Notable Children’s Books of 2008

The New York Times
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December 7, 2008
Notable Children’s Books of 2008

WABI SABI
By Mark Reibstein. Illustrated by Ed Young.
Little, Brown & Company Books for Young Readers. $16.99. (Ages 3 to 6)

In this book of ingeniously layered text — both narrative and haiku — and gorgeous collage art, a cat named Wabi Sabi sets out to discover the meaning of her name. Chosen by The Times as a Best Illustrated Children’s Book of 2008.

THE KINGDOM ON THE WAVES
The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume 2.
By M. T. Anderson.
Candlewick Press. $22.99. (Ages 14 and up)

This sequel completes the story of race and revolution told in “The Pox Party.” As Octavian Nothing, escaped from slavery, joins up with British forces in Boston, his story encompasses both the comic and the tragic with sweeping ambition.

SUNRISE OVER FALLUJAH
By Walter Dean Myers
Scholastic Press. $17.99. (Ages 12 and up)

An idealistic young soldier lands in Iraq’s deadly hall of mirrors, in a kind of sequel to Myers’s 1988 Vietnam novel, “Fallen Angels.” In this powerful new book, laced with violence but also warmth and humor, the narrator faces humanitarian missions that turn into deadly ambushes (a detonator is concealed in a tub of flour) and bears witness to the killing of friend and enemy alike.

THE HUNGER GAMES
By Suzanne Collins
Scholastic Press. $17.99. (Ages 12 and up)

A brilliantly plotted tale that begins after North American society has been decimated by climate change and war. In this world, children fight to the death in ritual games — a form of both repression and entertainment in the country of Panem. When her younger sister is picked to compete, Katniss Everdeen, a skilled hunter, makes the fateful choice to take her place.

LITTLE BROTHER
By Cory Doctorow
Tor/Tom Doherty Associates. $17.95. (Ages 13 and up)

A near-future terrorist attack hits San Francisco, and Marcus Yallow, 17, playing hooky from high school, is detained in the crackdown that follows. The experience leads him into an ingenious program of resistance and civil rights activism in a novel that is at once an entertaining thriller, a thoughtful polemic and a practical handbook of digital-age self-defense.

ABC3D
By Marion Bataille
Neal Porter/Roaring Brook Press. $19.95. (Ages 5 and up)

A simple but sophisticated idea animates this small, chunky pop-up book, which does wonders with the letters A through Z. In Bataille’s paper engineering, B doubles as 3, C flips over to become a D, U is a perfect pa­rabola, and so on, all in bold black, white and red. This stylish and interactive work of art can be read again and again.

TEN LITTLE FINGERS AND TEN LITTLE TOES
By Mem Fox. Illustrated by Helen Oxenbury
Harcourt Children's Books. $16. (Ages 3 to 5)

A witty and winsome look at babies around the world that has a toe-tapping refrain: the words sound easy and familiar, as though they have been handed down to children forever. And the story ends with a pitch-perfect moment: one little baby who is “mine, all mine.”

THE DISREPUTABLE HISTORY OF FRANKIE LANDAU-BANKS
By E. Lockhart
Hyperion. $16.99. (Ages 12 and up)

A nominee for a National Book Award in young people’s literature, E. Lockhart’s latest concerns “a nice girl” who remakes herself as a “near-criminal mastermind,” with pranks that upend her school’s oppressive power structure (created by and for boys). It’s a homage to girl power, with a protagonist who is fearless.