This book views venturing out into the world as the purest form of hands-on learning for young children (3 years and younger) as it provides so many opportunities for language, reasoning and exploration.  The book is divided into 4 main sections: Home & Community, Vehicles, Animals, and Our World. There are over 50 different “adventures” included, and each has a 1-3 activities to do afterwards that might be art, math, pretend play, sensory play, science observations or songs.  The “adventures” listed are all toddler fun; most are free and easily accessible in everyday life. The activities listed have a clear description of supplies needed and are fun and engaging. Simple book, with lots of fun activities to get the toddler out of the house. (written by Michele Neely, SpEd Preschool teacher in the Olympia School District)

The aim of this book is to provide fun, interactive lesson plan ideas for early childhood classrooms (Kindergarten or younger) that help to embed the different art content (Music, Drama and Visual arts) into rich STEM learning.  It focuses on learning through exploration, observations, questioning and simple investigations. 4-5 lessons for each section include open-ended tasks, opportunities for social interaction and opportunities for reflection and elaboration.  The activities and descriptions are fairly simple and traditional (no new earth-shattering ideas) but it does make clear how it connects to the learning standards for each section. The pictures are in black and white, small and not very helpful.   (Written by Michele Neely, SpEd Pre school teacher, Olympia School District)

Fred Rogers (1928–2003) had a tremendous influential on generations of children through his television program Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, a program which he created and played the title role. Rogers was on the ground floor of teaching compassion, equality, and kindness. He advocated for inclusion and against bullying. Rogers devoted his lief to children and he took their fears, concerns, and questions about the world seriously.

The Good Neighbor is the first full-length biography of Fred Rogers, tells the life story of this American icon. Drawing on original interviews, oral histories, and archival documents, the author, Maxwell King looks at Rogers’s personal, professional, and artistic life through decades of work, including his years as a Presbyterian minister. What the viewing public may not have known was that in the 1980’s on Rogers’ increasingly sophisticated episodes were written in collaboration with experts on childhood development. The book takes the reader through Rogers’ delayed retirement, at a point by which he was already ill with stomach cancer. The reader follows Rogers’ and his wife as they face is final days. This is a wonderful book that provides great detail into an amazing man.

This 75th Anniversary Edition is jammed with historical information, original illustrations and comments about the book over the years of its publication. It is perfect for fans of this inspirational little book.

Vampire movies, friends who feel uneasy around your other friends, parents who want to meet your friends’ parents, a wolf howling in the night, and a middle-school sleepover to celebrate the end of the school year. This book has it all.

Emily enjoys her nightly visits with the two home schooled teens across the street. Neither Emily, nor her parents have ever met Drew and Vicky’s parents. When Emily begins planning the end of the school year party with her school friends, Emily thinks it would be the perfect time to invite Drew and Vicky to meet her school friends. Problems arise, when Drew and Vicky’s parents are never available to meet Emily’s parents.

Oh, why is there a wolf howling in Drew and Vicky’s back yard? “The howling drifted through her window, as if somehow the creature knew that she was coming after it, and calling her to join in. Emily found it strange that this sound didn’t scare her. In fact, it didn’t even surprise her. She felt as though she had an appointment with the beast to settle their score. To end this.” (69)

Time is getting short before the party and Emily still has no word from Drew and Vicky’s parents as to whether they can come or not. Emily takes it upon herself to go to their house and talk to them during the day, but no one is home. Drew and Vicky are home schooled? Emily enters their house. She discovers coffins in a back room. Emily feels “duped, taken, lied to…” (99). Drew and Vicky will not be coming to her party. She wants nothing to do with them. Now, of course, Drew and Vicky want to come to the party.

On the night of the party, Ethan’s cousin Declan comes to the party, too. Declan shares a vampire story. Finally, Emily begins to connect the dots and assumes Drew and Vicky are in fact vampires. But it is too late for Emily. The real Declan was never at the party. The Declan at her party was Drew shape shifted to look like Declan.

In the Epilogue, “Years had passed since the night of the sleepover, and much had changed. Drew and Vicky no longer lived in the same town. As the two had done many times before, they moved to an abandoned house in a new town where no one knew them. Where they would be safe. And where they could make new friends.” (133)

P. J. Night writes this new series- Creepover. The top and bottom of each page is dripping in black ‘blood’ (it is printed only in black and white, after all) or perhaps paint.

It all begins with Abby and Leah grocery shopping for their sleepover. The sleepover is in the basement with scary DVDs and a game of “Truth or Dare”. Abby reluctantly reveals she like Jake, the boy who lives a cross the street. Then the other girls coax Abby to text Jake. Later that night, Abby is awakened when her cell phone receives a message saying, “LEAVE HIM ALONE. HE’S MINE!!! DON’T MAKE ME TELL YOU TWICE!” (32) All the girls are creeped out by the text. It sounds like it was sent by Jake’s former girl friend Sara, who was killed in a fatal crash. The text must be a mistake or a prank.

Back at school, the first dance of the school year is announced. It will be a benefit for the Sara James Memorial Scholarship Fund. Jake and Abby walk home from school and he asks if she’d like a ride to the dance. “Yes.” Awhile later, Abby sees a girl with long red hair running, could it be Sara’s ghost? Later the new blouse Abby plans on wearing to the dance is ripped and stuffed under her suitcase, but how? Abby Googles* “proof of ghosts” (76). She find an article on-line entitled- “When the Paranormal Gets Personal” (76). Though Abby does not want to believe in ghosts it is hard not to with all the creepy things happening to her lately. Plus, her best friend is not supporting her in this.

