Fireworks

by Matthew Burgess, Catia Chien (illustrator)

Part poem, part portable fireworks display with a vertical gatefold, this POB picture book from the award-winning team of Matthew Burgess and Cátia Chien highlights the simple delights of a steamy July day in the city as two siblings eagerly await a spectacular fireworks display.

POP! As a hot day sizzles into evening, everyone on stoops and sidewalks looks skyward on this special summer night—the Fourth of July! Words and art blossom into flowers of fire across the sky, making this a perfect read for firework enthusiasts in cities and suburbs everywhere. POP! POP!

Genres: Picture Books, Summer, Childrens, Storytime, Holiday, Fiction, Family

44 pages, Hardcover

First published May 13, 2025

Reviews

[DaNae · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lush marriage of descriptive text and decadent illustrations. One to watch for Caldecott.

[Ashley Guerrero · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a gem! It is a true master class in figurative language and visualization. It’s also perfect for teaching writers how to explode a small moment. Definitely one to add to your shelves! It would even be cool to read it aloud without showing pictures in order for students to see just how descriptive words can be!

[Nashelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fantastic meld of verse and artwork. Joyous, exuberant, summer captured on the page! This country girl enjoyed this city summer day and night immensely.

[Maria Rowe · Rating 4 out of 5]

• 2025 Caldecott Winner •

Beautiful, joyous illustrations.

Materials used: “The artist used mixed media, including pastels, pencils, paint, and scratch board to create the illustrations for this book.”

Typeface used: text: unlisted; display: hand lettering by Rilla Alexander

[Kayla Edwards · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's not at all that I don't like it, but I feel like this one was overhyped. Nice depiction of a summer day.

[Ann Haefele · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perfect picture book about a hot summer day and evening in the city. The descriptive writing and the illustrations that pull the reader in is perfection.

[Janet · Rating 5 out of 5]

In lyrical verse with lots of sensory words one can feel the heat of the summer day and the enjoyment of climbing to the apartment building roof to watch the fireworks with all the noise and smoke. Loved the colorful illustrations, the choice of sensory words, and this title made me remember lots of fireworks displays of summer nights gone by. Great title for the summer season and children will love it.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the hot summer in the city, children play outside in the water from the fire hydrant, or run in the park that has a variety of people. Enjoy watermelon. Dance to random music.

The sounds of summer fun to children are heard. Then the climax of going to the roof to watch a night of fireworks is exciting. A double/double foldout page yields a big image.

The story didn't have a text that was simplistic enough for the reader:
- 'venture'
- 'steamy'
- 'bodega'
- 'bubble cheeks blowing brassy blasts' (sounds nice but tough for kids)

The pictures are colorful, and I had just read a kid's book where I like slightly incomplete pictures ('impressionistic'), but these raw pictures just seem to lack that artistic purposefully-incomplete feeling. Tough for me to describe..

The big fireworks pictures didn't capture that fireworks I've seen. The noises are here, but the images could have had better detail.

I've read kids books to kids, and KNOW when a book is good since they say "again, again". I just don't feel I'd hear that phrase when this concludes.

3.5

[Chana Stiefel · Rating 5 out of 5]

A sparkling marriage of text and art, FIREWORKS by Matthew Burgess and Catia Chien stunningly captures a joyful summer day (and a ka-booming night) in the city, with the most gorgeous pullout and a delightful ending. Sweet and explosive illustrations depict children living with their grandmother, enjoying the best things of summer in their multicultural community. Highly recommended for every home and school library!

[Bethe · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 stars. Sisters spend the day in the park, anticipating the big fireworks show. Bold bright beautiful, especially when it turns nighttime with the black background pages during the fireworks show. Don’t be fooled by the double open spread page, it caught me off guard. Possible shiny medal? Wins 2026 Caldecott Medal!

[Andrew Dittmar · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fireworks by Matthew Burgess & Cátia Chen


Reading history:
Normally I keep this in my private notes section, but I'm moving it. Yay!

