Here we round up new and forthcoming children’s titles including a picture book about an outsider, a high fantasy YA novel, a story of sisters, a picture book Easter egg hunt, and many more.
Daisy by Jessixa Bagley. Holiday House/Porter, $18.99; ISBN 978-0-8234-4650-6. In this picture book, a warthog collects beautiful items and is teased by classmates who don’t understand. Bagley, always the soul of empathy, doesn’t focus on fixing Daisy or her situation. The story’s power—and genuine hope—comes from an author acknowledging and validating her protagonist’s feelings.
The Stolen Kingdom by Jillian Boehme. Tor Teen, $17.99; ISBN 978-1-25029-882-9. In Perin Faye, magic is the king’s prerogative, his throne wedded to a dark magic stolen a century ago, which plagued the land with the Black Death. The teen protagonist of Boehme’s novel is embroiled in a high fantasy adventure full of court intrigue and romance.
Yolk by Mary H.K. Choi. Simon & Schuster, $18.99; ISBN 978-1-5344-4600-7. In this reflective, deliberately paced novel told from a younger sibling’s point of view, Choi (Permanent Record) examines the relationship between two Korean American sisters. The YA novel earned a starred review from PW.
The Easter Bunny’s Present Hunt by Mieke Goethals. Clavis, $18.95; ISBN 978-1-60537-620-2. This interactive seek-and-find volume by Goethals invites readers to follow the Easter Bunny, helper mice, and a chicken throughout the book.
Impossible by Isol, trans. from the Spanish by Elisa Amado. Groundwood, $18.95; ISBN 978-1-77306-434-5. In this wispy be-careful-what-you-wish-for fable that takes a comic scenario to the far reaches of its logic, the title’s “impossible” refers to two-and-a-half-year-old Toribio who can’t sleep.
The Big Bad Wolf in My House by Valérie Fontaine, trans. from the French by Shelley Tanaka, illus. by Nathalie Dion. Groundwood, $18.95; ISBN 978-1-77306-501-4. This piercing account of the pain that results when adults harm those around them shows an abuser entering a child’s life as a parent’s partner.
Once Upon a Quinceañera by Monica Gomez-Hira. HarperTeen, $17.99; ISBN 978-0-06-299683-1. To earn her high school diploma, a Miami teen must spend the summer performing with her ex-boyfriend, in Gomez-Hira’s contemporary YA rom-com.
Houdini and Me by Dan Gutman. Holiday House, $16.99; ISBN 978-0-8234-4515-8. Having been born in the New York City house in which Harry Houdini lived the last years of his life, 11-year-old Harry Mancini has become obsessed with the famous magician, learning the illusionist’s history and picking up magic tricks of his own. When Harry is injured trying to flatten a coin on the train tracks near his home, he wakes up from a coma and finds a gift box with an old flip phone inside, and soon he is getting texts from none other than Houdini himself.
The Lost Package by Richard Ho, illus. by Jessica Lanan. Roaring Brook, $18.99; ISBN 978-1-250-23135-2. Ho’s moving story uses fewer than 200 words—including part of the USPS motto, “neither snow,/ nor rain,/ nor heat,/ nor gloom of night” —to trace a package’s journey across the United States. The book earned a starred review from PW.
Beautiful Eggs by Alice Lindstrom. Scribble, $12.99; ISBN 978-1-950354-43-6. This intricately illustrated board book offers a kid-friendly introduction to the long history of egg decoration, which spans several cultures and countries: the Czech Republic, Greece, Japan, Latvia, Mexico, Slovakia, and Ukraine.
A New Day by Brad Meltzer, illus. by Dan Santat. Dial, $17.99; ISBN 978-0-525-55424-0. If farm animals and crayons can have labor disputes, why not days of the week? In this amusing spoof of talent competitions by Meltzer (the Ordinary People Change the World series) and Caldecott Medalist Santat, Sunday, tired of being unpaid and unappreciated, quits.
