Here are 100 books that Who Made This Mess? fans have personally recommended if you like
Who Made This Mess?.
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As a kindergarten teacher and mom, I have dealt with messy kids. It’s part of who they are! These books are a funny, enjoyable way to try to get kids to enjoy clean up time, and understand that messes are normal!
Lenora’s story is so relatable for kids who get attached to every single toy, sock, or cereal box craft.
I love how this book gently introduces the idea of decluttering in a way that doesn’t feel overwhelming or sad—it’s playful, realistic, and makes organizing feel like something fun and empowering!
Lenora loves her toys, clothes, and dolls. She loves everything so much she never wants to get rid of them! But having too much stuff can take up too much room, so Lenora has to organize and declutter.
A joyful, rhyming picture book about tidying up, letting go, and the magic of sharing.Lenora loves her toys—a little too much. Her room is overflowing with books, blocks, stuffies, and sparkly dress-up clothes. But when the mess starts to get in the way of play, Mama gently suggests it might be time to clean up… and give a few things away.At first, Lenora isn’t so sure. She needs everything! But as she begins to sort, she discovers something surprising: decluttering doesn’t just make space in her room—it makes space in her heart.Perfect for ages 3–8, Lenora’s Super Duper Messy Room…
Over the past 50 years, scientists have made incredible progress in the application of genetic research to human health care and disease treatment. Innovative tools and techniques, including gene therapy and CRISPR-Cas9 editing, can treat inherited disorders that were previously untreatable, or prevent them from happening in the first place.…
As a kindergarten teacher and mom, I have dealt with messy kids. It’s part of who they are! These books are a funny, enjoyable way to try to get kids to enjoy clean up time, and understand that messes are normal!
Robert Munsch is one of my all-time favorites for humor and heart, and this book totally delivers.
I love how Lacy’s messy problem leads to a hilarious surprise. It reminds kids that cleaning up (and laundry!) may not be fun, but it saves you from some pretty wild wardrobe situations!
Lacy is dumping out all of her bedroom drawers to try and find a clean shirt to wear to school. After asking her mom, Lacy finally agrees to wearing an embarrassing tee that her grandma gave her; “Kiss Me, I am Perfect,” it says. Yikes! To her surprise, she receives lots of kisses on the way to school from various animals!
If Lacey can't remember to put her clothes in the laundry, her mom is going to make her wear a weird grandma shirt to school.... And who knows what could happen?
With his classic style, Robert Munsch takes a normal, everyday situation and turns things upside down! When Lacey goes to get dressed for school she finds she has. . .no clean clothes! Her mom tells Lacey to wear the shirt her grandma gave her. It's a weird shirt that says: "Kiss me, I'm perfect!" Lacey just knows the other kids are going to make fun of her. On the…
As a kindergarten teacher and mom, I have dealt with messy kids. It’s part of who they are! These books are a funny, enjoyable way to try to get kids to enjoy clean up time, and understand that messes are normal!
Llama Llama is a classic in our house, and this book is such a clever way to show cause and effect when it comes to messes.
I love how it uses imagination to get kids thinking about their role in keeping things tidy. Bonus points for the sweet mama/child moment!
Lama has a messy room that he doesn’t want to cleanup. His mama asks Lama to think of a world where mamas didn’t clean up. With the chaos that a dirty mama leaves behind, Lama quickly cleans up and realizes that even little llamas need to help clean.
Mama Llama teaches Llama Llama a humorous lesson in cleaning up in Anna Dewdney's bestselling Llama Llama series.
Time to pick up all your toys! Why is Mama making noise? Mama says it's cleaning day. Llama only wants to play.
Anna Dewdney's Llama Llama is growing up, but he still loves to play with all his toys! When Mama Llama says it's time to clean up, Llama responds like any child more interested in playing than cleaning . . . by ignoring her! But Mama has an imaginative response of her own. What if she never cleaned? What would happen…
Over the past 50 years, scientists have made incredible progress in the application of genetic research to human health care and disease treatment. Innovative tools and techniques, including gene therapy and CRISPR-Cas9 editing, can treat inherited disorders that were previously untreatable, or prevent them from happening in the first place.…
As a kindergarten teacher and mom, I have dealt with messy kids. It’s part of who they are! These books are a funny, enjoyable way to try to get kids to enjoy clean up time, and understand that messes are normal!
