The overarching narrative is a small boy’s experience of the cumulative result of breaking rules as imposed or enforced by an older brother. The fantastic role play, assisted by Tan’s mechanical and primordial creatures, has dark consequences for the younger brother. He is borne away by a hybrid furnace/tram into a bleak landscape. Wordless pages help to maintain tension, and readers will relate to the mad scramble of those last days of freedom. An app accompanies the book.

Esther’s Rainbow (Allen & Unwin, 32 pp, $24.99 hb) has been written by Kim Kane and illustrated by Sara Acton. These creators last collaborated on the puzzling The Unexpected Crocodile (2012). Esther notices a rainbow which ‘hummed a secret hum’ on her kitchen floor and then, just as quickly, slips away. For the rest of the week she sees, feels, and tastes its colours in everything she does. But will she ever see a full rainbow? Acton’s pictures track the little girl’s activities within a busy family, in fine pen lines and washes using seven featured colours. This appealing concept has been written poetically by Kane, who has an eye for domestic detail.

Eleanor Kerr’s To Get to Me (Random House, $19.95 hb, 32 pp) has been illustrated by Judith Rossell. Peter asks his friend Ahmed to meet him at the zoo. Ahmed’s trip starts off with him on the back of a camel, making his way from Africa to Australia in stages by bus, plane, train, ferry, and, finally, chairlift up to Taronga Zoo. The exuberant collage and colour will appeal to readers who are obsessed with transportation of all kinds, and the text prompts the use of sound effects for each one. Rossell’s renditions of the scenes are perfect: she knows the details needed to satsify each small petrol head and the adult reading to him. The best spread in the book is the world map that shows Ahmed’s journey. The continents are shown in green, with animals and structures representative of countries on top. For example, South America has a llama, toucan, butterfly, soccer ball, and penguin: each of them the same size. Children who are starting to understand the idea of living in a diverse world will find this instructive.

Programs such as the State Library of Western Australia’s excellent Better Beginnings Family Literacy Program have led to greater awareness by parents and the broader community of the importance of sharing books with babies. Publishers have responded with more books specifically for this market. Here are three new releases.

In Mem Fox & Emma Quay’s Baby Bedtime (Viking, $24.99 hb, 32 pp), a parent elephant expresses its love for the baby elephant: ‘I could rock you in my arms. I could gaze at you all night. I could whisper lots of stories till the darkness turns to light.’ Quay’s illustrations, in her trademark lilacs and lavenders, show the affection between the animals as they lock eyes and use their trunks to point towards each other and entwine. There is no room for the reader except to gaze at them. The reader is not included in this scene; as the book itself says, it’s strictly for parents. As the narrative progresses through the familiar leave-taking rituals, the range of pachyderm facial expressions (in profile) is small and results in a disappointing lack of variation in the drawings. The final ‘Fall asleep, my angel, with a kiss upon your brow’ is jarring.

Alison Lester’s Kissed by the Moon (Viking, $19.95 hb, 32 pp) has an embossed textured cover with the feel of linen. The narrative moves from night to night and concludes with ‘May you grow sleepy at sunset, sing to the stars, and drift into dreams. And may you, my baby, be kissed by the moon.’ A round-faced baby looks straight out of this book as it experiences the world as breezes, flowers, sand and mountains. The adults are laps, secured hands, and encircling arms; the sole focus is on the baby. Lester’s colours, especially the blues and greens, are beautifully chosen to be appealing but not sickeningly pastel. This being a book by Alison Lester, there are companion animals aplenty. There is much for adult readers to discuss while they read it to their infants. I don’t remember seeing Lester insects before, but the bug-eyed procession in the baby’s garden is a delight.

Repackaging artwork and texts from previously published picture books in order to cater for the 0–5 market has produced some books that miss the mark. Graeme Base’s My First Animalia (Viking, $19.99 hb, 32 pp) takes the illustrations from his Animalia (1986) and squishes them into a slender flap book. The original alphabet book featured large paintings that could be examined by readers as they searched for things that started with particular letters. There was hardly a children’s librarian in Australia who didn’t swoon over the lazy lions.

In this new incarnation, the left-hand page has two letters of the alphabet, upper and lower case. The right-hand page contains four vignettes. One illustration with a caption (‘Ingenious iguanas / Jovial Jackals’) is on the flap, which can be opened to reveal a reduced reproduction of the original full page. The turn of the flap also reveals a caption for each of the vignettes: ‘Iron/Iceberg/Ice-cream/Ibis.’

This artist famously supervised the printing of the original himself, to ensure that the integrity of his artwork was retained in reproduction. All the more mystifying, then, why he agreed to this. The only other text comprises two introductory verses instructing the reader to find the four items featured on each page. This is best passed over quickly. I can only suppose that this book has been produced to excite nostalgia for the original among parents. As the key message of sharing books with babies and toddlers is enjoyment, go straight to the source for this one.