ENTOPIA by Kevin Noel Olson

Having five children and six grand children, I've read more than my share of children's books in my time. All too often they tend to blur with a homogenized sameness that makes most of them easily forgettable. Not so with this little gem.

ENTOPIA tells the story of a group of bugs who all become trapped in a candy store shop-vac operated by the janitor. In this huge, debris and junk cluttered bag they form a township, elect a mayor and proceed to live their lives. The town is called Entopia and is established as a place of peace and harmony for all its citizens. When a lost bee named William arrives in Entopia, he is both awed and intrigued by this odd community. William gets to know the other bugs and although he misses his home hive, begins to settle in.

All this changes when a newcomer, a sugar-ant named Adam, reports that his colony has not only kidnapped William's brother, Robert, but has gone off to attack the home-hive for the honey it holds. Frantic to save both his brother and the hive, William convinces the other bugs of Entopia to help him escape the shop-vac and go warn the hive. Gordon, a scorpion, devises a plan to clog the shop-vac thus forcing the janitor to empty it earlier than scheduled. Using an old discarded party balloon patched up by Swirl, the spider mayor, all the bugs float away in it as the bag is tilted upside over the dumpster behind the candy store.

From that point on William and his friends experience one amazing adventure after another on their journey to the hive. Individually and together, they learn to work as a real family, each displaying unique skills and bravery. William is given life lessons about love, tolerance and sacrifice along the way. Lessons he puts to magnificent use at the book's climax when must stop the war between the bees and ants. This is truly an imaginative tale that will enthrall both young and old with its colorful characters and settings, at the same time holding up a mirror to our own confused and complicated world.

ENTOPIA is a truly special book and I am so happy to have experienced. I think you will be too.