Children Books

Got this as a gift for my new son. Lot's of fun to read and make the dinosaur sounds. OK, so I'm a big kid. Highly recommended!

We got this book for my son when he was about 1 1/2 years old. In the past year, he has read it a ton, but he still likes to go through it every few nights. A couple months ago, we came across a pop-up version. It has the same words (Dinosaur roar, dinosaur squeak, etc...), but the dinosaurs are pop-up and each pop-up does something when you open/close the page. For example, one dino has his tongue go in and out, another lifts a boulder with his feet. The pop-up action makes this somewhat short book last much longer, as the kids move the dinos to make them 'do stuff.'

You can't go wrong with either one, but I'd search out the pop-up version for an even more enjoyable reading experience.

Our baby loved this book from when she was like 5 months old. It has great contrasty illustrations, not too much text, and you can test your acting abilities as you make "dinosaur fat" and "dinosaur tiny" voices.

I have two little boys, 3.5 and 1.5, and they both LOVE this book. I have read it so much that my older has it memorized and reads it to the younger one.

i bought this book for my just turned 3 year old son, because of his latest fascination with dinosaurs. he had the book memorized the day after he got it. he loves all the different dinosaurs, the colors and pictures are wonderful. he loves the rhyming and the opposites. his favorite is dinosaur fierce which he says so fiercely himself!

This is a good book for my 4th grade son. It is hard to find books on his reading level that hold his interest. The narator of the story is Hank the cowdog (also self proclaimed head of ranch security). The chapters are only 3 or 4 pages and give my son a sense of accomplishment for being able to read a couple of chapters each night.
Hank also has a few pronuciation problems, allowing the young reader to identify correct pronunciation and grammer. The stories are interesting and funny and have really improved my son's interest in reading as well as his grades in reading and language skills. We now own them all as well as many audio books as well. It was fun to hear Hank's voice and read along.

Some background for this review: I originally purchased Hank in book and cassette form for my nieces and nephews in the early 80's. What first caught my eye was actually The Further Adventures of Hank the Cowdog. Further adventures? I plucked the Original Adventures book from the shelf and was hooked after the first two pages. These stories are entertaining and funny, the characters, too; and they aren't just for kids, either. Everyone I have given Hank to over the years has enjoyed hearing and/or reading the stories. I also like that it is the author giving voice to his creations.

I loved hanks first adventures in this book.this book is great.

The Original Adventures of Hank the Cowdog (Hank the Cowdog 1)

These audio books help children that are having trouble with the written word. I also use them in the car, so each trip we hear more of the story. The kids love them and I think it makes them interested in reading.

This book takes place on a ranch in Texas. The characters are Hank, Drover, Loper, the coyotes, and Bruno. Hank is the boss for guarding the ranch at night. He watches out for the chickens. But Hank got sick of the ranch. He tries to find the kill of the chickens, but eats one of the dead ones instead. Then he went to live with the coyotes and still tries to find the chicken killers. Does Hank go back to the ranch? You will have to read the book for yourself to find out. I really like this book because I got to see the author give a talk and read out of one of his books.

My son and I really enjoyed this story, and we have the paperback at home. His first grade teacher had been looking in bookstores for this book and couldn't find it, so we ordered it for her. We ordered the library binding, which is sturdier for all the little hands it will be held by! This book has good historical value, and the basic content is accurate, without scaring the children. It's the best "Jack and Annie" book!

I purchased this book in order to replace a damaged one. The transaction was smooth and the price was great!

Magic Tree House has done it again!! Jack and Annie are in for the adventure of their lives when they climb aboard the Titanic!! An unsinkable ship that hits an iceberg. What will Jack and Annie do when they dicover that the Titanic needed twice as many life boats as it had on deck?Jack and Annie find themselves just as sad as so many passengers when they realize that people could have survived if the people who planned the voyage had thought ahead. This is an amazing story that I couldn't stop reading! Women and children were put into the lifeboats first becuase men were brave and cared about their lives. More than 1,500 people lost their lives. Everything was explained clearly so that you don't get confused. After this tragedy, laws were made so that all ships would have enough life boats for all of its passengers and an INternational Ice Patrol was formed so that ships could be warned about severe ice conditions. In 1985 a scienctist named Dr. Robert Ballard discovered the ship under water. I reccommend this book to everyone that I know!!

