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The Talented Clementine by Sara Pennypacker, illustrated by Marla Frazee. Hyperion. $14.99.

When “Clementine” arrived on the scene in 2006 it hit a nerve. Otherwise sane and rational adults began thwapping one another over the heads with the book screaming, “READ THIS! READ THIS! READ THIS!” Children were left abandoned as their parental units devoured the title. Kids, as it happened, quite enjoyed the book as well, but you could be forgiven for not noticing this through the swarm of “Clementine”-addled adults out there. Now the sequel has popped onto shelves everywhere and we are experiencing the calm before the storm. Copies are already flying off the shelves, but we won’t experience the true gale-force winds of the faithful until the summer months. Then watch those copies simply fly. Sequels come with their own set of rules and regulations, of course. Rule #1 tends to be, “Be As Interesting As Your Predecessor,” and is too often ignored by writers. Not Pennypacker. A worthy sequel and a perfectly packaged little gem, “The Talented Clementine,” will please the initiated and uninitiated Clementine-fans alike.

It’s talent show time! Yes, the third and fourth graders of Clementine’s school are gonna put on a production to beat the band and this puts our heroine in a bit of a pickle. Clementine has no talents. None. Zippo o’ talentos. Well, none that she can perform anyway. She cannot dance or sing or cartwheel or Hula-Hoop. Her best friend Margaret can do all of these and more but even with her “help” Clementine’s having some difficulty. And really, it isn’t until the day in question that she discovers something she can do that no other third grader seems capable of. Something that isn't flashy or even noticeable, but that quite positively saves the day.

The funny thing about this particular volume is that Pennnypacker has done away with a subplot. There’s no A story paired with a lesser B story for kicks. This pup’s A and only A from start to finish. You might think that would make the book tedious and slow, but the author appears to know what she’s doing. The concept of figuring out what you do best is infinitely difficult to write about for any extended length of time without sounding like a broken record. All the more reason then for the author to add in details like Clementine super-gluing beer bottlecaps to the soles of her shoes in the hopes learning to tap. I can probably say with certainty that I’ve never read a children’s early chapter book that contained a kid who stinks like a brewery. Other unique details include the presence of adults that aren’t villains. The Principal that Clementine is constantly excusing herself to talk to acts more like an infinitely patient psychotherapist than an authority figure.

I’d like to point out that what I’m doing right now (reviewing this book) is a dangerous thing. You have no idea the position I’ve placed myself in, do you? How easy it is, when reviewing a Clementine, to suddenly lapse into copying down quote after quote from the text without giving it a second thought. I might try to encourage you to read the book by typing something like, “And that’s when the worried feeling – as if somebody were scribbling with a big black crayon – started up in my brains.” That might work. Or I could slip in a little description of the school nurse that says, “She always looks bored, as if she’s just killing time until a really good disease hits the school.” I think you should count your lucky stars that I’ve too strong a sense of self-preservation to ever fall into that trap. Whew!

You know, if we’re going to be perfectly honest with one another here, you should probably know that some people do not care for “Clementine”. Such people have grown tired of the spunky-red-haired-female genre and equate Clem with Junie B. Jones and her pseudo-spunky ilk. Such people, nine times out of ten, have not physically sat down and read the book cover to cover, but some have and Clementine is just not their bag. I’ve also heard objections to Clementine’s maturity or lack thereof. Some people didn’t believe (as seen in the first book) that a third grader would be so immature as to cut off all of her best friend’s hair. But even if that’s your objection to “Clementine”, there’s nothing to stop you from loving its follow-up. Maturity varies with every individual. And if there's any way to describe this heroine, it's as an "individual" indeed.

So why do people like Pennypacker’s books so much? Maybe it’s because she’s damn good at nailing little truths here and there. We know what it’s like when a teacher is so excited by a program that they end up tacking on words to the Pledge of Allegiance like, “With liberty and justice for all and I know we’re all very excited to get to our big project.” Her characters feel believable. Clementine is self-involved, sure. What third grader isn’t? But she honestly feels a concern for her annoying baby brother. In fact, she’s so afraid that the babysitter will forget that he’s allergic to peanuts that she scrawls a, “NO PEANUTS FOR ME!” in blue permanent marker on his head so as to avoid any accidents.

