Stuey is just the right kind of friend—confident and independent—for any third grader.
Stuey is back!
This new installment takes up just where the first left off, with Stuey and his friends comforted that their second-grade teacher, Ginger Curtis, is moving on to third grade with them. Lilly Stanley (the “Queen of Obnoxious”) and best friend Will Fishman are also back—keeping the humor light and the friendship real. Told in Stuey’s own fresh, direct voice, with the school year as the frame, these four loosely joined stories show our hero facing new challenges while growing into a more independent, less worried young man. When Will lets on that Stuey’s dad runs a space center, Stuey comes up with a one-of-a-kind field trip and becomes more comfortable with the fact that his parents are divorced and his father lives far away. Stuey’s older brother Anthony becomes more important to Stuey when they travel alone on a plane to see their dad and plan an unforgettable Mother’s Day celebration. Stuey’s resourcefulness shines in the final tale, when Ms. Curtis decides to end the year with a class pet show. Each story is just the right length for chapter-book readers, peppered with frequent humorous ink drawings. Stuey’s mom’s hair in a car vacuum is an image that most third graders will never forget.
Stuey is just the right kind of friend—confident and independent—for any third grader. (Fiction. 6-10)Pub Date: May 22, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-374-39901-6
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Margaret Ferguson/Farrar, Straus & Giroux
Review Posted Online: March 27, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2012
Stern and Sims (George, 1999) join forces again for another easy reader in beginning-chapter format about an average boy named George and his older siblings. In this book the focus is on his irrepressible but appealing dog, Diggety. In the first story, the three kids administer a multiple-choice test to Diggety to determine his intelligence. The directions and answer choices are cleverly integrated into the text, which might be a useful read-aloud for children facing their first standardized testing. (And the story might be comforting to some, as “Diggety does not test well.”) The second story has a sledding theme, and the third has the siblings baking dog biscuits for Diggety’s birthday, with a recipe included for biscuits that can be eaten by both canines and humans. Teachers will like the integration of the multiple-choice test format and the procedural format of baking (along with the recipe) as examples of everyday reasons why we need writing in our lives. Kids will enjoy the illustrations of Diggety by Sims, also the illustrator of the perpetually popular Polk Street School series. Diggety is a charming, rangy dog (perhaps part poodle and part golden retriever) with fluffy tan fur and a big white spot around one eye. Diggety never does dig any holes, and there’s an unnamed, shy gray cat in the background, so Diggety and George seem destined for more adventures, even though they aren’t as charismatic as the characters in the beloved Henry and Mudge books. A serviceable addition to the easy-reader shelves. (Easy reader. 6-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-531-30295-4
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Orchard
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
For a new highlight in the annals of Good Cooperation, the creators of Once Upon a Cool Motorcycle Dude (2005) reprise the winning premise and bring back much of the original cast. Two young narrators paired for a storytelling exercise have very different ideas of how the story should go: For him, there’s nothing finer than a mightily thewed superhero king—portrayed by Goto in suitably pulp-comics fashion astride a flying motorcycle outfitted with missile tubes—but she posits a flaxen-tressed Queen named Tenderheart (depicted with airy delicacy by Heyer) who marries “some guy, I forget his name” and decides to have a baby. Wrestling their plot back and forth, the two youngsters ultimately end up with superbaby riding a chopper of his own (the missiles replaced by a brace of formula bottles), rescuing his royal parents from a cyclops and flying them back home on a robot unicorn to a happily-ever-after. The artistic mashup illustrates the value of collaborative effort as hilariously as does the tumultuous tale. (Picture book. 6-9)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-8027-2164-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Walker
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2010
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