Reading history was not added on Goodreads, but was instead kept on a piece of paper note with the book.


Started February 1st, 2026.
Finished February 1st, 2026.


February 1st, 2026: read entire book in physical copy.

[Shanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

A spectacular journey through a summer day in the city! This one is filled with eye-popping illustrations that take you right there as two children experience a summer day, complete with fireworks. Get ready for a grand finale like you’ve never seen before.

Caldecott Medalist 2026

Mia’s 2nd Year of Books: Day 364

[Cheryl Gladfelter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read this today (1/26/26) and thought these illustrations are amazing!! Looked up the YMA to see what was announced today and not shocked to see this won the medal! Gah, these illustrations are just gorgeous and make me feel so warm and fuzzy over summer and fireworks (and I don't like fireworks).

[Rebecca · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simple, poetic text that use all the senses to describe a day in New York that ends in a thrilling fireworks display. Gorgeous and vital, this book is a delight to experience.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although I read this cold January, this bright and vivid book took me right into the heavy heat of Summer. It’s no wonder it received the 2026 Caldecott Medal. Stunning!

[Beth · Rating 5 out of 5]

2026 Caldecott medal

[Naomi · Rating 4 out of 5]

cute

[Heidi Burkhart · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such joyous illustrations will delight picture book readers. Simple and appropriate text.

[Joy Day]

This is a sweet story about two siblings that are waiting for a fantastic firework show in New York City. They enjoy spending time together before the firework display that welcomes them that night.

[AJ Easterday · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's good, but I'm still bitter it beat Cat Nap for the Caldecott.

[shirley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Initially felt a skosh done but the experience was a slow burn. Wonderful payoff. This year's Caldecott recipient.

Library copy.

[Betsy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Think for a moment of the great picture books about summer. The ones that capture it perfectly. It’s such a subjective thing to ask. For me, the ideal summer picture books are the ones I read as a kid. Books like Ultra-Violet Catastrophe by Margaret Mahy or even A Time to Keep by Tasha Tudor. You probably have your own favorites to draw upon. Of course, summer picture books set in the city are another animal entirely. And summer picture books set specifically in New York City? That makes me think of wonderful titles like Water in the Park by Emily Jenkins or Heatwave by Lauren Redniss. We don’t really have a universal summer city picture book to call upon though, do we? Well, as it just so happens, I have a candidate in mind. It KNOWS summer. It KNOWS New York City. And best of all, it knows how to be interesting to large groups as well as individual readers all at once. Kaboom.

“In the summer, the sun rises between buildings on our block to greet us at breakfast.” Two kids (siblings perhaps?) document what the day looks like for them. It’s summertime, and that means “steamy city sidewalks,” fire hydrant sprays, “bubble cheeks blowing brassy blasts that make us onlookers dance,” watermelon slices, salsa, and so much more. But the best is yet to come. Tonight is a special summer night. The two kids climb to the roof of their building and wait. And soon enough… fire erupts in the sky! Fireworks (though never named) begin their incredible show. By the time it’s all done, the two return to their room and their bed, “between cool sheets… to be tucked in with summer on our skin.” Kaboom.

Is it a Fourth of July book? Not specifically, but you just KNOW that’s when it’s going to get pulled out by librarians and booksellers nationwide every year for displays. And for good reason too. In general, Fourth of July picture books just… don’t exist. Mosey on over to your local library sometime and peruse the Holiday Book section of the children’s room. You’ll see loads of different Holiday-related titles there, but I guarantee you that you’ll find at least twice as many more Groundhog Day books than July 4th. That’s because it’s a hard topic to tackle. None of this is to say that such books don’t exist. I consider Janet Wong’s Apple Pie 4th of July a pioneer in the field. But books about the fireworks display that accompanies such celebrations… it’s weird, right? By all rights we should have loads of them! They’re kid-centric (for those kids who aren’t susceptible to loud noises), beautiful to see, and the kind of thing a family can attend together. So where are the books celebrating them? A quick Google search displays some… but none can compare to this. Burgess and Chien? They’ve hit on something.

