61. I've Lost My Hippopotamus by Jack Prelutsky

illustrated by Jackie Urbanovich
read the book - from Bosler Library
2012 Greenwillow Books
144 pgs.
Kid's Poetry
Discovered and read on 10/10/17
Goodreads rating:  3.89 - 277 ratings
My rating:4

Some of the poems I liked to follow comments, below

My comments:  I was greatly surprised to see this book pass through circulation at the library....I'm very familiar with other Prelutsky books that "look" the same - A Pizza the Size of the Sun, New Kid on the Block, Something Big Has Been Here. - but this was totally a new one to me.  There were lots of poems that take two words (one being an animal) and combining them:  Pelicantaloupes, Crabacus, Asparagoose, and Wiguanas to name a few, where he goes on his usual silly explanations that no one else can get away with.  And there are six haikus!  CAMEL:  I have one large bump,/ Two long, beautiful lashes,/ And a foul temper.  His vocabulary usage, as usual, is superb, introducing what I am sure are many new words to unsuspecting young'uns.  Lots of fun!

Goodreads synopsis: Some of the animals in this book are real. They include:
the hippopotamus (she's missing)
the elephant (he's artistically talented)
the octopus (it's great at multitasking).
          Others may not be quite so real. These include:
the wiguana (very hairy, for a lizard)
the halibutterfly (there's something fishy about it)
the gludu (quite clingy).
          In the tradition of Jack Prelutsky's classic poetry collections The New Kid on the Block, It's Raining Pigs & Noodles, and A Pizza the Size of the Sun, here is a book packed with more than 100 funny poems and silly pictures. Most of the poems are about animals—some are big and some are small, some have unusual interests, and some are just plain unusual.

A handful of haiku: (!!)

Camel

I have one large hump,

Two long, beautiful lashes,

And a foul temper

Frog

All evening I sing.

Happy on a lily pad,

Celebrating spring.

Mole

Tunnel!  I tunnel!

I never see my tunnels,

Yet they comfort me.

Oyster

I’m clearly no gem,

But in my interior

I’m growing a pearl.

Peacock

I am glorious!

My tail has a thousand eyes

For you to admire.

Zebra

Black white black white black.

I am a striped illustion,

A horse in disguise.

Cupcakes

I’m very fond of cupcakes

And love to eat them up,

But I’ve never found a cupcake

That came inside a cup.

I Played a Game of Golf Today

I played a game of golf today –

I’d never played before.

I wasn’t ery good at it

And won’t play anymore.

I shot a sixty-seven,

Which was surely not my goal.

My score was even higher

When I played the second hole.

I’m Gazing through My Telescope

I’m gazing through my telescope

At something in the skies,

Something I could never see

If I just used my eyes,

Something that’s so far away

I wonder haow the light

Can even reach my telescope

Sop I can see the sight.

Somewhere in the universe,

As distant as can be,

I now extraterrestrials

Are looking back at me.

Of course, I can’t detect them,

And in fact, I have no hope,

If they can see me, the must have

A Better telescope.

A Centipede Was Thirsty

A centipede was thirsty,

But to satisfy its need,

It drank too much for it to hold ---

And so the centipede.

My Pencil Will Not Write

My pencil will not write,

My crayons do not draw,

My lantern cannot light,

My saws refuse to saw.

My toothbrush is too soft,

My football can’t hold air,

My kit won’t stay aloft,

I’ve lost my underwear.

My songbird has no song,

My you-you doesn’t work,

My calendar is wrong,

My clock has gone berserk.

My TV won’t turn on,

My hat falls off my head,

My cat’s meow is gone ---

I’m better off in bed.

My Snake Can Do Arithmetic

My snake can do arithmetic,

My snake is far from dumb,

My snake can take two numbers

And come up with a sum.

She can’t subtract, which makes her sad,

And two things make her sadder . . .

She can’t divide or multiply ---

My snake is just an adder.

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.

