New Friend

Description: Eight-year-old Sophie Mouse's excited to return to school after the long winter break, but there's a new student--a snake--and Sophie and the other animals are afraid to sit near him, much less ask him to play with them, because they've heard that snakes are awful.

Brief description: Poppy Green can talk to animals! Unfortunately, they never talk back to her. So she started writing in order to imagine what they might say and do when humans aren't watching. Poppy lives on the edge of the woods in Connecticut, where her backyard is often a playground for all kinds of wildlife: birds, rabbits, squirrels, voles, skunks, deer, and the occasional wild turkey.