From Our Bookshelves 2016

2016 is quickly coming to an end, and one of our favorite things to do is scour all of the end-of-the-year lists for any favorite books we may have missed.  Are there any hidden gems that have escaped your notice?

Before the year closes, be sure to check out these "Best of" Lists:

Publisher's Weekly's Best Children's and YA Books 2016

The New York Times Best Illustrated Children's Books of 2016
The New York Times Notable Children's Books of 2016

Kirkus Best Middle-Grade Books of 2016
Kirkus Best Picture Books of 2016

Horn Book Fanfare

School Library Journal's Best Picture Books of 2016
School Library Journal's Best Chapter Books of 2016
School Library Journal's Best Nonfiction Books of 2016
School Library Journal's Best Middle Grade Books of 2016

NCTE Orbis Pictus Award for Outstanding Nonfiction for Children
NCTE Charlotte Huck Award for Outstanding Fiction for Children

National Book Awards

And, if that didn't quench your thirst for top books of the year, let us throw our vote it!  These are some of our favorite books from 2016.

Picture Books:

• They All Saw a Cat by Brendan Wenzal
• A Well Mannered Young Wolf by Jean Leroy, illustrated by Matthieu Maudet
• Owl Sees Owl by Laura Godwin and Rob Dunlavey
• Before Morning by Joyce Sidman, illustrated by Beth Krommes
• The Princess and the Warrior by Duncan Tonatiuh

Non-Fiction Picture Books:

• A Poem for Peter by Andrea Davis Pinkney by Andrea Davis Pinkney, illustrated by Steve Johnson and Lou Fancher
• Some Writer!: The Story of E. B. White by Melissa Sweet
• Best in Snow by April Pulley Sayre

Fiction:

• Hour of the Bees by Lindsay Eager
• The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill
• When the Sea Turned to Silver by Grace Lin

Non-Fiction:

• We Will Not Be Silent: The White Rose Student Resistance Movement That Defied Adolf Hitler by Russell Freedman
• Samurai Rising: The Epic Life of Minamoto Yoshitsune by Pamela S. Turner, illustrated by Gareth Hinds

Poetry:

• When Green Becomes Tomatoes: Poems for All Seasons by Julie Fogliano, illustrated by Julie Morstad
• Wet Cement: A Mix of Concrete Poems by Bob Raczka

From Our Bookshelves 2015

'Tis the season for many things . . . including end-of-the-year lists.  You'll want to check these lists twice to make sure you didn't miss any of the year's best.

Horn Book Fanfare

Kirkus Best Middle-Grade Books

School Library Journal's Best of 2015

Publisher's Weekly's Best Children's Books

The New York Times Notable Children's Books
The New York Times Best Illustrated Children's Books

National Book Awards

And, finally, here are our favorites of 2015.  These are books that we read, loved, and shared again and again.   We whole-heartily recommend them.

Picture Books:

• Supertruck by Stephen Savage
• Counting Crows by Kathi Appelt, illustrated by Rob Dunlavey
• Two Mice by Sergio Ruzzier
• Float by Daniel Miyares
• Wolfie the Bunny by Ame Dyckman, illustrated by Zachariah OHora
• The Bear Ate Your Sandwich by Julia Sarcone-Roach
• Job Wanted by Teresa Bateman, illustrated by Chris Sheban
• Gingerbread for Liberty!: How a German Baker Helped Win the American Revolution by Mara Rockliff, illustrated by Vincent X. Kirsch

Fiction:

• The Nest by Kenneth Oppel, illustrated by Jon Klassen
• Echo by Pam Munoz Ryan
• Audacity by Melanie Crowder
• The Hired Girl by Laura Amy Schlitz
• Orbiting Jupiter by Gary D. Schmidt

Nonfiction:

• Tricky Vic: The Impossibly True Story of the Man Who Sold the Eiffel Tower by Greg Pizzoli
• The Boys Who Challenged Hitler: Knud Pedersen and the Churchill Club by Phillip Hoose
• Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and the Siege of Leningrad by M.T. Anderson
• Drowned City: Hurricane Katrina and New Orleans by Don Brown

Poetry:

• Over the Hills and Far Away: A Treasury of Nursery Rhymes collected by Elizabeth Hammill, illustrated by more than 70 artists

tara recommends Over the Hills and Far Away: A Treasury of Nursery Rhymes collected by Elizabeth Hammill

Nursery Rhyme books are scattered throughout my shelves.  I have several Mother Goose collections (including the essential Tomie dePaola's Mother Goose and Mother Goose's Storytime Nursery Rhymes by Axel Scheffler), Pocketful of Posies: A Treasury of Nursery Rhymes by Salley Mavor (one of my favorites), and several different versions of rhymes in the board book variety (including Tomie's Little Mother Goose).  I definitely did not think I needed any more collections to stock my personal library . . . but I was wrong.

Over the Hills and Far Away is a Treasury of Nursery Rhymes that breathes new diversity and life into the genre.  Collected by Elizabeth Hammill, it has the traditional rhymes that you would expect and look forward to, but as an added surprise, there is a healthy collection of lesser-known rhymes from all around the world.

