On a class field to the Busy Bee Farm, students learn  how bees work together to gather nectar, pollinate crops of our food, and make honey.  In a back and forth dialogue format, Farmer Ellen explains to the students the step by step process covering the interesting essentials as well as new vocabulary of bee farming..  She teaches the students to “Listen to their buzz.”  At this point the story makes a shift into a counting section with the bees counting the things they fly over.  Thinking that this interrupted the flow of the story, I wondered why the author made this choice.  Then Farmer Ellen asked the kids what they heard.  One student said, “Bees count!”  Adults may groan at the somewhat forced double meaning, but the text moves quickly to an explanation of how bees make honey and such a  hiccup will  probably not be an issue for the intended audience.  Being so highly informative, this publication is a great way to introduce the subject of bees and their critical importance in our food supply.  The Back Matter, “The Buzz on Bees”,  includes  much more fascinating bee information.

A preschool-age gem that will  delight the toddlers and parents alike.  Starting with one baby,  then adding one on each two- page spread…they run,  spin,  bounce, jump , hop , bang, shout, jiggle, wriggle,  their way up to ten babies on their way to bed.   The bold, vibrant colored, roly-poly babies  are so endearing you want to take them right off the page and snuggle.  Just the right amount of text, just the right amount of visuals, and just the right amount of silly.  I can see why Karen Katz has won so many awards from parenting publications.

This book presents philosophy in comic form, covering from the time of the Ancient Greek philosophers to the present.  The concept is excellent as the graphic novel format really does force the author to boil down the concepts to the essence which is an excellent introduction for students.  Due to mature content, this book is not appropriate for an elementary/middle school library but would be great for high school.

Glitch is book 7 in the Aldo Zelnick Comic Novel series.  Highly illustrated and comical, this story is set just before Christmas when Aldo is implementing his master plan to maximize his gift receiving.  “G” words are featured in the storyline and defined in a glossary at the back of the book.  Students enjoy this series and ask for the next letter in the series as they work their way through them.

Women have long been overlooked or underrepresented in the history books.  This collection of biographies about female explorers is a positive step toward recognizing these courageous women and their contributions.  The ten women explorers who are featured, with four pages of text and illustrations each, include Louise Arner Boyd, Nellie Cashman, Ynes Mexia, Lucy Evelyn Cheesman, Annie Smith Peck, Alexandrine Tinne, Delia Julia Denning Akeley, Violet Cressy-Marcks, Freya Stark and Daisy Bates.  These mini biographies give a snapshot of each woman’s life and accomplishments, written in well-organized text which is easy to read and understand.  There are several colorful and expressive illustrations for each biography which compliment the text nicely.  I learned a lot reading this book and discovered heroes I was not familiar with before.

Bad Kids:  The naughtiest children in history explores laws and punishments from ancient to modern day societies.  The author’s writing style is very tongue-in-cheek and humorous, while sticking to historical facts on the subject.  Several famous characters from history around the world are featured including their notorious childhood behavior.  This book is easy to read and engaging with comical illustrations, historical portraits and photographs as well as artwork to support the subject matter.  I would recommend this book for 4th grade and up due to some violent content.

This beautiful book about Ancient China covers a variety of topics including the Silk Road and early trade, the early Yangshao and Longshan civilizations, Chinese philosophers, ruling dynasties and emperors.  The Great Wall of China is mentioned.  Chinese inventions and other achievements are outlined including the development of a writing system, bronze and iron for use as weapons and tools, Chinese medicine, fireworks, wheelbarrows, umbrellas and the discovery of silk. There is a timeline for major events in history as well as a glossary, index, table of contents and further resources page.  The illustrations and photographs are beautiful and the backgrounds for each page are tasteful and not distracting.  The text is clearly written and organized.  I highly recommend this book.

This Justin Bieber biography is chock full of photographs, graphics, and facts about Justin’s life to date.  The text is clearly written and employs current “hip” slang throughout which might help with engaging young readers.  Although the recent photographs are good quality, the older ones of Justin’s childhood tend to be blurry.  I think Bieber fans will enjoy this book.

