(2) PS Mother duck sits on her nest full of eggs one night, when things take a turn. The rhyming text says, "One egg hatches... / and then another... / Seven little ducklings are up before Mother!" Soft-hued ink and watercolor art captures the personalities of the mischievous little hatchlings, who decide to spend their first hours exploring unchaperoned. When Mama wakes to a nest of empty shells, panic ensues. She sets off to round up her new brood, launching this lively counting story into action. Every baby she finds has landed in a more amusingly precarious position than the one before it. Readers counting along will recognize early that she has accumulated more than she started with and that one of those babies is clearly a turtle and another likely a swan. While Mama mulls over this conundrum -- they all seem like family to her -- a struggling mouse floats by and she rescues it too, along with a few more ducklings. Mama observes, "They can't all be mine," but "then she looks at their faces / and knows that it's fine." The sunny palette, singsong rhymes, and ragtag collection of funny, wide-eyed creatures keep this family story engaging and surprising all the way to the bedtime end -- as one last headcount reveals.

Reviewer: Julie Roach | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2025

(1) PS "This is your sun. It is coming up for you." Thus begins each of three original board books, accompanied by an image of the sun peeking up over an implied horizon line. Subsequent spreads introduce, one by one, other characteristic features you'd find on a Farm (barn, horse), in a Forest (cabin, stream), or on an Island (palm tree, boat) and add them to the scenes. "These are your plants. They can go on the ground." The basic-shaped objects accumulate on mainly white backgrounds; once the settings are fully created, the day concludes, and each book ends with the line: "Now you can sleep too and think about what you will do there tomorrow." A simple premise, but with subtle depth cleverly provided by Klassen. His minimalist style is on full display, from the brief, straightforward texts ("Here is your truck. It is a good truck. It can go in the barn too") to the sparsely populated pages. Of course, Klassen also infuses life and character into each object in the ink and graphite illustrations by giving them expressive eyes, which close at night when the farm, forest, and island go to sleep. Additional imaginative elements include a ghost in Forest and a magical fire that never goes out in Island. The whole process mimics and encourages a toddler's drawing activity, adding things to negative space to create art that tells a child-friendly story. In short, Klassen has crafted three unassuming master classes in picture-book making for the youngest listeners/viewers. Review covers these spring 2025 titles: Your Farm, Your Forest, and Your Island.

Reviewer: Cynthia K. Ritter | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2025

(1) PS "This is your sun. It is coming up for you." Thus begins each of three original board books, accompanied by an image of the sun peeking up over an implied horizon line. Subsequent spreads introduce, one by one, other characteristic features you'd find on a Farm (barn, horse), in a Forest (cabin, stream), or on an Island (palm tree, boat) and add them to the scenes. "These are your plants. They can go on the ground." The basic-shaped objects accumulate on mainly white backgrounds; once the settings are fully created, the day concludes, and each book ends with the line: "Now you can sleep too and think about what you will do there tomorrow." A simple premise, but with subtle depth cleverly provided by Klassen. His minimalist style is on full display, from the brief, straightforward texts ("Here is your truck. It is a good truck. It can go in the barn too") to the sparsely populated pages. Of course, Klassen also infuses life and character into each object in the ink and graphite illustrations by giving them expressive eyes, which close at night when the farm, forest, and island go to sleep. Additional imaginative elements include a ghost in Forest and a magical fire that never goes out in Island. The whole process mimics and encourages a toddler's drawing activity, adding things to negative space to create art that tells a child-friendly story. In short, Klassen has crafted three unassuming master classes in picture-book making for the youngest listeners/viewers. Review covers these spring 2025 titles: Your Farm, Your Forest, and Your Island.