One particularly enchanting page comes early in the book, and really showcases the genius of this creative collection.  I read it several times because I love how it compares, at a glance, the similarities and differences between cultures with one base rhyme.  Four different versions of "Little Miss Muffet" are set side-by-side on the page (English, Jamaican, American, Australian) and reading them together is just fun.

If you set the unique rhymes aside, this book is a must-have for the artwork alone.  With over 70 different artists contributing their talents, each page is a new style and a surprise, with artists including Mo Willems, Ashley Bryan, Jon Klassen, Jerry Pinkney, and many more.  There is certainly nothing boring or expected in these pages and the full color illustrations are simply beautiful.

This is a grown-up collection of nursery rhymes that will still entertain young readers with clapping rhymes, riddles, counting-out rhymes, traditional rhymes and distinct illustrations.  Even if you think you have seen it all, check this collection out and it is sure to find a space on your shelves.

Over the Hills and Far Away:  A Treasury of Nursery Rhymes
collected by Elizabeth Hammill
illustrated by more than 70 celebrated artists
published by Candlewick Press
March 2015

danyelle recommends What the Heart Knows by Joyce Sidman

For the past week, the book that has sat on my bedside table--the one I've read and re-read--is Joyce Sidman's poetry collection, What the Heart Knows: Chants, Charms & Blessings.  These twenty-nine poems, each illustrated with the inimitable artwork of Pamela Zagarenski, offer hope, express grief, look to the future, and recall the past.  In her Note to Readers, Sidman wrote, "We still believe in the power of the words themselves."   Sidman displays that power here.  She puts into words the raw emotion that we carry in our hearts, giving it shape and definition.  Some of these poems feel intensely personal, as though I could have written them if only I could have figured out how to say what exactly I felt.  I had thought to cite some of the most effective examples, but to pull a few words or phrases from their places, robs them of some of their power, so instead, I'll just recommend getting a copy of the book and reading the poems yourself.  My current favorites are "Chant to Repair a Friendship," "Song of Bravery," and "Blessing on the Downtrodden."  Read them and find yours.

What the Heart Knows: Chants, Charms & Blessings
by Joyce Sidman
illustrated by Pamela Zagarenski
published by Houghton Mifflin Books for Children
October 2013
Recommended for ages 12 and up

Spotlight on Poetry

National Geographic Book of Animal Poetry
compiled by J. Patrick Lewis

This collection of poetry is filled with full-color photographs of animals large and small: a luminescent weedy sea dragon, a snowy owl with spread wings flying straight out of the book, a grasshopper photographed mid-leap, and a close-up of the green eyes of a fly.  (Penguins, orangutans, lizards -- all captured in beautiful photography.)

With poems by Ogden Nash, Robert Frost, Rudyard Kipling, Bobbi Katz, Aileen Fisher, X.J. Kennedy, J. Patrick Lewis, himself, and others, there is something for everyone.

And for those inclined to try writing animal poems, the final two pages have ideas to get you started.

diane recommends Follow Follow: A Book of Reverso Poems by Marilyn Singer

This companion to Mirror Mirror: A Book of Reversible Verse is amazing! Follow Follow: A Book of Reverso Poems contains more reverso poems from some classic fairy tales. For those of you who haven't had previous experience with this kind of book, reverso means that if you read the poem, line by line, from the top to bottom, and then from bottom to top, it would still make sense. The exciting part about these poems, is most of them are written from two different points of view. So, for example, when you read, "Ready, Steady, Go!" a retelling of the Tortoise and the Hare, you get to read the hare's perspective for one poem and for the reverso poem, you get to read it from the tortoise's point of view.

Although I love all of the poems, my favorites are the retelling of "Aladdin", and the retelling of "The Emperor's New Clothes". Unfortunately, without putting on the whole poem, I couldn't find a way to place a segment here that made sense. So, I decided to do one from the retelling of the Little Mermaid.

"For love,
give up your voice.
Don't
think twice."

and then the reverso:

"Think twice!
Don't
give up your voice
for love."

The cleverly done poems get all wrapped up by the very clever and carefully done pictures. The pictures are split in half as the poems are, but then they are tied together. They have opposite colors, but they look like, if you changed the colors, they could just be one picture. (Like on the cover) This is a fun book for kids of all ages, but especially fun if you already know the background fairy tale.

I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who needs a good smile, because they will laugh, as they read both perspectives from, essentially, the same poem!

Follow Follow: A Book of Reverso Poems
by Marilyn Singer
illustrated by Josee Masse
Published by Dial
February 2013

Picture Books -- Day 5

Step Gently Out is another of my favorite books from 2012. This poem by Helen Frost invites readers to "Step gently out, be still, and watch a single blade of grass."  It asks you to look at the little things: an ant, a honeybee, a moth, and a spider.  And as you contemplate those little things, breathtaking photography by Rick Lieder grabs your attention.  A pink and yellow moth, a spider dropping from a web highlighted with droplets of dew, and a brightly patterned yellow jacket all take on a quiet importance in full-bleed photos that bring nature up-close.

Everything about this book works in harmony, from a perfectly-chosen font to end papers that feel like the beginning and ending of day.  Even the dark green metallic lettering on the pale green spine is beautiful.  More information about each of the insect featured is included at the end.

Step Gently Out

by Helen Frost

photographs by Rick Lieder

published by Candlewick Press

March 2012