Here is a summery of this book. There is two kids and they were playing in the woods when they found a tree house. So the kids decided to see in side. So read this book to find out what happens to the kids. The way I found out about this book is because my mom told me to read a book when I was in 5th grade. So I heard about this wonderful series of books. I would love to recommend you to read this book. Who can read this book you ask! Anybody can read this book. If they like to explore then you should read this book.

What did I like this book you ask! The thing I liked was the characters because they are young and they don't know what was going on. They are always getting in trouble and they don't know why they are in trouble. I also like the action in this book. There are so many parts. I don't know how to explain. There are some parts I don't like is the length of the book. It is to short.

I loved this book a lot because it is nice and cool. I really think you should read this book. So read this book.

My 1st grader hates to put it down, he would rather read Magic Tree House books, than play video games. He even reads them to his class and explains the story for show and tell. In his kindergarten class the teacher would also let him read the Magic Tree House books out loud, not to give her a break, but to promote reading out loud. Great books!

Polly is a young country girl who meets Fanny Shaw and they become friends. Polly is good and does not become tainted with jealously and envy when she is immersed in the town life. As the years go by she becomes a woman who is able to provide for herself. The unnecessary friperies other young ladies feel are essential are of no consequence to Polly. The Shaw's, especially Tom, can not understand Polly's unselfishness. Polly's simple pleasures in life guide Tom to become a man worthy of her.

I admire Polly.

Although I think it may be a bit advanced for my 9 yr. old, I'm still glad I purchased this book for my most recent book club choice. A gentle book that flows easily, and the characters change for the better in wonderful ways. The one thing that bugged me was Mrs. Shaw and her smelling salts. It almost seemed to me that Polly Milton was the better 'mother' to the Shaw family. All in all, this is truly a memorable classic.

This book started off a bit slow, but if you read more than a page or two at a time, I think you will like it. This story is about a girl from the country who goes to visit her cousins in New York. Polly's cousin, Fanny, and her friends find Polly "coutrified" and "old fashioned". Everyone falls in love with her because of her quiet manner along with the fact that she dresses and acts her age. Although their are multiple hardships along the way, you couldn't have wanted the book to end any other way. I recomend that you don't read the book until you are at least 11 or 12 because some of the wording is odd because it was writtedn so long ago. Happy Reading!

Alas. In my opinion, both "An Old-Fashioned Girl" and "Eight Cousins" audio versions would benefit by having a much younger narrator. Despite her long and illustrious career in audio, Flo Gibson is now too old to bring these novels to life. They are books about young girls, and they are obviously being read by a grandmother. Rather than illustrating the timeless quality of these fine books, an elderly reader makes the books simply sound old and out-of-date. What were the publishers thinking?---CaroJ11

Do you ever feel like you are tied up in our times? Worrying too much about cell phones, fashions, and the latest whatevers? This book can set you straight. It gives you a peace of mind and fills you with simple pleasures.

The stories main character, Polly, we meet at the age of 14. She has come to stay with rich friends for a while. THey do everything so differently from she. The family has two daughters. One that is two years older than Polly called Fan, who cares for fashion, balls, and beaus. The author daughter is six and she is fixed onoo having her own way about everything. THe young man in the family Tom is a trouble maker, who no matter how hard he tries can't seem to stay out of trouble very long.

Polly is a gentle, kind, loving, caring, selfless, practical, and sensible girl. SHe becomes a great service to this family, touching each of them in a special way. She moves in the same town six years later and gives piano lessons. The family needs her more than ever and she helps them all in the end. This book has heart, romance, and realness to it that we can all relate to, rich or poor, young or old. It will make you feel warm fuzzies. Read on a rainy day underneath a flanel blanket!

I am so lucky. I have an excellent friend, a best friend, who knows I appreciate unique stories and beautiful things, and when you put the two together you have something really special. She saw 'The Arrival' and knew I would love it and gave it to me. And she was right -- I never expected it, but I absolutely love it.

