The One and Only Sparkella Makes a Plan

K-Gr 3–Sparkella and her amazing father are back, and new friend Tam is on her way for a sleepover. Sparkella has a problem: How can she create a castle for two royal highnesses? Enter Dad, wearing a Hawaiian lei, wolf slippers, and a can-do attitude. According to Sparkella, the castle must be made of leopard stones, have a moat, two floors, a candy shop, and a secret passage. When the castle isn’t turning out how she wanted, Sparkella gets another boost from her father. “We paint and patch and polish. And when we are done…it is even better than what I had imagined.” In this weaker second story about the charming father-daughter duo, the illustrations are bold and bright with glitz, glam, and shimmers around Sparkella and her creations. A pet turtle makes a regular appearance on many pages and is included in the royal castle experience, but children will love the book’s disclaimer: “No turtles were harmed in the making of this book.” While Sparkella and her father are white, Tam and her grandmother have brown skin.