PICTURE BOOK - The Right Word: Roget and His Thesaurus by Jen Bryant

Illustrated by Melissa Sweet

2014, Eerdmans

HC $17.50

40 pgs.

Goodreads rating: 4.53

My rating: 5 FOR SURE! My 2nd favorite book of 2014!

Title Page:  double-page spread, blocks of wood with alphabet prints

Endpapers:: vertical strips of vintage papers collaged in thin stripes

At the end of the book there's a two-page detailed, really interesting timeline, a page-long author's note and a page-long illustrator's note, followed by a page of resources and other sorts of information.

1^st line/s:  (the book begins with this glorious quote) "The man is not wholly evil - he has a thesaurus in his cabin." (J. M. Barrie's Peter Pan; about Captain Hook....)

My comments: This is much more than a biography of Peter Roget.  As an altered book artist and journaler I find the illustrations just magnificent.  They include words as part of the illustrations.  Lists of words; wallpaper of words; thinking boxes and journal pages - different fonts, paining and collage - wonderful, whimsical words, delicious words....it's almost overwhelming.  I've poured over each page, finding all sorts of inspiration for my own journal-making, writing and art.                   WONDERFUL BOOK!  Roget is my new hero (Jen Bryant and Melissa Sweet are already on that list)!
     I want a literature circle set of this book for my classroom!

PICTURE BOOK - The Very Inappropriate Word - Jim Tobin

Illustrated by Dave Coverly

© 2013, Christy Ottaviano Books/ Henry Holt & Co.

HC $16.99

32 pages

Goodreads rating: 4.07

My rating: 4

Endpapers: Lt. blue with special words (like QUEASY FISTICUFFS, FLUTTER, GNOME) written inside an oblong, simple drawing that exemplifies the word.

Illustrations:  Ink and watercolors - really fun pages and illustrations, another great example of lots of ways to create a page.
An excellent example of book-making.

1^st line: "Michael collected words,"

My comments: Word-lover alert - this is a great story for us!  The inappropriate word is written as[@#and then a couple of symbols I can't do on my computer, ending with !].  There are two main themes for this book.  First, how many people DO use inappropriate words, what INAPPROPRIATE means, and how we should react when we hear one.  Second, that there are some really great words in the English language that we can and should use (which, in the classroom, would initiate a conversation about great words). I just need to prepare for the moment (and it WILL arrive) when kids want to discuss what the inappropriate word actually is!

Goodreads:  Michael loves interesting words (hard words like ELASTIC, little words like VAST, and big words like SMITHEREENS) and is always on the lookout for words to collect. Then one day, he picks up a new word. A badword. An inappropriate word. At least, that’s what his friend says. But Michael kind of likes the word. He thinks he might try it out.

POETRY PICTURE BOOK - Water Can Be ... - Laura Purdie Salas

Illustrated by Violete Dabija

2014 Millbrook Press/ Lerner Books

32 pages

Goodreads rating: 4.47

My rating: 4.5

Endpapers: Moss Green

Title Page: simple, perfect- bluey greeney with white raindrops and blue and green circles overlapping each other

Illustrations:  I'm not sure of the media used...the pages have no white, they're entirely covered and it almost seems like some of it is sponged...I'd like to know how she did them.

1^st line/s:  Water is water --- / it's puddle, pond, sea. / When springtime comes splashing, / the water flows free.

My comments:  This is a beautiful book...both in words and pictures. They go together really well.    You'd think with only two words on each page it would be simple...but it's not.  It's much more intricate, especially when you think about what each descriptor - all of water - means:  Otter feeder.  Downhill speeder..... Salmon highway.  Eagle flyway....  Storm creator.  Decorator....  Mmmm hmmm. Delicious words.

Goodreads:  Water can be a 

Thirst quencher 
Kid drencher 
Cloud fluffer 
Fire snuffer 

Find out about the many roles water plays in this poetic exploration of water throughout the year.

