Pirates and Spooks, Beware!
written by Susan Weiner
illustrated by Bobbie Kogok
Shiver me timbers! Pirates and parrots, mummies and mermaids—get ready for these fun and funky creatures to tickle your funny bone and send a chill down your spine! Between the lines of these eerie poems, a lady pirate fights her battles in stolen ball gowns, a cannibal decides to become a vegetarian, and a ghost hitches a ride in the family car. You’d better get started: it’s all hands on deck!
PRAISE FOR PIRATES AND SPOOKS, BEWARE!
“Pirates and Spooks, Beware! is a collection of refreshingly fun, funny, and sometimes rascally poems, sure to delight elementary and middle school readers (and their teachers)! This entertaining collection of works from clever and talented poet Susan Weiner lends itself to enjoyable reading and a deeper study of poetic conventions, all the while providing subtle vocabulary, geography, history, and even meteorology lessons. Each poem reads equally well both silently and aloud, and could also provide a wonderful ‘old school’ memorization activity at the end of the unit of study. (Slam poetry, anyone?!) These rhyming poems appeal to the reader while telling a story in the most charming way. The lovely illustrations make them come alive, and thanks to Ms. Weiner’s incredible imagination, we walk away smiling, thinking surely, ‘Why, pirates (and spooks) are just like us!’ Arghhh, matey . . . ENJOY!”
~ Pat Talbert Smith, former Head of St. Francis Episcopal Day School and former Lower School Head/Assistant Head of St. Andrew’s Episcopal School in Potomac, MD
“Many areas of study have been lost or seriously curtailed in the push to include the latest technology into classrooms across the country. One of these areas is poetry. Children do not read, study, or memorize much poetry as they have in past generations. Susan Weiner is doing her part in trying to alleviate this gap through this little volume of pirate poetry. Most kids go through a ‘pirate phase’ in their lives, and these poems capture the essence of the pirate lore quite fancifully. The fact that they also employ rhythm and rhyme are icing on the cake and serve to provide instruction in one of the basic skills of early literacy. I recommend this book for anyone interested in the drama and intrigue of pirates!”
~ Carol Parent, learning specialist and former school administrator and classroom teacher