One of the branches in my library system is mere days away from hosting an honest-to-goodness “Clementine” party. There will be a pin-the-bologna-glasses-on-the-face, a pigeon toss, and who knows what all. I was hoping there might be a wok spin, but no such luck. Now after having read the sequel, I wonder what additional crafts and ideas might come of this newest title. A howling contest? A bottle cap coloring station? The mind boggles. Whatever they decide upon, I know that they’ll need plenty of copies of this book when it finally reaches their shelves. Once again, the Clementine-shaped ball that is this book gets knocked cleanly out of the park. A worthy continuation.

Notes on the Cover: Uh, it's Marla Frazee, dude. Short of drawing this cover entirely in her own blood I can't think of a way she could have messed up this image. I also happen to love that Clementine's new shoes make the cover and that the image you see here hints broadly at the talent she eventually finds. Nicely done.

First Line: "I have noticed that teachers get exciting confused with boring a lot."

Previously Reviewed By: What Adrienne Thinks About That, MotherReader, and A Year of Reading. Please inform me if I have missed anyone.

Mokie and Bik by Wendy Orr, illustrated by Jonathan Bean. Henry Holt & Company. $15.95.

Before I begin, I'd just like to point out that when I saw this book I had no intention of picking it up, let alone reading it. But Henry Holt & Company had the mighty clever idea of creating little pamphlets that contained selections from the first chapters of their 2007 titles for the Mid-Winter ALA Convention. I took one glance at the words in "Mokie & Bik" and the next day I walked in the Seattle Convention Center, located their booth, and plucked up this book ASAP. I do not regret this action.

I credit Wendy Orr with launching the surprise sneak attack of the century. As I write this she is by no means a household name. Her books are distinctly Australian in flavor and tend to span no more than 100 pages apiece. Then 2007 rolls around and BAM! She starts hitting the American market left and right. First her book, “Nim’s Island,” gets sold to a big Hollywood studio and will star such luminaries as Jodie Foster. Then the American release of “Mokie and Bik,” comes with an uppercut to the jaw. Yankee child audiences’ll never know what hit ‘em. I would like to warn you here and now that upon picking up “Mokie and Bik,” your average adult reader is going to have one of two reactions to the writing. Either they are going to embrace Orr’s delicious, sing-song use of the English language or they are going to read half a page and disregard it out of cowardice. I’d estimate that a good 25% of the potential adult readership won’t have the sheer moxie to read this aloud to their child, and that depresses me. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen an author take such a wild and wonderful chance with words, phrases, definitions, and pronunciations. This isn’t a verse novel. It’s three times as amusing and creative as that.

Mokie and Bik, girl and boy twins, live out their days on their mother’s boat, scampering about all the live long day. Their father, to hear them tell it, is a parrot with a pirate who has been out to sea so long they’ve almost forgotten what he looks like. So while their mother does her Arting and their nanny Ruby fishes them out of the sea by their overalls whenever they tumble in, these two get into trouble faster than a man could blink. Whether they’re fishing up “eee-normous fisk”, learning to swim (via the old toss-em-in-with-a-rope-around-their-waists method), or walking their saggy soggy dog, these two are making a head-first, devil-may-care, hot-snorting, rip-roaring dive to remain in the pantheon of classic children’s literature. And you know what? You’d have a hard time arguing against it. Pure liquid charm, this book.

Some twins develop a language entirely of their own, and Mokie and Bik seem to fall smartly into that category. What they say can be deciphered eventually, but it takes some doing. You have to understand what it means when the twins say that their father is a “parrot” who’ll come home with “a pirate on his shoulder” and a “treasure on his chest”. So what does the book sound like? Here’s a taste: “They monkeyed off the roof to the slippery wet deck, slip slide slippering in soggy socks, skate chase racing up to Bullfrog’s bow – Mokie was bigger but Bik was faster – and Bik balanced on his sliptoes at the very front point.” The spellcheck on my computer is going bonkers over words like “slippering” and “sliptoes” and I wouldn’t have it any other way. The water patrols sometimes give the twins, “police cream in a cone.” Catching food from the sea is “fisking”.

