My name is a gift by Zeshan Akhter illustrated by Asa Gillano

When I met Daddy and fitted in his hands, I didn't have a name. 

So Daddy and Mommy whispered one in my ear. 

My name is the first present I ever got. 

It came wrapped in Daddy and Mommy's love.

Publisher blurb:  On the day Sitara is born, she receives a very special gift from her parents—her name. As Sitara grows, some people tumble up her name in their mouths until it's not her name anymore. So Sitara learns about the history, tradition, and culture that went into choosing her name, giving her the confidence to help others say it right. This heartwarming story not only teaches us the significance of our names, but it also highlights that trying to say names correctly, or asking if you're unsure, goes a long way.

"People I meet have never heard my name before." - this means they make up names or miss out letters. If you don't know how to say someone's name - just ask. The little girl in this story will also show you a world map as a way to explain where her name comes from. Her name means 'shine like a star'. Her name is Sitara. 

"When someone says my name carefully and kindly, it lights up my heart."

Names are so important. I have two sad stories to share about names. When my little mum moved into an aged care facility (it was a dreadful place) each of the resident names were displayed on the door of their room - I went to set up her room a few days before her arrival only to discover her name was spelt incorrectly - I really think there is absolutely no excuse for this. To my horror the registered nurse who had printed the sign was quite "put out" that I dared to ask for it to be corrected. The second example is from the same facility. My name has a silent letter. Many of the staff have English as a second or even third language but the nurse who needed to tell me when my mum needed help or had fallen could never ever get my name right in spite of repeated corrections. At first my friends thought this was very funny but over time it really upset me. Her way of mangling my name actually sounded quite rude. My name actually means "pearl". 

My name is a gift is an Empathy Lab title. It was published in 2024 and is available in paperback. I think this book should be an essential purchase for all Primary school libraries. Take a look at this post for other book titles that explore names. 

I am Nefertiti

Going for Pippies by Wilaaran Laurie illustrated by Tori-Jay Mordey

"My name is Wilaaran. My family has lived on this Country for thousands of years. 

We walk in our old people's footsteps, hunting, collecting and catching seafood. 

Today I'm goin' for pippies with the biggest mob. 

With me are my mum and dad, nans and pops, uncles and cousins. 

They're going to show me how to find pippies, just as our old people taught them."

The pipi is member of the clam family and staple of the Indigenous Australian coastal diet for thousands of years ... Pipis are fished year round in South Australia, but it's the larger New South Wales pipi that attracts most of the attention when the season runs, from early June to late October (or November in a bumper season). When cooked properly they have a subtle flavour and soft texture, perfect to try as a variation to other clams. 

Publisher blurb from Magabala Books: Going for Pippies is a beautifully illustrated children’s picture book that welcomes readers to a First Nations narrative about family, culture, traditions and a way of life. Join Wilaraan and his family as they venture on Country to collect pippies for dinner. At the very heart of the story is a family outing, demonstrating how generations come together to teach and share knowledge, such as the practice of gathering pippies. This reinforces the importance of intergenerational learning and the passing down of cultural wisdom.

Read more about Pippies:

Australian Museum

Marine Stewardship Council

Here is a recipe for the fritters that Wilaaran and his family enjoy at the end of the book:

To make delicious Pipi Fritters, follow these steps:

Ingredients: Gather 250 grams of tuatua/pipi meat, finely chopped; 1 small onion, finely diced; 1 firm tomato, finely diced; and foodies Extra Virgin Olive Oil for cooking.

Batter: In a bowl, mix flour, eggs, milk, and curry powder to form a smooth batter. Season and add the tuatua/pipi meat, onion, and tomato.

Cooking: Heat a frying pan or barbecue plate to medium and add enough foodies Extra Virgin Olive Oil to shallow fry the fritters. Cook spoonfuls in batches, flipping halfway through, until golden brown on both sides.

