The best picture books published in the past two months (May 2008-July 2008)

 
   
In May, a dev­as­tat­ing earth­quake brought our hearts and souls to Sichuan. The “Mud Book­worm” online mag­a­zine was sus­pend­ed for near­ly two months. We ask for your under­stand­ing! Some time ago, Car­rot Inspec­tor and Ajia, vol­un­teers from the Ren’ai Char­i­ty Foun­da­tion, trav­eled to Han­wang Qunx­in Vil­lage in Mianzhu, Sichuan, to man­age the “Ren’ai School,” a tent school. After near­ly a month of hard work, the vol­un­teers trans­formed it into an ide­al “Red Mud Village”-style school. See this sto­ry for details.Red Mud ForumandAjia Sto­ry­telling: Chron­i­cles of the Renai School in Han­wangqun New Vil­lage, Mianzhu, Sichuan (June 11-July 5). 

Back in Bei­jing, I noticed how many new books have been pub­lished in the past two months. I was par­tic­u­lar­ly sur­prised by how many pic­ture books have been pub­lished dur­ing this time. Let me share my thoughts on them:
 

【New­ly released excel­lent pic­ture books】

Rec­om­mend­ed by this issue: Argen­tine Primera División

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The Very Hun­gry Cater­pil­lar

We’ve been wait­ing so long for this Chi­nese edi­tion of Eric Car­le’s book… Thanks to the remark­able efforts of a group of esteemed pub­lish­ers, Chi­nese chil­dren can final­ly expe­ri­ence this pic­ture book, “the most beloved by chil­dren world­wide.” It may not be the “best,” but it’s cer­tain­ly the most acces­si­ble.On May 25, Syn­net­ics held a unique press con­fer­ence in Shang­hai. Thanks to An An’s moth­er (Alin) for keep­ing such detailed records for us!

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Sev­en Blind Mice

Chi­nese-Amer­i­can artist Chih-Cheng Yang is a lead­ing illus­tra­tor active in the West­ern world, a source of immense pride for the Chi­nese peo­ple. Many of his mas­ter­pieces have cap­tured the imag­i­na­tion of the world by metic­u­lous­ly pre­serv­ing the rich­ness of Chi­nese cul­ture while suc­cess­ful­ly incor­po­rat­ing West­ern pic­ture book tech­niques. Among his many mas­ter­pieces, I believe the most icon­ic is Sev­en Blind Mice, a work of extra­or­di­nary cre­ativ­i­ty and visu­al provo­ca­tion, result­ing in a tru­ly mag­i­cal effect.

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Pulling radish­es
The Russ­ian folk tale “Pulling the Turnip,” adapt­ed by Tol­stoy, is a house­hold name. This illus­trat­ed book, orig­i­nal­ly pub­lished in the Japan­ese illus­trat­ed mag­a­zine “Chil­dren’s Friend,” has been hailed by Nao Mat­sui as “the best of many ver­sions.” Its sim­ple plot and clear moral are obvi­ous enough. Yet, once you try telling this sto­ry to chil­dren, you’ll dis­cov­er its mag­i­cal pow­er.

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Black Rab­bit and White Rab­bit
Garth Williams
Williams is an illus­tra­tor I great­ly admire. He’s said to be a rel­a­tive of E.B. White, and at White’s enthu­si­as­tic invi­ta­tion, he illus­trat­ed Stu­art Lit­tle, which fas­ci­nat­ed him ever since. His illus­tra­tions for books like Char­lot­te’s Web, the “Lit­tle House on the Prairie” series, the “Crick­et in Times Square” series, and “The Bridge Fam­i­ly” are all mas­ter­pieces. This book, a mas­ter­piece of his own writ­ing and illus­tra­tion, tells a deeply mov­ing and beau­ti­ful sto­ry of love and mar­riage.

After get­ting this book, I didn’t read it to my daugh­ter first, but read it to her moth­er. After lis­ten­ing for a long time, the moth­er sighed and said: What a good book!

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Flower-lov­ing cow

A friend sud­den­ly asked me, “What’s so great about “The Cow Who Loves Flow­ers”?” I was stunned for a moment, unsure how to explain it. I can only describe it in three words: “Great!” It’s a tru­ly won­der­ful sto­ry, per­fect­ly com­posed. If some­one could tell just one sto­ry like this in their life­time, their life would be ful­filled!

