Chris Van Dusen
Recognized in the Creative Minds Montessori 2026 Teacher’s Choice list.
Chris Van Dusen is one of roughly one hundred authors whose work was selected by the Montessori-certified teachers at Creative Minds Montessori for the 2026 Teacher’s Choice list — 120 books chosen across four reading stages, from first lap-reads to first chapter books. The selected book was chosen for how precisely it meets children at a real developmental moment. This recognition cannot be bought: no author or publisher paid to appear on our lists, and we take no commission on any book sale.
About Chris Van Dusen
Chris Van Dusen writes and illustrates picture books from coastal Maine, painting in gouache on illustration board. He is the author-illustrator of the If I Built... books and the illustrator of Kate DiCamillo's Mercy Watson series.
Van Dusen drew for teen and children's magazines — Nickelodeon, Family Fun, Disney Adventures — for more than a decade before his first book, Down to the Sea with Mr. Magee, appeared in 2000. He says If I Built a Car grew out of a game he used to play as a child.
Also by this author: If I Built a House · If I Built a School · The Circus Ship
Official website: www.chrisvandusen.com
Selected for the 2026 Teacher’s Choice list
Part of The Best Children’s Books by Age, chosen by the teachers at Creative Minds Montessori in Frisco, TX.