Lately, it seems that I am racing the clock. Can't believe that 2018 is only a few days away. I wanted to get a few end of the year posts finished. Thanks to my dear, sweet cats I might not get as many completed. I have been working on this post for several hours. Every time I try to type one of them comes over and pushes the keyboard away or tries to knock the laptop out of my hands. But I am determined to get this written.
In 2017, I read over 300 picture books. Not a great year for me but still a decent number of titles. Since I posted my favorite nonfiction books the other day, and did a Mock Sibert Post here and here, I kept this list to fiction picture books. Since I couldn't really keep my list to ten titles, I tried, I decided to do 17 books in honor of 2017.
As I scrolled through the various books I read in 2017, I realized that there were some amazing books. Books that made me laugh and others that made me cry and others that made me feel on a deep level. All of them were beautifully illustrated. And there were of course some titles that I had to leave off the list even though I enjoyed so many. Here are the ones that made my final list...
Several paired sparse to no text to tell a story through pictures.
Wolf in the Snow by Matthew Cordell (Feiwel & Friends)
Boat of Dreams by Rogério Coelho (Tilbury House Publishers)
Letters to a Prisoner by Jacques Goldstyn (Owlkids)
Other books, dealt with challenging topics of family struggles, dreams, friendships, love and life.
Town by the Sea by Joanne Schwartz, Illustrated by Sydney Smith (Groundwood Books)
Walk With Me by Jairo Buitrago, Illustrated by Rafael Yockteng (Groundwood Books)
A Different Pond by Bao Phi, Illustrated by Thi Bui (Picture Window Books)
Alfie: (The Turtle that Disappeared) by Thyra Heder (Harry N. Abrams)
Life by Cynthia Rylant, Illustrated by Brendan Wenzel (Beach Lane Books)
This house, once by Deborah Freedman (Atheneum Books for Young Readers)
The Unexpected Love Story of Alfred Fiddleduckling by Timothy Basil Ering (Candlewick Press)
And other stories provided me with a smile or a burst of laughter as the story unfurled.
The Five Forms by Barbara McClintock (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Be Quiet! by Ryan T. Higgins (DIsney-Hyperion)
Creepy Pair of Underwear by Aaron Reynolds, Illustrated by Peter Brown (Simon & Schuster)
Colette's Lost Pets by Isabelle Arsenault (Tundra Books)
And others celebrated journeys of courage and celebrations of who we are.
The Blue Songbird by Vern Kousky (Running Press)
Jabari Jumps by Gaia Cornwall (Candlewick Press)
Crown: An Ode to the Fresh Cut by Derrick Barnes, Illustrated by Gordon C. James (Agate Bolden)
And all of them made my life just a little better for having read them. What were your favorites in 2017?