Reviewer: Cynthia K. Ritter | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2025

(1) PS "This is your sun. It is coming up for you." Thus begins each of three original board books, accompanied by an image of the sun peeking up over an implied horizon line. Subsequent spreads introduce, one by one, other characteristic features you'd find on a Farm (barn, horse), in a Forest (cabin, stream), or on an Island (palm tree, boat) and add them to the scenes. "These are your plants. They can go on the ground." The basic-shaped objects accumulate on mainly white backgrounds; once the settings are fully created, the day concludes, and each book ends with the line: "Now you can sleep too and think about what you will do there tomorrow." A simple premise, but with subtle depth cleverly provided by Klassen. His minimalist style is on full display, from the brief, straightforward texts ("Here is your truck. It is a good truck. It can go in the barn too") to the sparsely populated pages. Of course, Klassen also infuses life and character into each object in the ink and graphite illustrations by giving them expressive eyes, which close at night when the farm, forest, and island go to sleep. Additional imaginative elements include a ghost in Forest and a magical fire that never goes out in Island. The whole process mimics and encourages a toddler's drawing activity, adding things to negative space to create art that tells a child-friendly story. In short, Klassen has crafted three unassuming master classes in picture-book making for the youngest listeners/viewers. Review covers these spring 2025 titles: Your Farm, Your Forest, and Your Island.

Reviewer: Cynthia K. Ritter | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2025

(2) PS The three animal friends who live in an oak tree "at the edge of the meadow" are back for more lighthearted frolicking (Molly, Olive, and Dexter: The Guessing Game, rev. 7/24). Dexter the fox, who "loves chasing games," tags Olive the owl to get one started. Olive quickly tags Molly the hare from the air. Molly happily sets off after Dexter, and the two end up running in different directions around the oak tree. "BUMP!" Now Dexter is "it" (and dizzy), but Molly is "just too quick" and Olive is "just too good at flying." How will he ever catch his friends? This companion book features the same spirited fun as the first installment. Rayner's detailed, soft-hued mixed-media illustrations give her characters lots of charm; her light line work and effective compositions playfully convey movement. If Dexter can't run as swiftly as a hare or fly like an owl, he'll need to do what foxes are good at: "I can think of clever plans!" He slyly catches his friends off-guard in a crowd-pleasing conclusion. If you focus on what you can do, everyone wins.

Reviewer: Kitty Flynn | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2025

(2) PS Three children experience the invisible power of the wind over the course of a year. The children -- eyes upward, dark hair flowing against an expansive blue sky -- begin with a direct question to Wind itself: "How will you blow today?" Each subsequent full-bleed, double-page spread provides an answer. In the spring, text nestles in the negative space between a tree's pink-flowered branches as Wind provides a light "puff at the petals." In summer, the children lounge on a dock under a willow tree, waiting for Wind to bring the relief of a breeze on a sweltering day. Later, Wind stirs up storms. "Sometimes I like to be WILD!" it says, chasing the children indoors. The lyrical, poetic language is easy to read aloud, and thoughtful positioning of text on the page creates a sense of cohesion with each image. Archer's masterful use of acrylic ink and paper art showcases a variety of techniques, compositions, and perspectives. From the glittering depth of collaged streaming rain to the textured, sleepy haze of a darkened bedroom, each page-turn inspires the same wonder Archer depicts in the faces of her three awestruck subjects.

Reviewer: Jessica Tackett MacDonald | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2025

(3) PS Illustrated by Lucy Ruth Cummins. In this comical picture book, an offscreen unseen narrator becomes more and more frustrated with little dog Freddie, who is having a wonderful time with various articles of clothing. He wears three pairs of pants, then a shirt as pants, then no pants at all—and so on. A monkey friend adds to the silliness. The combination of Cummins’s expressive art and Daywalt’s tongue-in-cheek, exasperated text makes for an exuberant read-aloud.

