Danny's life is baseball. Though when his divorced mother starts to go out with someone, Danny is worried she will get remarried. Since his dad can't come to his games anymore because he's travelling too much with his new wife nobody will come and see him play. Also, Passover is coming up and his mom won't let him go to any games on Passover because of a seder he has to go to. With all this going on he is afraid to tell his coach he can't play in a game against their biggest rivalry. Will Danny stop worrying about everything and continue to concentrate on baseball? Read the story to find out.

I enjoyed this book. It is about the importance of observing one's holidays and preserving one's traditions. But not at all costs and not without compromise, flexibility and change. When his mother insists that Danny miss the Little League opening game in order to attend a Passover seder. Danny is miffed. But eventually he does realize that loyalty to his family and faith can be achieved without disloyalty to his team. Along the way Danny also comes to terms with his parents' divorce, learns alot about the fallibility of adults and matures in general. I particularly appreciated the fact that the way in which the Passover seder is observed is non-traditonal and thus very realistic for a large segment of the Jewish population. Attendance at a Passover seder is something that 90% of Jews do, most of them in a not strictly traditional way. Well done with lovely illustrations

These twenty-six acrostic poems are wonderful. I use this bookevery year in my third grade classroom. Each poem tells about anaspect of the autumn season with such detail. The pictures are amazing and very well done. This book is a keeper!

Illustrated by Peter Fiore and edited by Steven Schnur, Henry David's House introduces young readers ages 5 to 9 to the life, thought and writings of Henry David Thoreau. Text and illustration collaborate to showcase the beauty, power and subtlety of solitary living withing the context of a nature-oriented retreat as represented by Thoreau's tiny house in the woods and on the shore of Walden Pond. Henry David's House is an enthusiastically recommended addition to school and community picturebook collections.

"Near the end of March I borrowed an axe and went down to the woods by Walden Pond and began to cut down some tall white pines for timber..." Author, Steven Schnur has chosen several wonderfully engaging passages from Henry David Thoreau's Walden, in this elegant picture book, and young readers will really get a vivid sense of the hard, yet rewarding work of building his house, the few possessions needed to live comfortably, the beauty of the changing seasons, and living the simple life in harmony with nature. "Sometimes, in a summer morning, having taken my accustomed bath, I sat in my sunny doorway from sunrise till noon, rapt in a revery, amidst the pines and hickories and sumachs, in undisturbed solitude and stillness, while the birds sang around or flitted noiseless through the house, until by the sun falling in at my west window, or the noise of some traveller's wagon on the distant highway, I was reminded of the lapse of time." Peter Fiore's lush and exquisite watercolor illustrations bring the splendor of Thoreau's existence at Walden Pond to life on the page, and together word and art evoke feelings of peace, quiet, and contentment. Perfect for readers 8-12, this book works well as a real aloud with D.B. Johnson's Henry Builds a Cabin, for younger children. With an editor's note at the end to fill in further biographical details about Thoreau and his time at Walden, Henry David's House is an evocative treasure to read, share, and most of all discuss. "We can never have enough of Nature."

Henry David's House is a picturebook adaptation by Steven Schnur of a part of Henry David Thoreau's classic nature book "Walden", told with only a limited amount of editing. Beautiful, slightly abstract yet full-color illustrations by Peter Fiore bring this classic thinker's words to vibrant life for young readers. Henry David's House is a superb introduction to a literary masterpiece for young readers, and its final message, "We can never have enough of Nature," reverberates in the hearts of all ages. Highly recommended for family, school, and community library picturebook collections.

There are several good messages in this book: respect the past and one's elders, open your mind and heart to those who have experienced tragedy, accept the possibility of miracles. How awful, then, it is to realize that in "Little Match Girl" fashion, the Tie Man's "miracle" is his death. Even worse for the children in the story to understand that they have unwittingly wished for--and caused--this. To think that for decades all the Tie Man wanted to do was die so he could "reunite" with his family is a message of despair, not of hope.

Survivors of the Holocaust and other family-destroying tragedies have found strength to create new lives for themselves and to make a positive impact on humanity, not just to mark time until they die; why the Tie Man is portrayed as incapable or uninterested in doing so is the central tragedy in this book.

The anguish I felt for the title character was replaced by anger at the manipulative text. The pictures are engaging and the title and beginning of the story are deceptive. Don't be fooled into thinking this is a good book to read to your children.

Although this is a children's book, it is a beautiful Chanukah story for all ages and faiths. (I'm an Italian Protestant, but my great-grandfather was Jewish, and I light a menorah each year in honor of my Jewish ancestry.) The simple words portray a moving event that makes me cry with sadness and joy each time I read this compassionate and graceful story.

What a wonderful book this is! Seven-year-old Seth is waiting impatiently for his father to get home on the last night of Chanukah when the Tie Man shows up at the front door. As the elderly door-to-door necktie vendor unties the cardboard box containng his wares, Seth fears he will delay the family's celebration. He asks the Tie Man "Isn't your family waiting for you?" just to hurry him out the door. But when the sight of Seth's baby sister Hannah leads the old man to join the famiy in the menorah lighting, Seth begins to wonder about that question in earnest. The Tie Man responds to his innocent, direct questions with a sad story about the loss of his wife and five children in a "terrible war,"; and with a happy story about wishing on Chanukah candles in the village of his youth. After the Tie Man leaves, Seth wishes with all his heart on the Chanukah candles for the Tie Man to get his family back.

At the conclusion of the evening, Seth has learned that there are wants greater than his own. He has learned about loving concern for other people. And, he has learned about a world in which both concentration camp victims and wishes to Heaven are carried upward in a flicker of light and a whirl of smoke.

"Hannah and Cylcops" is about two fifth graders, Hannah Bernstein and Rafi Alexander. Rafi just moved to the school and has already earned the nickname "Cyclops" because of the swollen eye he came to school with one day. From the beginning, Hannah doesn't really like Rafi, basically because most of the other students don't like him--he's too quiet, dyslexic, and always looks like he's been in a fight. Hannah's mother, however, insists he come over for dinner sometime. And after that one night, Hannah learns a lot more about him than she wanted to when he asks her, "Does your father ever lock you in the basement?" and "Have they ever put you in a clothes dryer?"

Yet it's not until Hannah overhears her parents discussing Rafi's injuries that she realizes where his bruises and broken bones come from--his stepfather. Then Hannah stops at nothing to prove he's being abused, even sneaking over to his house at night and witnessing it happen.

The targetted audience is 8 to 12-year-olds, but everyone can benefit from the moral of the story--protect one another. It's a great story about Hannah's bravery and determination to save Rafi and takes on the very delicate issue of child abuse.

Even though this book is set for younger readers, I thought it would have made a much better young adult novel if Hannah and Rafi had been developed more and an extra 100 or so pages added. Otherwise, I thought the story was interesting enough and suitable for everyone.