(3) K-3 Illustrated by Maria Dek. Mouse asks Blackbird for an egg to make an omelet. Blackbird doesn't have one but offers flour for a cake and suggests asking Dormouse for the egg. After five more encounters yield five more ingredients, the neighbors all bake a cake in Owl's oven. Does Mouse get a slice if he didn't contribute anything? This tale about sharing and fairness is accompanied by playful illustrations.

Reviewer: Sheila M. Geraty

(3) K-3 Illustrated by Anna Pirolli. The adult narrator lists cats Ginger's and Fred's odd and/or frustrating behaviors (all utterly familiar to cat lovers), culminating in their coordinated attack on the man's drafting desk. The man loses his cool, apologizes, and is forgiven; then the cycle begins again. Much of the slight but endearing and funny story's humor comes from characters' expressive body language in the realistic illustrations--and from a single glimpse of the narrator's fed-up face on the final spread.

Reviewer: Katie Bircher

(3) K-3 Illustrated by Benjamin Chaud. Once again (A Funny Thing Happened at the Museum... etc.), Cali and Chaud tease humor from the rift between amusingly unreliable young Henry's statements ("Our swimming instructor is kind of strange") and what the viewer sees (the school's swimming instructor is a sea monster). With its fine-lined, borderline-macabre art and small trim size, this book could almost be an Edward Gorey creation.

Reviewer: Nell Beram

(3) K-3 Translated by Lyn Miller-Lachmann. Illustrated by Marco Somà. In this Portuguese import, when a "crown" (a human's lost ring) lands in a pond and a frog finds it, the pond's amphibious denizens agree that she's now the queen and must "give orders...and punish the frogs who don't obey." This delicious riff on the misuse of power is accompanied by predominantly green- and brown-hued art with Beatrix Potter–like delicacy and the subdued mirth of Arnold Lobel.

Reviewer: Nell Beram

(3) K-3 Illustrated by Benjamin Chaud. In Museum, a boy recounts to his mom a mishap-filled school trip. In Summer, he describes finding a treasure map in a bottle, which leads to adventure. In both small-trim books, the fine-lined art reveals what the texts don't: e.g., a dino replica illustrates "I was charged by a triceratops," and it was Mom who planted the treasure map. Review covers these titles: A Funny Thing Happened at the Museum... and The Truth About My Unbelievable Summer....

Reviewer: Nell Beram

(4) K-3 Illustrated by Sébastien Mourrain. As a toddler, Little Pea is so tiny he bathes in a bowl and sleeps in a matchbox. The boy discovers at school that he is too small for the real world. But all ends well: grown-up ("but not much") Little Pea ultimately finds his niche as a stamp artist. The story's message is forced, but charming illustrations create an appealing world in small scale.

Reviewer: Grace Worcester Greene

(3) K-3 Illustrated by Raphaëlle Barbanègre. In this feminist fairy tale, Cinderella answers a fairy godmother's ad but gets an unsightly dress, beastly slippers, and a turnip coach. When Cinderella wins the prince's weird dance contest and discovers that he, too, "was much better in the magazine," she runs off to a girls-only job fair. Zany digital illustrations depict a fairy-tale realm that--like our real world--is far from picture perfect.

Reviewer: Lisa Catherine Findlay

(3) K-3 Translated by Debbie Bibo. Illustrated by Serge Bloch. A man named George wakes to find his shadow sitting in the kitchen. At first, George dislikes being followed around the city and tries to get rid of his shadow (via scissors, a vacuum, etc.). When he finally comes around to appreciating his constant companion, it disappears. This original story deserves distinctive art, and Bloch obliges with larkish mixed-media scenes.

Reviewer: Nell Beram

(3) K-3 Translated by Laura Watkinson. Illustrated by Marco Somà. In this Italian import, a human couple adopts Boris, the baby with gills like a fish they find by a swamp. Boris is content with them until the day the wind brings an evocative salty smell. Boris tries swamp life but ultimately wonders, "Maybe our family is simply the ones we love?" It's a sweetly peculiar adoption story made all the more so by the nonchalantly surreal illustrations.

Reviewer: Nell Beram

(4) K-3 Illustrated by Alice Lotti. An elephant suffers the pangs of love, including all the indecisiveness and agony of wondering whether the object of his affection (eventually revealed to be a female elephant) notices his heartfelt gestures or even realizes he exists. While conceptually a story that will most likely resonate more with adults, the book's playful, minimalist text and illustration style may appeal to young children.

Reviewer: Jessica Bushore

(3) K-3 Illustrated by Benjamin Chaud. In Museum, a boy recounts to his mom a mishap-filled school trip. In Summer, he describes finding a treasure map in a bottle, which leads to adventure. In both small-trim books, the fine-lined art reveals what the texts don't: e.g., a dino replica illustrates "I was charged by a triceratops," and it was Mom who planted the treasure map. Review covers these titles: A Funny Thing Happened at the Museum... and The Truth About My Unbelievable Summer....

Reviewer: Nell Beram

(4) K-3 Illustrated by Raphaëlle Barbanègre. In Cali's spin on the classic fairy tale, Snow White keeps house for seventy-seven obliviously unhelpful dwarfs, all portrayed--to wonderful effect--in a rainbow palette. With all the laundry, individual bedtime stories, "beard maintenance," and so on, Snow White decides "to leave and take her chances with the witch." It's brilliant dark humor that will resonate more with parents than kids.

Reviewer: Tanya D. Auger

(4) K-3 Illustrated by Benjamin Chaud. The author-illustrator team behind I Didn't Do My Homework Because... brings us another litany-of-excuses picture book, here a drawn-out explanation of why a child is late to school. There's humor in the nonsensical string of diversions, but there's not much transition from one to the next. Chaud's fine-lined cartoons contain lots of surreal, clever details (including a final twist behind the teacher's back).

Reviewer: Katrina Hedeen

(4) K-3 Illustrated by Benjamin Chaud. In this small-trim manual, author Cali delivers an onslaught of over two dozen outlandish explanations for neglected homework. The one-note running humor is unrelenting, but homework-averse kids will applaud the zany excuses, each made cleverer in Chaud's hilarious, detailed cartoons: e.g., the narrator has turned into an elephant to illustrate "cough medicine that my doctor prescribed had a strange effect on me."

Reviewer: Katrina Hedeen

(4) K-3 Illustrated by Serge Bloch. A battlefield soldier is convinced that a hole in the ground near his own harbors something inhuman. In the end he realizes that his "enemy" may be just like him. This purposeful allegory's message will resonate more with adults than children, but it could be useful as a discussion starter. The spare cartoon drawings are a good match for the stark text.

Reviewer: Nell Beram

(4) K-3 Translated by Marcel Danesi. Illustrated by AnnaLaura Cantone. A boy lamenting how busy his mother is (no father is mentioned) dreams of inventing a robot mom who becomes his protector, chef, and indulger. The boy's epiphany is sappy--"How do you hug a robot mom?"--but the mixed-media art, featuring a Muppet-like boy set against stripy backgrounds that employ ribbon and lace borders and accents, is humorous and imaginative.

Reviewer: Nell Beram

(4) K-3 Illustrated by Éric Heliot. Marcolino would rather do anything than practice piano, but he keeps at it to fulfill his mother's lost dream of becoming a concert pianist. When Grandpa comes to dinner, though, the truth about Mom's ambitions come out--and Marcolino gets a new start. Clever mixed-media illustrations combining simple shapes both pointy and round enliven an otherwise stale story about ambition and self-actualization.

Reviewer: Norah Piehl