King and Kayla and the Case of the Lost Tooth, written by Dori Hillestad Butler and illustrated by Nancy Meyers

 Butler, D. H., & Meyers, N. (2018). King & Kayla. king & kayla and the case of the lost tooth. Peachtree. 

King and Kayla and the Case of the Lost Tooth, written by Dori Hillestad Butler and illustrated by Nancy Meyers is an adorable Level Three Easy Reader about a girl who loses her first tooth, and then loses it again! Using a typeface that appears to be approximately a size 18, this adventure in the stories of King and Kayla is playful and unique. The use of narration by King, Kayla’s dog, is an engaging way to tell the story. This story uses more complicated sentences than would be expected in a level one or two, and has about seven words per line on average. The majority of the sentences are broken up into brief ones, rather than being compound or complex.  There are no more than nine lines per page, with some pages that are filled with pictures instead of lines of text. 

While the typical guidelines for a Level Three book states that there will be no more than one illustration per two page spread, each two page spread in this book features at least one full color illustration done in pencil with digitally added color, portraying King and Kayla’s search for the tooth that Kayla lost. The pictures don’t move the story along. Instead, they illustrate the text to make the book more appealing and vivid to young readers, and give context clues to give the reader some forward momentum. 

The plot of King and Kayla and the Case of the Lost Tooth is not so complicated that young readers will not be able to follow it. As King and Kayla search for signs of the missing tooth, the pair meet a small cast of characters, perhaps more than would be expected in an easy reader, but not so many that the book becomes hard to keep track of. The book is also split into chapters, which gives readers the chance to take a break from reading for a moment or feel accomplished for their efforts.