Sydney are holding an indigenous food festival this weekend so it is timely to talk about this book. Thank you to Magabala Books for sending this review copy. You can read more about Going for Pippies in this review from The Bottom Shelf. 

Wilaaran Hunter Laurie is a Yaegl boy whose family come from Yamba on the north coast of NSW. Wilaaran enjoys playing footy and going to the beach to swim and fish. He currently lives on the Central Coast with his mum, dad and little brother. 

Wilaaran Laurie wrote this story when he was just five years old. He is now fourteen. This is something I would be keen to share with students - to show them the journey from idea to book can be a long one. 

Tori-Jay Mordey is an established illustrator and artist based in Meanjin/Brisbane. Born on Thursday Island in the Torres Strait, she is descended from the Meriam and Maluyigal clans. Her published works include Bakir & Bi co-written with Jillian Boyd (2013), and In the City I See (2018). Her other works include illustrating the portrait of Cathy Freeman in Shout Out to the Girls (2018) and the Children’s Picture Book A Blue Kind of Day (2022, Kokila). A Blue Kind of Day has a Kirkus Star review.

Read more about Bush Tucker here.

Companion books:

Three Dresses

Here is the Reading Time review

Home by Nicola Davies

The date is 2067. Society is now divided into two (or maybe four groups) - there are the corrupt rulers called Supas with family names like Murdoch and Nabisco, the Workers who are named for the tasks they perform such as Sacks, one of the two main characters in this story, there are also Rebels and Outsiders.

The Workers are controlled through drugs that are added to their food:

"No one needed to be told about Meal One or Two. Your body did that for you. Every morning you woke up wanting that fat straw in your mouth, and until you got it you felt very bad."

"Product helps Workers. It keeps them happy. Keeps their minds free of worry, of thoughts that might get in the way of their desire to work. And of course it makes them unwilling to leave their Stations."

Workers are also controlled via media propaganda. Meal Two works to calm the down and put them to sleep but before this Workers watch tv. The messages on tv are filled with the dream of Planet Home. They have been told there is another planet, life on this one where they live exist now is dangerous and toxic. Sacks does not even know words like bird or buffalo. Workers are told one day everyone will climb onto space rockets and they will be taken to Planet Home.

Supas "they were the richest, most powerful families. They had resources to build crystal domes to protect their Cities and grow food inside vast buildings. Stations. But they needed workers to grow their food and run their Cities - building, mending, cleaning. All the things Supas didn't want to do. So they offered ordinary people a choice: stay Outside and take your chances with the poisoned world or become a Worker."

The actual setting of this book is several hundred miles from Manhattan. The city is filled with disgusting refuse. The Supas live in the top floors of the badly damaged city towers. 

As this story opens rebels attack. Sacks escapes and so does a young Supa named Nero Nabisco. The race is now on for survival and to expose the corruption and overthrow the leaders and find a way to free the workers. Along the way Sacks and Nero also discover their own heritage, identity and most amazing of all they discover they are connected -they are twins.

Take a look at the labels I have added to this post - these will give you an idea about some of the themes.

There are graphically described battles in this book and horrible descriptions of battery chickens called Units so I will only recommend this book to mature readers aged 11+ especially if they enjoy Science Fiction or dystopian stories. Readers in Australia will not identify with the Native American culture that is explored in this story - it is a minor theme but one that added an interesting layer to the story for me. I do enjoy books which explore corruption and coercion and brainwashing (such as in cults) but clearly these are deep ideas suitable for mature readers. The prologue to Home is chilling. 

Companion books (many of these could have the label Post Apocalyptic):

The Last Human

Where the River runs Gold

The Dog Runner

The Glass Tower

How did I miss this book from 2005? I wonder how it came to be in the library where I have been working as a volunteer?  I told a bookseller in a shop the other day that I am a huge fan of dystopian middle grade books - Home is a perfect example. Home was shortlisted for the Branford Boase Award. I wonder if IBBY UK have considered nominating Nicola Davies for the Hans Christian Andersen Award. Her body of work is SO impressive - from non fiction to picture books to complex novels like Home. Wikipedia have a list here of all her books up until 2023. Here is a 2021 interview where Nicola Davies talks about animals and non fiction and climate change. 