PICTURE BOOK - When I Grow Up - Al Yankovic

Illustrated by Wes Hargis

2011 Harper Collins

24 pgs.

HC $17.99

Goodreads rating: 4.19

My rating: 5 - A terrific book, both text and illustrations

Endpapers: Kid-like drawings of kids in various occupations (front) Protagonist sitting on a kinosaur skeleton eating his sandwich (his job?) (back)

Title Page: Double-page spread, we are looking through the leaves of a large tree, watching the protagonist walk to school.  Great layout....

Illustrations:  VERY fun to look at.  His bio at the end of the book:  "Wes Hargis wanted to be a professional dirt miner when he grew up.  Unstable market prices for dirt led him to pursue his second love, and he has been an illustrator for more than fifteen years.  Mr. Hargis lives with his family (and his dirt) in Arizona."

1^st line/s:  "I waited so long for the hours to pass,

                 But soon it was noon there in Mrs. Krupp's class.

                 And Thursday at noon, as I'm sure you know well,

                 Is the time of the week when we do show-and-tell."

So here is just one example of the wonderful words and rhyming that are a part of this book:

          "My walls will be filled with awards that I've gotten

           For toast-on-a-stick and my Twinkies au gratin.

           My kitchen will be the most famous in France,

           So make reservations twelve years in advance!

           There's no doubt about it --- I'm certain, you see ---

           A world-renowned chef is what I'm gonna be."

My comments:  I love rhyme and rhythm when the words flow and are unforced, and Weird Al does this brilliantly!  I love the words in this great, creative story, and I love they way he uses them.  And the illustrations compliment them wonderfully.  Clever.  And great fun!  I will DEFINITELY be sharing this with my fourth graders, and what a great gift for picture-book-loving graduates.

Goodreads:   

'Cause maybe I'll be a gorilla masseuse Or an artist who sculpts out of chocolate mousse Or a rodeo clown or a movie director Or maybe professional pickle inspector...

          Billy's classmates may have never considered careers in snail training or sumo wrestling before, but by the time the exuberant eight-year-old is done cataloging his dream jobs, they just might share his belief in unlimited potential! 

          Virtuoso wordplay, irresistible rhythm, and laugh-out-loud humor abound in the first picture book by the one and only "Weird Al" Yankovic. This unbridled celebration of creativity and possibility invites readers of all ages to consider afresh what they want to be when they grow up.

Little Owl's Night - Divya Srinivasan

Illustrated by the author
2011, Viking
HC $16.99
Goodreads rating:  3.77
My rating:  5 - I really loved it
32 pages

Endpapers:  Both are different - FRONT:  raccoon and squirrel in tree, huge black sky, BACK: raccoon sleeping and squirrel gathering acorns, both at the base of the tree, daytime.
1st Line/s (Actually, 1st three double-page spreads):  "Little Owl was having a wonderful night./He watched the funny possum family waddle along in a neat row./By the river, beavers gnawed at trees.  turtle hid in her shell as fireflies danced all around."
Illustrations:  Dark black sky - paper cuts and paint? - hard to say.  I really love 'em...it was the cover illustration that forced me to pick ut up in the first place.
Illustrator:  www.pupae.com . This is her first book.  She loves nighttime and lives in Austin, Texas.

I was just going o take a quick flip through this book to peek at it, but slowed down to admire the illustrations.  Then I went back to read it and discovered some beautiful language.  Font is white on black (which I love).

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.

Favorite Words: Parched

Here's another word that delights me.  My oldest grandchild started talking early and has had an incredible vocabulary ever since she started.  But when a three year old tells you that she's parched, it stays with you.  It's been one of my very favorite words ever since.  Just found it again today in a poem from Room Enough for Love, by Ralph Fletcher:

Lost

We lay once beneath the clouds
but now I've lost the sky.

Youn handed me an ice-cold drink
and now my throat stays parched.

I ran my fingers through your hair
which cost mey sense of touch.

With you I watched my first sunrise --
that's how I lost the sun.

