Children’s Book Review
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Book ReviewsThe Boxcar Children Graphic Novel
by Gertrude Chandler Warneradapted by Meika Hashimoto2026 / 176 pagesRating: GOOD/Great/Give The Boxcar Children first appeared back in 1924, about Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny, four…
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Book ReviewsThe Complete Tales of Winnie-the-Pooh
by A. A. Milne 1926-28 / 368 pages Rating: Good/Great/GIFT The Complete Tales includes both Winnie-the-Pooh, first published in 1926, and The House at Pooh…
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Book ReviewsJames Herriot’s Treasury for Children
by James Herriot 260 pages / 1992 & 2104 Rating: Good/Great/GIFT James Herriot is best known for a series of semi-autobiographical books he wrote about…
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Book ReviewsBruno the Bear
by W.G. Van de Hulst 47 pages / 1978 & 2014 Rating: Good/GREAT/Give Little Rosie is sick so Mother takes her off to bed. But…
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Book ReviewsBad Badger
by Maryrose Wood 2024 / 184 pages Rating: GOOD/Great/Give This was a wonderfully strange book that left me wondering where it was going to go next….
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Book ReviewsSir Ladybug (3 books)
by Corey R. Tabor 2022 / 68 pages Rating: GOOD/Great/Gift Pell is a roly-poly bug with a mission: he wants everyone to know just how important…
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Book listsThe best of TOON Books for young readers (18)
TOON Books don’t have much in common with each other besides their younger target audience. As the story is told, the founding publisher, Françoise Mouly,…
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Book ReviewsThe Great Brain
by John D. Fitzgerald 1972 / 175 pages Rating: Good/GREAT/Give The Great Brain is the story of Tom Fitzgerald, a ten-year-old boy living in frontier…
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Book listsKeiko Kasza: All about cartoon critters
Author and illustrator Keiko Kasza was born in Japan and moved to the US for college only to meet and marry an American and then…
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Book ReviewsFern and Otto
by Stephanie Graegin 40 pages / 2020 Rating: Good/GREAT/Give Fern is a bear, an author, an illustrator, and a best friend to Otto, the adventurous…
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Book ReviewsMooses with Bazookas
by S.D. Smith 2023 / 160 pages Rating: Good/Great/GIFT I liked this book so much that right after I finished it, I read it again,…
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Book listsMr Putter & Tabby: 25 sweet stories
by Cynthia Rylant illustrated by Arthur Howard 44 pages / 1994-2016 Rating: Good/Great/GIFT It’s always fun to find a children’s book that is interesting enough…
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Book ReviewsThe Boxcar Children: Great Adventure
1. Journey on a Runaway Train 2. The Clue in the Papyrus Scroll 3. The Detour of Elephants 4. The Shackleton Sabotage 5. The Khipu…
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Book ReviewsDr. Seuss’s “Horton trilogy”
Parents may be familiar with the first two of Dr. Seuss’ Horton books, but the third, only recently republished will be a new delight for…
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Book ReviewsThe Adventures of Lancelot the Great
by Gerald Morris 92 pages / 2008 Rating: Good/GREAT/Give This has all the adventure you’d expect from an Arthurian tale, but way more humor. And…
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Book ReviewsThe Gardener
by Sarah Stewart and David Small 38 pages / 1997 Rating: Good/GREAT/Give Lydia Grace Finch’s family has fallen on hard times. So their little girl…
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Book ReviewsDon’t let the Pigeon drive the bus!
by Mo Willems 2003 / 40 pages Rating: Good/GREAT/Give Pigeon desperately wants to drive the bus. But the bus driver, who has to leave for…
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Book ReviewsHippopotamister
by John Patrick Green 88 pages / 2016 Rating: Good/Great/GIFT Hippopotamister isn’t strictly a comic or a picture book – it is as much the…
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Book listsMo Willems’ “Elephant & Piggie” (25 books)
From about three years old and up, my daughters and I have all loved Elephant and Piggie and their whole 25 book series. When I’d…
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Book ReviewsMedallion
by Dawn L. Watkins 1985 / 213 pages Rating: GOOD/Great/Give This will be a fun one for Grade 4/5 boys. Young Trave plans to be king one…
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Book ReviewsMaker Comics: Draw a comic
by JP Coovert 2019 / 124 pages Cartooning was a fascination as a kid, so I’ve read a few different books on how to do…
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Book lists7 (or is it 8?) great board books!