Abby and Jake do go to the dance, but leave almost immediately when Abby can’t handle the huge photo of Sara displayed at the dance. Jake follows her out of the gym. Abby shows Jake the texts. Jake has Abby text, “IS THIS REALLY SARA? PROVE IT!” The text comes back, “I’M @ ST. RAYMOND’S CEMETERY. COME SEE ME IF YOU DARE!” (122)

Spoiler alert: it is not Sara, but Sara’s cousin, Samantha, who is staying with her aunt and uncle while Samantha’s mother is working in Africa. Samantha’s and Sara’s resemblance is so great Aunt Stacy is having a hard time dealing with it. Samantha spends most time of her time in Sara’s old bedroom out of Aunt Stacy’s sight. Samantha is miserable. Eventually Samantha goes through all of Sara’s things including her diaries.

In the end, all of the creepy things resolve themselves, except one. Is it from Sara?

• Abby does attempt a seance in chapter 8.

Seven students trapped in their school after a bomb goes off must fight to survive while also discovering who among them is the bomber in this provocative new thriller from the author of the New York Times bestselling Testing Trilogy.

Featuring multiple perspectives, this riveting thriller explores the power of prejudice and assumptions through the lens of school violence. It’s revealed early on that one of the survivors is also involved in the bombing. From the school’s perfect Queen Bee to the tough-as-nails delinquent, each of the students has a different motive for being at school that day. Charbonneau builds suspense by subtly planting red herrings about the accomplice’s identity while also raising questions about others. The frequent shifts in perspective allow readers to see beyond each character’s stock exterior. While each one has a distinct voice, some narratives are more compelling than others. The most complex and developed character is Rashid, a Muslim teenager who feels he must compromise his family’s ideals in order to make his school life easier. Other students are immediately suspicious of Rashid after the initial bomb. While the book confronts this racism head-on and another character is ultimately responsible, the narrative feels stereotypical and exploitative in its casting of Rashid as a would-be terrorist based on his race and religion alone.

Time Bomb is a fast paced quick read, perfect for fans of This Is Where It Ends by Marieke Nijkamp.

Storm-Wake is loosely based on Shakespeare’s The Tempest. Moss has grown up on the strangest and most magical of islands; the story moves from her childhood to her teenaged years. The island is covered with brilliantly colored flowers which seem to have some hallucinogenic qualities. Her father has a plan to control the tempestuous weather that wracks the shores. Pa uses the hallucinogenic flowers to conjure up storms and to create spiritual beings from the sea (first a white horse, and then a fish-boy).  But the island seems to have a plan of its own once Callan — a wild boy her age — appears on its beaches. Her complex feelings for Callan shift with every tide, while her love for the island, and her father, are thrown into doubt.

And when one fateful day, when teenaged boys from the outside world wash up on the beach, speaking of the Old World, nothing will ever be the same.

This novel is unlike Lucy Christopher’s other novels. I am not sure that it is actually a YA book.  The writing is very lyrical and mystical. I found it hard to concentrate and had to re-read pages to try to understand. It’s an interesting fantasy tale, but not one I would highly recommend.

Monster Nanny by Tuutikki Tolonen

School has just let out for the school , when Mother wins a two week free trip to Lapland. The contest will send a nanny to take care of her three children. Mother is thrilled to be going to Lapland, but worries because the children’s father is still off on business in America. The nanny turns out to be a half-human, aka monster, aka troll. “Strange things were happening. Mom, who never went anywhere, was going away. Dad, who was never at home, was coming back. The children, who had never been left alone, were about to spend the night on their own. And in the hall closet slept a trained monster, though everybody had always been told that monsters didn’t exist.” (20)

The monster takes good care of the children. The children learn more about monster by checking out a very old book from the public library. From the book, which they read in bits and pieces, they learn to let the monster go into the woods at night to eat, it is a vegetarian. Between the book and the youngest child’s ‘talking bathrobe’ ( the siblings think it is an imaginary friend, but it isn’t) they decided they should go camping outside by their back fence next to the woods. Soon the children learn their mother was not the only one who won the contest. Fourteen other children’s parents are now on vacation in Lapland, too. Each child has its own monster nanny. Little by little, it is discovered the monsters are connected to each other and the monsters can not go back home to their own world until a missing monster in this world has been found.

Dad returns home by the first morning of the camp out. He seems fine with the monster situation (this is Finland) and at one point states, ” so what we have here is a monsters’ liberation camp”. (249) Dad is enjoying his role as camp director. He helps ward off the three strange ladies, perhaps witches, when they show up looking for the monsters. As the monster puzzle’s pieces continue to fit into place the missing monster is found, allowing them all to go back home to their own world, the last monster through the hole removing the key to the doorway.

Rory Tiger and Sheldon Turtle are getting ready for Christmas, when they change into their super hero gear to help out the woodland animals from Grumpus Bear. Grumpus Bear has been taking bees’ honey, rabbit’s carrots and squirrel’s nuts. Rory and Sheldon start by doing research on the internet and in books and discover, “I think I know the reason Grumpus didn’t hibernate. His red coat is so big and warm and puffy…”, says Rory. Sheldon finishes, ” …he doesn’t REALIZE that it’s wintertime!”

Rory and Sheldon decide to trick Grumpus into hibernating by offering a free show in a heated tent with free candy.  Once inside the tent, the usher (AKA Rory) takes Grumpus’ coat, as “Operation Bear-in-Underwear is about to get underway.” First comes the dancing squirrels, then the magic show with a disappearing tent and heater, followed by, “You are getting very sleepy… Hush, little baby… Time to take a beary long nap!” Mission accomplished. 

The graphic science novel ends with a “Super-Duper Animal Fact” about bears hibernating.

Story by Henri Meunier/ Illustrations by Nathalie Choux/ Adapted by Liza Charlesworth by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt / first published in France