The Caldecott Honors

The Caledcott Medal honored three books this year in addition to the winner (which I will blog about Friday).  Each of the three books honored this year were wordless, which I feel speaks greatly of the illustrators who were able to tell moving stories using only their artwork.

Flora and the Flamingo by Molly Idle is a sweet story of a young girl, Flora, who meets a flamingo.  Flora, who is dressed in pink decides she will mimic the movements of the flamingo.  Through the turning of the pages and the lifting of the flaps the story of friendship unfolds.  One move is a little hard for Flora and she falls, embarrassed.  The flamingo doesn't skip a beat and helps Flora up.  The two then dance a beautiful ballet together, like great friends.  The illustrations are simple but the pink stands out on the plain white pages.  The perfect book for any young ballerina in your life!

David Wiesner is no stranger to the Caldecott Medal.  His books Tuesday, Three Pigs and Free Fall have all either won or been honored by the Caldecott Medal.  His latest wordless book, Mr. Wuffles, is a 2014 Caldecott Honor book.  Just like his other books, Mr. Wuffles, is fully of fantasy.  Mr. Wuffles is a cat, who is picky about the toys that he plays with.  One day he finds the perfect toy, which unbeknownst to him, is a UFO.  Wiesner goes on to tell the story of Mr. Wuffles and the UFO through a comic book style layout.  When Mr. Wuffles breaks the UFO, the aliens must leave their flying saucer to fix the broken piece.  The aliens receive help from some ants hidden behind the radiator, all while Mr. Wuffles is waiting for them.  When the aliens finally make a dash back to their UFO Mr. Wuffles is ready, but not for an ambush!  The ants and other bugs help the alines get safely back to their UFO and they fly off, leaving Mr. Wuffles with no toy to play with.  Wiesner's pictures sure to are spark the imagination of any child, telling a different story every time it is read!

The last 2014 Caldecott Honor book was one that many believed should have won the medal.  Journey by Aaron Becker is a wordless masterpiece taking us all on an adventure to magical lands.  The story starts with a little girl sitting on her front porch looking bored.  She goes inside, picks up her red crayon and lets her imagination take her away.  She travels through her imagined world, sometimes getting into trouble but always using her red crayon to find a solution.  Her red crayon even helps her to make it back home safely.  This is an amazing book with even more amazing pictures and a MUST for every bookshelf!

Here are links to the trailers for all 3 of the 2014 Caldecott Honor books.

Flora and the Flamingo

Mr. Wuffles

Journey

Happy Reading!
Laura