Books | Page 36 of 82

Reptoids From Space!, a goofy graphic novel for ages 6-11

A movie that sneaks under the audience’s or critic’s radar used to be called a sleeper. To an extent it still is, but movie marketing has become so bloated that it’s almost impossible to get something green-lit unless a sequel or two can be made from the initial idea. Sometimes, smaller is better, like taking a potentially complicated, cumbersome story and breaking it up into a dozen or so television episodes. I’m looking at you Eternals. Reptoids From Space! is a sleeper book in the Carlton Crumple Creature Catcher book series that sneaks up on you and is perfectly sized for eight-year-old hands.

Reptoids from Space also has the content, DIY sensibilities, humor, and flow that will keep grades three through early sixth grinning. It’s also an example of a case where the shape of the book adds to its enjoyment. The book is almost square and the smaller pages suit the pacing of the story. Had the pages been on a larger graphic novel format, they would’ve been too big and made the story feel forced.

Has your child read any of the Captain Underpants books? Even if they or you have glanced at any of the books or seen the show on Netflix you’re familiar with the comic books that George and Harold make. The style in those faux comic books is similar to Reptoids From Space!. The drawings are loaded with energy and have a look about them as if they’re being created by an actual elementary school student. ….Albeit, a very artistic and talented student, but one whose short attention and propensity to kid-friendly dinosaurs, monsters, and action take the front seat.

Reptoids From Space! is comfort reading for those elementary school students. Carlton Crumple has two adventures before this book and has established himself as quite the monster catcher. Carlton Crumple #3 starts out with him getting spooked by a scary movie on television. He looks out the window and sees a UFO. Because he’s done this before, he gives chase and ultimately catches them, only to realize that it’s a prank designed by his brother, and not a real one at all.

This lands Carlton in trouble, but only until a real UFO is spotted across town. This one is inhabited by real aliens who just want to capture their pet who has escaped. Unfortunately, their pet is a Reptodactyl, a giant, flying lizard who is just about to wake up from its very long nap.

Carlton teams up with two friends, hops on his flying sofa, and proceeds to hopefully save the day. There are many more subtle plot shifts and things that happen in the story that will have kids laughing along with it. They’ll laugh as they read it because Reptoids From Space is incredibly silly. Based on this book, the entire Carlton Crumple Creature Catcher graphic novel series, assuming the first two are like this, will be great for kids in second through fifth grade.

Some of those in that range won’t be able to read the onomatopoeias in the book, as well as, a handful of other words. If that’s the case then they’ll easily be able to follow the story based on the illustrations. The older readers in that range will be able to read all of the words and go to Reptoids From Space as graphic novel comfort food, or because they’re making their own comic book that’s akin to this. It’s in full color and is the (again) silly sort of graphic novel that some kids will pass around to their friends as they talk about who is most like whom in the book. If there was a middle-elementary school water cooler then they’d gather around, have milk coming out of their noses and goof about Carlton Crumple’s adventures also.

Carlton Crumple Creature Catcher, book 3, Reptoids From Space is by David Freemont and available on Pixel + Ink.

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No Se Permiten Elefantes, early Spanish learning awesome

My Spanish is very far from fluent. However, I speak enough Spanish to communicate with lower-grade elementary students. Having said that, I also believe the full-immersion is the best way to learn a language for most students. I’ve also taught ESL for four years and know that communicating in the language that you’re learning, even when it’s beyond your comfort level is beneficial. It’s with all of that in mind that I read, and had our 12-year-old middle school student read No Se Permiten Elefantes. He’s been studying Spanish for half a year and already has a solid vocabulary base under him.

No Se Permiten Elefantes is an illustrated book with a classic theme, great art and is now available in a Spanish translation.

