Monster and Dragon Books
Your kid wants the scary thing right there on the page, close enough to poke, and then wants to be told it's actually pretty friendly. These books hand over a dragon who just wants tacos or a monster who's more worried about the ending than your kid is.
Zog by Julia Donaldson turns a clumsy dragon's bumps and bruises into the whole point of the story, not something to avoid.
One rule for a good dragon party: no spicy salsa. Dragons Love Tacos by Adam Rubin makes the whole book out of that single joke.
Ignore a problem and it gets bigger, literally, until it's bigger than the house in There's No Such Thing as a Dragon by Jack Kent.
Saint George and the Dragon by Margaret Hodges plays the dragon straight, a real fight with real danger, no wink at the reader.
No fire-breathing, no scales that gleam like the others. Dragolin by Stephen Cosgrove is for the kid who feels like the odd one in class.
He asks you not to turn the page, so of course your kid turns it immediately. The Monster at the End of this Book by Jon Stone runs on that trick alone.
Two grandmothers, two different dragon stories, one kid caught happily between them in The Truth about Dragons by Julie Leung.
When your kid's feelings are all tangled together at once, The Color Monster: A Story About Emotions by Anna Llenas sorts them into colors a little girl can actually point to.
A dragon, a princess, and a knight team up as flying doctors to heal sick animals across the kingdom, until the king locks the princess away for wanting more than a royal title.
A little werewolf tries to settle down for the night in a cold gray tomb full of monsters, but a mischievous goon barges in determined to keep everyone from sleeping.
Fold out the mask, try on the face. Glad Monster, Sad Monster by Ed Emberley and Anne Miranda makes naming a feeling something your hands do, not just your mouth.
You're not just reading Tickle Monster by Josie Bissett aloud, you're doing the tickling it tells you to do.
Pages you press and feel, dragons hidden in embossed grooves. Where's the Dragon? by Jason Hook rewards fingers as much as eyes.
After causing havoc in his wolf suit, a boy sent to bed without supper sails to an island of monstrous Wild Things, who crown him king before he chooses to sail home.
A boy builds the perfect sand castle at the beach and a dragon moves in — but when no one believes his amazing new friend is real, the dragon starts causing mischief to prove a point.
