Book to Screen

Here at Tundra Books, we are all huge movie and T.V. lovers and we get extra excited when what we see on the screen is adapted from our very own books! Keep reading to find out which of your favorite Tundra titles are set to hit the big – and slightly less big – screen!

Picture Books

Wilding Pictures, the Toronto-based indie production company, has acquired the rights to the book series Professor Goose Debunks Fairy Tales and is set to make a loose adaptation of the book series as its first kids project.

Professor Goose Debunks Goldilocks and the Three Bears
By Paulette Bourgeois
Illustrated by Alex G. Griffiths
40 Pages | Ages 3-7 | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735267305 | Tundra Books
Mother Goose’s fairy tales are NOT based in science, and her great niece Professor Goose thinks it’s time to share the truth. Join Professor Goose as she – literally – travels through the pages of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, fact-checking, exposing the flaws and explaining the science. Bears don’t live in cottages – they prefer dens! The smallest bowl of porridge wouldn’t be “just right” – it would have been the coldest! Professor Goose is delighted to see Baby Bear use the scientific method and Goldilocks’s fight or flight response. And maybe Goldilocks should have used a GPS so she wouldn’t have gotten lost in the first place? Jammed with jokes and wonderfully silly illustrations, this book entertains while it introduces basic scientific laws and rules to young readers. At the back of the book, readers will find Professor Goose’s instructions on how to engineer their own chair for a (teddy) bear!

Professor Goose Debunks The Three Little Pigs
By Paulette Bourgeois
Illustrated by Alex G. Griffiths
40 Pages | Ages 3-7 | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735267329 | Tundra Books
Release Date: February 13, 2024
The second in a fractured fairy tale series by the author of Franklin the Turtle! Join Professor Goose in this STEM-filled picture book as she fact-checks classic fairy tales and shares the science behind these flawed stories. Mother Goose’s fairy tales are NOT based in science, and her great niece Professor Goose thinks it’s time to share the truth. Join Professor Goose as she – literally – travels through the pages of The Three Little Pigs, fact-checking, exposing the flaws and explaining the science. Did you know that pigs run in a zigzag pattern? And that there’s no way a wolf’s breath would be strong enough to blow down anything, even if he has his whole pack with him? And that hay bales are strong enough to resist most up, down and sideways forces? Sounds like the perfect material for building a house! . . . Or, not. But not to worry – Professor Goose is armed with helpful hints on how to make a structure strong enough to withstand hurricane forces! Jammed with jokes and hilarious illustrations, this book entertains while it introduces basic scientific laws and rules to young readers. At the back of the book, readers will find Professor Goose’s new, carefully researched fairy tale ending as well as her favorite facts about coding!

Toronto-based company Portfolio Entertainment and Treehouse have taken Cale Atkinson’s Where Oliver Fits and have expanded it into nine animated short videos as well as a Christmas special.

Where Oliver Fits
By Cale Atkinson
40 Pages | Ages 3-7 | Hardcover
ISBN 9781101919071 | Tundra Books
Oliver has always dreamed about where he will fit. Will he be in the mane of a unicorn? The tentacle of a pirate squid? The helmet of an astronaut? When he finally goes in search of his perfect place, he finds that trying to fit in is a lot harder than he thought. But like any puzzle, a little trial and error leads to a solution, and Oliver figures out exactly where he belongs. Where Oliver Fits is a sweet and funny story that explores all the highs and lows of learning to be yourself and shows that fitting in isn’t always the best fit . . .

Image courtesy of The Jim Henson Company

The Jim Henson Company, with animation partner Factory, is developing How to Make Friends with a Ghost as a new stop-motion animation series for kids ages 5 -9 years old.

How to Make Friends with a Ghost
By Rebecca Green
40 Pages | Ages 4-8 | Paperback
ISBN 9781774880401 | Tundra Books
What do you do when you meet a ghost? One: Provide the ghost with some of its favorite snacks, like mud tarts and earwax truffles. Two: Tell your ghost bedtime stories (ghosts love to be read to). Three: Make sure no one mistakes your ghost for whipped cream or a marshmallow when you aren’t looking! If you follow these few simple steps and the rest of the essential tips in How to Make Friends with a Ghost, you’ll see how a ghost friend will lovingly grow up and grow old with you. A whimsical story about ghost care, Rebecca Green’s debut picture book is a perfect combination of offbeat humor, quirky and sweet illustrations, and the timeless theme of friendship.

Ryan Reynolds’ Maximum Effort production company has launched a new show on Fubo called “Bedtime Stories With Ryan.” This 15-episode series features Reynolds reading new and classic bedtime stories including The Little Ghost Who Was a Quilt, Night Lunch, and Narwhal and Jelly: Peanut Butter and Jelly.

