Five questions for Hyewon Yum
A Spoonful of the Sea by Hyewon Yum; Norton.

Tasty traditions
A Season for Fishin’: A Fish Fry Tradition by Pamela Courtney, illus. by Toni D. Chambers; Farrar. 
Tea Is Love by Adib Khorram illus. by Hanna Cha; Dial. 
Soy Sauce! by Laura G. Lee; Algonquin. 
Every Peach Is a Story by David Mas Masumoto and Nikiko Masumoto, illus. by Lauren Tamaki; Cameron/Abrams. 
Hilwa’s Gifts by Safa Suleiman, illus. by Anait Semirdzhyan; Candlewick.
Picking Tea with Baba by Xu Bin, illus. by Yu Yin, trans. from Chinese by Shan Chen; Charlesbridge.

Adventure awaits!
Billions to Burn by Taylor Banks; de la Cruz/Disney-Hyperion.
Kid X by Tracey Baptiste; Little, Brown.
Abeni and the Kingdom of Gold by P. Djèlí Clark; Starscape/Tor.  
Candace, the Universe, and Everything by Sherri L. Smith; Putnam.

Family and resilience
Butterfly Heart by Moa Backe Åstot, trans. from Swedish by Agnes Broomé; Levine/Levine Querido.
Spark by Chris Baron; Feiwel. 
Leave It on the Track by Margot Fisher; Dutton. 
The Family I’m In by Sharon G. Flake; Scholastic.
13 Ways to Say Goodbye by Kate Fussner; Harper/HarperCollins.
A Scar like a River by Lisa Graff; Ottaviano/Little, Brown.  
Lilac and the Switchback by Cordelia Jensen; Holiday.
We Fell Apart: A We Were Liars Novel by E. Lockhart; Delacorte.    

From the January 2026 issue of Notes from the Horn Book.