Two illustrated chapter books, both set in the towns and classrooms these stories actually come from. For readers aged 6 to 9, and for anyone reading along beside them.
A Snake in the Grass
A story about Lisa and the troublesome ‘S’
Lisa can do almost everything perfectly: dancing, violin, always first off the school bus. There is only one thing she cannot do, and that is say her own name. The letter S has never much liked Lisa, hiding the moment she needs it most and letting a stubborn TH slip out instead, turning Lisa into Litha in front of the whole class. On the one day of the year children get to wear whatever they like, Lisa is determined that nothing will go wrong. But between a strict teacher with a pocket watch, a devoted friend carrying three bags at once, a bird with opinions, and seventeen kinds of milk tea toppings, the streets of Saigon have other plans. It takes something long, green, and completely unexpected, slithering through the grass, to finally set the S free.
51 pages · Ages 6–9 · Illustrated by Funti Kidbooks Studio · ISBN-13: 979-8905890673
How to Shrink a Hippo
A story about Nam and the impossible word
When Nam’s teacher asks him to say a word out loud in front of the whole class, one word gets stuck: hippopotamus. So he does the only sensible thing, and stops saying it altogether. That decision comes with an unexpected side effect: a hippo. A real one, or close enough, that appears on his shoulder one morning and gets a little heavier every day he keeps the word inside. Set in a Mekong Delta classroom, with front-row nerves, new words, and one very confident friend named Khôi, it’s a story about the words that get stuck, the things we carry when we won’t say them, and what happens the day Nam finally does.
47 pages · Ages 6–9 · Illustrated by Funti Kidbooks Studio · ISBN-13: 979-8905890680