Children's Series Books Books

All of the Jennie McGrady books are marvelous. Without a Trace is one of the best. Jennie, as always, is trying to solve a mysterious happening. Her brother disappears and Jennie investigates. The rest, I will leave you to find out for yourself.

I have the whole Jenny McGrady series and this one is one of the best out of all ten. I have read it around four times and it still never gets boring!

All of the Jennie McGrady books are great - but this has to be one of the top 3. For a little while, while your brain's stuck between the pages of the book, you could swear that it's you there. They call it suspension of disbelief - well, I'd say disbelief was expelled! Carribbean cruise, good-looking rich guy, crime happening all over, and somehow it's not unbelivable. I'd say that the Jennie McGrady books are definetly classics material.

My cousin loaned me this book along with Dying To Win and In Too Deep. I started reading it as soon as I got home. From the very beginning there's a mystery. The first page makes you want to keep on reading so that you'll find out what's going to happen. When you read this book you have all of these guesses on who's the criminal, and in the end, you figure out that none of them were right. Just when you think you know exactly who the criminal is, you either start to suspect someone else or Jennie has a good reason for the criminal ot to be him/her. I never wanted to stop reading this book because I had no idea who the real criminal was. In the end, the criminal turned out to be someone wha wasn't even on my suspect list. This mystery is full of danger and suspense. Many times Jennie almosts gets herself killed while investigating. If you LOVE mysteries like Nancy Drew, add this series to your list of favorite books. I wouldn't reccomend reading this book at night because eventually you'll get too tired and have to stop.

Two weeks before Mothers Day 2008, I was looking for ideas on the web on what to do for a 11 year old who has lost their mom. I came across this book. I ordered 2 copies, one for me and one for the 11 yr old. The similarities to my own life was amazing.

I am dating an amazing man who has an 11 year old daughter named Maddy as well. Her mom died when she was 8 yrs and she is now 11 yrs old. Though the story is fiction, I found that a lot of the feelings and emotions were definitely genuine. I met Maddie 's dad in church. We began to date and feel in love. Ater one and a half years of dating our Maddie cannot accpet her dad dating me, she often cried herself to sleep. After seeing his little girl cry herself to sleep, her dad has totally distanced himself from me. He is angry with me and himself. He was so burdened with guilt and torn. He says, to me "you are the best thing to ever happen to me and I love you with all my heart." I know he does and I pray that he one day he is able to let go of the guilt, find balance and allow himself to be happy as well.

I thought the part at the end of the book with Grandpa talking to Maddie was very encouraging. Maddie said to Grandpa, "I read that if a bee is left all by itself, it usually won't live more than twenty-four hours." Grandpa looked thoughtful. "Sounds a lot like what happens to people." he remarked. "Of course, people don't kill over like bees. Left alone, they tend to die little by little - inside." Maddie said, like Pearl after her sister died?" Grandpa concurred slowly, "Well yes, but like your father, too." Maddie felt her jaw tighten. "It's not the same," she said, contradicting him. "Dad wasn't alone after Mom died. He had us. He has us." But even as she said it, she knew that isn't what Grandpa meant. Ever since her mother died, Maddie had been trying to fill the empty place in her dad's life; but it hadn't happened, and it never would. It wasn't that her dad didn't love her - he did. So why did it hurt so much when someone else wanted to love him, too?

This book really spoke to what we are going through right now. I hope my Maddie reads the book and gets the healing and support she needs and begins to accept her dad and I dating and getting married.

Signed,
carbon copy

Maddie begins a pen pal relationship with a stranger when she finds a balloon and a note attached; but quickly comes to believe her new friend is a ghost from the past. Pearl uses old-fashioned phrases and sends a photo decades old; but the real surprise comes when Maddie decides to track her down. Mystery, supernatural overtones, struggles with a new person in the family and a surprise ending make for a fast-paced, highly recommended story.

Write Me If You Dare! is a compelling story of Maddie, an endearing, fun-loving, courageous eleven-year-old who has lost her mother. A pen pal comes into her life just as her father begins dating a woman quite different from her mother. Maddie, her father, and grandfather and their relationships are exceptionally well-drawn and convincing as Maddie tries to accept her father's new friend. Interwoven throughout the book is a fascinating study of the family's bee-keeping enterprise. The story is told in a warm, reflective style, while Maddie herself is a bright, engaging youngster full of personality. I grew to love the characters. This story is meant for 8-12 year-olds, but I am a full-blown adult who laughed aloud, cried and felt every emotion in between as I read to the finish. I hope Emily Rhoads Johnson writes many more stories!

