Category: Intermediate

Posted in Intermediate, Non-Fiction, picture books

Whazzat? You want MORE book suggestions? Happy Holidays, I got you.

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

You need kids’ books? I have recommendations!

For the kid who loves cars and trucks and things that go:

Big Bertha: How a Massive Tunnel Boring Machine Dug a Highway under Seattle, by Amanda Abler/Illustrated by Katy Wu, (Sept. 2024, Little Bigfoot), $18.99, ISBN: 9781632173065

Ages 7-10

Have an emerging middle grader who loves reading about heavy machinery and vehicles? Big Bertha is the book for them: an earthquake rocks Seattle, Washington in 2001, damaging an elevated highway by the city’s waterfront. If another quake were to hit, the roadway could be at danger of collapsing. The decision was made to replace the highway with a double-decker tunnel running underneath the city. Bertha is the huge tunnel boring machine – the height of a 5-story building! – built in Japan and brought to Seattle to dig and build the tunnel. Named for a former Seattle mayor, Bertha is depicted as massive; readers will be amazed at her scale and power. Deputy Project Manager Greg Hauser and his crew, dedicated to the project, took sleeping shifts and stayed with Bertha all the way, even sleeping in shifts to stay with her as she worked. Do you know kids who love building with LEGO and blocks? Do they construct cities in Minecraft and Roblox? Readers interested in engineering and heavy machines will be fascinated by Bertha, who “chewed up dirt and boulders, removing the earth ahead of her” while her “red erector arms pieced together arcs of concrete to form the outer walls” of the tunnel. Back matter includes a photo of Bertha and her crew; numbers, and facts about the machine and the construction.

Big Bertha has a starred review from Booklist.

 

For the future marine biologist:

Narwhal: Unicorn of the Arctic, by Candace Fleming/Illustrated by Deena So’oteh, (Oct. 2024, Anne Schwartz Books), $18.99, ISBN: 9780593377789

Ages 4-8

Is there anything Candace Fleming can’t do? She writes picture books, novels, fiction, non-fiction, and she’s a conservationist, making her a super human being in my book. Fleming’s newest work is a lyrical piece about a year in the life of a narwhal. Fleming combines nonfiction description with storytelling verse, with playful descriptions – “You are… . shy, / swift, / small (for a whale)” and detailed: “your tusk… / a single / twisting / rod of ivory / that sprouts from your upper left jaw”. The narwhal moves with his pod through the seasons, following food and avoiding danger. So’oteh’s digital illustrations bring the clear cold of the Arctic to beautiful life, with brilliant blues and greens and murky blues showcasing the underwater world. A gatefold displays an incredible narwhal pod dive that will delight readers, and near escapes from a pod of killer whales on the hunt, being stuck under the ice, and discovery by a polar bear! This is picture book nonfiction done spectacularly well and is perfect for readers who love animal stories.

Narwhal has starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, Booklist, and Horn Book.

 

For the stargazer:

The Mathematics of the Universe, by Soledad Romero Mariño/Illustrated by Renee Hao, (Oct. 2024, Schiffer Books), $18.99, ISBN: 9780764368387

Ages 5-9

Verse, quotes, and beautiful illustrations come together to explain the patterns of our universe, from the spiral of a snail’s shell to the swirl of a galaxy. It’s a beautiful introduction to STEM and mathematics, inviting readers to explore concepts like spheres and hexagons, symmetry and spirals, and inviting readers to look closer at nature and unpack the mysteries they see: “The universe seems in such disarray, / but it follows an order, not one thing astray”.

Want to show your readers more about mathematics in nature? The Carnegie Museum of Natural History has some great photos that explain these concepts, too!

 

 

Reaching for the Stars: A Mission to Space, by Roxanne Troup, Amanda Lenz, (Aug. 2024, Schiffer Books), $16.99, ISBN: 9780764368172

Ages 4-8

A space exploration story in rhyming verse! A group of explorers head to the stars in this fun story with dynamic illustration that blends art with actual NASA space photographs. “What will we find light-years away, / beyond the expanse where our planets play?” Constellations, nebulae, and meteor showers, for starters! The group introduces new space vocabulary to readers and features a diverse cast of explorers. Great for a STEM storytime or a space storytime, and excellent to pair with Roda Ahmed and Stasia Burrington’s Mae Among the Stars (2018).

