8-Year-Old Boy Books of the Week: The Book of Beasts, Imagine a Place, Rose (Bone)

Here are Tintin's favorites from the past week:

The Book of Beasts
Author/illustrator: E. Nesbit/Inga Moore
Publisher: Candlewick (October 2001)
Source: Public library

To Lionel's surprise, he's just been made king of his people, even though he's just a boy and there hasn't been a king in quite some time (the people had been saving up for a crown ever since the death of Lionel's great-great-great-great-great-grandfather). When Lionel discovers the palace library, he calls it "a worldful of books" and decides he must look at a book right then and there, despite the chancellor and prime minister's warnings that the books might be magical. He finds a book called The Book of Beasts and opens to the first page. Out pops a beautiful  butterfly. On the next page, a bird flies out. Before Lionel can turn the page, the book is snatched away and put up on a very high shelf. The prime minister and chancellor worry that what's next might be "a snake or a centipede or a revolutionist," but Lionel is tempted and takes the book outside when no one's looking. What he finds is much worse than anyone could have imagined, and now he must find a way to get the fearsome creature back into The Book of Beasts.

Tintin's note: I like it when the dragon comes out of the book. I like when the boy is flying on the hippogriph.

 Find it: Amazon
 

Imagine a Place
Author/illustrator: Sarah L. Thomson/Rob Gonsalves
Publisher: Atheneum (September 2008)
Source: Public library

Imagine a Place follows Imagine a Day and Imagine a Night, two books we still need to read but will be getting soon. Each magic realist painting is accompanied by lyrical text that always begins with "Imagine a place..." The artist, according to this bio, was influenced by René Magritte and M.C. Escher, and you can definitely tell. Gonsalves's work, according to the same bio, "is an attempt to represent human beings' desire to believe in the impossible." Tintin liked the text and especially loved the pictures and would keep saying, "Wait, can you go back to the other one for a minute?"

Tintin's note: I like when there was a houseboat because it is cool, but you can't really take a house out on the ocean. The poems were beautiful. I like when those people were skiing on the blossoms.

 Find it: Amazon, IndieBound

Bone: Rose
Author/illustrator: Jeff Smith/Charles Vess
Publisher: Graphix (August 2009)
Source: Public library

Rose is the the first prequel to the original Bone graphic novel series, of which there are eight books. Princess Rose and her sister, Princess Briar, are taking lessons to help build awareness in their dreams. Their parents, the king and queen, soon send them off to take their final test at Old Man's Cave, and that's when the adventure really begins. When a river dragon possessed by the Lord of the Locusts is let loose during one of Rose's dreams, Rose feels she must be the one to stop it. It's a difficult task, seeing as how it appears that the dragon cannot be permanently hurt. The Great Red Dragon gives Rose the solution she needs, but there is a price to pay, and the princess must make a difficult choice. This is the second Bone book Tintin has read (his first was the eighth), but Tintin has said he now wants to read them all in order, which shouldn't take too long, since he finished this one without interruption.

Tintin's note: I liked when Rose cut off the dragon named Mim's head. The drawings were awesome. They were bloody and they were adventurous.

Find it: Amazon, IndieBound