Where the Wild Things Are Book: Anniversary Edition

Max is sent to bed without supper and imagines sailing away to the land of Wild Things, where he is made king. Where the Wild Things Are is one of those truly rare books that can be enjoyed equally by a child and a grown-up. If you disagree, then it's been too long since you've attended a wild rumpus. Max dons his wolf suit in pursuit of some mischief and gets sent to bed without supper. Fortuitously, a forest grows in his room, allowing his wild rampage to continue unimpaired. Sendak's color illustrations (perhaps his finest) are beautiful, and each turn of the page brings the discovery of a new wonder. The wild things, with their mismatched parts and giant eyes, manage somehow to be scary-looking without ever really being scary; at times they're downright hilarious. Sendak's defiantly run-on sentences one of his trademarks lend the perfect touch of stream of consciousness to the tale, which floats between the land of dreams and a child's imagination.