Min Makes a Machine

May 7, 2018
Min, the ingenious, intrepid little pachyderm protagonist of the early reader 3-2-1-Go, is back to save the day with a new invention. The social dynamics are the same: Min, whose bright pink bow embodies her indomitable energy, wants to play with older elephants Ann and Bess, but they view Min as a pest at best. (Readers with older, too-cool-for-you siblings will instantly identify.) In this installment, it’s a brutally hot day on the savannah, but Ann and Bess would rather sweat, sulk, and tell Min to “go play with someone else” than do anything to change their situation. Not Min: she figures out a way to flood an empty pool using water from a nearby well and an Archimedes’s Screw (although it’s not named as such), and suddenly the pages are awash in splashes of bright, almost palpably cooling blue. McCully (Caroline’s Comets) breaks down Min’s problem solving into digestible, replicable parts and acknowledges that every great solution takes hard work. It’s a nifty lesson in both science and tenacity, but some may wish that McCully had slipped in an etiquette lesson as well: would it kill Ann and Bess to thank Min? Ages 4–8.

May 1, 2018
This early reader has a resourceful elephant girl at its center.The story follows the same characters introduced in McCully's 3, 2, 1, Go! (2015), in which the protagonist builds a catapult. Here Min, an anthropomorphic elephant child, wants to play, but her friends, Bess and Ann (also elephants), are too hot to join her. First Min tries to cool them off with a leafy branch she calls a fan, which she waves with her trunk. This doesn't work, and so she goes in search of water to fill an emptied, abandoned swimming pool. Undeterred when the only water to be found is at the bottom of a deep well, she coils a long hose around a pipe and secures it with some glue to build the eponymous "machine" that draws water from the well to the conveniently located swimming pool. The story, which is dedicated to "all problem-solving girls," concludes with the friends joyfully splashing in the pool. Unfortunately, nowhere is the device Min builds identified as an Archimedes screw, which seems like an oversight since even a brief front- or backmatter explanation would enrich the book as a whole. But, the controlled text and lively watercolor illustrations will engage young readers learning to independently decode text and just might inspire some to build their own machines, too.STEAM-y early-reader fun. (Early reader. 5-7)

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July 1, 2018

PreS-Gr 1-Min is back and still solving problems like a pro. It is so hot that no one wants to play with Min. She makes a fan-still too hot for Ann and Bess. If only the old pool had water; playing in the pool would be perfect on such a hot day. Min (aka MacGyver) is on the job! First she finds an old well then, using only her STEM knowledge, a tube, a hose, and some glue, she siphons the water from the well into the pool. This amazing bit of science fills the pool and fun play in the cool water follows. McCully's illustrations are spare but perfect for the text and focus on the action at hand. Her depiction of Min's syphon is clear and easy to reproduce, if one should want. VERDICT This pachyderm's predilection for problem solving will delight readers who will want to try this for themselves. Sure to be popular for STEM lessons and a good addition for most collections.-Catherine Callegari, Gay-Kimball Library, Troy, NH

Copyright 2018 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2019
Min's fellow-elephant friends are too hot to play. Min finds a creative solution to cool everyone off by engineering a machine to move water from a well to an empty pool. (Bafflingly, she doesn't use her trunk; and the presence of both a well and an empty pool in the savanna is unexplained.) Cheerful pen-and-ink and watercolor illustrations show the clever elephant's design process.

(Copyright 2019 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)