Because Amelia Smiled by David Ezra Stein This is a book about how one smile can affect a whole world. Amelia smiled and Mrs. Higgins saw her and smiled too. She was so happy that she baked some cookies for her son, who sang a song to his class, who inspired a dancer… The books [...]
Rachel Carson and Her Book that Changed the World by Laurie Lawlor This beautiful new picture book tells the story of Rachel Carson’s life, from her nature-loving childhood through her 1962 publication of Silent Spring, the book that launched modern environmentalism. Carson was a biologist by training at a time when few women entered scientific [...]
One Gorilla by Anthony Browne In this oversized counting book, Anthony Browne presents one of the most lusciously beautiful picture books that I’ve seen in a long time. The brightly colored, richly saturated portraits of chimpanzees, mandrills, baboons, macaques, and other members of the primate family fill each page, compelling the reader to pause and [...]
The Bird King: An Artist’s Notebook by Shaun Tan Looking through this gorgeous (and beautifully reproduced) book is like peeking into the sketchbook and portfolio of Shaun Tan (The Arrival). His working method is to “just start drawing” and the book goes on to show everything from highly detailed doodles to painted storyboards. Most of [...]
Building Our House written and illustrated by Jonathan Bean Imagine packing up and moving to a vacant grassy field in the country to build a new home and participating in its transformation. In Building Our House, Bean tells the story of his own family’s experience when he was very young and his parents built a [...]
Hokey Pokey by Jerry Spinelli Hokey Pokey is a land where kids spend their days “running, leaping, playing, chasing, shrieking, hopscotching, footballing, hide-and-seeking, razzing, dazzing, run-amucking and chuckleducking.” Taking place over the course of the day when Jack, a Big Kid, wakes up to find his precious bike has been stolen, Hokey Pokey is a [...]
Bananas in My Ears by Michael Rosen; illustrated by Quentin Blake This wacky book from Britain’s Children’s Laureate is full of silly jokes, funny stories and nonsense poems. There’s lots of zany ‘what if’ speculations – what if a piece of toast turned into a ghost, what if my bed grew wings, what if they [...]
The Book of Blood: From Legends and Leeches to Vampires and Veins by H. P. Newquist “There is more to blood than that it’s red and kind of gross” and this books sets out to prove it, though keeping at least some of the gross factor too! Looking at the biological, cultural and historical significance [...]
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