From one of the Cinder books (didn't record which one, unfortunately) by Marissa Meyer
Disc 2, Track 8

"She wet her parched lips...."

From Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver
Audio disc 6, chapter 11

"I was interested in the weather forecast.  We hadn't had a drop of rain since that double rainbow hailstorm back in January, and the whole world was looking parched.  When you walked  by a tree or a bush it just looked like it ached somehow."

From Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan
Page 179

"I try to say Who's there? but it catches in my throat, which is parched, and I make a little croak instead." 

From Alliance: The Paladin Prophecy #2 by Mark Frost
Page 313

"Her lips were chapped and she sounded parched."

From Sepulchre by Kate Mosse Disc 2, near the beginning

"His cheeks grew hollow and his skin transparent; his brown eyes were dulled, permanently blood-shot; his lips withered and parched." 

From The Janus Stone by Griffiths
pg. 93

"But then the moment passes and Hennessey says briskly, "I'm parched.  Do you fancy a cup of coffee?" 

From Twisted Innocence by Terri Blackstock:

"Kathy took in the sight of Michael like a parched desert traveler." 

Favorite Words: Cacophony

I am a word person. Give me a simile, a metaphor, alliteration, a snazzy verb and I'm happy. My friend, Sheila, loves the word flummoxed. Great word. The one I get a kick out of the most is cacophony. It's a word full of onomatopoeia, hard sounds, sounds that describe what it means. And every time I find it in a book or article I'm quite excited. Perhaps it's because a few years ago, when teaching 8th grade at Sonoran Science Academy, I had a dad come in to take issue with one of the words on the kids' weekly vocabulary list. He had never heard of cacophony and certainly never heard it used. Huh? So every time I see it, I can envision him standing on the other side of my desk smirking at me. So take this sir. I just found it again!

From The Lost Sisterhood by Anne Fortier
pg. 63

"A remarkable vaqriety of insects and birds was already anticipating sunrise with hectic rustling and all manner of shrieks and quawks, and beyond this cacophony of wildlife, from somewhere out there, came the steady, pulsing sound of the sea."

From Mercy Kill by Armstrong
pg. 127

"I ducked through the barbed wire and heard the sputtering engine of the ATV beneath the cacophony of crackling wood."

From Biting the Moon by Grimes
pgs. 6

"Their voices were like ladders of sound - up several notches, down a few, up and up again, and in that queer syncopated rhythm that might have sounded cacophonous to somebody else but sounded to her like harmony."

From Pray for Silence by Linda Castillo
pg. 173

"As I start toward the front door, the forest around me comes alive with a cacophony of rickets and frogs from the creek."

Also From Pray for Silence by Linda Castillo
pg. 2

 "It was so quiet he could hear the cacophony of frogs from Wildcat Creek a quarter mile to the south."

From A Discovery of Witches by Harkness
pg. 371

"This remark earned me the sensation of my head splitting in two as a bloodcurdling shriek tore through the air.  A cacophony of horrifying sounds. followed.  They were so painful I sank to my knees and covered my head with my arms."

From Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Riggs
pg. 72

"Jet-lagged and exhausted, we went to sleep early - or rather we went to our beds and lay in them with pillows covering our heads to block out the thumping cacophony that issued through the floorboards, which grew so loud that at one point I thought surely the revelers had invaded my room."

From The Weird Sisters by Brown
Chapter 21, disc 9

"She slept poorly for months until it became part of her, until she had to listen consciously to hear the cacophony.  And now, back in the middle of nowhere, the silence seemed alien." 

From Available Dark by Elizabeth Hand
pg. 187

"There was a cacophony of breaking glass, furniture breaking glass, furniture being overturned, curses."

Also From Available Dark by Elizabeth Hand
pg. 131

"The song continued for another thirty seconds, ending in a cacophony of feedback, followed by a thunderclap."

From Pandemonium by Oliver
pg. 303

"Walkie-talkies cackle around us - buzzing, a cacophony."

