Summer Picture Books
Summer picture books slow down for popsicle drips and lightning bugs, for the long stretch of a day that doesn't need a plan. Read one on a hot afternoon and your kid feels the whole season open up, sprinklers and cousins and all.
A rhyming tour through one sunny season — beach trips, watermelon, fireflies, fairs, gardening, fishing, and fireworks — capturing everything that makes summer feel endless.
Time of Wonder by Robert McCloskey slows down to the pace of fog rolling over a bay, then lets a hurricane crack that calm wide open.
Tiny mice cooling off by a millstream, then planning a wedding: Summer Story by Jill Barklem makes a heat wave feel cozy instead of miserable.
If your kid's summer means a grandparent flying in, When Lola Visits by Michelle Sterling puts words to that specific ache and joy.
Whistle for Willie by Ezra Jack Keats puts the shimmering heat of a city summer on the page, sturdy board pages built for the youngest hands at the table.
A Caldecott-winning look at one steamy July day, Fireworks by Matthew Burgess finds the good stuff in a neighborhood everybody already knows.
The hugging goes on so long it gets funny, and then the goodbye in The Relatives Came by Cynthia Rylant actually stings a little.
Skip this one if your kid needs the TV to wind down. Blackout by John Rocco only works once the screens are already off.
Every animal that climbs into that boat is one more thing about to go wrong, and Mr. Gumpy's Outing by John Burningham lets it happen anyway.
If Chicka Chicka Boom Boom is on repeat, Old Black Fly by Jim Aylesworth gives you the same alphabet momentum with a much messier villain.
When your kid wants a summer road trip without leaving the couch, Lady Liberty's Holiday by Jen Arena sends a very famous statue coast to coast instead.
Nature camp loses to waffles and video games in A Couple of Boys Have the Best Week Ever by Marla Frazee, which is exactly the summer some kids actually want.
No plot to speak of, just a grandmother up at five to fish the lake. Fish for Supper by M. B. Goffstein slows the whole shelf down on purpose.
