Siblings loom large in children’s literature, and for good reason. Despite the relationship’s infinite varieties, it’s always a story. If the essence of story is Desire meets Danger over Time, siblings are a built-in plot, particularly during childhood, when sharing a house guarantees that every Desire is common knowledge and therefore prey to Dangers large and small.
Family life is a drama rich in emotional alliances and rebellions, secret signals, idiosyncratic rules and ancestral rites. Plus jokes. Sure, parents are part of the narrative, but they are too necessary for survival to experiment on. Brothers and sisters, equals in status (or unfairly not!), are much better story fodder. They can be messed with.
Accordingly, children’s books contain some of the most intense and memorable sibling relationships in literature. For young readers, these depictions can serve as models, wish fulfillment or revenge fantasies. For parents, the drama on the page may offer an opportunity to talk about the drama in the dining room.
Here are some of my favorites, starting with the ur-moment of siblinghood.
Julius, the Baby of the World
by Kevin Henkes
The arrival of the new baby: This theme is an old standby of picture books, and all too often it feels like it. Occasionally, though, you get the real deal, and Henkes’s “Julius, the Baby of the World” is it. Lilly is prepared to be the greatest older sister ever, until baby Julius actually shows up and proves to be dull, smelly and inexplicably adored by his parents. Lilly proposes a number of solutions to this problem and spends a lot of time in the Uncooperative Chair. The brilliance here is that the perspectives of all the characters — Lilly, her parents and even Julius — are thoroughly clear, which makes for a resource that is both hopeful and entertaining for families in a similar position. (Ages 4 to 8)
The Goody
by Lauren Child
For more everyday events, you can find a slew of great books featuring sibling pairs whose bond is tested and renewed by conflict, including Rosemary Wells’s rabbit duo Max and Ruby and Russell Hoban’s Frances the badger and her little sister, Gloria. These are wonderful — and fun — but a more complicated scenario is addressed in “The Goody,” a picture book by the creator of another popular pair, Charlie and Lola. Here we find Chirton and Myrtle, whose assigned family roles are, respectively, The Goody and The Not Goody. Chirton cleans the rabbit pen and “never, ever stuck his finger up his nose.” Myrtle ignores the rabbit pen and scatters cereal on the floor. As the rewards of being a Goody predictably pall, Chirton tries an exciting new life, while Myrtle works to fill the Goody gap. Child’s wry text and vibrant images show how behavior abstracted into labels becomes a prison, no matter which side of virtue you’re on. It’s an extremely appealing argument for nuanced thinking, and we could all use some of that. (Ages 4 to 8)
Island Storm
by Brian Floca; illustrated by Sydney Smith
Those seeking examples of sibling camaraderie can always turn to good old “Hansel and Gretel,” with its “Stick Together and You Won’t Get Eaten” message, but for a more positive worldview a new picture book, “Island Storm” — the Caldecott medalist Floca’s first author-only foray, with art by the Hans Christian Andersen Award winner Smith — presents the glory of shared adventure: A brother-sister pair go outside to watch the advent of a stupendous summer storm, then ask each other, “Is this enough, or do we try for more?” The outcome? “You pull on me, I pull on you, and we decide to go on.” Given the book’s beauty, readers will want to “go on” right alongside them. (Ages 4 to 8)
Little Women
by Louisa May Alcott
Middle grade readers have a treasure trove of sibling stories to choose from. The contention-to-reconciliation narrative abounds (hello, Beezus and Ramona), but supportive relationships are rarer — and immensely gratifying when found. At a low point in our rivalrous childhood, my sister and I fought so bitterly over our copy of Alcott’s “Little Women” — the classic of sisterly devotion — that our mother had to buy a second one, which my sister claimed on the grounds that my fingers had polluted the first. Obviously, we didn’t learn much from the story. Equally obviously, we cared passionately about it. Each of us secretly knew herself to be the fifth March sister, unrelated to the impostor on the other side of the line down the middle of the room. Our real sisters weren’t real; they were on the page. (Ages 10 and up)
The Penderwicks
by Jeanne Birdsall
More recent standout novels in the supportive-siblings category include Birdsall’s “The Penderwicks,” winner of the family-every-reader-wants-to-be-in award, as it tells the tale of four very distinct, very loving sisters and their affectionate father vacationing in a cottage on the grounds of a grand estate with a perfectly awful owner and a boy who, like us, wishes he were a Penderwick. (Ages 8 to 12)
The Willoughbys
by Lois Lowry
In “The Willoughbys,” Lowry sets the scene for “an old-fashioned type of family, with four children” — bossy Tim; a pair of twins, both named Barnaby; and softhearted Jane — then upends all convention, and makes us laugh, by giving them insufferable parents who blithely depart on a trip to Europe and sell the family home out from under them. Not to worry, though. The Willoughby children are plucky and establish a brand-new and more gratifying family on their own. (Ages 8 to 12)
Sisters (Smile, Book 2)
by Raina Telgemeier
We’re in the midst of an efflorescence of graphic memoirs. The pioneer of this genre is Telgemeier, who has kindly mined her own childhood for our reading pleasure in her beloved Smile trilogy. While her brother also makes appearances in the books, “Sisters” takes a keen look at a particularly sticky phase of her relationship with her sister. (Ages 8 to 12)
Mexikid
by Pedro Martín
What’s it like to be in a really big family? Another touching and hilarious graphic memoir provides an answer to this question. We join Martín’s family of 11 (!) on a road trip from Central California to Jalisco, Mexico, to bring their abuelito back to live with them — an odyssey that involves a Winnebago, a pickup truck, border-guard bribery, bananas, a lousy haircut, a deer and, definitely not least, Pedro’s growing respect and love for his grandfather. Martín succeeds in creating a warm and generous portrait of the whole family, while treating young readers to the vicarious thrill of participating in an overflowing community of brothers and sisters, filled with sibling stories of every kind. (Ages 10 and up)
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