KidPages: The Deductive Detective by Brian Rock

You may have noticed that I've been reading a lot of books about education lately. (Some have even approached me, wondering if I'm getting ready to jump on the homeschooling bandwagon. In case you've been wondering, too: Not yet, but it never hurts to be prepared.) Anyway, everything I've been reading has stressed the importance of letting the child be in control of his own education; let him decide what he wants to learn and when he wants to learn it and how much of it he wants to learn.

This type of parenting and teaching takes a great amount of energy and creativity. I don't think I'm quite cut out for it. But luckily, my kids love books, and as long as they continue to love them, there will always be a way for them to learn what they want to know. (Why, just the other day I checked out a fabulous book all about worms because Aaron is currently spending hours a day digging them up.)

Besides a vast number of nonfiction titles to satisfy my children's ever-growing curiosity, there are also many, many fictional stories out there that include some kind of educational spin. The Deductive Detective is one such kind of book. Published by Sylvan Dell (an educational company), I was expecting it to include some science or math concepts, and I was not disappointed.

The book begins with an urgent phone call to Duck: one of the cakes is missing from the cake contest! Duck rushes over to find Fox crying over the disappearance of her beautiful cake. Duck begins to look over the suspects: there are 12 other cake decorators present, so the thief must be one of them. Slowly, Duck begins eliminating suspects: Mouse is too small to make off with such a big cake, Rooster was busy waking everyone up when the cake was stolen, etc. Eventually, he's down to one last suspect who turns out to, indeed, be the (hungry) cake thief!

The educational spin I was talking about came in the form of deductive reasoning and subtraction. At times, it felt a little contrived, like you could tell you were supposed to learn to use logic and subtraction, but honestly, most fictional/educational hybrids I've read felt like they were written for one angle or another.

My boys love this kind of book where they get to look for clues, make guesses, and figure things out. Most of the premises and subsequent conclusions made sense to my 3- and 4-year-olds: they could understand that, of course, the thief couldn't have been Swan because Duck had found an incriminating strand of hair, and Swans don't have hair. The only one that was too much of a stretch for me was Horse, who is freed from suspicion after they see that the lights are off in the kitchen. They conclude that it couldn't have been Horse because he's "not a dark horse." This didn't make any sense to the boys, and frankly, not much to me either.

The subtraction part was fun, especially for my 4-year-old, who has recently been doing a lot of addition and subtraction in his head. The story begins with 12 suspects, and each time one is eliminated, the results are given: 12 - 1 = 11. I think my only problem with this was just that we started with 12, which made the story feel really long. However, the book is geared for ages 3-8, so even though 12 was a little bit high of a countdown for my 3-year-old, it probably helps make it more interesting for the older crowd.

There are quite a few puns and slapstick-type jokes scattered throughout the story.  For example, Detective Duck realizes that the thief couldn't be Tiger because they found some hand prints on the windowsill, and Tigers have paws, not hands. Tiger says, "And I have claws on my paws...That's why I always bake from scratch." Of course, I caught the joke, but it was more eye-rolling than funny to me, and the humor went right over my kids' heads. I explained some of the jokes to them, but mostly I found them distracting and silly.

The illustrations were satisfactory. I would have liked a few more details in places (like a hand print on the windowsill when that's being discussed), but overall they were engaging and fun and went well with the story.

While this maybe was not our favorite picture book of all time, it did what it set out to do. My expectations were well-placed, and I wasn't disappointed or surprised. It taught new skills in an engaging way, and even if it sometimes felt like it was written for the sole purpose of teaching deductive reasoning, it did teach it, and it was fun in the process.

Along with this review, I had the opportunity to ask the author, Brian Rock, a few questions. I hope you enjoy getting to know him!

Q: Where did you get the idea for The Deductive Detective?

A: The Deductive Detective was inspired by my daughter's BFF snuggle buddy, Quacky. I wanted to write a story for them both, but wanted to try to avoid the usual duck themes that had already been done in stories like Make Way For Ducklings and Little Quack. So I started doing some word associations with duck, which led to deductive, which of course led to a detective.

Q: The story includes a lot of puns and other funny lines. Do you enjoy telling jokes in real life?

A: I probably enjoy telling them more than my friends and family enjoy hearing them, but yes. In fact, I used to do a little stand up comedy when I lived in Roanoke, VA (and boy are my legs tired!).

Q:  What made you decide to become a writer? Have you always enjoyed writing? Tell us about something you wrote as a kid.

