[Repost] January 2014 List: “Parents Must Read” & Red Mud’s Top 10 Children’s Books of the Year

Vot­ing is open for the 2014 Top 10! Which 10 books would you choose?Orig­i­nal address:Jan­u­ary 2014 List: Par­ents Must Read & Red Mud Top 10 Chil­dren’s Books of the Year Vot­ing Opensauthor:Hong­ni­ba Vil­lageRed Mud Vot­ing Web­site:http://www.hongniba.com.cn/fumubidu

Jan­u­ary 2014

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The Hic­cup­ing Zebra (20140101)
Illus­tra­tions by David McK­eevin; Trans­lat­ed by Liu Yang
Bei­jing Unit­ed Pub­lish­ing Com­pa­ny 2013
Rec­om­mend­ed rea­sons:
A seri­ous and solemn zebra kept hav­ing hic­cups. Along the way, he met sev­er­al ani­mal friends who enthu­si­as­ti­cal­ly sug­gest­ed var­i­ous inter­est­ing and less solemn treat­ments. Nat­u­ral­ly, the zebra ignored them. It was­n’t until he met Mrs. Duck that he real­ized his stripes had changed due to the hic­cups. He went back to find his ani­mal friends…

David McK­ee is a renowned British pic­ture book author, for­mer­ly active in the Lon­don mag­a­zine indus­try as a car­toon­ist and illus­tra­tor. His works are imbued with a unique­ly British sense of humor, and he excels at cre­at­ing con­tem­pla­tive spaces with­in his sto­ries. He is known in Europe as a “mas­ter of con­tem­po­rary fables.” His Chi­nese-lan­guage works include “The Hic­cup­ing Zebra,” “Don­key, Wait a Minute,” “Three Mon­sters,” and the “Plaid Ele­phant Emma” series.

Suit­able read­ing age: 3 to 8 years old

Baby starts walk­ing (20140102)
Text and illus­tra­tions by Taruishi Mako et al. (Japan­ese); Trans­lat­ed by the Xinyi Edi­to­r­i­al Depart­ment
Tomor­row Pub­lish­ing House 2013
Rec­om­mend­ed rea­sons:
The book con­sists of three vol­umes: “Big Red Apple,” “Afu Goes for a Walk,” and “Come Along.” “Big Red Apple” focus­es on the arrival of dif­fer­ent ani­mals dur­ing apple har­vest sea­son and their shar­ing of the deli­cious apples. The vibrant col­ors and vivid images delight young read­ers while also help­ing them under­stand the con­cepts of quan­ti­ty and col­or. “Afu Goes for a Walk” explores the dif­fer­ent ways Afu takes his dai­ly walks: walk­ing with a duck­ling, rid­ing a croc­o­dile, and even strolling on the back of a cow.

Mako Taruishi, author of “Big Red Apple,” has a warm and engag­ing style, often depict­ing sto­ries about ani­mals. She has pub­lished over 70 books in Japan. Kaoru Ono, author of “Fuku Goes for a Walk,” fre­quent­ly fea­tures ani­mals in her works, with over 30 books pub­lished.

Suit­able read­ing age: 1 to 4 years old

Big Bear has a sto­ry to tell (20140103)
Philip Steed­win (USA); Erin Steed (USA); Trans­lat­ed by Ajia
 Twen­ty-First Cen­tu­ry Pub­lish­ing House 2013
Rec­om­mend­ed rea­sons:
Win­ter was approach­ing, and Big Bear was grow­ing sleepy. But first, he had a sto­ry to tell. He first asked his friend, Mole, but he was busy gath­er­ing seeds and had no time for a sto­ry. Then he saw his friend, Duck, prepar­ing to fly south. And Toad? He was also busy look­ing for a warm place to sleep. Big Bear helped each of his friends pre­pare for win­ter, but in the end, would any­one still be awake to hear the sto­ry he want­ed to tell?

 The authors, a young cou­ple named Steed, pos­sess unique per­spec­tives and per­spec­tives on life. Their first col­lab­o­ra­tive work, “Amo’s Sick Day,” fea­tures Amo’s kind­ness and leisure, while Big Bear’s gen­eros­i­ty and patience con­vey a life atti­tude: peace, accep­tance, and wait­ing. The gen­tle, sooth­ing rhythm of the sto­ry and the graph­ic style also con­vey a sense of warmth and reas­sur­ance.

