CHARLIE PIECHART AND THE CASE OF THE MISSING PIZZA SLICE

Name: CHARLIE PIECHART AND THE CASE OF THE MISSING PIZZA SLICE
Author: Eric Comstock
ISBN: 978-0-06-237054-9

From the Charlie Piechart series

by Eric Comstock & Marilyn Sadler ; illustrated by Eric Comstock ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 2015

Kids will have fun following Charlie as he solves the mystery and reinforce their fraction skills along the way

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Pizza night brings a mystery, and plenty of math, to the Piechart household.

Charlie’s family of five is joined by his friend Lewis, which means that if they order a large pizza, each of them will get two slices. But can they agree on toppings? Four-sixths want nothing to do with veggies, and no one wants anchovies. Pepperoni it is. But between the pizza’s arrival and its serving, one piece has gone missing. Charlie goes into full detective mode (his dog is even named Watson!) and hunts for clues, then turns to his five suspects…though maybe he should include one more. Comstock and Sadler give readers plenty of exposure to fractions in both written and pie-chart form: fittingly, Charlie’s body is a round pie chart that changes to reflect the math around him. The authors find sneaky ways to seamlessly add more and more fractions to the tale while at the same time upping the humor: Charlie has his sisters do the burp test to see if they are guilty. Debut illustrator Comstock’s digital artwork is a retro-modern throwback, from the red, white, mustard, and turquoise palette to the asterisk designs on the plates and the furniture shapes.

Kids will have fun following Charlie as he solves the mystery and reinforce their fraction skills along the way . (Math picture book. 4-8)

Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2015

ISBN: 978-0-06-237054-9

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Katherine Tegen/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: June 22, 2015

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2015

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S MYSTERY & THRILLER

- BOOK REVIEW
TANGLED
by Anne Miranda ; illustrated by Eric Comstock

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THE GREAT DICTIONARY CAPER
by Judy Sierra ; illustrated by Eric Comstock

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THE DAY THE CRAYONS MADE FRIENDS

by Drew Daywalt ; illustrated by Oliver Jeffers ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 3, 2025

Quirky, familiar fun for series devotees.

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After Duncan finds his crayons gone—yet again—letters arrive, detailing their adventures in friendship.

Eleven crayons send missives from their chosen spots throughout Duncan’s home (and one from his classroom). Red enjoys the thrill of extinguishing “pretend fires” with Duncan’s toy firetruck. White, so often dismissed as invisible, finds a new calling subbing in for the missing queen on the black-and-white chessboard. “Now everyone ALWAYS SEES ME!…(Well, half the time!)” Pink’s living the dream as a pastry chef helming the Breezy Bake Oven, “baking everything from little cupcakes…to…OTHER little cupcakes!” Teal, who’s hitched a ride to school in Duncan’s backpack, meets the crayons in the boy’s desk and writes, “Guess what? I HAVE A TWIN! How come you never told me?” Duncan wants to see his crayons and “meet their new friends.” A culminating dinner party assembles the crayons and their many guests: a table tennis ball, dog biscuits, a well-loved teddy bear, and more. The premise—personified crayons, away and back again—is well-trammeled territory by now, after over a dozen books and spinoffs, and Jeffers once more delivers his signature cartooning and hand-lettering. Though the pages lack the laugh-out-loud sight gags and side-splittingly funny asides of previous outings, readers—especially fans of the crayons’ previous outings—will enjoy checking in on their pals.

Quirky, familiar fun for series devotees. (Picture book. 4-7)

Pub Date: June 3, 2025

ISBN: 9780593622360

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Philomel

Review Posted Online: March 8, 2025

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

- BOOK REVIEW
LITTLE FREDDIE TWO PANTS
by Drew Daywalt ; illustrated by Lucy Ruth Cummins

- BOOK REVIEW
HAPPY FATHER'S DAY FROM THE CRAYONS
by Drew Daywalt ; illustrated by Oliver Jeffers

- BOOK REVIEW
HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY FROM THE CRAYONS
by Drew Daywalt ; illustrated by Oliver Jeffers

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ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...

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Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.

The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)