Smile-A-While Reads

Hooray! A brand new year! Let’s welcome 2026 with some stellar Picks.

Clover’s suggestions for January are light-hearted and fun, stories to tickle readers’ funny bones. Moving forward, let’s set the mood-meter to pure joy, stay resolute about adding a smile-a-day to our calendars. Everyone knows “laughter is the best medicine,” and Clover is happy to prescribe a trio of “Smile-a-While Reads” that are sure to please.

Page On! Enjoy!

The Community Literacy Foundation, in partnership with Neighborhood Reads, and with support from its sponsors, provides these books at no cost to 34 schools in Washington, Union, Pacific, St. Clair and surrounding communities and to the Washington Public Library. Learn more at CommunityLiteracyFoundation.org.

Youngest Read

Nostalgic, pastoral illustrations grace the pages of “Zip Zap Wickety Wack: A Story About Sharing.” But all isn’t calm in the barnyard. A stubborn standoff begins early in this stand-out written and illustrated by Matthew Diffee.

The story unfolds with cow, horse, sheep and goat introducing themselves by the sounds they make. An argument quickly arises when sheep says it goes “baa,” and goat lays claim to “baa” too. Both animals dig in their hooves, as other farm animals join the discussion—a dog, pig, duck, rooster and frog. The animals all try to talk through the problem, to figure out what sheep and goat can say, without relinquishing their own individual voice. To share their “moo” or oink” is simply “neigh neigh” for them.

Finally, sheep makes a ridiculous pronouncement. It will just say, “Zip Zap Wickety Wack, Bing Bang Walla Balla Flip Flap Yackety Yack Wing Ding Dill!” from now on. As the animals ponder this suggestion an even more unlikely turn of events occurs when a far-out alien suddenly appears from outer space. The alien talks to the animals about what sharing is like on its planet, and though the alien talks a good talk, it isn’t much on sharing either.

In the end it’s frog that gets the last laugh in a grade “A” original story that borders on bizarre.

Buy the book at Neighborhood Reads

Middle Read

Go ape with “If You Make a Call on a Banana Phone,” by Gideon Sterer, starring a tyke with an imagination bigger than Africa. The child’s personality and jungle animals come to brilliant life in appealing, mixed media Illustrations by Emily Hughes.

It’s clear from page one that the wild child who uses a banana as a phone isn’t getting much attention around the house. The kid’s mom is busy caring for a new baby, leaving the middle sibling open to farfetched fantasies, like believing a banana could connect you with a gorilla thousands of miles away?

“If you make a gorilla laugh on a banana phone, they will probably like that very much—there aren’t many jokes in the jungle, and they might wonder more about you.”

So begins a conversation that grows legs and takes off as scenes shift from the jungle to the child’s home and back again—one locale ordinary and dull, the other offering pure escapism, climaxing with a surprise visit the tyke couldn’t have predicted.

Though this quirky story might seem preposterous, its message of friendship rings true no matter the phone you use to call a cheetah on a different continent.

Buy the book at Neighborhood Reads

Oldest Read

Turn the clock back and enjoy an old standby with a charming new look. The nanny everyone wishes would blow into their lives is as caring and creative as ever in a revamped version of “Mary Poppins” by P.L. Travers, the original first published in 1934.

Mary, her family and friends, as well as London scenes, entice with winsome illustrations by Lauren Child, who has recreated a book that’s as British as afternoon tea and scones, a compilation of tales about the Banks’ family and their daily lives.

The action begins in the Banks’ home at Number Seventeen Cherry Lane. It’s the smallest house on the street, but is inhabited by quite a crew, four children—Jane, the eldest, Michael, next in line, and the twins Barbara and John. Goodness knows Mrs. Banks needs help, and she has it, until the day Katie Nanna quits without notice, which doesn’t disappoint the kids at all. Still, Mrs. Banks is frantic. Until the day the wind shifts to the East, “blowing through naked branches of the cherry trees in the Lane.”

Jane and Michael are at the window when they see a strange sight, a woman with an umbrella and carpet bag in hand being “flung” toward their house. With that inspiring entrance, Mary Poppins appears.

Life turns lighthearted for the Banks with magical Mary at the helm, her personality both bossy and kind, a combination that quickly makes this nanny an unforgettable addition at Seventeen Cherry Lane. Oh, that she could stay forever!

Buy the book at Neighborhood Reads

Written by Chris Stuckenschneider.

Copyright 2026, Community Literacy Foundation.