Aaron Meshon

diverse picture book (in English with a sprinkling of Japanese words; baseball/sports, Japan, grandparents; for preschoolers age 3 and up).
* Prominently features diverse characters: starring a Japanese-American boy (grandpa Ji Ji lives in Japan, grandpa Pop Pop is American and has orange-brown hair on his arms and legs); the stadium crowds are generic/colorless but the baseball players are diverse (a Caucasian pitcher and a black batter on the American team; Japanese players on the Japanese team of course).
* Would work for a baseball- or sports-themed (or multi-cultural?) preschool storytime. The text on each page is pretty short and action-packed, but the overall story is longer so you'll may want to read this one earlier in your circle session, before the kids get too wiggly, and maybe you would skip some pages if your audience is still working on their "sitting quietly" skills.
Some of the story is conveyed through the vibrant and appealing illustrations, so this doesn't work as well for dial-a-story over the phone, but it definitely is good as a read-aloud to one or more kids in person. There is also a glossary in the back (including the Japanese writing for the Japanese words) but it doesn't provide a pronunciation guide, unfortunately.… (mehr)

This book was pretty cute...a bunch of tools with adorable faces decide that they need to build a shed to keep themselves in so they're not always scattered around in the backyard.

I found it more interesting to read this book if you imagine it takes place in a world where everyday items have gained sentience and killed all the humans, and are now trying to figure out how to manage their new-found independence. The perpetual grins on all the formerly inanimate objects in the backyard becomes much more sinister when you imagine that the inside of the house is covered in blood and dead bodies.… (mehr)