If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. I don’t know about you but I’m tired of hearing myself whine. Every time there’s a cool sounding award for humor given out to an adult book you can count on hearing me pipe up. “Wah wah, no funny book awards for kids, […]
Today marks Day 3 in our celebration of humor, women, and children’s literature. Produced in tandem with the release of my anthology of funny female writers and illustrators (Funny Girl, Viking) so far we’ve seen the following: Day #1: Children’s Book Biographies of Funny Women Day #2: What Other Projects My Contributors to Funny Girl […]
At long last it’s almost here. Tomorrow is the book birthday and release date of my anthology FUNNY GIRL: FUNNIEST. STORIES. EVER. published by Viking Press (Penguin Random House). To celebrate, I was wracking on brain on how to celebrate properly. Then it came to me: Let’s do an entire week celebrating funny women and […]
Like many of you I snuggled down the other day and watched the Oscar Award ceremony in the comfort of my own home. I was happy. I was disappointed. I was amused. I didn’t have, what you might call, particularly high expectations, so the results often pleased me. Then we got to the end of […]
Princess Cora and the Crocodile By Laura Amy Schlitz Illustrated by Brian Floca Candlewick Press $16.99 ISBN: 978-0-7636-4822-0 Early Chapter Book On shelves March 28th What if. What if Good Night Moon had been illustrated by someone other than Clement Hurd? What if. What if Charlotte’s Web had had an artist who wasn’t Garth Williams? […]
Every single list that appears on this blog is subjective. I mean, here I am declaring stuff to be great based entirely on a single solitary opinion: my own. That’s okay when you’re talking alphabet books or readalouds, but humor is a far trickier matter. There are a LOT of humorous picture books that come […]
Makoons By Louise Erdrich Harper Collins $16.99 ISBN: 9780060577933 Ages 7-12 On shelves now They say these days you can’t sell a novel for kids anymore without the book having some kind of “sequel potential”. That’s not really true, but there are a heck of a lot of series titles out there for the 7 […]
Leave Me Alone! By Vera Brosgol Roaring Brook Press (an imprint of Macmillan) $17.99 ISBN: 9781626724419 Ages 4-7 On shelves September 13th Knitting. It shouldn’t be so hard. I say this as the grown daughter of a chronic knitterer (not a word). I grew up neck deep in roving. I know the difference between a […]
The Mighty Odds By Amy Ignatow Amulet Books (an imprint of Abrams) $15.95 ISBN: 978-1-4197-1271-5 Ages 10 and up On shelves September 13th If you could have one weird superpower, what would it be? Not a normal one, mind you. We’re not doing a flight vs. invisibility discussion here. The power would have to be […]
The Magic Mirror: Concerning a Lonely Princess, a Foundling Girl, a Scheming King, and a Pickpocket Squirrel By Susan Hill Long Knopf (an imprint of Penguin Random House) $16.99 ISBN: 978-0-553-51134-2 Ages 9-12 On shelves May 10th What do you want from a fairy tale? Magic? Romance? Derring-do? Despicable villainy? Academics and scholars have puzzled […]
Mars Evacuees By Sophia McDougall Harper Collins $16.99 ISBN: 978-0-06-229399-2 Ages 9-12 I’ve a nasty habit of finishing every children’s book I start, no matter how dull or dire it might be. I am sort of alone in this habit, which you could rightly call unhealthy. After all, most librarians understand that their time on […]
Hilo: The Boy Who Crashed to Earth By Judd Winick Random House Children’s Books $13.99 ISBN: 978-0-385-38617-3 Ages 9-12 On shelves September 1st Relentless cheer. You can use it for good. You can use it for evil. You can use it in the name of humor too, but that’s a trickier game to play. I’m […]
Castle Hangnail By Ursula Vernon Dial (an imprint of Penguin Group) ISBN: 978-0803741294 Ages 8-11 On shelves April 21st These are dark times for children’s fantasy. Dark times indeed. Which is to say, when I pick up a fantasy novel for kids, more often than not I find the books filled with torture, violence, bloody […]
With Comic Con NYC later this week, publisher previews on the rise, and various work-related meetings, talks, and speeches I’m just the teeniest tiniest bit busy this week. But no matter! It is you, dear readers, that give me what for and how to. For you I would forgo all the sleep in the world. […]
The Simples Love a Picnic By J.C. Phillipps Houghton Mifflin Harcourt $16.99 ISBN: 978-0-544-16667-7 Ages 3-7 On shelves now I am on a mission. A quest. A journey to find the funniest picture books published for children in a given year. It isn’t an easy thing to do. First, you have to deal with the […]
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