Merit badge No. 2 for Ben and his new friends will arrive soon.
What’s worse than being forced to go to summer camp? Monsters at summer camp.
Ben Beederman is an indoors kind of kid, but his outdoorsy parents have decided he needs to get out more, so they’ve sent him to Camp Nature. He’s assigned to Troop D, the one Troops A, B, and C call “Troop Dweeb.” Under the sometimes-sleeping eye of wizened senior troop leader Walter, Ben and his troop mates, video game–addicted Manuel, hypochondriac Asma, and tiny ball of anger Ginger, suffer the slings and (thankfully not literal…yet) arrows of the bullies in the other troops. When Ben finds a moldy old camp handbook that includes information on monster wrangling even as giant footprints start appearing around camp, it’s clear that something’s…afoot. When the troop leaders go missing, it’s up to Troop Dweeb to find them—but there is more to this camp’s history than any camper knows! Cody’s cryptozoological camper caper is a good kickoff for a new series aimed at those newly comfortable with chapters. Plentiful illustrations by Lambe show his roots in television animation, offering just enough Saturday-morning goofiness of a Scooby variety to hook new readers. Characters seem to be white by default, with diversity hinted at in Manuel’s name.
Merit badge No. 2 for Ben and his new friends will arrive soon. (Fantasy. 6-10)Pub Date: April 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-63565-059-4
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Rodale Kids
Review Posted Online: Jan. 21, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2018
A brisk if bland offering for series fans, but cleverer metafictive romps abound.
The titular cookie runs off the page at a bookstore storytime, pursued by young listeners and literary characters.
Following on 13 previous How To Catch… escapades, Wallace supplies sometimes-tortured doggerel and Elkerton, a set of helter-skelter cartoon scenes. Here the insouciant narrator scampers through aisles, avoiding a series of elaborate snares set by the racially diverse young storytime audience with help from some classic figures: “Alice and her mad-hat friends, / as a gift for my unbirthday, / helped guide me through the walls of shelves— / now I’m bound to find my way.” The literary helpers don’t look like their conventional or Disney counterparts in the illustrations, but all are clearly identified by at least a broad hint or visual cue, like the unnamed “wizard” who swoops in on a broom to knock over a tower labeled “Frogwarts.” Along with playing a bit fast and loose with details (“Perhaps the boy with the magic beans / saved me with his cow…”) the author discards his original’s lip-smacking climax to have the errant snack circling back at last to his book for a comfier sort of happily-ever-after.
A brisk if bland offering for series fans, but cleverer metafictive romps abound. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Aug. 3, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-7282-0935-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Adventure, humor, and smart, likable characters make for a winning chapter book.
Ada Twist’s incessant stream of questions leads to answers that help solve a neighborhood crisis.
Ada conducts experiments at home to answer questions such as, why does Mom’s coffee smell stronger than Dad’s coffee? Each answer leads to another question, another hypothesis, and another experiment, which is how she goes from collecting data on backyard birds for a citizen-science project to helping Rosie Revere figure out how to get her uncle Ned down from the sky, where his helium-filled “perilous pants” are keeping him afloat. The Questioneers—Rosie the engineer, Iggy Peck the architect, and Ada the scientist—work together, asking questions like scientists. Armed with knowledge (of molecules and air pressure, force and temperature) but more importantly, with curiosity, Ada works out a solution. Ada is a recognizable, three-dimensional girl in this delightfully silly chapter book: tirelessly curious and determined yet easily excited and still learning to express herself. If science concepts aren’t completely clear in this romp, relationships and emotions certainly are. In playful full- and half-page illustrations that break up the text, Ada is black with Afro-textured hair; Rosie and Iggy are white. A closing section on citizen science may inspire readers to get involved in science too; on the other hand, the “Ode to a Gas!” may just puzzle them. Other backmatter topics include the importance of bird study and the threat palm-oil use poses to rainforests.
Adventure, humor, and smart, likable characters make for a winning chapter book. (Fiction. 6-9)Pub Date: April 16, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4197-3422-9
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Jan. 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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