Suit­able read­ing age: 3 years old and above

Tico and the Gold­en Wings (20140104)
Text and illus­tra­tions by Leo Lion­ni; trans­lat­ed by Ajia
Nan­hai Pub­lish­ing Com­pa­ny 2012
Rec­om­mend­ed rea­sons:
A wish­ing bird grant­ed Tico a pair of strong gold­en wings, but Tico, with the gold­en wings, was reject­ed by his com­pan­ions. Tico had no choice but to leave alone. While using his gold­en feath­ers to help oth­ers, he was sur­prised to find that a real black feath­er had grown in the place where the gold­en feath­ers had orig­i­nal­ly grown!

This sto­ry sparks a series of reflec­tions: How do we get along with friends? How do we pur­sue our dreams? Is our most unique qual­i­ties in appear­ance or in our thoughts?
Author Leo Lion­ni was born in Ams­ter­dam, the Nether­lands, in May 1910. A bril­liant and unin­hib­it­ed artist, Lion­ni served as the design direc­tor of For­tune mag­a­zine for ten years. He began writ­ing pic­ture books at the age of 49, ush­er­ing in a new era for pic­ture books. His books have won numer­ous awards, includ­ing The Inch­worm, The Lit­tle Black Fish, Alfred the Field Mouse, and Alexan­der and the Clock­work Mouse, which won the Calde­cott Medal in 1961, 1964, 1968, and 1970, respec­tive­ly.

Suit­able read­ing age: 3 years old and above

It’s great to meet you (20140105)
(Japan­ese) Text and illus­tra­tions by Miyan­ishi Tat­suya, trans­lat­ed by Pu Pulan
21st Cen­tu­ry Pub­lish­ing House 2013
Rec­om­mend­ed rea­sons:
The sto­ry takes place in a sea­side grove of red fruit trees. A baby Spin­osaurus comes to pick red fruit when it encoun­ters a Tyran­nosaurus Rex, a preda­tor. As the Tyran­nosaurus opens its jaws and pounces on the baby Spin­osaurus, the earth shakes and cracks, trap­ping them on a sep­a­rate island. This forced jour­ney at sea trans­forms these once sworn ene­mies into mutu­al­ly sup­port­ive part­ners on this iso­lat­ed island.

Author Tat­suya Miyan­ishi draws inspi­ra­tion from his cher­ished child­hood mem­o­ries and his expe­ri­ences rais­ing four chil­dren. His works are imbued with play­ful inno­cence, char­ac­ter­ized by heart­warm­ing, humor­ous sto­ries and a pow­er­ful illus­tra­tion style. While cre­at­ing, he is also ded­i­cat­ed to pro­mot­ing pic­ture books, trav­el­ing to every pre­fec­ture in Japan to give pre­sen­ta­tions on pic­ture books to chil­dren and par­ents. His rep­re­sen­ta­tive works include “You Look Deli­cious,” “I Am a Tyran­nosaurus Rex,” and “You Are So Good.”

Suit­able read­ing age: 3 years old and above

For­ev­er Yang Huan Series 4+2 Vol­umes (Chil­dren’s Poet­ry and Rhyme) (20140106)
Poems by Yang Huan; Illus­tra­tions by Huang Xiaoy­an
Hebei Juve­nile and Chil­dren’s Pub­lish­ing House 2013
Rec­om­mend­ed rea­sons:
This series con­sists of six vol­umes: “Where is Spring?”, “Sum­mer Nights,” “Fruit Par­ty,” “Home,” “Poems of the For­est,” and “Lit­tle Paper Boat.” Here, you can expe­ri­ence the beau­ti­ful encounter between clas­sic chil­dren’s poet­ry and folk music, and the inge­nious fusion of time­less vers­es and orig­i­nal illus­tra­tions.

Yang Huan, known as a pio­neer of chil­dren’s poet­ry, passed away at the age of 25, but remains one of the most out­stand­ing and unfor­get­table chil­dren’s poet­ry writ­ers in the his­to­ry of Chi­nese chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture. His poems, fresh and time­less, imbued with musi­cal rhythms and melodies, remain beloved by chil­dren even half a cen­tu­ry lat­er.

Suit­able read­ing age: 2 years old and above