Image – Mom Read It

I recently read and reviewed the Image book, Hinges, Book One: Clockwork City for WhatchaReading, and had to crosslink here. This book is a gorgeously illustrated fantasy that kids, tweens, and teens will love.

Image is blowing my mind with the books they’re coming out with for all-ages. I love a good rated “T” or “M” book as much as the next comic book fan, but when there’s an intelligent, beautiful-looking book available for kids, I am all over it. We all started reading comics when we were kids, and we need to keep finding books that elevate the dialogue and bring them more into the fold. Hinges, Book 1: Clockwork City is one of those books.

A doll named Orio arrives in the city of Cobble. She has to choose a familiar, called an Odd, and it looks like one of the Odds has its eye on her. Bauble, who kinds of reminds me of Stitch from Disney’s Lilo & Stitch, makes sure he ends up with Orio – to the displeasure of a few of the people she encounters.

Check out the rest of my review on WhatchaReading!

Everyone’s talking about STEM these days – or STEAM, depending on which library or classroom you’re hanging out in. What’s STEM? It’s the new thing for education – Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (with an “A” for Art, if you’re talking STEAM). It’s going beyond the three “Rs” to get kids ready for this crazy future we’re heading toward. It’s LEGO Robotics, it’s NASA mentors for kids, it’s teaching kids to code in languages like HTML, Python, and Ruby on Rails.

Beyond that, it’s starting with what’s around you. I had a duct tape crafting workshop at my library that the kids went berserk for. We made wallets, change pouches, even little mustaches on popsicle sticks. If you don’t have funky, leopard-spotted duct tape, you can still make stuff – show me one home that doesn’t have a roll of duct tape laying around, right? With that base, you can create.

And that is the idea that HowToons works with. HowToons is more than a comic, it’s a movement. It’s taking comics one step further and bringing kids into the adventure, by creating a story that shows kids how to create – using things around them – to save their own world.

Read the rest of my review over at WhatchaReading!

Tag: Image

Hinges, Book One: Clockwork City : a steampunk, fantasy fairy tale for all ages.

HowToons shows how makerspaces will save the world – A WhatchaReading Review!