ARQS PRESS ORIGINAL • EMOTIONAL-LEARNING STORY WORLD
EMOJI
CARNIVAL
Two buses carry exactly twenty-two recurring personalities from carnival to carnival. Eleven represent positive emotional strengths. Eleven represent challenging emotions every child recognizes. Difficult emotions are never villains; stories focus on what feelings signal, what choices follow and how people repair, connect and keep going.
BUS ONE • EXACTLY 11
Positive Crew
Joy, Courage, Kindness, Curiosity, Gratitude, Patience, Confidence, Hope, Empathy, Calm and Teamwork.
BUS TWO • EXACTLY 11
Challenge Crew
Anger, Worry, Jealousy, Sadness, Frustration, Fear, Embarrassment, Impatience, Loneliness, Grumpiness and Confusion.
FOUNDATION ARC • BOOKS 01–11 • AGES 3–6
One complete first pairing cycle. Every one of the 22 recurring characters receives a featured role before the world expands into older-reader stories.
BOOK 01Joy & Anger and the Stuck Parade
Open → BOOK 02Courage & Fear and the Big Wheel
Open → BOOK 03Kindness & Loneliness and the Empty Seat
Open → BOOK 04Curiosity & Confusion and the Mystery Map
Open → BOOK 05Gratitude & Jealousy and the Golden Ribbon
Open → BOOK 06Patience & Impatience and the Slowest Carousel
Open → BOOK 07Confidence & Embarrassment and the Backward Talent Show
Open → BOOK 08Hope & Sadness and the Rainy Fireworks
Open → BOOK 09Empathy & Grumpiness and the Lost Balloon
Open → BOOK 10Calm & Worry and the Whirring Teacups
Open → BOOK 11Teamwork & Frustration and the Crooked Carnival Tent
Open → SECOND CYCLE • AGES 6–9 • NEW DEPTH
Not relabelled preschool books. Older-reader stories use denser scenes, ambiguous motives, evidence, fairness, mixed feelings, group decisions and longer consequence chains.
BOOK 12 • AGES 6–9Joy & Anger and the Midnight Parade
A missing lantern list turns into a fairness investigation. Anger must separate evidence from accusation; Joy learns that keeping things “positive” can silence a real concern.
Open Book 12 → BOOK 13 • AGES 6–9Courage & Fear and the Night Maze
A lighting failure forces Courage and Fear to distinguish bravery from recklessness, caution from avoidance, and feelings from evidence while they redesign the maze safely.
Open Book 13 → BOOK 14 • AGES 6–9 • NEWKindness & Loneliness and the Closed Gate
A missed gate-change message becomes a story about belonging, privacy, consent in helping, intent versus impact, communication design and repairing systems instead of making assumptions.
Open Book 14 → LITTLE CARNIVAL • AGES 0–2
Picture-led first feelings. Giant faces, action words, sounds and repetition; 0–15 words per page; caregiver interaction does much of the teaching.
LITTLE 01Faces on the Bus
Open → LITTLE 02Sounds on the Bus
Open → LITTLE 03Stop, Go, Wait!
Open → LITTLE 04Where? There!
Curiosity and Confusion play a picture-led search game with up, down, behind, under and there.
Open → LITTLE 05 • NEWMine? Yours? Share!
Gratitude and Jealousy use a shiny drum to practise mine/yours words, asking for a turn, one-beat waiting and gentle turn-taking without forced sharing.
Open Little 05 → THE EXACT 22-CHARACTER CANON
01 JoyPositive
02 CouragePositive
03 KindnessPositive
04 CuriosityPositive
05 GratitudePositive
06 PatiencePositive
07 ConfidencePositive
08 HopePositive
09 EmpathyPositive
10 CalmPositive
11 TeamworkPositive
12 AngerChallenge
13 WorryChallenge
14 JealousyChallenge
15 SadnessChallenge
16 FrustrationChallenge
17 FearChallenge
18 EmbarrassmentChallenge
19 ImpatienceChallenge
20 LonelinessChallenge
21 GrumpinessChallenge
22 ConfusionChallenge
ARQS PRESS AGE-BAND SYSTEM
0–2Picture-led; labels, sounds, repetition; 0–15 words/page; roughly 50–200 story words.
3–6Highly illustrated simple stories; 15–50 words/page; roughly 400–1,000 story words.
6–9Story plus substantial illustration; 50–120 words/page target where prose carries the scene; roughly 1,500–4,000 story words.
9–12Longer narrative/comic chapters; richer vocabulary, motives and choices; roughly 5,000–15,000+ words depending on format.
Production status: all linked titles are manuscript previews, not print-ready editions. Final character sheets, cover/interior art, trim/layout, proofs, metadata, rights and release QA remain required before any retail label.