And it’s not just the fact that they’ve discovered a subject too little lauded in the picture book sphere in the past. You know how people ship characters in stories or TV shows or movies? I ship authors and illustrators. Not romantically (ew) but professionally. It’s one of the few times I envy editors. Imagine having the power of combining any author/illustrator combo you want. Kadir Nelson and Christian Robinson. Laura Amy Schlitz and Sophie Blackall. Pedro Martin and Yuyi Morales. The POWER…. the power…. And I could use it to such great effect. I could take illustrators that have never received the texts they deserve and pair them with the authors who have penned the BEST texts… and that’s what we have here. At last. Not that I ever would have come up with this pairing myself. But Matthew Burgess and Cátia Chien? By the magic that imbues only the best of picture books, these two work exceedingly well together. Burgess brings the literary poetry. Chen, the level of creativity and sheer chutzpah a book like this one warrants. Together, they are unstoppable.

Let’s look at Burgess’s language. First off, Burgess makes this book UNAPOLOGETICALLY NYC. It never names the city, but come on. All the clues are there. The fire hydrants that let loose on summer days. Bodegas. Musicians playing the saxophone in the park. The Brooklyn Bridge (that one's a biggie). And, best of all, creaky fire escapes leading to the roof. Burgess sets the scene, but then he brings another level of introspection to the proceedings. The whole book is written in the present tense, so why is there this prevailing sense of nostalgia on every page? I couldn’t say. What I do know is that I love reading the words of this book. Listen: “On this special summer night, we climb the rickety ladder up up up to the silver tar rooftop, still soft from the day’s sun…” The whole book is like that. Trembling on the cusp of the exciting sky show that will only happen near the story’s end. Burgess’s true talent lies in the fact that he can name his book Fireworks and somehow manage to make you forget all about the premise until the moment of truth appears.

Of course, the best picture book authors leave space for their illustrators to fill in their gaps. Just as Burgess never specifies New York as the location, he doesn’t say much about the characters themselves. We know, from the text, that a grandmother is involved in some way, but that’s it. It’s Chien who brings that second level of pathos to the title. She’s the one who gives these kids a home run entirely by their grandmother and no other adult. It’s Chien who, along with the unnamed genius Art Director of the book, makes the endpapers that vibrant eye-popping fluorescent pink (echoed throughout the book in the art). The two children in the book, who traipse through New York City like it's their own private playground, are genderless, nameless, and we’re with them every step of the way. Chien has a style that can often be described as “dreamy”, but that’s not the word I’d use to describe this book. Engrossing, maybe. Enchanting, definitely. Using (according to the publication page) “mixed media, including pastels, pencils, paint and scratch board,” it’s fascinating to watch each spread do something completely different from the one that comes before and after it. You might see the kids leaping in the spray of the fire hydrant’s water one moment, then receive a bird’s eye view of a park in the next, followed by an extreme close-up of the two kids eating watermelon in the third. You literally never know where Chien is going to go next when you turn the page, and that’s half the fun!

It all builds to the fireworks themselves, and it’s here that I learned a thing or two recently. Let’s say you’re a children’s book author or illustrator and you wanted to put a gatefold into your book. A gatefold is a spread of pages that physically open up outside of the confines of the book’s dimensions in some manner. Historically, librarians have not been huge fans of gatefolds because they have a tendency to rip over time. What makes the gatefold in “Fireworks” so extraordinary is that it’s vertical rather than horizontal. It also tucks so perfectly into the book that it might take an adult reader a couple seconds before they realize it’s even there. Only the thickness of the paper gives away its presence. Now here’s the kicker: Did you know that a gatefold can only appear in a book at just the right moment? Because of the physical nature of how books are made (the folding of the pages together) gatefolds can only come at certain moments. So part of what’s so amazing about this book is that its gatefold comes at precisely the right moment, both physically and from a literary perspective. It’s a marvel of simultaneous engineering and storytelling.

