Earl the Squirrel - Don Freeman

Rating: 6/10 I like the art in this and the use of color is just great. The thing about bulls and red is a bit of a tired old trope, but I'm sure this was all legit when it was written. The story is a bit long

if you want to see a whale - julie fogliano

Rating: 7/10 This book is more of a poem with pictures than a book (maybe that's fine?). But it's not a poem that I particularly love. I like the art quite a bit, and it goes well with the words. Unlike Mom's immediate

The Puddle - David McPhail

Rating: 6/10 Great art. I liked the rhythm of the story and how it worked with the pictures quite a lot. It's a story about a boy who plays in/with a puddle. With his boat. The cover is a bit of a giveaway like that. But

The Snowy Day - Ezra Jack Keats

Rating: 8/10 Sign me up for any book about a snowy day, that's my jam. And this book is certainly that! Great art, too, if this style does it for you (it definitely does for me). I definitely have fond memories of this book that are coloring

Arabella Miller's Tiny Caterpillar - Clare Jarrett

Rating: 5/10 It's a perfectly nice book about a girl who finds a caterpillar. This is apparently a reference to a nursery rhyme but not one I'd ever heard of, and it doesn't actually follow the rhyme very closely as far as I

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs - Judi Barrett

Rating: 9/10 As always when possible, I want to give the art a shout-out. I enjoyed it quite a bit. Also really appreciate that "it was all just a story", and that was up-front and it still was great. Just a fun story, and the writing was

The Pigeon Finds a Hot Dog - Mo Willems

Rating: 3/10 Well, the whole story is in the title, and not in a great way. The pigeon finds a hot dog. There's also a duckling who wants it, and maybe is a little clever about trying to eat it. There's no spoilers in this,

How to Catch a Star - Oliver Jeffers

Rating: 8/10 As always, I'm a big fan of the author's art. And I think it's a reasonably good story, very typical pacing for him (in a good way!). The ending was solid, I spent the whole time wondering how he'd

Kitten's First Full Moon - Kevin Henkes

Rating: 7/10 A nice book. Obviously you know more than the kitten does, and I think books like that where the reader has perspective the characters lack are a good start. And I think in general, it does pretty well with it. Nice art. The ending is predictable, that&

The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales - Jon Scieszka

Rating: 10/10 I love this book, it's so much fun. Obviously you have to know the fairy tales to really enjoy it, but my fond memories of checking this out of the town library as an elementary school student were totally validated. In fact, I think it&

The Runaway Bunny - Margaret Wise Brown

Rating: 9/10 I like this book a lot! The story is great fun, I love the little escalations and one-uppings. And a nice little ending. The art is definitely something special, find the bunny on every page.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do You See? - Eric Carle

Rating: 7/10 Ah, you know, this one doesn't really do it for me. I do enjoy the art quite a lot, and the "plot twist" at the end is amusing enough, especially since I'd totally forgotten it in the 30-ish years since I

If You Give a Mouse a Cookie - Laura Joffe Numeroff

Rating: 8/10 Well, I love a lot about this. The story is fun, I am a fan and I liked the ending. There's a good amount of of whimsy and silliness in it, and it's well complemented by the art - it's nothing

Frederick - Leo Lionni

Rating: 9/10 First, shout-out to the art: I love these pictures. They're beautiful and evocative and everything I want from my children's book art. Just a delight to drink it all in as you read the story. The story is solid too, it's

Will the Pigeon Graduate? - Mo Willems

Rating: 1/10 Sorry, but this just sucks. I still enjoy the art in a way, and the pacing is fine, but there's just nothing here. The art can't carry a book like this. Who is this for? There's no story, no real whimsy

Where the Wild Things Are - Maurice Sendak

Rating: 10/10 I am just a huge Maurice Sendak fan, and this has to be my favorite of his. It's funny, there's an enjoyable plot, it wraps up nicely. The art has this amazing, creepy, un-sanitized feeling to it that you can't imagine

Good Night, Gorilla - Peggy Rathmann

Rating: 8/10 So, first of all, let's get this out there: you don't need to use words to tell stories, and picture books get a big leg up here. You do need great art and a lot of fun if you're going to

Moby Dick - Philip Graham

Rating: 5/10 This is an adaptation of Herman Melville's Moby Dick, which I am a medium fan of. Unfortunately I don't think that the full... literary force, or whatever, of Melville's work quite translates to children's picture books. The book nails

The Hueys in What's the opposite? - Oliver Jeffers

Rating: 2/10 I really didn't enjoy this one, which was a huge letdown after reading his other books. It wasn't interesting, it was pretty repetitive. The art was sorta cute I guess, that's definitely a strength, but it's definitely not his

Welcome - Mo Willems

Rating: 8/10 This feels a lot like a more baby-oriented version of Here We Are, which I obviously enjoyed immensely. I don't think this holds up quite as well - the art is not as impressive, it's got a lot less going on and it

When Dinosaurs Came With Everything - Elise Broach

Rating: 9/10 I really liked this one. The art is great. The tone is hilarious, I absolutely love the dialogue and the characters. The story is silly but is played completely straight-faced, which I always love. And then it builds to a very fun and clever climax with a

Stuck - Oliver Jeffers

Rating: 6/10 I continue to love Oliver Jeffers' art. The story, as a concept, is very clever! The escalation process is also conceptually good. Unfortunately it gets pretty repetitive pretty quick, and sorta runs out of steam at the end. Sort of a Deus ex Machina situation -

This is a Book of Shapes - Kenneth Kraegel

Rating: 7/10 Short, but funny. I don't have a lot to say about this that won't spoil it, but I think it has poor re-readability value which is unfortunate because I absolutely did laugh out loud with joy when I read it for the first

Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! - Mo Willems

Rating: 10/10 I love the design of this book, it's fun to have a book written in the second person. Reading it out loud is such a pleasure. Funny, interactive, and the format works so well. The art is nothing special that makes you say "wow&