The Little Ghost Who Was a Quilt
By Riel Nason
Illustrated by Byron Eggenschwiler
48 Pages | Ages 3-7 | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735264472 | Tundra Books
Ghosts are supposed to be sheets, light as air and able to whirl and twirl and float and soar. But the little ghost who is a quilt can’t whirl or twirl at all, and when he flies, he gets very hot. He doesn’t know why he’s a quilt. His parents are both sheets, and so are all of his friends. (His great-grandmother was a lace curtain, but that doesn’t really help cheer him up.) He feels sad and left out when his friends are zooming around and he can’t keep up. But one Halloween, everything changes. The little ghost who was a quilt has an experience that no other ghost could have, an experience that only happens because he’s a quilt . . . and he realizes that it’s OK to be different.

Night Lunch
By Eric Fan
Illustrated by Dena Seiferling
48 Pages | Ages 4-8 | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735270572 | Tundra Books
Noses sniff the air as mouthwatering smells waft down city streets, luring growling bellies to the Night Owl. Inside this elegant, horse-drawn establishment, a feathery cook works the grill, serving up tasty dishes for shift-workers and operagoers alike: a mince pie for Fox, a ham sandwich for Badger and puddings for little Possums. Mouse, a poor street sweeper, watches as the line of customers swells, ever hopeful that someone will drop a morsel of food – but Owl’s cooking is far too delicious for more than a crumb to be found. As the evening’s service winds down, weary Owl spots trembling Mouse. Has he found his own night lunch, or will he invite this small sweeper inside for a midnight feast for two? From the imagination of two acclaimed picture book creators, together for the first time, this dreamlike picture book is a magical ode to Victorian lunch wagons. Evoking the sounds, sights, smells and tastes of the city at night, Night Lunch reveals how empathy and kindness as well as dignity and gratitude can be found – and savored – in the most unexpected places.

Peanut Butter and Jelly: A Narwhal and Jelly Book #3
By Ben Clanton
64 Pages | Ages 6-9 | Paperback
ISBN 9780735262461 | Tundra Books
When Jelly wonders what a unicorn is, Narwhal explains that they’re pretty much narwhals of the land (!) – and then gets carried away with a grand plan to see one. With the help of Star, Narwhal’s wish comes true in the wildest, weirdest way: Narwhal gets some land legs and takes their first step ashore. After some wibble-wobbling and a bit of practice, Narwhal is soon galloping along in search of unicorns, though Jelly is a little land sick. Before they know it, Star has the duo blasting off to a magical planet where everyone is a unicorn! But Jelly’s out-of-this-world adventure makes him feel out of his comfort zone, and he wishes he were at home . . . can Narwhal cheer Jelly up and also party down with their new unicorn pals?

Middle Grade

ABC Signature, the production company subsidiary of Disney Entertainment, has picked up the film rights for David A. Robertson’s middle-grade fantasy series The Misewa Saga.

The Barren Grounds: The Misewa Saga #1
By David A. Robertson
256 Pages | Ages 10+ | Paperback
ISBN 9780735266124 | Puffin Canada
Morgan and Eli, two Indigenous children forced away from their families and communities, are brought together in a foster home in Winnipeg, Manitoba. They each feel disconnected, from their culture and each other, and struggle to fit in at school and at their new home – until they find a secret place, walled off in an unfinished attic bedroom. A portal opens to another reality, Askí, bringing them onto frozen, barren grounds, where they meet Ochek (Fisher). The only hunter supporting his starving community, Misewa, Ochek welcomes the human children, teaching them traditional ways to survive. But as the need for food becomes desperate, they embark on a dangerous mission. Accompanied by Arik, a sassy Squirrel they catch stealing from the trapline, they try to save Misewa before the icy grip of winter freezes everything – including them.

The Great Bear: The Misewa Saga #2
By David A. Robertson
240 Pages | Ages 10+ | Paperback
ISBN 9780735266155 | Puffin Canada
Back at home after their first adventure in the Barren Grounds, Eli and Morgan each struggle with personal issues: Eli is being bullied at school, and tries to hide it from Morgan, while Morgan has to make an important decision about her birth mother. They turn to the place where they know they can learn the most, and make the journey to Misewa to visit their animal friends. This time they travel back in time and meet a young fisher that might just be their lost friend. But they discover that the village is once again in peril, and they must dig deep within themselves to find the strength to protect their beloved friends. Can they carry this strength back home to face their own challenges?

The Stone Child: The Misewa Saga #3
By David A. Robertson
256 Pages | Ages 10+ | Paperback
ISBN 9780735266186 | Tundra Books
After discovering a near-lifeless Eli at the base of the Great Tree, Morgan knows she doesn’t have much time to save him. And it will mean asking for help – from friends old and new. Racing against the clock, and with Arik and Emily at her side, Morgan sets off to follow the trail away from the Great Tree to find Eli’s soul before it’s too late. As they journey deep into the northern woods, a place they’ve been warned never to enter, they face new challenges and life-threatening attacks from strange and horrifying creatures. But a surprise ally comes to their aid, and Morgan finds the strength to focus on what’s most important: saving her brother’s life. 

