Chloe Alvarez has never been to the reading of a last will and testament before, but she hopes it is just like the movies. Lies! Intrigue! The reading of her Uncle Will's will is standard, until he announces his gift for Chloe: his African grey parrot, Charlie. Uncle Will was Chloe's best friend. Without him, she's left with only her memories of them together--which come to her in snapshots--and her new friend, Charlie. The parrot has a vast vocabulary,...

When her teacher assigns a report about animals and all the popular animals get snatched up, Ellie McDoodle is stumped for a topic. Then a neighbor asks Ellie to pet-sit her African gray parrot and it seems her problem is solved. But when the parrot flies the coop-literally-Ellie has an even bigger problem. With help from a librarian, a zookeeper, and Ellie's own pet-obsessed family, the bird comes home-but will Ellie finish her report on time?

Ellie pet-sits for her neighbor's African grey parrot Alix, about whom she is writing a report, while her family argues over whether to get a cat or a dog, and her little brother accidentally lets Alix out of his cage, all of which is chronicled in Ellie's ever-present sketchbook.