Children’s books break the legendary fourth wall when the characters on the page speak directly to readers or involve them in the action. A number of books in the past few years have asked the reader to join the fun: Herve Tullet’s Press Here, David Wiesner’s The Three Pigs and Mo Willems’ Elephant and Piggie books, among others. Following in this vein is Open Very Carefully, an amusing British import by illustrator Nicola O’Byrne and author Nick Bromley in which the reader is part of the story.

The very first illustration appears to be a traditional piece of artwork from an old version of The Ugly Duckling. As we turn to the right-hand page, we see a giant crocodile tail with a red arrow and the words, “What’s that? I’m trying to read you the story ‘The Ugly Duckling,’ but there’s something in this book that shouldn’t be here!” The next page is torn, and assorted fairy tale animals cover most of the body of the offending crocodile.

The fun really begins when the red-capped duck narrator asks the reader to get involved.  When the crocodile starts eating letters and then words, something must be done—and the duck is just the one for the job! First, the duck asks the reader to rock the book back and forth, to put the crocodile to sleep. Then she draws a purple tutu on the reptile to make him seem less scary (a scene reminiscent of Harold and his purple crayon). The funniest page of the book is when the crocodile tries to escape but smacks into the edge of the page, curling up his snout in pain.

How DOES he get out? Well, shaking the book doesn’t work, that’s for sure! But he figures it out for himself. Those sharp teeth are good for something.

Picture books are a child’s first museum, filled with art that is critical to understanding the story. Visual literacy starts with board books and continues through every illustrated book a child reads. By breaking the barriers, cleverly crafted books such as Open Very Carefully challenge and engage the reader in a special way—and amuse parents at the same time.

Part of the fun of reading is being surprised, whether by an author you thought you knew or a story whose next step you thought you could predict. I was surprised in both ways when I read The Stamp Collector. Before I ran across this inspired picture book, I had read Jennifer Lanthier’s stylish and action-packed series of young adult mystery novels starring an intrepid 12-year-old named Hazel Frump, which began with The Mystery of the Martello Tower. Except for also being very well written, Lanthier’s new book could not be more different from its predecessors.

“This is the story of not long ago,” Lanthier begins, “and not far away. It is the story of a boy who loves stamps and a boy who loves words.” François Thisdale’s delicately colorful paintings match the fable-like simplicity of Lanthier’s prose. If you know a child who wants to write or paint or otherwise find expression in the arts, this book might be just the inspirational nudge you’re looking for. It is very much a story about yearning to communicate.

The Stamp Collector is a thoughtful, lyrical tale about how imagination and empathy take hold in different ways in the mind of a city boy and a country boy—and speak across all barriers. The book’s resonant central image is a stamp on a letter that the poor boy finds on the street. “In his dreams, the stamp is a kite,” writes Lanthier, “a paper jewel from the crown of a wise old king.”

The city boy becomes a prison guard. The country boy becomes a writer whose too-realistic stories draw the ire of the country’s repressive political regime. “Words are dangerous,” snarl the officers who arrest the writer in the night. The two boys, now men, meet across the bars of the prison doors. But they are not allowed to speak.

Then the writer begins to receive letters in response to his book, which is banned in his own country—letters from all over the world, adorned with exotic stamps. The guard can’t pass the letters to the writer, but finally he begins to read them himself. And slowly he begins to pass the stamps to the writer as coded messages of hope.

For this new direction in her writing career, Lanthier was inspired by the story of Chinese writers Nurmuhemmet Yasin and Jiang Weiping, during her work with the international organization PEN (Poets, Editors, Novelists). In many hands this tale would have become a screed about repression or free speech. By concentrating on the basic human need to communicate, and by expressing much of her story through the poignant symbolism of the stamps, Lanthier avoids sermonizing. Together she and Thisdale turn The Stamp Collector into a poignant fable.

Michael Sims’ most recent book is The Story of Charlotte’s Web.

Parents may be quick to admit their obsession with technology, but most hope their children won’t follow in their footsteps. In Matthew Cordell’s timely new picture book, hello! hello!, a young girl named Lydia finds herself immersed in electronic gadgets, but she is beginning to grow bored and lonely in this black-and-white, high-tech world. She greets her dad who is staring at his cell phone and her brother who is engrossed in a video game. Even her mother ignores her and taps away on a laptop keyboard. Lydia feels all alone, and she sighs in frustration.

Then, a leaf appears in front of her, and Lydia follows it outside to discover a brilliant, brightly colored world. She runs through flowers, meets a horse and rides through the wind with a whale, a buffalo and an octopus until—RING RING RING—her parents call her cell phone. But instead of returning home to stay in a stale house filled with electronics, Lydia swaps her mother’s computer for a leaf, her father’s cell phone for a flower and her brother’s video game for a butterfly. Hand in hand, the family walks outside together to say “hello” to the beautiful natural world outside their door.