Our Earth 2 Spanish dopleganger better find some cool books

A World of Wisdom, phrases that we know, in ways that we don’t

If upper elementary school polyglot students had a collection of bathroom books, then A World of Wisdom would be in every single one of them. The same could be said if those ages also had a coffee table in their living room for those coffee table books that people pick up when they want to make interesting, idle chatter. A World of Wisdom is an illustrated book that humorously shows the absurdity that some idioms mean to those who don’t speak their native tongue. As a former ESL teacher, I can 100% tell you that “it’s raining cats and dogs” is incredibly silly to Chinese students. They’ll gamely play along as they practice and try to master one of the more common idioms in English. However, every country on the planet has some phrase or idiom that uniquely states a condition with such precision that it leaves text 50 times as long for want.

A World of Wisdom takes the phrases that we know and show us that they exist everywhere in one shape or another.

Phrases that we know in ways that we don’t

The Dirt Book, a vertical, poetic look at a place we see, but don’t realize

When panoramic photography became a thing in the mid-90s I was a big fan and used it often. One day I was with some friends exploring a mountainous area and turned my panoramic camera so that I was using it in a portrait manner. This allowed the massive contrasts of the mountains to share some of the images with the depths of the river. The Dirt Book brings us back to that memory because it’s presented in vertical panoramas. That design, as well as, the exceedingly clever manner in which the poetry complements the art will bring young readers into a world that they see every day but don’t think about too often.

The Dirt Book is a poetic look at the ecosystem we walk on for ages five and up.

Dirt, panorama and poetry meet up for a good time

Odd Beasts proves that board books have a life past pre-K

Hello, little sponge of knowledge. Would you like some food? Board books speak to crawlers in a variety of ways. The vast majority of them are silly, building block-oriented books that teach colors, numbers, or the alphabet. It works like that in whatever language you’re learning, as a matter of fact, reading board or illustrated books, in a second language is a great way to learn vocabulary and some grammar. Odd Beasts: Meet Nature’s Weirdest Animals is a smart board book that’s meant for crawlers, aged two and up, but also goes north to those first and lower second grade students. For those of you keeping score, that’s a board book that can be interesting to young readers for five years, which is a massive spread in the Range Game on The Price is Right.

Odd Beasts: Meet Nature’s Weirdest Animals, introduces ages 2 and up to strange critters in a board book that demos through second grade.

A board book on odd Animals that demos past crawlers and into 2nd grade

The Bones of Ruin is big scope sci-fi with an alt-steampunk edge

The Bones of Ruin is a big book. It’s the thick kind of upper mglit book that starts with that age range, but demos north for some readers. This is a story whose scope of action grows with each chapter and new character introduction and mysterious ability that they have. Aside from having one of the coolest titles I’ve seen in ages, The Bones of Ruin comes across as a book that will make the rounds for high school kids as a smart, alternate history tale that could possibly lead to the apocalypse.

The Bones of Ruin is the first book in a series about an immortal girl, circus freaks and the end of the world in Victorian England.

A meaty book on social outliers, shady characters and the end

Pizazz, the hyperkinetic intersection of graphic novel and chapter book

What attracts an elementary school reader to a book? They might be assigned to read it, as in Because of Winn-Dixie, it’s a book their older sibling had, it’s a subject matter they’re interested in or it has that thing that speaks to ages seven and up. Pizazz has that thing. It has a pre-teen on the cover who’s wearing a cape with a star on it. She’s on a turquoise-colored cover that’s complimented with neon orange dots interspersed among the bubbled white explosion. That collision of colors and energy carries on into the book as Pizazz sets its sights on being one of those books that elementary students reach for.

Pizazz is book enough to please adults who want kids to ‘read’, yet illustrated enough for ages 7 and up to actually do so.

Manic energy in its illustrations, text and story young readers want to discover

Middle School Bites: Out For Blood is fun, mglit want-to-read-it, incarnate

Our 12YO read Middle School Bites: Out For Blood so quickly that I thought he was trying to distract me from something else. It’s not I thought he was lying, but he got the book on Friday and had read it by Tuesday. Combine that timeframe with middle school, LEGO, Scouts video games, and something didn’t add up. He told me the plot of Out For Blood, I then read it for myself and had a similar experience, except I read it two days quicker. Apparently, I need to play more video games, buy more LEGO sets, or otherwise engage my time, or maybe not.

A howling good delight for ages 9 and up…… way up