Sharon Creech: Love that Dog

By MARGIE THOMSON

Inspirational and heart-warming, this is the story of how a boy named Jack came to love poetry.

His teacher, Miss Stretchberry, (who sounds the ideal ambassador for any kind of learning; she even whips up batches of chocolate brownies for her class) introduces her charges to the poems of Robert Frost, William Carlos Williams, William Blake and, most importantly as far as Jack is concerned, Walter Dean Myers. Jack begins by not wanting to write poetry ("I don't want to/because boys/don't write poetry./ Girls do.") and finishes up an enthusiast with a voice eloquent and full of meaning.

We see what poetry can do, what fun it can be, and how it can help us tell our stories. This short book, written in a variety of poetry forms, is absolutely lovely.

Bloomsbury

$15.95