Also From Pandemonium by Oliver
pg. 216

"It teeters, teeters, and then falls; the pots spill everywhere, a cacophony of ringing and dinging metal." 

From Dash and Lily's Book of Dares by Cohn & Levithan
pg. 44

"The theater was a cacophony of "wah wah" and "Mommy, I want..." and "NO1" and "Mine!"  I barely had a chance to pay attention to the movie, what with having Goldfish crackers and Cheerios thrown in my hair from the aisles behind me, watching Legos hurl through the air, and unsticking Great-aunt Ida's taps from the sippy cup liquid spillage on the floor."

From Gone Missing by Linda Castillo
pg. 43

     "The air is cool and clean and filled with a cacophony of birdsong."

From The Expats by Pavone
pg. 20

     "They settled at a brasserie table.  In the middle of the crowded leafy square, a ten-piece band -- teenagers -- and just struck up a cacophony." 

From Let the Devil Sleep by John Verdon
pg. 222

     "Listening to it became the price he willingly paid for listening to the cacophonous garbage he claimed to prefer." 

From Dualed by Chapman
pg. 27

"The voices are louder here behind the house, an angry cacophony of sound."

From Hand of Evil by Jance
Disc 6, Track 7

"Again she became aware of the cacophony of sound."

From Frame 232 by Mara
p. 62

"There was also the usual cacophony of street noise drifting up from below."

My fantastic 4th grade student, Berto, found this one:
In The New Kid on the Block by Jack Prelutsky
pg. 152  in the poem "Happy Birthday, Dear Dragon:

" Then they howled in cacophonous chorus,'HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DEAR DRAGON, TO YOU!"

From City of Ashes by Cassandra Clare
pg. 376

"Only now they stood in front of him, a cacophony of demons: the bone-white Raum that had attacked them at Luke's; Om demons with their green bodies, wide mouths and bodies, wide mouths and horns; the slinking black Kuri demons, spider demons with their eight pincer-tipped arms and the poison-dripping fangs that protruded from their eye sockets." 

From Sepulchre by Kate Mosse
near the beginning of disc 1

"A group of at least nine or ten men leapt to their feet in a cacophony of whistling and booking and slow hand clapping."

From Orphan Train by Kline
9% in

"Despite the landlord's disapproval, the sweltering heat, the gloomy rooms, and the cacophony of strange noises, so unfamiliar to my country ears, I felt another swell of hope."

Also From Orphan Train by Kline
pg. 62

"As if someone has turned a crank in my back, I am propelled forward, on foot in front of the cther.  The cacophony of the station becomes a dull roar in my ears."

From And the Dark Sacred Night by Glass
near the end of disc 5

"A minor cacophony of clicks, hums, and groans starts the return of the power."

From Unseen by Slaughter
Disc 1, Track 14

"The morning rush had arrived.  The cacophony of beeping monitors and machinery had started to rev."

From The Narrows by Michael Connelly
disc 2

"The cacophony rising from the room assaulted her as she descended."

From The One by Cassandra Cass
near the end...

"Guttural shouts of pain filled the room adding to the cacophony of chairs screeching.  Bodies hitting walls, and the stampede of people trying to escape as fast as they could in their heels and suits."

From Chill of the Night by James Hayman
pg. 92

"The woman slumped.  Abby's brain exploded in a cacophony of Voices.  She screamed."

From After the Storm by Linda Castillo
Ch. 4

"A sound reaches me over the cacophony, a tiny cry, like the mewling of a kitten."

From In the Blood: A Genealogical Mystery by Steve Robinson
14% in

"Their guests continued to stream into the room, everyone gazing at the happy couple and adding their remarks to the cacophony of words that circled the room."

From Ready Player One:
Disc 4, about halfway through...on the way to Tubac!

"Behind me I could hear a cacophony of digital combat coming from dozens of other vintage arcade games."

