It’s rare that I’ll review just one picture book, but for this board book, “Below the Ice,” I’m making an exception because it is exceptional. Michaël Escoffier and Ella Charbon have created a brilliant board book—yes, I said brilliant—with a twist at the end worthy of any bestselling mystery novel.
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Adrian So is not your average fourteen year old. He wrote a middle grade novel, “The Groundworld Heroes,” and it’s being published by Monarch Educational Services this August. Adrian described how he started writing by explaining that during COVID, he was stuck at home and had nothing to do but read and write. He wrote nonstop and wrote short stories daily. He wasn’t ready to write a book, he thought.
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Biographic picture books serve multiple purposes; they not only teach children about special people, they can serve to inspire children by demonstrating the actions of others who may have overcome challenges, followed their passions, or shown a desire to change the world. In these picture books, children will learn about people who challenged traditions, people who fought to discover our history, and a woman who didn’t listen to what others thought women should do. We also learn about the people who saved an elephant in Vietnam and a man who wants to save the world.
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“Wrecker,” is pure Carl Hiaasen with its Key West setting and fabulous action, quirky characters, and clever plot. Carl Hiaasen is known for his novels about Florida, its struggle against pollution and destruction of the land and waters around it, as well as his tongue-in-cheek depiction of people who are oblivious to common sense and basic reasoning skills. This is a book that, in pointing out the racist past of Florida, and Key West in particular, could very well be banned in Hiaasen’s home state of Florida: In this clever and gripping novel, one of the characters actually feels terrible about an ancestor who was a member of the Klu Klux Klan and participated in the lynching of a white man who had dared to enter into a common law marriage with the Black woman he loved.
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Each of these nonfiction picture books has something special to offer children. Most children love reading nonfiction picture books as a way to learn about the world around them, and even adults like me can learn new information from these books! Each book would make a fabulous addition to any classroom or home library.
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“The Boy Who Cried Bear” is the second book in the Haven’s Rock series by Kelley Armstrong. Few mystery series have enthralled me as totally as these novels set in the Canadian Yukon wilderness, in a settlement so remote that there are no roads, no cell phone service, no internet, and limited electricity. The first series, the Rockton novels, ended after seven mysteries, but the main character, detective Casey Duncan, and her husband Eric, the sheriff of that settlement, weren’t finished in their mission of rescuing those who needed a safe place to hide. Haven’s Rock, which belongs to Casey and Eric, takes in those who are in danger and must flee for their lives.
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In her new book, “Project F,” Jeanne DuPrau takes us yet again far into the future to a different kind of world. It’s a simpler world where there is some electricity, but little technology. Through the eyes of main character fourteen-year-old Keith, we learn about a world in which there are no cars, no planes, no smart phones. Instead people take trains if they need to travel long distances, they bike within their small cities, and they walk. Life as we know it today is hundreds of years in the past.
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In “Gather,” Kenneth M. Cardow introduces us to a teenager who has had to grow up much more quickly than anyone should have to. Ian is used to being abandoned; his father left Ian and his mother years before, and then his grandmother left them to move south to be with her sister. So now, it’s just Ian and his mother in the small, run-down family home, on land that has been in Ian’s family for many generations. His father’s family, that is.
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“Hemlock Island” is the eponymous setting for Kelley Armstrong’s new stand alone horror novel, and just the name of the island is a clue that it could be a dangerous place to visit. Laney, a divorced teacher who just published her first book, owns a beautiful house on the island. It was a gift from her ex-husband Kit when he walked away from their marriage. Laney must visit it because the current renters left in a huff after complaining about a blood-stained closet door, and that, in combination with other strange happenings, causes her to investigate what’s going on there.
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The best way to educate young readers is to provide picture books that are so irresistible that kids feel a compulsion to pick them up and read them. Here are some educational picture books that appear to accomplish just that feat.
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Even if your child or student isn’t bilingual, getting books that come with a Spanish version is a wonderful way of sharing books in two languages. But if you or the children are lucky enough to speak Spanish as well as English, here are some wonderful choices for your home or school library.
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With her latest introspective novel, “Just a Regular Boy,” Catherine Ryan Hyde takes us on a journey that we’d never imagine taking ourselves — going with a survivalist and his five-year-old son into the wilds of northern Idaho to survive what he believes is a coming apocalypse. Remy’s father, Roy, plans to survive off the land, and he believes that he has everything they need to survive.
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