Chris Van Dusen

"When a big truck and its big load get stuck on a narrow road, traffic on the little island comes to a halt. Some cars need to go south and some have to travel north. How will Meg get to her swim meet? What about Barry's ballet class? Luckily, the kids come up with an ingenious solution: why not just swap cars? Inspired by an incident that happened on Vinalhaven, Maine, Chris Van Dusen tells a fun tale of resourcefulness and community through clever,...

Imaginative Jack describes the kind of house he would build--one with a racetrack, a flying room, and a gigantic slide.

It's a summer day so beautiful and peaceful that Hattie, paddling in her canoe in the middle of a lake, can't help but sing. In the deep water below, a creature is lurking. He's huge and green, with a long, long neck and he rarely leaves his lair. But on this day, he hears something sweet and inviting. He hears a song. What happens when the creature rises to the surface is nothing short of magical. Can a young girl and an enormous lake monster become...

Jack describes the kind of car he would build -- one with amazing accessories and with the capability of traveling on land, in the air, and on and under the sea.

Randy Riley is a science genius who loves baseball, but isn't very good at it. Riley needs to use both his interests to save his town from a giant fireball hurtling toward earth.

Forging an instant bond with spaghetti-loving horse Maybelline, horseless cowboy Leroy Ninker inadverently risks eternal loneliness when he forgets a vital rule about Maybelline's care.

When Stella gets the sudden idea to go caroling, she has a little trouble getting someone to join her. Her brother, Frank, is not good at spontaneity. The Watsons are very involved in a precarious fruitcake attempt (but happy to send their pig, Mercy, out for the occasion). Eugenia Lincoln declines, a bit rudely, to accompany on her accordion, and Horace Broom is too busy studying planetary movement. Will Stella need to sing by herself -- with enthusiastic...

Stella Endicott loves her teacher, Miss Liliana, and she is thrilled when the class is assigned to write a poem. Stella crafts a beautiful poem about Mercy Watson, the pig who lives next door -- a poem complete with a metaphor and full of curiosity and courage. But Horace Broom, Stella's irritating classmate, insists that Stella's poem is full of lies and that pigs do not live in houses. And when Stella and Horace get into a shouting match in the...

Mercy the pig's love of buttered toast leads to the capture of a small thief who would rather be a cowboy.

Mr. Watson's usual Saturday drive in his Cadillac with his favorite pig, Mercy, turns into an adventure when an unexpected passenger shows up in the back seat and Mercy finds herself behind the wheel.