Review: Cool Beans: The Further Adventures of Beanboy by Lisa Harkrader

Cool Beans: The Further Adventures of Beanboy by Lisa Harkrader. The Sequel to The Adventures of Beanboy.

Houghton Mifflin Books for Children
Publication Date: May 2014
List Price: $16.99
ISBN-13: 9780544039049

Review: In Cool Beans: The Further Adventures of Beanboy by Lisa Harkrader, Tucker MacBean is bullied by a kid named Wesley. The art club teacher, Mrs. Frazee, Coach Wilder, and Beecher MacBean are the main characters in this fiction book. Tucker is an ordinary kid, and he makes posters, drawings, and comics of H2O, a superhero, and Beanboy, H2O's sidekick. This book is the second part of a series; the first book is called The Adventures of Beanboy.

In the beginning, Tucker and Beecher go to the sports store. Even though they don't play sports, they went there to cash in the gift cards from their dad. Then Beech saw a baseball helmet that looked like Iron Man's. He grabbed it and he put in on his head. Then Wesley came in, stole the helmet off of Beech's head, and cashed it for himself. Sadly, it was the last one. Tucker went to go chase after him but saw Emma, the shiniest girl in school, and got distracted. So he didn't get the helmet back. Then he went home to do his New Year's Resolution, but instead he started to draw. Tucker continued to draw more Beanboy pages, and then when he returned to school his comic was everywhere. It kept happening and a boy named Owen Skeet was interested, but when he got to art club, he saw the scariest thing, Dillon. He was a big and scary kid that always got detention. The principal announced to the school that they were having an annual carnival, and they would have a dodge ball tournament. Tucker wanted to join with his art club members because the helmet Wesley bought was the prize.

I really liked Cool Beans: The Further Adventures of Beanboy because it was funny, surprising, and very interesting. At first, I thought it was just good, but then when I got into the book more, it became more exciting and I thought, "What is going to happen next? " For example, are Emma and Tucker going to do anything together or what is Wesley going to do with Tucker? What will happen when he entered the dodge ball tournament? It also makes you wonder who is posting Tucker's comics.

It is very funny because Beech says his C's like T's, and since he is a little kid he does funny little kid things. Students in middle school will like this book because it is just right reading level, and most of it takes place in a middle school. Girls and boys will enjoy this book because it involves both girls and boys in it so both genders can relate to it. The only thing I didn't like about this book was the beginning because it doesn't hook you as much as the middle and the end do. Overall, the book is hard to put down because the reader can't predict what will happen.

Review written by Aiden (6th grade student).

We would like to thank Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for providing a copy of Cool Beans: The Further Adventures of Beanboy for this review.

Have you read Cool Beans: The Further Adventures of Beanboy? How would you rate it?