Lissy’s Friends by Grace Lin.

I am a great fan of Lin’s.  She manages to do short, friendly picture books with a uniquely Asian perspective and universal appeal.

In this book, Lissy has moved to a new school.  No one is friendly with her at all.  She begins to build her own friends out of origami so she will never be alone again.  Her mother continues to push her to play with the other children, and Lissy heads out to the playground with all of her origami friends.  But when she pushes them on the merry-go-round, they fly away in the breeze.  Lissy is heart-broken until she finds that her paper friends have led her to some real ones.

The book is filled with Lin’s characteristic illustrations where the sky is filled with swirls, and patterns cover the world.  It creates a vivid and inviting setting for her characters.  The language is accessible for children and they will recognize the struggle to make new friends and be thrilled with the use of origami as a bridge to friendship. 

Recommended for classes doing origami or as a read aloud when new students join a class.  But families should not save it until then.  It is a very nice book to share with children who are preschoolers through Kindergarten. 

And the Train Goes…  by William Bee.

This picture book is filled with the noises of a train station, from the ticking of the station clock to the call of the station master to the whistle of the train.  The entire text works together with a subtle rhythm of life and action combined with a style both vintage and quirky.  Turning the pages takes readers down the length of the train, seeing soldiers on parade, school children, businessmen, and chefs.  Each group of people matches the style of the train car they are on, creating a vibrant tableau of color and faces. 

Add this to the large collection of books on trains, but realize that this is a real winner of a read aloud.  It would be my first choice for train read aloud due to its large and bright art and the evocative text. 

Framed by Frank Cottrell Boyce

Dylan is the only boy in the Welsh village where his family owns the garage.  There is no chance to play football anymore now that his last male classmate has left.  The only claim to fame the village has is that it has the lowest crime rate in Britain, and that is attributed to the fact that it also has the highest rainfall.  But things are about to change in the quiet village, because of the secret at the top of the mountain.  Who would have thought that a single secret could change people entirely, create color where there was none, inspire new endeavors, and rock the comfortable but dull world that Dylan lives in?

This book is pure magic, just as Cottrell Boyce’s first book, Millions was.  The entire book has a warmth, a coziness, but also has plenty of mystery and magic.  The language of the book welcomes readers in, shares a laugh, and moves gently onward.  The characterizations of everyone is deep and meaningful, down to even the people of the village who play very secondary roles.  Everyone has an aspect of their personality that is surprising but rings very true. 

I loved the inclusion of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as the cusp of the story. But best of all was the message that art really does change lives, in ways that those who love it most may not understand.  The inspiration characters took from art is what makes this book sing.  Gloriously.

I listened to the book on CD, and the narrator, Jason Hughes, is extraordinary.  I would never have been able to read the book with a Welsh accent in my head, and it was a treat to listen to it.  Some narrators simply read the book, but Hughes has added a bit of himself into it and brought the entire story to life.  Lovely.

Highly recommended for children ages 10-13, this book will welcome them to a world they have never been before but will recognize immediately.

Adventures of Cow, Too by Lori Korchek, photographs by Marshall Taylor.

If you read and enjoyed Adventures of Cow, you will certainly enjoy this one. 

Cow is the clueless protagonist of the story where he is sent to the grocery store.  On the way and at the store, he misnames all sorts of things.  Calling a school bus, a train, and limes apples.  Each page has just one sentence on it, and preschoolers will enjoy the pure silliness of the stories as well as the quick pace.  There is no waiting around for the jokes in this little book, they happen on almost every page. 

Looking for a book that will keep restless little bodies seated?  Well, this is it.  I would recommend having it on hand to be the final book in a story time.  Even better, it is short enough that you could make it a closing tradition for a class story time.  Children will appreciate the humor more each reading.

Reaching for Sun by Tracie Vaughn Zimmer.

I have seen this book on several people’s favorites of the year.  And you can add my name to theirs.  This book is a real treasure of a read.

It is the story, told in verse, of Josie.  She is a teen with cerebral palsy who knows that she is different than the other children.  She has no friends until a boy, Jordan, moves in nearby.  He isn’t like the other kids at school.  He listens to her thoughts and never thinks that she is mentally slow.  He is her first real friend.  Their friendship is beautifully captured in the poetry.  It offers an especially tender medium for their fragile first moves to being friends that magnifies it, creating a lovely taut feeling in the book.

Josie is portrayed flawlessly in the poems, remaining true to herself even while she grows and changes.  That is a feat that many authors don’t achieve, the ability to have their characters change but remain real and true to who they started out as.  Again, the medium works extremely well here, allowing Josie the space and language to express herself.

I am often reluctant to start a verse novel.  If they are well done, they can be some of the most moving books in the world.  But poorly done, they are nothing more than prose forced into stanzas.  Luckily, this is one of the winners.  In the truest test of a verse novel, you could pull virtually any of the chapters from the book and they could stand on their own as individual poems.  Each poem was obviously separately crafted with care to make it a real verse, bearing no resemblance to prose storytelling.  Instead the verse, the medium strengthens the book into something it could never have become without the poetry of the language and power of the word choice. 

Lovely stuff.  Recommended for middle school readers who will enjoy the poetry here.  This would be a great first verse novel for anyone, because the poetry is accessible as most good poetry is.  Even better, the cover itself will reach out and grab the right sort of readers.  This is one that you just have to try.