Cordell uses few words to tell the story, instead using his distinctive pen-and-ink and watercolor illustrations to convey Lydia’s delight in the beauty and bounty of nature. Inside the house, the electronics-obsessed family is sparsely drawn in black and white and their words are written in an old computer-style font. Outside are loose, handwritten words and color-filled pages, showcasing the beauty a child can find by stepping outside her door. Cordell’s hopeful story encourages children to play outside, while also challenging their parents to play with them, a reminder for all of us to take time to disconnect from work and gadgets and reconnect with nature and family.

Otter is just looking for dinner when he finds love—with a fish. Focusing on her beautiful eyes, Otter no longer sees Myrtle as a food source. Myrtle feels a tug in her own heart and returns his affection as they play hide-and-seek and watch the stars. The story should end there, but the other pond animals find Otter, who’s always been a little odd, even odder with his new love interest. Some even call it unnatural.

Otter comes to his senses (according to the neighboring naysayers, that is) and resigns himself to living alone. Chris Raschka’s deceptively simple, childlike artwork, rendered in watercolor washes and thick colored pencil, evokes both Otter’s budding romance and crushing loss. After swimming by Beaver’s dam one day, Otter’s spirit is renewed, as Beaver helps Otter realize that love can take many paths, “that there is the way of the otter and there is the way of the heart.” Choosing the latter, Otter and Myrtle resume their lives—and love—together.

James Howe expertly crafts this modern fable to be read on many levels. Although adults may read more into the muddied relationship, even young children will recognize the strength of staying true to oneself. Otter’s reflective tale gives hope and validity to love everywhere.

Red Cat and Blue Cat seem to be enemies, until we learn that each cat secretly wishes he were like the other. Blue Cat is clever and Red Cat is fast and neither is happy just being himself. So blue cat has an idea: “If I turn myself red, I will become fast and bouncy!” Spying on him, Red Cat tries to do the same. Predictably, their scheme doesn’t go as planned and the two begin to fight. But after a tumble down the stairs, Blue Cat asks an important question: “Are you trying to be like me?”

“Maybe,” says Red Cat.

With this revelation, the cats help each other “become un-red and not-blue.” Instead of fighting, they teach each other the tricks of being clever and fast. Each cat works hard to be exactly like the other, but in the end, they both decide being themselves is best: “I can’t run as fast as you . . . but I am the best Blue Cat ever.”

With quirky pen-and-ink and charcoal drawings mixed with splotches of bright color, Jenni Desmond’s illustrations depict the chaos that follows the cats’ quarrels. The lesson of Red Cat, Blue Cat is predictable, but important for children who struggle with embracing their own identity. And the ending adds a clever twist when Yellow Cat arrives on the scene, promising another round of identity envy. I can’t wait to see what else Desmond has in store after such a strong debut.

The award-winning husband and wife duo of Sarah Stewart and David Small have created a compelling story of empowerment and self-discovery for a 1950s immigrant girl in The Quiet Place. Isabel enjoys her new experiences in the United States like making snow angels and being at school with her smiling teacher, but she misses Mexico—especially her Aunt Lupita. Speaking English is scary, but she practices by writing letters to her aunt, letters that expertly tell the story of her struggle to adjust to her new home.

Isabel’s family is warm and understanding, providing her with large cardboard boxes with which to construct a “quiet place” where she feels safe and secure. As she decorates her special getaway with origami and bright colors, it expands to become her own private world. As she helps her mother bake birthday cakes for the neighborhood children, Isabel begins to feel accepted. The story ends with Isabel’s own birthday celebration—and the whole neighborhood in attendance.

Through Small’s illustrations we learn that the quiet place has become the star of the show and Isabel is able to share the space with her new friends while simultaneously sharing her culture.

Small’s mixed-media illustrations add context and depth to Isabel’s story and serve to complete the letter-narrative. The Quiet Place is a warm and encouraging story of assimilation, not just for immigrants, but for any child trying to find a place in his or her community.

The creators of The Other Side and the Caldecott Honor-winning Coming on Home Soon team up again in another beautifully illustrated picture book that touches hearts and minds.

Just as snow falls on young Chloe’s community, a new girl named Maya appears at the door of her classroom. The first things Chloe notices are Maya’s ragged coat and broken springtime shoes. When Maya takes the seat next to Chloe and smiles, Chloe looks away without returning the smile—that day and every day after.