This is a non-fiction book about Alligators from a wonderful animal series that is packed full of interesting facts about habitat, diet, behavior, appearance, predators, characteristics, mating habits and raising the young.  Environmental and human hazards are also explored.  There is a habitat map as well as an index, glossary, quick facts page and a page for further resources.  These books are well-written and full of beautiful and high quality color photographs of alligators in their natural habitat.  I highly recommend this book.

This is a non-fiction book about Black Bears from a wonderful animal series that is packed full of facts about habitat, diet, behavior, appearance, predators, characteristics, mating habits and raising the young.  Environmental and human hazards are also explored.  There is a habitat map as well as an index, glossary and page for further resources.  These books are well-written and full of beautiful and high quality color photographs of bears in their natural habitat.  I highly recommend this book.

This was a great picture book all about the life of pirates.  The facts were interesting but not too scary for young readers and the illustrations were funny and full of rich detail and color.  There was a fold out page depicting a cut-away view of the interior of a pirate ship which students will really enjoy as well as a page with a pirate song, one with a pirate game, a quiz about pirate facts and a game to match pirates and their hats.  This exciting and interactive book is sure to be enjoyed by our elementary readers.

This chapter book for young readers (AR ATOS level 3.7) is about 2nd grader, Gooney Bird Greene who is quite an eccentric, confident and intelligent character.  She leads the class in a geography project before President’s Day vacation to explore the various travel plans of students in the class.  A few students who were bragging quite a bit about their plans learn to be more humble and appreciate fun activities closer to home.  I found the characters in this book to be unbelievable at times, particularly Gooney who presented as more knowledgeable than the teacher.   In addition, the editing was sloppy, with sections of text repeating on pages 19-20 and 25-26 which can be confusing to young readers.  I’m a big fan of Lois Lowry’s work but consider this book just an “additional purchase” if you want to complete the Gooney Bird set.

Young learners will enjoy seeing where eggs come from- the chickens and the farm. They will see: a side by side labeled diagram of a chicken (both hen and rooster), eggs naturally come in colors other than white, chickens raised for egg production and for meat, free range chickens with movable coop, different breeds of chickens are different colors, baby chicks, and a diagram of the life cycle of a chicken.

Each turn of the page give a full page photo, four or five sentences of factual text, and  usually a smaller photo by the text.

If you don’t look closely, you’ll miss the note on the last page (below the index) “from Matt and Tara of Howling Wolf Farm…We work in partnership with  nature and people to grow vibrant, abundant food…”

This book contains two graphic novel episodes of Scooby-Doo and two one-page “Velma’s Monsters of the World”.

When college students begin to disappear,  Scooby and gang investigate the video tape of the fast acting super contagious Virus-Z. They figure out Virus-Z isn’t from a biology lab class, but from a film making class. Case solved.

Velma gives information about the Yama-Uma from Japanese folklore.

In the second case, after a hurricane doesn’t ruin the Gumbo Restaurant, the owner still isn’t out of trouble because a bayou monster is creating havoc. Scooby and gang split up and chase the monster down on air jet boats to find the restaurant owner’s jealous twin brother in the monster outfit. Case solved.

Velma gives information about the griffin.

Though Paula Danziger is no longer with us, her good friends Bruce Coville and Elizabeth Levy have brought her, Amber Brown, character back to life in this new book in the Amber Brown series.

“I, Amber Brown, have to spend a million dollars.” So begins this tale of a school project in Chapter One. “We have to include: 1. Buy a house, 2. Pay for college, 3. Give to charity, 4. Spend the rest in $25,000 chunks”.  Chapters 2-17 are about Amber’s relationship with her father and soon to be remarried mother. Money issues arise as the wedding is planned, but they work themselves out.  Amber’s best friend, Justin, will be coming back to town from Alabama, for the wedding. And Amber makes a new unexpected friend of a follow classmate through the wedding planning.

“Sometimes happy and sad comes so close together in my life that I can’t keep track of how I’m feeling.” (page 87)

Nine year old Amber does not like to hear her divorced parents talk negatively about the other parent and tells them so, several times.

There is a happy ending!

This Iroquois creation myth is told using modern style artwork in graphic novel form, but with only one frame per page. The text box at the top of each page sits in a frame made of four bare bark tree branches stretching an animal hide. Sky Woman is wearing stylized pre-1492 Iroquois clothing.

