Here are 100 books that My Strange Shrinking Parents fans have personally recommended if you like
My Strange Shrinking Parents.
Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.
We’re picture book lovers and best friends that met in college at Washington University in St. Louis. Our friendship started out with long telephone conversations during the pandemic, and have now blossomed into a picture book partnership where we hope to write books that make people feel warm and fuzzy through the universality of the human experience. Vivienne is still currently a student at WashU, but will move to New York post-graduation. Eugenia has since graduated and is currently a designer in the children’s department at Chronicle Books in the Bay Area.
There is so much we love about this book. Every page stretches the imagination on how much one can love in physical distance form and it makes you realize that love, in a sense, has not bounds. You can’t guess how much Little Nutbrown Hare is loved, but he are loved endlessly. Not only is this book warm and fuzzy vibes, it makes you want to cry with this father and child relationship. Vivienne’s dad is a big inspiration in my life and it makes her realize how much she love him and hope to be just like him one day.
Celebrate twenty-five years of love right up to the moon and back! A new board-book edition is perfect for little hands.
How much does Little Nutbrown Hare love his daddy? And how much does Big Nutbrown Hare love him back? The cherished tale of boundless affection is ready for boundless sharing in a durable board-book edition for the younger set.
We’re picture book lovers and best friends that met in college at Washington University in St. Louis. Our friendship started out with long telephone conversations during the pandemic, and have now blossomed into a picture book partnership where we hope to write books that make people feel warm and fuzzy through the universality of the human experience. Vivienne is still currently a student at WashU, but will move to New York post-graduation. Eugenia has since graduated and is currently a designer in the children’s department at Chronicle Books in the Bay Area.
This sweet, tiny Japanese book is part of a three-book series revolving around a little bear named Kuma Kuma Chan. The story perfectly captures what it feels like to go visit a friend who lives far away. Even though the visit is not particularly eventful, the moments shared drinking bear tea and eating gifted chocolates feel so relatable. The illustrations are simple and serene, paired with an equally quiet and sweet story of friendship.
When a boy receives an invitation in the mail from Kuma-Kuma Chan, his friend who happens to be a bear, he travels by train, bus, and foot to reach Kuma-Kuma Chan's home. His friend welcomes him with 'bear tea', serves rice crackers and at the end of the day, a delicious salmon dinner. The two don't have a lot to talk about, but they spend the day sharing activities, eating delicious food, and experiencing the sense of belonging that comes from being with a good friend. When the boy leaves to catch the last bus home, both friends are enriched…
We’re picture book lovers and best friends that met in college at Washington University in St. Louis. Our friendship started out with long telephone conversations during the pandemic, and have now blossomed into a picture book partnership where we hope to write books that make people feel warm and fuzzy through the universality of the human experience. Vivienne is still currently a student at WashU, but will move to New York post-graduation. Eugenia has since graduated and is currently a designer in the children’s department at Chronicle Books in the Bay Area.
This book is composed of beautifully rendered landscapes in a considered color palette. A mother-daughter story sits at the heart of the book and is accompanied by breathtaking environments juxtaposed with everyday settings. This story shows that whether we are climbing a large mountain, or watching the shadows stretch in the afternoon, as long as we are together, there is nowhere else we rather be.
Let's Do Everything and Nothing is a lush and lyrical picture book from Julia Kuo celebrating special moments―big and small―shared with a child.
Will you climb a hill with me? Dive into a lake with me? Reach the starry sky with me, and watch the clouds parade?
Love can feel as vast as a sky full of breathtaking clouds or as gentle as a sparkling, starlit night. It can scale the tallest mountains and reach the deepest depths of the sea.
Standing side by side with someone you love, the unimaginable can seem achievable. But not every magical moment is…
We’re picture book lovers and best friends that met in college at Washington University in St. Louis. Our friendship started out with long telephone conversations during the pandemic, and have now blossomed into a picture book partnership where we hope to write books that make people feel warm and fuzzy through the universality of the human experience. Vivienne is still currently a student at WashU, but will move to New York post-graduation. Eugenia has since graduated and is currently a designer in the children’s department at Chronicle Books in the Bay Area.
This heartwarming watercolored picture book follows a crocodile as he sets off into the great metropolis for his morning commute. With no words at all, this book expertly shows the bustling, dynamic city life with both human and animal inhabitants. Each page is compositionally unique, and it is a masterclass in pacing and paneling. Despite the urban landscapes, the illustrations are rendered in a way that feels like a breath of fresh air. And best of all, the last page will make you want to revisit the entire book from beginning to end.