Jacqueline Woodson’s poetic narration and E.B. Lewis’ stunning watercolors, which use light, shadow and perspective for dramatic effect, capture the hurt feelings as Chloe and her friends whisper secrets and snub Maya’s attempts at friendship. One day Maya stops asking to play and jumps rope alone. The next day her seat is empty, the same day that teacher Ms. Albert drops a stone into a bowl of water, and the children watch as waves ripple away. “This is what kindness does, Ms. Albert said. Each little thing we do goes out, like a ripple, into the world.”

While each classmate drops a stone into the water and recalls a kind act, such as helping with a baby brother’s diaper or carrying the teacher’s books, Chloe can’t think of one act of kindness she has done lately. When she discovers that Maya will not be returning, she laments her missed opportunities to be kind to her classmate. A lesser author would have made this a didactic moment. In Woodson’s soft, lyrical tone, Chloe’s dilemma becomes an occasion for personal reflection. From now on, when they watch water ripple, readers of Each Kindness will ponder their own gifts to the world and the splash they can make.

Suppose you have to talk about a family member for show-and-tell at school and the only family member who isn’t busy is your grandfather. All you know about Granpa Frank is that he’s old and he prefers everything to be the way it was back in his day. This is the crisis that David Mackintosh’s young narrator faces in The Frank Show, the hilarious story of a boy who discovers that old age may make a person different, but it certainly doesn’t make him uninteresting.

Granpa Frank doesn’t like doctors, or today’s music, or haircuts. The only flavor of ice cream he eats is vanilla. His grandson can’t imagine there is anything else about Granpa Frank that he doesn’t know, and there is only so much one can say about preference for vanilla to fill “one full minute” during show-and-tell.

When he brings Frank to school, sure that Frank will embarrass him, his grandfather does just the opposite. Granpa Frank tells the wild story of his days as a soldier, including a glorious battle and the singlehanded capture of 100 men. Tom’s drum-playing uncle and Paolo’s Italian mother suddenly pale in comparison to the exciting adventures of Granpa Frank. As Frank becomes the class hero, the young narrator takes pride in his relative and basks in the adulation of his classmates.

Complete with lively pen-and-ink illustrations, this offbeat picture book is sure to become a family favorite. Along the way, it may prompt children to wonder what exciting details their grandparents have yet to reveal about their own life stories.

Do children really need another story about Helen Keller and her teacher, Annie Sullivan? If it’s Deborah Hopkinson’s enthralling picture-book biography, then the answer is an overwhelming yes. Blending riveting narration with portions of actual letters Sullivan wrote to her own teacher at the Perkins Institution for the Blind, the author begins with the arrival of 20-year-old Sullivan and her first charge, six-year-old Helen, who “was like a small, wild bird, throwing herself against the bars of a dark and silent cage.”

While the book does feature such famous scenes as Helen’s dinner disaster and her breakthrough at the water pump, the focus is on Helen’s need for language and how Sullivan taught her to communicate. Using the world as Helen’s classroom, Sullivan helped her understand sound by placing frogs and crickets in her hands, which allowed her to feel them vibrate as they croaked and chirped. The teacher even found ways to teach abstract concepts like thinking.

Readers may associate Helen’s learning with sign language, but Sullivan also showed her pupil how to read with raised alphabet letters and Braille. On her first trip away from home in 1887, Helen was able to write a letter home to her mother. Illustrated with award winner Raul Colón’s muted watercolors, the book also includes numerous black-and-white photographs, a copy of Helen’s letter to her mother and a Braille alphabet on the back cover for young readers to practice Helen’s skills. Most importantly, Hopkinson shows how in the process of learning to communicate Helen also learned to be a girl again.

Attention safari fans! It’s a jungle out there, literally, and you’ve got to know just how to behave to avoid major obstacles, like those presented by the titular character of What to Do if an Elephant Stands on Your Foot.

In this playful tale by first-time author Michelle Robinson, an androgynous safari guide (expertly and emotively drawn by acclaimed illustrator Peter H. Reynolds) demonstrates how to navigate in the wild with varying degrees of success—and a lot of hilarity.

Great pacing and suspense-inducing text will pique young readers’ interest to see what happens next. As the story progresses, the tension and silliness mount, and soon kids, like our protagonist, will be jumping around like monkeys and flailing as if in crocodile-infested waters. The ending brings us back to the beginning, with stern but helpful warnings for our next safari.

Reynolds’ illustrations are always lively and clever; his pictures here of the hapless guide and uncooperative animals are no exception. As one might expect after being stepped on by an elephant or chased by a rhinoceros, the guide reacts with fear, frustration and eventually relief, all delightfully captured in Reynolds’ portraits.

The cacophony of animal sounds and the safari guide’s frenzied exclamations make this title ideal for preschool storytime—but be warned, it could get loud!