Recipe for Happiness

First, sidle up to a human who is too lazy to sit at a table but instead is sitting on a low couch and eating while watching Spongebob.  Wait for the right moment....  Gotcha!  All the meat off a lemon-pepper rotisserie chicken leg is yours!!  Next, dig around with your nose for some good books from the library pile.   After all, if they're just going to sit on their tail-ends watching TV you might as well read their books.

What I found in the library pile were two dog books:

"Down Girl and Sit: Smarter than Squirrels" by Lucy Nolan was the first one I read.  Ha, ha, so funny!  Also, it was easy to read, and would be great for humans just graduating to chapter books.  The pictures, by Mike Reed, were really good - my favorite one was of Down Girl eating an entire pie off the table.  That one was in the chapter called "I Ate It".
Down Girl lives next door to Sit, and behind them is the evil creature called Here Kitty Kitty.  The two dogs are constantly having to take care of their humans, who don't seem to know what they're doing.  Like one time they went off and forgot to take the dogs!  After many leaf piles, a muddy creek and the park with the squirrels Down Girl and Sit finally find them at an outdoor place with tables and lots of doughnuts!  I won't tell you what happened, but it did involve a whole bag of doughnuts.
Down Girl and Sit are two of the happiest dogs I've ever read about.  What's their secret?  In Down Girl's own words: "The secret to our success is simple.  We are smarter than squirrels."

This is the real Roo with Harry Horse!

The second book is a perfect fantasy adventure for a summer read, "The Last Castaways" by Harry Horse.  Lots of little pictures make it special.  The story is told in letters and ship's log entries.  Grandfather and his dog Roo have declared an end to their adventuring ways but then they are invited on a seaside vacation in Saltbottle.  Roo ends up being the winning bidder at an auction for a ship because the auctioneer's glasses get steamed up and he thinks Roo is an old lady in a fur coat.  The ship belongs to their old friend the captain, and all three set sail to find The Door to the Sea and the legendary King Cod.  One storm later Roo and Grandfather find themselves adrift and then washed up on a deserted island.   Which turns out not to be deserted after all, but you'll have to read this book to find out about the old man with the straggly beard, and about the gramophone and the Mouse Family singers, and what role the walrus named Poopy plays in this amazing adventure.  This book would make a fabulous family read-aloud or would be great for ages 7-10.