Sky Woman becomes ill, then falls through a hole in the clouds. Swans gently carry her to a watery earth. Toad brings up earth from under the water and places it on Big Turtle’s back. It magically grows into an island, which eventually becomes all of North America. Sky Woman has twin boys, one is evil-spirited and the other is good-spirited. They bring good and evil into the world.  Six pages later, it skips back to “Big Turtle still carries the land on his back. Sometimes he stretches out his legs, causing the earth to tremble.”  [The End]

This darling picture book is about Joanie, a young girl who learns that she needs glasses.  She goes into town with her mother, aunt and cousin, Barbara Louise to pick them out.  The girls are dazzled by all the glamorous eye wear choices and Barbara Louise becomes quite jealous that she doesn’t need glasses.  She tries everything to convince her mother that she needs them, but to no avail.  When Joanie becomes disenchanted with her glasses, the girls switch and Barbara Louise tries wearing them with silly consequences.  In the end, the girls decide to return the glasses to Joanie.  Walking home, they came upon a yard sale and Barbara Louise finds a treasure, her own pair of glamorous glasses without the lenses!  The style of this book reminds me of the Fancy Nancy series and the girls are accessorized to the hilt and very focuses on their appearance.  The illustrations are bright, colorful, and cartoonish.  The wonderful cover art is sure to draw in young readers.  This fun book is perfect for a girl who is new to wearing glasses.

Princess Viola is a spirited girl, more fond of diving into the moat, skateboarding up and down the drawbridge and karate-chopping, than doing all that princesses typically do.  She decides to go off to princess camp where she can learn to be a proper princess.  However, her true nature cannot be suppressed and in the end that saves the day!  This is a fun, free-spirited book about being true to yourself and being loved for it.  The illustrations are reminiscent of a graphic novel and the cover features glitter which is sure to draw young readers.

This is a beautiful nativity story about a little shepherd girl who followed her father into the night and toward the stable where she discovered the baby Jesus.  Joining Mary, Joseph, the three kings, shepherds and stable animals, the girl meets Jesus, who enters her heart.  The illustrations are gorgeous watercolors, rich and detailed.  I’m thrilled to have this treasure for our Catholic school library.

The Highway Rat is written by the creators of The Gruffalo and has the similar theme of a character who uses his/her clever wit to solve a problem.  In this case, Duck tricks the Highway Rat, stopping him from stealing everyone’s food.  The author and illustrator use rhyming, repeating text and engaging illustrations to create this folktale.  It would be fun to pair this book with The Gruffalo for story time.

In this Elmer book, a herd of pink elephants are having a birthday party for Old, who was turning 100 years old.  Elmer and his cousin, Wilbur, went to check out the commotion and ended up witnessing an earthquake disaster!  Old was stuck on a small rock that separated from the cliff during the earthquake.  Fortunately, Super El came to the rescue and lifted Old to safety before the rock crumbled into the valley.  Colorful and fun, this book will appeal to young students for story time.

Two Shy Pandas is a lovely children’s picture book with a friendship theme.  The two young pandas are lonely playing by themselves at the zoo and long to have a friend but are too shy to introduce themselves to each other.  One day it snows and one panda goes inside while the other plays outside.  Both worry when they don’t see each other and decide to venture out to check.  They bump into each other and decide to be friends.  It’s a nice lesson about reaching out to others to pursue friendship.  The illustrations are colorful and sweet.

This fun dinosaur book is written in a bit of a story style.  It is full of questions to make the reader think.  The pictures are inviting and interesting.  At the end of the book are a variety of fun activities, a puppet making project, a quiz about the information in the book, and a couple of poems.

I enjoyed the light humor and interesting facts.  It’s a wonderful book for young readers and listeners with a large variety of things.  A good addition to our library.

This book surprised me.  It looked like and started like a story book about a tiger family. The book ended up being a book about ecology.  It has a wide variety of information about our earth and how it has and is changing throughout it’s history.

It encourages us to be good to the earth and take care of what we have. throughout the book are learning circles filled with interesting facts that clarify or enhance the information on the pages.

The pictures are fun, colorful and interesting.  This is a good science book for children.