Maddie, the book's main character, is wonderful. She's bold and adventuresome, smart and fair, and best of all someone who knows how to stand up for herself. But she is also going through a tough time and feels lonely and abandoned--like many 12 year olds. She finds a mysterious letter telling her "Write me if you dare" and begins a correspondence that allows her to feel better for a while, and eventually helps her to grow up a bit. I won't reveal the great ending, but will mention that the book has the added attraction of teaching readers all about the beekeeping business, a family business that Maddie helps out with that gives her a sense of competence and being needed. It's a good book for any 10 to 13 year old but particularly for girls that age who may be struggling to adjust to life with just one parent (Maddie's mom has died) or to accept a parent's new partner.

An African ground squirrel of the genus Xerus. I used to love these books as a kid and was so excited to see them online! Now as an adult my dad and I still try to remember the names of all the animals and their personalities. I definately recommend this as an educational tool, and also something your kids will remember fondly even as adults.

I got 5 of the Sweet Pickles books as hand-me-downs, and posters at my middle school and high school reminded me of this wonderful 26-book series. I collected all 26 and later realized that they couldn't think of an animal beginning with X, so in order to have 26 animals for each letter of the alphabet, they took a squirrel and applied the name "Xerus" to it because(I think)one type of squirrel has Xerus in its latin name.

This was my favorite in the series (if I am thinking of the right one). I don't have the books anymore, but they are a very fond memory from my childhood. Xerus - I can't remember what he looks like! But, the story goes that Xerus is obsessed with everyone following the rules. He goes to the extreme of starting to post signs around town for everyone to follow. It gets way out of hand...there are signs everywhere! The signs start conflicting, such as "don't walk on the grass" and "don't walk on the sidewalk", so the other animals start getting very confused and upset with what they can and cannot do. In the end, the animals come over to Xerus' house and post this giant billboard outside his house that says something like "no more signs" or "no more rules".

I hope that I'm not the only one who remembers these Sweet Pickles book. This book was pretty entertaining as a child. There are 26 letters in the alphabet and for the Sweet Pickles series, each main character, an animal, represented a letter of the alphabet. "X" is for "xerus", but does anyone know what a xerus is?

This book has given my three children confidence in dealing with other kids at school. They have learned new respect for themselves and others. We have learned so much from the other three books. I'm hoping she plans to continue to write more books on this topic.

The Mom's Choice Awards® honors excellence in family-friendly media, products and services. An esteemed panel of judges includes education, media and other experts as well as parents, children, librarians, performing artists, producers, medical and business professionals, authors, scientists and others. A sampling of the panel members includes: Dr. Twila C. Liggett, Ten-time Emmy-winner, professor and founder of Reading Rainbow; Julie Aigner-Clark, Creator of Baby Einstein and The Safe Side Project; Jodee Blanco, New York Times Best-Selling Author; LeAnn Thieman, Motivational speaker and coauthor of seven Chicken Soup For The Soul books; Tara Paterson, Certified Parent Coach, and founder of The Just For Mom Foundation(tm) and the Mom's Choice Awards®. Parents and educators look for the Mom's Choice Awards® seal in selecting quality materials and products for children and families. This book has been honored by this distinguished award.

I gave a copy of this book to my two grown daughters, to read to their children. The whole family has decided this is a group effort - and really good information. The examples and illustrations are very attention-getting, and the wording is friendly and easy to understand.
This is a book that will help a lot of children and adults feel better about the way they communicate with others.

This book addresses the way children can be courteous to each other, considerate of their friends' feelings, and respectful to their friends and to the adults they come in contact with--parents, teachers, parents of friends and others. The lessons, however, are good for all of us. If adults practiced them more often, there would not be as great a need for the children to learn them because they would parrot our good conduct. As a retired teacher and grandmother of five children, I encourage parents to start reading Respectful Manners (and all the preceding books by Ms. Elerding on manners) to their children as early as possible, to instill in them the polite way to act with parents, friends, teachers and other adults they encounter in life. The book is timely and ageless.

If I'd seen this book in a store, I don't think I'd have felt compelled to buy it. It doesn't look that different from countless other children's books on the shelves... Yet it IS different. It was given to me as a gift, and I'm so glad it was. My son was fascinated by it. He was 8 months old, and it was the first book he ever took an interest in. Months later, it is still his favorite. It makes him smile every time, guaranteed.

Jan Pienkowski's "Zoo" uses a simple format to appeal to the youngest children. The book introduces the reader to 14 different animals that you would see at a zoo: crocodile, hippopotamus, toucan, gorilla, and more. Each page combines a one-word caption with a colorful illustration.

The pictures are particularly appealing. Bright and colorful, these illustrations combine an iconic quality with realistic touches. From the grandeur of the peacock's tail to the charm of a koala mother and her baby, each picture is delightful. This is a fun book for both child and caregiver.

I bought this book for my son when he was 7 months old. He is now one and still chooses it over all of the other books we own. He loves the illustrations! He took his first step to get this book off of a table and he said his first word when we turned to the lion page. He now says "Yion" each time we read it!And he's learned to roar!

