Reading order
| # | Title | Published | Author | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Garden of Abdul Gasazi | 1979 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 2 | Ben’s Dream | 1982 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 3 | The Wreck of the Zephyr | 1983 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 4 | The Mysteries of Harris Burdick | 1984 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 5 | The Polar Express | 1985 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 6 | The Stranger | 1986 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 7 | Two Bad Ants | 1988 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 8 | Just a Dream | 1990 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 9 | The Wretched Stone | 1991 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 10 | The Widow’s Broom | 1992 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 11 | The Sweetest Fig | 1993 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 12 | Bad Day at Riverbend | 1995 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 13 | Probuditi! | 2006 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 14 | Queen of the Falls | 2011 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
| 15 | The Misadventures of Sweetie Pie | 2014 | Chris Van Allsburg | Buy |
Chris Van Allsburg’s picture books span from 1979 to 2014 and share a common thread of everyday life being touched by something strange or magical. His first book, The Garden of Abdul Gasazi, follows a boy who chases a dog into a retired magician’s garden with unexpected results. The Stranger, published in 1986, is about a farmer who takes in an injured man who seems to have a mysterious connection to the changing seasons.
His illustrations, rendered in styles ranging from pencil to full-color pastels, have a cinematic quality. Books like Two Bad Ants, which shows the world from an ant’s perspective, and The Wretched Stone, about a mysterious glowing rock that hypnotizes a ship’s crew, take simple premises and push them toward the unsettling or the wondrous. Several of his later works, including Queen of the Falls (2011), draw on real historical events.