Bookseller blurb: Thrilling futuristic science fiction with an environmental slant. It's 2067 and the world has become virtually uninhabitable with all the pollution and toxins created by mankind. Ruling classes live holed up in the cities and workers live in Stations, safe from the outside world. But one day Station 27 is taken over by rebels. Nero, from the ruling classes, and Sacks, a worker, find themselves thrown together as they're captured by the rebels, their common enemy. As they begin to discover the terrifying truth about their world, the two children get separated and find themselves in great danger. Will they find each other before it is too late?

Listen to an audio sample here. This sample is a perfect introduction to this book - you could use it in a book talk with your library group of readers aged 11+.

Here are some other books by Nicola Davies which show the breadth and depth of her writing:

Ride the Wind

Last the story of a white rhino

Just Ducks

Butterflies for Grandpa Joe

King of the Sky

Ghost by Jason Reynolds

"And that's when I saw him, my dad, staggering from the bedroom, his lips bloody, a pistol in his hand ... me and my mum kept rolling. The sound of the gun cocking. The sound of the door unlocking. As soon as she swung the door open, my dad fired a shot. He was shooting at us! My dad! ... One things is for sure, that was the night I learned how to run."

Ghost (real name Castle Cranshaw) thinks his true sport destiny is basketball - not that the other bigger kids will let him play but then he stumbles on the track and decides to join in a race and even though he is wearing the wrong shoes and the wrong clothes and he has had no training and has missed lunch he somehow wins the race. The coach can see this kid has potential and so he invites Ghost to train with his team. Ghost is not a kid who knows how to stick with things, but he does keep coming back to the track and he does try to master all the warmup drills and endurance races. He desperately wants to fit in and one way to do this would surely be wearing the right shoes but Ghost has no money and his mum is working hard and only just keeping them afloat.

"Where I live. Where I live. When anyone ever asks about where I live, I get weird because people always treat you funny when they find out you stay in a certain kind of neighborhood. But I was used to people treating me funny. When your clothes are two sizes too bug, and you got no-name trainers, and your mother cuts your hair and it looks like your mother cuts your hair, you get used to people treating you funny."

The sport shop has so many fabulous shoes - surely it cannot hurt to just try them on. At this point in the story I actually called out a warning to Ghost but of course he didn't listen to me (after all I was only the read, the bystander, the observer).

Publisher blurb: Running. That’s all Ghost (real name Castle Cranshaw) has ever known. But Ghost has been running for the wrong reasons —until he meets Coach, an ex-Olympic Medalist who sees something in Ghost: crazy natural talent. If Ghost can stay on track, literally and figuratively, he could be the best sprinter in the city. Can Ghost harness his raw talent for speed, or will his past finally catch up to him?

Readers aged 10+ need to read this book especially those kids who ask for sport stories. Ghost is a quick book to read with only 200 pages and large print and a story that will keep you turning the pages. I read it in one sitting. Listen to a five-minute audio sample here. If you don't have this series in your school library please add all five books (see below) to your library wish list. I highly recommend Ghost - I wish I was still working in my school library because I would love to put this book into the hands of so many Grade 6 readers. 

An endearing protagonist runs the first, fast leg of Reynolds' promising relay. Kirkus Star review

Readers will quickly fall into step with Ghost’s slangy voice and will find themselves relating strongly to a character who’s just trying to get through each day with all the anger and hurt he feels about the cards life has sent his way. ... This story also interrogates our perception of wealth and poverty and the impact of poverty on kids. Finally, at its core, the story is about healing, moving forward from the need to escape oneself because of past trauma. Reading Middle Grade

Jason Reynolds is a #1 New York Times bestselling author a Newbery Award Honoree, a Printz Award Honoree, a UK Carnegie Medal winner, a two-time Walter Dean Myers Award winner, and the recipient of multiple Coretta Scott King honors, a Coretta Scott King Author Award, and the Margaret A. Edwards Award. He was also the 2020–2022 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. His debut picture book, There Was a Party for Langston, won a Caldecott Honor and a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor. He lives in Washington, DC. 

