One of the things I used to love about working in bookstores was when new boxes arrived from publishers. It was like Christmas every month, the anticipation and the joy of finding out what was inside.

Now I get that feeling when I walk into a bookshop to see what is new on the shelves and also when I’m browsing the internet, checking out other peoples blogs for new and exciting books.

A couple of days a go I came across Suzy Lee on Amazon. The book is Wave and it is wordless.

Suzy Lee is amazing and I must now have Wave on my bookshelf; have a look at her website here to learn more about this very gorgeous artist.

Wordless picture books are of course an art because the whole story must be conveyed convincingly in the illustrations. They are very important in education for prompting children to learn how to interpret stories and also to recognise a beginning, middle and end in story telling. Wordless books are great at home as well; younger children can enjoy explaining what is happening in the illustrations and older children can take it further by imagining alternate endings and additional plot lines. Wordless picture books are rewarding.

weheartbooks top 5 wordless picture books

1. Up and Up (Shirley Hughes)

I love Shirley Hughes and one of my favorite books as a child was Dogger, or David and the Dog as it is known in the USA (I’ll post about that one another time). She is one of the best known children’s author/illustrators in the world. Set out in comic strip style Up and Up consists of black line drawings against a sepia background. The story of a little girl who longs to fly, it is purely magical as you follow her journey: she gets her wish and off she goes up and up. Her personality is infectious and she always makes me smile as she drifts along until she is finally rescued by a man in a hot air balloon. There is so much to look at in this book which makes it a great tool for encouraging children to make up their own stories. It doesn’t even have to be about the main character, you could make up different stories for the others she meets along the way. Ages 3+

2. The Arrival (Shaun Tan)

Well I just think this award winning book is incredible, in fact Shaun Tan is incredible. The Arrival depicts the journey of a man who leaves home for a strange, fantastical land in order to support his family. The hundreds of drawings Tan worked on for this stunning book are partly a reflection of his own father’s journey to Australia and his struggle to fit into an alien culture. More than a book The Arrival is an awe-inspiring artwork; every time I pick it up I find new and amazing elements that I had missed before. Ages 8+

3. The Snowman (Raymond Briggs)

Regarded as a cult classic this picture book tells a story in pictures - 175 frames to be exact - of the one night friendship of a boy and his snowman. The boy lovingly creates the man out of snow and when he looks out of his window that night he discovers the snowman is alive. They take each other on a tour of their worlds, the boy of his house and the snowman of his wintery world. In the morning when the boy wakes up the snowman is gone, he has melted and all that is left are pieces of coal. This book is all about the joy of exploring and discovering new things, it is about new friendships and then the fond memories of those friendships. This book really does give children the opportunity to imagine their own ending to the story. 4+

4. Sunshine and Moonlight (Jan Omerod)

These are favorites of mine from childhood, I can remember borrowing them from the school library numerous times. In the last few years they have been re-published and are just as beautiful as I remember them way back in primary school. Sunshine follows the progression of a little girl’s day as she gets up out of bed and begins her daily routine. My favorite scenes are when she hops into bed with her parents while they read their morning papers; everyone in this house has a routine and they all fit into each other’s. Toddlers can compare their routine in the morning before childcare/preschool with this little girl’s. Jan includes so much detail that this is perfect for beginning discussion with children about their own routines. Sunshine won the Australian Children’s Book of the Year Award in 1982. Moonlight is similar to Sunshine but of course follows the routine on the other end of the day; cleaning teeth, bathtime and bed. Ages 2+

5. Tuesday (David Wiesner)

Reading Tuesday is like watching an M. Night Shyamalan film; it is weird, quirky, funny and enthralling. On this particular Tuesday around 8 in the evening a strange thing begins to happen, suddenly frogs/toads start to invade the town levitating on lily pads and seemingly having a great time. The frogs eventually return to their rightful homes BUT the big surprise is what is going to happen on the following Tuesday? Tuesday won the prestigious Caldecott Medal and Wiesner’s amazing speech is here. I love this quote from that speech

Fortunately, kids know funny when they see it. If, after reading Tuesday one evening before bed, they look out the window and see frogs flying by—well, we should all be so lucky.

Wiesner’s art is incredible and I can guarantee that parents will love this as much as their children. Ages 4+

Although we have used some very classic choices here there is also room for a special mention for the fantastic wordless books by wonderful Australian illustrator Gregory Rogers, The Boy, the Bear, the Baron and the Bard and sequel Midsummer Knight. Ages 6+

Katie and I have been meaning to post on this amazing book for a while now.

Gallop! is not your usual animal picture book. It has been in the independent booksellers’ top 10 lists for months which is unusual for a children’s book that’s not a Harry Potter.

