Trade Book Thursday

December 1 • 24 Hour Sale

Thank you for being part of our first-ever Trade Book Thursday!

Browse By Grade Level

K-2

To the Stars! The First American Woman Walk in Space

By: Carmella Van Vleet

Kathy Sullivan wanted to go everywhere. She loved blueprints and maps. She loved languages and the ocean. She didn’t like the question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” She wanted to explore and do exciting things that girls weren’t supposed to be able to do. Only men had the exciting jobs.

Kathy liked fishing and swimming; flying planes and studying science. That’s what she liked and that’s what she decided to do with her life. She followed her heart and eventually became a NASA astronaut and the first woman to walk in space. Kathy wanted to see the whole world and so she did: from space!

Hardback: $15.00

Energy Island: How One Community Harnessed the Wind and Changed Their World

By: Allan Drummond

At a time when most countries are producing ever-increasing amounts of greenhouse gasses, the rather ordinary citizens of Samsø have accomplished something extraordinary―in just ten years they have reduced their carbon emissions by 140% and become almost completely energy independent. A narrative tale and a science book in one, this inspiring true story proves that with a little hard work and a big idea, anyone can make a huge step toward energy conservation. The inspiring first book in the author’s acclaimed series about real-world communities going green.

Hardback: $15.00

A Weed Is a Flower: The Life of George Washington Carver

By: Aliki

Discover how George Washington Carver went from a slave to an innovator of agricultural science in this luminously illustrated picture book.

Born a slave, George Washington Carver went on to become the most prominent black scientist of the early twentieth century.

Paperback: $10.00

The Fossil Girl: Mary Anning’s Dinosuar Discovery

By: Catherine Brighton

It's 1811. Ten-year-old Mary Anning, her brother Joe, and their widowed mother are eking out a meager existence running a little fossil shop in the seaside town of Lyme Regis. After a storm wipes out most of the shop's merchandise, Mary and Joe begin the slow work of restocking the shelves. They search high and low for fossils, and one day Mary spots a huge eye in a cliff face high above the town. She resolves to bring the creature down €” no matter what the risk. The exciting discovery and recovery of the first complete fossil of an Ichthyosaurus is told in an attractive graphic novel format, perfect for reluctant readers.

Paperback: $10.00

Timeless Thomas: How Thomas Edison Changed Our Lives

By: Gene Barretta

Edison is most famous for inventing the incandescent lightbulb, but at his landmark laboratories in Menlo Park & West Orange, New Jersey, he also developed many other staples of modern technology. Despite many failures, Edison persevered. And good for that, because it would be very difficult to go through a day without using one of his life-changing inventions.

Hardback: $15.00

Burn: Michael Faraday's Candle

By: Darcy Pattison

Solid wax is somehow changed into light and heat. But how?

Travel back in time to December 28, 1848 in London, England to one of the most famous juvenile science Christmas lectures at the Royal Institution. British scientist Michael Faraday encouraged kids to carefully observe a candle and to try to figure out how it burned.

Since Faraday’s lecture, “The Chemical History of a Candle,” was published in 1861, it’s never been out of print. Faraday originally gave seven lectures on how a candle burns. Pattison has adapted the first 6000-word lecture to about 650 words for modern elementary students. Known as one of the best science experimenters ever, Faraday’s passion was always to answer the basic questions of science: “What is the cause? Why does it occur?”

Paperback: $10.00

Noa, the Little Scientist

By: Shenell L.T. Bolden

Noa is your average elementary school kid. She likes school, she likes to learn and she loves to eat spaghetti! Noa’s teacher Mrs. Campbell introduces her to science. Then her whole world opens up. She becomes enthralled with science and how things work. Join her on her journey of discovery.

Paperback: $10.00

3-5

The Boy Who Invented TV

By: Kathleen Krull

Plowing a potato field in 1920, a 14-year-old farm boy from Idaho saw in the parallel rows of overturned earth a way to “make pictures fly through the air.” This boy was not a magician; he was a scientific genius and just eight years later he made his brainstorm in the potato field a reality by transmitting the world’s first television image. This fascinating picture-book biography of Philo Farnsworth covers his early interest in machines and electricity, leading up to how he put it all together in one of the greatest inventions of the 20th century. The author’s afterword discusses the lawsuit Farnsworth waged and won against RCA when his high school science teacher testified that Philo’s invention of television was years before RCA’s.