 

Posted in Fiction, Fiction, Intermediate, Middle Grade, picture books

Holiday Shopping Suggestions!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

I’m back with more holiday book shopping ideas! Let’s see what we have today:

For the young entrepreneur:

Ryder K The Mini Boss: The Littlest Hands, Yet the Biggest Dreams, by Cheyenne Davis, Margaret Bowdre, & Ryder K Wharton/Illustrated by Niles Britwum, (Nov. 2024, Kingston Imperial), $16.99, ISBN: 9781954220782

Ages 5-9

Many will recognize 7-year-old entrepreneur and her mother, Cheyenne Davis, from MTV’s Teen Mom series. Here, Ryder tells the story of how she created her own nail polish line. The book features Ryder’s mom, Cheyenne, and her family, all who support Ryder in her efforts. With messages of empowerment and creativity, Ryder K The Mini Boss shows positive images of children and families of color. Ryder’s mom guides her through the process of becoming a “mini boss” with keywords written on a whiteboard: “Passion! Patience! Persistence! Play!” and Ryder still comes across as a playful child, pondering the upsides of abeing a “mini boss”: “Can I buy all the toys I want? I am a mini boss. Can I have candy every day? I am a mini boss”. An additional purchase.

 

 

For the middle grader who loves crafting:

The Best Friend Bracelet, by Nicole D. Collier, (Oct. 2024, HarperCollins), $18.99, ISBN: 9780063326163

Ages 8-12

Zariah (“like Mariah Carey, but with a Z”) has a tidy little business making best friend bracelets for classmates at Hurston Middle School. She puts a lot of thought into the process; her customers fill out a profile on their best friend so that Zariah can choose the right beads and make the perfect bracelet. The irony is, Zariah has no best friend: she suffered a best friend breakup that she’s still reeling from, but she hopes to have a bestie again one day. After inspiration strikes on a trip to the bead store, Zariah creates a stunning bracelet that goes viral on her school’s social media platform, but this bracelet is different: everyone who tries on the bracelet becomes Zariah’s best friend! Zariah uses this as the opportunity to audition new best friends, but her parent aren’t as thrilled with her bracelet as everyone at school is: her grades have been dropping and her mom lays down the ultimatum: pull those grades up, or lose the beading supplies. Zariah turns to a school loner for help… but could she be the best friend that Zariah’s needed? A fun story about best friends and learning that one size doesn’t fit all, readers will love Zariah’s voice and creativity.

The Best Friend Bracelet has a starred review from Publishers Weekly.

 

For the fantasy reader:

Princess Betony and the Unicorn (Princess Betony, Book 1), by Pamela Freeman/Illustrated by Tamsin Ainslie, (Aug. 2023, Kane Miller), $6.99, ISBN: 9781684647156

Ages 7-10

Princess Betony is a young princess surrounded by overbearing courtiers. The daughter of a human king and a dryad who retains a human form, Betony’s governess, Lady Pineal, complains and berates her and her father’s chancellor is rude and blustering. Betony longs to learn more about her mother’s Wild Magic, much to Lady Pineal’s and the Lord Chancellor’s chagrin. When Princess Betony sees her mother heading toward the forest one morning, she runs after her, afraid her mother has left her; she discovers other dryads who set her on a quest – catch a unicorn! – to prove she has the Wild Magic; then and only then will she be able to find her mother. With a seemingly impossible task against her, Princess Betony relies on her determination and her legacy as a child of a tree spirit. Storytelling has fantasy elements and black-and-white illustrations throughout and readers will quickly find themselves fans of Betony, who has a strong sense of who she is, a love of family, and a curious streak. Princess Betony and the Unicorn is the first in a series of four adventures, originally published in Australia from 2012-2014.

