Flat Stanley

Author:  Jeff Brown
Lexile measure: 640
Language: Mild swearing--"darndest" and "gosh"; and mild rude language (Leave it to Beaver style) which is labeled as such.
Violence:  A blackboard falls on Stanley to make him flat.  A central part of several of the chapters is stopping the theft of a piece of art.
Big Kid Mature Topics:  Stanley gets dressed as a girl for part of a disguise.  He doesn't like it.  Sibling rivalry.
Illustrations:   Frequent black and white shaded drawings
Plot:  simple.

I don't know what it was, but my girl just wasn't very entertained by this.  She read it maybe 2 or 3 times and then didn't touch it again.  Not sure if it was part of the "I only read books about girls" phase or what, but now I think its "not thick enough", as she is wont to phrase it.    DS likes it a lot, at age 2 1/2.  Its an interesting plot for a piece at this reading level, with fairly few objectionable elements.  It does come as a series, which we have not read, but which is a benefit if your child likes this and is a voracious reader.  My understanding is that the series is also not one of those where the main character becomes significantly more mature over time, so I don't think you'll end up with a lot of "mature" reader issues that you have to do a lot of censorship/explaining over.