The worry here is that Orr would get cutesy on you. I know a certain percentage of you out there cringe in the deepest depths of your soul when you encounter a children’s book where the author lets his or her characters intentionally mispronounce something because, to them, it equals automatic funny. But that isn’t what Orr’s doing here, so shake off your cringes and give the book a shot. This is a title that concerns itself with the elasticity of language itself. How far can the author push words and phrases so that they still make sense but come out sounding magnificently mangled in the meantime? Somehow Orr manages, and the result is a book that luxuriates in lines like, “Laddie was a sheepdog, a saggy, shaggy, long licky-tongue dog with brown eyes hiding under his wool.”

This is a book that demands that you read it aloud. And let me tell you, it is mighty hard to read this book to yourself when you’re taking a red eye flight home from Seattle and all you want to do is hear the way Orr’s language bounces off your tongue. Bedtime stories rarely come as sweetly as this. It also pairs beautifully (if on the slightly younger end of spectrum) with Natalie Babbitt’s wonderful, “Jack Plank Tells Tales,” which also has a sea-based harbor feel. And don’t let me forget to mention the evocative pen-and-ink illustrations by Jonathan Bean that capture the flavor of the story. For two twins who are always “overboard or underfoot,” you’d need an illustrator with the ability to convey that sheer unbridled energy. Bean does decently in this respect. It’s a slim pup, coming in at only seventy-some odd pages, but it packs one helluva wallop. Label this one most certainly worth your time and attention.

On shelves June 12th.

Notes on the Cover: Well, in my research (don’t be fooled, as “research” for this blog is usually half-assed and sometimes even a quarter-assed if it’s been a long day) I found alternate “Mokie and Bik” covers out there. Remember, it came out in Australia first. Here’s what it looked like then.

I think I prefer Bean’s work.

You may also wish to check out Wendy Orr’s blog and the now defunct Mokie and Bik blog that ended when the book appeared on Australian shelves.

Where I Live by Eileen Spinelli, illustrated by Matt Phelan. Dial Books for Young Readers. $16.99

Once a children’s book author wins the Newbery Medal, their title receives a certain amount of attention, praise, and (in some instances) controversy. We know that this means that future books under that author’s name, while not guaranteed to be bestsellers, will still be purchased by a certain segment of the population based on name-recognition alone. How fare the illustrators of Newbery winning books then? In the last 20 years there have only been four medal winners with illustrations (not counting the photographs found in “Lincoln: A Photobiography”). Some, like Peter Sis, have gone on to fame and fortune. Others, like Eric Beddows, have mostly stayed under the radar. So when I saw that Eileen Spinelli’s newest verse novel, "Where I Live", was being illustrated by “The Higher Power of Lucky”’s own Matt Phelan, I didn’t know how it would potentially affect book sales. The story in and of itself is a simple one that tries for a pure, straightforward emotional response from its readers. With this in mind, Phelan’s illustrations can only cast Spinelli’s work in the best possible light. If not a match made in heaven, at the very least what we can define here is a match made under the auspices of particularly beneficent stars.

Right from the start, you know that Diana is living a pretty nice life. She loves her house, with the family of birds living in the wreath hanging from her front door. She loves her best friend Rose and her floppy purple hat. She loves how well she does in school in terms of poetry and she enjoys learning about the stars. Imagine how devastated she feels, then, when it suddenly becomes clear that the family needs to up and move in with Diana’s Grandpa Joe in his house that is six whole hours away. Author Eileen Spinelli delicately tell the story of one girl’s hurt and confusion. She loves her Grandpa, but how can that make up for moving away from her best friend in the entire world? In the end, Diana finds that it isn’t about making your new life exactly like your old but creating a space for yourself in your new surroundings that leads to happiness.

I hadn’t read any Eileen Spinelli books prior to seeing this one (which, considering how prolific she is, strikes me as a bit odd). Then I found that some of the choices she made as an author caught my attention and caused me take a closer notice of this title. I found it interesting how long it took Spinelli to get to Diana’s actual move. The book stands at a slim 112 pages (give or take a few) so it’s funny that it’s not until 45 or so that our heroine gets the big news. It works in the end, but I wouldn't call it a natural choice. The writing itself is very simple. Spinelli does little things with her words that might go unnoticed, but add to the overall reading experience when you examine them. At one point near the end we read, “When Mom and I go back ‘home’ Twink is waiting at the door.” “Home” in parentheses is a clever little touch. “Where I Live” is a good title to hand to children who like to read but aren’t quite up to regular chapter books yet. And they’ll still be able to get lines like, “Ha. / Ha. I’m / never / laughing / again,” when Diana refuses to smile at her Dad’s jokes the night of her move.