On one level, 'The Arrival' is a simple, fairly common story, one we've heard many times before in other ways, from other people. A man leaves his home and family in a frightening place to try and make his way in the world, and to support the ones he loves best. He moves to a new country, a bustling metropolis of hope. He struggles. He meets new people and experiences new things. He learns. Things change and he adapts. It is a familiar story, to be sure.

What makes 'The Arrival' different is Shaun Tan's beautiful illustrations, and the way he uses the images to tell the story without the needs for any words -- no narration, no dialogues, no accompanying text. Even the words seen on signs and books are written in an unrecognizable language, which only help you, the reader, share the main character's initial frustration as he makes his way in a new place. But the illustrations are of such beauty...in many cases I found myself getting lost in the details of Tan's remarkable black-and-white pictures, exploring these cities and landscapes and pathways, noticing details, marveling at wonders. The illustrations are simple yet powerful, suggestive of much greater depths than 10,000 words might have conveyed in the same space. Shaun Tan found a new way to tell an old story...with strong, fanciful, imaginative art. And for this, it works perfectly.

Can a story be told without words? Can ideas be conveyed without sentences and grammar? Shaun Tan not only proves that they can, with 'The Arrival' he proves that it can be done elegantly and beautifully, and that the use of words would only take away from the story he's told, and the way he has told it.

This is powerful imagining, and I am so very lucky that my friend knew to share it with me.

I remember when I first immigrated to the states when I was nine years old. So many things looked foreign to me. I came on the fourth of July; I thought they were celebrating our arrival with the fireworks. Protagonist in Shaun Tan's THE ARRIVAL is fresh off the boat to a land that is strange and bizarre that is so alien even to everyone who picks up the book so we become the immigrant who can't figure out what the sign on the store says or become deaf to the spoken words that it wouldn't make sense to have dialog in the book. It's a well thought out book to give readers the experience of being an immigrant through this beautifully illustration book.

Shaun Tan wordlessly writes about the immigrant experience in this sepia-toned graphic novel. In large two-page cityscapes and smaller one page, half page, quarter page, and 1/12th page drawings he unfolds the tale of a man who leaves his wife and child to seek employment in a foreign land. Using fantastic creatures, architecture, alphabets & objects to portray the strangeness of a new world, Tan creates the disorientation of the immigrant in a way any reader can understand.

Absolutely breathtaking in its beauty and originality. Obviously the work of a true genius. I can't imagine what Shaun Tan could produce that would top this...although I imagine he DOES! I eagerly await your next work. And thanks for sharing.

I just finished "reading" this book, and I'm weeping. It's THAT beautiful. I'm a high school reading specialist, and I will be using this in my classes. I'm glad it's my prep period with no students in the class right now, as I'm trying to compose myself.

I can't even express in words how wonderful this book is. I wish I could draw like Tan, then I could, perhaps, come close to expressing what this book can do and has done. Overwhelming.

I was so excited to get this Bible for my kids, given all the excellent reviews. I've been searching for a really good children's Bible and kept being disappointed. I was sure this would be the one for us. Boy was I wrong! I am a very conservative Christian and I just didn't see this Bible giving an accurate account of the stories. It seemed to have a very "interpretive" spin on them. One I didn't think was accurate or appropriate. I was really disappointed, to say the least. I did, very much, feel like a lot of the stories emphasized God's "punishment" of people. While I believe strongly in discipline, and believe that "God chastens those whom He loves," I do not think the theme of "punishment," which I thought was pretty blatant in this Bible, was doing God's word justice at all. Yes, there is eternal punishment, and the Bible teaches that, but it is not what is being taught in this Bible. Further, the themes of love, redemption, grace, etc are too subtle to really be enjoyed, much less even seen by children. For instance, this Bible says that God kicked Adam and Eve out of the Garden to "punish" them. This is interpretive. It was not a punishment, it was a disciplinary measure to help them see their sin and their need for God. It was to teach them what life is like without God, and realize how they had been wrong. Further, it was to protect them--God did not want them to eat from the Tree of Life, and "live forever." I interpret that to mean, as in a mortal life, in their sinful state. God, in His *mercy," protected them from eating from that Tree, which would have been far worse since they were in a fallen state. I know that is *my* interpretation, but the "punishment" theory in this Bible is also interpretive. It would have been much better to simply leave out the interpretation, and just tell the story.

