Agnes Aubert’s Mystical Cat Shelter

by Heather Fawcett

Del Rey, 2026. 353 pages.
Review written April 14, 2026, from my own copy purchased via Amazon.com.
Starred Review

I love Heather Fawcett’s Emily Wilde books so much, that when I saw she had a new cozy fantasy novel coming out, I preordered my own copy. Sure, I can read the library’s book, but this is going to be a favorite I’ll want to come back to.

As with Emily Wilde, Agnes Aubert is an ordinary woman – but also very competent and single-minded – who encounters a man who is not quite human.

Agnes is a widow who runs a cat shelter with her sister in 1920s alternate-reality Montreal – but the shop she was renting to run her shelter was recently completely destroyed by two irresponsible magicians having a duel. She looks all over the city for somewhere to move her cats, but everywhere she looks is either too expensive or won’t allow so many cats.

So when a shop in an upscale part of town eagerly signs her up at a reasonable price, she does wonder what’s up. But she’s too desperate for her cats to have a roof over their heads to hesitate for long. But when it turns out that the most notorious magician in the world – the Witch King himself – is running a magic shop in the basement, she’s a bit alarmed.

It turns out the Witch King is socially awkward and allergic to cats. But even he can’t keep a determined cat out of his rooms. And his sister – also a powerful magician – wants a powerful artefact she says he has.

Well, Agnes is not surprised he can’t find it – his rooms are a disorganized mess! That’s something she can fix. And then maybe these magicians will get out of her life.

With all the cats plus many mentions of good food (from the enchanted oven), “cozy fantasy” is the perfect description of this book, solidifying my conviction that it’s my new favorite genre. This one will make you smile. I hope it’s only the beginning of another series.

heatherfawcett.com
heatherfawcett.substack.com
randomhousebooks.com

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The Brightness Between Us

by Eliot Schrefer
read by James Fouhey

HarperCollins, 2024. 11 hours, 3 minutes.
Review written February 8, 2025, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review

The Brightness Between Us is a sequel to The Darkness Outside Us – and it’s very much a sequel. Don’t read the second without reading the first. The good news is that both are outstanding. I was lucky that I didn’t start the first until after the second was out, so the only waiting I did was for my hold to come in.

This book begins on a distant planet with Ambrose and Kodiak, the universe’s last two surviving humans – and now two children, Owl and Yarrow, who were born from zygotes sent across the galaxy in their ship. Yarrow turns sixteen at the start of the book, and Owl will reach that age soon. So far, they are the only children to survive out of many attempts.

Our fledgling human settlement is up against two major challenges in this book. First, external to them, is the fact that the planet where they live is prone to comet strikes. They need to make a bunker before the next one strikes. The second one is more personal to them. Yarrow has undergone a strange personality change since his sixteenth birthday. He’s getting intrusive thoughts about killing all his loved ones.

And then a beacon appears – falling from space – with lights specifically telling Ambrose and Kodiak to find it. Well, it lands somewhere out in the unexplored part of the planet, where Owl has been hoping to explore anyway.

And after the beacon appears, the narration takes us back to earth many thousand years in the past – to the original Ambrose and Kodiak shortly after they learned that their supposed mission to Titan was a ruse.

And in the process of going back and forth between the two time periods, we learn more about the original twosome (and I love that they ended up meeting each other and together trying to escape capture). But we also learn that there is a reason for some of the troubles of the colony – and why the beacon got sent to try to fix them.

Now, the whole thing about the sabotage – that was the first place in this whole saga where the science got hard for me to believe. Let me just say I’m skeptical about that whole part. And I also wasn’t thrilled to go back to the younger, more hedonistic and immature Ambrose character. But once I got past those things, it was good to again watch Ambrose and Kodiak learning to work together. And the situation certainly gave the characters on the planet challenges to overcome together.

And honestly, by the time the book was past about the halfway point, I found myself looking for more excuses to listen. These characters – in all their iterations – have firmly found a place in my heart.

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While We’re Here

written by Anne Wynter
illustrated by Micha Archer

Clarion Books, 2026. 32 pages.
Review written April 28, 2026, from a library book.
Starred Review

I was completely captivated by this picture book from my first reading – and find myself happily reading it over and over.

First, the artwork is colorful and beautiful. It’s done with collage papers, so everything from the tree trunks to the grass in the park has subtle patterns. Especially highlighted are the red tops and colorful skirts of our featured characters – a Black mother and her young daughter, all dressed up for a party.

In almost the first half of the book, all the spreads begin with the words “Hurry, Hurry.” And several of them end with “We have somewhere to be!” We see the mother is the one doing the hurrying – getting jackets zipped, out the door, on the train, through the park. The little girl, as little girls do, pays attention to the things she sees along the way

But when they get where they’re going – a picnic bench on a hill beside two trees, there are no words except for a HAPPY BIRTHDAY banner. There are some cups left on the picnic table and colored wrapping paper in the trash. There’s a balloon in the tree.

On the next page, the mother is checking her calendar:

Hurry, hurry,
check the date.

Yesterday.
Yesterday?

Yes, the little girl is clearly upset. But that’s where all the tension leaves the book. When we turn the page, we read:

We’ll head back home,
but while we’re here,
let’s take turns
rolling down the hill.

From there on out, party balloon in hand, the pair make the most of time together in a wonderful sprawling park, because “we have nowhere to be.” They go under a bridge, watch ducklings in the pond, enjoy sitting under a tree, and more.

And it’s all colorful and beautiful and full of love. Their outdoor time together exudes peace and we know it all adds up to a wonderful day.

This is going on my I’d-love-to-see-get-Caldecott-recognition list for this year.

This book just makes me happy.

annewynter.com
michaarcher.com

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Orris and Timble

Star Stories

by Kate DiCamillo
illustrated by Carmen Mok

Candlewick Press, 2026. 76 pages.
Review written April 22, 2026, from a library book.
Starred Review

Kate DiCamillo and Carmen Mok’s beginning chapter book series about a rat and an owl who are friends just got even sweeter.

All the books are gentle, recapping the details of the friendship and thinking about action before it happens. All the books have Orris and Timble telling stories to each other in their nightly meetings.

In this one, Timble invites Orris to fly on his back. Orris isn’t even a little bit interested. But little by little, we see that gently change. Until finally, the saying on Orris’s treasured sardine tin again motivates him to action: Make the good and noble choice!!

It’s all so wonderfully done, taking the reader along on the emotional as well as the physical journey. And with simple language for a beginning reader, too!

katedicamillo.com

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Toilets of the World

100 Strange & Spectacular Thrones, Commodes, Loos, & Latrines

written by Patrick Kinsella
and Lonely Planet editors

Lonely Planet, 2025. 142 pages.
Review written December 23, 2025, from a library book.

When the nonfiction selector for our library system posted a Teams message about this book he was ordering (There may have been a request.), at least a couple of us couldn’t resist putting it on hold.

This is a book of photography – of toilets in far-flung, and usually gorgeous, corners of the world. There’s a glossary of toilet terms, a toilet timeline, and list of extreme toilets (the lowest, the highest, the oldest, the most expensive – that sort of thing). There’s even a list of ways to ask, “Where is the toilet?” in twelve different countries. You’ll find photos of toilets from all over the world. And an abundance of potty puns.

What can I say? I had to see this book for myself. A glimpse of the world from the point of view of the facilities. They indeed surprised and delighted me.

No, I will not be using this as a list to try and go visit – many were remote (such as the one on Mount Everest), and I’m happy that someone did it for me – and took a picture.

If you, like me, can’t resist taking a peek at these ravishing restrooms – you know who you are!

lonelyplanet.com

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Silenced Voices

Reclaiming Memories from the Guatemalan Genocide

by Pablo Leon

HarperAlley, 2025. 240 pages.
Review written February 17, 2026, from a library book.
2026 Pura Belpré Honor Book, Young Adult
2026 Robert F. Sibert Honor Book
Starred Review

Silenced Voices is a graphic novel with children on the front – that covers a horrific part of history, so this is firmly for teens, rather than children. The historical event was a genocide carried out by the Guatemalan government in the 1980s against indigenous people they claimed were helping the guerrillas.

The graphic novel focuses on the story of one character at a time. First, a boy in America who hears about a genocide trial of a former Guatemalan military leader and asks his mother about it – who’s never said much about growing up in Guatemala.

Then the bulk of the book is his mother’s story – how she barely escaped, with the help of her sister, when soldiers came and wiped out their whole village in horrible ways. But before she could get to safety, she and her sister split up, and they never saw each other again.

And there’s more in the present and in the past tying up that story. (I won’t give it away.)

This is a graphic depiction (literally) of a family and culture traumatized and victimized – showing the fallout into the next generation. But I appreciate the positive and optimistic framing of letting voices that were once silenced speak up and that injustice won’t stand forever. All in a compelling and powerful story.

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Goldfinches

by Mary Oliver
art by Melissa Sweet

Viking, 2026. 36 pages.
Review written April 20, 2026, from a library book.
Starred Review

This little book is a poem by Mary Oliver – illustrated by Caldecott Honor illustrator Melissa Sweet. The poem about goldfinches shows the author observing in fields as goldfinches fly by and make their nests. Then a note at the back explains how Mary Oliver did just that – and Melissa Sweet imitated her to make authentic pictures.

