All EYES on Jon Klassen's BOARD BOOK Series

 Creator Jon Klassen has firmly established his style and successful track record in making distinctly, quirkily appealing picture books (His I WANT MY HAT BACK series, TRIANGLE, and so many others). In each case, the storytelling melds words and seemingly simple illustrations in ways that speak to audiences of every age, and that includes toddlers and adults. regardless of the simplicity or complexity of the narrative. In every case, his stylized eyes play a major role in the success of the storytelling and emotional journeys within the covers of the books.. 

In a recent board book series, each title of the sturdy and perfectly-sized books is populated by inanimate objects with their own sets of eyes. In each title the language pattern and story sequence follows a predictable template after reading even one. Despite seeming simplicity, each manages to introduce little ones to the power of narrative, its anticipated sequences, the comfort of a satisfying conclusion, and the ability to generate new meanings from otherwise familiar onbjects.

The series titles each feature YOUR.... followed by a noun/naming word that sets the stage for a little mini-drama within the few pages involved.

Candlewick Press 2026

Candlewick Press 2025

YOUR PLACES includes YOUR FARM, YOUR FOREST, and YOUR ISLAND, while the latest title, YOUR TRUCK, explores experiences of ownership, connection, and more. As the press summary describes, 

"Building on the quiet but evocative world he created

in Your Farm, Your Forest, and Your Island, Jon

Klassen invites young children to consider more

things that are theirs and theirs alone, reinforcing

that they have a right to solitude, exploration, and

companionship."

In every case the journey from opening page to closing is one of accumulative elements, arrangement options in relationship to the other elements, using simple language that depicts both obvious and imaginative traits (a fire that never grows out) and illustrations that are minimalist but also have depth and character. And those eyes. The few page turns needed to assemble a scene or connections lead to a shift toward sunset, the eyes closing, and night time. 

The power of these entertaining, conceptually complex, and magically simple books encourage engagement, awareness of language patterns, easy acquisition of basic concept words (orally and in print) while the dramatic significance of YOUR throughout the titles and lines assures that the child will feel full ownership of the story, the process of narrative, predictive capacity, and a sense of comfort within the world of books. 

In recent months I've focused on picture books for emerging and established readers, but that was not meant to diminish the layered and lovely importance off books for the youngest audiences. Even if you have no little ones in your lives, include a peek at these at your next library or bookstore stop. And if you DO have little ones in your life, make sure these are among their very own bookshelves. 

A Bounty of Farm Picture Books

It's officially summer now, and farmers' markets are in full swing. I don't know about you, but even one visit takes me back to times on farms, including field trips with classes or visiting grandparents in Kentucky on their pocket farm (not the gentrified version!) or living "in the country" where every neighbor was a farmer/large-scale gardener of some sort or other. I've gathered up several picture book titles to share in hopes it will nudge you out to a local farmers' market soon, no matter what the weather. If they can spend countless hours in the elements, daily, we can support their commitments to providing the very best and also benefit from the inevitable plusses to mind and body that straight-from-the-farm goodness provides.

FEEDING MINDS PRESS, 2023

The first of two books are from a tremendous pair of creators and an awesome small press you should know about.  FARM BOOTS  is written by Lisl Detlefsen and illustrated by Renee Kurilla. In this delightful story-in-rhyme, it's the boots that star. Revealed in short couplets and brightly illustrated pages, the many ways that boots are part of life on the farm throughout the year are celebrated through a year's seasons. These certainly involve work of many kinds, but also reveal the types and variations of fun and adventure that can be had in footwear that we rightly label boots.

The end papers are a visual glossary of the variety of boots (and related farm elements) that can be spotted within the pages. In repeated readings (which both the story/concept and the rhymes will invite) young audiences may try using that array inside the covers to play a find-and-search game in the illustrations. 

