PICTURE BOOK - Hattie & Hudson by Chris Van Dusen

Illustrated by the author

2017, Candlewick Press

40 pgs.

Goodreads rating: 3.82 - 173 ratings

My rating: 5

Endpapers:  All pale green - small island on a lovely lake/silhouettes

Illustrations:  Bright, bold, and completely covering most pages

1^st line/s:  "Haddie McFadden loved to explore.  Every morning after breakfast, she'd grab her life jacket, wave good-bye to her parents, and paddle out in the canoe to see what she could see."

My comments:  Chris VanDusen does it again! (I love his stuff.)  His illustrations amaze me - big and bold, covering the page from edge to edge.  Hudson is a "monster" who lives at the bottom of a quiet country lake.  (He looks more like a dinosaur to me.)  I can't wait to read it to my grandson - he's afraid to swim in fresh water, but LOVES the stories of Sasquatch and Bigfoot.  I'm betting he's going to love this.  And I like the end note that Mr. Van Dusen writes on the copyright page: "And to all the young explorers who will be spending time at a lake this summer: Remember, there are no such things as a lake monster.  They don't exist.  At least I've never seen one.  But I keep looking."

Goodreads:  A little girl and her colossal friend teach a monster-size lesson about prejudging others in a charming new offering from Chris Van Dusen. 
          Hattie McFadden is a born explorer. Every morning she grabs her life jacket and paddles out in her canoe to discover something new on the lake, singing a little song on her way. When her singing draws up from the depths a huge mysterious beast, everyone in town is terrified except Hattie, who looks into the creature's friendly, curious eyes and knows that this is no monster. So Hattie sneaks out at night to see the giant whom she names Hudson and the two become friends. But how can she make the frightened, hostile townspeople see that Hudson isn't scary or dangerous at all? 
          Chris Van Dusen brings his colorful, perspective-bending artwork to this satisfying new story about acceptance, friendship, and sticking up for those who are different.

PICTURE BOOK - Up in the Garden and Down in the Dirt by Kate Messner

Illustrated by Christopher Silas Neal

2015, Chronicle Books (SF)

48 pgs.

Goodreads rating: 4.1 - 794 ratings

My rating:  5

Endpapers: Beige with brown line drawings of plants and garden tools

Illustrations:  No white border, actually no white: all beige, edge of page to edge of page...

1^st line/s:  "Up in the garden, I stand and plan ---
my hands full of seeds and my head full of dreams."

My comments:  Great information about gardens, soil, planting, and seasons, this reads as a fiction book but is full of information for little ones.  It also has beautiful language, lots of alliteration, and great rhythm.  I read it aloud to eight preschoolers, holding all their attention, and will use it with my STEM "Down and Dirty" (soils) summer camp at the library.  

Goodreads:  In this exuberant and lyrical follow-up to the award-winning Over and Under the Snow, discover the wonders that lie hidden between stalks, under the shade of leaves . . . and down in the dirt. Explore the hidden world and many lives of a garden through the course of a year! Up in the garden, the world is full of green—leaves and sprouts, growing vegetables, ripening fruit. But down in the dirt exists a busy world—earthworms dig, snakes hunt, skunks burrow—populated by all the animals that make a garden their home.

King Hugo's Huge Ego - Chris VanDusen

Illustrated by the author
Candlewick Press, 2011
HC, $16.99
40 pgs.
Rating:  4.5
Endpapers:  Yellow with darker yellow crest/shield with a slightly darker "H"
Title Pages: Full page illustration (a castle atop rolling green hills)

"Long ago, when people spoke
with words like "thou" and "thee,"
there lived a king named Hugo
who was only three foot three.

And though this mini monarch
stood no higher than an elf,
his ego was enormous --
he thought highly of himself."

Rhyming a b c b
Alliteration
Rhythm
Great vocabulary

Favorite illustration:  Tessa (a sorceress), after being bumped into the river, is grubby, shoeless (a dog is sticking out from under her haystack), she has a bedraggled frog on her head and a turtle on her rear....

Incredibly haughty King Hugo is poxed by a farm girl and his head grows and grows...and grows each time he brags.

Basil's Birds - Lynn Rowe Reed

Marshall Cavendish, 2010
$17.99
32 pages
Rating: 4
Endpapers: BRIGHT yellow

The humor in this book is very appealing. The illustrations are particularly interesting as well. So that means the story and the pictures are both a GO.

