(3) K-3 I Like to Read: Comics series. Ebbeler uses a dash of mythology and the comics format in this story about Nick's first day at Icarus Elementary, creating a beginning reader with a controlled ­vocabulary that doesn't feel rudimentary. Young readers will pore over the front endpapers that depict the school as a shadowy labyrinth on a parchment background. The story itself shifts into a traditional comics look in the digital illustrations, with thick lines, bright colors, and speech bubbles. This is where we find Nick contemplating entering the school, when along comes Gus, a minotaur, and it's his first day too. Gus's solution to finding their classroom? "Charge!" The text is primarily sight words, many repeated. Expressive faces, energetic pacing, and the just-right amount of detail in the images create a level of humor and action that is more elaborate than the words on the page. Experienced readers will get as much enjoyment out of this story as new readers will.

Reviewer: Adrienne L. Pettinelli | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2025

(1) YA Elliott's clever verse version of the classical story of the Minotaur unrolls in the voices of seven characters, each with his or her own poetic form (an appended author's note details them); but it's the god Poseidon who determines the tone--as instigator, manipulator, and despiser of humankind. Raplike wordplay, rhymes with coercive predictability, unpleasant intensity--it's horribly effective.

Reviewer: Deirdre F. Baker | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2017