The most common pitfalls in Valentine’s books for children are: 1) depicting romance between children or 2) giving an unbiblical definition of love. What better way do I like to celebrate any time of year than with a children’s books curation. I love curating book collections (and I don’t discriminate against “lower” art mediums so movies too) that are beautiful or good in some way to share with others. And I am highly selective! In general what I look for in children’s literature (and all art forms) is a piece that somehow captures some of whatever is true, noble, just, pure, lovely, of good report, of any virtue, or praiseworthy.
Books that come out into the house annually for a season are going to be pretty powerful for family culture so I want to find good ones. I consider this work to be refining a child’s palette. I am helping shape an appetite for what is beautiful, as defined by God.
These are children’s books I recommend that capture a piece of the heart of christian charity and love and the beauty of Valentine’s Day.
These are children’s books I recommend that capture a piece of the heart of christian charity and love and the beauty of Valentine’s Day.
- Happy Valentine’s Day, Curious George written by N. Di Angelo
- Love from Madeline written by Ludwig Bemelmens
- The Day It Rained Hearts written by Felicia Bond
- The Valentine’s Bears written by Eve Bunting
- I Heart Dad written by Eric Carle
- I Heart Mom written by Eric Carle
- Love Is illustrated by Paola Escobar
- I Love You, Daddy! written by Edie Evans
- The Hug Book written by Sue Fliess
- I Heart You written by Meg Fleming
- That’s What Love Is written by Hannah Hall
- Mirabel’s Missing Valentine’s written by Janet Lawler
- Our Loving God written by Carine Mackenzie
- I Can Say to God “I Love You” written by Catherine Mackenzie
- Jesus: The Best Love written by Catherine Mackenzie
- A Hug is for Holding Me written by Lisa Wheeler
All of these on amazon would be $144 (at time of writing). If you wanted just a few, I’d say the shortlist of the very, very best are That’s What Love Is, The Valentine’s Bears, and Jesus: The Best Love – in that order. But, all of these are strong and over a long time I have filtered out MANY ugly or poor ones, even just within the Valentine’s Day niche!
If it’s helpful, I put all these as amazon links, so you can source them easily there. If from this list you know of one I’ve missed that sounds like we’d like please tell me!!
This post is a part of my very selective curations series of books and movies.
“Every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.” I John 4
