(Photo by Steven Pings Rawley/use with permission only, please)

• Here’s a sweet and funny new picture book: “Bookie & Cookie,” written and illustrated by Blanca Gómez (Rocky Pond Books/Penguin Random House, 2024, all ages, $18.99). The bright and colorful collage art (combined with digital art) really makes this book come to life. Bookie and Cookie get along great… until they don’t. Good story about conflict resolution and how cookies and bookies can bring us all together. (This has been my philosophy since birth, really. xoxo)
• Author Ariel Bernstein and illustrator Marc Rosenthal have an awesome new creation out, too: “Mabel Wants a Friend” (A Paula Wiseman Book/Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers; order now for Oct. 1st, 2024 release; ages 4-8; $18.99). The theme of the week is… friendship, y’all. Cuz you got to have friends, like the old song says. Mabel (a fox) wants what she wants, when she wants it, and she’s not too concerned about this affects other people. Until she meets Chester (the bunny), that is. A great story that deftly unfolds, and the art is bouncy and fun.
• “The Ship in the Window” is an engaging new book, written by children’s librarian (yay!) Travis Jonker and illustrated by Matthew Cordell. (Viking/Penguin Random House, 2024, $18.99, ages 3-7 but I’m gonna say… all ages! Because it’s that kind of book.) Wait a minute… we have another Mabel, friends. This one is a cute little mouse, and she lives “in a little cabin on a little lake. But she wasn’t alone.” There’s a boy. There’s a man. And there’s a model ship (“It was magnificent.”) Mabel, our Mabel, dreams of being a captain, and all she wants to know is: Will that ship sail? Great art, with tons of imagination and little details for the kids to notice.

The Pick of the Week is… “The Ship in the Window”! You know, it reminds of “The Mouse and the Motorcyle”? It does. Happy day.

Disclaimer: All of the books reviewed today were sent to me free for review purposes. Disclaimer here. See you next time!

WM