Next Month's Pick

Grace chose The One and Only Ivan for this month's read. She purchased it at her school's recent book fair and thought it would be a great choice for the group. 

Here is the Book's description from Amazon:

Ivan is an easygoing gorilla. Living at the Exit 8 Big Top Mall and Video Arcade, he has grown accustomed to humans watching him through the glass walls of his domain. He rarely misses his life in the jungle. In fact, he hardly ever thinks about it at all.

Instead, Ivan thinks about TV shows he’s seen and about his friends Stella, an elderly elephant, and Bob, a stray dog. But mostly Ivan thinks about art and how to capture the taste of a mango or the sound of leaves with color and a well-placed line.

Then he meets Ruby, a baby elephant taken from her family, and she makes Ivan see their home—and his own art—through new eyes. When Ruby arrives, change comes with her, and it’s up to Ivan to make it a change for the better.

Katherine Applegate blends humor and poignancy to create Ivan’s unforgettable first-person narration in a story of friendship, art, and hope.

Enjoy!

The Lemonade Crime Review

The Lemonade Crime is a continuation of the book The Lemonade War which our group read last month.  At the end of the first book in the series a crime takes place. Money was stolen from Evan who stole it from his sister who earned it selling lemonade. Evan's little sister Jessie is really mad because she worked really hard to get that money with her friend Meghan.

Jessie has a hunch of who took the money.  The suspect is Scott Spenser.  When the kids in school start talking about Scott's new X-Box 20/20 the siblings get mad. They are even more convinced it was him.  Jessie gets the idea to hold a trial to prove that Scott is the culprit. She organizes everything even the punishment. 

Ava really enjoyed the end of the book and how things were resolved. She was surprised at the verdict of the trial. The book didn't end how she thought and she liked that.
Grace really liked the part when the court was going on and everyone was all together on the playground and they were trying to figure out if Scott Spencer took the money or not.
Jordyn enjoyed the part when they were in line and Jessie accused Scott Spencer of taking Jessie's money. She was surprised the way Jessie spoke up to Scott because she was younger than him.
Copper's favorite part was when Jessie made Spenser sign the documents for the trial. It seemed funny for a little girl to be doing grown up things.

The ideas of kids running their own trial is unrealistic its likely that they would need adults to supervise.  but it was still neat to read about it.

Overall the girls preferred the first book in the series, The Lemonade War but would still recommend The Lemonade Crime to others,  and are even interested in reading the next book in the series The Bell Bandit as well as others in this series.

Both boys and girls will like this book because the main characters are a boy and girls. I think boys would like it because it has an X-Box in it and I know boys like X-Boxes. I also think girls would like it because a girl is one of the main character and the girl planned the trial.  

The Secret Zoo Review

Book Review By Ava

The Secret Zoo by Bryan Chick

This story is about a nine year old girl named Meghan who mysteriously disappears one night. After the commotion Noah, (Meghan's brother), asks his closest friends, Ella and Richie (The Action Scouts), to set out to look for her. They go through a whirlwind of adventure. That includes finding a secret zoo.

My favorite part of the story was when Ella, Richie, and Noah find the secret zoo when looking for Megan. They find it accidentally after finding clues left for them by the animals.

The main characters are Noah, Ella, and Richie. We also get to know some pretty cool animals from the secret zoo such as Podgy the penguin, Blizzard the polar bear, and Hot Dog-one of the many other prairie dogs. 

All three of them are adventurous and are always trying there hardest and never giving up.

In the story Meghan gets lost and Noah, Ella, and Richie try to find her.

This story is a chapter book.

There are no illustrations in this story. I think it really didn't need illustrations because it was so descriptive  and I could imagine being there.

I liked the story because it had mysteries, adventures, and made me laugh. 

Some parts made me laugh like when Noah took that crazy ride on podge

I think girls would like it and maybe some boys as well.

February's Pick

This month we will be reading The Lemonade Crime chosen by Ava. This is a follow up book to The Lemonade War  which the girls really liked last month. 

Here is a brief description from Amazon.com:

Just as The Lemonade War, which sold more than 260,000 copies, put business into the
hands of Evan and his younger sister, Jessie, this equally exciting follow-up puts the
law into their hands. Using the rules of our legal system as a guide, they turn the playground
into a courtroom and put Scott Spencer, alleged thief, on trial, with fourthgraders
serving as judge and jury.

