Gr 1–3—In his own mind, Lucy Chin's chihuahua, Ember, is destined for world domination! Being the future Dark Lord that he is, he will one day rule the world. What could be more necessary than having an army to help him meet that destiny? But wait! What army? Where is it? Fear not! The mysterious orange cat who shows up on Ember's windowsill in the middle of the night, when everyone and everything in the house is asleep, has the solution: merely cat-sit her five kittens for a couple days and teach them everything he knows, and they will serve as Ember's army! All of Ember's BFFs are there to help train the kittens—Neo the canary, BeBe the beetle, Smelly Steve the hamster, and Bubbles the Goldfish. But kittens will be kittens, and before Ember can rally his new troop, it's total kitty chaos! There's lots of action and high drama as Ember and the pets frantically work to corral the high-speed kittens and train them to stand as "Ember's Army!" This third volume in Scholastic's Branches line of early chapter book series for new readers features high-interest characters that run, crawl, swim, and fly, with easy-to-read text, simple vocabulary with only an occasional unfamiliar word printed in bold font to draw readers' attention, and plenty of black-and-white drawings that help push the fast-paced story along. VERDICT Recommended for newly independent readers who will get caught up in this latest page-turning adventure of future Dark Lord Ember's quest to rule the world.—Cheryl Blevens