This book is simply fascinating–and true! John Leahr and Herb Heilbrun grew up in the same neighborhood, went to the same elementary school, were in the same third grade class, became WWII fighter pilots at the same time, and even flew in the some of the same combat missions, but they didn’t meet each other until they were in their 80s.
John is black and Herb is white. In the 1930s and 1940s black people and white people rarely spoke to each other, let alone became friends. It wasn’t until a chance meeting when they were in their 80s–when Herb crashed a reunion for Tuskeegee Airmen to tell them how grateful he was for “saving his tail” during the war–that they ever knew the other one existed, let alone what strangely parallel lives they had led.
These days, John and Herb are great friends, but it’s not hard to imagine that they might never have met. This book details their extraordinary experiences in the past, and their modern adventures telling children about them.
Posted by: Sarah
Ever wonder what the biggest thing in the ocean is? Well, this Giant Squid thinks he knows. This book takes readers on a journey through the ocean where they get to meet various ocean animals that happen to be smaller than the squid. The friendly squid is even bigger than a shark. This brightly illustrated book uses fun characters to draw the reader in. Author Kevin Sherry doesn’t use many words to tell this squid’s story, but the words are carefully chosen and are as fun as the illustrations. Check out this book to find out if he really is the biggest thing in the ocean.
Have you ever thought about what your life might be like if you lived in another area of the world?
A very special fox terrier puppy named Ginger Pye, who disappears on Thanksgiving Day, a colorful family in Cranbury, Connecticut in the 1920’s, mysterious footsteps and a stranger in a mustard yellow hat combine to make this 1952 Newberry Award Winning book still fun to read.
This is a wonderful story. It seems to take place in the late 1800’s but it is a different world. In this world, huge, luxury airships ply the skies buoyed by a gas called hydrium. Matt Cruse is a cabin boy on the Aurora. He loves his airship and hopes to captain her himself one day. He is keeping watch one night when he sights a hot air balloon losing altitude. He is instrumental in rescuing the balloon and its occupant, a very sick man. While sitting beside the man in the infirmary, Matt tries to calm him by agreeing with him that he has also seen the beautiful winged creatures the man is talking about. The man dies but the next year a young lady passenger arrives on the Aurora in possession of the balloonist’s diary. The man was her grandfather and she has come on this trip in order to prove that he was not hallucinating ; that these creatures that he wrote about really exist. She enlists Matt’s help and then the unthinkable happens, the ship is attacked by air pirates and must make an emergency landing far from their route on an uncharted island. The island looks exactly like the drawing of the island in Kate’s grandfather’s journal. Their adventures are just beginning and the pirates do reappear. Kate and Matt turn out to be clever, brave, and intrepid. They do encounter one of the creatures which Kate thinks of as sweet but which turns out to be a very dangerous carnivore.
In this Sheherazade type tale, Bob, a mouse, keeps telling stories to Muffin and Brutus, cats, so he will not be eaten. The stories all feature a mouse as a main character in one of the better known fairy tales from Cinderella to Jake and the Beanstalk. They are fun because there is always a little twist to them, like Cinderella turning into a horse and Bob turning into the girl in a fancy outfit. They will make you laugh out loud with some of the turns the stories take.
I have always enjoyed reading poetry. Whether in rhyme or not, I like the thoughts and feelings that are conveyed in poems. One of my favorites for children is And the Green Grass Grew All Around: Folk Poetry From Everyone by Alvin Schwartz.
This book is the story of 11-year old Cal Lavender who much to her surprise ends up in a group foster home. She knows that there must be some mistake, and that this can’t be her REAL life. She little by little realizes that she is a part of this mixed up, sometimes hurt and troubled, family of girls. Her guardian, “the knitting lady”, helps Cal and the other girls understand life by telling wonderful stories of life and loss and helps them know that they too can find their way. This story is full of real life and lots of humor. I really enjoyed listening to this book on cd, which was read by several characters.
This is fourth in the futuristic series, Traces, which takes place in London and places near there. Luke Harding is a 16-year-old crackerjack forensic investigator. His faithful work companion is MALC, a Mobile Aid to Law and Crime — a sort of hovering robot with lasers and scanners for finding evidence at crime scenes. In Double Check, Luke gets a tip that a certain death row inmate might be innocent. The inmate is just a teen and there is overwhelming evidence suggesting that he did indeed commit the murder, but Luke and MALC race the executioner’s clock, risking life and professional reputation to revisit crime scenes, reexamine forensic evidence, and try to sort out the truth. 