The illustrations look like something I could draw. I'm sure I couldn't, but they LOOK like I might be able to. I love the eyelashes, the teeth, the necks (or lack thereof, Principal Kabalsky) and the added phtots here and there. Reed uses clay birds as well, so the illustrations have a definite collage look.

Basil Birkmeister, the Janitor at Perch Elementary School, has had a bird build a nest on his bald head. He becomes quite attached to the nest, the bird....and then the baby birds that hatch and grow there. He caters to them, and even sleeps standing up so that he does not disturb them. It's really that simple...and that fun.

As simple as the illustrations are, I examined each one for the added touches that were included. Real tool fabric makes up Basil's nightshirt. And the worms - real, yucky worms. Kid's will love this! It's different. And fun. And it even has some great language included in some really good writing. A hit for me!

Lynn Rowe Reed's website.
Lynn Rowe Red's Facebook page.

Ling Cho and His Three Friends - V. J. Pacilio

Illustrated by Scott Cook
Farrar Straus Giroux, 2000
Looks like it's out-of-print
Library: picture book section
32 pages
Rating: 3.5
Endpapers: 4

This is a longish story told in couplets. The couplets are wonderfully rhythmic, use great words (fertile, entrusted, summon, reap, grueling, resolution, poverty, annual, depart, meager, transport, envision, destined, ...) and is full of alliteration. It's a tale of friendship and honesty. The illustrations are great at close examination, but would look blurry and washed out if read aloud and a listener was even a short distance away.

This would make a great reader's theater or choral reading for an older class.

Note: I took it from the library to read because i thought it might apply to my unit on China. And although the illustrations are about Chinese people, it could apply to any group of farmers that celebrate the harvest.

"In the wondrous land of China, many years ago,
There lived a wise and kindly man, a farmer names Ling Cho.
Together with his wife and sons, in fertile fields he'd toil;
Their lives entrusted to the land, true servants of the soil."

Thea's Tree - Alison Jackson

Illustrated by Janet Pedersen
Dutton Children's Books, 2008
32 pages
Rating: 4
Endpapers: Dark blue

Thea Teawinkle, a budding scientist who lives in Topeka, Kansas, plants a purple seed as the beginning of a choose-your-own research project. But it is a very unusual plant -- making the dirt ooze and turn purple, growing excedingly rapidly and quite huge. And so begins a series of letters between Thea and various experts in their fields.

Thea's letters show the rapid growth, the strange noises she hears from above, and items (like a huge golden egg) that begin to appear beneath the giant immovable "tree." The information she receives - from all sorts of sources - doesn't help her at all...but they're such fun to read.

There's humor everywhere - in the watercolor illustrations that completely cover each green-bordered page, in the condescending answers she gets, even all the salutations cover the gambit from Enthusiastically, Carl Capshaw, Curator to Doubtfully, Ada Adler, First Bank of Kansas to Importantly, Anna Applebaum, Arboreal Acquisitions. Such fun.

Perfect for a letter-writing lesson. And how about a twisted faiy tale?

Ten Rowdy Ravens - Susan Ewing

Illustrated by Evon Zerbetz
Alaska Northwest Books, 2005
$15.95
32 pgs.
For: kids a bit older than the usual "counting book" age...
Rating: 4.5
Endpapers: Large purple and lavender squares with numbers and cutouts of ravens

First of all, this book is just gorgeous. The illustrations are from carved linoleum prints that are then hand-colored. They're beautfiul. And secondly, the word choices, the alliteration, the writing is clever and deosn't talk down to kids.

"Eight rougish ravens
Pilfer piles of loot,
Cheater swipes some pretty pearls,
Seven give pursuit."

"Five unruly ravens
Gobble up chop suey
Noodles make a bellyache,
Now there's four. Aw, phooey!"

That was a lot of alliterative "r" adjectives! And at the end of the book, a 7-page "Daily Kaw", True News from Around the Raven World, that includes true stories of mischievous ravens, information about these trickster birds, and even "Corvid Classifieds" - all done with superb humor.

I went through a second time for a really close examination of the illustrations. Fantastic!

Grandpappy Snippy Snappies - Lynn Plourde

Illustrated by Christopher Santoro
Harcourt, 2009
$17.99
Ages 3-6t
Rating: 4
Endpapers: Red

I usually adore Lynn Plourde's writing - rhyme, rhythm, clever wordplay and wonderful words. However, I didn't seem to get caught up into these snappin' red suspenders. So I read it a second time, and a third. And I got into the silliness - and the cleverness - and now I can't wait to read it to Ella!

