Rainbow Magic: The Party Fairies, Cherry the Cake Fairy by Daisy Meadows. Rainbow Magic Ltd., 2005.

In my quest to understand early chapter books, I read a handful of the Rainbow Magic series. I enjoyed discovering that strict "logic" isn't so much of a concern for this sort of book. No one is asking in this first chapter how a little frog-man gets in an envelope, or about the origin of little frog-men or why frog-men are involved with the fairy world at all (slaves? A fairy-world underclass?).

In this particular story, the "problem" is fairly small: a ruined cake. But in Ramona the Pest fashion, it quickly escalated. All the cakes in the world will be destroyed! Every birthday party will be ruined! Unlike Ramona, however, the reader's attention is split among different characters with point of view shifts galore. I found myself never quite developing an emotional attachment to any character, although I did worry for poor little frog man.

Interestingly, there's a larger plot thread that unites the series (unlike, say, Babysitter's Club where each volume could stand alone) and a smaller thread for each individual book.