Before we announce them, we're going to tease you a bit by showing you just how many books made it into our "Book of the Week" slot this year. We had to double up quite often, as there were just too many great books to choose from. 72 books were considered a cut above the rest in 2015 but there were so many others that could easily have slid into the slot too (in fact it's equally hard to pick book of the week winners let alone book of the year ones!)
So here's the full month by month list!
January
Rebel Science (Templar)
Goth Girl and the Fete Worse than Death (HarperCollins)
Never Tickle a Tiger (Bloomsbury)
Katie and the Starry Night (Orchard Books)
Big Pet Day (Templar)
February
The Really Gross Body Book (Templar Publishing)
Alfie and Grandma (Red Fox Picture Books)
Robopop (Maverick Publishing)
Pirates of Pangaea Book 1 (David Fickling Books)
March
Very Little Cinderella (Random House)
The Great Big Book of Families (Frances Lincoln Children’s Books)
The Underwater Fancy Dress Parade (Scribe)
That Rabbit Belongs to Emily Brown (Hodder Children’s Books)
Missing Jack (Lion Hudson)
April
The Giant of Jum (Macmillan Children’s Books)
Fuzz McFlops (Pushkin Children’s Books)
The Hog the Shrew and the Hullabaloo (Faber and Faber)
Rosie Revere Engineer (Chronicle Children’s Books)
Tales of Fayt - The Mystery of the Crooked Imp (David Fickling Books)
May
Troy Trailblazer and the Horde Queen (Troy Trailblazer Book 1) (David Fickling Books)
Azzi In Between (Frances Lincoln Children’s Books)
Poppy Pickle (Templar Publishing)
Iggy Peck Architect (Chronicle)
The Strongest Boy in the World (Frances Lincoln Children’s Books)
Where oh Where is Rosie’s Chick? (Hodder Children’s Books)
June
The Fire Children (Frances Lincoln Children’s Books)
Sir Lilypad (Simon and Schuster)
The Little Gardener (Flying Eye Books)
Grumbug (Templar Publishing)
July
Lovely Old Lion (Andersen Children’s Books)
One Hundred Bones (Templar Publishing)
How to be a Dog (Scholastic)
Little Kunoichi the Ninja Girl (Sasquatch Books)
There’s a Lion in my Cornflakes (Bloomsbury)
William Heads to Hollywood (Templar Publishing)
Grandad’s Island (Simon and Schuster)
Max (Templar Publishing)
August
The Official Astronauts Handbook (Usborne)
Corpse Talk Season 2 (David Fickling Books)
Jill and Dragon (Tate Publishing)
The Princess and the Pony (Walker Books)
The Marvellous Fluffy Squishy Itty Bitty (Thames and Hudson)
I’m a Girl (Bloomsbury)
September
Imelda and the Goblin King (Flying Eye Books)
The Red Shoes and Other Tales (Papercutz)
How to Catch a Mouse (Walker)
Fashion Rebel Outfit Maker (Thames and Hudson)
Book O’ Masks (Curious Fox)
Historium (Big Picture Press)
The Whale (Big Picture Press)
Greenling (Templar)
October
The Art of Wreck-It Ralph (Chronicle)
Finding Winnie (Orchard Books)
Tough Guys have Feelings Too (Flying Eye Books)
Leo: A Ghost Story (Chronicle)
Harry Potter - The Character Vault (Titan Books)
The Art of Hotel Transylvania 2 (Titan Books)
The Queen’s Handbag (Hodder Children’s Books)
Flo of the Somme (Strauss House)
Evil Emperor Penguin Book 1 (David Fickling Books)
Interstellar Cinderella (Chronicle)
November
Legendary (Weldon Owen)
Stina (V & A Publishing)
Shackleton’s Journey Activity Book (Flying Eye Books)
Julius Zebra (Walker Books)
Lady Pancake and Sir French Toast (Sterling)
Warren the 13th and the All Seeing Eye (Quirk)
The Usborne Big Book of Rockets and Spacecraft (Usborne)
Claude Doodle Book (Hodder Children’s Books)
December
Home Alone (Quirk Books)
Santa Baby (Bloomsbury)
Stick Man (Scholastic)
Charlotte's Book of the Year 2015 - "Evil Emperor Penguin Book 1" by Laura Ellen Anderson (David Fickling Books).
A no-brainer this one for Charlotte, ever since the collected Phoenix stories have been released, this was the one she was rooting for the most - and this was the one that caused a genuine "WHOOP" of excitement when it arrived. Charlotte loves EEP - and though she has a very soft spot for Eugene she secretly loves the whole cast including old grumpy-drawers EEP himself. People will tell you that they love books that make their kids snort with laughter, we love this purely because you get great big loud guffaws a-plenty. We can't wait for EEP's return to The Phoenix and perhaps if we're lucky a collected Volume 2 of stories including "That Christmas Special That Nearly Made Us Cry" (you know the one!).
Congratulations Laura and the fabulous Phoenix team!
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| Charlotte's Book of the Year 2015! "Evil Emperor Penguin Volume 1" by Laura Ellen Anderson (David Fickling Books) |
A no-brainer this one for Charlotte, ever since the collected Phoenix stories have been released, this was the one she was rooting for the most - and this was the one that caused a genuine "WHOOP" of excitement when it arrived. Charlotte loves EEP - and though she has a very soft spot for Eugene she secretly loves the whole cast including old grumpy-drawers EEP himself. People will tell you that they love books that make their kids snort with laughter, we love this purely because you get great big loud guffaws a-plenty. We can't wait for EEP's return to The Phoenix and perhaps if we're lucky a collected Volume 2 of stories including "That Christmas Special That Nearly Made Us Cry" (you know the one!).
Congratulations Laura and the fabulous Phoenix team!
Daddy's Book of the Year 2015 - "The Princess and the Pony" by Kate Beaton (Walker Books)
Sassy female characters always win us over, but none more so this year than Kate Beaton's superb creation, the tiny warrior princess in "The Princess and the Pony" and of course her Gary-Fisher-Esque pony with a penchant for looking vacant and farting a lot. It's the sort of book that we return to again and again, purely because of the comedic nuances and hilarious observations that Kate is renowned for on her superb "Hark, A Vagrant" blog - and of course here in her first (but hopefully not her last) children's picture book. Utterly brilliant in every way. If your little girl (like mine) would rather fire spitballs at nasty stinky barbarians in a warrior's arena than paint her toenails pink, she's going to love this book to bits!
Congratulations to Kate and Walker Books!
We hope you like our Book of the Year choices and will join us in 2016. We're taking a bit of a well earned break but not for long, catch up with us V soon!
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| "The Princess and the Pony" by Kate Beaton. Daddy's Book of the Year 2015! |
Sassy female characters always win us over, but none more so this year than Kate Beaton's superb creation, the tiny warrior princess in "The Princess and the Pony" and of course her Gary-Fisher-Esque pony with a penchant for looking vacant and farting a lot. It's the sort of book that we return to again and again, purely because of the comedic nuances and hilarious observations that Kate is renowned for on her superb "Hark, A Vagrant" blog - and of course here in her first (but hopefully not her last) children's picture book. Utterly brilliant in every way. If your little girl (like mine) would rather fire spitballs at nasty stinky barbarians in a warrior's arena than paint her toenails pink, she's going to love this book to bits!
Congratulations to Kate and Walker Books!
We hope you like our Book of the Year choices and will join us in 2016. We're taking a bit of a well earned break but not for long, catch up with us V soon!