I listen to a lot of audiobooks for small children and this is the first one I’ve encountered that includes image descriptions. It’s such a good idea! The small child I was listening with was so excited that I had to pause the story for celebrations. Alt text all the things.
The book is Secret of the Jade Bangle, by Linda Trinh.
I need to be precise in talking about it because infantilization is real, but there can be so much solidarity between children and disabled people.
My favourite heatwave / climate change picture book is this one, where one night it is so hot that the moon melts.
It has everything: apartment-dwellers helping each other, a grandma with good ideas, climate refugees (from the moon), environmental restoration, and an ending that is cute and encouraging, or maybe “icy and sweet”.
Gonna go make popsicles and work on my neighbourhood extreme weather prep. Sending courage to my fellow west coasters.
My runner-up favourite heatwave / climate change picture book is this one, where a family is trying to get to the lake but their car keeps breaking down.
A baby is taken seriously as a person with valid ideas, a dad does all the parenting, it’s a solid right-to-repair story, and the car is correctly portrayed as unglamorous and annoying. But the noises it makes are a lot of fun to read.
I think I accidentally grew the exact lettuce from The Lady And The Spider?