From Gun Games by Faye Kellerman

"At 6:30 in the morning, Gabe sat at the bus stop, head in hand, cursing the hour and the singing birds, whose current cacophony was giving him a headache." 

From Station 11 by Emily St. John Mandel

"Francoise heard the first notes, the cacophony of musicians practicing their sections and tuning up." 

From The Leaving of Things by Jay Antani

"A cacophony of cheering and garba music from loudspeakers radiated from the athletic field - I saw a stage had been set up there overhung with a battery of lights and a garba was in progress before an audience of maybe 300, clapping to the dandiya rhythm." 

From Age of Order by Julian North

"Sung noticed us, even while dashing around the kitchen.  "Four minutes," she declared before turning her attention back to the cacophony of pots, pans, fire, and smoke." 

From Lost Girls by Angela Marsons

"The room erupted into a cacophony of screams and exhalations." 

From Immoral by Brian Freeman

"Stride heard the overlapping cacophony of police radios buzzing like white noise." 

From Still Life by Louise Penny

"Faced with this cacophony of color, he couldn't remember what he had expected, but certainly not this." 

From Openly Straight by Bill Konigsberg 

"All around us families were unloading boxes and suitcases onto the sidewalk.  Guys were shaking hands and thumping fists like old friends.  It was a steamy day, and the huge oak tree near the front entrance was the only break from the hot sun.  A few parents sat on the grass there, watching the car to dorm caravan, cicadas buzzed and hissed, their invisible cacophony pressing into my inner ear."

The Odious Ogre - Norton Juster

Illustrated by Jules Feiffer
Michael DiCapua Bks/Scholastic, 2010
$17.95
32 pages
Rating: 4
for older kids
Endpapers: Easter yellow

Lots and lots.....and lots......of high-level , fancy, wonderful words. There once was a horrendous ogre. "He was, it was widely believed, extraordinarily large, exceedingly ugly, unusually angry, constantly hungry, and absolutely merciless." He terrified one and all - until he met his match in a friendly, happy, positive-thinking young lady.

Talk with kids about the ending: "She also understood that the terrible things that can happen when you come face to face with an Ogre can sometimes happen to the Ogre and not to you."

I'm not usually a Jules Feiffer fan - but these watercolor illustrations, framed with a thicker line of paint, work perfectly.

57. Word After Word After Word - Patricia MacLachlan

Katherine Tegen Books, 2010
For: younger middle grades
HC: $14.99
128 pgs.
Rating: Hard to say....great for this word-lover adult, but kids? We'll find out, because I'm going to start the year by reading this aloud and teaching a Patricia MacLachlan author study. That means I have to have it ready for n-e-x-t w-e-e-k!!!

This is a simple, lovely story of a children's writer who shares her love of words with a classroom of kids - and we meet five of them. Friends, each with their own unique qualities and stresses, who meet after school under a lilac bush and discover they love to write - and they CAN write.

Told from the point-of-view of one of the kids, a girl who is sad, whose mother is going through chemo. However, this is NOT a sad book. It's a thoughtful look at the way that kids think, and the way that kids relate to one another

27. The Dream Stealer - Sid Fleischman

Illustrated by Peter Sis
Greenwillow, 2009
$16.99
For: Grades 2-4 with a wide vocabulary
90 pages
The first half was quite delightful, the second half didn't catch me quite as well.

Susana lives in Mexico and discovers that a big spotted, crazy-looking bird has stolen her dream before she could find out what happened. The Dream Stealer was only supposed to steal bad dreams, so she is a little perturbed at him. She figures out a clever way to catch him, and convinces him to take her to the place where he keeps all the dreams he's stolen. Once they get there some of the creatures from his stolen bad dreams escape, and Susana has to help put things right.

Sid Fleischman uses great language, interesting similes, and fantastic vocabulary to spin this fantasy/fairy tale. It's quite clever and would make a great read aloud. Play with the words thief/bandit/burglar before reading so that kids understand they are synonyms.

