Books like Words with Wings and Magic Things
By Matthew Burgess
For the kid who turns a gray afternoon into a whole adventure just by narrating it out loud, this book hands them a stack of doors marked Wonder, Wild, and Weee! and says go ahead, open one. Playful, colorful, and a little unpredictable — part poetry collection, part pop-up adventure.
A white shape drifts across page after page of blue sky, looking like a rabbit, a bird, an ice-cream cone, and more — until a final reveal answers what it really is.
A boy with a summer to fill decides to grow his own civilization from scratch, planting a mystery crop that towers over him and ends up supplying food, clothing, shelter, and games.
A young Chinese American girl notices color everywhere in her everyday world, from red dragons and firecrackers to lychees, and brown in her own teddy bear.
An imaginative boy dreams up the ultimate house, sketching in a racetrack, a flying playroom, and a gigantic slide as his ideas grow wilder with every rhyme.
A poor boy who longs to paint is given a magic paintbrush that brings to life whatever he creates, until a greedy emperor sets out to capture him and claim its power for himself.
An author-illustrator named Harris Burdick vanishes, leaving behind fourteen mysterious drawings with only a title and a single line of text each — and no story to explain them.
Two curious kids set off on a wonder walk through nature, asking playful questions about the world — is the sun a light bulb, is dirt the earth's skin — and seeing everything anew.
A little girl with a boundless imagination becomes a mermaid, a wolf-raised boy, a wonderland wanderer, and more, turning cushions into castles and boxes into boats.
A little girl moves through her day with family and friends, noticing that everyone feels colors differently — her neighbor's red is angry, hers is brave like a fire truck.
Three pigs build their familiar houses of straw, sticks, and bricks, but when the wolf huffs one pig right out of the story's pages, all three escape into a wild landscape of other tales entirely.
A child imagines an entire day as a horse — galloping through familiar settings, wondering if they'd fit in their clothes, and whether a little sister would get a ride.
A single yellow dot invites the reader to press it, tap it, and tilt the book — and with each turn of the page, the dots multiply, scatter, and change color right before your eyes.
