The Little Women Letters is an absolutely delightful modern spin-off of the original Little Women stories, with Jo’s great-great-granddaughter finding the letters she wrote to her sisters before her marriage. Reading this made me happy. I love Little Women. My parents went to see the Winona Ryder/Christian Bale version when I was nine and my mom came home and said…
Read More
The BEA Loot (or Why Bart Fears He’ll Never See Our Kitchen Counter Again)
On Thursday afternoon, the UPS man knocked on my door and practically collapsed under the weight of my BEA box. And then it was like Christmas in my living room, as I pulled out book after book. Should you happen to be curious, here’s a list of what came back from New York (and what is currently sitting on my…
Read More
A River of Words: The Story of William Carlos Williams by Jen Bryant and Melissa Sweet
I feel particular love for A River of Words because it was my nomination when we did mock-Caldecotts in my grad school picture book seminar and then, just a month later, it did indeed pick up a Caldecott Honor. You can imagine I feel compelled to mention this fact to anyone I tell about this book. A River of Words…
Read More
The Aftermath of BEA
I’m a little overwhelmed at the thought of talking about BEA. To give you an idea why, let me show you the exhibit hall map. Each of those little squares is a publisher’s booth, each filled with multiple employees of the publishers, with boxes and boxes of books: So yes, the whole thing is kind of insane. And I’m guessing…
Read More
A Magical Intersection: Guest Post by Uma Krishnaswami
I’m always curious about what books people remember vividly from their childhood. For me, the books that were most strongly part of my growing up were the Little House books. I loved those books and still do. Uma Krishnaswami, author of The Grand Plan to Fix Everything, wrote this beautiful post about one of the books that was instrumental in…
Read More