A: I've wanted to be a writer from as early as I can remember. I think the first time I realized that I could write or say something that would make someone else laugh, I was hooked.When we used to go on family trips, I would take a notepad and write my own comics and jokes and riddles. The earliest I can remember was about third or fourth grade when I wrote a series of comics about a dog, a cat, and a mouse that went on a trip to the moon. I haven't checked in a while, they may be there still!

Q: Did you like reading when you were a child? What was your favorite book?

A: I loved reading. My family moved around a lot as I was growing up so I was always "the new kid." Books and music became some of my closest friends.Some of my favorite books when I was younger were Ferdinand the Bull, Winnie the Pooh, Harold and the Purple Crayon and The Phantom Tollbooth.

Q: What is your favorite picture book (besides your own, of course!)?

A: When I was younger my favorite picture book was Ferdinand the Bull, because I think I related with that character that doesn't quite fit in with others' expectations. Of more recent picture books, I'm a huge fan of the whole Pigeon series by Mo Willems. I'm amazed at how much emotion he can pack into so few words.

Q: Besides writing, what else do you like to do?

A: I also write Country songs with my friends in the group Family Reunion (http://www.familyreunioncountry.com/) Our debut album, Family Album won the 2012 ICMA award for album of the year. I also enjoy playing football in a rec league with my friends. I enjoy cooking with my wife, and of course reading with my daughter.

Q: Do you have any tips for reluctant readers?

A: Explore! If you keep looking, I guarantee you'll find something interesting to read about.

But mainly, my advice is for parents of reluctant readers - let them choose what they want to read. The more interested they are in a story, the more likely they are to read it. Try to avoid that "you need to read this" or the "you ought to read that" mindset. Let kids discover themselves in the books they choose. I know a good one about a duck detective I can recommend!

I received a copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All opinions and thoughts are my own.

Four Facts for Friday (5)

A fact about our transportation: Remember how our car got run into? Well, while I was in Colorado with the boys, Mike found a good deal on a Honda Odyssey. It is far from new, but we love it anyway (we christened it Fern). Somehow it makes me feel more like a real mom, driving my van around with my three kids in the back.

Another fact about our transportation: Tonight I was going to go over to our church to practice the organ, but I couldn't get the doors on the van to unlock. For some reason, we can't open the locks with the key (either there used to be a different key for the locks or the locks were changed...one of those mysteries that comes with buying a used vehicle). Anyway, the battery on the van was dead, which was why the key fob wasn't unlocking it. The problem was we couldn't unlock the car so we couldn't open the hood so we couldn't hook up jumper cables so we couldn't restart the car. Urgh. There's nothing more frustrating than trying to (unsuccessfully) break into your own car. (I'm speaking for Mike here.)

A fact about my reading speed: Last month after reading my speed reading book, I said that by March I'd like to be reading 600 words per minute. Well, here it is March, and I am not reading that fast. Based on the book, it should be fairly easy to get up to 600 wpm. Based on my personality and obsessive compulsive habits (like rereading any sentence I don't understand), not so much. I'm still working on it, and I am faster, but I'm not as fast as I want to be.

A fact about our future: Things are starting to pick up and get a little bit exciting! After years of Mike being in school, graduation is finally on the horizon. This week, he had a job interview, and next week, he has another one. I've been waiting for these decisions for so long, and turns out, now that they're finally here, they are kind of stressful. (But mostly just exciting.)

Maxwell's Preschool: P is for Penguin

When I realized that my turn to teach Maxwell's preschool would fall on the letter P, I had a hard time deciding what to focus on. Puppies? But I did dogs when I taught the letter D. Pears? I didn't think I could plan an entire preschool around one piece of fruit. Planets? Would a three-year-old be able to grasp what a planet was?

I finally decided on penguins because then I could talk about Antarctica at the same time and easily incorporate some shapes and numbers activities.

I always like to use a book for the basis of my lesson plans. I read through a huge stack of penguin books before deciding on A Penguin Story by Antoinette Portis (with a close runner-up in Penguin and Pinecone by Saline Yoon, which I also really love).

Edna is a penguin. Every day she sees lots of blue, black and white. While the other penguins enjoy swimming, sliding, and eating, Edna dreams of something more. What that is, she's not exactly sure, but she knows there has to be something besides blue, black, and white. Then one day, she sees it: a bright orange something flying in the sky. She follows it and discovers she was right! There is more than blue ocean, black night, and white snow. After visiting the orange scientists (for that is who was in the orange airplane), Edna continues wondering, "What else is there?"