Hardback: $15.00

Annie Jump Cannon Astronomer

By: Carole Gerber

This biography illustrates the accomplishments of a woman who developed a system of classifying stars and who-to this day-holds the record for identifying more stars than anyone else in the world. In 1925, Annie Jump Cannon became the first woman to be honored by Oxford University with a doctor of science degree. In addition to noting the achievements of the astronomer and her contributions to science, the book details Cannon's work and system of ranking stars by heat.

Hardback: $15.00

Mr. Ferris and His Wheel

By: Kathryn Gibbs Davis

Capturing an engineer's creative vision and mind for detail, this fully illustrated picture book biography sheds light on how the American inventor George Ferris defied gravity and seemingly impossible odds to invent the world's most iconic amusement park attraction, the Ferris wheel.

Hardback: $15.00

Gregor Mendel

By: Cheryl Bardoe

Gregor Mendel explains to children the theory of heredity in simple-to-understand language and examples. Regarded as the world’s first geneticist, Gregor Mendel discovered one of the fundamental aspects of genetic science: animals, plants, and people all inherit and pass down traits through the same process. Living the slow-paced, contemplative life of a friar, Gregor Mendel was able to conceive and put into practice his great experiment—observing yellow peas, green peas, smooth peas, and wrinkled peas to craft his theory—years before scientists had any notion of genes. Includes an author’s note and bibliography.

Hardback: $15.00

The Watcher: Jane Goodall's Life with the Chimps

By: Jeanette Winter

Acclaimed picture book biographer Jeanette Winter has found her perfect subject: Jane Goodall, the great observer of chimpanzees. Follow Jane from her childhood in London watching a robin on her windowsill, to her years in the African forests of Gombe, Tanzania, invited by brilliant scientist Louis Leakey to observe chimps, to her worldwide crusade to save these primates who are now in danger of extinction, and their habitat. Young animal lovers and Winter's many fans will welcome this fascinating and moving portrait of an extraordinary person and the animals to whom she has dedicated her life.

Hardback: $15.00

Barnum's Bones: How Barnum Brown Discovered the Most Famous Dinosaur in the World

By: Tracey Fern

Barnum Brown's (1873-1963) parents named him after the circus icon P.T. Barnum, hoping that he would do something extraordinary--and he did! As a paleontologist for the American Museum of Natural History, he discovered the first documented skeleton of the Tyrannosaurus Rex, as well as most of the other dinosaurs on display there today.

Hardback: $15.00

Snowflake Bentley

By: Jacqueline Briggs Martin

Wilson Bentley was always fascinated by snow. In childhood and adulthood, he saw each tiny crystal of a snowflake as a little miracle and wanted to understand them.

His parents supported his curiosity and saved until they could give him his own camera and microscope. At the time, his enthusiasm was misunderstood. But with patience and determination, Wilson catalogued hundreds of snowflake photographs, gave slideshows of his findings and, when he was 66, published a book of his photos. His work became the basis for all we know about beautiful, unique snowflakes today.

Hardback: $15.00

The Man Who Named the Clouds

By: Julie Hanna

In 1782, when Luke Howard was ten, he began keeping a weather journal to describe what he saw in the sky--he especially loved to watch the clouds. As an adult, Luke wanted to classify clouds, though many others had failed at this.

Hardback: $15.00

The Boy Who Drew Birds: A Story of John James Audubon

By: Jacqueline Davies

If there was one thing James loved to do more than anything else, it was to be in the great outdoors watching his beloved feathered friends.

In the fall of 1804, he was determined to find out if the birds nesting near his Pennsylvania home would really return the following spring. Through careful observation, James laid the foundation for all that we know about migration patterns today.

Capturing the early passion of this bird-obsessed young man as well as the meticulous study and scientific methods behind his research, this lively, gorgeously illustrated biography will leave young readers listening intently for the call of birds large and small near their own home.

Hardback: $15.00

Ada Byron Lovelace & the Thinking Machine

By: Laurie Wallmark

Ada Lovelace, the daughter of the famous romantic poet, Lord Byron, develops her creativity through science and math. When she meets Charles Babbage, the inventor of the first mechanical computer, Ada understands the machine better than anyone else and writes the world's first computer program in order to demonstrate its capabilities.