Reviewer: Martha V. Parravano

(2) PS Illustrated by Tim Miller. An egg tumbles down a mountain and lands beside another egg. The jostling causes them both to hatch, one after the other. First out comes Duckie, wide-eyed, loquacious, and looking for a friend. Then there's Snaps, a crocodile who'd just as soon beat it: "Well...Goodbye!" Duckie lays out a convincing case for staying to play, but just as Snaps seems ready to relent, an adult-looking croc comes by: "No. You cannot be friends" because "We. EAT. Duckies!" Snaps is confused: "I had no idea! I JUST GOT HERE!" After some hysterics on everyone's part, a creative culinary solution leads to the promise of lasting friendship and appetite satisfaction (fun fact: crocodiles do eat fruit). Speech bubble-heavy text with thoughtful use of repetition enhances comprehension and enjoyment. Digitally colored pen-and-ink illustrations (a mix of scene-setting introductory spreads, varied panels, and single pages) feature crisp black lines, bold hues, and slapstick-y interactions between an unlikely duo -- who, in terms of friendship, turn out to be very lucky ducks.

Reviewer: Elissa Gershowitz | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2025

(2) PS Bold, comical crayon illustrations set the tone for a boisterous game of pretend and its noisy cacophony of sounds. "Let's be bees," suggests the text on the opening page, while the accompanying illustration shows a grownup reading this very book to a child. "LET'S BUZZ," the adult encourages. When the page turns, the imaginative art steps up the energy, with the pair's heads now two buzzing bees. From there, they joyously make appropriate noises as they pretend to be birds ("CHIRP!") and then trees ("RUSTLE!"). The pace quickens (with a thunderstorm) and then quiets down briefly (with snow) -- but then comes an avalanche. Surprising with every page-turn, the visuals explode into a series of immersive double-page spreads with speech bubbles full of onomatopoeia. In a climactic feat, the grownup and child attempt to be Earth and make all the sounds at once. The art, with its call for noise, becomes calmer as the book approaches the end, but the final page picks up speed for an encore: "AGAIN!" Busy endpapers full of creatures and natural marvels make useful prompts to extend the story with a variety of sounds.

Reviewer: Julie Roach | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2025

(3) PS In this series entry, human Kayla and dog Kugel bake hamantaschen, dress up as each other, and attend the megillah reading. Kayla’s explanations of the holiday, directed toward Kugel, are informative (if brief, especially about the Purim story) and interspersed with humorous asides. The community’s costumes are a highlight of the lively illustrations. An author’s note encourages discussion about Purim.

Reviewer: Shoshana Flax

(3) PS Illustrated by Raahat Kaduji. In this playful story, a little groundhog named Tess resists hibernating, despite her parents' best efforts to tuck her in and help her sleep. From warm cocoa to lullabies, nothing works until Mommy and Daddy doze off themselves and Tess tires herself out playing in the snow, almost sleeping through Groundhog Day. Full-color illustrations in a palette of soft, earth-toned hues combine anthropomorphic appeal with bedtime humor. A wintry confection that proves even the most determined little ones need rest.

Reviewer: Summer Edward

(2) PS Duck is looking for his spaghetti, but as Tiny Horse puts it, "spaghetti is the trickiest of all the pastas." A search ensues, and while the deadpan narration addresses the mission seriously, Duck and Tiny Horse look in all the wrong places (inside a boot, under a rug) and use all the wrong methods (digging, fishing). A recipe book provides a useful clue, pooh-poohed though it is by confident Tiny Horse: "You can't just MAKE spaghetti." Boldly hued illustrations, painted in gouache and digitally colored, range from vignettes and sequential panels to full-bleed spreads, with absurdity taking center stage. Why is Tiny Horse tiny while Duck is just the right size to live in a teapot? Doesn't matter. The silliness offers young readers and listeners plenty of opportunities to figure things out before the characters do (if your spaghetti is hissing, it might be snakes) -- and that's a heady-spaghetti feeling.

Reviewer: Shoshana Flax | Horn Book Magazine Issue: July, 2024

(3) PS Barefoot Singalongs series. Illustrated by Brian Fitzgerald. Adapted from a cumulative Irish folk song, this picture book is also a delightful science lesson about the flora and fauna found in bogs. Technicolor, woodcut-inspired illustrations follow a “rattlin’ bird” in a “rattlin’ tree” through the “rattlin’ bog.” Back matter provides facts about bogs and the life cycle of birds and trees, as well as sheet music for “The Rattlin’ Bog.”

