Children’s Notes

From easy reader and chapter book series to epic fantasies, favorite characters, settings and story lines reemerge in new additions. Young readers will welcome the return of Mo Willems’s pessimistic pachyderm and spirited pig. In There Is a Bird on Your Head! Gerald the elephant despairs over a family of birds that nests atop his cranium, while Piggie is delighted. And in I Am Invited to a Party! party expert Gerald helps Piggie prepare for all possibilities, as they get dressed for a fancy party, pool party and costume party—all at the same time. (Hyperion, $8.99 each 64p each ages 4-8 ISBN 978-142310686-9; -142310687-6; Sept.)

Sprightly narrator Grace, introduced in Charise Mericle Harper’s Just Grace (“a good choice for kids just beginning to tackle chapter books,” wrote PW) returns in Still Just Grace. This time Grace is faced with the possibility of losing her best friend to a new neighbor and being stuck working on a school project with the “Big Meanie.” (Houghton, $16 160p ages 6-10 ISBN 978-0-618-64643-2; Sept.)

Lauren Child’s spunky heroine is back in her third novel, Clarice Bean, Don’t Look Now. When Clarice learns that her best friend is about to move away, not even “The Ruby Redfort Survival Handbook” (written by Clarice’s favorite girl-detective) seems to help. (Candlewick, $15.99 256p ages 8-11 ISBN 978-0-7636-3536-7; Sept.)

The cast of characters from what PW called the “charming and compelling world” created in Travels of Thelonious, the first book of the Fog Mound series, is back in Faradawn by Susan Schade, illus. by Jon Buller. With new friends in tow, Thelonius, Fitzgerald, Olive, Brown and more set out in hopes of discovering what exactly happened to the humans. (S&S, $15.99 208p ages 8-12 ISBN 978-0-689-87686-8; Sept.)

Jumper, from Sharon Robinson’s Safe at Home, settles into his new school in Harlem, runs for class president and tries to raise enough money to start a basketball team for his school in the sequel, Slam Dunk! (Scholastic Press, $16.99 160p ages 9-12 ISBN 978-0-439-67199-6; Sept.)

The Heir of Mistmantle by M.I. McAllister, illus. by Omar Rayyan, joins the Mistmantle Chronicles (which PW said “may appeal to fans of the Redwall series”). Here, the newborn princess Catkin disappears as a mysterious illness threatens the island. (Hyperion/Miramax, $17.99 320p ages 8-12 ISBN 978-0-7868-5490-5; Sept.)

In The Tiger’s Egg by Jon Berkeley, illus. by Brandon Dorman, the second of the Wednesday Tales, a new circus comes to town, bringing with it the possibility that Miles’s father is still alive. Miles and Little also seek out the titular artifact, a stone that supposedly contains a tiger’s soul. (HarperCollins/Julie Andrews, $16.99 416p ages 8-12 ISBN 978-0-06-075510-2; Sept.)

Audrey Penn’s Blackbeard and the Gift of Silence, the third in the Blackbeard Quartet, tells of an ancient pirate treasure stolen from Westminster Abbey as well as mysteries and secrets involving pirates, Knights Templar and more. (Tanglewood, $15.95 332 p ages 8-12 ISBN 978-1-933718-11-8; Sept.)

In The Empress’s Tomb, the second in Kirsten Miller’s Kiki Strike series, the Irregulars take on enemies new and old, across and underneath Manhattan; their unexpected encounters take in giant squirrels and an ancient Chinese empress. (Bloomsbury, $16.95 350p ages 10-14 ISBN 978-1-59990-047-6; Oct.)

Tom Ward returns in Night of the Soul Stealer by Joseph Delaney, illus. by Patrick Arrasmith, in the Last Apprentice series (in a starred review, PW called the first book a “tantalizingly creepy tale of solitude and sorcery”). Tom and the Spook travel to the Spook’s winter house, where they contend with a host of otherworldly foes, including one of the Spook’s former apprentices. (Greenwillow, $16.99 512p ages 10-up ISBN 978-0-06-076624-5; Sept.)

Extras wraps up Scott Westerfeld’s Uglies series. In this fourth outing, life has become an enormous digital reality show—a constant competition for attention and fame; against this backdrop, an unpopular 15-year-old “extra” stumbles upon an under-the-radar group called the Sly Girls and risks a perilous path to celebrity. (Simon Pulse, $16.99 432p ages 12-up ISBN 978-1-4169-5117-9; Oct.)

A boy revels in firehouse culture in My Mom Is a Firefighter by Lois G. Grambling, illus. by Jane Manning. The narrator, Billy, describes the life of a firefighter, as he watches his mother and her colleagues (Billy’s “firehouse uncles”) keep the fire truck clean, take turns with chores at the station, give a fire safety presentation and, of course, fight fires. Accessible text and cheery full-bleed illustrations ably combine to capture the unique life of a firefighter. (HarperCollins, $16.99 32p ages 4-8 ISBN 978-0-06-058640-9; Sept.)