{My thoughts} – I have been seeing these books in the scholastic catalogs for quite some time. I have always had an interest in diary like books. I decided to request the most recent through scholastic which at this time is book 7. When I received it I flipped through it to see how it was made.

The things I liked right away were the simple graphics, the bright colors and the child like diary structure. Of course, once I’d decided I liked the book I had to buy the previous six.

Onto my review of book one, Eva is an owl that lives in Treetopolis. She has two siblings and a best friend named Lucy. In this book she is a bored owl and decides to do something to distract her mind. She tells her teacher she wants to plan a festival for the first day of spring. Her teacher agrees to let her, but tells her she should let other students help her plan it too. She however, tries to do it alone and ends up asking for help in the end.

I think this story has a great lesson within its pages. It shows that it’s okay to ask for help when your in over your head. That it’s okay to feel overwhelmed and that in the end things can and will work out, although it may not work out the way that you’d like it too.

I highly recommend this book for beginner readers. It’s an easy to read book, that allows for children to learn a simple lesson within its pages. Also, at the end of the book are some questions that can be used either to quiz the reader or to just discuss the book openly. All and all it was an enjoyable quick read. ( )

Independent Reading Level: Kindergarten to 3rd grade

Awards: New York Times Best Seller

Eva, an owlet, comes up with a plan of holding a spring festival and tries to do everything herself. Eva also is helping her best friend Lucy with her entries into the festival with baking and painting. Eva realizes that she cannot do this on her own and asks for the help of her classmates. After the festival, when the prizes are given out, Eva is surprised to be given an award for organizing everything, but she shares that award with everyone as she knows that without their help, the festival would not of happened.

I read this book with my Grade 1er. It is written in diary form, and brightly coloured which held her attention. Some words were difficult as they were made up to be apart of an owl’s vocabulary, other than that it is a cute story of friendship and teamwork.

“It’s good and interesting. I like the picture of Baxter, Eva’s pet bat. Eva and Lucy are having a festival and they bake cupcakes. A story of friends working together to make the festival.” EOS 6 yrs

“It’s a good book about working together and friendship. Eva thinks Sue is mean but at the end of the book they end up being friends because Eva asks Sue for her help and Sue agrees. Eva spent a lot of time helping her friend Lucy get ready for the festival by baking muffins and painting.” IRS 7 yrs ( )

My 7 year old loves these. She says they are great because they teach about friendship sometimes. ( )

Mentioned in a blog post at https://booksbeyondbinaries.blog/2020/07/20/chapter-books-whats-good/ (July 20th release)