Allow me to introduce you to three children I have recently grown to adore. Well, two children and one pig, to be exact.Their names are Clementine, Ruby Lu and Mercy Watson, and I met them in the pages of the chapter books that bear their names.
Chapter books, for 7- to 10-year olds, bridge the gap between easy or beginning readers like Arnold Lobel’s Frog and Toad and relatively print-intensive middle grade novels. In the past decade, chapter book publication has boomed, as teachers and parents seek to satisfy the endless need for material for our newly independent and increasingly skillful readers. With the likes of Clementine, Rub, and Mercy in the mix, chapter book readers are guaranteed not only more choices, but more quality choices.
In Clementine, by Sara Pennypacker, we see one week in the life of a third grader whose understanding of the world, and the logic with which it operates, is often at odds with those of her parents and teachers. “Pay attention, Clementine!” her teacher says, when, Clementine claims, “I was the only one in the art room who was paying attention,” which explains how she can interrupt the Pledge of Allegiance to tell everyone that she noticed two grown ups kissing in the parking lot.
Clementine’s story is filled with good intentions and humorous misunderstandings. She is the child who is always in trouble, but only because she is trying to be helpful. When she is sent to the principal’s office and has to wait, she answers the phone and tries to take messages. When Margaret gets glue in her hair, Clementine is there with the scissors — and then the permanent markers — to give Margaret a sympathetic makeover. Of course, none of this goes over well with the adults in the story, but it is enormously successful for young readers who enjoy a good laugh. Further fun is found in a second book, The Talented Clementine.
I love Clementine for her unceasing energy, and her creative, if disruptive, solutions to problems, but I also love her for wanting, always, to do the right thing. Clementine wins our hearts by working very hard to be a force for good in the world, despite the mistakes she makes along the way.
The title character in Lenore Look’s Ruby Lu, Brave and True, is a Seattle girl through and through, with a long list of loves. Ruby loves her house on 20th Avenue South. She loves the rain. She loves the bus, her school, and the Beacon Hill Public Library. She loves reflective tape, her red cape, and magic tricks. Still, Ruby is not without challenges or wild ideas that go wrong. How can she get her baby brother to talk? Wouldn’t it be a nice surprise to drive herself to school so her mother doesn’t have to?
You can’t help but like Ruby right away, and sympathize with her in her moments of weakness. She is the child who insists, “I am a yellow-eyed tree frog,” and the one who doesn’t think mean Christina deserves any special attention when she is sick. Look infuses the adventures of this sparkling second grader with the many truths of childhood — and makes us smile every time.
Perhaps the funniest of the bunch, and the most irresistible, is award-winning writer Kate DiCamillo’s Mercy Watson, the buttered-toast loving pig whose personality shines on the pages of Mercy Watson to the Rescue, Mercy Watson Goes for a Ride, and Mercy Watson Fights Crime. Mercy is raised in the loving care of Mr. and Mrs. Watson, who tuck her in at night, take her for weekend rides, and prepare for her piles upon piles of hot buttered toast.
Though in some ways, Mercy lives the life of a human child, the humor in DiCamillo’s books lies in the ways in which Mercy is thoroughly and undeniably a pig. She doesn’t talk, she walks on all fours, and when her family thinks she is going off to seek help in a crisis, she is actually off to sniff out . . . what else? Buttered toast. Mercy’s obliviousness, and the way her innocent actions consistently create utter chaos and confusion are enough to keep young readers laughing themselves silly.
But wait, you say! These characters are all girls! Who are the boys we should be looking out for in chapter books? You certainly wouldn’t want to miss Suzy Kline’s new Herbie Jones series, for a fresh look at starting second grade, making friends, and having an older sister. Andy Shane is another favorite. For children who have just moved beyond easy readers, Jennifer Richard Jacobson’s Andy Shane and the Very Bossy Dolores Starbuckle shows one boy’s struggle to assert himself against the strong personality of his know-it-all classmate. Finally, in Margaret Peterson Haddix’s Say What? Brian and Reed Robinson band together with their little sister to cleverly undermine their parents’ attempts to get them to be better listeners. Their spy work and careful planning results in an entertaining, mixed up situation that the whole family must iron out together.
Galen Longstreth is currently enrolled in the MFA program in Writing at Vermont College. She received a Masters in Early Childhood and Elementary Education from the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, where she taught kindergarten for five years. She is a 1994 graduate of Mercer Island High School. She can be reached at glongstr@gmail.com.
