What does the wind know? How will the wind blow? Follow along as three siblings discover the answers to these questions and much more in Micha Archer’s Wind Watchers. In Spring, Wind ruffles flower petals and nudges rain clouds. In Summer, Wind fills sails and sends kites soaring. “Some summer days, when it’s too hot to move, we beg Wind to bring us a breeze.” Fall brings Wind scattering seeds and leaves, before Winter arrives and Wind forces us inside to watch for swirling snow.

As with many of Archer’s previous picture books, Wind Watchers is deeply rooted in nature and how we interact with it. While the narrative follows the siblings on their explorations through the year, it is Wind who is truly the main character of this story. Wind comforts, plays, sings, surprises. “‘Some days I like to be WILD!’ Wind roars.” Some days, Wind is so calm that readers might wonder, alongside the siblings, “Are you there?” The lyrical text moves slowly and gracefully, with subtle uses of alliteration and snippets of dialogue between the children and the wind itself. Wind Watchers begs to be read aloud again and again.

Archer’s signature collage illustrations bring the adventures of these three siblings to life in a way only she can. Like in Wonder Walkers (2021), Archer’s use of full spreads for every illustration allows a sense of wonder and playfulness with scale. Whether an intimate close-up of the siblings looking through a window, or a zoomed out view of the siblings next to a vast ocean, each picture captures a distinct moment in time and carries feeling and wonderment.

A breathtaking journey through the seasons, Wind Watchers is a perfect companion to Wonder Walkers. Readers will be filled with joy and whimsy and be inspired to get outside, no matter the season, to explore and experience the wind once more!

The Gift of the Great Buffalo is a thrilling adventure story and an excellent history lesson about Métis-Ojibwe culture all wrapped up in one. The author of We Are the Water Protectors, Carole Lindstrom, who is Métis and an enrolled member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Ojibwe, explains in an author’s note that although she grew up enjoying Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House books, “being portrayed as a ‘savage’ in a book where I felt an actual kinship to Laura Ingalls was very difficult for me to understand. It felt as if I were being hurt by a friend.”

Lindstrom wrote The Gift of the Great Buffalo to let readers know that “before there was a little house on the prairie, there was a little tipi on the prairie.” The book follows Rose, a young Métis girl accompanying her family to a big gathering for a twice-a-year buffalo hunt. Readers will be fascinated to see how the group hunt is organized, with “strict laws that were enforced by the captains, to ensure order and fairness.” Lindstrom skillfully incorporates other historical context as well, noting that European settlers had already eliminated most of the buffalo.

Aly McKnight’s illustrations capture the close relationship between Rose and her family, the sense of community fostered by the hunt, and the excitement of the big gathering. She wonderfully depicts tangible objects, like a steam locomotive—an invention that hastened the demise of the buffalo—as well as the spiritual connections Rose and her family have to the land and the animals they hunt. In a moving spread, readers see Rose listening to the voice of the buffalo spirit as a giant herd grazes amidst the green prairie grasses.

When Rose’s father, who is a captain, and others have trouble finding buffalo, Rose takes matters into her own hands in a daring show of female empowerment. While the story is both compelling and satisfying, the actual hunt is not portrayed—which is understandable, although its omission feels somewhat glaring, with only a single line mentioning, “It was a good hunting day.” Overall, The Gift of the Great Buffalo offers a meaningful look at Métis-Ojibwe history, and will have broad appeal for young readers.

In the opening pages of Caldecott honoree (They All Saw a Cat) Brendan Wenzel’s radiant new picture book, Good Golden Sun, the sun’s rays just barely glint over the hilly horizon, tinting a deep purple night sky with the first shimmering roses and violets of dawn. A bee, still a shadowy silhouette in the early daylight, approaches a flower whose newly opened petals have been transformed to a luminous gold. The bee sips from the flower and . . . voila! It too has taken on the sun’s golden hue.

On subsequent pages, bee makes honey, bear eats honey, mosquito bites bear, bird eats mosquito, and on and on. As each takes on the sun’s golden glow, readers can visualize, in the most beautifully evocative way imaginable, the transfer of the sun’s energy to all of Earth’s living things, including, as the sun recedes into twilight, a young human.

Wenzel’s gorgeous artwork, rendered in cut paper and other mixed media, accompanies a series of questions posed by each character to the sun. These questions reflect particular concerns. For example, the mouse asks questions stemming from justified fears: “Good golden sun, / are you up there staying safe? / Do you think about the scary things that sometimes lie in wait?” On the other hand, the grain crops, baking under the midday sun, ask “Good golden sun, / could you take a tiny break? / For your rays are scorching hot / and so often there’s no shade.”

Good Golden Sun shows it’s possible to integrate STEM topics in an age-appropriate way that doesn’t sacrifice lyrical language, discussion-sparking philosophical questions, gorgeous artwork or moments of humor (young listeners will giggle to see how energy is transferred from the fox to the earthworms and plants). This is a joyful ode to the Earth’s interdependence, one that grows alongside readers.

The adorably precocious star of Every Monday Mabel is the opposite of famously cranky cartoon cat Garfield: She loves Mondays. In fact, she thinks, “Monday is the best day of the week.”

As Jashar Awan conveys via punchy, vivid art and wryly humorous text, Mabel’s Mondays have a ritual. She rises early, dresses, drags her chair through the house—stopping only to get herself a bowl of Cocoa Os—and sets up shop at “the top of the driveway. The perfect spot to sit and wait.” Suspense builds as Awan traces Mabel’s path through the family home: Where is she going? Why does she need a chair? And what’s got her so focused and determined?

Mabel’s parents and sister engage in their own morning rituals, too. Older sister Mira reads and listens to music as she rolls her eyes at Mabel doing “the most boring thing.” Plant-loving Mom waters an indoor tree and smiles as Mabel “does the cutest thing.” And sports-jersey-clad Dad drinks coffee as he watches her do “the funniest thing.”

Mabel steadily eats her big bowl of chocolate cereal until, at long last, the object of her admiration appears, with a “RRRRRRRRRRRRR!” and a “HONK HONK!”: the glorious garbage truck. It’s big and bright and loud, and makes trash disappear. What’s not to like? She marvels at the green behemoth’s impressive attributes (“The hubcaps shine! The engine roars! The brakes squeak! The lights flash!”) as a bright, sunny yellow background heightens five wonderful pages of intense excitement.

Awan, the creator of Towed By Toad and several other picture books celebrating childlike exuberance, uses a high-contrast palette, fuchsia action lines and skillfully employed onomatopoeia to create eye-catching visuals and fodder for fun read-alouds.Sure to be a favorite reread for kids and grown-ups alike, Every Monday Mabel is an enthusiastic, delightful tribute to community helpers and the many, many people who value and appreciate them. “GAH-DUMP!”