The Cayuga Island Kids series features a diverse group of big-hearted friends who work together to solve mysteries, have adventures, and organize community projects. They are fact detectives who think, brainstorm, research, and collaborate to uncover answers and puzzle out solutions. Above all, they are kind, helpful, smart, and resourceful kids who have lots of fun together.
These chapter books are perfect for 7- to 10-year-olds in 1st through 4th grade.
“Any book that begins with a map of an island is my kind of story. Enliven that setting with a diverse group of characters who are consistently kind—and bursting with curiosity—and you’ve got all the elements of a series that is alive with adventure, friendship, and mystery.”
~ James Preller, author of the Jigsaw Jones mystery series
Book 1: The Mystery of the Barking Branches and the Sunken Ship
This entertaining mystery-history adventure is based on real events surrounding one of the biggest puzzles of the Great Lakes! The Cayuga Island Kids set off on a hunt for a certain kind of tree and instead unearth a cannonball thought to be from a treasure ship built right on their island that sank in 1679 and was never recovered. As they hunt for clues and follow leads, they discover that the island they live on is home to a whole lot of history. And, it turns out, a whole lot of mystery, too. We all have history in our own backyards, just waiting to be discovered by inquisitive, adventurous, and fun-loving fact detectives!
Book 2: The Adventure of the Big Fish By the Small Creek
Moving from knowing something has to be done to getting it done takes determination, teamwork, and sometimes, looking in a new direction. In this award-winning second book in the series, the Cayuga Island Kids rescue a mallard caught in the plastic rings from six-pack of cans. Moments later, a girl on a bike carelessly tosses a plastic bottle in the creek. That’s when they decide it’s time for action. How the Cayuga Island Kids go from fishing a plastic bottle out of the creek to bringing the community together to build a recycling bin big enough to hold plenty of plastic makes for a lively adventure. Young readers will be entertained as they come to realize the importance of brainstorming ideas, teamwork, the value of community effort, recycling, and the promise of new friendships. Best of all, readers will cheer on the Cayuga Island Kids as they come to realize that, although we are each just one person, together we can make a BIG difference.
Book 3: The Case of the Messy Message and the Missing Facts
It’s fall as Book 3 of the Cayuga Island Kids chapter book series opens. Julian explores food science as he experiments with recipes for the perfect chocolate chip cookie. Being a cookie sampler takes Mac’s mind off his troubles with fractions. Yoko practices for the school play tryouts, and Maya helps Ms. Choi with the Make-and-Take-Club. Lacey, of course, is searching for the next mystery to solve. And then two of Ms. Choi’s glitter pens go missing. The clues and evidence point to a suspect, but are the Cayuga Island Kids jumping to conclusions? When a classmate jumps to conclusions and shares false information about Julian’s cookies, the kids join forces to set the facts straight. And while researching explorers for a school project, the kids uncover misinformation that blurs the truth, and makes the reasons for being a fact detective crystal clear. Sorting through clues and evidence—just like research—means making sure you have all the facts, and not just a fraction of the truth. Young readers will cheer for the Cayuga Island Kids as they embark on this adventure involving misinformation, faulty assumptions, flour bugs, glitter pens, and chocolate chip cookies.
Click here to download Educator Guides and Activity Kits!
Rebecca Gray –
A beautifully illustrated story of exploration and imagination. The story captured my grandson’s interest quickly. He loved watching the story unravel before his eyes. Wonderfully told through the universal language of artistry. Well done, Ms. Graf.
Diane Polec –
Love, love, love Treasure in the Trunk, a Wordless Picture Book. This book is wonderful! Can’t wait
to “read” it with my granddaughter when she visits. The illustrations are lovely and get the
imagination working right away! Highly recommended — Bravo!
Diane Polec –
Love, love, love Treasure in the Trunk, A Wordless Picture Book. The delightful story and wonderful
illustrations get the imagination going really quickly. I can’t wait to “read” it to my five year old
granddaughter, she’ll love it! Five Stars Plus!!
Sue Bango –
I was fortunate enough to have this picture book read to my first grade class by the author herself. They loved everything about this book and I loved how the beautiful illustrations sparked their imaginations. I highly recommend this book for all ages.
Debbie Rohrbach –
I’ve always loved wordless picture books, there were a couple of favorites when my children were
growing up. This would have been an extra special addition to our collection. Now I can share it with my grandchildren.
It is great to see a brother/sister relationship and their interactions on a rainy potentially boring day! I love the way the author brought out so many different scenes, cultures and activities once the children went outside, you could feel their excitement and awe.
I found my grandson wanted to hear my interpretations and then had his own, the boy was his favorite character and he noticed the dog in every scene!
Joe Murphy –
My 3 year old grandson and I enjoy creating new stories each time we read this book. It allows us both to use our imaginations I can also change the story to teach him different lessons. We both enjoy the interaction
Margaret Macleod –
The detailed illustrations in this book allows your imagation to explore and plot out your own adventerous story. It is benefical to use this book in a bilingual setting or in any creative way you desire. I have previously used this very book for educational purposes for children who are educated in Scottish Gaelic and it has helped the children enhance their language skills and interaction. I have no hestitation to recommend this book as it was throughly enjoyed by all age groups.
Melissa Maffei –
I gave this book three out of five stars on Goodreads. It is a nice story, and it has a nice progression. Like all wordless picture books, I do judge the artwork a bit more, since it is the artwork that is telling the story. I do like the simple style of the artwork. I also like how she framed each page. It gives you a more dimensional artwork when pieces of the story go beyond that frame. The only time that the framing changes in the book are towards the end when she uses both pages to share the same frame. It makes me want to have a hard copy of the book just so I can see how the artwork lays within the two pages.
The only thing that I would want to change in the story is one of the pictures. I do work with little kids, and how a person is drawn is a huge factor. On one of the pages, one of the characters, the girl, is drawn a bit creepily. I understand that it was just the angle of the picture, but my first response was how creepy that girl looked. Other than that, I have no complaints.
Right now I am in a kindergarten classroom as a classroom aid, and I would have loved to use this story in the classroom. Our unit this month is about the weather and how we express the weather in our daily lives as well as in art. This book illustrates very well everything that our teacher talked about in today’s lesson. Sadly, due to Covid-19, I am not able to share this book with any of my friends. I would have loved to not only see their responses but to share with your their words of wisdom about the story.
In all, I do think that this book would be fun to read with small children. I believe that everyone will enjoy the artwork, as well as the story being told. I also know from other wordless picture books, young ones will love being able to tell you the story that is happening within the pages.
Reviews in Chalk –
A pair of siblings are very excited about spending the day outside, but a thunderstorm ruins their plans. When the storm causes the lights to go out, they decide to explore the attic. There they find a treasure trunk filled with all the light their imaginations need.
This story is wordless, but its detailed pictures allow children to create a very complete story. The ending can also can be told and retold in different ways, more or less fantastic, exploring options. I really liked the story. I read a pdf copy, but I would like to have a hard copy to “touch” the pages.
Frieda Dee –
Children can use their own words to share the story they see in the pictures. Good for pre readers and non-English-language families or teachers in ESL classrooms.
Katie –
My two year old son has taken a strong interest in this book! We read it multiple times a day and I’m looking forward to the story getting more elaborate or him helping decide the story as he gets older. I just bought a copy as a gift since it’s so unique and I think has real longevity in a library.