Julie Danielson

Captain Swashby is a reclusive, elderly man with an impressively unkempt beard. Having retired to a small house by the seashore, he is just fine with his “salty and sandy and serene” life of solitude in in Beth Ferry and Juana Martinez-Neal’s charming Swashby and the Sea.

That is, until unwelcome new neighbors appear: a girl and her grandmother. Captain Swashby leaves messages for them in the sand that state, in no uncertain terms, his desire that they skedaddle—but the waves alter his warnings by erasing some of the letters. The water turns “NO TRESPASSING” into “SING.” “NOW VANISH!” becomes “WISH!” Of course, the joyful, bespectacled girl follows the sandy directives, even breaking into song on Swashby’s deck. It seems the curmudgeonly captain’s continued attempts to live a quiet life are destined to be thwarted by both the ocean and his neighbors’ desire for his companionship.

Illustrations by Caldecott Honoree Martinez-Neal (Alma and How She Got Her Name, Fry Bread) give the curious girl much energy and spunk, and evoke the seaside with warm, earth-toned hues. Beth Ferry (Stick and Stone, The Scarecrow) has fun with Captain Swashby’s spirited dialogue (“What are ye up to, ye great salty imp?” he asks the girl at one point), and builds a tenderness to his transition from solitude to neighborliness that never becomes saccharine. “THANK YE, FRIEND,” he writes in the sand after he realizes “neighbors could be fun.” Fittingly, the waves turn this message into “THE END” on the final page. Swashby and the Sea is a picture book with a heart as big and boundless as the ocean.

Author Suzanne Slade has penned numerous picture book biographies about visionary women (A Computer Called Katherine and Dangerous Jane). In Exquisite: The Poetry and Life of Gwendolyn Brooks, she turns her attention to the poet Gwendolyn Brooks, the first African American to win a Pulitzer Prize.

Though Brooks grew up in poverty, her family’s home was lined with shelves that held books of poetry, a “great treasure.” They valued the written word, and writing “became like eating and breathing” for the young Brooks. She wrote her first poem at the age of 7 and was published in a magazine by the time she was 11.

Slade explores the impact of the Great Depression on Brooks’ family, as well as her misfit status at school. Through it all, her poems kept flowing. During college, marriage and motherhood, money was always tight, but Brooks continued writing and dreaming of a better future. Finally, Brooks secured publication for a collection of poetry.

Slade writes that Brooks’ words “helped people better understand others,” likening them to “bright, brilliant clouds.” Illustrator Cozbi A. Cabrera incorporates warm, luminous clouds repeatedly throughout the book. The final spread shows the exuberant moment in which Brooks learns that she has won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry. Cabrera depicts Brooks dancing for joy with her son in their home on the South Side of Chicago, their living room window framing a brilliant sunset and wispy blue clouds.

Exquisite quotes frequently from Brooks and her work, a smart choice by Slade that allows readers to experience for themselves the poet’s extraordinary voice. This vibrant portrait is a fitting introduction to a groundbreaking poet.

Selina Alko (Why Am I Me?, Can I Touch Your Hair?) introduces readers to Roberta Joan Anderson “before the songs” in Joni: The Lyrical Life of Joni Mitchell, the first picture book biography of the folk music icon.

Living in a small town in Canada, young Joni felt like “an upside-down bird on a wire” in a family who didn’t share her creative ambitions. The book chronicles her bout with polio at age 10; her interest in painting and poetry; her discovery of music and songwriting in art school; her marriage to and subsequent divorce from folk singer Chuck Mitchell; and the launch of her career in Greenwich Village. Alko sketches brief stories of the inspirations behind several of Mitchell’s most beloved songs and albums, including “Big Yellow Taxi” and Blue. She also includes portraits of the handful of musical luminaries who were contemporaries to Mitchell—Bob Dylan, Mama Cass, Leonard Cohen and more.

The illustrations, rendered with acrylics, collage, found objects and even wildflowers, are busy with occasional skewed angles, but Alko always keeps Joni their focus. Vivacious colors swirl in melodies, music notes and lyrics that undulate across the pages in banner-like waves. A wing motif dominates with birds, butterflies and winged insects. The final spread notes that the truth Joni shared in her music gives us freedom, and “freedom gives us wings to fly”—here, Joni herself is painted in flight. The color blue dominates, perhaps a nod to Joni’s most iconic album.

Alko, who in the backmatter relates a personal anecdote of having first heard Joni’s music at age 9, shares Joni’s life story with affection and drive.

Mimicking the classic cumulative nursery rhyme “This Is the House That Jack Built,” The Nest That Wren Built is the first picture book by author Randi Sonenshine. It tells the story of how Papa Wren constructs a nest for his growing family. After building the nest, Papa guards it while “chirping a mirthful song to the sky.” Once the eggs have been laid, he hunts for food. At 14 days old, the fledgling birds are ready to fly from their remarkably crafted home, high up in a tree. 