The Portal Keeper: The Misewa Saga #4
By David A. Robertson
256 Pages | Ages 10+ | Hardcover
ISBN 9781774880258 | Tundra Books
Release Date: October 10, 2023
Eli and Morgan experience life-changing revelations in this new adventure in the award-winning, Narnia-inspired Indigenous middle-grade fantasy series.
While exploring World’s End, an area in Aski they’ve just discovered, Morgan and Emily delight in their developing relationship, while Eli struggles to understand his new-found power: the ability to locate a portal. A shocking turn of events leads them to a new village, Ministik, where the animal beings who live there are going missing. Horrified to discover who is responsible, the children vow to help and turn to friends, old and new. But it’s getting harder and harder to keep the two worlds separate, especially when details of a traditional legend change everything. Forever.

Art images courtesy of Studio Ghibli and IMDB

Studio Ghibli and acclaimed director Hayao Miyazaki have loosely adapted Genzaburo Yoshino’s middle-grade novel How Do You Live? into the animated feature film The Boy and the Heron set to open the 2023 Toronto Internation Film Festival.

How Do You Live?
By Genzaburō Yoshino
Foreword by Neil Gaiman
Translated by Bruno Navasky
288 Pages | Ages 10+ | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735271883 | Puffin Canada
Anime master Hayao Miyazaki’s favorite childhood book and a beloved Japanese classic, this uplifting coming-of-age story brings philosophy, history and wonder together, available in English for the first time.
The streets of Tokyo swarm below fifteen-year-old Copper as he gazes out into the city of his childhood. Struck by the thought of the infinite people whose lives play out alongside his own, he begins to wonder, how do you live? Considering life’s biggest questions for the first time after the death of his father, Copper turns to his dear uncle for heart-warming wisdom. As the old man guides the boy on a journey of philosophical discovery, a timeless tale unfolds, offering a poignant reflection on what it means to be human. But when Copper betrays one of his new friends, how will he ask for forgiveness – and how can he forgive himself? How Do You Live? is the inspiring, transformative story of a young man who, like his namesake Copernicus, looks to the stars and uses his discoveries to answer the question of what kind of person he will grow up to be.

Young Adult

Picturestart, the production company behind book adaptations like Wonder and The Hunger Games, has obtained adaptive rights to Xiran Jay Zhao’s Iron Widow for a film franchise with J.C. Lee set to write the screenplay.

Iron Widow
By Xiran Jay Zhao
416 Pages | Ages 14+ | Paperback
ISBN 9780735269958 | Tundra Books
The boys of Huaxia dream of pairing up with girls to pilot Chrysalises, giant transforming robots that can battle the mecha aliens that lurk beyond the Great Wall. It doesn’t matter that the girls often die from the mental strain. When 18-year-old Zetian offers herself up as a concubine-pilot, it’s to assassinate the ace male pilot responsible for her sister’s death. But she gets her vengeance in a way nobody expected – she kills him through the psychic link between pilots and emerges from the cockpit unscathed. She is labeled an Iron Widow, a much-feared and much-silenced kind of female pilot who can sacrifice boys to power up Chrysalises instead.​ To tame her unnerving yet invaluable mental strength, she is paired up with Li Shimin, the strongest and most controversial male pilot in Huaxia​. But now that Zetian has had a taste of power, she will not cower so easily. She will miss no opportunity to leverage their combined might and infamy to survive attempt after attempt on her life, until she can figure out exactly why the pilot system works in its misogynist way – and stop more girls from being sacrificed.

Tuesdays with Tundra

Tuesdays with Tundra is an ongoing series featuring our new releases. This title is now available in stores and online!

New in Paperback:

The Stone Child: The Misewa Saga #3
By David A. Robertson
256 Pages | Ages 10+ | Paperback
ISBN 9780735266186 | Tundra Books
After discovering a near-lifeless Eli at the base of the Great Tree, Morgan knows she doesn’t have much time to save him. And it will mean asking for help – from friends old and new. Racing against the clock, and with Arik and Emily at her side, Morgan sets off to follow the trail away from the Great Tree to find Eli’s soul before it’s too late. As they journey deep into the northern woods, a place they’ve been warned never to enter, they face new challenges and life-threatening attacks from strange and horrifying creatures. But a surprise ally comes to their aid, and Morgan finds the strength to focus on what’s most important: saving her brother’s life. 

We can’t wait to see you reading this title! If you share this book online, remember to use #ReadTundra in your hashtags so that we can re-post.

Our Senior Managing Editor: Meet Kate!

Hi, I’m Kate (she/her) and the Senior Managing Editor at Tundra.

I love all things cozy and homey – housewares, big blankets, pillows, soft lighting, my cats (Cinder and Yuki), and watching Little Women every Christmas (the one with Winona Ryder). To me, there is nothing better than a good book with a cup of tea and a cat cuddle. I’m a Torontonian since birth and grateful for all the food options in all the pockets of the city. My favorite neighborhood is Kensington Market though I have never lived there.

