Kate Banks, Author . FSG/Foster $16 (160p) ISBN 978-0-374-31786-7
The title character of Banks's (The Night Worker) somewhat mannered first novel cannot understand how his "smart" and "nice" parents could have given him a first name that is the same as his last. But even though he "could...
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Kate Banks, Author . FSG/Foster $16 (160p) ISBN 978-0-374-38230-8
Banks's (Dillon, Dillon) mesmerizing prose draws readers into the world of 14-year-old Rachel as she struggles to understand the repercussions of a family tragedy. It has been seven years since her older brother, Jake, died at age 17, but only...
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Kate Banks, Author . FSG/Sunburst $5.95 (160p) ISBN 978-0-374-41715-4
When the title character wonders how his parents could have given him a first name that is the same as his last, he embarks on a journey of self-discovery. PW
wrote, "While many readers may react more to the slow pacing than to the poetics,...
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Kate Banks, Author Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers $12.95 (24p) ISBN 978-0-394-89151-4
Banks's story begins with a typical dinnertime predicamenta boy will not eat his soup. His mother notes that he is as grumpy as a bear, and so the boy fishes out the letters spelling ``bear'' from his alphabet soup. With that, he has a companion (loo
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Kate Banks, Author . FSG/Foster $16 (152p) ISBN 978-0-374-34575-4
This exceptional portrait starts out like a variation on Louis Sachar’s inimitable There’s a Boy in the Girls’ Bathroom
: the protagonist, nine-year-old Lenny, has exasperated teacher after teacher, his principal and his single...
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Kate Banks, illus. by Peter Sís. FSG/Foster, $16.99 (224p) ISBN 978-0-374-34716-1
Banks’s (This Baby) allegorical fable stands out in this genre for its understated tone and lack of pretension. Sixteen-year-old Baz, a realistic mix of fearful and brave, accepts an unknown visitor’s invitation to leave his village and become a...
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Kate Banks, Author, Tomek Bogacki, Author, Tomek Bogacki, Illustrator Farrar Straus Giroux $16 (32p) ISBN 978-0-374-30729-5
Delicate, dense color and a mannered geometric layout politely call for attention in this rebus picture book by Banks (And If the Moon Could Talk) and Bogacki (Cat and Mouse). Small squares, like softly drawn computer icons, neatly contain symbols...
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Kate Banks, illus. by Lauren Castillo. FSG/Foster, $17.99 (48p) ISBN 978-0-374-31321-0
Banks’s verse sees some of the great cities of Europe through the travels of an independent black cat. Making her way by cat, boat, bike, and bus, City Cat romps through the Coliseum, nestles under one of Notre Dame’s gargoyles, and pads across the...
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Kate Banks, Author, Boris Kulikov, Illustrator , illus. by Boris Kulikov. FSG/Foster $16.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-374-39920-7
Banks and Kulikov's (Max's Words
) latest collaboration stars three plucky pencil-top erasers—a green crocodile, blue owl, and pink pig—who work conscientiously to erase the mistakes of their owner, a dark-haired schoolboy....
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Kate Banks, illus. by Boris Kulikov. FSG/Foster, $17.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-374-34875-5
Although mathematics is front and center in this follow-up to Max’s Words and Max’s Castle, the clever wordplay of the previous books remains on display as Max and his brothers set off “looking for problems” to solve. Their journey takes them to...
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Kate Banks, illus. by Boris Kulikov. FSG/Foster, $16.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-374-39919-1
Imaginative Max, who first appeared in Max’s Words, discovers that a whole new world can unfold from one simple discovery—in this case, a wooden letter block. Using more blocks, Max builds an enormous castle. Max and his two brothers enact a kind of
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Kate Banks, Author, Boris Kulikov, Illustrator , illus. by Boris Kulikov. FSG/Foster $16 (32p) ISBN 978-0-374-39949-8
Both clever and funny, Banks's (And if the Moon Could Talk
) inventive picture book features literal and rambunctious word play. Max's brothers, Benjamin and Karl, each have impressive collections (stamps and coins, respectively). They laugh
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Kate Banks, Author, Peter Sis, Illustrator Dragonfly Books $6.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-679-86723-4
A boy with a vivid imagination turns lunchtime into an occasion for splendiferous adventures. Ages 3-7. (Sept.)
