It’s Raining Picture Books!

We’ve had a deluge of great new picture books coming through recently at KDL. Here’s a few of my favorites:

Friends by Mies van Hout offers a lovely take on one-word concepts, illustrating words like “cuddle” and “fight” with friendly, colorful monsters etched in black. Don’t miss her first book, Happy, either!

Flora and the Flamingo by Molly Idle is striking in its use of space as it tells the delicate tale of a little ballerina and a flamingo engaged in dance. Check this one out for the illustrations and lift-the-flaps design.

The Dark by Lemony Snicket, illustrated by Jon Klassen. Jon Klassen is one of my favorite illustrators, and he’s been getting much love all around after winning the 2013 Caldecott Medal for This is Not My Hat. Pair him with Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events) and you get a quirky, yet always honest tale of one little boy’s journey to co-exist with the dark. An outstanding book that tackles nighttime fears beautifully.

Bluebird by Bob Staake is another book that handles a tough concept in an innovative way. Staake’s wordless book is done almost in monochrome, with blues and grays predominating, as he tells the tale of a lonely boy who finds, and then loses, a friend in a little blue bird. Through deceptively simple illustrations, Staake demonstrates how broken the world can be, but also how we can transcend that same brokenness.

 From Bob Staake’s Bluebird (2013)