In addition to this, I found some of the stories to be awkward in the way they were told, seeming like they were abrupt in their endings. Some of them just didn't seem to flow very well, and I felt as though I needed to ad-lib a bit so they made sense and stayed true to the actual Bible Story. I found this pretty frustrating.

I have the "Read and See" Bible (Stephen Elkins) also and I think the stories there are much better. I plan to purchase the "Word and Song" Bible (also Stephen Elkins) which is extremely similar to the Read and See, but contains more stories (I think it contains at least one from every single book of the Bible, but I am not positive). I also have some of the "Greatest Bible Stories ever Told" series, (also Stephen Elkins--stories are the same as the Word and Song Bible) and find those to be far more accurate and less interpretive than this Big Picture Bible.

On the whole, this is one of the worst Kid's Bible purchases I have made. I learned my lesson and now try to get a copy to look at for myself before purchasing a book.

As a mom of a 4 year old, 3 year old, and 3 month old, I don't have as much time as I'd like to list ALL of the amazing things about this story-Bible. But, WOW - I read the whole thing through in one sitting when I first bought it - and had goosebumps.

This book really gives children a glimpse of the "bigness" of God's story.

BEAUTIFUL illustrations. emotion-evoking. wow.

The title says it all! This book tells the "Big Picture" story of the Bible. It uses different narrative stories to outline a Biblical theology. It is builds general, but very solid foundation for understanding God's work through biblical history!

This Bible was recommended to us by our Pastor. It is a great Bible to read to your kids because it explains in kid friendly language and illustrations God's redemptive plan through Scripture. It is also a very accurate and God centered/honoring Bible for kids...it has been great for my daily Bible reading time with my 3 (& even 9) yr old girls.

It has also been very useful for our Sunday school classes for young children that is currently going through John Piper's young children curriculum. It is one of the few (if not the only) Bibles that we can use in conjunction with the curriculum because he encourages the teacher to paraphrase/retell/rewrite Scripture to ensure that it is God centered and age appropriate for the younger kids to understand along with the lessons---THANK YOU for writing/creating such a wonderful Bible!

Congratulations go to author David Helm, illustrator Gail Schoonmaker and the good people at Crossway Books for putting out a book that I have read more than fifteen times this year!

If I could pick only one story Bible for my children,The BIg Picture Story Bible would be the one.

Other Bible story books turn Old Testament stories into moralistic lessons. Joseph? Share your toys. Daniel? Stand up for Jesus. David? Be courageous. If these moralisms are your idea of a children's Bible, you probably won't like The Big PIcture Story Bible.

But if you are like me and you have long hoped for a book that teaches children the biblical story from Creation to New Creation - a book that anticipates Jesus in the Old Testament and makes his crucifixion and resurrection the proper climax of the New Testament - then this book is for you.

This book is pure gold. Even the illustrations convey a message. The artist thoughtfully and strategically places a "star" upon God's chosen representative, from Abraham to Isaac, from Jacob to David and Solomon. There are future glimpses of Jesus throughout the Old Testament.

The story itself contains one central plot aim: "God's people in God's place under God's rule." This theme provides direction for every story in the book.

The Bible stories are told creatively. Take for instance the preface to Jesus' birth:

Caesar, the Roman ruler, the king of the whole Roman world, began counting all his people to show everyone how great he was. What Caesar did not know was that... God, the world's true ruler, the king of the universe, was getting ready to show everyone how great he was. And do you know how God was going to do this? Not like Caesar... not proudly, by counting all his people, but humbly, by becoming one of his people.

Some stories might be more abbreviated than you expect. (David and Goliath receives two pages within a longer passage about how God keeps his promises to his people. The prophet Daniel is only mentioned in the context of his prayers for the Messiah.) But whereas some of the excitement of individual stories gets left out, the growing anticipation of God's people being under God's rule more than compensates.

