Flotsam: 1

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Wiesner's wordless tale resonates with visual images that tell his story with clever wit and lively humor,". This book had such an impact on my 6 year old - when we first ‘read’ it together he actually cried at the ending. But there's no way he could have prepared for one particular discovery: a barnacle-encrusted underwater camera, with its own secrets to share .

I think the story having no words encourages a deeper level of engagement, and both the story and the drawings are wonderfully inventive. They consist of a robot fish, an octopus reading, a pufferfish being used as a hot air balloon, turtles with cities on their backs, tiny visiting aliens, and giant starfish with islands on their backs.The final photo consists of a girl, who is holding a photo of a boy, who is holding a photo of a boy, who is holding a photo of a girl, and so on. He creates three-dimensional models of objects he can't observe in real life, such as flying pigs and lizards standing upright, to add authenticity to his drawings. Flotsam won the Caldecott Medal in 2007 as well as being recognised by several other awards, and was chosen as the New York Times best illustrated children’s book that year. One thing I found hard to explain was developing photographs in today's world but we loved the book anyway.

Three of the picture books he both wrote and illustrated became instant classics when they won the prestigious Caldecott Medal: Tuesday in 1992, The Three Pigs in 2002, and Flotsam in 2007, making him only the second person in the award's long history to have won three times.Flotsam has won the 2007 Randolph Caldecott Medal for the most distinguished American picture book for children.