Release date: April 3, 2012 | Age Level: 9 and up | Grade Level: 4 and up | Series: The Lemonade War Series (Book 2)

The Lemonade War Book Review

This month we read The Lemonade War written by Jacqueline Davies.

Jordyn was really glad she picked this book. She had never heard about this book before she stumbled upon it on the library shelves at our last meeting. 

The book is about a brother and sister named Evan and Jesse. They got along really well. Evan is going into fourth grade. Jesse is supposed to be going into third grade but skipped a grade and is now going into fourth grade too. Evan is disappointed that Jesse is going to be in his class.  Jesse wonders what's wrong... why is Evan being so mean to her all of a sudden? And now Evan isn't interested in doing a lemonade stand with her anymore either.

The trouble started when Evan had a lemonade stand with Scott Spencer and didn't include Jesse. The boys were doing really well and then they realized that the customers stopped coming. When they went around the corner they saw Jesse having a lemonade stand with a fourth grade girl named Meghan. He told Jesse that by the end of the week he would have enough money to buy an iPod. Still upset that Evan wasn't playing with her Jesse said she would have one hundred dollars by the end of the week too. That stared the Lemonade War. 

The rest of the book tells us about their crazy competition.

What is your favorite part?

Ava:  My favorite part is when Jesse tried to sabotage Evan's lemonade by adding a few surprises to it...

Jordyn: I don't really have a favorite part, I liked the whole book.

Cooper: I liked when the girls were doing their best to sell their lemonade by giving away free stuff. It didn't worked out the way they planned and the boys sold more.

Grace: I liked the part when the Lemonade War got started. It sounds like an friendly competition but it becomes more than that. 

Who do you think will like this book?

We think that both boys and girls would like this. It's the perfect age for us because we are in fourth grade. 

January's Book Choice

Next month we will be discussing The Lemonade War  as chosen by Jordyn.

Here is a brief description:

 

For a full hour, he poured lemonade. The world is a thirsty place, he thought as he nearly emptied his fourth pitcher of the day. And I am the Lemonade King.

 

Fourth-grader Evan Treski is people-smart. He’s good at talking with people, even grownups. His younger sister, Jessie, on the other hand, is math-smart, but not especially good with people. So when the siblings’ lemonade stand war begins, there really is no telling who will win—or even if their fight will ever end. Brimming with savvy marketing tips for making money at any business, definitions of business terms, charts, diagrams, and even math problems, this fresh, funny, emotionally charged novel subtly explores how arguments can escalate beyond anyone’s intent.

Age Level: 9 and up | Grade Level: 3 and up | Series: The Lemonade War Series

Turtle in Paradise

The story takes place in Key West in 1935. All of the girls in our group have been to Florida but only Cooper has been to Key West.  She told us about the amazing bridge that is super long and super tall bridge that takes you there.
Each girl took a turn giving us one sentence to describe what the story was about... 
We thought it would be scary to move from away from our moms.  We would miss them very much just like Turtle missed her mom. 

The story is about a 11 year old girl named Turtle that moves from New Jersey to the Florida Keys. Turtle's mom would love to get a big house and live together but because they are poor Turtle goes to live with here aunt. She is creative and finds ways to entertain herself in the new place.  This includes hanging out with her 3 boy cousins and their 2 friends.  She discovers things about here family she never knew and surprises herself with her how much she fits in and loves her new life.

What are your favorite parts of the story?

Cooper: I like when they were stranded on the island discussing what they would do with the treasure they found... one of them was going to by ice cream and lots of it.

Ava: On the island they really wanted to give up looking for lost treasure but they didn't.

Jordyn: When a hurricane  blew onto the island I didn't want to put the book down. It was so interesting. I couldn't wait to find out what came next.

Grace: Turtle discovers she has a family member she didn't know about it and then made a special connection with them.  The connection had to do with what they thought about Shirley Temple. 

This is a chapter book and was very easy to read. 

We thought this book could be read by boys and girls. The main character is a girl but there are boys in the book and they go on adventures together.  After talking about it a bit though we think the boys we know in the 4th grade would probably like to read other books more.