Predictions! NYT Best Illustrated Books 2024

Perhaps my favorite “Best of” list is the annual New York Times/New York Public Library Best Illustrated Children’s Books list. I like it so much that every year I try to predict the books that will make the cut. Last year I hit on one prediction (What can I say? It’s a tough list to call).

How will I fare this year? The official list should be out later this month. Here are the books that I think will be on that list.

Hello Day by Charlie Mylie

This book is sort of mesmerizing to me. The bold brushstrokes. The colors. The landscape trim size that feels like it can barely contain all the energy. This book about a father/son day in the city immediately jumped out.

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Loose Threads by Isol

The master is back with something wonderfully inventive up her sleeve. Combining drawing with textiles and embroidery, Isol makes a book that is stunning in both story and art.

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The Island Before No by Christina Uss, illustrated by Hudson Christie

Speaking of visually inventive, this book does things I’ve never seen before. Christie creates a digital three-dimensional world that looks like the Weebles mixed with 80’s Saturday morning cartoons.

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When You Find the Right Rock by Mary Lyn Ray, illustrated by Felicita Sala

Sala is no stranger to this list – she made it last year for As Night Falls. But if Sydney Smith has taught us anything, it’s that this list is happy to reward great work year after year. This beautiful book captures a magnificent, rock-filled day at the beach.

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Lost by Bob Staake

Wordless books are always going to grab the attention of committees that are looking for visual excellence. This wordless-picture-book-meets-comic tells the story without text, as Staake gets to let his sequential art storytelling skills shine.

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Pepper & Me by Beatrice Alemagna

The Best Illustrated list loves Beatrice Alemangna, and for good reason – her art manages to combine humor, playfulness, and pathos – sometimes in the same spread. This oddity is one of my favorites of the year, as a girl becomes pals with her scab.

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The Spaceman by Randy Cecil

Another thing that illustration aficionados love: art that subverts the text, telling “the real story”. This book, which follows a little alien exploring earth, does just that. The pictures, when matched with the straightforward account of an outsider exploring a new place, add humor, and make the reader feel like they know the truth of the situation.

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There Was a Shadow by Bruce Handy, illustrated by List Feng

As usual, it’s not a matter of if a book published by Enchanted Lion will make the best illustrated list, but which one? Or ones (Loose Threads is also an E.L. book). Shadows are one of those daily wonders that eventually become invisible to grown-up eyes. But not to kids. And this book reminds us of the magic they can contain.

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Still Life by Alex London, illustrated by Paul O. Zelinsky

What happens when a still life won’t stay still? Utter chaos, it would appear. Very few artists have the skills to pull off both painterly and comedic styles, but count Zelinsky among them.

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Being Home by Traci Sorell, illustrated by Michaela Goade

As you likely remember from her 2021 Caldecott Medal winning book We Are Water Protectors, no one can do etherial watercolors like Michaela Goade. Here she brings her beautiful artwork to a story about a young Cherokee girl moving to a new home.

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