Good Books for Young Car Lovers

I love to hang out in libraries and book stores and look at as many books as I can carry. Surrounding myself with books makes me feel both calm and excited for a new adventure. Today my daughter's 2nd grade class walked to the public library for a field trip and I got to tag along and help the kids find books to check out. Two kids wanted books on lizards and another kid wanted a Tin Tin book. Having checked out almost all of the lizard books and Tin Tins with my kids, I knew exactly where to look. And I found the Eyewitness Car book with a Mercedes 300SL Gullwing on the cover which got me thinking about car books for kids. My short suggestion list follows.



Here are a few books that I found this morning that will likely appeal to your young car & truck enthusiast. Please share your favorites in the comments section. Happy Reading!

• Richard Scarry's Cars and Trucks & Things that Go and Going Places - Two favorites from my childhood. I can easily take two hours to look at the illustrations and search for little Gold Bug.

• Jon Scieszka's Trucktown SMASH! CRASH! - Great illustrations by David Shannon, Loren Long, and David Gordon. 

• NASCAR ABCs by Paul DuBois Jacobs & Jennifer Swender with illustrations by Aaron Zenz - Fun for NASCAR fans & their kids with a helpful glossary of terms in the back. Might be a good reference book to have on hand when watching NASCAR races or Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby.

• Little Blue Truck by Alice Schertle & illustrated by Jill McElmurry - Good for the truck and farm animal lover.

• Cars: Rushing! Honking! Zooming! by Patricia Hubbell and illustrated by Megan Halsey & Sean Addy - Fun rhymes and illustrations that make you laugh and incorporate vintage clip-art and collage. This author and illustrator team also put out Trucks: Whizz! Zoom! Rumble! and Trains: Steaming! Puffing! Huffing!.

• If I Built a Car by Chris Van Dusen has been one of our favorites at home since it came out in 2007. Every time we read it (which we still do even though the kids are 7 and 11), the kids run for blank paper and design some great vehicles that will take you from here to there while making you breakfast, or cleaning the kitchen and folding laundry. (Sounds like the kids might actually be listening to my To Do lists...)

• Our family loves the adventures of Mercy Watson by Kate DiCamillo with fantastic illustrations by Chris Van Dusen. Mercy Watson Goes for a Ride shows off Mr. Watson's beautiful pink Cadillac. (When reading these books to my kids, my Minnesota accent takes over. And I crave toasted white bread with lots of butter.) (For photos of Mr. Watson's pink car, check out Kate DiCamillo's website where you can read the first chapter and see the Cadillac: http://www.katedicamillo.com/books/mercy2.html.

Today the librarian read two books that we all loved: The True Story of the Three Little Pigs by Jon Scieszka (which got the kids thinking about the other side of the pig story, but they were still skeptical). She also read It's a Book by Lane Smith - a great book for our electronic whiz kids and a good reminder for all of us to unplug and read. 

Photos by Erika Fish.

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