Stunning paintings of primates to count. Gorillas, orangutans, chimps and more, with faces that will amaze. As always, Anthony Browne opens our own eyes with close-up views that we might otherwise never see.

Age: Early School Years. Award Year: 2013. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

A new form of technology gives readers an innovative new way of seeing. With accompanying text for each of the eight featured creatures, this is first and foremost an eyecatching book with motion! Sure you can see a gorilla chew on film, but the gorilla inside this book seems to come alove as you lift the flaps and set the little video in motion. There is an opening that sets the scene of a safari in Kenya. Each of the animals come alive as the sections are turned. Wait till you seethe cheetah dashing, the lion racing, the rhino charging, the elephant flap its big ears and others. All ages.

Age: Early School Years, Later School Years. Award Year: 2013. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

For the growing season this set of three handsome picture books may well inspire a new crop of young gardeners. These are all reissued in a smaller paperback format that retains the artful look of the originals. Eating the Alphabet is an alphabet book of fruits and veggies. Growing Vegetable Soup is a treasure of artful veggies with a recipe for making soup. Planting a Rainbow is a color concept book with more than 20 different kinds of flowers. The gift package comes with a poster to hang in the kitchen or a child's room.

Age: Preschool, Early School Years. Award Year: 2013. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

A young science book that recalls a night of catching, observing and then freeing fireflies. Told in verse, this little story will be familiar to kids who have enjoyed the magic of capturing the blinking lights of firefly night. 3 & up.

Age: Preschool, Early School Years. Award Year: 2013.

A look inside the human body with photographs overlaid with diagrams of the body's main systems. A simple clear text accompanies each of the photos and give young readers a beginning understanding of how the main body organs work to make us move, breathe, digest, and think. A lot of big concepts told in language that does not overwhelm.

Age: Early School Years, Later School Years. Award Year: 2012. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

Through quiet prose and lovely illustrations, this is, as the subtitle says, A Day in the Life of a Starfish. Slowly the starfish manages to get about, turns mussels to liquid food, and escapes from danger until a seagull snatches it up into the air and breaks off one of its rays! Imagine how surprised young readers will be to discover that the ray will grow back again. Watercolor collages add much to the charm of this fine science book for 5-9.

Age: Early School Years. Award Year: 2012.

With cut out openings that allow for previewing what comes next, this young science book introduces beginners to a number of sea creatures. It begins with seven clown fish and counts down to one shark. There is not a good reason for the creatures chosen, nor do the hints really define them in a unique way. That said, this is a simple counting book with an ocean setting. Edward Gibbs' underwater art fills the pages with active and attractive sea life on sturdy stock pages.  Preschoolers will like the peek-a-boo format that shows them part to whole images. 3 & up.

Age: Preschool, Early School Years. Award Year: 2012. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

As a kid, going to the park to feed the ducks was a weekly treat. All the stale bread of the week was saved in a special bag that we took to the Bronx Zoo on Sunday morning. This little book might have added much to those trips. Most kids don't have the language that describes all the doings of the ducks. Here, in the middle of the city, on a duck pond, we get up close for a good look at how the ducks eat, preen, dabble, and attract mates. The narrative is augmented with clear factoids that better define the typical actions of Mallards. A nice young science book that will extend what kids can see if feeding the ducks is on your agenda. 4-7

Age: Preschool, Early School Years. Award Year: 2012. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

Through painterly illustrations and clearly written prose, young readers follow a dolphin baby and its mother from the first breath through the major events of the first six months of life. The simple telling is done in print and extra information is printed in cursive style. Use it as a read aloud or share the reading with young readers who are learning to decode the two very different styles of the written word.

Age: Preschool, Early School Years. Award Year: 2012. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

Young science and counting all in one charming book about the many creatures that hatch from eggs. We see the eggs in nests, meadow grass, on green leaves, and in the seas and sand. Each new set of eggs is introduced in its habitat and then hatched on the fold out page. Muted colors go well with the quiet text. A good book for talking about the many kinds of eggs in our world.

Age: Preschool, Early School Years. Award Year: 2012. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.