Simply looking at the adorable cover of The Duck Who didn’t Like Water will quack you up. The duck is holding an open umbrella in the rain while wearing a lemon yellow macintosh rain slicker and yellow rain hat. Oh yes, and there is a green frog sitting straight legged on top of the umbrella. Duck is a little OCD when it comes to water. When a terrible storm makes a hole in the roof of Duck’s house (on stilts above the cattails) Duck discovers not only a frog on his front porch, but a true friend in the making.

Basic information about Italy is covered from: location with maps, landscape and climate with a seasonal temperature inset, wildlife with photos, communities, customs, school, food, and celebrations.

I found Italy, in the COUNTRY PROFILES series, the easiest to understand when it came to the use of local place names and vocabulary in captions. This is most likely because this is the country I am most familiar with in this series. Also, Amy Rechner does a great job of including definitions within the text.

Students will appreciate the two pages of quick facts containing Italy’s flag, money, capital city and other information they most likely will be required to give in a report on Italy.

The www.factsurfer.com links gave more information from at least three other resources. Most of the links were working today.

What disappoints is the Timeline section. The reader must jump up and down from the top to the bottom of the pages to follow the sequence of Italy ‘s history. Only four of the lines are straight directly connecting to their spot on the timeline. The other eight are lines in three segments giving the appearance of a maze.

Basic information about Thailand is covered from: location with maps, landscape and climate with a seasonal temperature inset, wildlife with photos, communities, customs, school, food, and celebrations.

Students will appreciate the two pages of quick facts containing Thailand’s flag, money, capital city and other information they most likely will be required to give in a report on Thailand.

The www.factsurfer.com links which should have given more information from at least three other resources were not working very well the day I went to see them. Of the three Scholastic Thailand books shown, only one of them had information. All the links that matched the photo of this particular Thailand title went to other countries.

What disappoints is the Timeline section. The reader must jump up and down from the top to the bottom of the pages to follow the sequence of Thailand’s history. There is not a single line connecting the appropriate picture to the year on the line. There is a three segmented line which usually crosses the book’s ditch from the left page to the right page.

The Wildlife section includes six photos of indigenous animals, but also talks about another five animals that are not pictured.

Basic information about Cuba is covered from: location with maps, landscape and climate with a seasonal temperature inset, wildlife with photos, communities, customs, school, food, and celebrations.

Students will appreciate the two pages of quick facts containing Cuba’s flag, money, capital city and other information they most likely will be required to give in a report on Cuba.

The www.factsurfer.com links gave more information from at least three other resources.

What disappoints is the Timeline section. The reader must jump up and down from the top to the bottom of the pages to follow the sequence of Cuba’s history. There is not a single line connecting the appropriate picture to the year on the line. There is a three segmented line which usually crosses the book’s ditch from the left page to the right page.

When four newly hatched dinosaurs imprint on Doc and Denise at a rundown dinosaur tourist trap this graphic novel becoming very interesting with overtones of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Doc and Denise’s landlord- Angus- unknowingly awakens the dreaded Armageddon, (buried a millennia past), from his underground hypercrystal prison. Armageddon, then transforms Angus into “THE MALICIOUS MAN-COMET!”

Armageddon sets Man-Comet out to destroy the manosaurs. Presently, the manosaurs are at the dinosaur museum with Doc and Denise, who want to show them about their earthly history. Mayhem at the museum ensues until Armageddon is once again trapped in hypercrystal.

Do not miss Book #2.

Tara Smith is a driven high school girl, the daughter of successful, driven parents. Then one day in a hurry to get to the school bus on time, Tara does not take her morning handful of daily pills. Everything changes from there! Tara can no longer block out the taunts from bullies. In a moment of rage, Tara transforms into a girl with glowing red eyes who spontaneously combusts.

Tara finds herself swiftly whisked off to a school for extraterrestrial high school girls. “…IF EVERYTHING GOES WELL, YOU’LL (Tara) HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO REPRESENT EARTH AND THE SOLAR SYSTEM IN FUTURE GALACTIC ENDEAVORS.” This could very well be Tara’s dream come true.

