A pattern of separation, departure and (possible) return lies at the heart of many of our best-known children's stories. It is an obvious metaphor for the need of the young to assert an independence free from parental and domestic restraint and to confront the challenge of their own first explorations. Increasingly, even picture books for the youngest readers touch on these significant themes and the most successful of them do so in a manner which is imaginative, witty and colourful.
Consider, for example, Maybe One Day, by Frances Thomas and Ross Collins (Bloomsbury, £9.99 in UK). Here, we are allowed to spy on the dreams of Little Monster (a weirdly fascinating amalgam of lizard, elephant and reindeer) as he announces to his benevolent and sympathetic parents that it is time to set off on his travels - which in this case will take him into the depths of space. In both text and illustration the juxtaposition of the security of home and the thrill of the interplanetary unknown provides opportunities, well taken, for a humorously original book.
The humour in Angela McAllister and Tim Archbold's highly entertaining Be Good, Gordon (Bloomsbury, £9.99 in UK) lies in their subversive view of the babysitter (Lily Jigg-Popsicle!) as being much more of a mischief-maker than her young charge (Gordon). Her Tuesday night with this doggedly earnest child becomes an amazing sequence of zany adventures, shaking him from his predictable "goodness" into an awareness of how fun and, indeed, sheer lunacy might also have a place in his development. Archbold's madcap illustrations - occasionally reminiscent of Quentin Blake - endorse the note of naughtiness which underpins the quirky text.
With words by Kathy Henderson and pictures by Brita Granstrom, Baby Knows Best (Doubleday, £10.99 in UK) is a mischievous tribute to the determination of even the youngest child to assert her own preferences. While parents and grandparents almost desperately go out of their way to provide diversions for her, she resolutely makes her own choices, resulting in a fair measure of domestic chaos. The playful, rhyming text - "She's got toys that roll and click and tick/There's one that sings as well" - combines with the dramatic large-scale artwork to convey a sense of baby power at its most headstrong - and most endearing.
"Headstrong" and "endearing" are, once again, the keynotes of the baby behaviour to be witnessed in Emma Chichester Clark's No More Kissing! (Andersen, £9.99 in UK), though here invested in a real young monkey as distinct from the metaphorical kind. "Why," asks Momo, "does there have to be so much kissing?" and as the story develops his scepticism is given increasingly strident expression, pitting his distaste for the pastime against the apparent kissing obsession of his family.
But then a baby brother arrives and, even if only by accident, a change of heart occurs. This is a totally delightful book, both in its gently ironic narrative and its exuberantly colourful jungle setting.
The delicacy of the crayon-style illustrations in Clare Jarrett's Jamie (Collins, £9.99 in UK) catches perfectly the mood of this touching portrayal of friendship between the generations. Young Jamie, staying with Grandfather, becomes involved with him in caring for a strange bird which mysteriously arrives one evening; their shared concern for its comfort soon results in their arranging for Thomas - as they name their guest - a wonderful surprise. But there are bigger surprises to come, not least in the form of a beautiful brown egg. Love, its evolution and growth are celebrated in this subtly engaging book.
While there is, perhaps, less subtlety in what Julie Sykes and Tim Warnes have done with a well-known Aesop fable in That's Not Fair, Hare! (Viking, £10.99 in UK), there is nevertheless a pleasantly down-to-earth story of how Muggs the tortoise outwits his rival, Greedy Hare. Their shared objects of desire are the cabbages in farmer's field; their race to reach them, via the browns and greens of their rural environment, is a splendidly competitive test of ingenuity and perseverance. But, ultimately, it is verbal dexterity which wins. Home here, it appears, is somewhere you never quite manage to leave behind - the place where journeys start and end.
Robert Dunbar's most recent book, Skimming, has just been published by O'Brien Press