What Are You Looking For?

Expect atmospheric Cornish tales where folklore, ghosts and magic meet farms, the sea and family life. The collection includes linked stories, including one about William, whose disability brings exclusion and cruelty from others.

Choose this for a child who enjoys eerie folktales, unusual friendships and stories that leave some things to imagine. The visual mood is shadowy, but the skull is presented as polite and friendly rather than simply frightening.

This is a character-led environmental mystery about two young people who feel different or guarded. It combines wildlife protection, a beach discovery, family secrets and friendship, while giving Ivy’s difficult earlier experiences meaningful emotional weight.

A bright, direct introduction to adoption and family belonging, using repeated language and diverse family images. Its emotional centre is welcome, but its one-sided account of need may not fit every family’s experience.

A lively, first-person school story combines farcical problem-solving and slow-burn romance with serious family instability. Its emotional centre is Aideen’s habit of helping others while struggling to address her own circumstances.

A lively story about affection, assumptions and comic cat chaos. It offers a warm intergenerational relationship, visual silliness and a clear opportunity to notice that loving intentions do not replace asking what someone wants.

Its emotional centre is the search for a new meaning of home.

This is a gentle shared-reading book about families expressing love through ordinary care. Its main offering is visible family variety alongside repeated, concrete examples of affection, help and time spent together.

This is an emotionally direct school-and-family story about being misread, finding ways to communicate and learning to recognise a person beyond appearance or speech. Harriet’s perspective gives disability, irritation, humour and courage a central place.

This is a serious historical novel about Hiroshima’s bombing and its long aftermath for one family. Its movement between prose, poetry and haiku gives the story a distinctive shape, while the paper cranes connect grief, promises and hope.

Expect a brisk, comic fantasy in which an ancient Egyptian pharaoh becomes an unexpected household guest. Its appeal lies in absurd situations, family reactions and a light adventure involving grave robbers.

This is a serious, emotionally intense story about forced movement, family separation and trying to belong in an unfamiliar country. Its unhappy ending may matter to readers who need preparation for difficult material.

This is a character-led YA romance combining K-pop, classical cello, Seoul, family ties and coming-of-age pressures. Jenny and Jaewoo’s ambitions matter alongside their relationship, while school, performance and family obligations shape their choices.

A thoughtful migration story combines everyday hardship with magical realism. Leelu’s loneliness, her brother’s difficulties and the family’s uncertainty make belonging feel complicated rather than instantly solved.

A warm, visually led celebration of how people show love: through friendship, kindness, consideration, comforting gestures, family events and ordinary routines. Six families and recurring named children give young listeners details to notice across different settings.

A warm, busy story about making something together when home and family security are under pressure. Its strongest appeal is the blend of theatre-making, farm life, friendship and practical determination.

This is an outdoor adventure about a child investigating her grandmother’s disappearance, helping eagles in difficulty and discovering a stronger sense of belonging in the mountain community.

This is an action-led coming-of-age story about a troubled child entering an extraordinary spy-training organisation. It offers perseverance, teamwork and personal change alongside danger, bereavement, coercion and language some families may wish to discuss.

This is an emotionally serious but often humorous story about a child trying to solve an illness he cannot control. Its interest lies in Colin’s urgency, bold schemes and changing understanding of help, responsibility and loss.

A tense survival adventure pairs a fast-moving journey with vivid Australian landscapes, environmental collapse and a close sibling relationship. The dogs are important companions, while family separation and uncertainty keep the emotional stakes high.

A dramatic, atmospheric story of companionship and courage, moving from cosy village life to stormy seas and back to communal celebration. The cat’s unusual power gives the legend a magical, memorable turn.

A gentle family story centred on two male penguins who care for an egg and raise Tango. Its main emphasis is belonging, parenting and adoption, with wider questions about what makes a family.

A gentle adoption story that acknowledges frightening beginnings, uncertainty about change and lingering sadness or anger, while offering comfort through foster carers, social-worker support and a loving adoptive family.