I love this book because it teaches kids to ask questions and to look beyond their own sphere of knowledge. There is more to discover! More to learn! More to experience! The book doesn't encourage kids to be discontented but just to always be on the lookout for new things.

I also love the illustrations. They start out pretty neutral (blue, black, and white), so when the orange airplane enters, it really pops out of the page. The penguins are blocky and simple, and the detail is minimal. Also, the text, while expressing some pretty big ideas, is pretty sparse, leaving a lot up to implication and the reader's imagination.

So after I'd decided to use this book for preschool, I thought, Why not make it into a flannel board story? (You must remember how much I love cutting stuff out of felt.)

So I did, and even though it didn't translate to felt quite as well as I was hoping it would, I still used it with the kids, and they seemed to enjoy it.

First I created an entirely new back drop for my flanne lboard:

This involved a lot of cutting and piecing together (and sorry, I used some gray for the mountain, but the book used gray also, so I figured it was legal).

 Edna off looking for "something": she sees the orange plane.

Edna makes the long trek over the mountain and finds the camp of the scientists. She is mesmerized by all the orange. (I know the proportions are off, but I wanted to keep Edna as the star.)

Edna goes back home, gets a few friends (by necessity, they had to be small friends :-)) and brings them back. As the scientists pack up, one of them gives an orange glove to Edna to keep as a memento.  She likes to wear it on her head.

When she gets back home, she wonders what she might discover tomorrow (as a green ship begins making its way onto the page).

I don't know what it was that made me not love the way this turned out...maybe I tried to include too many details? or too few? or Edna was too big for the board? or the mountain took up too much room? It's maybe just one of those stories that isn't meant to be told on a flannel board.

At any rate, I read the book to the children first, then reenacted it with the board, each of them getting a turn to put on one of the pieces, and it was a fun way to remember the story.

After the story, we went downstairs where I'd set up an Iceberg Number Walk (or feel free to think up a different name, if you like). Besides the letter P, we were also focusing on the number 16. I've noticed that the children have a difficult time comprehending the bigger numbers ("bigger" meaning anything past 10).

So I was hoping that by spreading all the numbers out in a path across the floor, they would not only get a visual idea for how many 16 is, but also get some practice navigating the ever-troublesome "13, 14, 15."

The way we played was like this: I taped 16 icebergs to the floor with a number written on each one. Each child pretended he or she was a penguin and hopped or walked from iceberg to iceberg. We took turns, so while one child was walking, the other ones were chanting out the numbers.

To mix it up a little bit, I put a goldfish cracker on one of the numbers each time. This brought some individual attention to actual numbers, and the kids loved pretending they were penguins eating fish. (Yes, they ate their fish each time! I think it was clean enough!)

Next we had a snack. I couldn't come up with a good penguin snack, so I just went with the letter P, and we ate popcorn and pears. 

We did spend a little time talking about the kinds of food penguins eat, so we pretended the popcorn was krill and the pears were fish. 

After that, the kids made their own penguins. I found this adorable Circle Penguin Craft at Reading Confetti. (I think this is also where I first came across A Penguin Story since Lori paired this craft with that book. Two great finds!)

I cut out all of the circles ahead of time. But I wanted to give the kids a little bit of cutting practice, so I traced an extra circle onto a piece of paper for each of them. I figured if it turned out, they could use it in place of one of my circles, but if it didn't turn out, they would still have enough circles for the picture.

The kids loved gluing the circles onto the paper and watching the penguin take shape.

Since A Penguin Story focuses on the magic of color, as a personal touch I had each of the kids choose a favorite color. Then we cut out a circle out of that color, and they wrote the letter P in the middle of it. Then they glued it to the bottom corner of their picture.

I mentioned that part of the reason I chose penguins for our theme was so we could talk about Antarctica. We talked about it a little bit with the Iceberg Number Walk, but for our final activity, we talked about it some more. 

I saw this great idea for "Arctic Ice Sensory Play" at No Time For Flashcards. Unfortunately, my execution did not turn out as well as theirs. They took a tub of water, weighted down a smaller container in the tub, and then froze the whole thing. Once it was frozen, they took out the small container, filled up that space with water, and played with little plastic animals in the ice and water.

Well, we only have the freezer above our refrigerator, which definitely does not have enough space to freeze one, let alone two, tubs of water. (I thought to avoid conflict, I should have at least two containers so the kids weren't all crowded around the same one). Anyway, undaunted by our lack of freezer space, I thought it was plenty cold outside to do the job. 

Apparently, the temperature needs to be quite a bit below 32 degrees Fahrenheit to do an adequate job. I did get a thin sheet of ice across the top, but mostly it was just cold water.

But kids like playing in water, right? Undaunted once again, I scooped up some snow to add to the water and ice, gave the kids some penguins, seals, and other animals, and let them have at it.

They really did like it, but their poor fingers got very cold. Still, I was surprised with how long they stuck with it.

All in all, it was a really fun morning learning all about the letter P, Penguins, and the number 16.

Safekeeping by Karen Hesse

One of my reading goals for 2013 was to "Read something less well-known by an author I liked." When I made the goal, I had my eye on a few authors, one of them being Karen Hesse. Ever since reading (and loving) Out of the Dust, I have wanted to read something else by her.

I didn't know what to expect, but what I found was that Safekeeping bore very little resemblance to Out of the Dust. Out of the Dust is written in free verse; Safekeeping is written in prose. Out of the Dust is for middle graders; Safekeeping is for young adults. Out of the Dust is historical; Safekeeping is futuristic. Out of the Dust is text only; Safekeeping includes 90 original photographs.

I can't say I loved it as much as Out of the Dust. That would have been difficult since I love that book tremendously. However, I definitely liked Safekeeping. It was really refreshing to see how Karen Hesse can (successfully) write in two very different ways.

As the cover states, Safekeeping is "a novel of tomorrow." The reader is never told the year...it could be five years from where we are now or fifty. I have no doubt this was intentional. It lends a timeless quality to the novel--in theory, these events could happen anytime; because we don't know when they were supposed to have happened by, they are still a possibility in the legitimate future.

When the story opens, 17-year-old Radley is on her way home from Haiti, where she has been volunteering in an orphanage. She has just received word that the American People's Party in the United States has taken power. She knows this will not have good results, and so she feels a driving urgency to get back to her parents. When she lands, there is no sign of her parents at the airport, even though the head of the orphanage sent word that she was coming home. Radley waits but eventually assumes her parents didn't receive the message and so starts out on a 60+ mile walk to her hometown of Brattleboro, Vermont (where the author currently lives, by the way).

Being an only child, Radley isn't at all used to making her own decisions and fending for herself. She is more than a little proud of herself when her home comes into view. But that short journey turns out to be only the beginning. Her parents are not at her home, and it is obvious they haven't been there for quite some time. Fearing they fled because of their opposition to the American People's Party, Radley decides to head to Canada, hoping to find her parents along the way or at least wait things out until the government fixes itself.

This is not your typical dystopian novel. In fact, I probably shouldn't even describe it as dystopian, but a more appropriate term alludes me. Yes, the government falls apart as different groups fight for control. Yes, there is violence and fear. Yes, freedom is suddenly a rare gift. But Radley (and by association, the reader) is far removed from all of this. By the end of the story, the government is establishing itself once again and the chaos has ended, but Radley did not have a hand in helping this happen. (In fact, at one point, Radley says, "They have nothing to fear from me. They never did. I don't want to topple a government.") So really, it is more about Radley's own journey and self-discovery. The political side of it merely sets the stage and then takes a quiet backseat.

That said, there is an undeniable political undertone to the whole story, and while I think "agenda" might be too strong of a word, I can't help but think that Karen Hesse is trying to get some personal point across. I have to admit that when it comes to politics, I am pretty oblivious. Occasionally, Mike will bring me up to speed on some important issue so I don't make a fool of myself during casual conversation. Maybe if I were more politically minded, I might have been able to tell who the American People's Party were supposed to be, but I'm afraid that although I could sense it through the whole book, I couldn't apply Hesse's forecast to real life.

Although this book is not written in free verse (as I already mentioned), Hesse's writing is still stunningly lyrical. Sometimes it almost reads like a poem. For example, there's a part where Radley is remembering a dress given to her by her grandmother. The dress was made of a yellow fabric with brown horses on it. Radley could never bring herself to wear it. Then she says this: "I feel a deep pain, like a punch to the gut. I'd wear it now, if only I could have my parents, my grandparents, my old life back. I'd wear it now."

One of the truly unique things about this novel is that it contains 90 of Karen Hesse's own photographs. I have to say that while the story itself was a tad lukewarm for me, the photographs made it so vivid and real that I found myself entranced. It wasn't that the photographs were amazing per se (although there were some that I truly loved) but that they complemented the story perfectly. Really. In the author's bio at the back of the book, it says, "Despite having a vast body of existing images to choose from, Hesse was determined to travel the entire route herself at the same time of year as Radley." Some of the photgraphs are beautiful, some are frightening, some are peaceful, some are breathtaking, but they all are authentically real. Even though Radley is fictitious, the images were real, and they made the story come alive for me.  I didn't find them distracting (even though there's one on nearly every page for the entire middle section), but rather, I felt like I was walking with Radley and observing a field here and a flower there...things that she herself didn't mention but which were there just the same.

This story features a very small cast: really there's only Radley, Celia (who travels to Canada with Radley and becomes a dear friend), Madame Seville (an unknown benefactress for much of the book), and a young man named Julian (oh, and Romulus the cat and Jerry Lee the dog). This lack of superfluous characters made the story feel more close-knit and personal but also a little bit isolated and lonely. Celia especially is very quiet and tight-lipped, and so even though she plays a part in most of the book, it takes a long time to get to know anything about her.

I felt like Radley's tie to Haiti was a little contrived. It seemed more like the author loved Haiti and wanted to raise awareness and sympathy and less like it fit into Radley's story. Which is a funny, and maybe false, observation considering the fact that Radley is in Haiti when the book begins, thinks about it through her entire journey, and goes back to it at the very end, so it actually plays a huge part in who Radley is. But it still felt forced to me, like the author wanted it there, and so there it was.

I have to say that my biggest gripe with the book was over something ridiculously small. So the main character's name is Radley, right? Radley. A name I can't say I'm particularly fond of. But then, you might remember, I have a son named Bradley. A name I happen to like quite a lot. Radley and Bradley. They sound so similar, and yet I dislike the one and love the other. Somehow, my brain couldn't reconcile these two facts, and so the whole time I was reading the book, I cringed every time I said "Bradley" because all I could hear was "Radley." I was worried (and resentful) because I thought this book was forever going to taint my love for my son's name. Thankfully though, this phase seems to have passed, and today was the first time in days I've remembered the similarity.

This isn't a book I would urge you to rush out and buy right now, but I wouldn't discourage you from reading it either. It's quiet and slow-moving but deep and tinged with meaning. I was glad to have read it.

P.S. I actually love the cover image. Don't you?

Virtual Book Club: What the Ladybug Heard

...or What the Ladybird Heard if you're British.

This month, the Virtual Book Club is highlighting the work of Julia Donaldson. We've read many of Donaldson's books, and although some of them are only so-so for me, I really LOVE What the Ladybug Heard. (Other favorites: The Spiffiest Giant in Town, Where's My Mom?, and The Gruffalo.)

The ladybug lived on a happy farm: there was a cow, hen, goose, duck, horse, hog, sheep, dog, and two cats. They all lived in contented harmony. All of the animals were very noisy in their own way except for the ladybug: she "never said a word." But she had other talents, watching and listening being among them. One night she saw two thieves intent on stealing the fine prize cow. She listened to their conniving plans, all perfectly laid out in a simple map. The ladybug knew she had to save her friend. She broke her silence to tell the other animals what would transpire that night. Together, they came up with a plan to lead the thieves in the wrong direction and save the fine prize cow.

I was inspired by this page from the book, which shows the map of the two thieves:

I thought, I'll bet we could draw up our own maps. And that is exactly what we did.

First, I drew up a couple of maps for Aaron and Max to follow. My sister helped me because she is a better artist than I am. The first map included six locations: the piano, the kitchen, the trampoline, the swing set, the washer/dryer, and the toy horse.

For this first map, I helped the boys decode and follow the pictures. I did leave a small treat at the end but nothing at the little stops along the way. The idea was just to have fun following the course of the map. The boys loved it, and it gave us a pretty good workout, too!

Aaron and Max wanted another map to follow, so we headed to the park with this one:

Aaron carefully studied it on the way to the park, and by the time we got there, he didn't need any help from me.

 (Picnic tables, twisty slide, swings, teeter-totter, house, and jungle bars)

(Looking at these pictures makes me realize that even though it's starting to feel like spring, the grass doesn't know it yet!)

After the escapade at the park, Aaron did exactly what I was hoping for...he wanted to make his own map! I thought he would want some help thinking of locations or figuring out how to draw items, but he wanted none of it. I left him to his own inspiration, and he came up with this:

 (His bed, the trampoline, the slide, the swing set (a popular landmark, it seems), the TV, and the apple tree)

I was actually totally impressed with his map, not only because he thought up some different locations on his own, but also because he grasped the sequencing idea--that one location would follow another in a specific order. (Also, Aaron has only recently become interested in drawing, so just the fact that he actually drew something out of his head was pretty awesome.)

Aaron thought it was even better following his own map than following my map. He liked it so much, in fact, that he decided to draw another:

(Mailbox, slide, game, toy horse, train set, toilet, and scooter)

I liked this map because he used certain objects to represent a specific location (the game for the room where the games are kept, etc.). 

By this time, we had run out of treats to put at the end. (I had a little bag of jelly beans, and each time they completed a map, they each got two.) Up until that point, I was pretty sure they were partly so enthusiastic because they got a treat each time. But when the last jelly bean was consumed, Aaron said, "Now we can still make more maps, and we just won't get a treat!" And off he went.

You know how sometimes you have a great idea in your head, but when you try it with your kids, it falls flat? This was NOT one of those times. My boys loved it. Aaron especially would have kept making maps all day if he hadn't had to, you know, eat dinner and other trivial things like that. Even this morning, he was talking about making another map. It's the activity that just keeps on giving. 

I hope you map out some fun (heh, heh!) for yourself as well!

(I'm also sharing this post with The Children's Bookshelf and the Kid Lit Blog Hop.)

Blackberry Crumble by Josi S. Kilpack

Last night, Mike told me that my posts are much too long. I agreed with him--I realize that very few people probably read them through in their entirety--but then, I remembered why I keep writing all these reviews anyway. One of the main reasons is just to help myself remember what I read. Quite often, I include certain details to help spark my memory months or years later, in effect making it so that the book lasts much longer than just the time it takes me to read it.

So, sorry but not sorry, folks, you get a pageful.

(Mike also had the audacity to inform me that really great writers use fewer words to get their point across, but I never claimed to be a really great writer. So there.)

And now, on to this book, which, admittedly, is just a quick read and doesn't have a lot of substance, but which I (surprisingly!) have a lot to say about nonetheless (sarcasm intended).

This is the fifth installment in a culinary mystery series starring Sadie Hoffmiller, a 50-something retired school teacher who can't keep her eyes and ears out of other people's business. Unfortunately, for the last nine months or so of her life, "other people's business" has included murder, and Sadie has become directly involved. At the beginning of this story, Sadie finds out that an article about her has just been printed in the Denver Post. It casts her in a very unfavorable, even scandalous, light, asking how it is possible for one middle-aged woman to be in the middle of so many murder investigations. All of her acquaintances begin whispering about her, and Sadie is mortified. You would think then that when an unknown woman approaches Sadie, asking her to look into and investigate her father's sudden and unexpected death, Sadie would run the other way (and work to build back her reputation!). But of course she takes the case. She's Sadie, after all, and she can't stand an unsolved mystery.

As with the other books in the series, this was just a fun one to be in the middle of. I've discovered that with these books, I far prefer the actual reading to the finishing because I almost always hate the endings (this one was no exception). You would think the endings would maybe dissuade me from reading any more of them, but I keep coming back because I like the middles so much.

Yes, unfortunately, the ending left me dissatisfied and irritable. (Warning: spoilers ahead! Read at your own risk, starting now...!) I've read enough of Sadie Hoffmiller to know that the murderer is going to be the person I least expect, which now means that the least-expected person is the MOST-expected person (so it seems like Josie Kilpack's system is backfiring).

But even I, with all my prior Sadie Hoffmiller experience, did not originally suspect Lois (the kind, elderly neighbor with a penchant for trendy fashion). However, later in the book, I realized it had to be her because a) she was the least suspicious and b) Kilpack has never had a female murderer, so to make it an elderly female murderer? Oh, too perfect. I audibly sighed in exasperation when I realized who the murderer was. I had been enjoying the book so much, and now, once again, it was ruined. I didn't hate it because she was an old lady, and old ladies are always perfect and innocent in every possible way. I hated it because Kilpack refuses to cast the real murderer in the same suspicious light as all the other suspects. She gives you nothing to question, so then, in the grand and dramatic reveal, you feel like you've been knocked flat on your back.

I feel like a broken record since I know I've said similar things about the first four books, but I have to say them again since they (unfortunately) still apply: a really well-thought-out mystery will make the reader slap their forehead in disbelief and say, "I should have seen that coming!" instead of pound their head on the table in frustration and say, "And the person with the spotless record is once again villainous." What I'm trying to say is that, however hidden, there should have been little hints or details along the way that I'll be able to look back on and say, "Oh, yes, she really was capable of murder because of this, this, and this." Instead, even once I know the motive, it still feels unbelievable to me because there didn't seem to be a proper set-up.

