Book Review: Space Dog and Roy (delightfully funny and creative children's book)

Space Dog and Roy, by Natalie Standiford (Avon Books, 1990, 74pp, ages 7-9, grades 2-3)

Boy Wants Dog. Dad is Allergic. Boy Gets Dog.

Isn't that always the way it works when one has children? 

But this dog is no ordinary dog, but something else in disguise with a name that describes it all. Space Dog was sent from outer space (Tzaxette on Queekrg to be exact) to learn about humans and has a hard time learning from his human, Roy, how to be a dog. But first, Space Dog must repair the engine in his spacecraft.

Space Dog, whose real name is Qrxztlq, would rather read the newspaper that he brings in ("Good Dog!") and would rather eat pizza than dog food from the floor. As for wearing a collar and walking on a leash, forget it! He wants to wear clothes and sleep in the top bunk and thinks it's silly to walk on all fours. And, he most certainly does not want to pick up a tennis ball in his mouth that another dog had slobbered on!

But I digress. Roy is being bullied at school by Stanley. And so the plot thickens. 

What does a boy's best friend have to do with a bully? Read the book to find out! But first, be ready to laugh!

Book Review: Dog Diaries - Mission ImPAWsible (the dog wrote it!)

Dog Diaries: Mission ImPAWsible, byJames Patterson (Jimmy Patterson Books - Little, Brown and Company, 2020, $9.99, 192pp, hardcover, book 3 in a series of 7)

The Dog Does it Again!

Writes the book, I mean. And cleverly, to boot! Junior, dog, lives with his furless pet human friend, his sister Jawjaw (Georgia) and Mom-Lady and goes on and on about his antics. One day he translates that the family is going on vacation to Hollywood which causes Junior no end of excitement when he hears he is going too. And later, the rest of the dog neighborhood. 

What transpires is dreams of making it big in Hollywood and the excitement is palpable.

Until the big day comes and results in vegetables galore until finally the dogs come home and make Junior's kennel (house) their own, redecorating it at will.

Creative Vocabulary

Jawjaw had me perplexed until I read the glossary in the back. Other words-at-play or misconstrued include picture box, comfy squishy thing, food room, sleep room, and chatty-ear-stick (we missed this one) and more. Fortunately the reader will find a guide to Doglish in the back of the book, along with a word search and a maze.

However, the creativity became a little contrived about a third of the way in and resorted to slap-stick humor. Your middle-school reader will love it and may just read the book as fast as he can turn the pages. Fortunately, there are six more in this series of dog books.

Book Review: Dog Tags, Prisoners of War (WW2 medic, Nazi dog, YA novel)

Dog Tags: Prisoners of War, by Alexander London (Scholastic, $5.99, 2012, 182 pp, book 3 of 4*) Review by Skye Anderson

Man's Best Friend Goes to War 

But the dog in this case is a Nazi. Can our young American serviceman turn the dog around, befriend him and use him to locate wounded American POWs during a forced relocation in Belgium during World War II**? Can a dog really change sides? Can he be trusted?

Here we have two enemy soldiers (one, a canine), and one uneasy alliance.

Our hero is a young US Army soldier from New Mexico who enlisted at age 17 and became a medic. On his first day in battle, he is separated from his unit during the Battle of the Bulge in Ardennes and sees plenty of action - and blood - and death - and fear. He believes he is a coward without a rifle (medics didn't carry weapons). He teams up with the dog but neither one truly trusts the other.

Luckily, our team also teams up with some Resistance fighters and plots to free the Americans but can our soldier find his courage at last?

Writing Style

Author Alexander London has penned an exciting (not too scary but a bit sad) fast-reading book with several gems like "It was like that whine said everything anyone needed to know about war." (p 33, when the Nazi dog realizes his SS handler is dead.)

Remember cliffhangers? Those single sentences at the end of a chapter that make you turn the page to the next chapter? Cliffhangers abound.

Next: Dog Tags - Strays

*Semper Fido and Divided We Fall

**This is WW2 which ended in 1945 regardless of the author extolling the virtues of the US Air Force and its role in this story, even though the Air Force was not created until 1947. Someone please tell London.

Book Review: AfterMath (middle school. dealing with grief) (OT)

AfterMath, by Emily Barth Isler (Carolrhoda Books, 2021, $17.99, 272 pp, grades 5-8, ages 11 and up)

A mass shooting incident in their classroom four years earlier. . . . 

The Perfect Title

AfterMath: What happens after Math class for Lucy? What does aftermath mean in this story - does it always mean that which happens after an unpleasant event? 

