Thursday, July 26, 2007

TT #11 - Children's Book Recommendations



Thirteen children's book recommendations. These are all books that we have borrowed and enjoyed from the local library.
  1. Henry Hikes to Fitchburg by D.B. Johnson. Henry as in Henry David Thoreau, and Fitchburg as in Fitchburg, MA. An excellent introduction to transcendentalism for preschoolers. But if you don't want to think of it that way, it is a good reminder to practice mindfulness.
  2. Henry and Mudge and the Happy Cat by Cynthia Rylant and Suçie Stevenson. A different Henry in this one. This book is especially endearing to me because it doesn't have the obligatory sappy happy ending and the cat looks like "mashed prunes", which our own Ebony often looks like after a rainstorm.
  3. The Saturday Kid by Edward Sorel and Cheryl Carlesimo. Beautifully illustrated and a great story. I am extremely disappointed that someone dinged this book as being too violent. Bullies beat other kids up, they certainly didn't learn it from a book.
  4. Oonga Boonga by Frieda Wishinsky and Carol Thompson. This book is so true to life in our family. Sometimes the only person who can calm Dova down in times of total meltdown is her silly brother Adam.
  5. Skippyjon Jones in the Dog-House by Judy Schachner. The enclosed CD made reading this book a lot easier. I didn't care for it much at first, but the kids loved it and pretty soon we were talking about Skippyjon Jones all the time.
  6. Old Macdonald Had an Apartment House by Judi Barrett and Ron Barrett. I love the imagery of carrots growing through the ceilings in this classic book.
  7. Old Granny and the Bean Thief by Cyntha DeFelice and Cat Bowman Smith. A great story including a cow patty as a character, set in the desert Southwest.
  8. On the Moon by Anna Milbourne, Laura Fearn and Benji Davies. The only non-fiction book on this list (I am female after all), this is a nice introduction to space for toddlers.
  9. Granite Baby by Lynne Bertrand and Kevin Hawkes. Another story from New England, this time a tall tale from New Hampshire. I love the larger-than-life illustrations and the super industrious women.
  10. Twister by Darleen Bailey Beard. Extremely vivid, slightly scary, but wonderful.
  11. Play, Mozart, Play! by Peter Sis. Dova and I spent hours looking at the illustrations by the author of Scranimals, but Doug felt it was just too bizarre.
  12. Max's Words by Kate Banks and Boris Kulikov. Extremely creative story with excellent illustrations.
  13. Car Wash by Sandra Steen. Cool illustrations and fun times.
  14. You'll note that I made a special trip to the library to remember all these great titles just for this post!


6 comments :

Erin the Innocent said...

Thanks for the comment on my blog! You've got a great list there :) I'll have to check them out!

Anonymous said...

interesting list...

thx for the recommendations

happy thursday!

Joely Sue Burkhart said...

I don't think the monsters have read any of these. A trip to the library is in order! Thanks for the list.

Anonymous said...

I am SO stealing this list - I need to check these books out! Thanks!

Happy TT!

Suprina said...

I have jotted down a few of these titles...

My kids love to read!

Great TT!

Anonymous said...

Good list, too bad Amazon doesn´t ship to Guatemala!