Children's book reviews, all age comic books, Kidlit, mglit, movies, entertainment and parenting
2020 is certainly an interesting baseball season. Partially because the season isn’t here yet it which gives books like S Is For Slugger, The Ultimate Baseball Alphabet plenty of oxygen to soak up. It’s a fun book that’s meant to entertain those pre-k through early elementary ages who are playing the game, or are big fans of it, some red meat to devour. For the fans it really accomplishes this done mainly to the jarring artwork by Matthew Shipley.
A great children’s illustrated book has a way of channeling into the way that kids think. It’s those centricities or absurd things that children think to themselves that make perfect sense to them, but no one else. This is the art of pretend play and the book is The Fort by Laura Pewdew with illustrations by Adelina Lirius. It manages to perfectly capture how the playground or rogue fort in the woods can dramatically change from one person to the next. It’s a book that exists in every child’s imagination, but is rarely seen in public.
New comic book day is back and this week it’s in a ‘kind of’ manner. There are a handful of great all age comic books out this week, in addition to a couple graphic novels or trade paperbacks. In comic books those young readers will want to look at Casper’s Spooksville, a very special reprinting of Lumberjanes #1 for only $1, Scooby Doo Where Are You? and more.
In graphic novels, if you have an elementary or middle school girl then you need to check out Phoebe and Her Unicorn’s latest, Camping With Unicorns. This series of graphic novels will mainly appeal to girls, but will cross over to boy readers who allow themselves to get lost in these very funny characters. There’s a sense of timeless, Calvin and Hobbes-esque wonder that the comic strip has. If you haven’t read it online or read one of Simpson’s other books they’re certainly worth a look.
Here are all of this week’s all age comic books. To find the closest comic book store to you just go to comic book store locator and put in your zip code.
My baseball knowledge is limited and by limited I mean that I know the utmost basics of the game and the marquee players. Who Got Game? Baseball is a book that is tailor made for the 11 year-old me. I love the story of things. They’re the key figures, obscure stats, amazing characters and background that make the game fascinating to the fans. I know it’s ironic that I like the elements that make up the game, but don’t like the game itself.
Whenever a middle grade book is published that might be a bit melodramatic or have a character who’s dealing with an illness or physical condition it’s compared to Wonder. I really need to read that book. We read one recently that was compared to that and found it quite uplifting. The Great Upending has been compared to that book and there are certainly lots of story threads in the book to make it an interesting read. We’re not going to list any spoilers about the book, it’s better for readers if they know fewer details about that.
Sandra Boynton is the queen of board books. We’ve still got the board books that our now 10 year-old read when he was crawling across the floor. He’s sitting here beside me as I write this and commented that he remembered her books. Not to fact check him, but I went through the books that she’s written and illustrated and sure enough, the ones that I know are upstairs (in the secret box of baby stuff) were the ones that said he remembered. While it’s certainly possible to have all of her books, we only have eight of them, with many of their corners chewed, just a little bit. Your Nose! Is somewhere north of release number 75 for Boynton and continues the timeless quality and charm as her classics.
Plastic Sucks! aims to be a middle elementary through middle school primer on plastic and its impact on the environment. In some ways it squarely hits the objective and for some young readers this will be the go-to book that will start their eco-interests. Let’s break down the book and see if it’s the polymer that will bond your young one to learning more about a substance that we use every day.
Catwad is a cat who’s usually in a bad mood. Blurmp is his best friend who’s usually in a good mood. One of them seems to have bad luck all of the time while the other one walks on clouds to a kitten soundtrack. Catwad is the stuff of elementary school legend. If you go to a Scholastic book sale early enough in the week there might be a copy or two of one of the Catwad books. If you go later in the week then they’ll be sold out. Catwad Me, Three! is out and kids everywhere are clamoring for it.
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