Reviews
Handle with Care: An Unusual Butterfly Journey
“Detailed discussion of each stage in the butterfly life cycle—egg, larva, pupa, and adult—is accompanied by wonderfully sharp, close-up photographs that show intricate structural details.” —The Horn Book Magazine View →
Mumbet's Declaration of Independence
“Woelfle keeps the spotlight on Mumbet and brings her to life as a strong, smart person. Using a vibrant acrylic palette, Delinois highlights the brilliant greens and blues of the Berkshires setting and allows the light to play on Mumbet’s face to show both her humor and… View →
The Story of Owen: Dragon Slayer of Trondheim
“…nothing short of epic.” —The Horn Book Magazine View →
A Matter of Souls
“While the prose in these compelling narratives is sometimes pedestrian, the complexity of each moment marks its power.” —The Horn Book Magazine View →
A Bag of Marbles: The Graphic Novel
“The book’s relatively busy layout is balanced by Bailly’s gorgeously detailed illustrations…[A] welcome addition to the rich Holocaust literary canon.” —The Horn Book Magazine View →
Fourth Down and Inches: Concussions and Football's Make-or-Break Moment
“[T]his is an informative and useful book on a topic of crucial importance to young athletes.” —The Horn Book Magazine View →
Tabula Rasa
“Sarah is an impressively fierce heroine with personality to spare. A page-turning adventure that will leave readers hoping for a sequel.” —The Horn Book Magazine View →
Esther's Hanukkah Disaster
“Esther, a purple gorilla, tries to be a good friend for Hanukkah, but the gifts she picks out are all spectacular failures, from huge socks for her diminutive monkey pal, Sarah, to a jogging suit for slow turtle Josephine. Esther feels terrible – until on the last night of… View →
Sadie's Almost Marvelous Menorah
“The family from Sadie’s Sukkah Breakfast and Sadie and the Big Mountain again demonstrates how kindness and creativity can overcome small (but they seem huge) setbacks. Illustrations filled with Hanukkah cheer capture both the bustling and the… View →
“The brief, age-targeted explanations of godwit development convey pertinent information about the growing birds’ behaviors…. Posada’s creative paper collage illustrations capture the fuzzy down of newborn chicks, the starry nights of flying, and the grassy green… View →
The Glee Cast: Inspiring Gleek Mania
“Thirteen actors from the TV show are superficially profiled in what amounts to an extended magazine article. In fact, related USA Today articles—about the actors and about issues such as obesity and gay teens—serve as sidebars to the main text. Glee fans… View →
The Twelve-Fingered Boy
“Readers will enjoy this trilogy debut, a wild and riveting tale full of allusions to fairy tales, movies, and comic book heroes…Polydactyl heroes are rare in children’s literature, and so are novels like this that make the fantastical utterly believable.”… View →
Hoop Genius: How a Desperate Teacher and a Rowdy Gym Class Invented Basketball
“Coy understands the power of detail . . . and his tight focus on the game’s initial season is immediately engrossing. Spare, precise language reflects the game’s welcome sense of order as well as its athletic appeal. Morse’s kinetic paintings, at once dynamic and View →
Something to Prove: The Great Satchel Paige vs. Rookie Joe DiMaggio
“Skead effectively uses a little-known baseball episode to portray larger issues of race and justice in America, while superbly developing the game’s tension inning by inning. Grainy brown-toned illustrations nicely evoke the dreamy reminiscences of baseball legend, and… View →
H.O.R.S.E.
“This crowd-pleasing picture book will appeal to young children who will enjoy the whimsy, and to older readers who will appreciate the escalating wordplay in the boys’ challenges to each other.” —The Horn Book Magazine View →
Infinity and Me
“Even for adults, this is an enormously complex idea—scientifically, mathematically, philosophically—but Hosford smoothly distills it to a manageable serving that will both engage and challenge kids. Swiatkowska’s art, too, is remarkable at this elucidation, illustrating the… View →
Their Skeletons Speak: Kennewick Man and the Paleoamerican World
“Walker and Owsley… build the narrative clue by clue, first in determination of the find’s importance, then through a richly detailed portrait of the practice of anthropology.” —The Horn Book Magazine View →
Four Secrets
“‘There is a secret story and it is inside of another secret story and that one is inside of another secret story,’ writes Katie, and the four secrets, one about each of the teens, are satisfyingly juicy yet given depth by Willey’s understanding of the… View →
A Game for Swallows: To Die, To Leave, To Return
“Stark, dramatic illustrations (mostly black backgrounds with white-outlined characters and features) include repeated motifs (flowers, dragons) that effectively capture elements of the culture and lend nuance to the high emotions through small changes in expression or detail. A… View →
The Count's Hanukkah Countdown
“Sesame Street mainstays Grover and the Count star, with new Israeli friends Avigail and Brosh, in this Shalom Sesame celebration of Hanukkah. Eight friends and family members—’the perfect Hanukkah number,’ by the Count’s refrain—come together to light the menorah,… View →
Jeremy's Dreidel
“Jeremy and his friends are enjoying the dreidel-making workshop at their local Jewish Community Center, especially since the children are being encouraged to be creative and put their own, er, spins on their designs. Jeremy decides to make a Braille dreidel for his blind father,… View →
Little White Duck: A Childhood in China
“Author and illustrator together give us an unvarnished and intimate account of a real childhood: plain-speaking, rough-hewn, and very much down-to-earth. While the time and place the book depicts are very different from our own, there’s not a hint of sentimentality or… View →
The Curiosities: A Collection of Stories
“These experimental, unedited short stories showcase the many faces of horror—goth, faerie, ghostly, grotesque, lyrical, vengeful, and nasty-cool… The presentation here is innovative, incorporating critique comments, hand-written marginalia describing the writer’s… View →
“Constant action, lively language, and a Mahy-esque sense of whimsy carry the narrative as the mysteries unfold. Jasper’s startling ability to think on his feet will endear him to readers, as will his sister Sibilla’s authentic toddler personality, while hidden… View →