Nest, Nook & Cranny - Susan Blackaby

Illustrated by Jamie Hogan
Charlesbridge, 2010
$15.95
54 pages
For: Kids
Rating: 5 !
Endpapers: White pine cones/crabs/snakes.jelly fish on black

All I had to do was open this book and take a peek at the endpapers and I was SOLD. This book is the size of a chapter book though a bit more slender, and it isn't what you expect.

It's full of poetry. Poetry from five different habitats. Desert. Grassland. Shoreline. Wetland. Woodland. They're beautiful, descriptive, and use incredible words. But there's more -- she ends with telling the reader how she wrote each poem. Whether it be cinquain or sonnet, she discusses her use of onomatopoeia, alliteration, similes, metaphors - and also gives information about some of the subject matter. I love this book.

Check out the wordplay, metaphors, similes, snazzy verbs and interesting rhyming:

Otters loll like whiskered boats,
bobbing gently in the swells.
Kelp beds help the otters float
While prying shellfish out of shells.
Thoughtful otters dot the ocean,
Head awash with crabby notions.
Whay prey, tell, do otters dwell on?
Anything that has a shell on.

or

A household tucked inside a hole
Or stuck inside a sticky bowl
Of twisted twigs and mud and stuff
Holds eggs or cheepy heaps of fluff
And various pairs of prickly feet,
Tiny feathers, pointy beaks.

Although it has a bird's-eye view,
With central air and skylights, too,
There's not a lot of room to grow.
Flighty families come and go.
As soon as one clan flies away,
Another mother comes to stay.

The author's from Portland Oregon, the illustrator's from an "island off the coast of Maine." WHICH ONE????

I Heard It from Alice Zucchini - Juanita Havill

POETRY
Poems about the Garden
Illustrated by Christine Davinier
2006
$15.95
Rating: 4
Endpapers: Garden, shed, tree, pen and ink with watercolor washes

Twenty clever poems about growing things -- using fabulous words and all sorts of literary pluses - alliteration, personification, punctuation of every kinds......take a look and see:

Carrots

What does a carrot know,
smothered in dirt below?

Songs of worms,
tap-tapping rains,
the smell of earth,
and growing pains.

What else does a carrot know,
alone in the dark, below?

Sound of boots,
thud of hoe,
a gentle tug ---
it’s time to go.

Garden Lullaby

Sudden hush when the sun goes down.
Night in the garden and the soothing sound
of crickets chirping lullabies.

Sweet dreams, little peas, ten to a pod.
Good night, radishes, tucked under sod.
Gone are the bees and butterflies.

Heads of lettuce wilted by sun
recuperate when the day is done.
Closed are all the potatoes’ eyes.

Tomatoes snooze and eggplants doze.
All is still while the moonlight glows
save crickets chirping lullabies.

Instructions

Plant seeds early in the spring
when the ground is warm,
two inches deep in well-tilled soil
where they’ll be safe from harm.

Let the sun and rain pour down.
Be careful where you hoe.
A miracle is taking place;
Seeds split and start to grow.

Crazy Hair - Neil Gaiman

Illustrator: Dave McKean
Published May, 2009
40 pgs.
$18.99
Harper Collins
For: Older kids - I can't wait to share it with my class.
Rating: 4.5
Endpapers: Indigo

The illustrations were really different, and I was prepard to not like them, but....I did! The hair iteself is wonderful, and all the detailed crevices and splashes of beautiful color, are, well, whimsical in a sophisticated way.

And the writing. Great rhyme and rhythm. IIt would make a great rock song. Let's put it to music! We hear all about what resides in this crazy, long hair. And we find out what happens when a young girl tries to comb it all out - she gets sucked in and begins to live there. Fun, fun, fun.

"This hair, you know,
Is all my own
Since I was two
My hair has grown.
Birds fly down
From everywhere
Nesting in my
crazy hair."

and

"Huge balloons
Come down to land.
People wave.
It's very grand.
They take off
From everywhere,
Drift across my crazy hair."

