Wemberly Worried

A back-to-school favorite

Wemberly worried about spilling her juice, about shrinking in the bathtub, even about snakes in the radiator. She worried morning, noon, and night. "Worry, worry, worry," her family said. "Too much worry." And Wemberly worried about one thing most of all: her first day of school. But when she meets a fellow worrywart in her class, Wemberly realizes that school is too much fun to waste time worrying!

Kevin Henkes, well-loved creator of the award-winning Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse, gets to the heart of a child's feelings like no one else can. Young worrywarts (and their parents) will see themselves in Wemberly, and be relieved that she, too, worries about playground equipment ("Too rusty. Too loose. Too high."), sure-to-be-inhabited cracks in the wall, whether she will be the only butterfly in the Halloween parade, and, of course, whether school will be dreadful in every way. Henkes's Lilly-style illustrations are sweet, expressive, and loaded with funny, inventive details that invite close perusal with every reading. (Wemberly's roller-blading grandma, for example, is wearing a T-shirt that says "Go with the flow.") We're not worried about whether this book will become a classic--it will! (Ages 4 to 8) --Karin Snelson