BOOKS TO BORROW

"Tuck Everlasting" by Natalie Babbitt, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 139 pages

Read aloud: age 8 and older.

Read yourself: age 9, 10 and older.

Ten-year-old Winnie Foster is an only child who is doted upon by her mother and grandmother. What Winnie really wants is to be by herself for a change and do something interesting. Fed-up, Winnie runs away into the woods, where she meets Jesse Tuck.

The Tuck family gained eternal life after they drank from a magic spring 87 years ago; they never aged and couldn't die. When Winnie discovers the Tucks' secret, Jesse and his family are frantic. No one must find out about the magic spring, and the Tucks must make Winnie understand why-that living forever is not the blessing one might think. But a strange man in a yellow suit has followed Winnie and tries to cash-in on the Tucks' long-kept secret. It's up to Winnie to save the Tucks.

LIBRARIAN'S CHOICE

Library: East Lyme Public Library, 39 Society Rd., Niantic

Library Director: William Deakyne

Children's Librarian: Randall F. Haines

Choices this week: "How I Became a Pirate" by Melinda Long; "Leonardo, Beautiful Dreamer" by Robert Byrd; "East" by Edith Patton

AT THE BOOKSTORE

"Bananas in My Ears: A Collection of Nonsense Stories, Poems, Riddles & Rhymes" by Michael Rosen, illustrated by Quentin Blake, Candlewick, 2012, 84 pages, $15.99 hardcover

Read aloud: age 6 and older.

Read yourself: age 7, 8 and older.

This collection of 26 nonsense stories, poems, riddles and rhymes is packed with fun. Covering concepts such as breakfast, bedtime, going to the seaside and the doctor, this hilarious romp through typical (and not-so-typical) moments in life will elicit smiles and laughter and is guaranteed to charge the imagination in every good way!

"King Arthur's Very Great Grandson" written and illustrated by Kenneth Kraegel, Candlewick, 2012, 36 pages, $15.99 hardcover

Read aloud: age 4 and older.

Read yourself: age 7 and 8.

Henry is the great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandson of one of the bravest knights to ever live - King Arthur! Knowing that waging battles runs in his blood, Henry puts on his armor and sets off on this donkey in search of adventure on the morning of his sixth birthday.

Henry first seeks out a dragon, then a cyclops, a griffin, and at last the dreaded leviathan. Much to Henry's astonishment, no one will fight with him, but his adventure is hardly a let-down, because Henry discovers something far greater than he imagined.

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