(Spoilers over)

This is the type of book where you get the impression that there's no overarching goal for the entire series (which, I don't think there is and never was intended to be). The way the book ends, there's the potential for more (and there are currently four more published), but it could also easily be the last one. I'm just curious about Kilpack's writing strategies (here I go again, analyzing and supposing things that are none of my business): when she sits down to write a new Sadie Hoffmiller mystery, does she review the previous ones and think, Oh, it's too bad I had ________ happen in the second one because I really wish I could do _________ in the sixth one, but now I can't. I think for me, who really likes to plan ahead, this would be a difficult way to write (and it seems probable that she does plan ahead to a certain extent and saves ideas for later books, so I'm not totally negative in my judgment).

Another thing I've mentioned with the other books, and that applies to this one as well, is just that sometimes the writing includes details that don't really seem necessary and just contribute to the overall wordiness. Like these two sentences: "She hurried to the bedroom for the cordless, then hung up the wall phone after verifying that Gayle was still on the line. Then she went to the living room and twisted the wand to open the slats." For me, all the information about switching phones and opening the blinds is just superfluous to the plot at hand.

There were also some details that didn't match up in the story, and that annoyed me a little bit, too. For example, at first Lois said that Jeremy was Jolene and Gary's younger son, but then later on, Sadie refers to him as their firstborn. Also, May insists that Sadie buys organic of everything, but then later on, it appears that she doesn't care anything about the quality of what she eats. I understand that these books are being published fairly quickly (usually two each year), but it still detracts from the story when details don't match up.

So why, if I have so much to say about what I don't like, am I still reading these books? Because I really do like them! Here's proof:

• Sadie is funny. I love her personality. Here are a couple of my favorite lines: "Not only had she lost her quarry, but she was going to get her first ticket in twenty-five years for not-really-talking on a cell phone." And this one: "Finally, after what she assumed was eight full minutes--she might have to write to Reader's Digest about that--she heard another creak of the chair." I know I'm taking these both out of context, so they're probably not funny to you, but Sadie is constantly making me laugh and smile.
• They're fast-paced and intriguing. I think Kilpack does an excellent job of setting the stage and introducing the characters and including a lot of interesting complexities. I wish it played out differently, but I can't deny that I'm hooked until I've turned the final page.
• The recipes--it's a culinary mystery because Sadie loves to cook. Each book includes 12-ish recipes. And having the recipe right there is different than just describing what she's eating; I can almost taste it. (And of course, it's always fun to try out a couple from each book--makes me feel like Sadie and I are friends.)
• The covers--I really do love the covers. They're aesthetically pleasing, and they pull me in every time.

I've kind of come to terms with these books. I realize going into them that there will be things that make me crazy but that it will be a fun ride anyway.

(And it looks like this will once again be a review that Mike will not have the stamina to get through. Did I say Josie Kilpack was wordy? Oops.)

Temple Grandin: How the Girl Who Loved Cows Embraced Autism and Changed the World by Sy Montgomery

Over Christmas, my mom told me that I had to watch the HBO movie, Temple Grandin, a dramatized depiction of the real Temple Grandin's life. So I did. And I absolutely, positively, completely loved it. It stars Claire Danes as Temple Grandin, and she is really fantastic. Up to that point, I had never even heard of Temple Grandin, but since then, I haven't been able to stop talking about her, and I've seen and heard her name popping up all over the place. (Does that happen to anyone else? You learn about something or someone new, and then all of a sudden, it's EVERYWHERE, and you wonder if it was always right there under your nose?)

This book is one of the things that popped up. It was published last year and is a condensed and simplified account of Temple Grandin's life, geared toward children.

Temple Grandin was born in 1947. Even before her first birthday, Temple's parents could tell she was not the same as other babies: she wouldn't make eye contact, she didn't laugh, she didn't want to be cuddled or held. In 1952, she was diagnosed with autism. At the time, autism was still a new and very misunderstood condition (Temple's mother was told that it was a type of schizophrenia, which it is not). Temple's father wanted to put her in a mental institution, but Temple's mother believed in greater things for her. Amazingly, even miraculously, Temple persisted through all kinds of challenges, both internally and externally, and emerged triumphant. She went to college where she earned not just a Bachelor's but also a Master's and PhD. She has done so much to improve the treatment of livestock animals and also to improve the face of autism. She is fast becoming one of my heroes.

It's normal for a person with autism to be really focused and passionate about a select few topics. With Temple, it's animals. But it's also autism. She has written books on both subjects, lectured on both subjects, and researched both subjects. I am so impressed with the way she has divided her life between these two passions. From what I've read, it sounds like Temple was really the first autistic person to describe what autism is like. In speaking candidly and openly about all aspects of autism, she has really changed how people view it and respond to it. I just admire her so much for actively changing the world for the better.