The most perfect book to read after Ghost is not about sport - it is about shoes!

The Wrong Shoes

I am very late in my discovery this fabulous book from 2018 but I am now totally hooked, and I can't wait to read the rest of the Track series (and that is fairly unusual for me as I don't always continue with a series). All of the books are currently available but might need to be ordered from your local independent bookstore. Colby Sharp shared the newest book from the series - Coach. You can see more books by Jason Reynolds here and notice how many have award stickers on their covers. 

We are Water Protectors by Carole Lindstrom illustrated by Michaela Goade

"We fight for those

who cannot fight for themselves

The winged ones.

The crawling ones."

"In Ojibwe culture, women are protectors of the water and men are protectors of the fire."

This story deals with a specific threat to water by an oil pipeline but it also contains an important message about the care we all need to take of our precious environment. Here in Australia you could use this book for a unit about water, the environment, or with older students as a way to talk about other indigenous cultures. This book also links with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 6 - Clean water and sanitation. 

From the author web page: Water is the first medicine. It affects and connects us all… When a black snake threatens to destroy the Earth and poison her people’s water, one young water protector takes a stand to defend Earth’s most sacred resource. Inspired by the many indigenous-led movements across North America, this bold and lyrical picture book issues an urgent rallying cry to safeguard the Earth’s water from harm and corruption.

Water is the first medicine.

It affects and connects us all.

Water is sacred.

My people talk of a black snake that will destroy the land,

Spoil the water, wreck everything in its path.

They foretold that it wouldn't come for many, many years.

Now the black snake is here.

Here is a set of teachers notes. 

An inspiring call to action for all who care about our interconnected planet. Kirkus Star review

A young Sioux girl recalls the story her grandmother told, featuring the dire warning that a black snake would come, contaminating the water source, thus causing harm to all the animals and land. The young girl decides to take a stand in order to protect the water sources and provide safety for all living things. The “black snake” a.k.a. the pipeline. While this is a simple story, there is more to it than meets the summary. The black snake? It’s really an oil pipeline. Raising Real Readers

We are Water Protectors won the Caldecott Medal in 2021. The criteria for the Caldecott emphasise the importance of the illustrators and in We are Water Protectors the illustrators are truly special. 

About the Caldecott Medal:

• The Medal shall be awarded annually to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children published by an American publisher in the United States in English during the preceding year. There are no limitations as to the character of the picture book except that the illustrations be original work.
• A “picture book for children” as distinguished from other books with illustrations, is one that essentially provides the child with a visual experience. A picture book has a collective unity of story-line, theme, or concept, developed through the series of pictures of which the book is comprised.
• A “picture book for children” is one for which children are an intended potential audience. The book displays respect for children’s understandings, abilities, and appreciations. Children are defined as persons of ages up to and including fourteen and picture books for this entire age range are to be considered.

List of the 'top' 25 Picture Books from the US

 The 25 Greatest Picture Books of the Past 25 Years

Image source: Slate

Picture books have undergone a revolution in the past 25 years

The authors of this article say: When we became parents, we too initially gravitated toward the unruly classics we loved as children, while shying away from new picture books. There were just so many of them! The ones we saw on the front tables in bookstores all seemed to be authored by celebrities—or, worse, were branded tie-ins promoting movies and TV shows. How could any of them be as good as the books of our youth, let alone better?

