This third adventure with Charley's alphabet, created by a mother-son team, engages the little letters in a competition with the capital letters. The alphabet worked hard all year to help Charley learn to read and write, and it was ready for a vacation. Soaring off on a pencil to Alphabet City, the little letters discover a broken-down fire engine. When they fix it up, it becomes a vehicle for letter rescues, including one of the capital letters when their own truck blows a tire. The shiny, bright images in the digitally rendered illustrations add dimension to the action. To stand out from the black text, the letter symbol in the character's name (Little b, Chief F) is printed in red. This will encourage phonics games and a-b-c-learning, though it will work best if the audience is familiar with the previous books.

In the newest installment of Audrey and Bruce Wood's alphabet series, Charley goes to visit his grandparents for the summer, and his lowercase letters go on vacation to Alphabet City, the place where they were born. There, the lowercase letters are excited to see a new fire truck—until they are told that they are too small to use it. Wandering around, they find an abandoned fire truck, clean off the m-u-d themselves and proceed to save a c-a-t from a tree. Suddenly, the factory where all letters are made catches fire, and the capital letters' truck's tire blows out. It's up to the lowercase letters to save the day and work together with the capital letters to squelch the flames—and return home in time to help Charley write a thank-you note to his grandparents. While the plot is a trifle thin, the hyper-realistic artwork, the bright colors, the spelling puzzles and the inventive use of letters within the text will no doubt appeal to children just becoming familiar with their ABCs. (Picture book. 3-5)

PreS-Gr 1-When Charley leaves to visit his grandparents for summer vacation, his lowercase alphabet letters travel on a pencil to their hometown of Alphabet City. The little letters' adventures include fixing up an old fire engine, cleaning M-u-d from a car, rescuing a C-a-t from a tree, and saving the day when the capital letters' fire engine spins out of control and cannot get to the fire at the letter-making factory. Readers will enjoy this sweet story and have fun identifying letters in the text and illustrations. As in the Woods' Alphabet Adventure (2001) and Alphabet Mystery (2003, both Scholastic), the pages are filled with 3-D-style digital artwork, creating a self-contained alphabet world.-Marilyn Ackerman, Brooklyn Public Library, NY Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.