Many who write and publish picture books are likely to caution that getting a full year span into a single story (unless the story is intentionally about seasons) is challenging and can be awkward. Detlefsen and Kurilla accomplish this with grace, allowing  boots to reflect work, play, holidays, weather changes, skating, sledding, and much more. Illustrations reveal detailed scenes that, to my eye, are in temperate- zone mid-America, but the circumstances shown are common to farming worldwide. Characters illustrated are diverse. Some aspects that are common to farming and shown in appealing detail include working with animals, harvesting crops, competitions, markets, and so many more. The back matter has a simple glossary that groups multiple boots under broader labels with a category name, and is then followed by a brief descriptive passage. This well-paced and lively concept book has limitless value for a wide range of young audiences, including naming objects and colors, recognizing and predicting rhymes, and retelling. Never let such useful purposes override the sheer joy of a book like this. If you've never known a child who refused to have anything on their feet but boots for a phase of their development, you've known very few children! This is winner.

FEEDING MINDS PRESS, 2019

Next up is RIGHT THIS VERY MINUTE: A Table-to-Farm Book About Food and Farming, also written by Lisl Detlefsen and illustrated by Renee Kurilla. These two books are quite different and yet they share some stellar qualities. The endpapers serve up an invitation to notice the farm-based products/objects and link them to the processed results on the closing endpapers. Throughout, the illustrations again provide a child-friendly but richly detailed and informative view of specific farm/food settings and steps in  growing, harvesting, processing, and delivering food to our supermarket shelves. Language and descriptors are accurate but not excessive and make this a great book for early childhood.

The text is not rhymed but uses a very intriguing hook for each cluster of pages. Direct address to the reader/characters inquiries- 

"What's that, you say? You'd like ________?

    RIGHT THIS VERY MINUTE? Then you need a farmer."

The questions arise in everyday homes, include a variety of families and identities, and range from pancakes to fruit to dairy to veggies, to... more. Each page and element involves the farm-to-table stages, showing complex situations that subtly include features related to safety, health, and mechanical aspects bringing seed to supermarket. The concluding pages encourage young readers to grow food themselves and to "see" the process behind their bounty in every bite they eat. The cover does a great job of suggesting the way a simple dinner can call to mind the farmer on a tiller, a rancher with cattle, an orchard, bees, and more. 

Alfred A. Knopf, 2024

If this is your first time finding Lisl Detleftsen's books, be sure to click her name above and learn more. She, with her young family, is a working farmer whose titles reflect a wide range of farming life that could likely be new to you. She does write on other subjects, too, like her recent picture book AT THE END OF THE DAY , illustrated by Lynn Bontigao. Visually referencing one very familiar family and feelings in opening pages, the narrator reminds us that school and work days are often exhausting, draining, sending us home, "at the end of the day" with more to do and little energy to draw on. 

Page after page we share in the sigh-inducing realities of bad weather, chores, sibling squabbles, disappointments and actual appointments. By mid-book we see that military mom is only able to coach and support her drooping mixed-race family via screen, but dad is valiantly seeking reasonable management along with moments of joy- as fleeting as a firefly, as corny as a knock-knock joke, as loving as puppy licks. I won't spoil the surprise climax, but the warmth and restoration of it is palpable and reassuring. The exhaustion is also real, the do-it-again-tomorrow reality is wry. But, especially at the end of the day, family is family and love is love.

Charlesbridge, 2017

When it released  several years ago, I wrote about FRESH PICKED POETRY: A Day at the Farmers' Market, written by Michelle Schaub and illustrated by Amy Huntington. They, too, are a masterful pair of creators whose combined text and images generate a virtual life experience for readers anywhere. The poems in this entertaining and informative collective are arranged so as to reveal a visit to a farmers market as if stopping stall by stall, sampling delectables, and making those visits a regular part of life. Give these books a try, then get yourself to a farmers market!

Happy Book Birthday to 365: How to Count a Year!

 When it comes to picture book releases, a celebration is always in order. Some, though, merit extra attention. That could be due to their unusual topic or treatment, the timeliness of the material, or connections with curriculum that hook readers from page one. Even more than those features (and others) are the track records of the author and illustrator who create the book. 