The author of Gallop!, Rufus Butler Seder has created a technique called ‘Scanimation’ which gives the illustrations in the book motion. Although it is hard to describe it is delightfully intriguing and utterly mesmerising to look at. I have opened it over and over again, amazed at how it works and at how fluidly the animals seemingly move. I say seemingly because the cleverness of ‘Scanimation’ is that it uses a trick of the eye called ‘persistence of vision‘ and the overlayed striped acetate pages create the illusion of movement in the illustrations. As the title of the book suggests the horse gallops across the page and on each new page a different animal moves too.

Katie and I both have a copy of Gallop! and although the concept of the animation in the book is too old for our boys, Ned still loves watching the movement on each page. The book has rhyming text which makes the age range of the book for between 3- and 5-year-olds however much older children will appreciate the complexity of the animation and will enjoy the exploration of finding out how it works. This is a book that will grow with children and is a very exciting development in the world of children’s publishing - what wonderful things will be coming next?

Click on the above image and you will see the horse move as it does in the book.

Zoo lovers check out this incredible website . It is the stunning companion to the book Bembo’s Zoo by Brazillian Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich.

I promise you it is amazing, especially for fans of graphic design and typography combined with children’s books.

The April edition of Cookie Magazine have done a design feature on bookshelves, One For The Books, perfect shelving units for your child’s tomes and trinkets.

This one was my favorite. See the wallpaper behind, which is pages from the Olivia books by Ian Falconer. What a great idea, although it might be hard getting your head around pulling a book apart.

I wrote a post at Christmas time about Olivia. If you like the Eloise books you will love Olivia, the funkiest, feistiest pig in literature.

If you want something really special, have a look at Teatro Olivia, a play set in which you have six Olivia paper dolls to create your own ballets and theatre. Falconer, whose background is set design, has created a masterpiece with Teatro, stimulating creativity and passion for the arts in his audience.

Katie did a post recently about Eric Carle fabric and there is also Olivia fabric available, I found it here. It’s very gorgeous and it’s about time I bought some.

The very cute toy on the shelf in the picture from Cookie Magazine is made by Mizutamago, a great blog I read regularly.

One blog I read regularly is Red Dog and Jude, written by Danielle McDonald talented artist and designer. Based in Melbourne she creates gorgeous and funky illustrations and designs for children’s toys, manchester, clothing, furniture and more.

Just in time for Mother’s Day she has teamed with Cathy Phelan on two books I’m Glad You’re My Mum and I’m Glad You’re My Gran, see her post here all about them. Published by local publisher Black Dog Books they are designed for children to fill in and so give mum or gran a very personal Mother’s Day gift.

With so much awareness now of environmental issues here are our favorite green children’s books…

1. The Lorax (Dr. Seuss)

The original and the best children’s book about the perils of destroying your environment with greed and selfishness. “UNLESS someone like you…cares a whole awful lot…nothing is going to get better…It’s not.” Of course this picture book is typical Dr Seuss with wild tongue twisting rhymes and technicolour illustrations that almost require sunglasses to look at but it is also probably Seuss’ most important and prophetic work. The Once-ler describes how he has decimated the Loraxs’ habitat with deforestation and air and water pollution to set up his manufacturing plants, leading to the poor Loraxs’ extinction. Check out the Lorax Earth Day website- help the real Lorax forests.

2. Weslandia (Paul Fleischman and Kevin Hawkes)

This beautiful picture book is so very important in many ways. Protagonist Wesley is bullied at school because he doesn’t conform to what his peers consider normal, for example he doesn’t like pizza! While he is on school holidays and with no friends to play with he decides to create himself a self sustainable civilisation. He uses a plot of earth and grows a crop of ’swist’ a plant of his own creation that takes off soon towering above him and and bearing bizarre looking fruit. Soon Wesley discovers that he can use his strange crop as a multitude of things including clothing and shelter thus creating his ‘Weslandia’. Kevin Hawkes beautifully illustrates Wesley’s utopia giving little children a lavish landscape to admire while older children will grasp the themes of environment and social conscience.

3. We are the Weather Makers : The story of Global Warming (Tim Flannery)

This revised and updated version of Australian Tim Flannery’s best selling book on climate change is for a young adult audience, the children who it seems will inherit all these environmental issues from previous generations. This is science without all the jargon, in depth Flannery explains all the problems regarding the climate and also explores the solutions but all in a way that is easy to digest and understand. It is broken into chapters on each issue and has been printed in an excellent easy to read type. Marketed for an audience of 9 to 90 this is a great introduction to the world we live in today.

