Rusty is a young housecat with dreams of running through the forest and catching mice. One day, as he ventures outside of his cloistered life and into the forest, he encounters a wild cat! Sensing that he is not wholly devoted to his "kittypet" life, he is offered the chance to become a Warrior!

The language and perspective are the most remarkable aspects of the story. The reader is left to figure out what "making dirt" refers to, and the language used to describe the time of day and year were so clever. I really felt like I was reading a book written by cats! The story is compelling and even after I reluctantly put it down, I couldn't stop thinking about it!

The other thing I find so interesting about this series is the wide age range that it appeals to. While it is in the YA section, 4th graders could easily get into this. The only warning I would have to give for parents is that there is some kitty death and violence between the cats. It isn't overt and is handled very well. The idea of eating a mouse was pretty gross, but also isn't terribly graphic.

I am going to LOVE reading all the books in this series!!

Alec Flint is a 4th grade super-sleuth. When the Christoper Columbus exhibit is stolen from the local museum, Alec's Dad, a police detective is called in to investigate. Alec, picking up on several clues, decides it is a great mystery to test his skills! At school, impressed by a fellow classmate, Gina, an expert at math who can also write in a supersecret code - he decides to partner up to solve his mystery. Gina, not only teaches him the nifty code but proves incredibly useful to his investigation. More than that - it turns out that Gina has a mystery of her own to solve - the Art teacher's gone missing too!

A fun kid's mystery read with excellent attention to detail and good behavior modeling. Alec tells a lie and feels "mushy" inside and owns up to it! They also have very good behavior in the library, not running, putting things away correctly and even exhibit good information literacy skills when selecting their research material!!! Not overly sophisticated, so while you are learning some good stuff, you are still having loads of fun! Lots of great fun facts about Christopher Columbus are also included!

In a word... very.

Despite the majority of Americans being well educated, informed and able to vote, many are displeased, disillusioned and dismayed by their government. So, what's our problem? (From what I gleaned) we, The People, can't face the truth, want to be lied to, and don't know enough to ask the right questions or know the truth when we hear it. Regarding 9/11... "we asked shallow questions and got shallow answers." When it comes to legislation our eyes cross and while most Americans can name all the members of a fictional TV family like the Simpsons, they can not recognize their Senator or Representative's name or face.

As soon as you have to explain something in this country you have already lost most of the public. If an idea cannot be expressed on a bumper sticker you can probably give up any hope that it will ever attract much attention. It will likely be ridiculed to death before it ever has a chance to be seriously considered.

What can we do about being so easily distracted, shallow, self-absorbed and uninterested in the direction of the government? I have no idea. But I think asking is a step in the right direction.

As wines are often described as drinkable, this book is eminently readable. If you liked the 1998 film "The Red Violin", or if you are ever (even occasionally) drawn in by Antiques Roadshow you will love this book. (And if you haven't seen "The Red Violin", you really should)

The tale of a world gone mad with wine lust, historical infatuation and drunk on self-importance, The Billionaire's Vinegar is much more than the story of a bottle of wine, but how circumstances were ripe for the old-guard elite and nouveau riche to be seduced by the siren's call of a new, highly indulgent, rare and collectible international craze that swept them away.

Before I read this book, all I really knew about wine was that I liked to drink it; and, if I had too much, it caused a headache unlike any other. Now, though hardly an expert, I have a deeper understanding and appreciation for the rich, complex and interesting process of wine making and appreciation. Terms and situations are explained clearly, with no hint of snootiness - which I find near miraculous given the subject.

The characters are intriguing and as the book progresses, you understand how so many individuals were duped, besotted or obsessed - in earlier chapters I felt the desire to build a time machine to transport myself to a time when such exquisite wine was sold in supermarkets for $8 a bottle. And as the mystery starts to become unveiled, you join the crowd yelling, "The Emperor wears no clothes!"

Full of blunders (a poor rich fool breaks a priceless bottle of wine while showing it off), masochistic dedication (the wine taster who flew in last minute after a liver transplant) and priceless charm, I laughed aloud, winced, and was kept guessing to the last chapter.

A very strong caution: You will want to drink wine while reading this book. It is inevitable. So, stock up.

Daniel Eagle Funk lives with his three sisters (all named after birds), his mother, his grandmother, and his Great Granny Nanny (who has flame tattoos on her wrist!) - and with a house full of girls what's a boy to do! If only he'd had a brother!

After snacking on some of Granny's goulash, Daniel feels some tingling, some bubbling and then - WHOOSH!- he shrinks! After a narrow escape, he runs nose to nose with a mirror image of himself, then faints. When he comes to, he is back to his normal size, but no one in his family believes him - that is, except for his extraordinary Great Granny Nanny who tells him that shrinking runs in the family. And in fact, he has an identical twin brother, Pablo Picasso Diego Funk, whom he had accidentally met! It turns out that Pablo has always been tiny and Granny found him in Daniel's ear right after he was born!

No one but Granny and Daniel know about Pablo, who has been living in Granny's elaborate tiny art projects, his sister's doll house and wearing the discarded clothes of Daniel's action figures!

With a new tiny twin brother, an unreliable ability to shrink and a big secret to keep from his nosy sisters, Daniel is up to his eyeballs in adventure. Full of burping, smelly socks, hissing cockroaches and lots of adventure, this series is sure to be a hit with the 2nd and 3rd grade boys!

