I can't believe the quantity of extremely crappy children's books out there. We've been given tons of them as gifts. Some of them are basically toy ads, others are really poorly written and edited, but the worst are just plain preachy. For the first time in our lives we've committed a book lover's capital offense. We've thrown some away. They were so bad that we figured that the world would be better off if we didn't trade them in at the used book shop or even donate them to the thrift store.Fortunately, we have plenty of Dr. Suess, and recently I checked out a collection of Greek myths by Geraldine McCaughrean. My son insists on reading Icarus and Daedalus every night, and I'm slowly working through the rest of them. Since the small group of readers and contributors to this blog is exceptionally well-read and has a wide-range of interests I'm open to any suggestions for illustrated books on mythology, philosophy, history, science or any other subject which might be of interest to preschoolers.
6 comments:
I agree in general. On the good end, I love BABAR, which is amusing (though my 26-month-old doesn't really understand it yet) and trippy (wears clothes, marries his cousin!).
As your son gets older, I HIGHLY recommend The DAulaire's Book of Greek Myths. It's an excellent book with lots of pictures and a more detailed story set, though still avoiding the more grotesque elements of the stories.
Fine. I'll go write my own children's book. With blackjack and hookers.
Or you can read one of my childhood favorites. It shows Vikings killing monks, chasing women, and it is questionable what their intentions toward the horses and sheep are. And it has blood and death. I really liked the Time Traveller book. I just have the Viking one. I guess it comes as a complete set now. Hopefully it is all in the same vein, which is then cut open so they have an excuse to tell you historical medicinal practices and then funeral rites.
Yeah, Usborne, who makes the Viking book Jake mentioned, does some other good stuff.
They're all presumably a tiny bit above where your kids are at (I think) but would make good purchases for the future. The Viking one has the most mayhem of the Time Traveller series, but the Knights and Castles one spends two pages on a seige.
A Visitor's Guide to the Ancient World is particularly good, with enough detail that I've used it as sourcematerial for multiple RPG campaigns. It's 200 pages, and again, I'd assume it's above their current reading level but not terribly far off.
The Usborne Illustrated Guide to Norse Myths and Legends is a fun one as well, with some really odd artwork that's completely unlike the other books from that publisher.
Usborne is a great publisher, I have yet to see any of their books that struck me as lame or toolish.
Oh, and it would be remiss of me to discuss children's literature and fail to mention "Violence: the roleplaying game of egregious and repulsive bloodshed" - it's fun for the whole family.
Oh, but, silly me, you must already be aware of it - the cover says "By Designer X".
I'm assuming that you might know about "The Way Things Work," but McCauley's other books are great, too. I haven't seen "Baa" or "Black and White," but now I'm tempted to go looking for them.
http://www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com/features/davidmacaulay/books.shtml
I also love D'Aulaire's. I think mythology is hard for the preschool set because it's all sex and violence. I mean, you've got to leave some mysteries for elementary school, right?
The Stinky Cheese Man guys also have several other awesome books, including Math Curse and Science Verse.
http://www.powells.com/biblio?isbn=0670910570
I heart Science Verse.
Don't ever tease a wee amoeba
By calling him a her amoeba.
And don't call her a him amoeba.
Or never he a she amoeba.
'Cause whether his or hers amoeba,
They too feel like you and meba.
I don't think that I'd be an architect today were it not for David McCauley and Lego.
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