Reviewer:

(2) PS "Mr. Santa? Is it really you?" A child wakes up to find Santa Claus delivering gifts to their house and proceeds to show him around, pointing out pet fish and sharing gingerbread, all the while asking him questions about the big night. The two later take off in Santa's sleigh, and more questions follow as he makes his rounds. Jarvis has chosen a nice mix of straightforward and silly questions ("Can reindeer talk...Can you eat clouds?") that young children may want to ask, and his digitally rendered illustrations give the book an old-timey feel perfect for an inviting bedtime story.

Reviewer: | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2024

(2) PS uring a routine day at the roadworks, Digger decides she needs a change of pace. Instead of digging down in "mud and dark and worms," she wants to go up: "Up would be sky, stars and adventure." But after laboriously reaching, jumping, climbing, and flapping, she is exhausted and still grounded. With a little ingenuity, she is finally able to set off on her journey. Digger quickly learns that "what goes up, usually does come down...just not always where you want it to." She realizes she must rely on her unique abilities to return to her friends. Hood's playful text is enhanced by bold lino-print and mono-print illustrations that use both bright pops and dark washes of color to tell the story. Shifts between pastel-hued and darker backgrounds emphasize the contrast between up and down. This preschool read aloud-friendly book, with its repetition of simple words, might also be well suited to emerging readers.

Reviewer: | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2025

(2) PS These lift-the-flap books creatively showcase threatened or endangered creatures (Countdown) and the ABCs (Alphabet; a reissue from 2003, rev. 1/04). In Countdown, left-hand pages present a spelled-out number, beginning with ten and counting down to one, on a textured mixed-media background that hints at a habitat. Right-hand pages (which lift up) are matte colors with square or rectangular die-cuts revealing additional glimpses of the scene below -- and in the general shape of the numeral being highlighted. The number nine, for example, shows a glimpse of an elephant's curled-up trunk, and eight is the negative space of a giraffe's markings. They're not all obvious; careful looking and use of imagination are bonuses, and additional creature facts are appended. Alphabet goes from A to Z, with clean black backgrounds and a word on every page (arrowhead, balloons, yolk, zipper). From Lolly Robinson's original Magazine review: "Lift the flaps and foreground turns background as pictured images become the negative space defining the letter form...This is great bookmaking, and a snazzy -- though sophisticated -- addition to the alphabet bookshelf." Sturdy flaps; thoughtfully placed and well-sized die cuts; abundant surprises; and visual delights make both of these volumes welcome and artistically elevated concept books. Review covers these fall 2024 titles: Animal Countdown and The Hidden Alphabet.

Reviewer: Elissa Gershowitz | Horn Book Magazine Issue: September, 2024

(2) PS Illustrated by Satoshi Kitamura. Creature-of-No-Words is content being "furry. And never in a hurry." The large, ungainly fellow enjoys his life, and although he doesn't "know how to say HAPPY" or "YUMMY" or "SAD" (having no words), he expresses himself through body language. Creature-of-Words, on the other hand, loves to use words; when she sees Creature-of-No-Words looking sad, she reaches toward him with outstretched arms and teaches him the word "HUG!" Creature-of-No-Words has a big red nose, his orange body is filled in with squiggly lines, and he's accompanied by eleven white birds. Creature-of-Words is smaller and redder, with a group of critter companions, including a fox, a cat, a squirrel, and two birds. Part of the book's fun is noticing the ways all of the animals interact in the illustrations. The text is written in triplets with occasional rhymes and includes such whimsical thoughts as the wish that pebbles would "burst like bubbles." Kitamura's paintings use intense color to show the pair living in a varied and beguiling landscape as they find joy together, sometimes sharing words and sometimes cuddled up "just listening to sweet silence." This tender tale illustrates the ways in which creatures, and humans, are alike and different from one another, especially in communication styles.

