PET SHOP HEROES is truly delightful and magical! A super read for elementary and middle grades, and with lovely and comical illustrations, great to read to younger children. Kids who love super heroes [what child doesn't?], magic and fantasy, or science, will each enjoy this story, which combines all of these, and gives a good moral lesson as well. I hope this will become a series of adventures for the four heroes of the pet shop.
Mallory Anne-Marie Forbes
This is a great book that really stands out from others in its use of the scientific method in such an elementary way that kids will begin to embrace this important concept. Hilarious at times and suspenseful at others, this book is simply wonderful for children and has it all: action, adventure, betrayal, and curiosity. The characters are well done and easy to get behind and cheer for. The illustrations are right on point and really add to the story as well. Definitely worth checking out for your kids - don't miss this book.
This is a cute beginning reader chapter book for young children. There are scientific methods explained in the book. A cute read with cute illustrations.
Carla Johnson-Hicks, Educator
This was a pretty cute story with lots of places for read-aloud special effects and adorable illustrations. A great beginner chapter book with some good vocabulary words to help young readers’ development, I hope to see it continue. My kids loved the pet theme hoping ours would develop powers of their own
I thought that this was really cute. I also liked it adding the lesson about the scientific method into the story. The illustrations were also really nicely done. The snake was so creepy! Loved it!
Stephanie Torina, Blogger
I had so much fun reading this book. I love the idea of animals as superheroes. I am going to use the book for reading circles in the classroom and have the students make up their own animal that could have superhero [powers]. It is a very creative and wonderful story of animals helping the world. A must read for kids.
Betty Moffitt, Teacher
I would gladly have "read" this book just for the pictures. They manage to be charming when they need to be, funny when they ought to be, pretty when they want to be, and they demonstrate a real sensitivity to the content and tone of the book as a whole. There are a couple of details like Grace making a little wire sculpture of a turtle (using her Super Strength) for Mud the Turtle that really delighted me. I know as a kid, I especially loved the feeling that if I spent a long time looking at the illustrations in a book, I would discover more about them well past the first cursory glances, and I think Christian Paniagua's art will provide that kind of delight for many young readers.
When it comes to Crow, his strength in this book lies in some of the quirky, silly, and funny depictions of animals' 'personalities' -- particularly the cat and the dog -- and especially in the contrast between the two. (As a cat person, I deeply appreciate the fact that the cat is intelligent and dignified [yes, yes, she's also arrogant] while the dog is really not very bright and often ridiculous.) One of my favorite things in the whole book: the dog's superhero costume is a silly mash-up of a dinosaur hat, a mask that makes me think of Zorro or a Mexican wrestler, and a small red cape. The cat's superhero costume is a cat suit.
Then, there is also the way that dog (Petruchio) speaks in nonsense... but it is often very funny, clever nonsense. He gets words confused or forgets the correct word for a sentence so often that he ends up saying things like, "Cake! That's enough hopscotch out of you! Prepare to meet your potato." Meet and potato? Get it?? Yuk yuk. There is also a little word play I particularly liked with "disapeached" instead of disappeared. I laughed...
I think the kids will like this, especially if it`s a series. It'll be the sort of comfortable read that kids enjoy
Allison Dollar
Pet Shop Heroes is an endearing read for elementary school readers. …. I thought the detailed, black and white line drawings were vibrant and fun to look at and liked the use of the concept of the scientific method. Perfect for budding scientists
Karen Oil