I’ve worked in publishing for over ten years, and I’ve been with Tundra since 2019. I love to organize, streamline, and problem solve. Some people describe a managing editor as the traffic control center of the book’s production process. I love to see all the pieces come together to make a book.

5 Random Facts About Me

  1. I have participated in multiple guac offs and won.
  2. I speak French and was a tour guide in Quebec City.
  3. I have red hair and have dressed up as Anne Shirley for Halloween too many times to count.
  4. I love to bike indoors to 90s music, and I love to bike outdoors with open ears and a helmet.
  5. I was once on CBC’s Video Hits with my sister introducing Roxette’s “It Must Have Been Love.” I held the host’s hand and said nothing. I was four. My dad has the clip on VHS.

Favorite Penguin Random House Titles

Mad about Meatloaf (Weenie featuring Frank and Beans)
By Maureen Fergus
Illustrated by Alexandra Bye
56 Pages | Ages 6-9 | Paperback
ISBN 9780735267930 | Tundra Books
Weenie loves his human, Bob. He loves his guinea pig friend Beans and his cat friend Frank. He loves naps, adventures and sharing. In fact, Weenie loves pretty much everything (except the mail carrier). But the thing Weenie loves and desires more than anything else in the world is meatloaf. And he’ll do anything to get it. Join Weenie, Frank and Beans on a laugh-out-loud meatloaf adventure, complete with a trench coat disguise, a wild meatloaf trap and even a hungry wolf.

On the Trapline
By David A. Robertson
Illustrated by Julie Flett
48 Pages | Ages 4-8 | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735266681 | Tundra Books
A boy and Moshom, his grandpa, take a trip together to visit a place of great meaning to Moshom. A trapline is where people hunt and live off the land, and it was where Moshom grew up. As they embark on their northern journey, the child repeatedly asks his grandfather, “Is this your trapline?” Along the way, the boy finds himself imagining what life was like two generations ago – a life that appears to be both different from and similar to his life now. This is a heartfelt story about memory, imagination, and intergenerational connection that perfectly captures the experience of a young child’s wonder as he is introduced to places and stories that hold meaning for his family.

The Little Ghost Who Was a Quilt
By Riel Nason
Illustrated by Byron Eggenschwiler
48 Pages | Ages 3-7 | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735264472 | Tundra Books
Ghosts are supposed to be sheets, light as air and able to whirl and twirl and float and soar. But the little ghost who is a quilt can’t whirl or twirl at all, and when he flies, he gets very hot. He doesn’t know why he’s a quilt. His parents are both sheets, and so are all of his friends. (His great-grandmother was a lace curtain, but that doesn’t really help cheer him up.) He feels sad and left out when his friends are zooming around and he can’t keep up. But one Halloween, everything changes. The little ghost who was a quilt has an experience that no other ghost could have, an experience that only happens because he’s a quilt . . . and he realizes that it’s OK to be different.

Daughters of the Deer
By Danielle Daniel
344 Pages | Paperback
ISBN 9780735282087 | Random House Canada
1657. Marie, a gifted healer of the Deer Clan, does not want to marry the green-eyed soldier from France who has asked for her hand. But her people are threatened by disease and starvation and need help against the Iroquois and their English allies if they are to survive. When her chief begs her to accept the white man’s proposal, she cannot refuse him, and sheds her deerskin tunic for a borrowed blue wedding dress to become Pierre’s bride. 1675. Jeanne, Marie’s oldest child, is seventeen, neither white nor Algonquin, caught between worlds. Caught by her own desires, too. Her heart belongs to a girl named Josephine, but soon her father will have to find her a husband or be forced to pay a hefty fine to the French crown. Among her mother’s people, Jeanne would have been considered blessed, her two-spirited nature a sign of special wisdom. To the settlers of New France, and even to her own father, Jeanne is unnatural, sinful—a woman to be shunned, beaten, and much worse. With the poignant, unforgettable story of Marie and Jeanne, Danielle Daniel reaches back through the centuries to touch the very origin of the long history of violence against Indigenous women and the deliberate, equally violent disruption of First Nations cultures.

Greenwood
By Michael Christie
512 Pages | Paperback
ISBN 9780771024481 | McClelland & Stewart
They come for the trees. It’s 2038 and Jacinda (Jake) Greenwood is a storyteller and a liar, an overqualified tour guide babysitting ultra-rich-eco-tourists in one of the world’s last remaining forests. It’s 2008 and Liam Greenwood is a carpenter, sprawled on his back after a workplace fall and facing the possibility of his own death. It’s 1974 and Willow Greenwood is just out of jail for one of her environmental protests: attempts at atonement for the sins of her father’s once vast and rapacious timber empire. It’s 1934 and Everett Greenwood is a Depression-era drifter who saves an abandoned infant, only to find himself tangled up in the web of a crime, secrets, and betrayal that will cling to his family for decades. And throughout, there are trees: a steady, silent pulse thrumming beneath Christie’s effortless sentences, working as a guiding metaphor for withering, weathering, and survival.

