(3) 4-6 Illustrated by Elizabeth Buttler. To cheat or not to cheat? That is the question outsider Jenna Lee must answer when the fourth grade's most popular girl tosses her a plea for help during a math assessment exam. Combining straightforward narrative with easy-to-follow graphic novel panels, the book insightfully incorporates multiple points of view: parents, teachers, students, and administrators.

Reviewer: Amy Lois Cohn

(3) K-3 Illustrated by E. B. Lewis. The narrator of this evocative book, with its sunlit watercolor illustrations, complains about moving to her fourth house. After all, she's just eight, while her grandmother, at sixty-five, has only lived in two homes. Nevertheless, by taking some ideas from Grandmom's "homegrown house," she finds a way to make the new house her own. The young narrator's conversational tone lends a pleasing intimacy to the story.

Reviewer: Martha Sibert

(3) 4-6 Illustrated by Geneviève Côté. In gentle free verse chapters, Jake learns that spending the summer in his former LA neighborhood isn't really the fun he thought it would be. And he keeps running into former crush Haylee when he's in very compromising situations. A visit from best friend Minn seems like the solution, but miscommunication and jealousy abound. Textured black-and-white illustrations reflect the multi-layered relationships.

Reviewer: Susan Halperin

(2) K-3 Illustrated by David Roberts. Dumpster diver Steve recruits the narrator and his pals to hose down the treasure he extracts. Then, disaster: the dumpster trash collapses and Steve gets hurt. Strips of text on found-paper backgrounds are pasted across the pages--form mimicking content. For Roberts, Wong's deft, economical script is only the beginning. Felicitously paired, they've made a snappy, inventive book.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: May, 2007

(2) 4-6 Illustrated by Julie Paschkis. Most of the sixteen poems in this book each focus on a particular yoga pose. Wong's verses effectively evoke their subjects, and Paschkis's elegant watercolors swirl with movement. Framed illustrations depict each pose, while animals, people, and related objects border the frame with Indian motifs. Suitable both for readers already familiar with yoga and those just getting started.

Reviewer: Bridget McCaffrey | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2007

(3) K-3 Meet the Author series. Photographs by Anne Lindsay. These autobiographical slices of life describe the creative processes and experiences of three children's authors: nature writer/illustrator Arnosky; poetry and picture book writer Wong; and dance, art, and Latino culture author/photographer Ancona. The texts are brief, simply written, and informative. The many photos (some taken by the authors) give readers a view into the subjects' lives and interests. Review covers these Meet the Author titles: Self Portrait, Whole Days Outdoors, and Before It Wriggles Away.

Reviewer: Jack Forman

(2) PS Illustrated by Margaret Chodos-Irvine. A father and son play a quick game of hide-and-seek. The boy's reluctance to remain in one spot keeps the action moving, as he and his dog look for better places to hide while Dad counts to ten. Chodos-Irvine's clean, bold, colorful art is well paired with poet Wong's brisk, refreshing look at a subject familiar to kids.

Reviewer: Jennifer M. Brabander | Horn Book Magazine Issue: May, 2005

(3) K-3 Illustrated by Stacey Schuett. Enlisting an unrhyming text with line breaks, Wong introduces the world of chess, with its tournaments and ratings, cheese puffs and puzzles, triumphs and frustrations, through the experiences of third-grader Alex, who has just joined a chess club. Each face depicted in Schuett's warm gouache and ink paintings reflects a distinct personality and ethnicity, and she manages to make playing chess look exciting.

Reviewer: Susan Dove Lempke

(2) K-3 Illustrated by Julie Paschkis. The tone in this picture book is mostly playful; Wong explains each superstition at the end. Where Wong's poetry here is a bit less thought provoking and nuanced than some of her previous work, Paschkis's paintings make the most of each poem. Paschkis and Wong show how a poet and painter in harmony can each enhance the other's work in this engaging and visually striking book.