Tiny Kitty, Big City by Tim Miller. HarperCollins/Balzer + Bray, $17.99; ISBN 978-0-06-241442-7. A little stray calico cat with big yellow eyes seems very much at home in New York City. Sure, there are noisy sirens and unfriendly dogs, but the feisty, curious feline doesn’t seem the least bit underfoot as it meanders through the busy street grid.
Boardwalk Babies by Marissa Moss, illus. by April Chu. Creston, $18.99; ISBN 978-1-939547-66-8. Moss (the Amelia’s Notebook series) surveys the early 20th-century use of premature infants as sideshow entertainment in this informative overview of pioneering pediatric history and the use of incubators.
Rescue by Jennifer A. Nielsen. Scholastic Press, $17.99; ISBN 978-1-338-62099-3. Meg Kenyon and her British father have always shared a love of deciphering secret codes, so when he is called away from their home on the France-Germany border on a mysterious WWII mission with the Allies, he leaves a jarful of codes for her continued practice.
Big Feelings by Alexandra Penfold, illus. by Suzanne Kaufman. Knopf, $18.99; ISBN 978-0-525-57974-8. In All Are Welcome, collaborators Penfold and Kaufman celebrated the spirit of inclusivity. Now comes the real work: learning to collaborate to achieve common goals.
The Thieving Collectors of Fine Children’s Books by Adam Perry. Yellow Jacket, $17.99; ISBN 978-1-4998-1124-7. This metafictional fantasy by Perry (The Magicians of Elephant County) finds 10-year-old Oliver Nelson secreting away in, and stealing books from, a largely unvisited library until he’s caught in an alternate reality of one of the books.
The Old Boat by Jarrett Pumphrey, illus. by Jerome Pumphrey. Norton, $17.95; ISBN 978-1-324-00517-9. In this tale from the Pumphrey brothers (The Old Truck), tight, vivid prose by Jarrett Pumphrey telegraphs the story’s essence, while spreads by Jerome Pumphrey show outings shared by two brown-skinned figures—one young, one old—who together take a green fishing skiff out to sea.
The Floating Field: How a Group of Thai Boys Built Their Own Soccer Field by Scott Riley, illus. by Nguyen Quang and Kim Lien. Millbrook, $19.99; ISBN 978-1-5415-7915-6. This real-life celebration of resourcefulness by debut author Riley follows Prasit Hemmin, a boy who, with his friends, found space for a soccer field on the Thai island of Koh Panyee and established one of the most successful youth soccer clubs in southern Thailand. The book earned a starred review from PW.
The Castle School (for Troubled Girls) by Alyssa Sheinmel. Sourcebooks Fire, $17.99; ISBN 978-1-7282-2098-7. Following the death of her best friend, high school senior Moira Dreyfuss skips school, sneaks out at night, and gets a tattoo. Frustrated, her parents send Moira to the Castle School in Maine, a talk therapy program that provides new circumstances to “troubled” girls.
Dawn Raid by Pauline Vaeluaga Smith, illus. by Mat Hunkin. Levine Querido, $17.99; ISBN 978-1-64614-041-1. Through the diary entries of 13-year-old Sofia Savea, Smith explores an era of New Zealand history little known to many readers outside Oceania: the 1970s movement for Pacific Islanders’ rights.
Facing Fear by Karen Lynn Williams, illus. by Sara Palacios. Eerdmans, $18.99; ISBN 978-0-8028-5490-2. In earnest vignettes, Palacios (A Way with Wild Things) brings emotional tension to a family’s backstory, portraying the relentless anxiety of one undocumented family’s experience.
Bear Outside by Jane Yolen, illus. by Jen Corace. Holiday House/Porter, $18.99; ISBN 978-0-8234-4613-1. Yolen (the How Do Dinosaurs series) captures the essence of inner strength in this sensitive portrayal of a girl and the bear who always accompanies her.
For more children’s and YA titles on sale throughout the month of March, check out PW’s full On-Sale Calendar.
