WWW.PUBLISHERSWEEKLY.COM 85Review_CHILDREN’S
vignettes shows her stepping up to chores
she normally avoids. When she drops the
letter and anxious Squirrel finds it, he
feels “oddly... carefree,” and more vignettes
show his relaxed reactions. As the friends
gather and the letter’s recipient is revealed
to be a fourth entity, the missive’s author
helps them see that friends who love each
other are lucky, indeed. Cummins places
the story in early winter, tinting the spreads
with blue, rose, and yellow, and dressing
the characters in cozy clothing. Denise
(Planting Stories) uses the parallel sequences
to demonstrate how seemingly immutable
personalities can be transformed by the
power of love. Ages 4–8. Agent: Emily van
Beek, Folio Literary Management. (Oct.)
★ Pokko and the Drum
Matthew Forsythe. S&S/Wiseman, $17.99
(64p) ISBN 978-1-4814-8039-0
“The biggest mistake Pokko’s parents
ever made was giving her a drum,” begins
this dark, hilarious tale by Forsythe (The
Brilliant Deep). As Pokko marches across
the colorful bed the frog family shares,
her sticks poised for big blows, her father
expresses deep misgivings. The next day,
he prevails upon her to head outside—
“We’re just a
little frog
family that lives
in a mushroom,
and we don’t
like drawing
attention to
ourselves”—
and she does,
venturing into
the surrounding
woods alone. After Pokko resists the forest’s
silence, “tapping on her drum,” a banjo-
playing raccoon falls in behind her; as
Pokko plays louder, a rabbit with a trumpet
appears. An eager wolf joins, too, with less-
than-musical results (“No more eating
band members or you’re out of the band,”
Pokko orders). As the drummer plays, the
parade grows, and pretty soon, it’s a throng,
joined even by her noise-averse dad.
Forsythe’s tapestrylike spreads give the
tense, funny sequences a lush elegance
marked by amusing visual asides, painterly
interiors, and a triumphant parade. In
embracing one’s own beat, Pokko discovers,
extraordinary things can happen—sur-
prising things, upsetting things, and
glorious things, too. Ages 4–8. Agent:
Judith Hansen, Hansen Literary. (Oct.)Fiction
Frank and Bean
Jamie Michalak, illus. by Bob Kolar. Candlewick,
$15.99 (48p) ISBN 978-0-7636-9559-0
Frank, a hot dog, insists that he just
wants to be left alone at his woodsy camp-
site so he can write his secret thoughts in
his secret notebook. “No peeking at my
words, owl,” he tells a bird, who clearly
has no interest in what Frank is writing.
Readers, however, will suspect that Frank
is a little lonely: “Good night, Frank,” he
says to himself. But everything changes
with the arrival of Bean, a raucous legume
who’s constantly shouting (“DO I HEAR
A COW?”), banging on a drum, or
tooting a horn (“TOOT, TOOT!”). Over
the course of four short chapters designed
for early readers, the two slowly discover
that they make a fine pair. Bean intro-
duces Frank to jelly doughnut holes (“Hot
diggity dog!” Frank says), and Frank’s
secret writings turn out to be poems that
Bean can use as lyrics for his “one-bean
band”—which quickly becomes a duo.
While unlikely friendships abound in
children’s books, Kolar’s (Trucker and
Train) sleek, animation-style digital art
and Michalak’s (the Joe and Sparky series)
highly performative dialogue build to a
manic hilarity that makes these pals, as
Bean might say, “half cool and half
amazing.” Ages 5–8. (Oct.)★ I Can Make This Promise
Christine Day. HarperCollins, $16.99 (272p)
ISBN 978-0-06-287199-2
Debut author Day (who is Upper Skagit)
drew from her own experience as the
daughter of a Native American adoptee
to create the character of Edie Green, a
12-year-old budding artist who lives in
Seattle with her parents. Edie has always
known that her Native American mother
was adopted and raised by a white family;
while digging around in the family’s attic,
Edie stumbles upon a box of photos and
letters written by Edith Graham, a
Suquamish and Duwamish aspiring actor
from the 1970s. When her friends notice
the striking similarity between Edie and
Edith and her parents don’t answer Edie’sbroad questions
about her, Edie
becomes con-
vinced that the
stranger is her
namesake.
Beyond the
mystery, impor-
tant themes
resonate
throughout,
including
cultural identity and what makes a friend-
ship worth keeping. Day’s affecting novel
also considers historical truths about
how Native Americans have been treated
throughout U.S. history, particularly
underlining family separations. Though
Edie’s first-person voice occasionally
sounds a bit young for a seventh grader,
her urgent desire to know her family’s
past propels this story forward. In illumi-
nating notes that bookend the novel,
Day further discusses the personal and
historical roots of Edie’s moving tale.
Ages 8–12. Agent: Suzie Townsend, New
Leaf Literary & Media. (Oct.)Project Middle School (Hope #1)
Alyssa Milano, with Debbie Rigaud, illus. by
Eric S. Keyes. Scholastic, $14.99 (208p)
ISBN 978-1-338-32940-7
As this series by actor and activist
Milano and author Rigaud (Truly Madly
Royally) lifts off, biracial, self-described
“future scientist” Hope Roberts, whose
father is a rocket scientist with NASA,
begins the sixth grade with considerable
angst. She has been accepted into an
accelerated school program and, for the
first time ever, will be in a different class
than her best friend, Sam. The author
introduces her manifest STEM/girl-power
message straight away, noting that Hope’s
bookcase displays multiple science awards
alongside her collection of comics starring
science powerhouse Galaxy Girl, who
shares Hope’s conviction that “girls can
do little and big things that can change
the world.” As Sam tries out for the school
play and gains a posse of new pals, Hope
immerses herself in a science club compe-
tition. Frustrated at her male teammates’
reluctance to listen to their female coun-
terparts, Hope takes it upon herself to
push against the status quo. Animator
Keyes’s simple cartoons underlinecontinued from p. 82