This is a favorite of my 9-month old son who consistently chooses it for us to read together and regularly pages through it on his own. The illustrations are bold, colorful and stimulating and the animals represented take us beyond the more common dog, pig, duck varieties to animals including the toucan, koala and camel. Its popularity with our son is motivating us to buy the whole series.

This book is a definite hit with my 20-month-old daughter (and me too). She loves this book and asks me to read it to her all the time. It's too soon to tell whether it will help with potty training but I am glad that I purchased it. It's a great book and I laughed so hard the first time we read it together!

"Zoo Poo" is a decent book for helping toddlers recognize the 'natural thing' of going number 2. I don't really think it has to be tagged as 'The First Toilet Training Book' as it states in the title. We had many other first books. This book came to us after a turbulent year and home life and many potty training attempts. If your son or daughter is having a hard time making a deposit in the toilet or potty chair (afraid, control freak, whatever), this book will help. It made it interesting for my 3rd-time-in-training, controlling daughter to see the animals 'going potty' in nature and then going about their business. At the end of the book, the moral of the story is that kids go potty on the toilet. We made it a fun to read book by laughing and saying together, "Ewww!" each time we turned a page. For those of you who might think they would find this a disgusting book, believe me, it's fine. My parents never let us say any of the words that started with the letter p. But we have to think like a toddler to help them and this books helps! I also recommend "It Hurts When I Poop". It explains what happens in your body and that poop is your body's trash and the toilet is the trash can. My little future doctor loved the simple drawings of inside the body. She's now trained and we're both happy!!! Good luck!

My 22 month old son loves this book. He thinks it's hilarious. I think it's hilarious to see other people's reactions when we read it! If you feel as I do, that it's best to talk to your children about their bodies and bodily functions as well as those of other animals, this is the book for you. It is, however, not the wordiest of books, which is unfortunate. A good "THIS is the last book" (when you've already read 10) bedtime book.

We bought this book during potty training because my daughter had fear about "poo-ing" in the potty....this book I think helped lesson her anxiety and of course since it is silly she LOVED and still loves it!! It isn't too expensive and was a great asset for our potty training!!

The book offers various worksheets on the most common topics covered in any high school chemistry class. They are a life saver because they save hours of worksheet creation time.

This book of worksheets became the most used book in our high school science department for science classes, 9th grade through chemistry; we were constantly swiping it from each other and finally had to make a rule that it lived on MY desk at all times but could be removed long enough to xerox pages. I handed out the worksheets to my chemistry students with the answers for them to do more drill-and-practice.

This book has wonderful reproducible worksheets. They can be used for general practice. If you have limited copies, you can make great overheads from this book.

This book was awesome. It's a powerful collection, with a wide range of prom stories. There are the traditional prom stories, where a good time is had by all ... or most. There are the anti-prom people, who want nothing to do with the dresses and the disco balls, but make their own fun. And there are a bunch of other stories involving gorillas, chickens, condom dresses, and six-packs of Bud.

My favorites from the collection were three amazing stories that stood out against the rest:

- "Mom called, she says you have to go the prom" by Adrienne Maria Vrettos
- Chicken by Jodi Lynn Anderson
- The Great American Morp by John Green

I liked them all for different reasons, and I'm not going to spoil the surprises that are hiding in this book. I'm just going to tell you that it's worth the read.

21 PROMS tells the stories of, well, twenty-one proms. Twenty-one fantastic authors contributed to this collection, and each and every one of the stories is fabulous and enjoyable. A few, however, really stick out in my mind after finishing this book.

Holly Black's IN VODKA VERITAS is a creepy story about an evil Latin club. "MOM CALLED, SHE SAID YOU HAVE TO GO TO PROM" is Adrienne Maria Vrettos' contribution to the book. It's a great story that manages, in just a few pages, to create wonderfully three-dimensional characters that I'd love to read more about. BETTER BE GOOD TO ME by Daniel Ehrenhaft is a brilliantly written and romantic story. Aimee Friedman's THREE FATES is a hilarious story about what happens when Abby ends up with three dates instead of going dateless the way she thought she would. THE QUESTION is Brent Hartinger's one-act play that would be wonderful to see performed. PRIMATE THE PROM is Libba Bray's very interesting, original, and unusual story of a boy going to prom with his boyfriend -- who just happens to be a gorilla. THE BACKUP DATE, by Leslie Margolis, is a fabulously well-written story about Jasmine, a whiny but completely believable character, going to prom with her boyfriend and brother's best friend.

