2026 Eisner Nominees: Early Readers

This post is the first in a series of three.

This year's Eisner Award nominees went public on May 15, and my most recent post here listed the nominees in categories that interest me particularly, including those for young readers' books: Early Readers, Kids, and Teens. Since then, I've checked out more than a dozen of these books from the LA Public Library in hopes of reading all nominees in Early Readers, Kids, and Teens before the (yipes) June 5 voting deadline. Wish me luck!​

So far, I've read all the nominated books in Early Readers. See below! It's a strong category. Clicking on a title, BTW, will take you to a publisher's page about that title. I've denoted the book I'm likely to vote for with a ♥​.

The Fire-Breathing Duckling, by Frank Cammuso, designed by François Vigneault (TOON Books)

This remix of The Ugly Duckling stars a pint-sized dragon, adopted by ducks, who knows he is different but doesn’t understand why. Guided by a friendly bluebird, he quizzes one animal after another to find out just what kind of “duckling” he is (his anxious questions recall P.D. Eastman’s classic Are You My Mother?). The story is simple, affirming, and unsurprising, but Cammuso’s cartooning is lively and assured. His neat three-tier pages, keyed to emerging readers per the TOON schema, have an irresistible rhythmic bounce. The climax, in which questioning gives way to heroism, is a hoot. 

Steve, A Rare Egg (Steve the Horse Book 2), by Kelly Collier, designed by Michael Reis (Kids Can Press)

Like the nominees by Cammuso and Fong, this is a funny animal story. It stars Steve the Horse, an irrepressible goofball whom Collier created for a picture book (2017), then recreated for a graphic novel series. This entry (the series’ second) is one of two Steve books published last year. Here Steve adopts a balloon, which he takes for an unhatched egg, while Bob the raccoon, a skeptic, plays the part of the sensible naysayer. The plot is blithely absurd, but what sells it is Steve’s cocky self-belief and enthusiasm, delivered with droll cartooning and sly wit. Dryly, weirdly, hilarious!

Night Light, by Michael Emberley (I Like to Read® Comics / Holiday House)

A blackout at bedtime sends a parent and child out to gather stars from the night sky. With a bag of borrowed stars, they light up their darkened room -- until they hear the weeping of the moon, now alone in the dark. How can they all share the light? The situations are familiar, and Emberley’s digital colors a touch cloying, but his cartooning is sure and his pages inventive, with staggered, overlapping, sometimes free-floating panels. The vaguely humanlike characters hail from two prior books (one a Geisel Award winner). The approach, while TOON-like, is more complex than Cammuso’s. Charming.

The Faraway Forest: Wally’s Route, by Debbie Fong, colors by Kayla Catanzaro, designed by Sara Gillingham Studio (Chronicle Books)

Ostensibly the start of a new series, Wally’s Route depicts an idyllic green community, a sort of suburban Hundred Acre Wood in which anthropomorphic critters hold various jobs (imagine a sylvan Busytown). Wally, a raccoon, is the mail carrier (a benign Postman Pat type), assisted by his friend Bo, a rabbit. Across four quick chapters, Wally delivers mail, helps neighbors, annoys a grumpy one, then catches a cold and must be helped by others. Conflicts are simple, the mood friendly. Fong’s cartooning is decorous, but her pages are dynamic and Catanzaro’s coloring gorgeously mixes brightness and texture. I’d read more.

All the Hulk Feels, by Dan Santat, designed by Brann Garvey (Abrams Fanfare / Marvel)

Santat is often wonderful, yet I came to this book skeptically, wary of yet another corporate superhero riff (mis)targeted at early readers. I was wrong. Somehow, Santat manages to deliver a picture book about emotional regulation (see When Sophie Gets Angry…, The Color Monster, and countless others) that works perfectly well as a Hulk comic. Here the Hulk and his human alter ego Bruce Banner leave each other notes (scrawled in crayon on scraps of paper) that enable them to better understand each other and channel their feelings. This is done with deadpan wit, energy, and formal flair. My pick!