The Big Picture Story Bible does not shy away from theology. Of course, theological concepts are kept simple for children, but the author takes great care in pointing to Jesus through the Exodus, the kings, the prophets - reaching back to past events to fill in the meaning of the atonement. All of the stories ultimately point ahead to Jesus.

I fully expect that The Big Picture Story Bible will one day be considered a classic Storybook for children. I cannot recommend it highly enough. Our son loves it, and we do too. It has been a tremendous addition to our library.

This is a great start for any young child's book collection. I've been reading Boynton to my daughter since she was an infant. She is now 2 and still loves them and "reads" them back to me. I purchased this set for $15 here on Amazon. Individual retail value would be $24+. This is a steal.

My one and a half year old daughter loves them.

She first got "The going to bed book" as a gift from her aunt living in the States and even though we are not english native speakers, she keeps wanting me to read it again and again and again...

I decided to buy more SB's book and she seems to love them all... maybe that was one of the best purchases I got through Amazon...

We love the Boynton books. We've been reading them to our little one since before he was born. The pictures are great and the text is cute. Fun to read!

Sandra Boynton's books are a must have for anyone with small children or babies. This collection is perfect for someone starting to collect books for their child. Even a newborn will listen to several of these books in a row.

These books are GREAT for babies, and older children enjoy them, too. I got them for my grand daughter's first birthday, and they were a hit! They are imaginative, appealing, engaging, and fun!

The book is perfect for my 6 year old. She had to read it for school..and we truly enjoy the Frog and Toad books. The seller sent it in a timely fashion and it was in excellent condition :)

The Frog and Toad books have helped my 8 year old grandson learn to read--he has been having trouble and these books were so interesting and fun to him that he finally realized how reading could open up whole new worlds for him. He loves these books.

I've read this book over and over and over again to my kids... they're now adults, but they still remember Frog and Toad.

An absolute classic book of short stories - my favorite is the one where one of them is in bed all winter, and the other one is bored, so he tells the sleeping one to wake up because it's spring, even though it isn't quite spring yet... just too cute. They're friends, they love each other - what more could you want in a story that you'll read to a child? One of my family's favorite bedtime books. I look forward to reading this classic to my grandchildren.

And Remember: all Toads are Frogs, but not all Frogs are Toads.

'Frog and Toad Are Friends' by Arnold Lobel is a story is most appropriate for children ages 4-8. This is a great story of friendship between Frog and Toad. Toad tells stories to Frog when Frog is sick, Frog helps search for Toad's lost button, and Frog writes a letter to Toad because he never receives any mail. This book is full of tales of friendship and adventure. Read this book to see all that Toad and Frog do on their adventures.

The books were in excellent condition and arrived earlier than expected. I had checked all local used bookstores. They were not available because of the high demand in our district. Similar books were the same price as Amazon's including shipment. I will not be going to used bookstores again. Amazon saved me time, money & gas!

this is a great interactive book. my 2.5 year old loves the challenge question after every animal 'can you do it??' our fav is the donkey kick. the book is huge. i did not know that. probably the reason why it is so expensive....but well worth it....definitely two thumbs up!!!!

I don't think I've ever quite understood the whole Eric Carle thing. Still, I have to hand it him that his paintins are incredible and the books are simple enough one can force a dozen school lessons from them. This particular one gives repetition to the "I can" phrase as kids imitate the movements of various animals--that's a fun side effect.

In this book, various animals and children move parts of their body and encourage other children to do so.

Eric Carle is truly a master of this kind of text. Each spread follows the same repetitive structure - "I'm a $ANIMAL and I can $VERB my $BODYPART - can you? I can do it!" - which makes it very suitable both for young children learning to speak and older children figuring out how to read.

The only part I don't like is at the end, when the little boy says to his parrot (in a neat turnaround) "I am I, and I can wiggle my toe". It doesn't sound very idiomatic to me - I would say, in normal speech "I am me", or perhaps (in the form followed in the rest of the book) "I am a child" or "I am a person" or "I am a human".

This book is also, obviously good to encourage kids to move during a rainy-day storytime, or to let them move if they always are fidgeting during storytime.

