Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa: Partners

I bought this book for my daughter Kate's 3rd birthday. She really enjoys these stories. They are cute, simple and engaging and the illustrations are great too.

We first discovered the Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa series through my children's Scholastic Book Club catalogs brought home from school. What a find! We already know Betsy Lewin well as an illustrator of the great "Click, Clack Moo" series with Doreen Cronin so we were definitely not disappointed there. She really captures the feelings of Cocoa the Horse and gives the book a spark of life with her choice of colors and subtle touches to show movement and emotion. Erica Silverman has won our hearts with this interesting, funny and heart-touching story of Cowgirl Kate and her best friend, Cocoa the Horse. Cocoa gets jealous as Kate starts going to school and even "dares" to bring a new friend home for a play date! The nerve! Well really, Cocoa is just sad as he's afraid he will lose Kate when she starts to get out into the world on her own. But Kate quickly works to reaffirm their strong friendship and help Cocoa know that they will always be best friends, no matter what! Sweet story and lots of good things to use to talk about with your own kids. We look forward to more collaborations between Silverman and Lewin!

Our 2-year old daughter Kate LOVES these books. I am so glad that there are two more in the works! Please keep them coming.

Join Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa on their wild west adventures. This is the second book for the Cowgirl Kate series. Cowgirl Kate loves her job as a rancher and tries to do her best. Cocoa is her hourse and sometimes has a mind of his own! There are four chapters in the book. Each is like a separate adventure for the 2 best friends! Cocoa the horse was a neat character.. He sounds a lot like a real child instead of a horse! I would recommend this book to kids who are just learning to read. The words are simple and easy and the chapters are short.

In another happy pairing of Cowgirl Kate and her horse, Cocoa, Partners contains four more stories of the antics of this spunky cowgirl and her best pal. In the first story, Cocoa is due for new horseshoes, but balks at the suggestion, declaring, "I don't want horseshoes. I want cowboy boots." When Kate tries to fit him with the boots, Cocoa realizes with disappointment that they will never fit a four-legged creature. Once Kate explains that horseshoes are everywhere on the ranch because they bring good luck, Cocoa is delighted, prancing about in his new horseshoes, pleased to be the bearer of good luck. Whether playing hide-and-seek (or as Cocoa likes to call it "hide-and-eat") or practicing roping, Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa are partners in everything, working out compromises and solving every dilemma with good humor. Playful and affectionate, Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa tackle life together, sharing the chores and the fun, because "partners do everything together". Betsy Lewin's paintings are particularly energetic and colorful, full of the action of life on a ranch and the joyful friendship of a little cowgirl and her favorite horse, a chapter book on working together and problem-solving for young readers. Luan Gaines/2006.