Grandpappy snaps his red suspenders to "fix" things -- and flixes them in crazy ways. Cows stuck in mud end up flying through the sky raining milk. He sends the derailed mail train to Mars. But when all the snippy snappy goes out of the suspenders....and just as he's about to save Grandmammy from a flock of crows --- well --- you'll never guess what happens!

Yes, this is perfect for little 'uns - say 2 1/2 to 5ish...

Horace and Morris Say Cheese (which makes Dolores sneeze!) - James Howe

Illustrated by Amy Walrod

Ginee Seo Books (Atheneum) 2009

$16.99

Rating: 4

Endpapers: Dark aqua

The title of this book doesn't work. Dolores is getting shortchanged - this is her book, not Morris'! I'd have kids give it a better title. Kids frequently have a tough time coming up with an appropriate, catchy title - so this would make for a great writing lesson.

It's also full of alliteration, rhyme, dialogue boxes, a great story, and all-color pages. And the characters are all...mice.

Dolores loves loves loves cheese - any kind of cheese - but becomes very allergic to it. It's difficult to find replacements for cheese, and she keeps slipping back, which makes her break out in a horrible rash. She finally discovers that if she tries different combinations of cheeseless food, she's all set. Cute story written in a clever way. And kids will love the illustrations. I do.

"Horace and Morris but mostly Dolores loved to eat cheese. They ate string chees and Swiss chesse on Sundays. Thet ate Muenster with mustard on Mondays."

Bubble Trouble - Margaret Mahy

Illustrated by Polly Dunbar
Pub 2008 in UK, 2009 in US
$16.00
Rating: 5
Endpapers: Blue, Green, White Bubbles in the sky

"Little Mabel blew a bubble, and it caused a lot of trouble...
Such a lot of bubble trouble in a bibble-bobbly way.
For it broke away from Mabel as it bobbed across the table,
where it bobbled over Baby, and it wafted him away."

Page after page of adventure, rhyme, and rhythm, as the entire town starts to chase after the baby floating in the bubble. Nineteen four-line stanzas. What a perfect production for a class to practice tongue-twisting, alliterataive, rhythmic verse. For MY class to practice, to memorize, to perform. I can't wait!

The illustrations are definitely cute and go well with the story, but it's the words that grabbed me here.....words to love (especially the verbs....) bobbed, bobbled, wafted, quibble, dribble, reeling, bellowed, groveled, babble, hobble, squable, tattered, tartan, gabble, gibbering, goggling, vanish, hovel, cavorting, aloft, huddled, grapple, topple, clambered, nefarious, plunged, gargles, quiver, drivel, shrivel, wilt, swivel, divested, dumbfounded, rebounded, prattle. Wowee!

Read Anything Good Lately? - Susan Allen & Jane Lindaman

Illustrator: Vicky Enright
Published: 2003
Rating: 3.5
Endpapers: Christmas Green

Simple sentence fragments in comic sans font with cute, detailed illustrations show many of the places and types of literature (well, at least 26) that you can read. For example:

Information on the internet
Joke books in the jacuzzi
The back of the Kellogg's box in kitchen,
Literature at the library

There's a thought bubble/oval for each page that show bits of the text that people in that illustrations are reading.

Q=quotations in the quiet (girl reading a book hight in the green branches of a tree with the quote she's reading in the thought bubble: "The pen is mightier than the sword.")

X=xrays in the eXamination room (doctor and girls and dog with bandage on his tail are looking at the tail xray)

Z=Zodiac at the zoo (animls are bending over people sitting on a bench as they all peruse a newspaper. (Thought bubble: PISCES, Feb 19-Mar 20 YOU WILL ALWAYS LOVE READING)

M is for Mischief - Linda Ashman

POETRY
An A to Z of Naughty Children
Illustrator: Nancy Carpenter
For: Kids, not too too young, though
Published: 2008
Rating: FIVE
Read: Oct. 21, 2008
Endpapers: Purple

This is going to be a favorite. An ABC book with alliteration, sophisticated vocabulary, poetry, and illustrations that have a little extra something, a different technique, very subtle and very fun. Nancy Carpenter uses what appears to be photographs of real items as part of her drawaings. Now maybe I'm wrong, but check out the pink cowboy boots from Evesdropping Eva, the orange frisbee from Fiendish Frankie, the shrubbery in Hiding Hal, the first place ribbons and trophies from Blustering Buster. A close examination of each page is in order!