This black-and-white pic­ture book may seem sim­ple on the sur­face, but once you share it with your child, you’ll dis­cov­er its sheer per­fec­tion. Such a heart­warm­ing, humor­ous, and sim­ple sto­ry sur­pris­ing­ly address­es extreme­ly seri­ous and weighty issues about war and peace, and about life’s choic­es. It’s so thought-pro­vok­ing that even the fas­cists once banned it! It’s incred­i­bly enter­tain­ing and worth read­ing over and over again!

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sleep­ing Beau­ty

Mr. Nao Mat­sui once explained this book page by page in his book “My The­o­ry of Pic­ture Books.” It essen­tial­ly fol­lows the sto­ry of Sleep­ing Beau­ty from Grim­m’s Fairy Tales, but with slight tex­tu­al changes, the illus­tra­tions offer a fas­ci­nat­ing expan­sion and retelling of the sto­ry. Swiss illus­tra­tor Hoff­mann excelled in illus­trat­ing this tra­di­tion­al sto­ry, and his pic­ture books are both clas­sic and roman­tic, yet unique. “Sleep­ing Beau­ty” is his most rep­re­sen­ta­tive work of this type.

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dawn

Liu Zongyuan’s poem “The Fish­er­man” says: “The fish­er­man sleeps by the west­ern rocks at night, and in the morn­ing draws clear water from the Xiang Riv­er to burn Chu bam­boo. / The smoke dis­si­pates and the sun ris­es, but the fish­er­man is nowhere to be seen; a sound of “Ei Nai” turns the moun­tains and waters green. / Look­ing back at the mid­dle stream below the sky, I see unin­ten­tion­al clouds chas­ing each oth­er over the rocks.” — This pic­ture book was inspired by this poem.

Pol­ish-born illus­tra­tor Shuli­wacz is a Calde­cott Medal win­ner. His work is both chal­leng­ing and the­o­ret­i­cal. This is his most rep­re­sen­ta­tive pic­ture book. While not nec­es­sar­i­ly a genre that chil­dren will par­tic­u­lar­ly enjoy, it is a rare “text­book” for cre­ators and enthu­si­asts.

〖Oth­er spe­cial rec­om­men­da­tions〗

Spe­cial rec­om­men­da­tion of orig­i­nal pic­ture books——

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Afan­ti Clas­sic Sto­ry Pic­ture Book Series (3 vol­umes)

A few years ago, Xin­jiang mil­i­tary painter Wang Hong­bin’s “Avan­ti’s Say­ings and Sto­ries” left a pro­found impres­sion on us. In the past two years, he has devot­ed him­self to cre­at­ing “Give You What You Want” and “As Many Hairs as a Don­key’s Tail.” These two new works are more com­plete, more mature, and more humor­ous. Con­grat­u­la­tions to the “Avan­ti Fam­i­ly” on these two out­stand­ing addi­tions!

Fan­ta­sy nov­els are espe­cial­ly rec­om­mend­ed——

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Mag­ic Fam­i­ly

This book, a ghost sto­ry, isn’t scary (though it’s a bit fright­en­ing). It leaves read­ers feel­ing excit­ed and thrilled, yet also bright and heart­warm­ing. Author Mei Xi, win­ner of the 2006 Hans Chris­t­ian Ander­sen Award, tells grip­ping sto­ries, writ­ten in poet­ic lan­guage and pep­pered with won­der­ful sim­i­les and metaphors. In Mei Xi’s mag­i­cal world, we learn about tol­er­ance, under­stand­ing, and com­fort for chil­dren, the yearn­ing to unleash one’s inner nature, and a fierce resis­tance to vio­lence and oppres­sion.

Pop­u­lar Sci­ence Pic­ture Book Spe­cial Offers——

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Visu­al Won­ders 22 Vol­umes (DK Series)
“Visu­al Won­ders” is a well-made, high-qual­i­ty sci­ence pic­ture book import­ed by Tongqu Pub­lish­ing Com­pa­ny from DK in the UK. Through remark­ably clear images, it guides chil­dren direct­ly into the nat­ur­al ency­clo­pe­dia, and adults will also find it enjoy­able. It is a wor­thy col­lec­tor’s item.