This looks like a cool one…
It started simply – I asked myself, “I wonder what new kids’ books are coming out in October.” Two hours later, I was still browsing through publisher catalogs, muttering to myself, “That looks so cool, that looks so cool, that looks so cool…” There just SO many epic kids’ book releasing this month (the number of titles coming out on October 7th alone is ridiculous) and I couldn’t be happier about it.
In an effort to share the amazing, I decided to put together this quick guide to 21 books that are coming out this month that I’m personally EXCITED about and that I think you should be excited about too. Sometimes, it’s because I like the creators’ early work, sometimes, I just like the concept, sometimes, I am literally judging the book by its cover. This is a TOTALLY subjective list. But, at the very least, this should give some of you a heads-up about some very cool books that are on the horizon and, if I missed any fantastic-sounding upcoming titles, PLEASE let me know in the comments section below. Enjoy!
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A Bean, a Stalk and a Boy Named Jack by William Joyce, illustrated by Kenny Callicutt
Format: Picture book
Release Date: October 7th
Why You Should Be Excited: It’s the newest picture book from William Joyce, the creator of A Day With Wilbur Robinson, Dinosaur Bob, and the beautiful, beautiful The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore, which Joyce adapted from his Oscar-winning short animated film. So… yeah, there’s some pedigree here.
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Creature Features: Twenty-Five Animals Explain Why They Look the Way They Do by Steve Jenkins and Robin Page
Release Date: October 7th
Format: Picture book
Why You Should Be Excited: Jenkins makes some of the most consistently beautiful and informative picture books I’ve ever read – my daughter adores his Never Smile at a Monkey: And 17 Other Important Things to Remember – so I can’t imagine this one will be anything less than fascinating.
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The Eye of Zoltar: The Chronicles of Kazam by Jasper Fforde
Format: Young adult novel
Release Date: October 7th
Why You Should Be Excited: I haven’t read the previous Chronicles of Kazam books, so I’m not speaking from experience, but I love, love, LOVE Fforde’s Thursday Next and Nursery Crime series, which makes it hard for me to deny the potential on this one.
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The Graveyard Book Graphic Novel: Volume 2 by Neil Gaiman, adapted by P. Craig Russell
Release Date: October 7th
Format: Graphic novel
Why You Should Be Excited: Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book is one of my favorite young adult novels of the past ten years and the first volume of Russell’s graphic novel adaptation was impressive. (I really love Russell’s prior comic adaptation of Gaiman’s Murder Mysteries story.) Plus this volume features the conclusion of The Graveyard Book, which I’ve written about before and absolutely adore.
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The Great Escape: Magic Shop Series by Kate Egan and Mike Lane, illustrated by Eric Wight
Release Date: October 7th
Format: Chapter book
Why You Should Be Excited: I haven’t read the early volumes of the Magic Shop series, but the description sounds very cool – I love magic stuff – and the real reason I’m excited is the artwork by Eric Wight, who’s absolutely amazing and who created the totally fantastic Frankie Pickle series of early readers.
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Ivan: The Remarkable True Story of the Shopping Mall Gorilla by Katherine Applegate, illustrated by G. Brian Karas
Release Date: October 7th
Format: Picture book
Why You Should Be Excited: C’mon, this is Applegate adapting the remarkable story behind her 2013 Newbery Medal-winning YA novel into a gorgeous-looking picture book. A new take on The One and Only Ivan that I can share with even younger readers? No-brainer. I’m in.
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Kid Sheriff and the Terrible Toads by Bob Shea, illustrated by Lane Smith
Release Date: October 7th
Format: Picture book
Why You Should Be Excited: Because… Lane Smith. He’s a picture book god and is responsible for SO many of my daughter’s favorite books. And his previous collaboration with Bob Shea, the picture book Big Plans, is super, super funny. I’m looking forward to this one.