I am as excited as everyone else when a debut picture book creator knocks it out of the park. It is truly thrilling, and I watch for more offerings from those remarkably talented folks. That was the case for the debut picture book by author Miranda Paul (ONE PLASTIC BAG, ISATOU CEESAY AND THE RECYCLING WOMEN OF THE GAMBIA, Lerner). Since that initial publication, I have praised her picture books (both fiction and nonfiction) in several posts here, here, and here. Her work has garnered positions of honor  on "best of"  and notable lists, have earned many starred reviews, and developed more than a decade of fans among kids, parents, educators, and librarians. Just insert MIRANDA PAUL in the search option of the right sidebar here >>> and you'll see that I am a longtime fan. You'll also find a wonderful interview she participated in some years ago.

BEACH LANE BOOKS, 2023

Speaking of years, that is the topic of her latest release, launching TODAY (September 26, 2023). I was delighted to receive a signed review copy from Miranda (with no promise of my response) and am even more excited to share it with you on the book's birthday!

Of course there are plenty of calendar and season-themed picture books, as well as ones with math twists. In this case, the new release not only confirms that reliable creators are always producing books worthy of our attention. 365: HOW TO COUNT A YEAR also offers unusual twists on prior calendar-focused titles. 

Beginning with the straightforward (and familiar) starting point that most years have 365 days, the very next page-turn sparks engagement with references to 365 routine happenings, explored with humor and surprises. Yes, 365 good mornings and good nights, but also, "hopefully, 365 pairs of clean underwear". The fun continues with accurate, amusing, and curiosity-inducing narrative, shifting to the ways in which such big numbers  can be made friendlier by grouping into weeks or months. In a clever circle-story cycle, the text revolves back to the twelve months and a full year,  in which that long-awaited, once-a-year birthday returns. This is a seemingly simple subject that is executed with shining success in the text.

Now, about those illustrations! Julien Chung is a prolific illustrator whose characteristic approach is to make "out-of-the-box illustrations for children's books." He is true to form in this latest of at least twelve picture book creations, many of which deal with familiar topics in lively and smile-inducing, brain-stimulating ways. In this case, the cover illustration alone reveals that his vibrant but seemingly simple images are layered with levels of connections and comical appeal. That lion (irresistible, right?) travels throughout in countless roles: as the face of the morning sun, the model for that daily underwear change, and countless (pun intended) other ways. The cover also is a masterful approach to retaining focus on the big idea- 365 days make a full year, completed with that return of a birthday celebration. In fact, though, the overall images invite a pause to examine it more closely, hinting at the complexity of that year. Those include the solar system's role in creating one trip around the sun each year, the role of calendar concepts, and even aspects of this topic that are not directly addressed but allow for further investigation. Did you notice that MARCH is the calendar page LION is roaring toward, coming on strong? From jacket/cover, to front and back endpapers, to each colorful spread, time-related connections are revealed in the illustrations that are not directly addressed in text but expand understanding and inspire questions and "AHA" moments. (See yearlong phases of the moon on the "365 goodnights" spread.)

I urge you to celebrate this lovely release with me. For those of you who are new to Miranda Paul or Julian Chung, this is likely to nudge you to get your hands on more of their work. I have no doubt you'll agree with me that they are picture books worthy of cake and ice cream, but mostly, of reading and sharing.

Time-limited note: Until Saturday, September 30, 2023, this is a personal invitation to join her in celebrating her new release. Wish I could be there!

FROM MIRANDA PAUL: I want to personally invite all of you to join me for a Book Birthday Party at Lion's Mouth Bookstore in downtown Green Bay on Saturday, September 30 at 11:00 a.m. The event is free, and there will be FREE gourmet cupcakes and cake from the fabulous local bakery Bake My Day. (With some gluten-free ones!). I'll be signing books and doing a very short presentation. Mostly, we'll celebrate life and just hang out for an hour.