Daddy Mojo, Author at Daddy Mojo

Stories to Keep You Alive Despite Vampires, year-round treat reading

Scary is relative. Sometimes the things that fourth through sixth-grade ages find scary, actually start out funny. Other times those stories are icky, disgusting, or mildly disturbing, but they’re never graphic and usually fun. Stories to Keep you Alive Despite Vampires is kid scary in the best of all possible ways. Ages eight and up know Lemony Snicket, while their compatriots who are a year older are reading it. Despite Vampires is cut from a similar cloth, with a couple more influences that’ll make the book demo just a bit older.

Stories to Keep you Alive Despite Vampires is an anthology collection of spooky, scary, heartfelt, tongue-in-cheek stories for ages eight and up.

Age-appropriate scary stories know no best month to be read

Trubble Town 2, The Why-Why’s Gone Bye-Bye, too 4 tout

Disparate is an adjective that I absolutely love. I’m currently teaching 8^th grade ELA and I used that term in conversation when comparing things that have nothing to very little in common, and then trying to make a compelling argument as to why they belong in the same classification. A cursory glance at the pages of Trubble Town 2, The Why-Why’s Gone Bye-Bye would yield the same conversation. That is if I were to tell you that this graphic novel is flat-out hilarious, weird, creative and constantly gives readers a smile, even when they don’t know what’s going on. It is.

Trubble Town 2: The Why-Why’s Gone Bye-Bye is a time-shifting, absurdly hilarious all age graphic novel that ages eight and up will celebrate.

Stop, elaborate and listen

The Museum of Lost Teeth, far from being pulled-it’s a great-goodnight book

“I have no idea why you lost your tooth or what the tooth fairy does with them”, that’s what I told a kindergarten student earlier this month. They were over the moon with curiosity as to how the tooth disappeared from underneath their pillow last night. And while they were thankful for the money that it had been displaced with, their wonderment as to where the tooth could’ve gone took up as much real estate in their mind as their sudden financial gain. The Museum of Lost Teeth is an illustrated book by Elyssa Friedland with illustrations by Gladys Jose that examines one theory as to how baby mouth bones disappear from the cool side of the pillow.

The Museum of Lost Teeth is a great-goodnight book that takes the fear away from losing your first tooth and turns it into an adventure for all.

It’s funny, clever and takes the scares out of that first lost tooth

Leon the Extraordinary, graphic novel gold for elementary ages

It’s a world where people with super abilities are common and Leon is just an average kid. Holy metaphors and feelings of life that any elementary school kid can agree with Batman! Leon the Extraordinary is a graphic novel that knows its audience. It has all of the feels, frustrations, and relevance that elementary school kids will understand. The hall monitor is bossy and bigger than life, the teachers are a little bit weird, the school bullies are much bigger than them, and he just wishes that he was a little bit more super.

Leon the Extraordinary is an elementary school-age graphic novel that runs with energy, a sense of joy and just enough feelings.

Leon’s getting larger

Digestion! The Musical, a madcap illustrated opus on food’s destiny for ages five and up

Upend expectations. Take what is normally expected from a thing and completely subvert it in a much more excellent manner than you are used to. Digestion! The Musical is an illustrated book that takes the normally short presentation of those books and makes it longer. It takes a subject that every elementary-aged child is curious about and turns it into a theme park of a book. There are three distinct areas of the book that looks at how the body digests food. Digestion! The Musical works as an illustrated book for young elementary ages, as well as, a primer on the human body for ages six and up. It’s also worth noting that it does this with style, STEM, humor, and poop, just in case your audiences are curious about the end results.

Digestion! The Musical is an uproarious illustrated book for ages five and up that looks at food’s journey in a way that kids will swallow.

STEM, fun and dancing poop for ages 5 and up

Let The Monster Out, succeeds were it not for those muddling meddling kids

Allegory, teen-angst, outsiders, corporate shenanigans, and overcoming your fears meet in mglit, what’ll ya have? If you’ve ever been to The Varsity in Atlanta, which is a fabulous place to grab a hot dog, they’ll greet you that way. Let The Monster Out is mglit that wants to be in the Stranger Things, but with-more-heart club, and almost gets there. It has high aspirations and does offer plenty of thrills along the way, but left us feeling empty as though the book was playing favorites, let us explain.

Let The Monster Out has moments of mglit through a techno thriller lens, but jams in feelings that moot the scares and slows the pace.

Evil Corporation and kids overcoming stuff 101

Books Aren’t For Eating, illustrated comfort book food on leveling up

Growth is good. That’s not exactly what Gordon Gekko said, but let’s keep that phrase in the context of schooling and growth is good. That can happen in many forms, from not kicking the chair in front of you, to remembering to bring a pencil to those younger ages when they stop chewing on the pages of books. It’s a special day when board books can go the way of the Do Do and those pre-k kids know that the time for that is nigh. Books Aren’t For Eating is silly, illustrated book fun that pre-k and K kids know, but will draw in their own parallels as to things that they know that they shouldn’t be doing at that age.

Books Aren’t For Eating is a basic truth and an old-soul, illustrated book that’ll make those who might be tempted to, stop and think about it.

A message for those who know they shouldn’t, but really want to, until they don’t

I’ll Take Care of You, is poetry that kids can get onboard with

Poetry is a tough nut for elementary school readers to crack. Some might find it too boring, too slow or are unable to grasp the plot of it. If there’s not a traditional story arc to the poem, then it’s even more challenging. It can be vague, esoteric, pointless and excuse to simply kick or bother the person next to you when it’s read aloud. Believe me when I say this because I read poetry to elementary school ages on a weekly basis and it’s not because I’m a glutton for having students kicked who otherwise want to be left alone. I’ll Take Care of You is a great poetry book for elementary school students. It’s easy to see how this is an illustrated poetry book that those ages will dig in spring, but here’s why it’s good anytime of the year and how to present poetry to elementary ages.

I’ll Take Care of You, oversized-landscape presentation of its nature watercolors is soft-sell poetry that works for elementary ages.

Fear not the poetry books for the elementary ages…if ye present them in a fun manner