As you can see, there are quite a few fabulous stories in this collection. The two that I loved the most, however, were these: Melissa de la Cruz told the absolutely true and absolutely hilarious story of her prom in A SIX-PACK OF BUD, A FIFTH OF WHISKEY, AND ME. THE GREAT AMERICAN MORP is John Green's absolutely brilliant story and one of my two favorites about a couple of girls having a "morp," a party that is a backwards prom. In this funny and fantastic story, he introduces characters that I'd absolutely love to see again.

I did notice one thing that is interesting, and I want to know why this is: people seem much more likely to write about two gay guys than two lesbians. Quite a few of the stories had gay guys in them, but I can't think of any about two girls who wanted to go to prom together; I don't know why. In fact, I can only think of one book that I've read where the main character is a lesbian: KEEPING YOU A SECRET, by Julie Anne Peters.

A good short story, one that has good characters or a hold-your-breath-suspenseful plot or something, has to do it in just a few pages. These were some of the best short stories I can ever remember reading!

Reviewed by: Jocelyn Pearce

I loved every minute of this book. I have read most of the authors' other works, so I shouldn't have been so surprised with how much I enjoyed reading every story, every page.

As with any compilation, there were some real standouts, but they were mostly because I could totally relate to them or laughed out loud. "`Mom called, she said you have to go to the prom'" by Adrienne Maria Vrettos was a fantastic story about an uninhibited girl who has the time of her life putting her oddities on display for the world to see. "Prom for Fat Girls" by Rachel Cohn was great because, honestly, what fat girl doesn't want to read about another fat girl getting the guy? And they saved the best for last. John Green's "The Great American Morp" rocked--it was the reason I gave this book five stars rather than four.

Great Authors + Great Stories = A Great Read. (Okay, that was pretty cliché and cheesy even for me.)

This book consists of, as the back of the book says, "tricky teasers, verbal vagaries, and mathematical mind manglers." There are also many funny brain vacation jokes. As you can tell from the title, this book has 263 challenging riddles or questions that really make you to think. For ex, one of the questions is: Why didn't Beethoven finish the Unfinished Symphony? The answer is: The Unfinished Symphony was started by Schubert, not Beethoven!! Some of the puns are corny but it's still very enjoyable. It's a good book to read when you want to take a break from work and just laugh. Personally, I liked it a lot and I still take it out sometimes to re-read some of the riddles. I highly recommend it

This book is really neat for those of you trying to boggle yourmind with brain puzzles. One of my favorites is "If King Midassits on gold, who sits on silver?" (You'll have to figure that out on your own) Anyway, it is very funny and makes you laugh at yourself when you see the answers to some!

I love this book! I got it for my third grade class. We break into teams and I'll give them a question. They love trying to come up with a creative answer the other groups don't figure out. These are great "thinking outside the box" kind of questions. By the end of year, the kids no longer look to the obvious answers. It's great!

Have you ever wondered how people think of God in another world? In the book Passages; Darein's Rise by Paul McCuster, two yuong children, Kyle and Anna were venturing through an old abandoned huose when they found themselves in a diffrent world. Kyle ends up in a castle and Anna ends up in King Lawrence's closet. Both are surprised, they didn't know where they were. Soon they find out they were in Marus. Marus is on a world that has two moons, one was white and the other was a light orange. Marus is also a country that stroungly beleives in the Unseen One. Thruogh out the story the King goes mad and looses his faith in the Unseen One, which causes him to want to kill his best general. Kyle and Anna were sent by the Unseen One as a protector and a vioce. kyle is the protector and Anna is the vioce. Kyle keeps getting these weird feelings and Anna keeps having these wierd dreams. Eyes of two colors in Marus means you were sent by the Unseen One as a vioce. Will Kyle and Anna ever make it home? Does the King succeed in his plot to kill the general? To find out I invite you to read Passages; Darein's Rise by Paul McCuster.

I thought this book was a great re-telling of the King Saul and David story.I can't wait to read the next one! I think Darien's a great charactor. I'm 11 years old and I loved this book.

A cool new way to learn the story of David ("Darien") from the Old Testament, while also touching the "Other Worlds" lobe that makes things like this, The Chronicles of Narnia, and The Lord of the Rings books so cool.

Kyle and Anna accidentally stumble into the world of Marus while exploring an old shack in the woods. Each is quickly caught up in the action from different sides, while trying to figure out what in the world happened. They soon discover they're under the protection of the Unseen One, known in our world as God.

I began reading this book, and I honestly couldn't put it down; fortunately, it was on a weekend! It's pretty awesome, because instead of a slingshot, Darien uses a pocket knife. Instead of a sword, Darien uses a pistol and a saber. Marus is in a Western type of time frame for this story, and that is one thing that helps this book to work so well.

I'm already a fan of Focus on the Family's Adventures in Odyssey, and this book contains some elements of the series, but it can function on its own, for sure.

If you like this one (and I can almost promise you will), you'll want to check out the other five titles.