The Boat People
By Sharon Bala
416 Pages | Paperback
ISBN 9780771024313 | McClelland & Stewart
When the rusty cargo ship carrying Mahindan and five hundred fellow refugees reaches the shores of British Columbia, the young father is overcome with relief: he and his six-year-old son can finally put Sri Lanka’s bloody civil war behind them and begin new lives. Instead, the group is thrown into prison, with government officials and news headlines speculating that hidden among the “boat people” are members of a terrorist militia. As suspicion and interrogation mount, Mahindan fears the desperate actions he took to survive and escape Sri Lanka now jeopardize his and his son’s chances for asylum. Told through the alternating perspectives of Mahindan; his lawyer Priya, who reluctantly represents the migrants; and Grace, a third-generation Japanese-Canadian adjudicator who must decide Mahindan’s fate, The Boat People is a high-stakes novel that offers a deeply compassionate lens through which to view the current refugee crisis. Inspired by real events, Sharon Bala’s stunning novel is an unforgettable and necessary story for our times.

Favorite Non Penguin Random House Titles

Anticipated Penguin Random House Titles

Tundra Telegram: Books That Put You in Your Element

Hello, and thanks for joining us at Tundra Telegram, the column where we dig into the burning topics floating in the ether and recommend some books to dive into and set your synapses ablaze.

This Friday (June 16), Disney and Pixar release the animated film Elemental in theatres, a movie set in a world inhabited by anthropomorphic versions of the four classical elements (fire, water, air, earth). The romantic story follows a fire element (Ember) and water (Wade), who meet and fall in love and attempt to make their relationship work, against the odds and their society’s preconceived notions.

People are excited to visit Element City and mix it up with the characters. Accordingly, we’re recommending three books for each classical element in each age category. So, no matter if you’re a down-to-earth reader or your flair is for air, we’ve got some elemental reads for you!

PICTURE BOOKS

Looking for books about air? We’ve got a few books that will have you on Cloud 9, starting with Elbert in the Air by Monica Wesolowska and Jerome Pumphrey, a picture book about a boy who begins to float shortly after birth. Shortly after he is born, Elbert floats up into the air, making life a little tricky for him and his mother. Everyone in town has some homespun advice for keeping her boy down on the ground, but Elbert’s mother knows her son is meant to float.

Elly MacKay’s In the Clouds is another wonderful book for young skywatchers and cloud stans. A dreamy book that takes place mostly in the stratosphere, if features a bored and curious little girl whisked off by a friendly bird to an adventure in the sky, where she can contemplate questions about the sky: how do clouds float? Or carry the rain? Where do they go when they disappear?

For a picture book that speaks more to the power of air, there’s Jeremy Worried about the Wind by Pamela Butchart and Kate Hindley. Anxious Jeremy learns his worries are well-founded when it comes to the wind: on a very windy day, he’s literally blown right out of his shoes and up into the sky. What follows is a madcap adventure, powered by the element of air, that makes Jeremy realize the things he worries about could be incredible experiences in disguise.

Maybe you’re looking for books that take a plunge into water? Dip your toes into the subject with Benjamin Flouw’s Constellation of the Deep, in which a daring fox dons scuba gear and embarks on an underwater quest for an elusive, bioluminescent plant that reportedly grows at the bottom of the ocean.

If you’re ready to fully dive into the element, The Aquanaut by Jill Heinerth and Jaime Kim is ideal. Written by an actual underwater explorer and photographer (who is in the Women Divers Hall of Fame!), this is an inspiring picture book that encourages readers to explore their world, build their self-esteem and imagine what they can do and become when they grow up. This a book about chasing your dreams, especially when those dreams involve immersing yourself in water.

And David A. Robertson and Maya McKibbin’s The Song That Called Them Home is a fantastical adventure inspired by Cree legends, in which a canoe trip in the lake goes horribly wrong and, after being thrown overboard, Lauren’s little brother, James, is taken underwater by mischievous creatures called the Memekwesewak. Lauren must journey into the watery depths to retrieve him.

What about some picture books that are on fire?Any reader of Dragons Love Tacos, the hit picture book by Adam Rubin and Daniel Salmieri, knows that once spicy salsa – which dragons do not like – enters the picture, a conflagration is sure to follow. Accordingly, spicy salsa is one element that dragons do not want at their taco bar.

The flames in Logan S. Kline’s Finding Fire are considerably less destructive. A prehistoric young boy hunts for fire to bring his family warmth, and will face multiple challenges and dangers – and maybe make one woolly friend – in his attempt to bring the fire home.

While the 2023 Caldecott winner Hot Dog by Doug Salati may not feature much in the way of actual fire, the book is hotter than a short order cook’s grill. Depicting one dog and his sweltering travails in a New York City heatwave, the book is enough to make any young readers sweat.