Mr. Crocodile loves his job. Every morning he gets up with an alarm. He brushes his teeth. He chooses the right tie to match his outfit, eats a quick slice of toast, and heads off to work on a crowded train. But what is his job? The answer may surprise you. Readers will want to pore over this witty, wordless book again and again, finding new details and new stories with every reading.
Having heard Celtic legends as a kid made me want to either become a leprechaun or a goddess with the power to remake the world’s worst parts. Although I didn’t achieve either, I write about both, as well as other quirky people who march to the rhythm of delightfully offbeat drummers. I so adore eccentric people and jaunty environments, I’ve built a career out of writing them. That has allowed me to capture the sassy voice of the daughter of madcap Hollywood stars, the outrageous garments worn by a cheerfully fake psychic, and the journey of a brokenhearted chef who can’t quote an adage normally to save her life.
Nazaré is a charming fable, showcasing the pursuit of justice in an authoritarian world. Kin, a young homeless boy, originally accused of sorcery and forced to flee, eventually leads a band of revolutionaries pitted against their oppressive dictator. His army is made up of delightful misfits, along with a variety of wild animals.
I love the rebels in this parable for the modern world. How could any writer or reader not appreciate revolutionaries who, while living rough in the countryside, impose a reading hour on their members. There is such beauty in the author’s language, unexpected humor throughout, and the most appealing charm.
If you believe in magic, as well as the the power of right to prevail against tyranny, despite impossible odds, this is the novel for you.
Nazaré tells the story of a peasants’ revolt in the polyglot city of Balaal. The story begins with a miracle. A homeless boy sees a whale washed up on the beach. He alerts the local fishermen, and soon the whole town is trying and failing to push it back into the ocean. With just the boy left to accompany the whale now in its dying throes, a freak wave pulls the creature back into the sea. This is an omen. Change is coming.
The boy and the washerwoman who adopts him cobble together a ramshackle army of fishermen, shopkeepers, lapsed…
After reading The Enormous Egg as a child, I’ve been devoted to stories where the strange, the uncanny, and the magical are all elements of the worlds characters must negotiate. I’m most drawn to fiction containing seemingly unreal elements because, in my experience, that is reality. Those moments when the past suddenly feels present, or when you glimpse something at the edge of your vision that feels significant, but you can’t quite catch it. Moments when anything is possible. No surprise that I write fiction that explores those moments of uncertainty and leaves the reader unmoored, thinking about the people and their experiences long after they’ve left the book.
I’m always impressed by how Karen Russell pulls the reader into her stories with no warning about what we’re getting into. No easing into strange situations. She places her characters in what we publicly claim can’t be real but privately know to be true.
To make a fabulist story work, images must cling to the reader’s mind like golden treacle. Each one either grounding us in the familiar or firmly establishing the unfamiliar as quotidian. Russel is a master at this. Her stories flow so easily, and her characters’ unforgettable voices hit the reader in the first paragraph.
Charting loss, love, and the difficult art of growing up, these stories unfurl with wicked humour and insight. Two young boys make midnight trips to a boat graveyard in search of their dead sister, who set sail in the exoskeleton of a giant crab; a boy whose dreams foretell implacable tragedies is sent to 'Sleepaway Camp for Disordered Dreamers' (Cabin 1, Narcoleptics; Cabin 2, Insomniacs; Cabin 3, Somnambulists. . . ); a Minotaur leads his family on the trail out West, and finally, in the collection's poignant and hilarious title story, fifteen girls raised by wolves are painstakingly re-civilised by…
I was born in a stable close to the Himalayas in India. The family farm was buzzing with animals and one of the most wonderful was a wild monkey called Oma who adopted our family and insisted on living with us. This is where the magic in my life began. My Grandmother was the storyteller in my family, so even after we emigrated to England when I was only 18 months old, our house was filled with magical stories, many with roots in India. So when I became a children’s author it was this magic that I wanted to bring to my stories and it was this magic that drew me to reading.
Imagine if you could meet someone from the past without realising? This is what drew me to this magical book. When you are young there are things you just don’t question and this is what I was like. I saw things that adults would have said weren’t there. But I didn’t believe them. I only believed in the power of my imagination. For me anything could appear; a small creature under a tree in the garden or Santa’s sleigh flying through the sky at Christmas – it was all so real I could reach out and touch it. In Darkling Wood is one of those stories that wrap themselves around you and whisk you away, where you’ll leave believing in magic!
For fans of Kelly Barnhill’s The Girl Who Drank the Moon and Jack Cheng’s See You in the Cosmos, here is “a haunting and poignant exploration of family, loss, and redemption” (Booklist, Starred Review).
