Superman, born in Cleveland

Jerry Siegel, a shy kid from Cleveland who with his friend Joe Shuster created Superman. The superhero debuted in 1938. (''Boys of Steel''/Ross MacDonald)

Good Night, Leo: A Swashbuckling Bedtime Adventure
By Charise Mericle Harper
Robin Corey/Random House, 24 pp., ages 1-3, $6.99

Boys of Steel: The Creators of Superman
Written by Marc Tyler Nobleman
Illustrated by Ross MacDonald
Knopf, 40 pp., ages 6-12, $16.99

The Night I Freed John Brown
By John Michael Cummings
Philomel, 276 pp., ages 12-16, $17.99

It's bedtime for Pirate Leo - and pirate time for his teddy bear. As Leo bids good night to his nautical gear (pirate ship and sword, eye patch and bandana) teddy acquires each of Leo's castoffs. "Good Night, Leo" offers little swashbuckling adventure but a great deal of charm. The board pages are neatly die-cut-designed so that the right-hand page builds onto the left-hand page's images, layer by layer. "Good Night, Leo" sweetly combines many things in one - bedtime story, color teaching, handsome board book, and a primer of common and uncommon objects ("black witch hat," "black road"). This little square book packs a lot of wallop for small pirate lovers.

"Boys of Steel" reveals a whole new side of Superman - one both heroic and surprisingly touching.

Young Jerry Siegel spent his high school days in Cleveland "staring at the floor. He always wished he were going in the other direction - back home." Siegel's heroes were Tarzan, Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers. His life was often lonely, informed by the early death of his father and the Great Depression. Then he met Joe Shuster.

"Like Jerry, Joe was lousy at sports and mousy around girls. He, too, was shy. . . . And he, too, escaped to other worlds in pulps and strips." While Jerry invented stories in words, Joe did it in pictures. "He made do with wrapping paper from the butcher or the back of discarded wallpaper. In winter, because the Shusters' apartment had no heat, he drew while bundled in several sweaters, one or two coats - even gloves."

Then one night in 1934, Jerry came up with a new kind of hero, an alien who protected humans, someone who could perform extraordinary feats of strength and courage in the ordinary world. And his secret identity would resemble Jerry's and Joe's appearance - meek, mild, easy to overlook.

Superman debuted in the brand-new comic-book format, in 1938. He was "an instant hit," but as a well-crafted afterword explains, the two overeager young artists sold "that first Superman story - and all rights to the character . . . for $130." They never shared in any of the profits. When they sued for more, they lost, settled for $100,000, and promptly lost their jobs at DC Comics. Only in the '70s did the two creators begin to earn a modest stipend - and credit for their work.

The illustrated section of "Boys of Steel," which makes up most of the book, is upbeat, entertaining, and informative. It takes us up to Jerry and Joe's first success, the birth of our great American superhero, while the afterword shows the shadow side of the great American dream. Author Marc Tyler Nobleman is equally adept at both stories. Illustrator Ross MacDonald creates a strong visual counterpart, with a '30s feel. Together they do justice to their subjects' remarkable journey.

Josh knows that his father can't stand hearing church bells, or talk of his hometown's famous John Brown; that he angrily hides from his neighbors and is letting their rusting shack of a house fall down around their ears. Josh knows the mysterious white house his dad grew up in - now fallen into ghostly ruin - has its exact twin next door. What he doesn't know is why.

John Michael Cummings's debut novel, "The Night I Freed John Brown," mixes domestic drama, American history, adventure story, and page-turning mystery. There are marvelous plot twists and surprises right to the very end. One can't help liking young Josh, no matter how flawed he may be. He is funny, vulnerable, tough, and observant: "There was nothing like a big event to make you feel poor and ugly inside."

Humor and sadness lie cheek by jowl: "There was my poor mother, putting Lemon Pledge on her pieces of junk. She made me want to cry." Cummings writes with distinctive West Virginia flavor: "They were as different as chicory and crabgrass." And his prose can be pure poetry: "Luke turned in a complete circle, and I turned with him, slowly, as if we were tiny figures in a music box, the strange house turning around us, without the music."

Historic Harper's Ferry sits at a confluence where "two rivers, one green and fast, the other brown and slow, came together in the shape of a giant wishbone." Maryland rises on one side, Virginia on the other. It also represents the confluence of past, present, and future. "The Night I Freed John Brown" is all about heroes, both sung and unsung. At the center, of course, stands John Brown himself: "I stepped across the street and up to the picture window that held all six feet two inches of John Brown over the street like a glass coffin turned up on its end." But, as the novel proves, some of our greatest heroes are the living, hidden in plain sight.

Liz Rosenberg is a poet, novelist, and author of more than 20 books for young readers, most recently "This Is the Wind," from Roaring Brook Press.