So...a bit more about Temple's animal passion: She loves them so much. Especially cattle. I'm guessing that even if you are an animal lover, a cow does not top your list of favorite animals. But for Temple, it does. And because of that, she has been able to overcome and improve major issues in the livestock industry that no one else deigned to pay attention to (but which were really important).

For much of the book, I was completely mystified why Temple Grandin (who loves animals so much she lies down amidst the cattle and lets them walk around her and touch her face) would devote much of her life to finding more humane ways to slaughter them? Wouldn't she want to stop the killing altogether? The answer is one of the reasons why I really love and respect Temple Grandin. Sure, she would love it if all people stopped eating meat . But the fact of the matter is that 95% of Americans do eat meat (according to the book) and probably aren't going to quit anytime soon. (I found it really interesting that even Temple eats meat--she tried to cut it out of her diet and really suffered with dizziness so had to add it back in.)  Anyway, it sometimes seems like animal-rights activists have unrealistic expectations, but Temple looks at the current situation and thinks, How can we improve it NOW? What can we do to improve these animals' quality of life and give them a death that is free of fear and misery? (Incidentally, in recent years, Temple has become more vocal on the animal rights front, so she is striving to improve the lives of animals from all sides.) I thought that I might find all of the chapters dealing with Temple's feedlot designs a bit of a drag, but I actually found them fascinating...the author calls Temple's ability to "think like a cow" a sixth sense.

Another thing I love about Temple Grandin is the way she views (and talks about) her autism in such a positive way. She recognizes all of the good she is able to do because of autism (like her sixth sense with animals I just mentioned). She even says that if she were given the choice of living her life over again without autism, she wouldn't do it. She says that autism is a part of who she is. With a condition that has so much negativism attached to it (because it does include so many hard and difficult symptoms), it was really eye-opening for me to recognize that Temple Grandin would not have been able to do so many amazing things if she hadn't had autism.

On a personal note, this book came at a time when I really needed it. For the last 10 days, the boys and I have been visiting my family in Colorado. (Mike, meanwhile, has been attacking his dissertation with a vengeance.) My youngest brother, who is 12, has a condition known as reactive attachment disorder (RAD). Maybe you've heard of it. It manifests itself frequently in children who are adopted, in foster care, or neglected and abused early in life. My brother was adopted just before his second birthday. Anyway, there are times when he gets quite upset and irrational and becomes really angry and aggressive. He has had a couple of particularly bad episodes while we've been here. After the first one, I was reading this book and read about Temple's horrible tantrums as a child because of all the frustrations she was feeling and couldn't express any other way. Even though my brother is not autistic (although he does have significant developmental delays in addition to RAD), just reading about Temple's experiences changed my feelings of frustration and resentment into sympathy and tolerance. I was really grateful I read this when I did.

As I already mentioned, this book was written for children. I read a lot of children's literature, and many times, I don't even find it's a distinction worth making note of because it seems like I enjoy it just as much as an adult as I would if I were a child. But in this case, I often found that it was quite noticeable that this was written for a younger crowd. Sometimes the definitions and explanations were really simplified and dumbed down. Also, although all the important facts were there, it's obvious that this is an abridged or shortened account of Temple's life and that many of the details have been left out for the sake of the book's length. Don't get me wrong--I thought it was really well done for its targeted audience (and I will definitely share it with Aaron when he gets older), but for me personally, I would have liked a little bit more. (Temple herself has written a number of books, many of them autobiographical. I'm especially interested in Thinking in Pictures.)

One of the main things I noticed while reading this book was how many mentors and supporters Temple had along the way (not saying that she didn't have any naysayers--her own father wanted to put her in a mental institution, remember?). It made me realize how important it is to offer encouragement and help to others, particularly those who are struggling. But also, I couldn't help wondering how many other Temples are or have been out there who didn't make it as far as she did because they didn't have anyone to cheer them on? It breaks my heart to think of the untapped potential of so many. (I should also mention though that while Temple did have quite a bit of support, she is also one highly motivated person. She doesn't take "no" for an answer. She is always looking for another door. She definitely deserves a huge chunk of the credit for her own success.)

If you are like me and just barely becoming acquainted with Temple Grandin, this book is an excellent introduction to her life. Or, if you're not in the mood to read, watch the movie. Either way, I guarantee you will be inspired by this amazing woman.