Nosy Crow's Blog, page 116

Take a look inside Emerald Secret

Next January we’re publishing Emerald Secret by Susan Moore – the sequel to Crimson Poison, and the second book in the Nat Walker trilogy. This is another exciting, fast-paced and action-packed adventure – full of high-tech gadgetry and fun – and today, you can read an early preview of Emerald Secret for the very first time!

Nat is perched on the prow of the Junko as it glides up the Thames one cold, drizzly night. London is to be her home for the next year, and it looks to be a strange and uninviting place after the bright lights and fast pace of Hong Kong. Little does Nat know that she and her dragon-robot, Fizz, are at the start of their second adventure, one that will see them become lost in the high-tech world of one of her father’s games and seeking out a long-lost Chinese sword.

Secrets that have been kept hidden for decades will be revealed and Nat will learn some startling things about her family, her future and herself . . .

You can read the opening chapters of Emerald Secret below – here’s a look inside the book:

Emerald Secret won’t be in shops until January – if you want to stay up to date with all of our book news, you can sign up to our newsletter at this page, or with the form below. And if you’re new to the Nat Walker trilogy, you can buy the first book in the series, Crimson Poison, here.

NameEmail



Books


Apps
EmailThis field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

The Many Worlds of Albie Bright has been shortlisted for the East Sussex Children’s Book Award!

The shortlist for the East Sussex Children’s Book Award has been announced, and we’re thrilled that The Many Worlds of Albie Bright by Christopher Edge has made the list!

This annual book award is presented by the East Sussex Schools Library and Museum Service – and this year’s shortlisted books were carefully chosen with the help of children from St Mary Star of the Sea Primary School, Framfield Primary School, Breakwater Academy and Hollington Primary Academy.

Frank Cottrell Boyce called The Many Worlds of Albie Bright “A book with a big brain, big laughs and a big, big heart.” The Times, naming the book a Children’s Book of the Week, wrote: “Christopher Edge has written a clever story infused with science that wears its intelligence humorously, introduces complex ideas with the lightest of touches … Give the man his own element on the periodic table of children’s authors.”

Here’s a look inside the book:

Buy the book online.

Congratulations, Chris!

 

Win a copy of our new app, Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Pets!

It’s been a week since the launch of our latest app, Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Pets, and we’ve been thrilled by the response so far!

Apps Playground have given the app a great review – Stuart Dredge writes:

“There are educational elements here … but they’re worn lightly. Flip Flap Pets is as much about laughing together at the silly combinations. Plus, if you’re a fan of Gruffalo illustrator Scheffler’s work – my sons know him as much for the Nosy Crow apps he’s worked on, incidentally – you’ll love the animals themselves, as they’re instantly recognisable … It’s a great app to enjoy with your pre-schooler, and it might even encourage you both to try your hand at drawing your own mixed and matched animals when the device is turned off.”

You can read the full piece at Apps Playground here.

And Flip Flap Pets has also been awarded an Editor’s Choice Award, and a 92% rating, from Children’s Technology Review! In their review, CTR write:

“Twelve wonderfully illustrated pets are cut in half, and their parts can be mixed and matched … This is another excellent bite-sized starter app that is also a good language enrichment experience. The fonts and text highlighting also make it a noteworthy reading experience.”

You can read the full review at Children’s Technology Review here.

And we’re celebrating with an app giveaway! If you’d like to win a copy of Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Pets, just sign up to our apps newsletter at this page, and send an email to tom [at] nosycrow [dot] com with Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Pets in the subject heading. We have 5 copies of the app to give away, and the competition ends on Sunday!

If you haven’t come across the app yet, here’s a quick look at Flip Flap Pets:

Box wins the Sheffield Baby Book Award!

The winners of the Sheffield Baby Book Award and Children’s Book Awards were announced yesterday, and we’re thrilled that two Nosy Crow books were recognised for the awards!

Box, written by Min Flyte and illustrated by Rosalind Beardshaw, won the Baby Book Award – the third year in a row that the prize has been awarded to a Nosy Crow title! Last year, Can You Say It Too? Woof! Woof!, by Sebastien Braun, won the award, and in 2014, and it was awarded to Icky Sticky Monster, by Jo Lodge.

This is an absolutely charming novelty book, with flaps and fold-out pages that celebrate the creative possibilities and limitless joy of cardboard boxes.

What would YOU do with a box? When four toddlers find some toys in cardboard boxes, they have fun with them for a while. But, before long, the friends’ interest in the toys wanes and their attention turns to the boxes themselves. What could they do with SO many boxes, they wonder?

