12 of the Best New Children's Books Out October 2023

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Margaret Kingsbury grew up in a home so filled with books she couldn’t open a closet door and not using a guide stack tumbling, and he or she’s introduced that very same ornamental vitality to her grownup life. Margaret has an MA in English with a focus in writing and has labored as a bookseller and adjunct English professor. She’s presently a contract author and editor, and along with Book Riot, her items have appeared in School Library Journal, BuzzFeed News, The Lily, Parents, StarTrek.com, and extra. She significantly loves youngsters’s books, fantasy, science fiction, horror, graphic novels, and any books with disabled characters. You can learn extra about her bookish and parenting shenanigans in Book Riot’s twice-weekly The Kids Are All Right e-newsletter. You also can observe her kidlit bookstagram account @ChildLibrarians, or on Twitter @AReaderlyMom.

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It’s formally fall! October is my favourite month. I like the cooling climate and exquisite multicolored bushes, and it’s a fantastic month for each snuggling underneath blankets to learn and mountain climbing exterior with books in hand. Okay, perhaps most individuals don’t carry books on hikes, however I not often depart the home with out one. October additionally tends to be one of the largest new guide launch months of the 12 months, and there are some superb ones on this listing of October youngsters’s guide releases. I say it each month, however narrowing down my lengthy listing to 12 books is really agonizing!

Common themes for my October image guide launch picks are neighborhood and giving again to the Earth, with lovely new books by Jason Reynolds, Phùng Nguyên Quang, Dare Coulter, and extra. Transformation and alter are unintentional themes for my October center grade launch picks, with books about the challenges of shifting — each forcibly and by alternative — lovely fairytale retellings and searing dystopians. Authors embrace Amber McBride along with her first center grade novel, Jacqueline Woodson with one other highly effective center grade, and Pura Belpré Award winner Donna Barba Higuera with one other thought-provoking dystopia. You’re going to need to learn all of these October youngsters’s guide releases!

New Children’s Books October 2023: Picture Books

Cover of The Only Way to Make Bread by Quintero

The Only Way to Make Bread by Cristina Quintero & Sarah Gonzales (October 3; Tundra Books)

This joyful image guide for meals lovers instructs the reader on the right way to make all types of bread in direct, easy prose. The narrator tells the reader to start with a clear counter and a favourite bowl, and as the directions proceed, the recommendation turns into broader. The richly hued, heat illustrations depict households of all types making bread, and at the finish, all of them be part of collectively at bread-laden picnic tables exterior. Back matter consists of descriptions of the sorts of breads depicted in the guide, from challah to Canadian dinner buns to puri and extra. The writer additionally consists of recipes for arepas and pandesal. It’s a heartwarming image guide about neighborhood and meals.

Cover of Zora, the Story Keeper by Wilkins

Zora, the Story Keeper by Ebony Joy Wilkins & Dare Coulter (October 3; Kokila)

Have tissues helpful for this lovely image guide about grief that celebrates the considerable recollections of a Black household. Zora’s Aunt Bea is a storyteller, a former actress who loves performing household historical past for her niece. The two have a blast dressing up and remembering household tales. Aunt Bea has a guide the place she retains the household’s tales, and Zora is interested in what her story will probably be. When Aunt Bea will get sick, Zora is the one to inform her the tales, and when she passes away, Zora inherits the guide, and it’s as much as her and her uncle to inform Aunt Bea’s story in its pages. The mixed-media illustrations are gorgeous.

Cover of There Was a Party for Langston by Reynolds

There Was a Party for Langston by Jason Reynolds, Jerome Pumphrey & Jarrett Pumphrey (October 3; Atheneum/Caitlyn Dlouhy Books)

Join luminaries like Maya Angelou and Amiri Baraka in a celebration for wordsmith Langston Hughes on this jubilant image guide honoring his legacy by award-winning writer Jason Reynolds. The rhythmic story is a blast to learn aloud, not a lot a biography of the man however a biography of his phrases and the means his phrases might evoke emotion. The colourful and intelligent illustrations embed phrases and phrases into every scene: a mom’s physique composed of the letters in mom, Maya Angelou strolling up stairs made of phrases, and lights in an condominium constructing spelling “Harlem.” It’s a shocking image guide and an exquisite technique to introduce youngsters to Langston Hughes, although I think about all Langston Hughes readers will need this on their cabinets regardless of age.