Illustrator Matt Phelan has certainly created some lovely picture books in his day, and rumor has it that he even has a graphic novel in the works. Even so, “Where I Live”, is the first book of his that I’ve seen where he’s had to prove that his illustrations are capable of telling a story like and unlike the narration written by the author. The pictures in this book have to be able to show not only what Diana is saying but also was she is incapable of conveying. When, for example, she is drowning in self-pity after the family has moved in with Grandpa Joe, Phelan knows to show the look of mild hurt in Joe’s eyes when she refuses a game of chess. Even if those eyes are just tiny dots with whiskery lines above them for eyebrows. Phelan also mirrors the book’s purposeful repetition visually, just in case kids miss it in the words. The beginning of the book, where we see Diana waving out of her bedroom window at Rose in the morning, matches the twilight scene at the end where Diana is waving out her bedroom window at her new friend, Sam. I know that at this point in time it’s hard to separate Phelan from his work on “The Higher Power of Lucky”, but I don’t think it’s wrong to say that the characters of Diana and Lucky have quite a lot in common. Both girls notice the distinctive elements of their homes and love them. Though the reading levels for the two titles don’t encourage a pairing, it’s clear to me that Mr. Phelan is drawn to a particular type of writing (or, at the very least, type of heroine).

A sick part of me is amused by the fact that the title of this book is not too dissimilar from Meg Rosoff’s VERY young adult novel, “How I Live Now.” For your own sake (and the sake of those who benefit from your gift-giving impulses) do not get the two mixed up in your brain. The book also reads in a manner similar to “Amber Was Brave, Essie Was Smart,” by Vera B. Williams. It hasn’t the same emotional punch to the gut, but rather emulates the sweeter moments in Williams’ tale. You might consider pairing "Where I Live" with other “moving” titles if you know of a child who’s taking the change especially hard. It would work beautifully alongside Ralph Fletcher’s small verse picture book, “Moving Day”. The hero of that particular book is a boy, but it shouldn’t make much of a difference in the long run. Altogether this is a nice little story that will best fit the needs of children experiencing the situation faced by the main character. I’ll be interested to see if it garners a larger audience as time goes by.

Notes On the Cover: We can do better. I'm sure that the market for verse novels that look like Cliff Notes can't be as high as everyone's saying. You know that I adore Matt Phelan's illustrations, and the image of Diana on the cover is charming. However, let's take practical manners into hand here. This cover feel stuck and static. It needs to breathe a little. Let's consider livening it up in some way. Even the inclusion of the floppy purple hat would have been a welcome addition. Ah well.

Rickshaw Girl by Mitali Perkins, illustrated by Jamie Hogan. Charlesbridge. $8.50

Yes yes yes. Again I’m writing a review of a book that everyone and their mother has already seen. Trust me then that I wouldn’t be writing this review AT ALL were it not for the fact that the book is entirely deserving of the healthy heapings of helpings of praise it receives. I may be last in line on this one, but I’ll be the first to slip it proudly onto my library shelves.

Consider the reading levels a child goes through. You start them out on baby board books. Slooowly you start reading them picture books. Once they’ve a grasp on that then they start reading on their own with easy readers. A couple years in and it’s time to move on to early chapter books. Finally, and with great relief all around, they’re reading thick 500-page fantasy novels and everyone is happy. Now which one of those reading levels is, to your mind, the most difficult to find? Which is to say, which reading level seriously lacks in the quality-writing-department when all is said and done? My answer would have to be the early chapter books. Picture and baby board books are a dime a dozen and if you doubt the sheer quantity of easy readers out there, come on down to my library sometime. No, it’s early chapter books I worry about. Around this time you want to start luring the kids with writing that’s a little more sophisticated. Sure, you could hand them #43 in the Droon series and be done with it, but wouldn’t you like to hand them a fun book that talks about other cultures and features sympathetic characters and realistic concerns? Basically what I’m saying is, strong literature written in an early chapter book format is a rare beastie. “Rickshaw Girl”, by Mitali Perkins therefore manages to be all he stronger when you consider how rare a title it really is. Funny, smart, and chock full of the sights, sounds, and smells of Bangladesh, Perkins offers up a delightful book that distinguishes itself from the pack.