And for some picture books that are the salt of the earth: Two friends tunnel deep into the element in Sam and Dave Dig a Hole by Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen. Experience the joys of earth and soil as Sam and Dave endeavor to find something spectacular under the ground in this deadpan story.

Marianna Coppo’s Petra, on the other hand, features a character who is made of earth herself. Petra is a little rock with an irresistibly flexible self-perception – no matter what her situation, she knows she belongs – that goes to show not even earth is set in stone.

And if you’re a young reader who wants to know what’s really going under the soil, there’s Under Your Feet … Soil, Sand and Everything Underground by Wenjia Tang, a book that excavates all the information you want about the materials under your feet and the miraculous creatures that live there.

CHAPTER BOOKS & MIDDLE GRADE

A fast-paced fantasy adventure that spotlights the magical powers of air, Momo Arashima Steals the Sword of the Wind by Misa Sugiura features a Momo, an ordinary twelve-year-old who discovers her mother is a banished Shinto goddess who used to protect a long-forgotten passageway to the land of the dead. Momo will have to unlock her divine powers and team up with her former best friend and talking fox to protect that passageway from evil spirits. Plus, there is a weapon made of wind, which is why it’s on the list here.

The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind (Young Readers Edition) by William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer is a book that similarly showcases the power of air (though in a less stabby way). Based on the true story of how a young inventor (and the book’s co-author) brought electricity to his Malawian village, the story demonstrates how a windmill of scrap metal could generate electricity to pump the water needed in the village – all thanks to air.

The comics anthology Flight Volume One, edited by Kazu Kibuishi and featuring work from Derek Kirk Kim, Dylan Meconis and Hope Larson, among others, shies away from the power of air to instead highlight its majesty and wonder. Featuring dozens of short stories that circle around the topic of flight, with kites, airships, birds and more, it’s all about what takes place up in the air.

Is there such a thing as too much water? Rafe, the protagonist of Water, Water by Cary Fagan and Jon McNaught, would certainly think so. In this surreal adventure, Rafe wakes up one morning to discover his bedroom is floating in a vast sea of water. Alone with only his dog by his side, Rafe adapts to this watery new world by fishing cans of food out of the water and keeping an eye on the waves.

A futuristic underwater adventure worthy of Jules Verne, Rick Riordan’s Daughter of the Deep is set at an academy for the best marine scientists, naval warriors, navigators, and underwater explorers in the world. Freshman Ana Dakkar is on her class’s weekend trial at sea, when her class is attacked by a rival land school and the uneasy peace between land and sea is shattered forever.

A love letter to lake communities, Hello from Renn Lake by Michele Weber Hurwitz takes place in a Wisconsin town, where Annalise’s family has run lakeside cabins for generations. Annalise herself feels a real connection to the lake (and even speaks to it) – that is, until the lake becomes polluted by harmful algae. This is a book about water conservation, and – even better – there are sections written from the perspective of the lake itself!

Fire of the volcanic kind comes to play in Lei and the Fire Goddess by Malia Maunakea, a fantasy adventure based on Hawaiian legend and mythology. The book stars twelve-year-old Anna Leilani Kamaʻehu, who doesn’t think curses and magic are real until she accidentally insults Pele the fire goddess by destroying her lehua blossom on a return visit to Hawaii. (Whoops.)

No curses necessary, only poorly maintained ecosystems for fire disaster to strike in Iain Lawrence’s Fire on Headless Mountain. Virgil and his older siblings are on a mission to scatter their mother’s ashes (another fire reference) at her favorite mountain lake when a forest fire breaks out. Separated from his brother and sister, Virgil must remember the lessons of his science teacher mother to survive the sudden inferno.

And tween detectives Asim and Rokshar have a few close encounters of the fiery kind in Spooky Sleuths: Fire in the Sky by Natasha Deen and Lissy Marlin. When their friend Max finds himself in danger, Asim and Rokshar are attacked by fireballs. Is science … or a witch from Guyanese folklore … behind the flying fire?

You can’t talk children’s books and earth without mentioning Louis Sachar’s modern classic Holes. At a boys’ detention center, Camp Green Lake, Stanley Yelnats and his fellow detainees spend all day, every day digging holes exactly five feet wide and five feet deep. Soon Stanley realizes this isn’t just a punishment – the warden is looking for something under the dry earth. But what?

Continuing the tradition of books about underground tunnels, The Lifters by Dave Eggers, tells the story of two kids who discover the ground beneath their feet is not made of solid earth and stone but has been hollowed into hundreds of tunnels and passageways, created by mysterious forces for enigmatic reasons.

Set in a post-apocalyptic underground city, The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau, is an under-earth adventure without parallel. A last refuge for the human race, Ember is teetering on the edge of doom, its lamps flickering and threatening to extinguish forever. Only young Lina and her friend Doon can figure out the clues to save this city under the soil.

