This is a great story about how storyteller Zora Neale Hurston became the collector and teller of stories. The book follows Zora’s life from her childhood, where she got her love of oral storytelling, her mother passing away, her father remarrying, her leaving home at 14, getting educated and returning home to collect the stories she remembered from her past.

This book is illustrated by Jacqueline Alcantara and the illustrations in this book are fantastic. You can feel the energy that Zora Neale Hurston carried with her on her journeys and her story friends follow you through the illustrations. There are frogs in glasses, rabbits in hats, and foxes that you can find hiding in the pages of Zora’s story. The end papers at the end of the book offer an Author’s Note and additional reading sources to continue learning about the prolific storyteller.

This is a great addition to the biographies and stories in your classroom or library.

In Jules vs. The Ocean Jules, her mom and sister are having a beach day. Jules is so excited to build a sandcastle that will for sure impress her big sister, but the ocean has other plans. Every time Jules builds a castle, the ocean comes and destroys it. Jules gets frustrated, pulls herself together and keeps trying. Each time a wave comes and smashes her castle. She perseveres with her goal of building the “biggest, fanciest, most excellent castle” on the beach. And each time “SLAP” the ocean knocks the castle down. Eventually Jules’ big sister comes to help her build the castle and together they build a big, fancy, most excellent sand castle! But, once again CRASH the ocean slaps it down. Despite that Jules and her sister realize the most excellent part of the day was building it together, not the castle itself. The beach day ends with happy sisters after a great day, until Mom tells them really the moon is controlling the waves – now they’ll have to watch out for the moon!

Great illustrations add the fun nature of this story that everyone can relate to. This book could be used in the classroom for topics of perseverance, kindness, and just a fun read aloud.

Bear is so excited for the surprise party and he just can’t wait. The friends decorate and bake a cake. Bear is impatient and in his impatience he squishes the cake which makes bear sad. Bear’s friends comfort him and help him build a new cake to surprise Hare. The text is rhyming and the illustrations are colorful and bright.

A little beetle and a caterpillar are friends having a picnic and watching the moon on a cliff. One day the caterpillar is gone and the beetle is sad. Looking for its friend, it sees some red in the distance and sets off to look for its friend. In the illustrations, the reader can see that the caterpillar has built a chrysalis on the underside of the cliff out of view of the beetle. He encounters a crow and a frog, but it is not afraid. Once the beetle reaches the red, it sees that it was wrong. Soon a butterfly comes along and looks very familiar and it realizes that it is the friend.

The illustrations are black and white, but the caterpillar and butterfly are in red. The illustrations are striking in this story about friendship.

A little pig faces frustration again and again of not being able to do it yet. The pictures on the pages show the piglet’s frustration as riding without training wheels, flipping pancakes, playing violin, and completing a puzzle are tried without success. The book goes on to say that it takes patience to get to yet and to get there, you will make mistakes, but that is okay. The pictures are watercolor and add to the sweetness of the book. A great story for encouraging young ones to keep trying and not give up.

Victor and Linesi are twins in Malawi. Victor goes to school and plays with his friends, but Linesi has to collect water and do chores during the day. At school, Victor’s teacher asks them to think about equality and if boys and girls are treated equally in their own lives. Victor does not think it is fair that his sister does not get to go to school and is too tired from all of the chores to learn anything at the end of the day. He decides to take turns with his sister, so that she can go to school as well. This inspires others in the village to do the same.

This picture book is based on true events. The end of the book includes an author’s note about access to fresh water and a list of organizations for finding out more information about water scarcity and gender inequality. The author’s note also includes words to know and the pronunciation, since several Chichewa words (one of the languages in Malawi) are included in the story.

A humorous look at differently topics from parts of the body, animals, plants, and the earth. Cartoon panels introduce us to diary entries for different items. It is divided up into three different sections: Human Body, Animal Kingdom, and Earth and Science. The content is not in-depth, especially since each item is only discussed on one to two pages, but there are some interesting and funny facts. The topics and the focus will definitely appeal to children. Did you know wombat poop is cube shaped? Vampire bats throw up in other bats mouths? Some of the pages has me laughing out look, but I was disappointed to see that some of the humor came from making fun of others (the slug calling the snail stupid and a loser). A table of contents and glossary are included.

Pickup trucks‘ basic information on nonmechanical parts and basic pickup truck uses provide young readers just that – basic information. The information is given in one or two sentences per page along with an appropriate photo of what is being read about dealing with pickup trucks. The book is well labeled where needed.

There is a table of contents, glossary, index, and web site ( www.factsurfer.com / keywords – pickup trucks) for those readers learning how to locate information or wanting more information. The web site includes much more advanced information of the workings of trucks by Chevrolet, a coloring page, and multiple video truck games.

Egypt’s location, a very brief bit of Egypt’s ancient history, and geography is presented for young beginning readers learning to search for information. ABDO follows its standard procedure of providing two or three sentences of facts in large font on the left hand side of the book with the right side entirely devoted to amazing full page photos.

There is a table of contents, index, glossary, and web site (abdokids.com / code CEK55o2).

The web site contains five of the photos and most of the text from this book. Further information is provide by National Geographic Kids World. Plus, there is a printable word search and maze.