Sonenshine’s text is full of vivid, sensory images (“This is the moss, softer than suede”), and her seemingly simple narrative subtly works on multiple levels. The Nest That Wren Built may be a book about wrens, but it’s also about the patient, tender care that parents take when they provide for their offspring. Illustrator Anne Hunter (Possum and the Summer Storm, Cricket Song, Where’s Baby?) makes the warm, cozy nest the consistent focus of these illustrations, which are laid out on cream-colored pages. The ink and colored pencil illustrations appropriately feature a muted, earth-tone palette, and there’s a distinct sense that Hunter has constructed her drawings as carefully as Papa constructs his nest. Make sure to look closely to see Hunter’s crosshatching, which creates effective texture and shading. 

Nothing about the wrens and their work is anthropomorphized or made cute. Instead, Sonenshine’s bouncy text is filled with facts about how wrens construct nests. Young readers will enjoy spotting the other wild animals that pop up to watch the wrens, as well as the creature who repurposes the nest to serve as his own home at the close of this endearing and informative story.

It’s Saturday, and Ava and her mother are “all smiles.” Ava’s mother works every other day of the week, so this is their “cherished” day of adventure together, as evidenced by the marked-up calendars featured on the endpapers. Unfortunately, things don’t go as planned: Storytime is canceled, and Ava’s mother discovers she has left their tickets to the puppet show at home.

This bighearted ode to parent-child bonding comes from Oge Mora, who was awarded a Caldecott Honor for 2018’s Thank You, Omu! Mora uses repetition to build excitement (“Today will be special. Today will be splendid. Today is SATURDAY!”), as well as to accentuate the book’s themes of togetherness and coping when things go awry. Both mother and daughter often pause to “let out a deep breath” when facing ruined plans. (“Whew!”)

Mother and daughter make for an indelible duo in Mora’s collage illustrations, dominated by cool turquoise, olive and teal hues offset by warm shades of pink. The two are such bodies in motion—the book’s page turns are compelled by curiosity at their next activity, and  “ZOOM!” becomes a refrain as they embark on each adventure—that when they slow down for a hug, it’s all the more touching. Tenderly, Ava tells her mother the day was still splendid because it was time spent with her.

Peek beneath the dust jacket for a scrapbook-style illustration of a photo of mother and daughter, complete with a white Polaroid-esque frame and pieces of tape. It’s clear that, although their plans for the day were thwarted, they formed memories that will last a lifetime. Zoom!

Jessie Sima presents the entertaining story of Spencer’s New Pet as if it were an old black-and-white motion picture. The book opens with a film leader, the countdown from three to one with large numbers in rotating circles. The book’s art deco typeface—for the titles of the story’s three main parts, presented like the intertitles of a silent film (the book is otherwise wordless)—resembles film fonts from the middle of the last century. Throughout the book, rendered on a palette of varying shades of gray, Sima even simulates iris shots, a technique frequently used in silent films. A spare, warm red is devoted to only two objects in the book.

A boy leads his new balloon animal, tied by a clown, about on a leash, and the danger of popping seems to lurk around every corner. But what appears to be the simple story of a boy enjoying his new balloon animal as if it’s a pet turns out to be otherwise.

Once the big reveal comes at the book’s close—who is really holding the leash, exactly?—readers will want to immediately reread to look for clues. (In one spread, for instance, the boy reads Pygmalion, the classic Greek myth, to his new pet.) The twist even takes the book’s tone in a creepy direction (delightfully so).

Readers will understand that things are not always what they seem—and will thrill at the drama that unfolds in this surprising and suspenseful homage to silent films.

Julie Danielson conducts interviews and features of authors and illustrators at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast, a children's literature blog primarily focused on illustration and picture books.

“Like a car seat for your brain” is how Blair Thornburgh describes skulls in her informational picture book of the same name. Written in a second person voice (“You probably don’t think much about skulls”), Skulls! introduces a young girl who starts to see those around her in eye-opening ways as an unknown narrator describes the purpose and functions of skulls in the human body.

In the book’s second full spread, the girl sees a crowd of people around her, and at the page turn she sees them just as they were but with their skulls exposed. Illustrator Scott Campbell’s funny and affectionate watercolor illustrations (the Grim Reaper with a juice box, a mummy with a guitar and a pirate’s bearded skull, chomping on a hot dog) keep matters from getting too grisly. Skulls are “not trying to be scary,” after all. “They can’t help the way they look.”

Thornburgh draws in the reader with the immediate and direct “you” by pointing out the many ways in which the reader benefits from having a skull and emphasizing the importance of taking care of it. Appended are “Cool Skull Facts!” that close with an enthusiastic command to declare love for one’s skull. (“Say it again: I love my skull!”) The purple-tone opening endpapers show the heads of various humans, and the closing ones show the same humans—but with skulls exposed.

Skulls may often be associated with death and mortality, but this life-affirming book is breezy and ebullient. You can say it again: Skulls were never more fun.

Julie Danielson conducts interviews and features of authors and illustrators at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast, a children's literature blog primarily focused on illustration and picture books.