YOUNG ADULT

The air is a battlefield in Stateless by Elizabeth Wein. Teen pilot Stella North enters an air race across Europe in 1937, billed as “Circuit of Nations Olympics of the Air.” When she sees a plane deliberately knocked out of the sky by a fellow pilot, she must unwind the baffling mystery in the tense pre-war climate of the time.

The skies are also the site of terror in Flight 171 by Amy Christine Parker, though for entirely different reasons. In this case, a four-hour flight takes a turn for the horrific when a supernatural creature highjacks the plane and gives the senior class ski trip a deadly ultimatum: sacrifice one of them to die before the flight ends, or the entire plane will crash. (And you thought flying Sunwing was unpleasant!)

Science fiction makes us think of space (where there famously is no air), but Brandon Sanderson’s Skyward is a science-fiction epic about aerial dogfights on an alien world. Spensa, a teenager who is one of a group of shipwrecked humans living on a ruined world under constant attack from mysterious aliens called the Krell. Spensa is determined to become a pilot, one of the brave few who can protect her people from the Krell, but she has the reputation of her father – a pilot who deserted his team and was killed – to overcome.

When you’re talking YA and water, you know there will be piracy in the mix. And that’s the case with The Wicked Bargain by Gabe Cole Novoa, a Latinx pirate fantasy starring a transmasc nonbinary teen with a mission of revenge and revolution – as well as the power to manipulate fire and ice (which is technically water). Add in a bargain with the Devil, an arrogant and handsome pirate, and a gender-fluid demon with opaque motives and you’ve got yourself a thrill ride wetter and wilder than Pirates of the Caribbean.

Those We Drown by Amy Goldsmith (out June 27) is an ocean-drenched, atmospheric horror novel about a high school semester-at-sea program – or “Seamester” – that turns into a dread-filled voyage with disappearing classmates and strange creatures that haunt the students’ dreams. Imagine Breaker High rewritten by H. P. Lovecraft and you know this is a book that plunges into darker waters than usual.

And In the Serpent’s Wake by Rachel Hartman was – at one point – called Tess of the Sea, to note its aquatic bona fides. A follow-up to Tess of the Road, it sees Tess on a mission from the Queen to sail across the oceans to the bottom of the world and prevent a war, though she may take a few sea-faring diversions on the way there.

Fire meets thriller in Jennifer Lynn Alvarez’s Lies Like Wildfire, a book that features five friends who accidentally spark an enormous and deadly wildfire and – as the title suggests – lie about doing so. But as the blaze roars through their town and towards Yosemite National Park, Hannah, who is the daughter of the sheriff, feels her friends begin to crack and finds herself going to extreme lengths to protect their secret.

Another novel set into motion by wildfires, Up in Flames by Hailey Alcaraz, finds a wealthy and entitled teen, Ruby Ortega, whose life is turned upside down by wildfires that devastate her California hometown (and her parents’ business). Ruby must rebuild her life with the help of unexpected allies – including a beguiling, dark-eyed boy (naturally) – and become an unexpected heroine to the many people displaced by the fire.

The fires may be wild in Burn Our Bodies Down by Rory Power, but they are anything but natural. After all, it’s a massive fire in a cornfield in her mother’s hometown from which Margot pulls a girl who looks exactly like her. And things only get stranger after those fires.

Earth is at the heart of Bridge of Clay by Markus Zusak, an epic, multi-layered story of five brothers who – with a dead mother and absent father – raise each other, which not only features a main character named Clay, but also has that Clay build a bridge (also out of clay … or at least some form of earth) at the request of their suddenly returned father.

The novel Dig by A. S. King is a strange fever dream of a story that looks at racism, patriarchy, colonialism, toxic masculinity, and the systems that keep them all going, but it does so through five estranged cousins whose grandparents created a fortune potato farming (!) – a fortune they will not pass along to their grandchildren. In addition to the earth the potatoes are buried in, soil metaphors abound, looking at the darkness that finds root under white suburban respectability, and how one generation might be able to dig a way out to the light.

Finally, in less metaphoric matters, The Wrath & the Dawn by Renée Ahdieh is the first of a fantasy series with plenty of sand. Set in a desert kingdom, this reimagining of 1001 Nights sees Khalid, the eighteen-year-old Caliph of Khorasan, take a new bride each night only to have her executed at sunrise. When sixteen-year-old Shahrzad volunteers to marry Khalid, she has a plan to stay alive and get revenge for her best friend. But she discovers that the murderous boy-king is not what he seems and there is more to the deaths of so many girls. Also, she may be falling in love? (Time for Plan B!)

Cover Reveal: The Portal Keeper

Tundra Books is excited to be publishing The Portal Keeper on October 10, 2023! Fan-favorite author David A. Robertson returns with the fourth book in The Misewa Saga, an epic adventure full of new-found powers, mysterious disappearances of entire towns, and two worlds moving closer and closer together.

