Second-grade witch Heidi Heckelbeck wants revenge against Melanie, the meanest girl in school, so she decides to cast a forgetting spell on her right before the start of the school play. Simultaneous.

Heidi Heckelbeck displays her witching skills in this second book of a new young chapter book series! Now readers between the ages of five and seven can read chapter books tailor-made for a younger level of reading comprehension. Heavily illustrated with large type, Little Simon's young chapter books let young readers feel like they are reading a “grown-up” format with subject, text, and illustrations geared specifically for their own age groups! Heidi Heckelbeck seems like any other eight-year-old, but she has a secret: She’s a witch in disguise. Careful to keep her powers hidden (but excited to use them all the same), Heidi’s learning to live like any other kid—who just happens to be witch. And with easy-to-read language and illustrations on almost every page, Heidi Heckelbeck chapter books are perfect for beginning readers. Thanks to meanie Melanie Maplethorpe, Heidi is cast as a scary tree in the school play, The Wizard of Oz. Heidi decides to get even with Melanie by casting a spell on her. The result of the spell? Melanie—who has the lead role as Dorothy—will forget her lines. As the day of the play nears, Heidi carefully collects all the ingredients she needs. But when she casts her spell, will Heidi’s revenge be as sweet as she thinks?

Eight-year-old witch Heidi Heckelbeck goes to a regular school for the first time where she makes friends with Lucy Lancaster, begins a rivalry with mean Melanie Maplethorpe, and tries to control her magic powers.

After being homeschooled her whole life, Heidi Heckelbeck enters a real school in second grade, where she encounters a mean girl named Melanie who makes her feel like an alien.

Heidi Heckelbeck sees things differently in this whimsically witchy chapter book. When her friend Lucy Lancaster gets glasses, Heidi notices all the attention Lucy gets and decides that she, too, needs a new look. In order to get glasses, Heidi pretends that she has trouble seeing. All goes as planned and Heidi gets a cool pair of glasses—but when she puts them on there’s just one problem: She can’t see a thing! Heidi walks around with fuzzy vision and makes many messes until she realizes that she doesn’t need a pair of glasses to make her special. With easy-to-read language and illustrations on almost every page, the Heidi Heckelbeck chapter books are perfect for beginning readers.

This is the first volume to consider the popular literary category of Early Readers – books written and designed for children who are just beginning to read independently. It argues that Early Readers deserve more scholarly attention and careful thought because they are, for many younger readers, their first opportunity to engage with a work of literature on their own, to feel a sense of mastery over a text, and to experience pleasure from the act of reading independently. Using interdisciplinary approaches that draw upon and synthesize research being done in education, child psychology, sociology, cultural studies, and children’s literature, the volume visits Early Readers from a variety of angles: as teaching tools; as cultural artifacts that shape cultural and individual subjectivity; as mass produced products sold to a niche market of parents, educators, and young children; and as aesthetic objects, works of literature and art with specific conventions. Examining the reasons such books are so popular with young readers, as well as the reasons that some adults challenge and censor them, the volume considers the ways Early Readers contribute to the construction of younger children as readers, thinkers, consumers, and as gendered, raced, classed subjects. It also addresses children’s texts that have been translated and sold around the globe, examining them as part of an increasingly transnational children’s media culture that may add to or supplant regional, ethnic, and national children’s literatures and cultures. While this collection focuses mostly on books written in English and often aimed at children living in the US, it is important to acknowledge that these Early Readers are a major US cultural export, influencing the reading habits and development of children across the globe.

Heidi’s magical secret may be out of the bag in this thirty-sixth Heidi Heckelbeck adventure! Is the town of Brewster ready to learn the truth about Heidi Heckelbeck? Or would Heidi be better off if her magic disappeared forever? With easy-to-read language and illustrations on almost every page, the Heidi Heckelbeck chapter books are perfect for beginning readers.