Hardback: $15.00

Manfish: A Story of Jacques Cousteau

By: Jennifer Berne

Before Jacques Cousteau became an internationally known oceanographer and champion of the seas, he was a curious little boy. In this lovely biography, poetic text and gorgeous paintings combine to create a portrait of Jacques Cousteau that is as magical as it is inspiring.

Hardback: $15.00

The Real McCoy: Life of an African-America Inventor

By: Wendy Towle

Elijah McCoy (1844-1929), the child of escaped slaves, was born in Canada and educated in Scotland as an engineer during the Civil War. Settling in Michigan, he was able to find work only as a fireman, stoking the engines of a locomotive and oiling its parts. But his training was not wasted: he invented an automatic lubricator--possibly the original ``real McCoy''--and went on to patent other devices, including the portable ironing board and the lawn sprinkler. He eventually founded the Elijah McCoy Manufacturing Company but never received his due for his work and died alone in a nursing home. First-time author Towle honors her subject's achievements while acknowledging his meager public recognition, while Clay tones down the dynamism he exhibited in Little Eight John to paint sturdy, luminous images of McCoy in action. McCoy himself provides a compelling example of 19th-century African American achievement in the face of discrimination; this respectful biography is a useful addition to library collections.

Paperback: $10.00

The Brooklyn Bridge: The Story of the World's Most Famous Bridge and the Remarkable Family That Built It

By: Elizabeth Mann

A classic in children's non-fiction -- now in paper.

John Roebling had a dream.

He would build the world's longest bridge and he would build it in a new way. But his way was too new. It took 15 years to convince people it would work. And then, just as construction was to begin, John Roebling was killed in a freak accident.

That should have been the end of the story of The Brooklyn Bridge. Instead, it was the beginning. For John wasn't the only Roebling who could dream.

Paperback: $10.00

The Dinosaurs of Waterhouse Hawkins

By: Barbara Kerley

This extraordinary true story introduces readers to the unforgettable Waterhouse Hawkins: Victorian artist and visionary who built the world's first life-size models of dinosaurs!

Can you fathom a time when almost no one in the world knew what a dinosaur looked like? That was true in the mid-nineteenth century, until Victorian artist Waterhouse Hawkins built the first life-size models of dinosaurs, first in his native England and later in New York City, and dazzled the world with his awe-inspiring creations. With impeccable attention to detail, Barbara Kerley unearths a story of consuming passion, triumph, loss, and courage--and ultimately, of an extraordinary legacy that lives on today. Caldecott Medalist Brian Selznick celebrates this complex and fascinating individual through luminous, soul-stirring paintings that form a visual masterpiece.

Hardback: $15.00

Rachel Carson and Her Book That Changed the World

By: Laurie Lawlor

Determined and curious even as a child, Rachel Carson's fascination with the natural world led her to study biology, and pursue a career in science at a time when very few women worked in the field.

This lyrical, illustrated biography follows Carson's journey—from a girl exploring the woods, to a woman working to help support her family during the Great Depression, to a journalist and pioneering researcher, investigating and exposing the harmful effects of pesticide overuse.

Best known for writing Silent Spring, Rachel Carson was a major figure in the early environmental movement, and her work brought a greater understanding of the impact humans have on our planet. Rachel Carson and Her Book That Changed the World offers a glimpse at the early life that shaped her interest in nature, and the way one person's determination can inspire others to fight for real change.

An author's note delves into how Silent Spring helped shape the modern environmental movement and inspired a generation of readers to get involved in conservation.

Hardback: $15.00

Papa's Mechanical Fish

By: Candace Fleming

Clink! Clankety-bang! Thump-whirr! That's the sound of Papa at work. Although he is an inventor, he has never made anything that works perfectly, and that's because he hasn't yet found a truly fantastic idea. But when he takes his family fishing on Lake Michigan, his daughter Virena asks, "Have you ever wondered what it's like to be a fish?"―and Papa is off to his workshop. With a lot of persistence and a little bit of help, Papa―who is based on the real-life inventor Lodner Phillips―creates a submarine that can take his family for a trip to the bottom of Lake Michigan.

Hardback: $15.00