May 2016 – Page 2 – Reading Katie

RecoMonday: Lulu & the Brontosaurus by Judith Viorst

Remember Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day? That is an excellent book. My kids love it. And they love the other books in the series as well. (Though I just found out there is a 4th book about Alexander that came out in 2014; I’ve already put it on hold at the library.)

Well, the author of the Alexander books, Judith Viorst, has come up with another great series. This time it’s about a girl named Lulu and the books are slightly longer. Lulu wanders out into the forest and ends up finding a Brontosaurus, and the story that unfolds is quite entertaining.

I originally read this to my 6 year old son, who couldn’t wait to read it every night. So then I decided that it’d probably be a good chapter book for my 4 year old daughter to listen to as well. She still needs some pictures when we read and she really enjoyed it too.

I read Lulu and the Brontosaurus to them back in the fall, and then recently checked it out again so I could take a picture of it and recommend it. When Jane saw it today she told me that she wants to read it again.

So I’ll be reading this book for the 3rd time this week. You should check it out.

(We have read the other 2 Lulu books in the series and I don’t think they’re as good as this first one.)

Children Sports Books – Basketball

My boys’ favorite thing to do after school is to shoot hoops. So it’s no surprise that they love to read books about kids playing basketball. We found Matt Christopher books when my oldest son was in 1st grade and he immediately fell in love with them.

Over the past 4 years I have really built up our collection of Matt Christopher books. He writes about several different sports, but my boys’ favorites are the basketball and football stories.

Recently we’ve found a few new series that the boys love so I wanted to share them.

Amar’e Stoudemire (or a ghost writer) has started this series of stories about Amar’e growing up. My 5th grader is desperate to be able to dunk in 6th grade just like Amar’e did in the book. Good luck with that, Blake!

I also found this Super Hoops series by Hank Herman that Clark, my 4th grader, thinks is better than sugar cereal. My library doesn’t even have the whole series, so we’ll have to start scouting around for them at Goodwill.

Do your kids like to read sports books? Let me know what other good books are out there.

RecoMonday: The War that Saved My Life by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley

My RecoMonday for this week is a recent Newbery Award Winner. I read it in 2 days and could barely put it down. The chapters are quick and short and leave it easy to keep reading.

Ada is a 9 year old girl who has never left her apartment. Her mother is too embarrassed about her twisted foot. She’s never been to school and everyone in town thinks there is something wrong with her mentally, but when all the kids are shipped out of town because of the war, Ada decides to sneak off with her little brother.

The story that unfolds is just excellent. One of the best books I’ve read in a while. The characters were real and Ada is a delightful girl who learns to trust others and herself. Bradley’s writing was superb. This book definitely deserves that gold sticker.

It was in the tween section at my library, but would still be a great book for an adult book club. I gave it to my 11 year old son to read when I was done and he started ravenously reading it as well. Recommended as a read-aloud for ages 8+, or as a great book for any adult to read.