Bound To Stay Bound

Booklist - 02/15/2019 Things continue apace in Mr. Wolf’s class, where the anthropomorphized animal students have clicked together like a well-oiled learning machine since readers’ first visit to Hazelwood Elementary in Mr. Wolf’s Class (2018). A mystery club has formed, and it pursues the secrets behind Mr. Green’s “disappearance” (abducted by aliens? eaten by rats?) and the case of the missing Frisbee, even as the students gear up for an intergalactic birthday pizza party. A warm sense of community pervades the individual and group relationships here, though Mr. Wolf’s equanimity is occasionally tested by Abdi, who in turn is frustrated by his teacher’s rules. But this is just part of familiar school life, which young readers will easily recognize and invest themselves in. Even the rats turn out to have a good, community-based motive for being such pizza-snatching pests. Steinke’s soft, friendly cartooning matches the welcoming tone and makes for good flow through the story, leaving room here and there for nifty visual invention—a thought balloon filled with its own panels and story is particularly striking. - Copyright 2019 Booklist.