Our 20 month old and 3 year old boys love this Eric Carle gem. It combines beautiful pictures of animals with simple rhythmic text showing body parts and actions -- turning heads, bending necks, raising shoulders, arching backs and others. Best of all, it allows active participation by imitating what is on the page. We have purchased quite a few books but this one is magic.

My 18 month old son loves this book! He watched me do the movements as I read it and now he does them on his own when I read the book! Very cute and interactive.

Read this when I was twelve? Loved it ever since. It is perfection. It puts the reader in the mind and soul of a young girl and also into the mind and soul of a dog who is really the star, Sirius... and does it with such conviction and tenderness that you can't help but believe. Superb.

When Sirius, the Dog Star, is falsely accused of a crime he didn't commit, his penance is to inhabit the body of a dog on the planet Earth until he can prove his innocence. In Dogsbody (Greenwillow Books, 1977) by Diana Wynne Jones, the once-powerful Sirius must adjust to the obedient life of a house pet, where he finds that even the smallest child has more power than he. Sirius learns to work with his skills and around his limitations, so he can seek the evidence he needs to clear his name. To his surprise, he also finds that he has come to care for his earthly friends, with dog-like loyalty.

Jones cleverly depicts the conflicts that arise as Sirius's dog-like instincts compete with his imperious nature and urgent quest. The story combines adventure with a portrait of a relationship between a girl and her dog. While hardly an astronomy lesson, this book may inspire inquisitive readers to seek out a map of the stars or go out and search the nighttime sky for a glimpse of the book's hero.

Wrongfully convicted of murder, Sirius - the luminary who inhabits the Dog Star near Orion's Belt - is banished to Earth to live as a dog. To prove his innocence, he must find his "Zoi" - a powerful luminary's tool and the supposed murder weapon lost on Earth - before his short dog's life expires. After his first owners try to drown him, Sirius is rescued by a young girl named Kathleen, who lives with an abusive aunt and neglectful uncle and their two unpredictable sons. Kathleen and Sirius's fates intertwine as Sirius struggles to remember his past and overturn his conviction, and Kathleen vies for equality and survival while awaiting her father's release from prison.

Diana Wynne Jones's Dogsbody (Greenwillow Books: 1977) captures the pain, joy, and final dilemma of growing up through the metaphor of Sirius lamenting, then engaging, and ultimately celebrating his dual nature as a "warm, stupid dog" and as the brightest star in the night sky. Delighting in sensory detail, Jones transports the reader inside Sirius the dog, who is "rather exceptional," as he learns English, makes war and peace with cats, escapes his yard to roam freely through town, investigates tantalizing scents, begs for hamburgers and donuts, lies lovelorn outside the gate of a female in heat, and above all, develops a fierce love and loyalty for his young mistress, Kathleen. Jones complements Sirius's dog days with his growing awareness of his destiny as a great luminary in a universe animated with powerful forces reminiscent of elemental pagan gods. The Earth, the Sun, the Moon, and the Stars abide by strict scientific laws and mythical codes of conduct that endow the story with a timeless beauty and gravity. Jones's complex, bittersweet novel fulfills readers with a unique worldview, multiple compelling storylines, unforgettable characters, and rich sensory detail that invite the reader to investigate the faintest scent dancing on the breeze while imagining the power and freedom of life as a majestic luminary in a universe that never seemed more alive.

The dog star Sirius has been a bad dog star. His punishment is that he gets to be an actual real life furry mutt, instead of the stellar variety.

Sent to earth, he ends up in the creek when a young girl rescues him, and raises the puppy as her own.

The dog star has a quest to fulfill and an item to find until he gets to be a star again.

I actually stumbled upon this book in Barnes and Noble, and remembered seeing a friend of mine reading it a couple years ago. She has good taste in books, so picking it up I was immediately attracted by it's beautiful cover-art. Following my mother to a fabric store afterwards, I began to read. And honestly, it was extremely difficult to put down. I found the end to be slightly confusing, but that is hardly worth mentioning. If you're on the fence about buying this book, I definitely recommend purchasing it. You won't regret it! The characters are well defined and I love seeing their unique reactions to the dog. Sirius is a lovable character as is the young girl who keeps him.