Cover of Mnoomin Maan'gowing / The Gift of Mnoomin by Luby

Mnoomin Maan’gowing / The Gift of Mnoomin by Brittany Luby & Joshua Mangeshig Pawis-Steckley, translated by Mary Ann Corbiere (October 3; Groundwood Books)

This lovely Indigenous bilingual image guide is written in each English and Anishinaabemowin. It opens with a toddler holding a mnoomin seed, imagining every thing a seed remembers and experiences, from the moose uprooting crops to stop overcrowding to younger fish hiding from a heron behind seed sprouts. Halfway by, the story strikes again to the youngster and the means the youngster and neighborhood take care of the mnoomin seed and harvest, guaranteeing the interconnected ecosystem continues flourishing.

Place Hand Here by Katie Yamasaki (October 10; Norton Young Readers)

A younger boy has moved into an condominium constructing along with his grandmother after his mom’s incarceration. On the aspect of the constructing is a portray of a inexperienced coronary heart with a yellow hand in the center. When individuals contact the coronary heart, they keep in mind one thing that makes them comfortable. One neighbor remembers cooking dumplings and filling pink envelopes along with her sister. Classmates suppose of their father, who needed to journey to the South to work harvesting in fields. The boy loves studying different individuals’s tales, and when he’s lonely, he is aware of he can also contact the hand and keep in mind his mom, and know that she is going to come again sometime. This is a shocking, compassionate, and hopeful image guide a couple of matter that will get little protection in image books.

My Grandfather’s Song by Phùng Nguyên Quang & Huýnh Kim Liên (October 17; Make Me a World)

This lyrical and fantastically illustrated image guide is by the identical creators behind My First Day. When the grandfather left his dwelling, he discovered a brand new one in a good looking jungle the place he constructed a home and farmed the land. He’s now taught his grandson Tí the right way to take care of the land, hearken to its songs, and discover its presents. When the son grows up, he continues the custom of watching over the land and listening to its songs, and teaches his youngsters the right way to do the identical. Magical illustrations pair completely with the tender intergenerational story.

New Children’s Books October 2023: Middle Grade

Gone Wolf by Amber McBride (October 3; Feiwel & Friends)

McBride’s debut center grade is a piercing glimpse into the current and future for 2 younger Black ladies. In 2111, Inmate Eleven is introduced with a take a look at: which doll is extra lovely, the white, blonde doll or the doll with blue pores and skin like her personal? Inmate Eleven’s world is confined to a tiny cell she shares along with her canine, who’s changing into extra feral on daily basis, a sense she understands very properly. Meanwhile, in 2022, Imogen, who has an immune system dysfunction, grapples by poetry with life as a Black immunocompromised tween in a pandemic America. Between chapters are textbook excerpts about actual Black historical past. This is a robust center grade, one other one I’m including to my listing of award contenders for subsequent 12 months!

The Cricket War by Thọ Phạm & Sandra McTavish (October 3; Kids Can Press)

This slim, shifting center grade novel relies on the writer’s experiences. Eleven-year-old Thọ spends his days cricket combating and taking part in soccer along with his pals. But it’s 1980 in Vietnam, and he’s conscious that the Communist military might drive him and his brother into the army at any second. He’s already had pals disappear to flee this destiny. His mother and father purchase him and his brother a method of escape on a ferry, however the ferryman costs extra at the final minute, and solely Thọ’s brother is ready to depart with the ferry. Thọ flees one other means, however his journey is fraught with hazard. This is a compelling refugee story.

Alebrijes by Donna Barba Higuera (October 3; Levine Querido)

Thirteen-year-old Leandro and his youthful sister Gabi reside in a future dystopian California ravaged by local weather change and different disasters. As Spanish audio system descended from farmers, he and his sister are at the backside of a social caste system. Leandro has at all times dreamed of leaving the metropolis and exploring, however there may be little hope of that ever occurring. When his sister is caught stealing, Leandro takes the blame for her and is exiled by having his consciousness downloaded right into a hummingbird drone. Now, he can discover the world, however he’s left his sister in peril. This imaginative and fantastically rendered dystopian is by the writer of the award-winning center grade The Last Cuentista.

