Books with No Words

I love to read. There is nothing I want more than to make sure my kids love to read. I think it’s important to read books that are a little too old for them so they get used to hearing how words should go, how dialogue should sound and how great literature is. But some books come alive because of illustrations. The following books are some of my favorite books that have barely any words. The illustrations tell the story.

I picked up The Little Red Fishat the library a few weeks ago. It’s the story of JeJe who is finally old enough to accompany his grandfather, the librarian to the library. Which just happens to be in the middle of the woods (and for some reason, this makes it more exciting!). As he waits in the dark for his grandfather, he has an adventure (or maybe a dream or maybe both) of his little pet fish jumping through and into a book…with JeJe tumbling after him. It’s gorgeous and it absolutely sweeps you into the adventure with JeJe and his fish.

If I remember correctly, it was written by Tae-Eun Yoo as a final project for a masters program in design.  The illustrations are all black and white with only the fish and the book showing bright red. If you are a fellow bibliophile you will appreciate the vivid portrayal of how a book can captivate you!

Along those same color lines is The Red Book by Barbara Lehman. I just picked it up today because of the title. Oh yes, I always judge a book by it’s cover! This book has NO words. It’s the story of two little boys on opposite sides of the world who pick up the same book and when they open it up they see each other! One of the boys finally uses some balloons a la Up to visit his new friend. It’s such a fun story that again, shows the power of books!

Another one of my favorites is Good Night, Gorillaby Peggy Rathman. I think this is a staple on many children’s bookshelves but if you’ve never read it–you must! It’s a hilarioius story of a gorilla who sneaks  his animal friends out of the zoo to spend the night with the unsuspecting zookeeper…and his wife, who puts them all back safely in the zoo. My daughter loved this book the first time I read it to her and now loves to read it to her little brother. Both of them laugh and laugh at the sight of Mrs. Zookeeper waking to a roomful of animals. My favorite part is the little mouse toting his banana and the flyaway balloon seen on every page.

Do you have any favorite word-free books?

Linked to Adventures in Mommyhoods‘ Feed Me Books Friday hosted this week at our very own Vanessa’s Silly Eagle Books!