Creators, including many signatories to the 2011 manifesto (see below), have become more interested in innovating within, and subverting, the picture-book form: shortening the text, breaking the fourth wall, and fostering reader interaction—encouraged, perhaps, by the success of a certain argumentative pigeon. Picture-book nonfiction has grown in popularity, becoming especially useful in classrooms—where older elementary and middle school students, often fans of now-commonplace graphic novels, find it crucial in accessing difficult historical topics. And, of course, celebrities have flocked to the picture book—with mostly lukewarm results, although at least one TV star has published an unalloyed work of ridiculous genius. You’ll find it on our list. (The Book with no Pictures by BJ Novak - Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen argue (and I agree) that this is not actually a picture book). 

To make this guide, we surveyed more than a hundred authors, illustrators, librarians, booksellers, academics, and publishing pros. We ended up reading more than 200 books, for which we must fulsomely thank our local libraries. Our goal: to find the books that represent the best of these transformations, and to tell the story of an art form that responded to a front-page crisis with a new wave of inventive stories that respect the intelligence, playfulness, and widely differing experiences of young readers.

We hope that the next time you’re looking for a book to read aloud with your favorite young person, this package will help you find something new and surprising—and understand, a little better, how it came to be that way.

Of course, nearly all of the books on the list I have featured here in this post are from the US. Many have reached us here in Australia but a few relate to US History and so are less relevant here. When you read the article (link at the top of this post) you will find detailed notes about each title. 

I am going to suggest to my friend from Kinderbookswitheverything that we could make our own 25 book list. We both love picture books from around the world so we might need a list of Australian titles AND a list of international titles. 

Here are a few of the 25 books listed by Slate which is an online magazine that covers current affairs, politics, and culture in the United States. The Slate journalists (with help from their panel of experts) also list related picture books and novels to go with each of their 25 choices, so in a way this list is way more than the 25 stated in the title.

Related text: Hot Dog by Doug Salati

Related text: We are Water Protectors by Carole Lindstrom illustrated by Michaela Goade

Related text: Wolf in the Snow by Matthew Cordell

Press Here

Each Kindness

Related text: Watercress by Andrea Wang illustrated by Jason Chin

(This book has not yet arrived in Australia even though it won the Caldecott Medal in 2022)

Extra Yarn

Sylvia Long

 

Related texts: Small in the City by Sydney Smith; A Different Pond

Check out my post about Sydney Smith

They all saw a cat

Related middle grade text: Counting by 7s

Related picture book: If you come to Earth

Related texts: Hello Lighthouse; The House on the Canal

The reviewer also mention The Old Truck by Jarrett Pumphrey which is a book I am very keen to read

Don't trust Fish

2025 is a year of lists. In Australia we are voting now for the ABC Radio National top 100 books of the last 25 years. This is mainly an adult 'competition' but there is a children's book category. I have written about it here. Just like Jon Klassen and Mac Barnett I am not a big fan of lists. They are only as good as the people who write them. They date very quickly. Sometimes sadly parents think their children should read every book on a list or that a list is a measure of book quality and appropriateness. Lists can have a commercial purpose aimed at book sales. Having said all of that, though, I did find this list quite interesting - especially the addition texts listed with each of the 25 picture books. I have made a reading list from these for myself:

• Wilderlore: The accidental Apprentice by Amanda Foody
• Restart by Gordon Korman
• Drita, My Homegirl by Jenny Lombard
• Plants can't sit still by Rebecca Hirsch
• No Purchase Necessary by Maria Marianayagam
• Seedfolks by Paul Fleischman
• Parachute kids by Betty C Tang (Graphic novel)
• Dim Sum Palace by X Fang
• Chinese Menu by Grace Lin

Source: Best kids books: The 25 greatest picture books of the past 25 years.

Fairytales and Feasts — Food in children's literature ABC Radio National

Fairytales and feasts — Food in children's literature 

Listen here

The title of this program held great promise for me - Children's Literature (tick); food and feasts (tick); and fairytales (tick). BUT sadly I was quite disappointed. The title didn't say that this was about adults sharing memories of kids books which featured food. Although the focus of the twenty-eight precious radio minutes, where some truly splendid books COULD have been shared, instead took the popular culture route and spent around half of the show with Andy Griffiths. 

