Can you just wake me up when winter is over? I don’t want to look at any more books with idyllic cabin scenes or pretty ponies trotting in the snow. I don’t know what the weather is like in your neck of the woods, but around here it is freezing cold and windy and I’m sick of it! That’s why this month’s Book Basket is crammed full of silliness and adventure – these are books made for laughing your way out of the winter doldrums. All of the images are courtesy of Lookybook; just click on the book to flip the pages, and if it’s too small you can click on the orange googly-eyes to see a bigger version.
1. Lickety-Split, written by Robert Heidbreder and illustrated by Dusen Petricic
It’s a fact: kids love sound effects. That’s why I was so excited to discover Lickety-Split – it is chock full of fantastic sounds and dynamic illustrations. This is the kind of book that will keep the rapt attention even of the child who claims to hate books. It begs to be read with an enthusiastic voice and then read again, and again, and again.
2. Toilet Tales, written and illustrated by Andrea Wayne von Konigslow
Toilet Tales has us imagine what would happen if animals tried to use a toilet: A goat eats the toilet paper, a beaver builds a dam out of toothbrushes, and a chicken “would sit on it for three days waiting for something to hatch.” If humor is one of the best ways to get children to cooperate, this book should be in every parent’s potty training arsenal. What I want to know is, how is it that this book has been in print for over 20 years and I have only just heard about it?
3. Zoe Sophia’s Scrapbook: An Adventure in Venice, written by Claudia Mauner and Elisa Smalley, illustrated by Claudia Mauner
I first heard about this book from soultravelers3, a family traveling around the world – their daughter loved it, and they actually planned their itinerary in Venice around the places visited in the story (read their post here). The narrator is a precocious nine year old New Yorker who embarks on a journey to Venice, Italy, to visit her great aunt Dorothy Pomander. The illustrations in Zoe Sophia are rich and evocative, and the text zips along as Zoe Sophia and Dorothy explore Venice: a visit to the Accademia, shopping on the Rialto, an opera in La Fenice and hot chocolate at Caffè Florian. Zoe and Dorothy are both equally colorful, vivacious characters with a real zest for living, and that is what makes this such an enjoyable read: you can’t help but let a bit of their enthusiasm rub off on you. The publisher recommends this book for ages 6 and up, but I feel sure that 4 year olds will love it as a read aloud, too.
4. Sir Cumference and the Isle of Immeter, written by Cindy Neuschwander and illustrated by Wayne Geehan
If you haven’t read anything by Cindy Neuschwander, you should do it now: she is the master of writing captivating tales that also just happen to teach essential mathematical concepts. In Sir Cumference and the Isle of Immeter, a young girl named Per learns to play a game called “Inners and Edges” while visiting relatives. Per makes a connection between the game and a mysterious castle nearby on the island of Immeter – to unlock the castle’s secrets, she has to use the skills she learned in the game. We learn how to calculate the area and perimeter of a circle and a rectangle, and thanks to Neuschwander’s effortless weaving of mathematics into the storyline, we are excited every step of the way. A friend of mine used many of Neuschwander’s books as teaching tools in her math class with great success, and they would make a great addition to a home school curriculum. Recommended for ages 8 – 11, and precocious 6-7 year olds.
5. Boy Soup, written by Loris Lesynski and illustrated by Michael Martchenko
This is the story of a giant with a very, very bad cold. The giant looks for advice in an outdated home medicine book for giants, and comes across a recipe for “Boy Soup” which, it claims, is sure to cure his cold. Well, when the giant goes to scoop up a handful of boys, he accidentaly grabs Kate, too. This is lucky for the boys, because Kate comes up with a plan to fool the giant into thinking that the recipe is actually a soup made by boys, not made of boys. The poetic language in the book makes it a perfect read aloud choice, and the Giant’s lines just beg to be read in a thundering voice.
Happy Reading!
Related posts:
