Sosa, Daniela. Giant Parsnip Soup. Daniela Sosa, Illus. S&S/Paula Wiseman, 05/2025. [36]pp. Picture Book. Trade $19.99. 978-1-6659-6196-7. GRADES Preschool–2. OUTSTANDING.
After finding a giant parsnip, an ethnically diverse group of children gather other vegetables to make soup in this counting book. The bouncy text allows readers to count the number of each item, such as “two sacks of potatoes, three crates of carrots” as they begin to collect the ingredients. The collage, paint, pencil, and ink illustrations use pastel tones and white backgrounds to depict the children bringing the ingredients and preparing the soup, with both the numeral and word for each number included. The book concludes with a chart depicting the things that were counted and a recipe for the soup. This would be a great book to pair with Stone Soup and The Enormous Turnip, two classic folktales with similar themes.
Penny Peck—San José State University iSchool