I love how it introduces sorting and organizing in a way that’s interactive and creative. It’s not just about cleaning—it’s about how to clean, and helps kids feel in control of their own space.
Sam has lots of items in his room. Lots of things to sort through. There are many ways Sam can categorize his items. This book gives readers the critical thinking skills they will need to sort their own toys.
Marthe Jocelyn is back with another clever concept book to follow Hannah's Collections, Ones and Twos and Where Do You Look? This time, she tackles counting and categories.
Sam's things are in a heap. Time to tidy up! He starts to organize his things, but quickly runs into trouble. He can make a pile of black and white things. But the penguin also belongs in the things with wings pile. He can make a pile of rocks. But the round rock also belongs in the round things pile. How will he ever sort his 100 things? Marthe Jocelyn takes…
I am a lover of champagne and popular culture and am fascinated with how humor can be used to confront taboo topics and subvert familiar orthodoxies. As a cultural critic, I study how visual artists challenge notions of childhood innocence by adding images of drinking and drunkenness to their adaptations of children’s texts and childish objects. Through these re-imaginings, we see how children’s culture is drinking culture. The most important lessons about alcohol and childhood in the drinking curriculum walk a fine line between humor and dread. My other books include Graphic Girlhoods: Visualizing Education and Violence and Witnessing Girlhood: Toward an Intersectional Tradition of Life Writing (with Leigh Gilmore).
This picture book is one of the only contemporary books for children that shows drinking for pleasure.
After a mouse gets eaten up by a wolf, he meets a duck that lives in “the belly of the beast.” The two become fast friends and live happily in the wolf’s stomach. Together they make soup, dance to records, and enjoy the finer things in life. When the wolf complains of a stomachache, the duck calls up a cure for him—advising that he eat a hunk of good chess, a flagon of wine, and some beeswax candles.
After the wolf does so, mouse and duck don top hats, tuxedo jackets, bow ties and sit down to feast, raising their glasses of wine to the health of the wolf. Ultimately, duck and mouse save the wolf’s life and in return he grants them their wish to return to their home in his stomach.
They may have been swallowed, but they have no intention of being eaten... A new comedy from the unparalleled team of Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen.
"A subversive delight ... an unexpected, hilarious collaboration" Guardian
Early one morning a mouse met a wolf and was quickly gobbled up...
When a woeful mouse is swallowed up by a wolf, he quickly learns he is not alone: a duck has already set up digs and, boy, has that duck got it figured out! Turns out it's pretty nice inside the belly of the beast - there's delicious food, elegant table settings and,…
I never actually stopped reading children’s literature. Even as a grown-up, I figured out a way to read picture books every day. After earning a master’s degree in education, I found myself back in the library reading to students. I love reading funny books; they are more engaging and more likely to get kids reading and keep them reading. I love humor and think it is perfect in the shorter format of picture books.
In this Caldecott Honor-winning picture book, The Twilight Zone comes to the carrot patch as a rabbit fears his favorite treats are out to get him.
Jasper Rabbit loves carrots-especially Crackenhopper Field carrots. He eats them on the way to school. He eats them going to Little League. He eats them walking home. Until the day the carrots start following him...or are they? Celebrated artist Peter Brown's stylish illustrations pair perfectly with Aaron Reynold's text in this hilarious picture book that shows it's all fun and games...until you get too greedy.
I am an American children’s author and expat living in France. Holding a bilingual master’s from La Sorbonne University in Paris, I now teach both English and French as foreign languages to children and adults of all ages. A Francophile since my very first French lessons back in high school, I now enjoy French citizenship and am happy to be “living my best life” between my two countries. I am passionate about promoting literacy and the languages I hold dear.
I fell in love with the adorable illustrations of this sweet and funny story in which Escargot wanders from page to page, determined to reach the tasty salade at the very end of the book.
Charmingly addressing the reader at every turn, Escargot narrates his own story in a French accent that begs to be read aloud.
2
authors picked
Escargot
as one of their favorite books, and they share
why you should read it.
This book is for kids age
4,
5,
6, and
7.
What is this book about?
Bonjour! Escargot is a beautiful French snail who wants only two things: 1. To be your favourite animal. 2. To get to the delicious salad at the end of the book. But when he gets to the salad, he discovers that there's a carrot in it. And Escargot hates carrots. But when he finally tries one - with a little help from you! - he discovers that it's not so bad after all.
