73. Big Whopper - Patricia Reilly Giff

Zigzag Kids #2
Illustrateda by Alasdair Bright
Wendy Lamb Books/Random House, 2010
Simultaneously in paper?
68 pages
Rating: 3

Patricia Reilly Giff, award-winning author, has begun another series of early chapter books for young kids. Set in the after-school program at the Afternoon Center at the Zelda A. Zigzag School, readers meet the same group of children in each installment. However, each one features a different child as the protagonist. Alasdair Bright’s line drawings accentuate a small part of almost every two-page spread.

I read this one before the first, but there was no problem understanding what was going on. I'm guessing you can jump in anywhere. This one's about a frizzy blonde-haired girl named Destiny who loves the afterschool program. She runs into trouble, however, when she tells a lie because she's feeling a little like a loser. It's a simple lie, but it troubles her greatly. Then she tells her friend, Mitchell, and he tries to help her fix things. Meanwhile, it's DISCOVER week at the center, and Destiny feels she's never going to DISCOVER anything - and be able to write it on the huge drawing-paper wall. It's another student, one named Gina, that precipitates much of the frustrations that Destiny is feeling this week. We all have a Gina in our lives! Of course everything turns out well. Too well??

It's a very cute story. Teachers and adults are helpers and friends, not the enemy. When I look online for reading level guidelines, I see ages 9 - 12 everywhere. This seems much too high to me. My nine and ten year olds could read this just fine, but it would seem very young for them, I think. But would a first or early-second grader, which I would think would be the target group, be able to read it? Yes, it's written in short sentences and paragraphs. Is the font the right size? I'm really not sure!

My Uncle Emily - Jane Yolen

Illustrated by Nancy Carpenter
Philomel Books, 2009
$17.99
32 pgs.
For: Lovers and discoverers of Emily Dickinson's poetry (including those who don't "get" her poems!)
Rating: 4.5
Endpapers: Rosy cranberry
Illustrations: "Pen and ink and digital media." They look old-fashioned and really work beautifully with the story and subject.

Based on facts that Jane Yolen has researched, we are treated to a little bit of the life of Emily Dickinson and of the people who loved her, the lives she touched. It explains what a "recluse" is, and gives us a wonderful glimpse into the possibilities of her quiet personality.

When she givers her six-year old nephew (and next-door neighbor), Gib, a dead bee and a poem to take to school to share, he feels obligated to do so - even though he doesn't understand the poems and knows that his classmates probably won't either. When one of the boys makes fun of his aunt (she refers to herself as Uncle Emily), he socks him in the nose. Not wanting to tell the truth at a family gathering that night, he omits the fighting part of the story, buy Uncle Emily is the one that figures out there's something missing. And she gets it out of him in with a poems and gentle kindness.

There's a note at the end entitled "What is True About this Story."

A for-sure addition to reading aloud the poems of Emily Dickinson to kids! Many love her poems, some have glimmers of understanding, but many screw up their faces and say, "I don't get it." This story should be included! For sure.

What a lovely cover illustration!