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The Rhino Who Swallowed a Storm by LeVar Burton and Susan Schaefer Bernardo, illustrated by Courtenay Fletcher
Release Date: October 7th
Format: Picture book
Why You Should Be Excited: It’s the very first children’s book ever written by Reading Rainbow creator LeVar Burton. Do I need to say anything more? No? Good.
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Sebastian and the Balloon by Philip C. Stead
Release Date: October 7th
Format: Picture book
Why You Should Be Excited: Philip Stead and his wife Erin are two of my family’s favorite picture book creators – their Caldecott-winning A Sick Day for Amos McGee is sublime – and this new one looks like a spiritual cousin to Stead’s earlier Jonathan and the Big Blue Boat, which is one of my daughter’s all-time favorite bedtime reads. So… yeah, when you say “favorite” that often while talking about an author, that’s a reason to get excited.
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Star Wars: The Adventures of Luke Skywalker, Jedi Knight by Tony DiTerlizzi, illustrated by Ralph McQuarrie
Release Date: October 7th
Format: Picture book
Why You Should Be Excited: OK, the geeks reading this are already salivating, so let me explain to the ‘norms why this is cool. This is a picture book-retelling of the story of Luke Skywalker using the iconic concept paintings of Ralph McQuarrie – the artist credited with designing the “look” of the original Star Wars trilogy – with text written by DiTerlizzi, the creator of the WondLa series and the co-creator of the epic Spiderwick Chronicles series (and an amazing illustrator in his own right). This thing is BRIMMING with geek cred and looks very, very cool.
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Tumbleweed Baby by Anna Myers, illustrated by Charles Vess
Release Date: October 7th
Format: Picture book
Why You Should Be Excited: I’m not familiar with Myers’ previous works, but I like the sound of this book – a “tumbleweed” wild child roaming the 1930s Dust Bowl – and, for me, the real draw is the art by Charles Vess, who turned Neil Gaiman’s Blueberry Girl into one of most beautiful picture books we own.
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Bink and Gollie: The Completely Marvelous Collection by Kate DiCamillo and Alison McGhee, illustrated by Tony Fucile
Release Date: October 14th
Format: Picture book
Why You Should Be Excited: Because, as I’ve written about before, Bink and Gollie are THE BEST. And anything by Kate DiCamillo is THE BEST. If you don’t own the three volumes of Bink and Gollie already, this collection is definitely worth a look.
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Emma and the Blue Genie by Cornelia Funke, illustrated by Kerstin Meyer
Release Date: October 14th
Format: Chapter book
Why You Should Be Excited: Because Funke is the creator of the amazingly good Inkheart series and, previously, she and Kerstin Meyer teamed up to create three of my daughter’s favorite picture books – The Princess Knight, Pirate Girl, and The Wildest Brother – so, when I hear they’re starting a new chapter book series for kids, it gets my attention.
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In Real Life by Cory Doctorow, illustrated by Jen Wang
Release Date: October 14th
Format: Graphic novel
Why You Should Be Excited: Doctorow is an amazing writer – I love his novels and his articles on BoingBoing and his YA novel Little Brother is so damn good I want to hand out free copies to every twelve year old I know. This is Doctorow’s first graphic novel, which is noteworthy, and it’s focused around the social phenomenon of “gold farming” – where people in third-world countries are paid slave wages to acquire wealth in online video games that is then illegally sold to first-world players – which was also the topic of his excellent novel For the Win. So this should be good.
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Once Upon an Alphabet: Short Stories for All the Letters by Oliver Jeffers
Release Date: October 14th
Format: Picture book
Why You Should Be Excited: This is the creator behind the uber-cool The Incredible Book-Eating Boy and the illustrator of Drew Daywalt’s uber-popular The Day the Crayons Quit creating an uber-original take on the alphabet book. Sign me up.
