Robin Smith

If: A Father's Advice to His Son is the poem that fathers and son seem to share more than any other. No namby-pamby, overly sweet stuff from Rudyard Kipling! Charles R. Smith Jr., a respected poet himself, has taken Kipling's familiar poem to new heights in this edition by adding his own boy-friendly, sports photographs. Smith's stark, dramatic photographs complement each line of the poem, from the soccer player heading the ball in the opening line, "If you can keep your head when all about you/Are losing theirs and blaming it on you," to the almost spiritual shadow of a man and his son at the end. It's interesting that Smith chooses to photograph each athlete from the smallest Little Leaguer to the mature high school runner from the back, making each figure into an Everyman. If is a sentimental favorite, expertly repackaged here for today's fathers and sons.

"I'm Not Scared" insists Baby Owl in Jonathan Allen's newest offering of the same name. In this sequel to the humorous and satisfying I'm Not Cute, Baby Owl is out for a late-night stroll with his stuffed owl doll, Owly. He meets various animal friends who, upon seeing his frightened eyes, keep assuring him, It's only me . . . what are you doing out so late? Despite Baby Owl's raised, terrified eyebrows, he retorts, "I'm NOT scared! I'm an owl, and owls stay up all night!" When Papa finds his son, Baby insists that it's his doll Owly who is scared, and Papa knows just the right thing to do. He gives Owly and Baby Owl a big hug and a favorite story before tucking them into a warm bed. Your little Baby Owl will love this a perfect bedtime book.

Twenty-three years is a long time to wait for a poem to become picture book. In the case of Me I Am by Children's Poet Laureate Jack Prelutsky and illustrator Christine Davenier, it was worth the wait.

Though the self-esteem movement may have (thankfully) fallen on hard times, this poem, so clearly a product of that movement, is welcome and timely. Prelutsky's gift is for rhyming, rhythmic, easy-to-memorize poems that are unapologetically for children, especially very young children who will be hearing and memorizing the poems before they can actually read. And then, when the reading light bulb is turned on, these books become comfortable old easy-to-read friends.

"I am the only ME I AM / who qualifies as me; / no ME I AM has been before / and none will ever be." So opens this sparkling new offering for the youngest readers and lap listeners. Repeating the first stanza three times, we follow the exuberant lives of three youngsters. The first child is a roller-skating, goldfish-loving tomboy. Riding her tricycle and turning her nose up at a fancy dress, she is all energy. The second, a young naturalist, loves all things living. His tool of choice is a magnifying glass and his imagination. Small unframed pictures unfold within the larger story, comic book style, to tell the story of a lost bird, saved to a shoebox and cared for in its own homemade birdcage. (The reader also has the joy of seeing the cage being built too.) Last is a gentle African-American dancer, en pointe and in charge. Performing in her bedroom with her dog partner, this little ballerina, wearing a delicious green tutu and a fetching tissue box hat, is all joy.

The energetic watercolor illustrations, full of all the movement and happiness of a preschooler embarking on life, are classic Davenier. And once the youngster reads this over a few hundred times, perhaps parents and teachers will find some of her other fine books like Sally Jean, the Bicycle Queen and the wonderful beginning reader series, Iris and Walter, by Elissa Haden Guest.

I can imagine a kindergarten teacher reading this book on the first day of school and asking the students to illustrate the poem with pictures of their own talents and passions.

Robin Smith is a second-grade teacher in Nashville.

2008 Newbery Honor Book

Hope is the thing with feathers / that perches in the soul, / And sings the tune without the words, / And never stops at all

The words of Emily Dickinson, mixed with the exquisite, spare prose of Newbery-honor author Jacqueline Woodson, float through this gentle story like a feather. On one hand, this is a book about bullies and good girls and social and racial stratification. On the other, it is the story of a family holding itself together through many trials.

It's 1971 in an African-American urban school when a new boy arrives in Ms. Johnson's sixth-grade class. Like the snowflakes that have been falling for days on end, this boy is quiet and still and . . . white. Bully Trevor brings this obvious fact to everyone's attention, Don't no pale faces go to this school. You need to get your white butt back across the highway. And who is this new boy anyway? How does he know sign language when he isn't even deaf? His inner calm, his long hair and his old eyes earn him a nickname Jesus Boy. Samantha, a preacher's daughter and the best friend of our narrator, Frannie, starts to hope he really is Jesus.