A perfect book for this time of year, Box is sure to inspire lots of creative and fun uses for all of those cardboard boxes that will be arriving in the run-up to Christmas.

[image error]

And There’s a Bear on My Chair by Ross Collins was also Commended in the Picture Book category of the Sheffield Children’s Book Awards!

The recipient of the inaugural Amnesty CILIP Honour, this is a joyously illustrated picture book, with a clever single rhyme echoing Dr Seuss, that’s perfect for sharing. You can  look inside There’s a Bear on My Chair below:

Buy the book.

You can find out more about the Sheffield Children’s Book Awards here. Congratulations, Min, Rosalind, and Ross!

Come along to next week’s Nosy Crow Reading Group

The Nosy Crow Reading Group will be back next week – we’ll be discussing Lydia, by Natasha Farrant, and if you’re interested in coming along, there is currently one space left!

We’ll be meeting on Tuesday, November 22nd at 6.30pm, here at the Nosy Crow offices – 10a Lant Street, London, SE1 1QR – for a discussion of the book (along with wine and crisps).

If you’d like to come along, just register for a place with the form below, or at this page – if the reading group becomes fully booked, you can add your name to our waiting list, and we’ll notify you if a place opens up.

You can order Lydia online from Waterstones here – and here’s a video of Natasha Farrant introducing the book:

We hope to see you there!

The (almost) first anniversary of our open call for children’s fiction submissions from debut BAME writers

Just under a year ago (last December) I wrote on this blog that I was looking for children’s fiction submissions from debut BAME writers.

Here’s part of what I said at the time:

“I think that it’s incredibly important that our industry represents a wide range of voices, not only so that children from every background can recognise their own lives and experiences in the books that they read, but also simply to enrich the body of children’s literature that we publish, by moving out of a monoculture and embracing a wider world of ideas.

It’s an area in which we could definitely do better, which is why today I’m posting this open call for children’s fiction submissions (so, anything in the 5 – 12 age range, but I’d be especially interested in 9 – 12, aka “middle grade”) from BAME writers. I’m very happy to receive submissions from agented and un-agented authors – and although I’d particularly like to see children’s fiction submissions from debut writers, if you’ve already been published, I’d still be very pleased to hear from you.”

Just under a year, and several hundred submissions, later, I thought that I’d give an update on this project.

I didn’t give a closing date for this call for submissions, and I wanted this to be an ongoing, open-ended project. And so the call for submissions from BAME debut authors is still very much open!

So, to reiterate, I’m looking for children’s fiction (not picture books) – from BAME authors. I can’t consider texts that have already been published, and although I’m particularly interested in seeing texts from debut authors, if you have already been published, I’d still be happy to hear from you. You can be agented or un-agented. I’ll consider writing in any genre.

If you’d like to submit something, you can email me at tom@nosycrow.com – ideally with a synopsis and the first three chapters of your manuscript. I’ll reply to everyone who submits something, but it might take a week or so before you hear from me, so please don’t be discouraged if it takes a while!

If you have any questions, please do send me a message. And if you’ve written something, please send it in!

Our new app, Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Pets, is out now!

Our newest app, Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Pets, is available on the App Store now!

This is the fourth app in the brilliant, award-winning Flip Flap Animal series, with incredible new artwork from Axel, new funny poems, 121 new silly animal hybrid names and creatures, and the same wonderfully intuitive interface – swipe any part of the screen to create new animals and hear the poem read aloud, with original sound effects, music, and text highlighting.

It is INCREDIBLY satisfying (and addictive) – you’ll be swiping for hours – and all for just 99¢/ 79p!

What do you get when you cross a rabbit with a dog? Why, a Rog, of course! What about a snake with a gerbil? Well, that would be a Snerbil, naturally!

Here are just a few of the brilliant combinations you can make:

Download Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Pets on the App Store.

And here’s what to look for on the Store:

If you enjoy Flip Flap Pets, we’ve also just launched a special new app bundle with our first three Flip Flap apps – Flip Flap Farm, Flip Flap Safari, and Flip Flap Jungle – for just $1.99/ £1.49!

You can find the Flip Flap Animals bundle on the App Store here.

And if you like the app, you’ll love the book! We’ve published a print edition of Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Pets too, in a wonderful split-page, spiral-bound board-book format – you can find out more here.

