Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast

“A whole page of text looked like a wall — keeping me out. By now, everyone in my class was reading book after book, except me. What if they found out that I couldn’t keep up?”
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I’ve a review over at BookPage of Hudson Talbott’s A Walk in the Words (Nancy Paulsen Books, September 2021).

That review is here, and below are some more spreads from the book.

Enjoy!

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“We’re moondust and star shine all circling the sun …”
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“How the World Adds Up” is the subtitle of Susan Hood’s newest picture book, We Are One (Candlewick), illustrated by Linda Yan (her picture book debut) and coming to shelves next month. It is precisely because not a lot of our world today does seem to add up (in non-mathematical ways) that I find this book so comforting. It’s a primer on early math concepts, and it’s a reminder that we’re all connected to something larger than ourselves.

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“A tree stood steel-straight and proud at the foot of the towers that filled its sky.
It grew, mostly unnoticed, silently marking the seasons.”
(Click spread to enlarge)

 
We will soon mark the 20th anniversary of 9/11. It’s hard to believe. Children’s literature will acknowledge this with more than one book (more soon here at 7-Imp about one such picture book from author-illustrator Sean Rubin, which was released in May), and today I have one from author Marcie Colleen and illustrator Aaron Becker. Survivor Tree (Little, Brown) will be on shelves this month.

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“Come now little one, it’s time to go to sleep.
All the little children are tucked up in bed.”
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Today’s book was first published in Swedish in 2019 as Alla Ska Sova — Now That Night is Near, written by the great Astrid Lindgren and illustrated in gouache, ink, watercolors, colored pencils, pastels, and acrylics by Swedish-Dutch author-illustrator Marit Törnqvist. The English version is now on shelves (May 2021, Floris), and as you can see above in the book’s opening spread, it is an invitation.

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I’m taking a small break from sharing picture book art to signal-book this excellent opinion piece (from just yesterday) at the New York Times from Nashvillian Margaret Renkl, an essay that touches on children’s books too. Click on the image above to be taken to the piece, and if you can’t access it but you contact me, I’ll glady summarize it for you.

“That evening Mayu went to the forest mailbox with her letter.
Her heart beat faster as she put her letter into the box. Then she ran home.”

 
Those of you who still correspond with friends and family via letter-writing know that to receive a letter from a friend, sitting there in your mailbox amongst all the credit card applications, is to receive a gift. In fact, I received one such gift this week, which brightened my day. Kyoko Hara’s newest illustrated chapter book for children, The Mailbox in the Forest, is a tribute to letter-writing. Originally published in Japan in 2007, it will be on U.S. shelves in September and was illustrated by Kazue Takahashi. (Fans of the fabulous Kuma-Kuma Chan books will recognize that name.)

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“Librarian Beck put a heavy book into Jake’s hands. It was old and worn. …”
(Click spread to enlarge and read text in its entirety)

 
There’s so much to love about Margaret McNamara’s The Little Library (Schwartz & Wade, March 2021), illustrated by G. Brian Karas and a new entry in a series of picture books called Mr. Tiffin’s Classroom, that I’m not sure where to begin. But we’ll begin with Jake, one of the book’s main characters. “Jake was a slow and careful reader. Sometimes he read the same page more than once so he could figure everything out. When it came to Library Day, Jake felt behind.”

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“What could Scott do with all that music buzzing in his brain?”

 
Let me say right off the bat that this post is best read while simultaneously listening to “Gladiolus Rag” (or your Joplin ragtime of choice).

Coming to shelves in September is King of Ragtime: The Story of Scott Joplin (Atheneum) from Stephen Costanza, author-illustrator and one-time ragtime player himself. And it is a beauty.

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“Meanwhile, the elephants ride in a trailer, past sycamore figs and acacia trees,
beyond the Umfolozi swamp, and along the Nseleni River. They bump over
one … two … three railway tracks and then down a dirt path
where a sign points the way to Thula Thula.
The elephants COME.”
(Click spread to enlarge)

 
I’ve a review over at the Horn Book of Kim Tomsic’s The Elephants Come Home: A True Story of Seven Elephants, Two People, and One Extraordinary Friendship (Chronicle, May 2021), illustrated by Hadley Hooper.

That review is here, and below (and above) are some of the book’s spreads.

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We all contain multitudes, but for those who forget, there is Divya Srinivasan’s newest picture book. What I Am (Viking) will be on shelves next month and was inspired by an experience her sister had. She was washing her hands in a restaurant bathroom when someone at the next sink looked up at her and asked: “What are you?”

On the title page spread of What I Am, an unseen, unnamed person asks our protagonist, an Indian American girl, the same question: In a oversized, somewhat intimidating speech bubble above her head, we read: “What are you?”

I didn’t know what to say. So I didn’t answer, and they left. But I kept thinking about it.

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