I’ve heard a lot of folks say that 2025 was an outstanding year for picture books, and it was, but I think that every year. Announcement day is coming soon, though, and there are some books we didn’t get to cover that we wanted to briefly acknowledge before the big day arrives.  

I’ll start with a personal favorite, Nunu and the Sea by Isabella Kung. Kung’s lively, expressive illustrations make beautiful use of color and line in a story about a child who loses her temper and is swept away on a sea of her own tears. The book evokes Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Where the Wild Things Are, influences that are present and purposeful without overwhelming the story, partly because Kung’s mixed-media illustrations have their own distinctive style. The combination of ambition and approachability in this book is impressive.  

Kitty and I discussed both Dragonflies of Glass: The Story of Clara Driscoll and the Tiffany Girls by Susan Goldman Rubin, illustrated by Susanna Chapman, and Making Light Bloom: Clara Driscoll and the Tiffany Lamps by Sandra Nickel, illustrated by Julie Paschkis. These excellent picture-book biographies tell the story of Driscoll, an artist who worked at Tiffany Studios, ultimately designing the iconic Tiffany dragonfly lamp. Driscoll’s story is fascinating and inspiring, and the illustrators of both these books have done excellent work. We aren’t sure either of the books will medal, but we agree that Paschkis’s ink and gouache illustrations that mimic the look of stained glass hit a lot of Caldecott notes: excellence of pictorial interpretation; appropriateness of style; delineation of theme, mood, and information.  

Kitty and I spent time, too, discussing the eligibility of two books from Tundra: one that we covered, Broken by X. Fang, and one we did not, Head Full of Clouds by Joanne Schwartz, illustrated by Afsaneh Sanei. Tundra is a Canadian publisher, which should make these ineligible, but the books are listed as being published through Tundra Books of Northern New York, which is in the US. However, according to the Caldecott Manual, unless the bulk of the editorial work happened in the US, these books would not be eligible. Personally, I doubt they are, but if the committee is serious about considering one or both of these books, they’d need to do research and work with the ALSC Office to determine eligibility. We had a couple of complicated eligibility questions back when I was on the Caldecott Committee, and it can take weeks and even months to track down the information the committee needs to be certain. That’s a lot of work to do on top of reading, rereading, and studying hundreds upon hundreds of picture books. 

The Caldecott could wind up going to a book we never even considered—that’s the fun of a new committee interpreting the criteria and making the selections each year. While it’s satisfying to correctly predict award winners, it’s exciting when committees recognize under-the-radar books and give us something surprising to read, think about, and enjoy.

Be sure to cast your votes to determine our mock Caldecott winner! The ballot goes live this Thursday, January 15, and closes Tuesday, January 20. We will post the results on Wednesday, January 21. To quote our tagline: “What can win? What should win? What will win?”