If you want to foster a love for reading in your children, it’s never too early to start reading to them. Even newborns will tune…
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Book listsDavid Wiesner: weird and wonderful
Super creative? Ultra creative? Mega creative? Every good picture book author is imaginative, but somehow David Wiesner (1956- ) manages to be all the more…
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Book ReviewsTikki Tikki Tembo
retold by Arlene Mosel 1968 / 48 pages Rating: Good/Great/GIFT My full first name is Jonathan, but long ago I learned there were benefits to…
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Book ReviewsElla’s big chance: a fairy tale retold
by Shirley Hughes 48 pages / 2003 Rating: Good/Great/GIFT This unique spin on the story of Cinderella is so good it improves on the original….
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Book ReviewsLarry Bendeco Johannes Von Sloop
by Larry V. and Mark Kummer 2014 / 32 pages Rating: Good/Great/GIFT In some respects, this is Tikki Tikki Tembo in a modern setting with the…
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Book ReviewsGod’s Big Book of Animals
Edited by Shirley Rash 248 pages / 2019 Rating: Good/GREAT/Give Did you know that baby elephants drink three gallons of milk each day? Or that…
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Book ReviewsThe old house
by Pamela Duncan Edwards 2009 / 32 pages Rating: Good/GREAT/Give This is a sweet picture book about a self-absorbed house who learns to think about…
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Book ReviewsThe Bug Zapper: The Ant Arrives! (2 books)
by Tom Eaton 2018 / 108 pages Rating: GOOD/Great/Gift Bug Zapper is a superhero that fights a bevy of bug-themed villains like Mean Mosquito, Butterfly Bob,…
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Book ReviewsFinding Narnia: the Story of C. S. Lewis and His Brother
by Caroline McAlister 48 pages / 2019 Rating: GOOD/Great/Give C.S. Lewis wrote, “A children’s story that can only be enjoyed by children is not a good…
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Book ReviewsIn Grandma’s Attic
by Arleta Richardson 1974 / 144 pages Rating: Good/Great/GIFT When Arleta was a little girl she would visit her grandma, where she’d play up in…
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Book lists46 children’s books to foster the love of reading and learning
We are “People of the Book” so reading should be, and is very important, to us. The goal of all reading is to become readers…
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Book lists100+ read-aloud suggestions…
I’ve been reading out loud to my girls since they were born, and now that they are older we’re still reading, ending each day with…
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Articles – BooksHow to get our boys to read
In a 2010 Wall Street Journal article, Thomas Spence argues that the way some “experts” were trying to encourage boys to read was all wrong….
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Children’s picture booksSophie and the Heidelberg Cat
by Andrew Wilson illustrated by Helene Perez Garcia 32 pages / 2019 Rating: GOOD/Great/Give The story, written in engaging rhythm, opens with Sophie crying because her…
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Children’s non-fictionShooting at the Stars: The Christmas Truce of 1914
by John Hendrix 40 pages / 2014 Rating: Good/GREAT/Give I was raised with stories of the Dutch Resistance and the Canadian liberators fighting against the…
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Children’s picture booksDance at Grandpa’s
by Laura Ingalls Wilder illustrated by Renée Graef 33 pages / 1994 Rating: GOOD/Great/Give I’d expect most everyone has heard of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on…
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Book ReviewsWings of Dawn
by Sigmund Brouwer 1999 / 456 pages Rating: Good/GREAT/Give Why would anyone go through all the trouble of building an immensely strong castle in the…