Cover of Curlfriends: New in Town by Miller

Curlfriends: New in Town by Sharee Miller (October 10; Little, Brown Ink)

This charming and really relatable center grade novel explores middle-school friendships and private identification. Charlie’s father has simply retired from the army, and he or she’s spent most of her life shifting, consistently having to begin over in a brand new place and make new pals. She’s by no means been excellent at making pals, however now that she and her household have lastly settled down and purchased a home, she’s decided to make impression. Things get off to a rocky begin when the janitor by accident spills water over her as he cleans the window on Charlie’s first day of faculty. Another woman involves her rescue, and Charlie is invited into her good friend group of three different Black ladies with curly hair. However, Charlie isn’t so certain about one of them, and he or she mistakenly thinks if she pretends to love every thing they do, they’ll like her higher. This plan positively backfires.

Remember Us by Jacqueline Woodson (October 10; Nancy Paulsen Books)

This spectacular historic center grade novel by Jacqueline Woodson takes place in Nineteen Seventies Brooklyn, New York, in an space generally known as Bushwick. It’s summer time, and Sage’s firefighter father has not too long ago died. Sage’s mom is writing a guide, and Sage roams the neighborhood, befriending a brand new boy named Freddy. Sage loves her neighborhood, however a string of fires leads the media to dub it the Matchbox, and her mom decides they’ll want to maneuver. Meanwhile, Sage struggles with native bullies who don’t suppose ladies needs to be taking part in basketball. She additionally doesn’t need to depart her neighborhood, her dwelling, though she will be able to see that the neighborhood is altering.

Cover of Stories of the Islands by Angkasa

Stories of the Islands by Clar Angkasa (October 31; Holiday House)

This is a beautiful assortment of three Indonesian fairytale retellings in a graphic novel format primarily based on tales the writer heard as a toddler. Clar retells them in a conventional means however with a feminist focus. In one, a egocentric princess’s sister curses her to reside life as a snail, however when a fisherwoman rescues her, she features a unique perspective on life. In one other story, two sisters take solace in the scarves their mom made them earlier than she died. But they know they’ll have to ultimately escape their abusive father if they will discover the braveness to take action. In the final story, an older lady unexpectedly turns into a mom after a large visits her and offers her a seed. She loves her daughter however is aware of the large will probably be again for her in the future. These attractive tales present how nonromantic love can change us, preserve us protected, and empower us. I’d like to learn much more retellings like this!

If you’d prefer to examine extra new youngsters’s guide releases past these October youngsters’s guide releases, take a look at my listing of July youngsters’s guide releases, August youngsters’s guide releases, and September youngsters’s guide releases. I evaluation extra in Book Riot’s The Kids Are All Right e-newsletter as properly.

You can discover a full listing of new releases in the magical New Release Index, rigorously curated by your favourite Book Riot editors, organized by style and launch date.

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12 of the Best New Children’s Books Out October 2023

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New Children’s Books October 2023: Picture Books

The Only Way to Make Bread by Cristina Quintero & Sarah Gonzales (October 3; Tundra Books)

Zora, the Story Keeper by Ebony Joy Wilkins & Dare Coulter (October 3; Kokila)

There Was a Party for Langston by Jason Reynolds, Jerome Pumphrey & Jarrett Pumphrey (October 3; Atheneum/Caitlyn Dlouhy Books)

Mnoomin Maan’gowing / The Gift of Mnoomin by Brittany Luby & Joshua Mangeshig Pawis-Steckley, translated by Mary Ann Corbiere (October 3; Groundwood Books)

Place Hand Here by Katie Yamasaki (October 10; Norton Young Readers)

My Grandfather’s Song by Phùng Nguyên Quang & Huýnh Kim Liên (October 17; Make Me a World)

New Children’s Books October 2023: Middle Grade

Gone Wolf by Amber McBride (October 3; Feiwel & Friends)

The Cricket War by Thọ Phạm & Sandra McTavish (October 3; Kids Can Press)

Alebrijes by Donna Barba Higuera (October 3; Levine Querido)

Curlfriends: New in Town by Sharee Miller (October 10; Little, Brown Ink)

Remember Us by Jacqueline Woodson (October 10; Nancy Paulsen Books)

Stories of the Islands by Clar Angkasa (October 31; Holiday House)

Recommended For You

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