“I’m thrilled to finally reveal the cover for the epic fourth book in The Misewa Saga: The Portal Keeper! The cover is illustrated by Winona Nelson and designed by Gigi Lau. The last books in the series will focus more on Eli, so we wanted a new look to focus more on Eli and to highlight the series name, giving it a bigger presence. I hope you like it!”

– David A. Robertson

Cover Illustration: Winona Nelson
Cover Design: Gigi Lau

The Portal Keeper: The Misewa Saga #4
By David A. Robertson
256 Pages | Ages 10+ | Hardcover
ISBN 9781774880258 | Tundra Books
Release Date: October 10, 2023
Eli and Morgan experience life-changing revelations in this new adventure in the award-winning, Narnia-inspired Indigenous middle-grade fantasy series.
While exploring World’s End, an area in Aski they’ve just discovered, Morgan and Emily delight in their developing relationship, while Eli struggles to understand his new-found power: the ability to locate a portal. A shocking turn of events leads them to a new village, Ministik, where the animal beings who live there are going missing. Horrified to discover who is responsible, the children vow to help and turn to friends, old and new. But it’s getting harder and harder to keep the two worlds separate, especially when details of a traditional legend change everything. Forever.

Also by David A. Robertson:

The Barren Grounds: The Misewa Saga #1
By David A. Robertson
256 Pages | Ages 10+ | Paperback
ISBN 9780735266124 | Puffin Canada
Morgan and Eli, two Indigenous children forced away from their families and communities, are brought together in a foster home in Winnipeg, Manitoba. They each feel disconnected, from their culture and each other, and struggle to fit in at school and at their new home – until they find a secret place, walled off in an unfinished attic bedroom. A portal opens to another reality, Askí, bringing them onto frozen, barren grounds, where they meet Ochek (Fisher). The only hunter supporting his starving community, Misewa, Ochek welcomes the human children, teaching them traditional ways to survive. But as the need for food becomes desperate, they embark on a dangerous mission. Accompanied by Arik, a sassy Squirrel they catch stealing from the trapline, they try to save Misewa before the icy grip of winter freezes everything – including them.

The Great Bear: The Misewa Saga #2
By David A. Robertson
288 Pages | Ages 10+ | Paperback
ISBN 9780735266155 | Puffin Canada
Back at home after their first adventure in the Barren Grounds, Eli and Morgan each struggle with personal issues: Eli is being bullied at school, and tries to hide it from Morgan, while Morgan has to make an important decision about her birth mother. They turn to the place where they know they can learn the most, and make the journey to Misewa to visit their animal friends. This time they travel back in time and meet a young fisher that might just be their lost friend. But they discover that the village is once again in peril, and they must dig deep within themselves to find the strength to protect their beloved friends. Can they carry this strength back home to face their own challenges?

The Stone Child: The Misewa Saga #3
By David A. Robertson
256 Pages | Ages 10+ | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735266162 | Puffin Canada
After discovering a near-lifeless Eli at the base of the Great Tree, Morgan knows she doesn’t have much time to save him. And it will mean asking for help – from friends old and new. Racing against the clock, and with Arik and Emily at her side, Morgan sets off to follow the trail away from the Great Tree to find Eli’s soul before it’s too late. As they journey deep into the northern woods, a place they’ve been warned never to enter, they face new challenges and life-threatening attacks from strange and horrifying creatures. But a surprise ally comes to their aid, and Morgan finds the strength to focus on what’s most important: saving her brother’s life. 

On the Trapline
By David A. Robertson
Illustrated by Julie Flett
48 Pages | Ages 4-8 | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735266681  | Tundra Books
A boy and Moshom, his grandpa, take a trip together to visit a place of great meaning to Moshom. A trapline is where people hunt and live off the land, and it was where Moshom grew up. As they embark on their northern journey, the child repeatedly asks his grandfather, “Is this your trapline?” Along the way, the boy finds himself imagining what life was like two generations ago – a life that appears to be both different from and similar to his life now. This is a heartfelt story about memory, imagination, and intergenerational connection that perfectly captures the experience of a young child’s wonder as he is introduced to places and stories that hold meaning for his family.

The Song That Called Them Home
By David A. Robertson
Illustrated by Maya McKibbin
52 Pages | Ages 4-8 | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735266704 | Tundra Books
One summer day, Lauren and her little brother, James, go on a trip to the land with their Moshom (grandfather). After they’ve arrived, the children decide to fish for dinner while Moshom naps. They are in their canoe in the middle of the lake when the water around them begins to swirl and crash. They are thrown overboard and when Lauren surfaces she sees her brother being pulled away by the Memekwesewak — creatures who live in and around water and like to interfere with humans. Lauren must follow the Memekwesewak through a portal and along a watery path to find and bring back James. But when she finally comes upon her brother, she too feels the lure of the Memekwesewak’s song. Something even stronger must pull them back home.