 

For the lovable and mischievous book-lover:

Nibbles the Very Hungry Book Monster, by Emma Yarlett, (Sept. 2024, Kane Miller), $17.99, ISBN: 9781684647897

Ages 5-8

Nibbles has long had a place in my heart – my middle schooler was a big fan as a little guy, and I’ve never grown tired of this goofy little book monster’s escapades. Nibbles is up to his usual silliness in this latest book, which is chock full of flaps and die-cuts as Nibbles chomps his way through a series of books, leaving holes in hilarious spots: a cookbook sports a peek a Nibbles’s bottom sticking out of a cake pan; a Hansel and Gretel cover has been chewed away to show Nibbles running at full speed; Old Macdonald Had a Farm shows Nibbles’s head peeking out atop the cow’s body. The little yellow monster gorges himself until he comes to the book’s close and his little crate: but will he go in, or will he eat his way through that, too? Great for an interactive readaloud or a scavenger hunt (just print a few Nibbles coloring pages here and set them around!), Nibbles is an enduring character whose antics always make for fun.

 

 

 

Posted in Intermediate, Non-Fiction

That’s the way the ball bounces: Bounce! is a history of rubber

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

Bounce! A Scientific History of Rubber, by Sarah Albee/Illustrated by Eileen Ryan Ewen, (Oct. 2024, Charlesbridge), $18.99, ISBN: 9781623543792

Ages 6-9

Learners who love the “why” of things will enjoy this one: illustrations and history pair with scientific explanation to deliver a concise and fascinating history of rubber. Entertainment in Europe wasn’t terribly exciting in the early days: to play ball, one had options like leather stuffed with feathers or an animal bladder stuffed with dried peas. You know where there were bouncing balls, though? The pre-Columbian Americas, where the rainforest had trees that yielded latex. The Spaniards “discovered” the balls along with everything else they “discovered”, leading to centuries of experimentation and innovation and culminating with simultaneous discoveries by American Charles Goodyear and Englishman Thomas Hancock; they discovered how to “vulcanize” rubber, making it moldable, shapable, and less likely to melt in the summer or freeze in the winter. Illustrated scientific explanations appear throughout the history, and pen, ink, and watercolor illustrations show people through the ages bicycling, sitting on inner tybes, splashing through puddles, and swimming underwater. Endpapers show a variety of balls bouncing across the spreads. Notes on history, details about rubber, a timeline, and a bilbiography round out the back matter. An excellent nonfiction resource.

Bounce! A Scientific History of Rubber has a starred review from Kirkus.

 

 

Sarah Albee is the New York Times best-selling author of more than 100 books for kids, including Troublemakers in Trousers: Women and What They Wore to Get Things Done and Accidental Archaeologists: True Stories of Unexpected Discoveries. Prior to being a full-time writer, Sarah worked at Children’s Television Workshop (producers of Sesame Street) for nine years. She played basketball in college, and then a year of semi-professional women’s basketball in Cairo, Egypt. She lives in Connecticut.

Eileen Ryan Ewen is the illustrator of many books for children, including H is for Honey Bee, Jonas Hanway’s Scurrilous Scandalous Shockingly Sensational Umbrella, and Nature’s Friend: The Gwen Frostic Story. http://www.eileenryanewen.com

Posted in Graphic Novels, Intermediate

Art Baltazar & Franco bring Flash Gordon to Papercutz!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

Flash Gordon Adventures, by Art Baltazar & Franco, (Nov. 2024, Papercutz), $7.99, ISBN: 9781545812181

Ages 7-12

I grew up watching reruns of the old Buster Crabbe Flash Gordon serials with my Dad, and I am a dedicated fan of the 1980 Flash Gordon movie in all its cheezy glory (“Flash! I love you! But we only have 14 hours to save the earth!”). Finding out that Art Baltazar and Franco are doing a Flash Gordon Adventures graphic novel series for Papercutz made my afternoon! If you’re familiar with Baltazar and Franco’s  work, you know you’re going to get funny jokes, snappy dialogue, and colorful, vibrant, cartoony illustration. If you haven’t enjoyed their work yet, you’re in for a treat. A series of vignettes framing an overall story makes it easy for readers to put the book down and pick it up as they please. Parents (ahem… or grandparents) will appreciate familiar character like Flash, Dale Arden, Zarkov, Ming the Merciless, Barin and Vultan; new readers will get a kick out of meeting the new characters. This first volume introduces Ming – historically a big bad – as a silly ruler who has his human prisoner, Dr. Zarkov, creating evil goatees and lizard-making machines for him while Flash and Dale befriend other resdents and play football and swim. InvestiGators creator John Patrick Green has a story at the end of this first volume, in which Flash and company learn about anti-cavity toothpaste in hilarious fashion. Flash Gordon is a fun addition to your graphic novel collections, especially for intermediate readers.