Hope is the thing with feathers. Hope. That's what Frannie is supposed to have. She wants to hope for the future, but the past has been so difficult. She can almost remember the depression that followed the death of Lila, the baby who should have been her older sister. Pictures of the baby haunt her, and her mother's sadness about her subsequent failed pregnancies hangs as a backdrop in their home. But this is not a forlorn, hopeless family. Older brother Sean might be deaf, but Mama sees this as a minor setback, and shortly after Sean's birth, Mama and Daddy teach themselves sign language and tell Sean that he is lucky to be bilingual. This is an intact, strong family whose members love and support each other.

Even after reading this fast-paced novel twice, I find myself drawn back to the ideas that Woodson lays out here, in the words of Frannie: "Maybe Jesus is just that something good or something sad or something . . . something that stays with us and makes us do stuff like help Trevor even though he's busy cursing us out . . . Maybe Jesus is that hope you were feeling." I'm not sure myself. But I do know this book filled me with joy. And hope.

“My sweat smells like peanut butter.” So opens Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life, a moving, hilarious and altogether engaging tale of self-discovery by Wendy Mass. Jeremy and Lizzie are best friends and have been since they were one-year-olds. They have lived through the departure of Lizzie’s mother, who ran off with a Dakota cattle rancher, and the death of Jeremy’s father. They are friends in the almost-like-a-sibling sort of way and not, definitely not, in the I-have-a-secret-crush-on-you way. Their bedrooms share a wall between their apartments and they have been passing notes, getting into spats and bossing each other around for nearly 12 years.

When he is about to turn 13, Jeremy opens a package from his father, deceased five years earlier. Engraved on the box are the words, The meaning of Life: for Jeremy Fink to open on his 13th Birthday. The box has keyholes on four sides and an accompanying letter explains that the keys have been accidentally lost. Intrigued? Well, so are Jeremy and Lizzie. And, as you might imagine, they embark on a search for the mysterious missing keys and for the meaning of life.

Mass manages to create both a mystery and a universal story. And she does it with no hint of moralizing or pretension. The characters have believable quirks: Jeremy collects mutant candy, is fearful of using public transportation, prefers to stay in his house or neighborhood and is obsessed with junk food. Lizzie has a collection of accidentally found playing cards, likes adventure but lacks judgment, is used to taking care of herself and her father, and makes quick decisions. The adults in the story, from the mother and father to Jeremy’s plainspoken Grandma, are blessedly normal as well. They are busy, overextended and challenged by their lives as single parents. And everyone in this story is looking, in his or her own way, for the meaning of life.

Mass stays true to her characters and doesn’t wimp out on the ending. Jeremy does discover the meaning of life, and you will, too. This is an unforgettable book that you will want to give to someone the minute you reluctantly turn the final page.

Dexter is angry. His life has been turned upside down by circumstances way beyond his control. It is only his first day at his new school, but Dexter hates everything and everyone, from the janitor to the secretary to the kids and even his sunny, sparkly teacher, Ms. Abbott. He has arrived on the day when Ms. Abbott is introducing a writing project in which the children are asked to write about their lives and to work on the story for a whole month, just like real writers.

And so Dexter's classroom story begins with the words, "I'm the new kid. I am tuf." And later, "This morning I beat up a kid." It takes a while to find out all that Dexter is angry about, and it turns out he has a right to be upset. His father is awaiting a bone marrow donor in a hospital far away, in Seattle. His mother has no choice but to move fourth-grader Dexter from his home in Cincinnati to live with his grandmother in Bellgap, Kentucky.

Slowly, Ms. Abbott peels back the layers of anger that threaten to destroy young Dexter. She pushes his writing project forward and eventually the writing of his story allows him to connect with a new friend, examine his behavior and look to the future.

Margaret Peterson Haddix's light hand keeps this from being a treatise on confessional writing and allows it to be the story of a child who learns to forgive himself. She hints at something that is rarely included in a novel for early readers the idea of an unreliable character. Dexter's memory of beating up a boy in the bathroom is so vivid to him and the guilt he suffers because of his behavior is so deep that he is not able to remember it correctly. And when he discovers the truth, the reader will surely feel a sense of recognition.

There is a lot to this slim volume. Children who are dealt a challenging hand will find much to identify with in young Dexter.