GO HOME, MRS. BEEKMAN!
by Ann Stampler & illustrated by Marsh Gray Carrington
The only way Emily Beekman’s mother can get her to overcome her first-day jitters is by promising she’ll stay at school with her daughter “for a million gazillion years.” This gets Emily to school, but it results in problems when Emily decides that school really isn’t so bad—but she can’t get her mother to leave. Mrs. Beekman employs increasingly outrageous subterfuges over the next several days to disguise her presence, frustrating Teacher Sue and humiliating poor Emily, before the hugely predictable conclusion. Carrington’s sunny, energetic paintings make the most of the silliness, but the lengthy text and Mrs. Beekman’s incredible obtuseness will weary young readers. (Picture book. 5-8)