Brilliant ink-on-tile illustrations created with a secret process bring the alphabet to colorful life. Children will delight in the rich, poetic language of colors like emerald, jasmine, and quartz—while also meeting old favorites like yellow, orange and purple.
A color key and pronunciation guide (for new colors like “zaffre,” which rhymes with “laugher”) is included. Instructions for how to extend the learning with a predictable sentence chart are also provided.
Supporting materials like miniature printables of the illustrations, plus sentence builders, can be found on our Literacy Extras page.
What Readers Are Saying
“This book honors young children and the beauty of the world.”
—Karen Deerwester
“Oooo WOW”
— Elias 4yo
“Just Beautiful! A children’s book that can be enjoyed by all.”
—Jackie Maverick
“A is for Azure is a feast for the eyes, ears, and imagination. Its pages are bursting with juicy colors and delicious words. I had such fun soaking up the gorgeous artwork and pronouncing sumptuous phrases like ‘a vermilion climb’ and ‘a heliotrope trio.’
I bought this book for a friend’s baby shower. (I admit to reading it many times before wrapping it.) Now she plans to purchase a copy for one of her friends, who is also expecting. I see this delightful book providing many years of fun and discovery.”
—Sharon A. Gibbs
“A book for all ages!
I’ve shared this book with my neighbor’s two year old daughter, my friends’ eight year old son, my seventeen year old niece, my fifty-six year old sister, and my ninety-one year old father-in-law. The words and images, the music of the language and the colorful artwork, spoke to them all.
The young ones touched the pages, so sure the colors would rub off on their fingers, and they giggled at the sounds of heliotrope and xanthic. The teenager was inspired by the imaginative connection between word and picture. My sister loved the choice of color words and the interpretation of the illustrations. My father-in-law, who has dementia, smiled as I turned the pages for him, and I knew he was delighted by what he heard as I read to him.
As for myself, each time I pick up A is for Azure, I am surprised by the magic synchronicity of the language and the images.
A beautiful work of art.”
—Vicki Addesso
“As a speech-language pathologist, I am often in search of simple materials that will help my students generate connections in their expression, and this book will be a valuable resource in my back-to-school library. In addition, the beautifully crafted, impressionistic illustrations will be a sunny summer-day-looking-up-at-the-figures-in-the-clouds tool all year round. I’ve included my favorite page (bubbles, of course)~what can you see?”
—Michelle Ortega