Posted in Fiction, Fiction, Graphic Novels, Intermediate, Middle Grade

Tales from the TBR: The Adventures of Penguin & Panda

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

The Adventures of Penguin and Panda: Surprise!, by Brenda Maier/Illustrated by Fanni Mézes, (Apr. 2024, Marble Press), $9.99, ISBN: 9781958325056

Ages 6-10

Geared toward emerging readers, this sweet graphic novel is the first in a new series and perfect for readers who love Mo Willems’s Elephant and Piggie and Ben Clanton’s Narwhal and Jelly stories. Penguin and Panda are best friends who go on easygoing adventures. Surprise! contains four short stories, all with an emphasis on friendship and gentle humor: the two go on a picnic, play hide and seek, take an art class, and try to keep a surprise secret from the other. Penguin is little bit high-strung and Panda is imaginative and kind, always looking out for Penguin. The dialogue between the two characters is lively, funny, and kind. Illustrations are adorable, with Penguin sporting ponytails and a pink sweater, and Panda’s body language is open and expressive. Consider adding this to your intermediate graphic novel sections if you haven’t already. There are two Adventures of Penguin and Panda available now; a third will be on shelves in October. Visit Marble Press’s Resources page for free downloadable worksheets and activities.

Posted in Intermediate, Non-Fiction, picture books

Colossal vehicles keep the world moving

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

Colossal: Heavyweights of the Vehicle Universe, by Stéphane Frattini/Illustrated by Studio Muti, (Aug. 2024, Twirl Books), $19.99, ISBN: 9782408052478

Ages 5-8

Learn about the world’s largest vehicles and machines in this oversized book filled with facts and figures. There are 28 different machines included in here, including Cadillac One, trusted with carrying the President of the United States, Bagger 293, an excavator and heaviest land vehicle, and the International Space Station. Detailed illustrations are accompanied by interesting, easy-to-read facts and diagrams to show scale and detail. Did you know that Bigfoot 5, the biggest monster truck, weighs about the same as two elephants Or that a cruise ship like Harmony of the Seas has 18 decks, a helipad, and 20 restaurants, cafes, and snack bars? Colorful drawings feature cross-sections to show interior areas like the inside of a passenger airliner and spacecraft crew module, and readers will be amazed scaled illustrations that show a tractor and 30 cars weighing the same thing on a scale. An exciting addition to elementary nonfiction collections.

Colossal is the companion to Incredible: Stars of the Plant World by Benjamin Flouw and Spectacular: Miracles of Nature by Philippe Nessmann and Alex Asfour.

Posted in Intermediate, Non-Fiction, picture books

When Beavers Flew: Geronimo!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

When Beavers Flew: An Incredible Story of Rescue and Relocation, by Kristen Tracy/Illustrated by Luise Uribe, (July 2024, Random House Studio), $18.99, ISBN: 9780593647523

Ages 5-8

In 1948, the town of McCall, Idaho was growing and coming up against beavers. They were everywhere. Idaho Game Warden Elmo Heter came up with a plan to relocate the beavers to an area where they could develop a wetlands habitat unmolested. After multiple attempts to transport the animals via horse and mule, he landed on a solution: parachute-drop the beavers in boxes made to pop open when they hit the ground. Tracy’s narration is light, even playful; sensitive to animal lovers by concentrating on Heter’s desire to relocate the beavers to a place where they will flourish and the care he took to create boxes that would keep them safe. Digital illustrations are soft, with earthy colors and include sketches of Heter’s journal entries. Back matter includes an author’s note, sources for additional reading, and a photo of Heter. A positive story about a little-known moment in conservation and environmental history.

