Life gets in the way.  Families drift. And when a child realizes that their family is drifting away from the family table and eating together, they hatch a plan to get everyone back together.  This story is marvelous, and the way the author uses color to show depression morphing into happiness is fantastic.  Overall, Peter Reynolds has another fantastic book in his collection. 

 

I had no idea that the first aquarium was built by a woman so that she could study sea life.  This biography is a great introduction to a woman few know about. 

 

This book seems more like little vignettes to join 2 people together than it does a proper story.  The information is interesting, but that is about it.  This book could have been done better. 

 

This book is long, but a decent look at what it took the Eiffel Tower to become a heart at the center of the Paris people.  

 

Once upon a time children worked.  They worked hard and dangerous jobs from an early age.  Lewis Hine went town to town across the country taking pictures of these working children to make the populace understand, that factories and mills were no place for children.  They belonged in the parks and the playground. This book is based on true works, and many new laws were passed to keep children safe.  But now a century later, our modem government are loosening the child labor laws.  Hine would roll over in is grave and be back on the train with his camera if he knew. 

 

Overall, this is a fun book that kids will love.  Is it perfect, no.  It does a decent job rhyming, but there is no cadence.  Plus, the book is broken up into “rounds” like a video game and each have a different feel.  It does work well, but ½ the book is just a description of the various monsters.  While I like this book, the thing that bugs me most is the letter to parents at the beginning telling them what this book will do for their child.  This isn’t needed.  I normally say, put this type of stuff at the end, but this book has it at the end too.  It’s like a reiteration salad.  The letter at the beginning doesn’t change my view of this story, but I still wish it wasn’t there. 

 

This is a pretty typical story about someone who can’t do what others do and finds a special ability that the others don’t have, then all are friends.  It’s not a bad story, but one that has been done many times over again.  I do think the angle of eating ice cream and fire breath works well, and the illustrations are fun.  The storytelling is a little lack luster but can get better with practice. 

 

This is just a fun coffee table book that illustrates different ways to have noisy upstairs neighbors.  Many of the vignettes are quite funny, and they make me very glad I do not have a team of clog dancers living one floor up. 

 

The confederate flag, or “that flag”, is a symbol of hate in our nation that people insist is just a symbol of heritage.  But it’s a symbol that hurts.  This book illustrates such story as two girls learn what that symbol means, and how our heritage informs our modern, and how that needs to change.  This book was heartbreakingly real.  It is fantastic in the way it portrays a modern story that plays out in schools now. 

 

The Molly Lou books are some of my favorites.  The stories are sweet and full of heart, but the best part are the illustrations.  David Catrow has a way of capturing not just the spirit of Molly Lou Mellon, but of all kids, and all fun-loving adults.  This isn’t the best Molly Lou book, but it is still her heart and rambunctiousness, and her need to be unique.  This is a book for my collection for years to come.