Shaun Tan’s brilliance as an artist and storyteller is on full display in this illustrated work of fiction. Hometown has a straightforward construct: a visual tour of a girl’s hometown as she sees it. But while the meaning of home and belonging might be universal, this place is utterly unique and unforgettable.
2026 books
Suffer a Witch: A Memoir
Author and playwright Joy McCullough recounts her experience of the abuse she endured by her youth pastor in the church led by her father, the senior pastor, when she was a 15-, 16-, and 17-year-old girl. McCullough’s memories are told chronologically through raw, sharp poems. Her precise, insightful, and informative writing is a masterpiece in verse. Yet the reckoning of her truth, brilliantly executed, is also a horrifying marvel of power and pain.
The Unlikely Tale of Chase and Finnegan
An unlikely pair of animals finds healing, companionship, and courage in this touching novel inspired by a real-life animal-rehabilitation program. Chase, a baby cheetah, is devastated when her mother dies during a visit to the veterinarian at the zoo where she was rehabilitated after being injured in the wild.
The Faraway Forest: Hester’s Big Dream
Finding friends can be challenging when everyone seems to be out and about during the day while you follow a nocturnal schedule. Night owl Hester keeps busy with cake decorating, living-room exercise routines, work on her novel, and sewing projects, but sometimes she’s “a bit lonely.” So Hester concocts a plan to stay awake until the sun rises, when she’ll go out and meet others.
Navigating Night
Inspired by Leung’s own childhood, this story centers on a Chinese American girl who helps her father, Baba, deliver the takeout orders from their family’s Chinese restaurant. In a time before smartphones and GPS, the girl uses a notebook of addresses and a foldout map spread across her lap to navigate. On one rainy night, their dynamic plays out in a variety of impactful ways.
Holloway
Following her mom’s death from Covid, an illness for which her mom staunchly refused a vaccine and treatment, Nora (white) travels to France to scatter her mom’s ashes at the site of their favorite painting: Seurat’s A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. Disappointed by the park’s current appearance, Nora decides to travel instead to Lascaux but goes a bit further than she planned: Passing through a holloway in the trees, she finds herself in the year 1946.
Sherlock Roach and the Case of the Crunchy Crumb
Famous bug detective Sherlock Roach and his trusty sidekick, Dr. Wormston, are reading the newspaper in their dapper duds (bowtie and deerstalker hat for Sherlock, waistcoat and bowler for Wormston) when there’s a knock at the door. Lucille the Ladybug has been robbed!
A Scar Like a River
Thirteen-year-old Fallon (white) has three secrets. She’s shared one of them—about who gave her the scar across her face—with her best friend. But when Fallon’s uncle Geebie dies, the trauma from her past resurfaces.
Black Hands: Builders of Our Nation
Weatherford traces the impact of Black effort and achievement on U.S. history and culture in this powerful picture book utilizing the refrain “Black hands.”
Bad Badger: A Family Story
Beloved badger Septimus is back for another adventure. In this sequel to Bad Badger: A Love Story, Septimus is co-parenting three downy seagull hatchlings with Gully, who is often at the seashore fishing for meals for the ever-hungry chicks. Septimus’s curated and comfortable home life is barely a memory as he busily tends the needy babies.