Read this as a warm, symbolic conversation between an adult and child about making a life together. Concrete building, imaginative journeys and emotional “tools” sit alongside ideas of protection, hope and forgiveness.

A quiet, participatory family story in which closeness is conveyed through shared routines rather than explanation. The sparse text and cropped illustrations invite a child and adult to notice details and create spoken stories together.

This is a gentle family story built around an everyday journey. Each relative brings a different pace, route and kind of companionship, while Papa’s shoulder ride becomes the child’s especially cherished school-day experience.

A friendship-focused YA fantasy in which a varied group of young characters face dangerous, action-packed moments. Its emotional emphasis falls on empathy, trust and choosing to stand by one another rather than on graphic or gruesome detail.

A magical historical-fantasy adventure about identity, family and friendship, with mysteries uncovered through flashbacks. Expect spells, Fairyland, talking animals, shapeshifting and a curse rather than a realistic everyday setting.

A gentle Chilean folktale about finding companionship, caring for someone who is not yours to keep, and living through separation. Its sea imagery and illustrations may invite close, unhurried attention.

A warm, nature-focused story about belonging and care. Roz learns by observing the island’s animals, while raising Brightbill gives the story a family relationship and a reason to explore migration, instincts and seasonal change.

A gentle family story centred on Rosie’s imaginative wrapping game, moving through familiar objects, caring relatives, bedtime upset, and the arrival of a new baby sister.

A tense, emotionally serious science-fiction mystery about desperate choices, hidden exploitation and sibling love. Its strongest appeal is the combination of a threatening facility, ethical questions and contrasting prose and poetry voices.

A tense story about a young person trying to escape a parent’s extreme survivalist rules while navigating foster care, distrust and the possibility of being found. Its emotional force comes from Amber’s guarded, sharply ironic voice.

A fast-paced adventure follows Ollie into The Haven, a child-run refuge and investigation network. The story combines criminal danger, missing children, bereavement and a threat to London, with friendship developing between Ollie and Dodge.

A quiet story of making something beautiful in a neglected place, then finding connection through it. Its focus is on patient care, creative action and the gradual opening of a friendship.

A sombre, imaginative story about sisters, a sleeping princess and a dreamworld shaped by inner struggles. Expect more emotional and psychological exploration than fast-moving adventure, with fairy-tale wonder alongside painful material.

This offers a warm, satisfying fairy tale with magical transformations, unusual characters and artwork rich in small visual details that create an intimate, familiar feel.

A humorous, emotionally serious story about a boy facing bullying, family disruption and caring responsibilities, with a fantastical wish premise. It may offer reassurance while still presenting difficult circumstances that merit thoughtful discussion.

A reflective picture book about leaving home and adjusting to an unfamiliar journey. Its mother’s reassuring voice offers steadiness, while the illustrations and repeated questions leave room to notice uncertainty, loss, hope and the child’s perspective.

This is a visually led story about forced movement, family resilience and the search for safety. It may help children consider refugees as people with fears, relationships and hopes, rather than as an abstract issue.

Expect a richly illustrated, surreal story rather than a straightforward cosy tale. The Greenling brings abundance and connection, yet its arrival and departure carry an ominous, folkloric atmosphere.

A celebrity-centred sequel about ambition and loyalty, offering backstage drama, fashion-business aspirations and relationship tension while questioning the costs of perfection and public success.

This is primarily a visual, hands-on activity book: readers colour Sogumi and Soso in fanciful settings, using coloured reference pages for inspiration. Its appeal lies in gentle imaginative play and making pictures, while the role and extent of any written storyline are unclear.

This is a war novel centred on a young woman’s divided loyalties: caring for the wounded, protecting family and considering escape. It offers an emotionally intense perspective on civilian danger, responsibility and hope.

A relationship-led YA novel about a young woman reconsidering a carefully shaped career while navigating renewed feelings for an ex-boyfriend. Its appeal lies in emotional decisions, family dynamics, K-pop settings and a South Korean cultural backdrop.