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Kate Banks, Author, Georg Hallensleben, Illustrator , illus. by Georg Hallensleben. FSG/Sunburst $6.95 (32p) ISBN 978-0-374-40473-4
"A naïve young baboon, just discovering his world, extrapolates from every encounter in this quasi-metaphysical tale," said PW
. "The expansive, meltingly blended paintings create a magnificent setting." Ages 3-6. (Mar.)
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Kate Banks, Author, Georg Hallensleben, Illustrator , illus. by Georg Hallensleben. FSG/Foster $16 (40p) ISBN 978-0-374-31382-1
Banks and Hallensleben further develop the bedtime theme of And If the Moon Could Talk
and The Night Worker, this time with the antics of a restless tiger cub. On a sunny midafternoon in a tropical forest, a mother tiger persuades her son to take a
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Kate Banks, illus. by Georg Hallensleben. FSG/Foster, $16.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-374-30591-8
In an extraordinary portrait of the tender, meandering, and inquisitive nature of reading together, a boy and his mother read a book about a hibernating bear, turning the pages slowly and commenting on the illustrations—it’s clearly an old favorite.
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Kate Banks, Author, Georg Hallensleben, Illustrator , illus. by Georg Hallensleben. FSG/Foster $16 (40p) ISBN 978-0-374-39968-9
In this sympathetic tale, a dislocated gray cat migrates from Rouen to St.-Tropez. (A back-cover map of France shows the traveler's zigzag itinerary.) Originally, the cat lives in southern France with his owner: "The old woman would scratch...
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Kate Banks, Author, Georg Hallensleben, Illustrator , illus. by Georg Hallensleben. FSG/Foster $16 (40p) ISBN 978-0-374-32769-9
In books such as The Night Worker
and The Cat Who Walked Across France
, Banks and Hallensleben draw attention to small details and things that happen while people are sleeping or distracted. This gentle book visits a spacious, robin's egg–
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Kate Banks, Author, Georg Hallensleben, Illustrator Farrar Straus Giroux $16 (40p) ISBN 978-0-374-35520-3
Banks and Hallensleben, whose And If the Moon Could Talk prepared children for a calm night's sleep, stay up long past bedtime in this absorbing after-hours expos . Unlike Eileen Spinelli and Melissa Iwai's Night Shift Daddy (Children's Forecasts,...
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Kate Banks, Author, Georg Hallensleben, Illustrator Farrar Straus Giroux $15 (32p) ISBN 978-0-374-30299-3
With quiet phrases and luxurious color, Banks and Hallensleben (Baboon) evoke a perfectly peaceful bedtime. In a stuccoed house, amid tranquil lakes and orderly rows of trees, a girl plays with stuffed animals and listens to a story read by her...
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In this disarming reflection on permanence, the creators of And If the Moon Could Talk
find the sublime in an ordinary stone. They begin in the present, as a boy finds a reddish, potato-shaped rock on an ochre beach. The scene then shifts to...
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Kate Banks, Author, Georg Hallensleben, Illustrator , illus. by Georg Hallensleben. FSG/Foster $15.99 (34p) ISBN 978-0-374-39948-1
The smudgy lines of Hallensleben's soft-focus acrylics capture the tranquillity of a snowy day in a semirural setting, while Banks's text reads like a lullaby, as “something” approaches in the days leading up to Christmas....
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Kate Banks, Author, Georg Hallensleben, Illustrator , illus. by Georg Hallensleben. FSG/Sunburst $5.95 (32p) ISBN 978-0-374-43558-5
PW
wrote in a starred review, "As night gently envelops the landscapes, the words and art convey the snug warmth of a featherbed and a world as small as a neighborhood." Ages 3-5. (Mar.)
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Kate Banks, Author, Georg Hallensleben, Illustrator , illus. by Georg Hallensleben. FSG/Foster $16 (40p) ISBN 978-0-374-39967-2
Frequent collaborators Banks and Hallensleben compose an appealing, idealized story of a young fox eager for independence. As the seasons shift, the kit's watchful parents teach him how to survive in the wild. Although this is a forest tale,...