Posted in Fiction, Historical Fiction, Intermediate, picture books, Realistic Fiction

Mamie Tape Fights to Go to School – historical fiction based in reality

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

Mamie Tape Fights to Go to School, by Traci Huahn/Illustrated by Michelle Jing Chang, (May 2024, Crown Books for Young Readers), $19.99, ISBN: 9780593644027

Ages 4-8

Mamie Tape was an 8-year old Chinese girl who fought, alongside her family, to attend school during a time when America was openly hostile to Chinese immigrants – while they labored to build the country. Mamie played alongside the white children in her San Francisco town, but was not allowed to attend the all-white school. Defining her struggle with on the Chinese proverb, “the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step”, Traci Huahn and Michelle Jing Chang bring Mamie and her family to life on the page. Huahn tells Mamie’s story and does not shy away from the virulent racism of the time, noting that the school principal told her, “Your kind is not welcome here”; that a preacher in favor of educating Chinese children had his home vandalized; that newspapers of the day resorted to using words like “heathen”, “barbarian”, “trouble”, and “disaster” to refer to children. Chang’s illustrations show the Chinese community in protest, the disappointed faces of the Tape family, and the determination of young Mamie Tape, who made the decision to continue pushing forward to attend school. Back matter includes an epilogue to the Chinese Primary School, which opened in 1885 and where Mamie and her brother Frank attended; an author’s note on the Tape family, complete with photos, and a selected bibliography. Endpapers continue the story by showing Mamie staring out the window of her home, and eventually running, with her brother, dressed for school. A very good study of American attitudes toward the Chinese community and a good addition to historical picture book collections.

Posted in Fiction, Graphic Novels, Intermediate

The Smurfs Celebrate the Olympics

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

The Smurfs Olympic Special, by Yvan Delaporte & Peyo, (June 2024, Mad Cave Studios), $3.99, ISBN: 601947046061 – 00111

Ages 7-10

This is another single comic book release – I know, I don’t normally do these – coming out tomorrow (New Comic Book Day, y’all!). Papercutz/Mad Cave releases this 1979 Smurfs story to celebrate the Olympics, so you may have seen or read this before. Hefty Smurf loves sports, and creates his own Smurf Olympics to get the others to play along with him. The top prize is a kiss from Smurfette, so all the other Smurfs are in: the only problem is that no one wants Hefty on their team! Hefty makes his own team, which causes a lot of uproar and leads to a lot of laughs. If you have budget money that you can use to pick up a few issues of this one, and you have readers who enjoy the Smurfs, it would be a fun way to start talking about the Summer Olympics, which start next month. It’s a 32-page story, and with some adhesive covers to keep the comics safe, you can put these into circulation (check with your catalogers first, though).

Mad Cave included some coloring pages this time around, so make sure to print up and put some out.

Posted in Fiction, Graphic Novels, Humor, Intermediate

This Book Will Self-Destruct! Can you help save the day?

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

This Book Will Self-Destruct (Agent Harrier), by Ben Sanders, (May 2024, Kane Miller), $14.99, ISBN: 9781684648979

Ages 6-10

A new graphic novel series starring a dog – or is he a wolf? – secret agent, This Book Will Self-Destruct is loaded with puns and breaks the fourth wall, making sure that readers can share in the fun. Agent Woof – ahem, Wolf – Harrier gets a call from his spy boss, Top Dog, with a critical message: the book is going to self-destruct unless Harrier can stop it! With the Narrator by his side, Harrier sets out to unravel the threads and find the bomb before the book goes boom. There’s something really odd about the Narrator, though, so Harrier will need help from readers to unscramble some clues. Readers will laugh out loud at the back-and-forth between characters, and the stark red and black illustration work makes everything pop against the stark white pages. Harrier is a fun character and his mission is easy enough to follow for newly confident readers moving on from picture books and easy readers. Endpapers show an inside view of Harrier’s briefcase, filled with all sorts of punny spy goodness like a “gadget watch: for everything except telling the time”, “Truthing Gum: one stick for sticky situations”, and a glass eye: “just because”. This is the first in a new graphic novel series, so get in on this from the beginning. The book includes a fun poster; if you’re buying this for your circulation, hang it up and promote the series!