A comical parody of dime store gumshoe novels (plus plenty of the gross-out factor from bugs and cooties that will really appeal to youngsters), this first of the Chet Gecko Mysteries earns my tentative recommendation.

Chet Gecko, 4th grade private eye, is a bug munching, crime solving gecko charged with finding Shirley Chameleon's little brother before the big football game. Chet gets help from Natalie, his Mockingbird friend who's talents come in very handy! While solving the mystery, Chet uncovers a plot to ruin the big game, is misled by a red herring, and is dangled over the pool by his tail in the clutches of the villain!

Very funny with tons of cheesy jokes, I can absolutely assure you that several kids will laugh out loud while reading it! Parents though might not like the irreverence displayed to authority figures and how Chet runs off from school to investigate his case. There is also some unfortunate stereotypes of football players (who display almost unintelligible dialogue) which I am hoping the series grows out of.

I get I why the kids love it - it's a chapter book with 1 or 2 drawings per page and it has the look of a real journal. Teachers will probably like the way the kids will want to write their own journals and make comics (plus the sentences are fairly well constructed). However, I must warn that there will be a few parents out there who will HATE the consequence-free and mistake-rich life that this turd lives. (I use "turd" lovingly, I assure you.)

Strongly recommended for reluctant older readers. Greg is very much a smart aleck and the content is more for middle schoolers than the younger readers that the pictures and appearance will appeal to the most. The characters themselves are in middle school and are dealing with middle school issues. Generally, I would quail at drawing such a strong line in the sand for an age recommendation, but younger children love to read about higher grades than their own, and this book wouldn't set a good example or expectation.

Funny, sarcastic, with hilarious pictures interwoven into the text, Diary of a Wimpy Kid could engage the most reluctant of readers.

In the style of hilarious American essayists such as Sedaris, Vowell and Klosterman, Sloane Crosley shares her peculiar life for our reading delight. My favorite essay was certainly "The Pony Problem" which much to my chagrin resonated with my own foibles and quirks. This is what I found the most wonderful about her writing, you weren't laughing at her, but with her as she clearly sees the absurd in the situations she describes.

"Bring Your Machete to Work Day" as well as "Lay Like Broccoli" are also on the top of my list as smart, genuine and uproarious in their insights and unique view of experiences I have shared (playing Oregon Trail and being a lapsed vegetarian, respectively). Full of many original sentences one of my favorites was "Life starts out with everyone clapping when you take a poo and goes downhill from there".

To the credit of our uber-technology loving culture, the book has a website and on that website a video! And honestly, I have never seen a better "ad" for a book in my life. If the clip doesn't want to make you read the book, you are a stronger person that I am.

Whether you were introduced to Jack Handey through Saturday Night Live, his pieces in The New Yorker, Outside and Playboy, or one of his many collected works, including Deep Thoughts, Deeper Thoughts or Deepest Thoughts, his humor, born from Steve Martin's "Jerk Humor," plays the fool again in these longer essays. Essays/bits/theories (I'm not sure WHAT to call them)vary from why your skeleton should be as scary as possible after you die to how he'd film a nature documentary. In addition to the new material, several old facetious favorites from the New Yorker and sketches from Saturday Night Live including "Toonces, the Driving Cat!" complete this wacky work. Handey is the quirkiest, funniest American humorist writing today.

In the title essay, Handey explains his unique approach to diplomacy in the cosmos [as told to the Martians keeping him prisoner]:

You claim there are other intelligent beings in the galaxy besides Earthlings and Martians. Good, then we can attack them together. And after we're through attacking them, we'll attack you. I came here in peace, seeking gold and slaves. But you have treated me like an intruder. Maybe it is not me who is the intruder, but you. No, not me -- you, stupid.

Doug Fine's thoughts and recollections on his first year of sustainable and eco-friendly living, Farewell, My Subaru, is an accessible, funny, sensible foray into environmentally thoughtful living and environmentalism, which I would recommend to anyone. Despite your political affiliations, views on gun control, or religion (unless you bathe in oil and club baby seals before your breakfast of genetically modified food pellets) you will find Fine's treatise on the simple and immensely rewarding joys of sustainable living, growing your own food and connecting to the earth around you a tempting and rational call to a richer way of life.

Not only charming, hilarious and heart-winning, it is peppered with factoids and garnished with mouth watering recipes Fine prepared with his own cultivated and carefully tended fruits of labor. His dedication to his goals and aspirations is inspiring to say the least. I mean, I love ice cream, and I love the homemade variety. But I don't know if I could go so far as to raise, vaccinate and shepherd goats for over a year in order to make it. And yet, when Fine describes it, it doesn't only seem possible, but enviable.

Fine weathers floods, droughts, hail, coyotes, loneliness, bureaucratic paperwork, clogged fuel lines, a runaway car, and all other unimaginable challenges with humor, grace and an indomitable spirit that keeps you cheering him on! While certainly an environmentalist, Fine is not strictly a vegetarian, and even hunts which might put off some hard core Greenies, but is forgivable given his unique attempt at the activity.

I might have been the only hunter in New Mexico history to have his laptop, complete with wireless Internet, with him as he aimed for dinner, and so I sent a lot of colorful e-mails to friends about sunsets ... I had packed local bean burritos for the trip, so Sadie and I ate quite splendidly as well. As we dined, we listened to NPR.

Needless to say, his hunting was unsuccessful. Read, enjoy, then recycle this book by passing it along!