Illustrators bear witness.
Nothing could be more important.
One hundred years from now, when someone wants to know what it was like to be a seven-year-old girl in New York City on her birthday – or what it was like to be a Mexican-American child growing up in Texas – they won’t go to a reference book and look it up.
For the last eight years, I have worked for a small Seattle book publisher called Chin Music Press.
I’ve done everything from fact checking and copy editing to developmental- and line-editing, from setting up book tours to reading through the slush pile (a task I actually enjoyed).
Continue Reading Guest Post: David Jacobson on Trusting the Illustrator & the Publishing Process »
Sample chapter from Candlewick Press
The second of a four-installment dialogue with Ambelin and Cynthia.
Our focus is on the creative life and process,
speculative fiction, diversity, privilege, indigenous literature, and books for young readers.
Yesterday,
Donna Janell Bowman is the first-time author of Step Right Up: How Doc and Jim Key Taught the World About Kindness, illustrated by Daniel Minter (Lee & Low, 2016). From the promotional copy:
A Horse that can read, write, and do math?
Jenny Kay Dupuis is the first-time author of I Am Not a Number, co-authored by Kathy Kacer, illustrated by Gillian Newland (Second Story, 2016). From the promotional copy:
When eight-year-old Irene is removed from her First Nations family to live in a residential school she is confused,
Continue Reading New Voice: Jenny Kay Dupuis on I Am Not a Number »
Welcome to Cynsations! What was your initial inspiration for writing Calling All Cars (Sourcebooks, 2016)?
I wrote this book for my first son, Owen, who was obsessed (and that’s putting it mildly) with his Matchbox cars. He had about 75 of them, and by age 3,
Continue Reading Author Interview: Sue Fliess on Calling All Cars »
By Emma Dryden
An Editor Tries on Her Writer Hat
I’ve been a children’s book editor for over thirty years. Editing’s in my blood. Little else brings me as much joy or satisfaction as coaxing, guiding, and encouraging authors and illustrators to dig deeply and express their truest passions and richest stories.
Continue Reading Guest Post & Giveaway: Emma Dryden on Putting the Internal Editor in a Time-Out »
Visit Heather Lang’s official author site & @Hblang
Congratulations on your new picture book biography Fearless Flyer: Ruth Law and Her Flying Machine (Calkins Creek, 2016) and the starred reviews from Booklist and School Library Journal!
I was captivated by your account of Ruth Law’s record-breaking flight from Chicago to New York City one hundred years ago,
Continue Reading Author Interview: Heather Lang on Fearless Flyer & Writing Strong Women »
Check out the book trailer for My Dog Is The Best by Laurie Ann Thompson, illustrated by Paul Schmid (FSG, 2015).
From the promotional copy:
What do you get when you combine one energetic, enthusiastic little boy with his sleepy but tolerant dog?
Continue Reading Book Trailer: My Dog Is The Best by Laurie Ann Thompson and Paul Schmid »
By Carmen Oliver
for Cynthia Leitich Smith’s Cynsations
In 2012, I was working on a nonfiction picture book project about white and black spirit bears in Canada and the boy Simon Jackson who was trying to save them from extinction.
At the same time, my daughter was in fifth grade and was given the awesome task of being a reading buddy to an incoming kindergartner.
