REGARDING THE TREES

The doyennes of the double meaning offer a third visit to the Missouri hamlet of Geyser Creek, whose residents are now regarding two crises. One is middle-school Principal Wally Russ’s “Proposal” to Flo Waters, which he supposes is only to cut down a century-old weeping willow to save his job (she thinks otherwise); the other a bitter culinary rivalry between the Geyser Creek Café’s Angel Fisch and Chef Angelo of newly opened Caffè Angelo that has blossomed into a town-wide split between the sexes. As in previous episodes, these and other intertwined plotlines are entirely leafed out through letters, memos, newspaper reports and ads, archival documents and chalkboard notes, all printed in various typefaces with the occasional ink-and-wash vignette grafted in. Led by crusading classmate Minnie “Ax not! It’s what you can do for your country” O., the six sixth-graders plant themselves right in the middle of it all, and by the end have helped to save the tree, nip the bad report of school inspector Leif Blite in the bud and turn intended “weedings” into multiple “weddings.” Consistently clever and often hilarious, this and its series mates may well become perennial favorites with young readers. (Fiction. 9-11)