The Cover

Lucy is in a classroom with empty chairs in a hodge-podge circle, moving toward the reader. Above her we see a sphere, angles and triangles probably ascending, and the infinity symbol (a theme which plays a major role in the story). Bright sunlight is streaming into the classroom, creating shadows, and the colored triangles, although triangles, remind one of balloons or kites (round or angular or both at the same time).

The Flow

Author Emily Isler has that rare gift for a first-time author, for putting the reader smack dab into the midst of her story. She doesn't tell us what happens - she shows us what happens. We are there. We are the girl, and the mother, and the father. Being a story teller with a background in acting, Isler encompasses in AfterMath three to four months in the life of a seventh-grade girl, new to the town and her school, where, four years previously a shooting incident occurred and is still constantly on everyone's mind. Lucy herself experienced the death of her younger brother just a few months ago but there are more differences than similarities there. Or are there?

Isler's style is melodic, flowing, rhythmic yet reminiscent of under-the-surface tragedy and dealing with the grief that remains. How it can appeal to both the middle school set and to adults is something she must have worked hard and long to create.

We  would have read it in one sitting if night had not come too early, so we finished it the next day. Along the way, we found it a bit too drawn out and we wondered how it would end - would it tie all the loose threads together and would everyone live happily ever after? We simply could not imagine how. . . . 

It's Cool to Be Mathy!

Each chapter starts with a math problem (and solution) but some seem a bit difficult for a seventh-grader and we were amazed at the fact she loved all the subsets of math, even geometry where you  must prove things that seem obvious!

Not only is our Lucy 'mathy' but she is also a good, true friend and a normal middle-school girl with her first crush on a boy. She befriends a girl that others shun and also has a wise side - perhaps too wise to be believable for her age but we also see her foibles. Nevertheless, we all learn from Lucy as she learns from her math teacher, from her after-school mime class, and from her classmates.

It's hard to believe that 'mathy' people can be fun or even funny but Lucy receives math jokes from someone unknown. She writes math jokes in return and we are surprised to find out who it is and why he/she started the tradition. You may find it hard to believe there actually are math jokes but you will have fun with them! (What kind of meals do math teachers eat? Square ones!)

Comparing Math With Life?

Author Isler has penned a unique award-winning novel for middle-schoolers, telling them that "Math Can Be Cool" and that friends and family can help us get over a traumatic event, even a shared trauma if we give it enough time and space. Our Lucy is both a 'mathy' person and a liberal arts person who finds she is also good at mime but especially good at being kind and honest and a friend. She is not only one of us but she is all of us. I can't wait for Isler's next book.

And, did you know Emily Barth Isler was a speaker at Columbia, Maryland's 2023 Books in Bloom? She was born and raised here in the Village of Hickory Ridge - perhaps you even know her from school!

Book Review: I Survived the Eruption of Mount St. Helens, 1980 (girl, twin boys, volcano)(OT)

I Survived the Eruption of Mount St. Helens, 1980, by Lauren Tarshis (Scholastic Books, 2016, 112 pages, $4.99, ages 7-11, grades 2-5), book 14 of 23 historical disaster books for kids. Fiction books in non-fiction settings. Reviewed by Skye Anderson.

Make History Come Alive!

Author Lauren Tarshis literally does make history come alive for kids by placing a child (or two, or three) smack dab into the middle of a historical event where they just might become heroes.

Perhaps you do remember the eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington? Ash slowly moved across the country and 350 miles away in Spokane, my mother thought it was snowing in May! (I, however, was in South East Asia in 1980 and was weeks late to hear the news.)

The Plot

Jessie and the Rowan twin boys were best friends. Two years earlier when Jessie's dad died, the boys were there for her and they became like the Three Musketeers.

Here we have 11-year olds being caught in a volcanic eruption but Jessie saves the day and even gets to ride in a helicopter.

The kids go hiking and fishing on Mount St. Helens when the twins' dad can take them in his truck and drop them off. Jessie grabs her (deceased) dad's camera to take pictures of Skeleton Woman but leaves the camera behind in an old cabin they discover and is afraid to tell her mother. 

For about two months, the mountain spews forth steam along with numerous small earthquakes, then seems to settle down until one day it doesn't. What that day brings will make a memorable story - but true, at least the factual part of the book. Jessie and friends are fabricated, however, and their adventures are, as well.

