BOOKS TO BORROW

"The Canterville Ghost" by Oscar Wilde, illustrated by Inga Moore, Candlewick Press, 128 pages

Read aloud: age 8, 9 and older

Read yourself: age 8, 9 and older

For 500 years, the Canterville ghost has frightened every inhabitant of the mansion Canterville Chase. His scare tactics have rendered many witless, some permanently dazed and some dead.

The Otises are the new owners of Canterville Chase and are too modernized to believe in ghosts, or at least to be scared by them. The Canterville ghost tries his hardest to add the Otis family to his list of victims, but he is unable to achieve his objective. His methods backfire, and it is he who winds up frightened. Saved by the kindness of young Virginia Otis, the Canterville ghost is finally able to resolve his centuries-old dilemma.

LIBRARIAN'S CHOICE

Library: Old Lyme Phoebe Griffin Noyes Library, 2 Library Lane, Old Lyme

Library Director: Mary Fiorelli

Children's Librarian: Danielle Ward

Choices this week: "Rah, Rah, Radishes!" by April Pulley Sayre; "Wonder" by R.J. Palacio; "The Mysterious Benedict Society" by Trenton Lee Stewart

AT THE BOOKSTORE

"Back to Front and Upside Down" written and illustrated by Claire Alexander, Eerdmans, 2012, $16 hardcover

Read aloud: age 4 and older.Read yourself: age 7.

Stan and his classmates are excited by the invitation to their principal's birthday party. Their teacher, Miss Catnip, suggests everyone make a birthday card for the principal. When Miss Catnip tells the students they must write "Happy Birthday" on their cards, Stan panics. "…his letters came out back to front and upside down, and some didn't look like letters at all."

After some sound advice from a friend, Stan feels brave enough to ask for help from Miss Catnip. As it turns out, Stan isn't the only one who needs help, and no one laughs at him, as he had feared. And after lots of practice, Stan's letters come out looking the way they should.

"Noah Webster & His Words" by Jeri Chase Ferris, illustrated by Vincent X. Kirsh, Houghton Mifflin, 2012, 32 pages, $16.99 hardcover

Read aloud: age 7 and older

Read yourself: age 8 and 9

Born into a long line of farmers, Noah Webster knew early on that he didn't want to farm but instead wanted to be a scholar. He graduated from Yale and began teaching school when he was 19 years old. More than anything, Noah wanted to teach his students about America. To accomplish this, he wrote an American spelling book, then a grammar book, and eventually began writing Webster's Dictionary. After 20 years of research, his dictionary was published, and is, to this day, the second most popular book printed in English.

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