ear Ms. Lisa Riebe,

I hate to do this.  You were so nice when I met you at the Chicago Artist’s Expo a few months ago. I do appreciate that you gave me a signed copy of your new children’s book, Pond Punkies, for review. However, I read the first chapter of your book and found that it contained ten glaring grammatical errors in the same number of pages, and this, coupled with the many research errors I also found in the first ten pages, compelled me to stop reading your book.

I’m afraid I will not recommend that anyone read it. I am a reviewer, not a copy editor, and I simply cannot recommend that children read a book that might leave them thinking that “all to familiar” is grammatically correct or that there is no difference between past and past perfect tense. Perhaps I’m being picky, and perhaps this is because of the sheer number of proofreaders I know who can’t find work, but I think that using proper grammar is a cornerstone in the foundation of good writing. You can’t write the next Phantom Tollbooth if you can’t integrate a subject into a sentence properly.

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he Horrid Henry series is for children, and each book contains four short stories with illustrations by Tony Ross. Horrid Henry is a little boy who is constantly getting into trouble, and can’t seem to get along with anyone around him. I got the chance to read four of Simon’s books, which equaled twenty-eight short stories about Henry attempting to get what he wants, often by throwing tantrums and exasperating his parents and friends. ¶ View In Entirety… →

f you’re looking for something fantastic to do for Earth Day that will help the environment, you should check out the three fantastic new books from Green Sugar Press: Earl the Earthworm Digs for his Life, N is for Nature: An Environmental Alphabet Book, and An Environmental Guide from A to Z. These books take environmentalism seriously from their production right through their content. ¶ View In Entirety… →

“By examining the elements, habitats and cycles in nature, An Environmental Guide introduces basic environmental science. Like the letters of the alphabet connect to build words and stories, the countless pieces and parts of nature weave, connect and link everything together.

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ontinuing on in the vein of environmental books that we seem to be in at the moment, I thought I’d take a moment to highlight a new Chicagoland press that focuses on spreading positive environmental messages to children. In their own words, “Green Sugar Press exists to ensure that our future leaders understand Cheerios don’t come from a box, milk doesn’t come from a plastic bottle, water doesn’t come from the tap and gasoline doesn’t originate at a pump.” They currently have three titles in stores, An Environmental Guide from A to Z, Earl the Earthworm Digs for His Life, and N is for Nature. Personally I love the second title.

I like that these books seem to be a bit of a cross between books like Grow from Featherproof that are both environmentally conscious and avant garde, almost to the point where a child would have difficulty understanding the book on their own, and many mainstream children’s books that don’t focus on strong morals of any kind and feature sparkly glittery colors. It’s nice to see that these books keep their color palate natural, which fits with their theme, but that they also feature moral stories that seem like they’d be interesting and not too difficult for kids to understand.

To learn more about Green Sugar Press you can check out their website, their blog, or their feature at Time Out Chicago.

Grow is a “squeaky-green” children’s book.  According to the liner notes, Beaton and Bradley used “the greenest” local printer and “enlisted a group of excellent graphic design students to hand-bind the book,” both exceptionally worthy causes.  Featherproof publishes the book, so they’re local as well.  Each set of heavy paper-board pages features, on the left side, a word or phrase and a daily time line spanning from 8:00 to 8:00. The right side features a white dotted-line design evocative of an environmental issue relating to the facing page and set against a uniquely colored background, ten in all.  According to Featherproof’s website, the book was designed to “take a child through a typical day, implementing a routine that is environmentally and socially sound” and to “benefit the environment, community, health, and a child’s awareness of self in the larger world.”

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he news keeps pouring in about Sourcebooks. To promote their popular children’s series Horrid Henry, Sourcebooks is teaming up with Books Are Fun/Imagine Nation Books to send 125,000 Horrid Henry books into classrooms across the U.S on April 1, 2009. The book made a splash in the UK, selling 12 million copies and spawning a TV show. At the back of each book is information that kids can use at http://www.jabberwockykids.com/ to get a free Horrid Henry chapbook and poster.

“KJ Bradley and Alyson Beaton created Grow to take a child (2-5 years of age) through a typical day, implementing a “normal” routine that is environmentally and socially sound. The sharply designed book helps parents teach children very early on how easy it is to take steps for a cleaner earth. The text focuses on words like “share” and “grow” to instill basic social concepts that resound in larger impacts, and the images encourage the child to actively participate in the daily routine and timeline that follows along the bottom of the pages. The book was based on the developmental findings of Clotaire Rapaille, which say that as a child’s vocabulary develops he or she makes connections to specific items. For example, if a child associates the word “coffee” with “starbucks” the word “starbucks” will likely be an association for life. Grow hopes to instill brandless, positive routines that can benefit community, health, and an awareness of self that’s connected to the larger world.

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“Henry, a brownie prince, loves the fairy Rose. Forty years ago, a bitter wizard cursed them to be forever apart and forever silent. Rose is trapped in a magic painting and Henry is trapped in a book. Neither can leave their prisons, or speak a single word, or the other will die. But Moonflower is going to lead a mission to release them, for every seventy two years a wishing star appears and with the help of the Pearl of Love, she, along with a jack rabbit, a unicorn, and two brownies, are going to set the cursed couple free.”

-from the publisher’s site