Darn good kid's books

Oliver Jeffers - Admist beautiful paintings of night skies and dark blue oceans, Jeffers tells 3 great stories of unlike friendships (How to Catch a Star, Way Back Home and Lost and Found). In his other books, he has fun with using books to make a book about a book eating boy and spins a whodunnit about disappearing trees and paper airplans (The Great Paper Caper). Jeffers clearly understands how to tell a great story with a lot of humour and heart.

David Shannon - While I am not as familiar with his earlier "David" series, Shannon's Too Many Toys and Alice the Fairy are big hits around the household. In these two stories, Shannon shows that he has a good grasp of what makes kids tick - whether it is the fear having mom go through your ever escalating toy collection or the frustration that you haven't mastered the ability to use your fairy powers to turn the bath water into straweberry jell-o. The detail in Too Many Toys is a marvel to behold. Each page details dozens and dozens of toys that make up Spencer's room with few if any references to current toylines.

Jeremy Tankard - Mr. Tankard is not a prollific writer / illustrator (only 3 books on amazon) which is a shame. His books - two of which show a day in life of a down on his luck bird - are hilarious. Tankard is very simple in his art and storytelling and here in which lies his power. In both Grumy Bird and Boo Boo Bird, the frustration of the bird is crystal clear as he either avoids his woodland friends or seeks ourt their expertise in fixing a boo boo.

Mo Willems - It's a good thing that Mo Willem's is not an evil supergenius since he would most likely devote his inexhautable energy towards bulding a race of super robots to take over the earth. Instead, he writes and illustrates a lot of kid's books. Outside of his very popular pigeon series (which my wife has banned from our house due to her fear of birds), Willem's has written dinosaurs who don't believe they are extinct, naked mole rats who want to wear clothes, and a massive pop-up book about a frog that wants to literally fit in. But besides these great stories are the Knuffle Bunny tales which chronicle the trials and tribulations of his daughter Trixie. The book, which is comprised of Willem's drawings set against black and white photos of his house and neighbourhood, can only be described as "really cool".

Peter H. Reynolds - If Shel Silverstein ever wanted to pass on the torch for enlightening and empowering the next generation, he would look no further than Peter H. Reynolds. In the books Ish, The Dot and The Northstar, Reynold's tells tales of children who are encouraged to find their way by unlocking their potential through self realization. And while that description may have sounded incredibly flaky, there is nothing flaky about these books.

Honorable mentions: Melanie Watt (Scaredy Squirrel, Chester), Emily Gravitt (Wolves, Casting Spells)