The net worth of Andy Griffiths though sales of books like his Just and Treehouse series books is estimated at 25 million! I don't think ABC Radio National need to promote him. A brief mention of a couple of his food inclusions such as brussels sprouts (always a baddie - could they talk about why), peanut butter and marshmallows would have been enough. Andy Griffiths does write popular books, but he is in no way a children's book expert. 

Luckily, the producers did invite an academic, Kara K. Keeling for the second part of this show BUT because she is from the US no Australian books were mentioned (that's not a big issue for me). Other ABC Radio National Book Show presenters mentioned very old 'classics' from their own childhoods such as Where the Wild Things are and In the Night Kitchen. The content became quite nostalgic, which I didn't expect from the introduction, with lots of references to Roald Dahl and Maurice Sendak. Thank goodness we were spared Enid Blyton, but I do wish the program had not taken this nostalgic focus. All of the titles they shared are fine, but I had high hopes for some other titles to be explored AND I didn't hear any mention of fairytales except for a very brief mention of Jack and the Beanstalk! 

Claire Nicols - Matilda

Alison Lester - the Billabong Books by Mary Grant Bruce

Kate Evans - The Hobbit

Sarah L'Strange - Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Cassie McCullagh - The Night Kitchen

Blurb from ABC: The books of childhood take us on adventures far from our own backyard, where we often encounter culinary delights that arouse memory and spark imagination. But if there's a common thread that runs through much of children's literature, it's that the paths to our deepest desires are stalked by danger. We explore the deep symbolism behind our favourite foodie fantasies in children's books.

The purpose of this episode of Every Bite was to promote the current ABC Radio National voting of the top 100 books (adult and children's books) so I will say I am happy the program focus was children's books. Take a look at my previous post. 

I was surprised Possum Magic didn't get a mention. Here are some other book choices for this program - some newer books and some Australian titles. Perhaps there will be a follow-up show from Every Bite. They could do a whole show just about pancakes for example:

Dear Broccoli

The Biscuit Maker

Mr Lepron's Mystery Soup

Thank you Omu!

Rose Meets Mr Wintergarten (hot fairy cakes)

Here is the book by Kara K. Keeling:

Published in 2020

Publisher blurb: Table Lands: Food in Children’s Literature is a survey of food’s function in children’s texts, showing how the sociocultural contexts of food reveal children’s agency. Authors Kara K. Keeling and Scott T. Pollard examine texts that vary from historical to contemporary, noncanonical to classics, and Anglo-American to multicultural traditions, including a variety of genres, formats, and audiences: realism, fantasy, cookbooks, picture books, chapter books, YA novels, and film. Table Lands offers a unified approach to studying food in a wide variety of texts for children. Spanning nearly 150 years of children’s literature, Keeling and Pollard’s analysis covers a selection of texts that show the omnipresence of food in children’s literature and culture and how they vary in representations of race, region, and class, due to the impact of these issues on food. Furthermore, they include not only classic children’s books, such as Winnie-the-Pooh, but recent award-winning multicultural novels as well as cookbooks and even one film, Pixar’s Ratatouille.

If you are feeling especially nostalgic you might like to look for this one (and the sequel):

The Little Library Cookbook

Here are my own nostalgic food books from my years of working in a school library are:

Where's Julius

Jam

Bread and Jam for Frances

Food in fairy tales - Goldilocks and the Three Bears; Hansel and Gretel; The Princess and the Pea; The Gingerbread Boy; and Little Red Riding Hood AND the book that brings nearly all of these together is one of my all-time favourite books to read aloud:

Jeremiah in the Dark Woods

The crocodile asks "would these be jam tarts? ... (and) by any chance would this jam be 

strawberry jam all dark and delicious from the baking ... 

And is it possible that the pastry of these tarts is a golden brown 

with glorious little crisp and curly edges?"