Children’s chapter book: Small Persons with Wings by Ellen Booraem

I liked the Spiderwick books ok, and this one seemed like it would be pretty similar.  And it had a great review.  Mellie is ostracized in kindergarten when she says she’ll bring in her fairy (not imaginary, either!), but the small person with wings is greatly offended and disappears, leaving her empty-handed.  She is further let down when she discovers her parents actually never believed that the fairy was real, despite what they’ve indicated.  Several years later, when her parents decide to move to her recently-deceased grandfather’s house, she is elated to have a chance to start over.  Then she finds that  her new home has hundreds of small persons with wings, her family is in charge of them, and her parents had lied to her about not believing she had a fairy.  The book did have some great moments–the grandfather clock is terrific–but it was hard to keep the characters straight, and there were details thrown in that either didn’t make sense, or were totally unnecessary.  There’s a fair bit of vocabulary in this book, but a great plot strategy to explain much of it.  A kid who totally loved the Spiderwick series will more than likely enjoy this book as well.