When Alice is suddenly bundled off to her estranged grandmother Nell’s house, there’s nothing good about it, except the beautiful Darkling Wood at the end of the garden—but Nell wants to have it cut down. Alice feels at home there, at peace. She even finds a friend, a girl named Flo. But Flo doesn’t go to the local school, and no one in town has heard…
From an early age, I have been fascinated with anything supernatural and occult. My Aunt would read my palm, and then, as a teenager, I would visit clairvoyants to see what the future held for me. As I grew older, I found I had an ability, a gift of seership, and after reading many books, embarked on my pagan journey, from which I have never looked back, and am now studying Druidry,which is very much nature-based. I hope you love the books on this list as much as I do!
This was another of my lockdown reads, and again, I became completely immersed in the story from the word go. There are some incredibly dark moments, which, however, balance beautifully with many heartfelt moments. It was most definitely an emotion-inducing story for me.
I loved the fast pace and the author's ability to keep me literally on the edge of my seat, mustering all kinds of feelings, from frustration and anger to great joy. I found the characters strong, and the magic thought-provoking, and this was another story that I was so sad to say goodbye to.
My ex-lover is a psychopath, hunting me down for revenge. I am falling in love with his enemy. And I am the last Arcane Witch left alive, destined to return magic to the modern world.
My whole life, I have been a prisoner. Starved. Beaten. Hated. By my own family! But most of all, I am feared. I am feared because I am the most powerful woman in the world. Most want me dead. Some want to control my magic for their own, dark desires.
There is nothing more gratifying when you are reading your own books to a group of children to see that they are eager to know what is going to happen next. My top priority is to create a story that is a page-turner. My second wish is to include social topics that provoke ideas and questions. After I read to a group of schoolchildren, I like to encourage them to discuss the themes in the story; the children are always keen to give their views. Nonetheless, adding social topics to my children’s books needs to evolve naturally; ultimately, for me, the story is king!
I really admire Raymond Briggs’ work; he’s a wonderful storyteller and a fantastic artist with a great eye for colour. Ethel & Ernest is a beautiful book. The strip-cartoon format works well and makes for an intense reading experience. Whilst this book has lots of humour and light, it also features some dark topics such as the Second World War, mental illness, and bereavement. It is generally considered unsuitable for children under the age of twelve. It’s a charming love story and a vivid social record. I find it heartbreaking at times. It becomes even more touching when you remember that it is based on Briggs’ own family.
A marvellous, life-enhancing book for all ages, now a major animated film starring Jim Broadbent, Brenda Blethyn and Luke Treadaway
Utterly original, deeply moving and very funny, Ethel & Ernest tells the story of Raymond Briggs' parents' marriage, lady's maid Ethel and milkman Ernest, from their first chance encounter in 1928, through the birth of their son Raymond in 1934, to their deaths, within months of each other, in 1971.
Told in Brigg`s unique strip-cartoon format, Ethel and Ernest live through the defining moments of the twentieth century: the darkness of the Great Depression, the build up to World War…
When I was starting out as an illustrator, I stumbled into two art director jobs, first at the innovative New York Herald Tribuneand then at The New York Times. Working with great journalists gave me the startling idea that a comic strip could have no better subject matter than real life. This led me to create my popular comic strip “Stan Mack’s Real Life Funnies,” which ran in The Village Voice and reported on the rowdy New York city of the '70s and ‘80s. Back then, I was alone in combining real-life stories with comics; today many artist-writers use the comic strip format to tell complex and multilayered true stories of the human experience.
I met Kevin Sacco when he was an advertising storyboard artist. Kevin knew how to sell the story of an ad simply and dramatically in a series of graphic panels with an economy of words. In Sevenoaks, I see the same brain at work. His book is based on his life: a ‘60s-era New York City high school kid sent to an elite private school outside London. Sacco’s distinctive elongated and restrained figures, beautifully drawn geometric and airy cityscapes, and genial pace can lull one into a sense of calm, so that his moments of high and even magical drama slice more deeply into the emotions. One might be surprised to discover an unexpected tear.
In the summer of 1966, aspiring artist Kevin Sacco learns that his family is moving from New York City to London-and that he will be attending
Sevenoaks, a traditional boarding school in the English countryside.
At first considered a "Yank" outsider with limited academic or sports acumen, Sacco gradually comes to experience and understand this life of rugby, cold showers, new friendships and discipline. Letters between Sacco and his best friend in New York serve to compare his cloistered life at Sevenoaks to the life that he would be living back home: a life touched by drugs, anti-war sentiments and…
