Sardine and the crew of the Huckleberry are back for more exciting adventures. Flesh-eating tattoos, a kidnapped princess — the file of a space pirate is never quiet, especially when Supermuscleman and Doc Krok get up to mischief. With the usual sly humor and gleefully childlike sense of the absurd, Guibert and Sfar offer bizarre, memorable characters and a delightfully surreal story. A few small details may make grown-ups raise an eyebrow (Supermuscleman gets a tattoo on his bottom), but kids will love the art, the bright colors, and the nonsense. — Tina Coleman

Gr 4-7— Nine stories irreverently capture a child's offbeat, often overly literal view of the world. Sardine and her friends Little Louie and Captain Yellow Shoulder are space pirates, out for fun, adventure, and the never-ending fight against Supermuscleman, chief executive dictator of the universe. In one selection, they find out that all children have a monster assigned to their bed to frighten them, and then move it to a grown-up's bed; in another, they find a baby rocket that fell from its nest and tenderly nurse it back to health with kerosene. The shaky lines and bright colors of Sfar's drawings evoke a childlike simplicity and exuberance. Young readers may not understand all of the jokes, but they should be entertained by the limitless fount of silly ideas and the array of whimsical space creatures, including the ghost Pallid Pete and Octo the octopus.— Lisa Goldstein, Brooklyn Public Library, NY