Reviewer: Susan Dove Lempke | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2024

(2) PS Illustrated by Bruce Ingman. In this tale of humorously escalating adventure and silliness, Elsie discovers a series of animals under the family dining table, an extravagant catalog that includes an elephant, kangaroo, and penguin. What to do with such a zoo? In each case the visitor finds a useful role in the family (e.g., car-washing, unloading groceries). The form and tone of the narrative beautifully capture the experience of an adult co-creating a story with a young child on the spot. The pleasures of pattern; the back-and-forth of improvisation; delicious, suspenseful page-turns; and the loopy energy of a plot twist coming in from left field -- all add up to a warm and jokey conversation happening in the immediate present. "There was once a girl. Elsie, her name was -- yes, Elsie Cannon." Ingman's naive-style paintings in primary colors, reminiscent of Ludwig Bemelmans, are perfectly suited to the flavor of the tale as they pursue and develop their own subplots. An anthropomorphic boiled egg, piano stool, saltshaker, and cutlery add an obbligato of animation, comedy, and naughtiness. What happened to Mildred the family cat? Oh, there she is, sipping lemonade at the picnic. And what about Bertie, that boiled egg who appears on almost every spread? Is he possibly our unidentified narrator? Ahlberg, a veteran of almost fifty years of picture book writing, pulls yet another irresistible rabbit out of his storyteller's hat.

Reviewer: Sarah Ellis | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2024

(2) PS There's a lot happening in this clever picture book with an all-dialogue text that introduces the nonsense words used when we can't remember the proper name for something. An adult elephant "can't find the...I forget the word...the...thing-a-ma-jig," so their little one confidently dashes off with a magnifying glass to track it down. Forgetfulness is in the air: a small yellow bird is missing its "hoo-zee-wots-it that makes thunder" and offers to help search. As they investigate, more animals (and stand-in words) join them, including a slug that can't find its "hoo-pull-dee-pewp. It kept the sun off my back" and a squirrel on the hunt for "the shis-moo I was using to carry things from here to there." Is there "a thief in the neighborhood"? Alexander's (You Rule!, rev. 7/23) deceptively simple illustrations, rendered in collaged photographs and hand-cut rubber stamps, are composed of bold primary and secondary colors that pop against ample white space. The expressive animal characters add humor and bring this who(didn't)dunit to life. Three double-page spreads provide a visual hint to what's really happening: the thing-a-ma-jig, hoo-zee-wots-it, shis-moo, etc., are all the same blue bottle cap, which began its journey through the neighborhood when the elephant left it on a tree stump. Spoiler alert: The cap is returned to its bottle, and together the group finds "something for everyone" to replace the multipurpose item, a process that will have young listeners turning back to the beginning to spot subtly placed details in the illustrations. A final spread provides the language of origin for the nonsense words employed in the text.

Reviewer: Kitty Flynn | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2024

(2) PS Daniel (Daniel Finds a Poem; Daniel's Good Day, rev. 7/19) is back in another open-hearted, child-friendly picture book. It's spring, and Daniel is meeting his grandfather in the park. When Grandpa asks him what's new, Daniel heads off to find out. He learns that his favorite rock is soaking up the sun, the redwing blackbirds are back, ducklings have hatched, a snake has shed its skin, tadpoles are growing legs. Daniel reports his findings and then updates Grandpa with his own news: he can whistle like blackbirds; he "can run fast 'cause [his] legs are growing, just like the pollywogs'"; and he has a new tooth, just as the snake has a new skin. The book ends with our thoughtful hero turning the tables: "Now it's your turn, Grandpa...what's new with you?" Archer's expertly composed double-page-spread illustrations, in "acrylic inks and collage, using patterned collage papers created by the author," portray a world bursting with life and vivid color: the deep blues and greens of the ducklings' pond; the light green of new leaves; the bright spots of red on the blackbirds. (Red is also the color of Daniel's hoodie, surely a call-out to The Snowy Day.) From the spectacular illustrations to the warm relationship between Daniel and Grandpa to Daniel's curiosity about the natural world, there's much to savor here; and the question of "what's new?" may elicit a wealth of reader response and interaction.

Reviewer: Martha V. Parravano | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2024