Henry and Mudge Make Moving Day Easier

When I was in second grade, my cousins, who had lived two blocks away from me up to that point, moved to a city five hours away. We were used to seeing each other every day, and now we had to adjust to a prolonged separation. As difficult as it was for me, it must have been much harder for them, leaving everything and everyone that was familiar for a new life in a strange place.

In Henry and Mudge and Annie's Good Move, the eighteenth book in the series of easy readers by Cynthia Rylant, author of the Poppleton and Mr. Putter and Tabby books, and illustrated by Sucie Stevenson, young Henry finds himself in the opposite situation than the one I faced. Instead of watching his cousin move away, he's thrilled to learn that his cousin Annie is moving in next door to him. Now he'll be able to see her as often as he wants instead of just on special occasions. But Annie still has to leave her home, her school, her friends. It's hard to say goodbye - and hard to trust that the movers will be careful with her shimmery dresses and shiny shoes. In fact, she's so nervous when Henry's family comes to help her move that she begins to break out into unsightly splotches. Can kindly Henry and his great big huggable dog Mudge help ease her transition?

The 35-page story is broken up into three sections: Next Door!, Blotchy and The New House. Henry comes off especially well in this volume; though he's always a kind-hearted soul, his compassion is usually directed toward Mudge, who is often the only other major character in the books, with Henry's parents on the sidelines. Here, he focuses his attention on Annie. While he finds her obsessive attention to the condition of her clothing a bit silly, he doesn't sit around and tease her about it. Instead, he tries to increase her confidence, expending every ounce of empathy he has in response to her plight.

Stevenson's illustrations are entertaining, with the addition of dolled-up Annie and her blotchy face and a whole moving van full of beloved belongings. I particularly like the two-page spread depicting the wishes Henry, his parents, Mudge, Annie and her dad make once they are happily settled in their new home, accompanying Rylant's droll text. "One by one they wished. Some wishes were big. Some were small. Some looked like T-bone steak." For children facing anxieties about moving, Henry and Mudge and Annie's Good Move is a wish come true.