I managed to read other wonderful books best for children, too. Here are a few I want to share!
This is a story that one must experience, as it tells in one passage, "how one thing can be lots of other things. All it takes is a little imagination." It's been a while when a book brought tears at the end, and this one, out May 1st, did. Livy, ten, has come back to visit her grandmother in Australia, has not been there for five years. She keeps thinking that there's something important she's forgotten from the earlier visit. And there is, a green-faced creature, a zombie?, is hiding in her bedroom closet, and neither one knows who he is or where he might be from. His name is Bob. It's up to him and Livy to figure out the mystery and along the way, other questions about life. Thanks to NetGalley, I had the pleasure of reading this a little early. Wrapped up beautifully using part of background stories in magical water creatures, Rebecca Stead and Wendy Mass have written a story that will fascinate children and offer a satisfying smile, maybe tears too, at the end.
Illustrations by Nicholas Gannon show just enough scenes to aid the imagination.
A lovely young girl examines the colors in her life, questioning the differences in the blue of the sky and the sea, yet when she lets water go through her hands, it's clear. Pages hold her imaginative wonderings in beautiful illustrations by Jillian Tamaki. It's a book to savor and talk about with children, connecting to the colors in their world, too.