If you enjoy Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Pets, or one of our other apps, we’d be incredibly grateful if you’d consider leaving a review on the App Store – it really makes a huge difference. And if you’d like to stay up to date with our upcoming apps, you can sign up for our apps newsletter here.

We hope you enjoy Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Pets!

Nosy Crow publishes Buster’s Christmas, a children’s picture book based on this year’s John Lewis Christmas advert

Nosy Crow has created a children’s picture book based on this year’s John Lewis Christmas advert. Buster’s Christmas will be published on Thursday 10th November, to coincide with the release of the retailer’s advert.

This is the fourth time that Nosy Crow has been chosen to produce the companion picture book. Buster’s Christmas will be sold exclusively through John Lewis stores and via the John Lewis website.

As in previous years, the book was produced on a tight schedule, with the John Lewis marketing team reading the outline of the story to Kate Wilson and Louise Bolongaro so that they could construct the picture book around it.

Harry Boughton, Buyer, John Lewis, comments: “The John Lewis Christmas advert signals for many the start of the Christmas season. We are delighted to be working with Kate and Nosy Crow again, and, as before, we are so impressed with the team’s ability to turn the story of the advert into a beautiful picture book that really captures the spirit of the advert and of Christmas too.”

Kate Wilson comments: “It’s a real privilege to be involved again in John Lewis’s Christmas advert campaign as the creator of the book of the ad. The advert itself is such a well-loved and highly anticipated annual event and it’s such a buzz and source of pride to be part of it. Sam Usher has been a joy to work with – as well as his terrific technical skill with pen and watercolour and his ability to work fast, he brought such understanding of the warmth at the heart of the story.”

Buster’s Christmas follows a family getting ready for Christmas, with a little girl, Bridget, gleefully bouncing up and down on her bed with excitement on Christmas Eve. The family dog, Buster, gazes out to the garden where he sees foxes and all kinds of other animals bouncing up and down on a trampoline, which is Bridget’s main present. On Christmas morning, Bridget dashes out to try out her trampoline, only to find Buster’s got there first and is showing off all his new-found tricks. How on earth did he learn all those tricks?

Buster’s Christmas will be sold exclusively through John Lewis stores and online.

The story is beautifully illustrated by Sam Usher, who was shortlisted for the Waterstones Children’s Book Award and the Red House Book Award, and whose artwork captures all of the excitement and anticipation around Christmas. Sam also illustrated a timeless retelling of the Christmas nativity story for Nosy Crow, Refuge, sales of which benefitted the charity War Child.

Sam Usher, the book’s illustrator, said, “It’s been such a fascinating experience working on this project – unlike anything I’ve ever done before! I very much enjoyed working again with the Nosy Crow team, with whom I worked on a very different kind of Christmas book, Refuge, last year. And of course it’s exciting to be involved in – and know a little about! – something that so many people will be talking about.”

Take a look inside Neon Leon

Next February we’ll be publishing an INCREDIBLY exciting new picture book: Neon Leon, written by Jane Clarke and illustrated by Britta Teckentrup – an absolutely beautiful gem of a book, with bright neon ink on every page. And today you can take a very first look inside!

Everyone knows that chameleons are the best at fitting in. But not Leon. Leon is NEON! In fact, he’s SO bright that he keeps all the other chameleons awake. Poor Leon is lonely, so off he goes in search of somewhere he can blend in.

In this delightful interactive book, filled with vibrant neon artwork, children can help

Leon on his journey by counting his steps, suggesting colours for him to turn and giving him lots of reassurance when he’s feeling sad. But will he ever find a place to call home …?

Here’s a very first look inside Neon Leon:

Neon Leon will be published in February – you can find out more about the book here, and if you’d like to stay up to date with all of our book news, you can sign up to our books newsletter at this page, or with the form below, and you’ll never miss a thing.

NameEmail



Books


Apps
EmailThis field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

The next Nosy Crow Reading Group is almost here – we’re discussing Lydia by Natasha Farrant

The Nosy Crow Reading Group will be back soon – this month we’ll be discussing Lydia, by Natasha Farrant.

And if you’re interested in coming along, there are just a couple of places remaining!

We’ll be meeting on Tuesday, November 22nd at 6.30pm, here at the Nosy Crow offices – 10a Lant Street, London, SE1 1QR – for a discussion of the book (along with wine and crisps).

If you’d like to come along, just register for a place with the form below, or at this page – if the reading group becomes fully booked, you can add your name to our waiting list, and we’ll notify you if a place opens up.

You can order Lydia online from Waterstones here.

We hope to see you there!