I also enjoyed how the artist put a palette of colors at the front, labeled with phrases from the poem, and you can find them later in the book.

But of course what I love most is the poem, which grew on me more each time I read it – and Melissa Sweet’s illustrations helped me appreciate it more from the start.

Here’s how the poem ends:

Is it necessary to say any more?
Have you heard them singing in the wind, above the final fields?
Have you ever been so happy in your life?

This book has the power to fill you with peace and happiness and send you out to nature to find even more.

MaryOliver.com
MelissaSweet.net
Penguin.com/kids

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Harriet Tubman

Live in Concert

by Bob the Drag Queen
read by the Author

Simon & Schuster Audio, 2025. 4 hours, 18 minutes.
Review written February 16, 2026, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review
2026 Alex Award Winner

I would have never listened to this audiobook if it hadn’t won an Alex Award. The Alex Awards are given each year to ten novels published for adults that will be of interest to teens. I hadn’t listened to any of the winners this year, so I was trying to make up for that – and I was completely enchanted with this book.

The story is told by Darnell, a hip-hop producer who’s been out of work for fifteen years when he meets his hero, Harriet Tubman, in real life.

We learn that people have been bringing back certain historical figures. I love that the book never explains why or how it’s supposed to work. Because that would rapidly get into ridiculous territory and as readers, we’d realize it doesn’t work. Instead, we’re caught up in the wonder of Darnell meeting his hero.

And what Harriet Tubman wants to do – along with “the Freedmen” she’s brought with her – is create a hip-hop album and go on tour to tell her story to the modern generation.

The process of Darnell learning more about Harriet’s life – from her own voice – and processing the lessons of it makes a simply lovely story. And along the way, Darnell needs to process his own coming-out journey, because Harriet senses that here, too, is someone she needs to lead to freedom.

I recommend listening to the audiobook performance of this book – especially because it ends with two of the songs written for Harriet to perform, consolidating lessons from her life.

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Relit

16 Latinx Remixes of Classic Stories

edited by Sandra Proudman

Inkyard Press, 2024. 346 pages.
Review written December 26, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

Here’s a bit of the Foreword from the editor so you know what’s going on in Relit:

This anthology began with a hope, a dream, a spark of an idea that the contributing authors and I felt passionately about: to take some of the most popular classics out there (the novels, myths, and plays we’ve all read in class or seen adaptations of on TV and in movies)… and reimagine, reignite, remix them into some epic science fiction and fantasy tales, with Latinx characters at the center of all the action.

I’ve always loved a good retelling, and this authors of the stories in this collection bring creativity and a sense of fun to the originals. Some of my favorites: Anna Meriano starts off by giving us Pride and Prejudice as livestreamed from space. Monica Sanz gives us a version of Jane Eyre with witchcraft and some female empowerment. David Bowles writes a science fiction version of Hamlet with fighting in mech suits. And Sandra Proudman does a version of The Old Man and the Sea in the future barren desert of Nevada.

There’s lots more here, with a collection of stellar authors retelling tales as varied as “Bartleby, the Scrivener” and “Goldilocks and the Three Bears.” They all have a speculative fiction twist, and they all feature Latinx characters showing resourcefulness and creativity. It took me a long time to get this book read – it’s too tempting to put it down between stories – but that way I got to lengthen the fun.

sandraproudman.com

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Two Artists, Grandad and Me

by Charnelle Pinkney Barlow

Doubleday Books for Young Readers, 2026. 28 pages.
Review written February 20, 2026, from a library book.
Starred Review

This is a sweet picture book about a little girl and her artist grandfather, and the joy she found making art with him in his studio, and how he’d gently guide her.

What makes it extra special is that this girl’s grandfather was the wonderful Jerry Pinkney – an amazing creator of children’s books, Caldecott Medalist, and a kind human being. (Yes, I’ve met him and heard him speak a few times. The man radiated goodness.)

This book pictures her as a little girl coming into Grandad’s studio, being greeted with love, given access to his paints and supplies, and shown how to use them.

He gives her her own sketchbook and gets her started filling it, drawing side by side.

“I don’t think I did it right.”
“There is no right way,” he assures me.
“Every artist sees the world differently.”

Hmmm . . . artist?

I’ve never been called an artist before.
I like the sound of it.
I have so many stories to tell.

May kids continue to be inspired to make art, continuing to build Jerry Pinkney’s generous legacy.

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