The Talented Clementine

Starred review from April 1, 2007
Gr 2-5-In her second adventure, Clementine is the only untalented student in her third-grade class, with the talent show fast approaching. She hints that her family may be leaving Boston and moving to Egypt on Friday if her father takes the building manager job at the Great Pyramid, but her teacher just laughs. Her friend Margaret offers her tap-dancing lessons, but her improvised beer-cap tap shoes don't work. Her baby brother (variously called by vegetable names) always laughs when she sings like Elvis, but her parents veto the leash she needs to keep him on stage. It's Mrs. Rice, the principal, who finally shows everyone where the child's talents lie. Clementine is a true original, an empathetic human being with the observant eye of a real artist and a quirky, matter-of-fact way of expressing herself. Whether shopping for new shoes with her mother, saving the talent show, or dining with her parents at the Ritz-no-crackers restaurant, she is laugh-out-loud funny. Frazee's line drawings are plentiful and just right. Libraries will need multiple copies of this one, because early chapter-book readers will jump at the chance to spend another eventful week with Clementine."Mary Jean Smith, Southside Elementary School, Lebanon, TN"

Copyright 2007 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2007
Recommenders hoping to turn indifferent readers into voracious ones often reach first for solid, funny chapter-book series; this follow-up to " Clementine "(2006) proves that Pennypacker's deserves a place alongside those by Johanna Hurwitz, Beverly Cleary, and Megan MacDonald. Here, Clementine frets over her own role in the school talent show, while friend-enemy Margaret flaunts umpteen stage-ready skills. Sure, a child's inability to recognize her own "astoundishing" gifts is a familiar plotline, and some readers may long for a flashier area for observant, insightful Clementine to shine than is ultimately revealed (she is retroactively hailed as the show's director). But children will see their own experiences and foibles in Clementine's precise observations, such as this zinger regarding grown-ups' habit of proffering reference books instead of answering questions: "And then suddenly I did not want to know! That is the miracle of dictionaries!" Frazee's polished, warm-spirited line drawings, not all seen, capture the endearing idiosyncrasies of its heroine, who will equally charm returning readers and those meeting her for the first time.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2007, American Library Association.)