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The Princess in Black by Shannon and Dean Hale, illustrated by LeUyen Pham
Release Date: October 14th
Format: Chapter book
Why You Should Be Excited: Holy. Crap. I just found out about this book and, oh man, am I excited about it. Why? Because my daughter is obsessed with Shannon and Dean Hale’s graphic novel Rapunzel’s Revenge (so good) and LeUyen Pham is one of the best illustrators working today – check out her work in the Freckleface Strawberry books or Vampirina Ballerina, if you doubt me. And, all that aside, this is the first in a new chapter book series about a princess who transforms into a black-clad superhero at night and fights monsters. What’s not to love?
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Sam and Dave Dig a Hole by Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen
Release Date: October 14th
Format: Picture book
Why You Should Be Excited: Because it’s two of the funniest, most talented children’s book creators currently working teaming up to make a new book. What’s not to like? Klassen’s illustrations are always breathtaking – I want to make wallpaper out of his backgrounds for I Want My Hat Back and This Is Not My Hat – and Barnett really knows how to make me laugh (Battle Bunny and Chloe and the Lion are so, so funny.)
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DC Super Heroes: My First Book of Girl Power by Julie Merberg
Release Date: October 21st
Format: Board book
Why You Should Be Excited: This might sound like a weird one to be excited about, particularly because DC Comics seems so adept at marginalizing their female characters/readers lately, but I have to say, I love the idea of having a board book that captures such a powerhouse group of girl power icons and presents them in the perfect way to introduce them to the youngest of nerds. I hope this is good.
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Princess Mononoke: The First Story by Hayao Miyazaki
Release Date: October 21st
Format: Picture book
Why You Should Be Excited: If you know any anime fans, this is going to make them lose their minds. Japanese filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki is a living legend, best known stateside for his animated movies like Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, and Princess Mononoke. This storybook presents the original version of the Princess Mononoke tale that Miyazaki first wrote back in 1980, accompanied by original watercolor art from the animator himself. This is something special.
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Under the Ocean by Anouck Boisrobert and Louis Rigaud
Release Date: October 21st
Format: Pop-up book
Why You Should Be Excited: Because Boisrobert and Rigaud’s previous pop-collaboration, Popville, was extremely, extremely clever and cool, and Under the Ocean looks like more of the same.
I’ve never seen a pop-up book designed quite like this – bringing to life everything that resides beneath the surface of the ocean – and it looks like a marvel of engineering. Can’t wait to get my hands on a copy.
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Hansel and Gretel by Neil Gaiman, illustrated by Lorenzo Mattotti
Release Date: October 28th
Format: Graphic novel
Why You Should Be Excited: I’m a fan of pretty much everything that Toon Books publishes, but when they get a superstar like Gaiman to create new take on such a classic fairy tale – an adaptation that’s already sold the movie rights and attracted a huge amount of early praise – you simply can’t ignore it.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Thanks for such a great post, I couldn’t wait for the clock to roll around to midnight in the USA as my kids pestered me all day to buy some of these books here for our library in Shanghai.
Where do you get the publisher catalogs? Being an Aussie, teaching in China, at an American school, I rely a lot on blogs… are there online publisher catalogs I can view?
Any advice appreciated.
Cheers
Kimbra Power, Barefoot Librarian
I’m so glad you found the post helpful!
One of the BEST online resources I’ve found is the blog EarlyWord.com. It’s a site dedicated to helping collection development librarians keep up-to-date on what new and exciting books their patrons might be asking about. There’s a kids’ section of EarlyWord too, which is great. But maybe my favorite thing about EarlyWord is the right-side sidebar of the page, which collects a ridiculously helpful series of hyperlinks. If you keep scrolling down that right side, you’ll see links to multiple best-seller lists, links to Excel sheets that collect all of the books that won “best book” designations for the past 4 years, links to award lists and coming soon lists, and (if you keep scrolling all the way down) you’ll eventually come to section that collects links to publisher catalogs.
Hope that helps!
YES< that helps a great deal…. thanks so much for "sharing the wealth"
Cheers Tom
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