Heidi Hart

My mother got this book as a birthday present for my youngest, who just turned one. A 2013 Caldecott Medal winner, it is narrated by a small fish who has stolen a hat from a much larger fish while the bigger fish slept. This is very similar to Klassen's I Want My Hat Back, which we'd borrowed from the library a year or so ago, only in that book, a rabbit stole a bear's hat, and the bear wants it back. I liked that story pretty well, but not enough to see it reprised among sea creatures.

I'd rather not encourage my boys to thievery, so the small fish's narrative excusing his wrongdoing is problematic: he stole the hat, but it's okay because he doesn't think he'll get caught, and he deserves the hat because it fits him better than it fit the big fish anyway. Yes, the final message is that crime doesn't pay -- SPOILER: Big Fish gets his hat back -- but I'm not quite ready to explain that to my wee ones, either.