Reviewer: Susan Dove Lempke | Horn Book Magazine Issue: September, 2003

(4) 4-6 Illustrated by Geneviève Côté & Geneviève Côté. Fifth-graders Minn, a tall, thin loner, and Jake, a short, scrawny newcomer, become friends by accident rather than intention and develop a relationship based on their mutual interest in animals. Their odd-couple story has its charms, and while it drags in places, the spare free-verse text will encourage reluctant readers. Sketchy black-and-white drawings accompany the chapters.

Reviewer: Norah Piehl

(3) PS Illustrated by Margaret Chodos-Irvine. "No one wants Chinese food on the Fourth of July," a girl tells her Chinese-American parents, who cook chow mein to sell in their market. As the day wears on with few customers, the girl is disappointed--until a crush of hungry people in the evening proves that chow mein is as American as apple pie. The immigrant experience is handled with good humor; the cheerful mixed-media art portrays cultural details in a matter-of-fact way.

Reviewer:

(3) 4-6 Illustrated by Teresa Flavin. This free-verse pep talk for reluctant writers encourages students who have trouble coming up with topics for creative-writing assignments to use what they know ("Write about the fights. / Write about the holes in your socks") and not worry if their first drafts aren't great. Gouache illustrations of frustrated, then inspired, kids examining their surroundings and memories for material give the text specificity.

Reviewer: Christine M. Heppermann

(3) PS Illustrated by John Wallace. Tired and slightly grumpy, Mommy tries to put her baby down for a nap and soon is asleep herself. The rhythmic, alliterative text tells the gentle tale in a way that will captivate even a wide-awake toddler. Soft ink and wash illustrations capture Mommy's harried state and the sleepy bliss that she and her baby finally find together.

Reviewer: CHristine Sarrazin

(3) 4-6 Illustrated by Julie Paschkis. Fifteen brief poems explore the fertile ground of the unconscious, a world in which "dreams grow wild / like dandelion weeds." The verse mostly forsakes the nightmarish or unsettling to focus on dreams that are peaceful, mysterious, and often surprising. Small, full-color gouache illustrations contrast with monochromatic backgrounds depicting fanciful images evoked by the poems.

Reviewer: Carolyn Shute

(3) K-3 Illustrated by Bo Jia. Simple and poetic, this unadorned story of a young girl's trip to Korea to visit her relatives has an appealing circular structure in which gifts and hugs are exchanged at the beginning and end of the visit. The rural household is very traditional, with no hint of contemporary life. Based on Wong's own experience, the themes of family love and nonverbal communication are lovingly portrayed in the text and the quiet watercolors.

Reviewer: Melinda Greenblatt

(2) K-3 Illustrated by Yangsook Choi. In a spare narrative enhanced by festive, richly colored illustrations, a Chinese-Korean boy reflects on what Chinese New Year means to him. By sweeping last year's mistakes and bad luck out of the house, he hopes to make room for "a fresh start, my second chance." Concepts of renewal, starting over, and luck will resonate with young readers in this imaginative appreciation of the emotional aspects of the holiday.

Reviewer: Kitty Flynn | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2000

(1) PS Illustrated by Margaret Chodos-Irvine. In her first book for preschoolers, young adult poet Wong has selected the right onomatopoeic word to reflect the mechanics of a busy morning. Everyone, it seems, is in a hurry to get somewhere--all except the young narrator, who opens this story of early-morning family rituals by observing a bumblebee buzzing around the garden. Chodos-Irvine uses pattern and color in a flattened perspective to balance the sounds and sights of the morning.

Reviewer: Kathleen T. Horning | Horn Book Magazine Issue: May, 2000

(2) YA It's difficult to believe that the theme of driving offers much range for a single-author poetry collection, particularly when, as here, the mood is predominantly reflective and the flashes of humor, gentle. But the mostly free verse is conversational and unfussy, and the timeworn idea that "driving is like life" is simply a given here, with Wong relying on telling particulars rather than heavy universals.

Reviewer: Roger Sutton | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 1999

(3) 4-6 Illustrated by Jennifer Hewitson. Eighteen free verse poems about mothers and the experience of motherhood are told from the perspectives of both parent and child. The author's mother inspired the poems, but they transcend any particular relationship to become an honest portrayal of mother/child universalities. Stylized scratchboard and watercolor illustrations complement the poems.

Reviewer: Carolyn Shute