I am a romantic; I live to love. My books Eve’s Blessing and Subjectified both help women build great sex and love lives. As a therapist and sex educator, I help people connect with their partners and build the relationships of their dreams. I am currently working on a romance novel with spiritual and psychedelic themes. I love books that introduce us to new worlds as we explore the inner world of each character.
This classic romance novel—and, now, movie—features a love story not just between a woman and a man but also between two sisters struggling to find themselves and overcome self-destructive behavior.
By the end, you'll experience catharsis as both women confront their longstanding self-confidence issues and make peace with themselves and each other.
Rose Feller is thirty years old, a high-powered attorney, with a secret passion for romance novels, an exercise regime she's going to start next week, and dreams of a man who will slide off her glasses, gaze into her eyes, and tell her that she's beautiful.
Meet Rose's sister Maggie. Twenty-eight years old, drop-dead gorgeous and only occasionally employed, Maggie is a backing singer in a band called. She dreams of fame and fortune -- and of getting her dowdy big sister to stick to a skin-care regime.
These two women with nothing in common but a childhood tragedy, shared…
I’m a poet, short story writer, novelist, essayist, and writing professor at New York University. I also have a fascination with altered states of consciousness, especially with mysticism, psychosis, and psychedelic art. (My book James Joyce’s Mandala examines all three.) My first novel, Claiming De Wayke, delves into those elements too, but with a particular focus on vivid first-person narration, so most of my recommendations involve books that are not only trippy in terms of plot and characterization but are also psychedelically inflected in their use of language itself. I hope you check some of them out.
I grew up in rural Ireland, so not exactly the gritty urban Scotland of Welsh’s novel, but the first thing that struck me about the book was its savage, semi-feral, intensely real Scottish dialect. I’d never seen anything quite like it in print.
The prose feels almost illegal, a ne’er-do-well that has simply decided to break into the publishing house and force its way onto the page without anyone’s permission. I didn’t consciously plan to steal this technique for my own novel, but how could I not endorse it?
Welsh has written more explicitly psychedelic works, but this book remains for me his masterwork, underscoring how, in many ways, his protagonist Renton’s life is at its weirdest when he tries to get sober.
'An unremitting powerhouse of a novel that marks the arrival of a major new talent. Trainspotting is a loosely knotted string of jagged, dislocated tales that lay bare the hearts of darkness of the junkies, wide-boys and psychos who ride in the down escalator of opportunity in the nation's capital. Loud with laughter in the dark, this novel is the real McCoy. If you haven't heard of Irvine Welsh before-don't worry, you will' The Herald
I’ve loved comic strips since I was a kid, so children’s books that had cartoon art in them were the ultimate for me. That love drove me to research and write about the career and life of Jack Kent. Books by cartoonists tend to have the whole package: They tell a story visually, they’re funny, and they use language economically but memorably. The limitations I placed on myself in choosing this list were 1) the creator had to have both written and drawn the book, and 2) they had to have been established as a professional cartoonist before moving into children’s books.
Shrek! was a book before it was ever a wildly successful film franchise, but the book bears almost no resemblance to the movies.
Yes, William Steig’s ogre is both vile and reviled, and he has a donkey for a friend, but the story itself is very straightforward, detailing Shrek’s rampage across the countryside on his way to meet a “stunningly ugly princess” with whom he can live “horribly ever after.”
Steig had been a celebrated New Yorker cartoonist for almost four decades when he produced his first children’s book in 1968. He wrote and drew Shrek! when he was in his early 80s. He breaks the cardinal rule of using simple language, but makes up for it with fun-to-read-aloud choices in vocabulary and sentence structure, such as “The irascible dragon was preparing to separate Shrek from his noggin.”
1
author picked
Shrek!
as one of their favorite books, and they share
why you should read it.
This book is for kids age
4,
5,
6, and
7.
What is this book about?
Read the book that inspired the famous film franchise in this wonderfully funny picture book.
Before Shrek made it big on the silver screen, there was William Steig's SHREK!, a book about an ordinary ogre who leaves his swampy childhood home to go out and see the world. Ordinary, that is, if a foul and hideous being who ends up marrying the most stunningly ugly princess on the planet is what you consider ordinary.