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Kate Banks, Author, Georg Hallensleben, Illustrator, Georg Hallensleben, Photographer Farrar Straus Giroux $14 (28p) ISBN 978-0-374-30474-4
A naive young baboon, just discovering his world, extrapolates from every encounter in this quasi-metaphysical tale first published in France. When Baboon comes upon a tortoise, he remarks to his mother, ""The world is slow."" Later, a fleet-footed...
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Kate Banks, Author, Isaac Millman, Illustrator Farrar Straus Giroux $15 (96p) ISBN 978-0-374-33500-7
Banks's (And If the Moon Could Talk; Spider Spider) slim chapter book introduces eight-year-old Howie, who feels nervous about starting a new school in the middle of his third-grade year. When, after the first day, the boy has trouble making friends,
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Kate Banks, Author, Tomek Bogacki, Illustrator Farrar Straus Giroux $16.5 (32p) ISBN 978-0-374-37885-1
Afraid of the Hippo in the middle, Turtle enlists a flock of friends to help her cross the river. But it's the most unlikely ally that eventually gets Turtle to the other side in The Turtle and the Hippopotamus, a rebus book companion to The Bird,
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Kate Banks, Author, Tomek Bogacki, Illustrator , illus. by Tomek Bogacki. FSG/Sunburst $6.95 (32p) ISBN 978-0-374-40658-5
Three unlikely animals share the same tree as their jungle home until, as a group, they set out to separate. In a starred review, PW
called this rebus-style picture book "an aesthetically pleasing introductory study in grammar, jungle life...
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Kate Banks, Author, Tomek Bogacki, Illustrator , illus. by Tomek Bogacki. FSG/Foster $16 (32p) ISBN 978-0-374-34747-5
This window into the parallel domestic and working worlds of two busy parents provides an upbeat look at contemporary life. As Mama closes up her pet shop and makes her way home through the hectic city, navigating the subway and storm-drenched...
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Kate Banks, illus. by Gabi Swiatkowska. FSG/Foster, $16.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-374-37514-0
A girl's questions about the baby growing inside her mother fall naturally into poetry, whose hand-lettered lines curl and twine through Swiatkowska's haunting paintings. "This baby,/ twisting, dipping/ kicking Mama's ribs./ Will this baby like the...
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Kate Banks, illus. by Gabi Swiatkowska. FSG/Foster, $16.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-374-36002-3
Alice has dark ringlets and dainty shoes, and she's learning to say please. "Mama, give me the pig," she orders. "Say please," Mama reminds her, then gives her the pig and some chickens so Alice (who also recently starred in Thank You, Mama) can...
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Kate Banks, illus. by Simone Shin. Random/Schwartz & Wade, $17.99 (40p) ISBN 978-1-101-94049-5
The brown-haired, light-skinned boy in this poem by Banks (How to Find an Elephant) has a parent who understands that shifting from raucous play to naptime isn’t easy. To help, the mother gives her child a bag of quiet-time amusements: “He makes a...
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Kate Banks, illus. by Naoko Stoop. Random/Schwartz & Wade, $17.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-399-55409-4
Discovered by a polar bear, an accidentally abandoned wolf cub flattens his ears against his head in fear, declares, “You are not my mother,” and expects the worst. “Aren’t you going to eat me?” he asks. But the polar bear, for reasons never...
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Kate Banks, illus. by Boris Kulikov. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $16.99 (32p) ISBN 978-0-374-33508-3
It’s a gray and slightly rainy day—what better time to go looking for an elephant? The pith-helmeted backyard explorer
created by longtime collaborators Banks and Kulikov (the Max series) doesn’t encounter his quarry until the final pages, but the...
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Kate Banks, illus. by John Rocco. Candlewick, $16.99 (40p) ISBN 978-0-7636-7484-7
Banks (Pup and Bear) sets her retelling of the biblical story of Noah’s ark in a garden behind a block of brick homes and casts a brown-skinned boy in the ark builder’s role. When Noah’s father starts boarding up windows ahead of a powerful storm (“I
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