Chicken Impossible

By Leslea Tash

ZuZu's lazy freeloader chickens fail to hatch any chicks, so she sets out on an adventure with her family to add three tiny fluffballs of chickeny goodness to the family's backyard flock. With the help of Mom, Dad, and three older brothers, ZuZu becomes a chicken agent, nonpareil.

If you loved Junie B. Jones, give ZuZu and her family's adventure a read.

Recommended for ages 6-12.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Smart Girls Gone Country
• Release date: Aug 10, 2017
• ISBN: 9781386106241

Book preview

Chapter One

My weird family

Hi, my name is ZuZu Mellencamp. That's right, I said ZuZu, and I also said Mellencamp, like a place where watermelons go on summer break. You probably think that's a weird name, but my mom's name is Qwerty and my dad's name is Boss, so it’s not that weird. I have three brothers, four dogs, and seven chickens and they all have weird names, too, but not as weird as ZuZu, probably. I will tell you their names in just a minute, I think. First it is my turn.

I'm six years old and I'm almost done with kindergarten. Kindergarten is the grade where you learn counting, days of the week, and to always put the seat down on the toilet, because one time I did not check to make sure it was down, and I went splash right there in the potty water. My teacher had to call my mom to bring me extra clothes because my fanny got wet.

My teacher’s name is Mrs. Junie, and there's some kind of sneaky deal going on between her and my mom, I think. My mom always seems to know what is going on at school before I tell her.  Some of the stuff, anyway. She doesn’t know we played My Little Pony on the playground at recess unless I tell her, but she knew all about Field Day before I did. It's like the teacher sends my mom secret notes about field day, but not My Little Pony. Mom says it's called the kindergarten newsletter and that I could probably read it myself if I would slow down and sound out the words, but I don’t care about that, really.

Mom shows me when my name is in the newsletter, like the time I got in the Principal’s Word Club. Principal’s Word Club is when you know all the words on the sight word list. The sight word list is a list of words that you see with your eyes, like eyesight. I don’t think there is a smell word list or a hearing word list, but maybe you learn those in first grade. I'll find out next year, I guess. First Mom says we have to survive summer break. I’m not sure what we have to survive, like, are we going to be attacked at home or something? Mom has some water balloons hidden in her dresser, so maybe there is going to be a water balloon attack. I think I can survive that. I’ll probably wear my swimsuit all summer just in case. Qwerty says she’s not sure that’s a good idea, but I