Science Sneaks into the Story

Author Lauren Tarshis manages to sneak in a lot of facts about volcanoes that are part of the story so the young reader is not aware she (or he) is actually learning some science. And, as in all the Survived books, the author speaks in a few pages at the end of the book and also answers questions about volcanoes and gives some suggested resources.

The First Survived Book Starring a Girl!

Although girls are often in books 1-13, Mount St. Helens is the first book to feature a girl star and on the cover and it's about time. Author Tarshis explains that she has written the series for her own children, all boys, but finally succumbed to the pressure of her girl readers. And we are so glad she did!

Other Great Books in the Series

I Survived the Bombing of Pearl Harbor, 1941

I Survived the Nazi Invasion, 1944

Book Review: I Survived the Nazi Invasion, 1944 (a boy and his sister hide and fight in the forest)(OT)

I Survived the Nazi Invasion, 1944, by Lauren Tarshis (Scholastic Books, 2014, 112 pages, $4.99, ages 7-11, grades 2-5), one of 23 historical disaster books for kids, book nine in the series. Fiction books in non-fiction settings. Reviewed by Skye Anderson.

What can be more interesting, intriguing, spell-binding than history told through the eyes of the children who lived it? 

Max and his little sister Zena survive in a Jewish ghetto but manage to escape from the Nazis in 1944 and stay with partisans in the forest. They meet up with their beloved aunt and then. . . the bombs fall.

Author Lauren Tarshis has done it again: told a story set in true times, in a true place but with kids from her imagination. Feeling a bit scared, the reader is saved by the author telling only one small segment of the long war and ending in 1947. In some books, she will begin with the event but then spend a few chapters in the lead-up.

What Would I Change?

Like so many other books, this reviewer would prefer to have the chapter titles in words not merely numbers. For example, "Sabotage" or "Plotting with Maps" rather than just Chapter 7. This would make for a more memorable book but, nevertheless, all books in the series are simply exciting. (And, educational!)

Other Books

I Survived Mount St. Helens

I Survived the Bombing of Pearl Harbor

Book Review: Laying Down the Paw (woman K-9 police dog handler, murder mystery with a bit of romance)

Laying Down the Paw: Paw Enforcement Series, Book 3* of 10, by Diane Kelly (Minotaur Books, 2015, 368 pp, $7.99) Review by Skye Anderson

Dog Knows it All

It took a few pages but then I couldn't "lay it down." Laying Down the Paw was an attention-grabber with a dog as a know-it-all and a human who has to be confronted with clue after clue - but then even this reviewer was surprised, pleasantly, by the ending which I didn't expect but came to realize was the only way this tale could end. All the loose ends were tied up quickly and to my satisfaction.

The Plot

Megan is a rookie police officer, in her first year on the Ft. Worth police force, and bucking for detective but currently a K-9 handler of Brigit, a German Shepherd Dog, who, being a dog, knows who the bad guys are right from the start but who wait patiently for the humans to catch on. (I know, usually rookie cops don't get K-9s and, to the picky reader, other discrepancies** abound but do not detract from this very good read).

Megan writes some chapters, dog Brigit writes others and Dub, a young teen in trouble writes yet others and how and when they all intersect make for one incredible yet credible tale.  Megan (and dog) survive a hailstorm that quickly morphs into a tornado and then looting which is how they meet Dub the first time. And how Megan gets out of a standoff with four bad guys (looters) with guns is told the only way it could have happened.

Toss in a Little Romance (and Drugs and Crime, of Course)

Enter Seth, also a first responder, but a firefighter, and his dog Blast. . . and two teens from different sides of the tracks. . . .

Too Much and Not Enough

The number of incidents and situations that are almost believable but not to the astute reader can be overlooked but the intricate plot which leaves the reader not only guessing but perhaps perplexed as to how it all will end - who will be killed, if anyone? Because that is the only way this reviewer could think of to end it all. But I was wrong! (I wonder, if I read more murder mysteries, if I will be able to foresee the endings eventually and, if I do, if it will spoil the read for me.)

There are subtleties that make one wonder if this is the first book in a series but hoping not. One clue is the numeral 3 on the cover. When I finally realized this is part of a series, I was of two minds: 1. ) I'd love to read the others, or even just one and 2.) I wonder if another Diane Kelly book could be as good as Laying Down the Paw. I didn't want to find out, in case I was disappointed.

------------

*Bending the Paw

Paw of the Jungle

The Long Paw of the Law

Enforcing the Paw

Above the Paw

Against the Paw

Upholding the Paw

Paw and Order

Paw Enforcement

**like being able to, in between patrol calls, be requested to help the female detective assigned to this major case