4. Scarlette Beane (Karen Wallace and Jon Berkeley)

The acrylic illustrations in this picture book are just so gorgeous. Scarlette is adorable with her face as red as a beet and little green fingers. On her fifth birthday she receives a small garden all of her own and begins to plant. Her vegies grow and grow until her whole neighborhood is enjoying the spoils. This is a beautiful sweet tale of ecology, friendship and sharing good food. Children love identifying objects and in this picture book there are plenty of vegetables to point at and name as well as showing them how plants grow.

5. Uno’s Garden (Graeme Base)

And of course funny little Uno! Winner of the The Wilderness Society Picture Book of the Year 2007, they described Uno’s Garden like this “Uno’s Garden is a lively and lavishly detailed picture book about environmental sustainability. A whimsical imaginary landscape demonstrates the importance of learning from past mistakes to ensure a balanced and liveable future“. See Katie’s fab post here about the Uno’s Garden Myer windows last Christmas.

And mummy is reading this!

The World Without Us by Alan Weisman, it’s a fascinating imagining of what would happen to the planet if humans disappeared.

Design Mom has posted a lovely review of the picture book In a Blue Room by Jim Averbeck and beautifully illustrated by Tricia Tusa. The books main character is little Alice, which has always been my most favorite girls name and doesn’t she just look like an Alice?

Tricia also illustrated the lovely picture book The Magic Hat by renowned Australian author Mem Fox and the stunning Fred Stays with me (written by Nancy Coffelt) about a little girl dividing her time between two divorced parents houses but whose dog, Fred, travels everywhere with her.

Check out the children’s lit posts on Design Mom as she chooses some really funky and interesting books to personally review.

I have just discovered a beautiful, gorgeous, amazing blog on children’s books called Kids Literati. Kara is obviously a very passionate reader and sharer of good children’s literature.

One of Kara’s reviews is of the incredible Could You? Would You?: A Book To Tickle Your Imagination by Australian author Trudy White. This little book is like a meditation, open it at any page and you have a question to which the answers are endless, only bound by your imagination.

I can’t wait to the day when I can sit with Ned and talk about all the possibilities this book’s questions can conjure up. What an amazing thing imagination is and what a beautiful book this is to nurture it.

What makes you smile?

This book!

Originally published in 1955, the protagonist of this book is as sassy as they come.
Eloise is six and she lives with her nanny on the top floor of The Plaza Hotel in New York. She is clearly used to adult company and speaks in the most precocious manner: “I live on the top floor, Of course I am apt to be on any floor at any time, And if I want to go anywhere I simply take the elevator … There are absolutely nothing but rooms in The Plaza, Oooooooooooo I absolutely love The Plaza.” I didn’t know Eloise when I was six, but I know that if I had, I would loved this idea – and would have invented all manner of make-believe games around the idea of living in a hotel!

The author was god-mother to Liza Minelli and there was speculation that Eloise was inspired by her. Initially the book was published for adults, but was soon adopted by kids, and became an instant bestseller to be followed by three sequels: Eloise in Paris, Eloise at Christmastime and Eloise in Moscow. Eloise Takes a Bawth was published post-humously in 2002. According to the book’s website, certain editorial changes have been made over the years to make Eloise more palatable, but if you look closely, a bottle of gin remains in Eloise’s bedroom on pages 20–21!

The pen and ink illustrations compliment the text in the best possible way; simply coloured in black and pink they are so are distinctly of the 1950s era, I love them.

An animated version of the books in the series, Me Eloise, has just finished airing on ABC TV here in Aus. I like this TV-adaption: the illustrative style isn’t as retro, but Oooooo I absolutely love the music. The voiceovers were pretty good too. For a taste, visit the Me Eloise website.

I found this still from new movie Dan in Real Life and it made me giggle. Anyone with a sense of humor loves this Japanese picture book and all children seem to have an inbuilt sense of humor when it comes to talking about bodily functions. The message of the book is that all living things eat so all must poop (or Poos depending on your hemisphere). This Japanese style of illustration is beautiful, it has a lovely innocence and the colours used are glorious. In the same series and along the same topic is also The Gas We Pass by Shinta Cho; the story of farts.

Some other great but slightly gross picture books;

My favorite - The Fly (La Mosca); How a Perfect Day Turned into a Nightmare -Fly goes for a swim in a porcelain pool (loo) until something very large falls from the sky , Splash! Sick? Yes very but the collage illustrations are fantastic and it is funny.

Walter the Farting Dog

And of course the classic - The Story of the Little Mole Who Knew it was None of his Business - you can’t get much better than a mole with poo on his head.