Now Tara must get used to having a roommate, a new school, and life as an alien living among many other aliens from many other worlds. The BIG question is- ‘can friendship withstand cultural history’? A history where one friend’s world destroyed another friends world.

It seems no matter which world a high school girl is from, there will always be drama.

Chestnut by Jennifer Li Shotz puts forth the tale of a family living on the financial edge and their daughter – Meg who wants to have a dog more than anything else in the world.

The Briggs Family Christmas Tree Farm is just entering their busiest time of the year as Meg has her twelfth birthday. Meg has been looking forward to this because Meg wants to show her brother, sister, and parents she is no longer the ‘little’ girl of the family. Now, she will be able to truly help daily at the yearly Christmas tree stand. On Meg’s way out to the tree stand, she discovers a hurt dog (Chestnut, a Plott hound, known for its tracking skills) entangled in the farm’s wire fencing. Meg rescues the dog, hides it in an old shed, then goes to work. Meg knows her parents do not want a dog.

Now the lying and the guilty feelings start for Meg. Meg has never lied to her parents before. She wants this dog so much. Surely, she will be able to find a way to support Chestnut so her parents will let her keep him. More lies, more guilt.

Meg’s parents finally discover Chestnut when he escapes from the shed and tracks Meg to the house. Meg’s tears are unending and her heartbreak all encompassing as her family takes Chestnut to the animal shelter.

Later that same day, the sheriff is called to the tree farm when it is discovered 150 trees have been chopped down from the very back lot of the farm. Feelings of financial ruin loom over the entire family.

Meg finds a way to temporarily retrieve Chestnut from the animal shelter with the help of her neighbors. Then, she and Chestnut track the thieves down. Along the way Meg falls through the snow covered ice into a pond. [Here is where my 10+ years, as an actively participating mother of three hiking Boy Scouts, has a problem with this story. From the time Meg falls into the pond until she is rescued by her parents, because of Chestnut’s tracking skills, hypothermia should have been so extreme, I feel, Meg would not have survived.]

Chestnut’s tracking skills saves Meg, the stolen Christmas trees, and the family from financial ruin.

Meg’s emotional roller coaster will ring true with intermediate readers.

If you have seen the Black Panther movie ( or maybe you have read the original comic books) , how could you forget Shuri, T’Challa’s (AKA the Black Panther) younger sister? Shuri wants to work in her laboratory, while her mother – Queen Ramonda would prefer 13 year old, Princess Shuri be fitted for formal wear and have her hair braided for T’Challa’s upcoming Challenge Day.

Princess Shuri struggles throughout the novel with you role in life as a princess, a young woman, gender equality, and a scientist. “…she will prove to Mother and T’Challa– to everyone, really– that she’s more than just some princess history will forget.” (70) Girl readers especially, hold on to your hats, this is going to be a bumpy ride.

When Shuri discovers Wakanda’s sacred heart-shaped herb that gives each new Black Panther his ( or someday perhaps her ) superior abilities is dying out at an alarming rate, Shuri concentrates her time researching the herb’s survival. Not get ready for Challenge Day. Then, Shuri discovers Wakanda is under threat of invasion. Shuri decides to secretly leave the palace with her Dora Milaje body guard in-training, K’Marah, to carry-out her royal duty to protect Wakana.

Get ready for more books in this series already in print.

I can not help but love the fact this book’s text is in purple ink, my favorite color. Also, the color of the heart-shaped herb, but I prefer my reason more.

Intermediate age students/readers are treated to a guided tour of the United Kingdom by a student their own age from London. They are shown the United Kingdom’s world and European location, food, schooling, a folk tale, famous landmarks, and a brief history of the United Kingdom among other things by this local student. A few English words which are different from those in the United States are included and add to the interest of Follow Me Around United Kingdom.

The child’s tour of United Kingdom format makes the factual information less intimidating than other books of its type.