There are so many other aspects of the book that one could discuss. For example, this book straddles a line that can be incredibly difficult for a number of picture books to manage: It is both a lapsit book AND a readaloud for large groups. The fireworks themselves DEMAND to be read out loud. It’s also an ideal summertime read. I mentioned it earlier, but the book that this bears the closest resemblance to, to my mind, has to be Heatwave by Lauren Redniss. I encourage people to read both of them on the coldest of snowy days. You can practically feel the heat emanating from their pages. And can we talk about the book’s ending? Cátia Chien doesn’t just stick the landing. She leaves the readers with a final visual image that’s part Jackson Pollock, part Yayoi Kusama. For me, though, the whole book distills down to that moment when the fireworks have finished and the world is this strange smoky evening land. Or, as Matthew Burgess puts it, “in the air, the sharp charcoal sniff of a thousand matches extinguished.” When you read enough picture books you shouldn’t allow yourself to have favorites. Still, I state loud and clear for the record, that this is without a doubt my favorite firework-related summertime picture book ever. Beautiful, weirdly touching, and utterly original. “Swish Zing Tizzle-ting POOF!”

[Elizabeth Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This one gave me goosebumps all the way up until the end (the end!!!). I love the illustrations and the accompanying text that mimics the sound and feel of fireworks. One of my favorite lines comes near the end: "Fireworks shimmer over the city before fading into ghosts, and in the air, the sharp charcoal sniff of a thousand matches extinguished." This would be a great storytime read-aloud for summertime.

[Lindsay · Rating 5 out of 5]

FIREWORKS is a beautifully written story that instantly pulls you into a moment with spot-on imagery and lyrical prose. From the blast of a fire hydrant to the sticky sweet watermelon juice running down chins, and the magic of fireworks lighting up the night sky like a bouquet of flowers, it perfectly captures how summer feels, smells, tastes, and looks right down to the little yellow squares that appear at dusk — those glowing window lights. All small details, but the way Burgess describes them is so evocative and full of nostalgia, you feel as though you’re in the book.

The illustrations are stunning and compliment the text so perfectly. They are bold, energetic, and bursting with color. They’re both dynamic and comforting, making the whole book feel like a celebration of childhood, community, and those long, golden evenings. Highly recommend as a seasonal transition read for ushering in the summer months. This one deserves a spot in every home, classroom, and library. It’s vibrant, nostalgic, and totally unforgettable.

[Kami Mauldin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a story about two siblings who live in NYC, I think, and who go to their rooftop to watch fireworks. It’s a pretty epic view.

My 4yo said “no other book does that!” The special XL page really won her over.

[Tina Hoggatt · Rating 5 out of 5]

A glorious ode to summer by this dream team of Burgess and illustrator Catia Chien, who has created loose, painterly and hand drawn illustrations alternating with graphic elements as the fireworks display progresses to the glorious gatefold of the finale. The two siblings (twins?) glory in the heat and treats of summer, and stand before the fireworks alone, as it should be. Child centered and lyrical with the fizz and pop of action. Wonderful.

[Sarah Diaz-Bastin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gorgeous and dramatic illustrations and sweet, lyrical text capture the magic of summer, family and fireworks in the city. Fabulous!

[Sierra · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review:

This book was full of onomatopoeia! It is perfect for a quick Fourth of July read for a family, story time, or a child who can read well on their own (multiple sentence at a time).

I personally wasn’t a fan of the artwork until getting to the fireworks aspect of the story (about halfway through). I just think that I didn’t like it because the colors weren’t as bright as the cover/fireworks scene and afterwards.

Summary:

Follow some children on their fun on the Fourth of July. Between the hot air, juicy watermelon, and bright lights of the fireworks the day is full of joys to be found!

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

The illustrations are definitely Caldecott worthy! I love the pop of neon pink! And the prose is excellent. It is very read-out-loudable!

[Alyssa Gudenburr · Rating 5 out of 5]

Follows two siblings and what they do in the summer. The illustrations are BREATHTAKING!!! Would be a good first storytime book.