now I can swing” page.

A delightful book that stays true to the characters and artwork of the original Peanuts comic strip while creating a bridge to tradition text for early readers.  It tells the story of Lucy’s frustration over her little brother Linus’s dependence on his trusty blanket.  Lucy tries calling in Grandma as backup; she tries taking it away; Linus tries asking Snoopy to hold it for him.  In the end, Linus decides that though he may have to give up his blanket someday, that day is not today.  The story is one that so many children can relate to, and in the end, they can be reassured that it is okay to have a comfort object.  This is an early reader that is also a good story. And the binding is nice and durable.