Every page I turn I love to read. Wonderful language, wonderful words.

Let's add some more scenes - what a great extension/writing/art project. More, more!

Other, more comprehensive reviews than mine:
Book Aunt (Kate Coombs)
Letter Rip (Letters to the authors and illlustrators)

Pippo The Fool - Tracey E. Fern

Illustrated by Pau Estrada
Published Feb, 2009
Charlesbridge
Older kids, 2nd-6th?
48 pgs.
$15.95
Rating: 4
Author's Note, Illustrator's Note, Resource List
Endpapers: White, with a hazy hilly landscape covering a small part of the bottom corner

This is an iteresting and FUN tale, based on the true story of Filippo Brunelleschi and his truly amazing cathedral dome - an extraordinary work of genius, especially for the early 1400's. The movers and shakers of Florence wanted a dome designed and built for their cathedral. Many artists and engineers of the day attempted designs, but none seemed able to actually WORK...until Pippo's. However, everyone thought him a fool, so he built a model to show them the intricasies, of which there were many - truly exceptional ideas. It took many, many years to build, but he was called a genius for evermore.

I love a gorgeous, interesting, informative picture book, and that's what we've got with this one. Estrada's illustrations work beautifully with Fern's excellent writing - full of figurative language and wonderful words.

Fancy Nancy's Favorite Fancy Words - Jane O'Connor

Illustrator: Robin Preiss Glasser
2008
Rating: 4
$12.99
endpapers; brigth, dark pink

A smaller version of the Fancy Nancy series, (perhaps 7 in. by 9 in.), this shows how you can use snazzy words instead of ordinary words - right up my alley

Fiasco - a big flop, a disaster. I dropped all the parfaits. What a fiasco!
Improvise - to use whatever is handy in order to make something. I wanted a canopy bed, so I had to improvise. I used a sheet, a mop, and a broom!
Yearn - to want really badly. I yearn to visit Paris some day.

Illustrations are detailed and fancy, flowery and very, very girly, quite adorable. The theme towards all things French and the way to look at snazzing up your words is excellent...and quite fun. This would be a great lead-in to creating a class book of snazzy words. CACOPHONY! EGREGIOUS! DILAPIDATED! Let's get started!

Blueberry Girl - Neil Gaiman

Illustrator: Charles Vess
2009
Rating: 5
Endpapers: Blueberry blue

An interesting blueberry-colored font is used throughout - looks hand-drawn, but isn't.

(Random choice:)
Keep her from spindles and sleeps at sixteen
Let her stay waking and wise
Nightmares at 3 or bad husbands at 30
These will not trouble her eyes.

Words and water color paintings completely cover the pages.

This is an expressive wish for a daughter - newborn - already grown - doesn't matter. I loved it. What a great mother's day gift for my own daughter to give to her daughter!

The Composer is Dead - Lemony Snicket

Illustrator: Carson Ellis
Music Composed by Nathaniel Stookey
2009
Rating: 4
Endpapers (back of covers): Silhouttes of composers

When the composer is found dead, the inspector is called in to interview all the usual suspects - the members of the orchestra. He starts with the strings, proceeds to the woodwinds, brass, and percussion. Their excuses were all plausible. And then the inspector remembered the conductor. "You've been murdering composers for years! In fact, wherever there's a conductor, you're sure to find a dead composer!" And then there's a long list of famous dead composers.

This is chock full of information about an orchestra and the instruments that make it up. I read the book at B&N, so I didn't get to listen to the CD - which was performed by the San Francisco Symphony. Looks like Tracks 1-9 are the story read by the author and tracks 10-18 are instrumentals. I'd love to hear it!

GREAT vocabulary; lurking, flamboyant, interrogate, weary, "on the contrary," crucial, treachery, alibis, boisterous, arrogant, ruckus, agitated, nostalgic, unison......

(Not my favorite illustrations, but they work with the book.)