Six to twelve-lined poems using alliteration and incredibly good vocabulary tell the stories of 26 very naughty children. Cleverly. Very cleverly. The poems stand alone, but the illustrations are a blast. I just want to read, and examine, and share, share, share. The middle schoolers loved it. The humor, the rhythm, the rhyming, the wording. They wanted to read it aloud to each other.

I always look forward to the letter X. This can be very telling about the cleverness and ingenuity of a writer. Check out Linda Ashman's X:

Experimenting Xavier

Xavier gets excited mixing extracts in the sink.
Mama takes exception, says, "You'll make us all extinct!"
Explains to him explicitly, "You lack the expertise
To execute experiments as difficult a these."

Xavier exclaims to her, "It's just a simple potion!"
But Mama cannot hear him on account of the...
EXPLOSION!

and I love Eavesdropping Eva (and NOT because it's primarily purple and lime green pages):

Eva enjoys hearing every exchange.
She creeps up to eavesdrop at very close range,
While people are eating, or out on a date,
At public events, or a private estate.
A whisper, an echo, and Eva appears,
Eagerly listening, straining her ears.
She'll sneak under tables, or lean from a ledge -
Uh-oh! Now Eva's gone over the edge.

Definitely, one of my favorites of the year.

Friday My Radio Flyer Flew - Zachary Pullen

For: Kids
Published: 2008
Rataing: 3.5 for kid appeal, 5 for my use as a teacher
Read: October 2008
Endpapers: Pale Cranberry
Very large/almost oversized

I love picture books. I love the art. When the text is good or more-than good, I celebrate. I look for text that I can use in my middle school classroom to draw out responses from kids when I'm teaching figurative language or genre. My fifth graders are always weak when it comes to identifying genre. This is a perfect book to use to begin that discussion. It's short and is full-full-full of alliteration and snazzy verbs to boot! I've ordered a copy, I just wish it would fit up and down on my bookshelf, but it's too tall.

One Saturday I searched... (yeah, elipses! I love elipses!)
...and my dad's old Radio Flyer surfaced.
That Sunday we went for a stroll.
Then on Monday morning I got motivated.
Maybe that old Flyer could really move. (Okay kids, let's talk about capitalization...)
So all day Tuesday...
...I tinkered....
...and by twilight my Flyer twinkled.
But Wednesday was wet. We had to wait.
On Thursday I tried to take off...
...but took tumble after tumble.
Finally on Friday...
...I focused...
...flew...
...and flew...
...and flew!

And oh, the illlustrations! Big and bold and in-your-face and FUN! I could look and look. They're done in oil paints and walnut medium. Now THAT'S interesting. Walnut medium? Zachary Pullen also illustrated The Toughest Cowboy (John Frank). I'm going to have to look for that one.

I took this book in to school a few days ago and shared it with my 8th graders. Two of the boys grabbed it immediately, and I'm not sure what they were looking for, but they quickly read it and put it aside. Would it have been different if it had been read aloud to them? I'm going to have to read it aloud to a class and see the reaction. And younger kids? I'll have to experiment with that, too.

So this book will go beside Weslandia, Violet the Pilot, Come On, Rain, My Mama Had a Dancing Heart, and Sleeping Ugly on my teaching bookshelf. Big grin.

Ellsworth's Extraordinary Electric Ears - Valorie Fisher

For: Kids
Pub: 2003
Rating: 4/5
Read: Aug. 25, 2008

Abundant alliteration.
Clever dioramas.
Multi-media.

I love alphabet books, and I love figurative language. I love collage and I adore cleverness. This books contains all. Each letter of the alphabet has a snazzy sentence and an accompanying diorama that not only illustrates the sentence but includes many other words beginning with that letter.

I want to share this book with my middle-schoolers and have them create sentences that they then illustrate with collage or diorama! We'll photograph them and put the page in our memory books.

A few examples:
"Fancy feathered fashions were favored by Floyd's farm friends. (You can imagine THIS diorama!)
"Kyle's kids kept kites in the kitchen.
"Quentin quickly quieted the quibbling, quarreling, and quacking of the quintuplets.
"Trust Trevor to tell you, typing on a trapeze was terribly tricky."

Loved it!