Ask Naima the one thing she’s good at doing and she’ll tell you right off the bat that it’s alpanas. A complicated but balanced series of designs painted on her family’s path and threshold, Naima tends to win her Bangladeshi village’s prize for best alpana every International Mother Language Day. This year, however, is different. This year Naima’s father isn’t bringing in enough money to pay for the newly redesigned rickshaw he runs. Frustrated that as a girl she can’t do anything to help the family earn more money, Naima makes a crucial mistake. One that might destroy her family’s dreams for good. If she’s to make it right, she must summon up her courage and, with the help of her friend Saleem, use her creativity to find a solution to her problems.

Sometimes it’s nice to hear the story of a screw-up. No one’s perfect, sure. We know that. But how often do you read a book in which the main character does something so cringeworthy that it has the readers, regardless of age, suffering the shame of a well-deserved embarrassment right along with the heroine? What Naima does (and I’m not going to give it away) is wrong. Yet she’s a character you want to believe in. Her family situation is actually pretty dire, all things considered, and what with having a heroine who is less than perfect, you really feel you can root for Naima. Perkins has the enviable talent of knowing how to connect a reader to a character. There’s a spark there. An understand that takes place. Alongside the believable and consistently interesting storyline, the book comes across as a keeper.

Now anyone can write a work of fiction off the top of their heads. And a couple people might even be able to make that work of fiction halfway decent reading. Imagine then the difficulties involved when one must write not only something interesting and well-put together, and not only an early chapter title, but also a Glossary of unfamiliar terms paired with illustrated images, and an Author’s Note giving additional background on Bangladesh and the author’s connection to it. All these things are greatly appreciated and easy to understand. And while a Bibliography or website or two wouldn’t have been out of place, what we do have here is doggone swell.

Illustrator Jamie Hogan remains a bit of a mystery to me. A relative newcomer to the children’s literary scene, Hogan’s work makes me want to thump Charlesbridge Publishers soundly on the back in thanks. What a fruitful pairing. Hogan’s style tends to be pastels on Canson paper, though they appear black and white in the book. It’s almost an affected style. You can see the texture of the paper beneath the images she draws. Yet her characters are pitch perfect 100% of the time. In an interesting twist, Hogan chooses never to show the faces of Naima’s mother and father. You see her sister, her pal Saleem, and even a random boy on the street, but the only glimpse you get of the parents is their hands. Only one adult appears in this story, and she’s definitely not related to Naima in any way. So in a sense, Hogan has chosen to throw in her lot with the children. Her heroine is a strong girl with natural energy. When she sticks out her tongue in one scene, it is exactly the way a kid WOULD stick out their tongue. Hogan knows how to capture kids at their most natural. It shows in the story.

If there’s a moral to this book it may be, “Stop and think before you act.” Sound advice, by and large. In an age of high fantasy and the aforementioned 500 plus page texts, slim realistic novels like, “Rickshaw Girl”, have to be especially good to get any of the attention they so richly deserve. I think Perkins and Hogan together accomplish that requirement with a seeming effortlessness. Consider this a necessary purchase to any library system, irregardless of collection size. A keeper through and through.

Notes On the Cover: Easy to approve of. A good example of Hogan's style, with a nice glimpse of an actual rickshaw being driven (possibly by Saleem) in the background. For some reason I've been especially taken with the shadow of Naima's arm. The shadows in general on this cover appeal to me. Kinda makes you wish the whole book itself was in color.

Previously Reviewed By (Deep Breath Now):

• PlanetEsme
• MomReady
• The Edge Of The Forest
• Reader's Rants
• Gather Around A Table With A Good Book
• MotherReader
• Literary Safari
• InfoDad
• A Chair, A Fireplace and A Tea Cozy