From Story Time: Summer Week 9

Stories in the Park

By Lian Cho

New York: Katherine Tegen Books, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, 2023. Picture Book.

Presenting Olive Chen! The most magnificent and brilliant artist in the whole wide world! Her parents are also artists--serious artists--who paint prim, proper, perfect shapes. They know Olive has the talent to follow in their footsteps. But Olive likes to smear, splatter, splash, and even lick. With a brush in each hand, Olive cascades through town with her friends in tow, painting what she wants to, what she feels--until she reaches her parents' pristine art museum... --Publisher

Stories in the Park

I Feel Teal

Written by Lauren Rille

Illustrated by Aimee Sicuro

New York: Beach Lane Books, 2018. Picture Book.

Encourages the reader to enjoy all of the colors, representing feelings, that may be experienced in the course of a day. --Editor

Canopy Capers

Have You Ever Seen a Flower?

By Shawn Harris

San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2021. Picture Book.

A child experiences a flower by seeing its colors, smelling its fragrance, and imagining a tiny world within it. --Editor

Canopy Capers

The Last Rainbow Bird

By Nora Brech

Edinburgh: Floris Books, 2022. Picture Book.

Two children search for a unique endangered bird in this vibrant, hopeful story which joyfully celebrates difference. Unless Jo and Alex can find the last Rainbow Bird, its species will become extinct. Journeying by riverboat through a spectacular forest, the children find many extraordinary birds - elegant Underwater Birds, glowing Lamp Birds and excitable Big-to-Little Birds - but will they find the last Rainbow Bird? The singularly fabulous world of the Rainbow Bird, created by award-winning author-illustrator Nora Brech, is a riot of color, imagination, and wonder. Children will love the heartfelt and humorous story that gently conveys an important conservation message. --Editor

Book Babies

Library Babies

Written by Puck

Illustrated by Violet Lemay

Baltimore, MD: Duo Press, LLC, 2020. Board Book.

Here come the library babies, ready to give you a tour of their favorite local library! There's no place more magical than a library, where adventures can be had both inside the pages of a book and out. Here you can find hidden nooks for reading, encounter new worlds during story time, and take the big step of signing up for your very first library card. From puppet shows to getting to take out towering stacks of books to enjoy at home, this joyful board book teaches every child that through books and libraries, the possibilities are endless. And the fun doesn't end there: Library Babies includes oodles of activities and educational reading tips to help parents enjoy the book with their children over and over again! --Editor

Comments

Review: Alice with a Why

Alice with a Why By Anna James New York: Penguin, 2026. Fiction. 240 pgs. In 1919, in the aftermath of the first World War, Alyce is living with her grandmother in the English countryside. Her grandmother, also named Alice, tells Alyce (with a y) stories from her childhood adventures in a wonderful land filled with white rabbits and mad hatters. Alyce doesn't really believe the silly stories, she just misses her father who was killed in the war. One day, Alyce receives a mysterious invitation to tea, and subsequently falls into a pond where she is transported to Wonderland. Her grandmother, of course, is that Alice. Alyce is prompted by the Mad Hatter, Dormouse, and March Hare to seek out the Time Being and put an end to the war between the Sun King and the Queen of the Moon. Thus begins Alyce's adventure through Wonderland. I have a certain soft spot for the original story of Alice in Wonderland. It is one of my particular favorites and I often have a hard time reading new int...

Review: A Strange Thing Happened in Cherry Hall

A Strange Thing Happened in Cherry Hall By Jasmine Warga New York: Harper, 2024. Fiction. 211 pages. A painting has been stolen from the Penelope L. Brooks Museum and sixth-grader Rami Ahmed is worried he's the main suspect. His mother works at the museum as the lead custodian and Rami spends a lot of time hanging out at the museum while she works. On the day the painting went missing, the only people there were the security guard Ed, the cleaning crew, and Rami. Then, a mysterious girl appears in the museum. She floats around from room to room and only Rami can see her -- and she looks exactly like the girl from the missing painting. To prove his innocence and help figure out who the floating girl is, Rami partners up with an aspiring sleuth at school named Veda and the two dive into unexpected situations as they try to solve the mystery. This is a cozy mystery that is focused mostly on characters and ambiance and only a little on the mystery itself. Don't read this book if yo...

Review: The Factory

The Factory By Catherine Egan New York, NY : Scholastic Inc., 2025. Fiction. 306 pages. Thirteen-year-old Asher Doyle has been invited to join the Factory, a secretive research facility in the desert which ostensibly extracts renewable energy from the electromagnetic fields of its young recruits. But Asher soon realizes something sinister is going on. Kids are getting sick. The adults who run the Factory seem to be keeping secrets. And the extraction process is not only painful and exhausting, but existentially troubling. Asher makes a handful of new friends who help him with an investigation that turns into a resistance, which turns into...a cliffhanger! The Factory is a page-turning sci-fi with multidimensional characters, an intriguing plot, and refreshingly straight-forward writing. Egan weaves in detail about climate crises and social unrest, making the story's dystopian setting feel rich and plausible. With its sophisticated themes and accessible storytelling, I would recomm...

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