Nosy Crow's Blog, page 143

“Beautiful, engaging and entertaining books”: a librarian reviews Nosy Crow

Today’s guest blog post is by Zac McCallum, a parent, children’s librarian, and blogger from Christchurch, New Zealand, sharing some of his favourite books from Nosy Crow.

As a Children and Young Adults Librarian and a parent of twin 11-year-old boys and a 6-month-old baby girl I’m always on the look-out for great children’s books. Nosy Crow are one of my favourite publishers because they produce beautiful, engaging and entertaining books for children of all ages. I know that I can go to the library shelves or my own bookshelves and grab a Nosy Crow book that will suit my audience perfectly.

I have lots of variety in my job, from presenting preschool sessions in our public libraries to visiting primary schools to promote books and the library. I love having the chance to read to kids of all ages and tell them about some really great books to read. I use lots of Nosy Crow books in my library programmes. We run a programme called the Travelling Roadshow where we take stories out to schools to promote the library and a love of books with the 5-7 year old children. This programme is very interactive, with the children joining in with actions and chants. We choose two books to read to the children and we often adapt stories so that we can include props, costumes and puppets. One of the wonderful books that we are using this year (and one of my absolute favourites) is Use Your Imagination by Nicola O’Byrne. Not only is it a hilarious story that the children love, but it also includes a wolf who is a librarian. We read this story as a pair as it works really well reading it this way. I have so much fun being the wolf, helping rabbit to use his imagination and create the perfect story. One thing that we’ve added to the story is our own Use Your Imagination sign. Every time we hold it up the children have to join in with us and say, ‘Use Your Imagination!’ One of my other favourite Nosy Crow books that I use a lot during school visits is Barry Hutchison’s The Shark-Headed Bear Thing. I’m a huge fan of Barry Hutchison and this is a fantastic book to hook kids on his stories. If you haven’t read this book, what are you waiting for! I explain a little about the book and then read my favourite extract, where Ben, Paradise and Wesley have a run-in with a troll. The troll’s challenge, to play a game of Burp-or-Death and then Fart-or-Death, gets kids every time. Just last week a kid from a school I visit told me about the boys in her class wanting to play Burp-or-Death at lunch time. If kids are talking about the books after my visits and buying or borrowing the books, that is a win for me. I’m eager to share a couple of my recent favourite Nosy Crow books, Box and Poles Apart, with kids on my school visits in the coming weeks.

At home I’m starting to grow a great reader with my 6-month-old daughter. She loves books, especially bashing them, and I love introducing her to lots of different books. At the moment her favourite types of books are touch-and-feel books and ones with flaps. Nosy Crow have some perfect books to share with her. Jo Lodge’s books (There’s a Toucan on My Telephone, There’s a Panda in My Picnic) really grab her attention. The colours are bold, the text is simple, and she loves seeing who pops out of the picnic basket or the ice-cream. I love the look of anticipation on her face! We also really like Sebastien Braun’s ‘Can You Say it Too?‘ series for the same reasons. I love making different noises with her and there are lots of them in these books. The big flaps are great for little hands too as they’re nice and easy to open. There are lots of other Nosy Crow books that I’ll look forward to reading with her in the future, like Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap series, Captain Beastlie’s Pirate Party by Lucy Coats and Chris Mould, and the Shifty McGifty and Slippery Sam books by Tracey Corderoy and Steven Lenton.

Thanks Nosy Crow for publishing the best books for kids. As a parent and librarian I’m always happy to read your books to kids again and again and again.

Thank you, Zac! Zac blogs at bestfriendsarebooks.com, and you can find him on Twitter at @zackids.

My Headteacher is a Vampire Rat is shortlisted for the Children’s Book Award!

The shortlists for the Children’s Book Award have been announced today, and we’re absolutely thrilled that My Headteacher is a Vampire Rat, written by Pamela Butchart and illustrated by Thomas Flintham, has been recognised in the Books for Younger Readers category!

The award (formerly known as the Red House children’s book award) was founded in 1980 by the FCBG to celebrate the books that children themselves love reading, and is the only national prize for children’s books that is voted for entirely by children themselves. And this is Pamela and Thomas’s second shortlisting for the prize: last year they were shortlisted for The Spy Who Loved School Dinners.

Here’s a look inside My Headteacher is a Vampire Rat:

Buy the book.

You can find out more about the award, and all of the shortlists, here – the winners will be announced in May next year.

Good luck, Pamela and Thomas – and congratulations!

Refuge

Nosy Crow publishes Refuge on 12th November. It is a book I dearly hope you will all support.

Like you, I suppose, all of us at Nosy Crow have watched the ongoing refugee crisis on the news – the terrible stories, the appalling pictures, the daily suffering and tragedies – and have wanted desperately to do something. Not just to raise money, but to help parents with young children asking difficult questions about the pictures they see of boys and girls their own age in unimaginable circumstances. But we did not know what we could do.

And then, just five weeks ago, Anne Booth, a picture book author on the Nosy Crow list, sent in a beautiful, careful, succinct text that we read. It made some of us cry with the beauty of the writing and the way it took a story that is already familiar and moving for many of us and cast it in a completely new light. We knew that this could be a book that helps. We matched Anne’s words with the hugely evocative and engaging illustrations of Sam Usher – who had recently visited the Calais ‘Jungle’ camp and met refugees for himself – and we had the book we will publish in just a few days’ time on November 12: Refuge.

Nosy Crow won’t make any money at all from Refuge. By absorbing everything other than our print costs, and through the generosity of all involved in producing, distributing and selling it (the list is on the copyright page of the book), we will be able to give £5 for every copy of this £7.99 book sold to our partner charity, War Child, to help care for Syrian refugee children and their families in camps and host communities in Jordan and Northern Iraq and other children displaced, orphaned and suffering as a result of war too. It’s a small, focussed charity, and they are delighted to be involved.

The Children’s Laureate, Chris Riddell, has called Refuge “an important Christmas book.” He says it is “a book to share with a lump in your throat and an ache in your heart until the beauty and hope of the very last page.”

I agree, and I hope you will too.

Today’s the last day to apply for jobs at Nosy Crow

We’re currently looking for four people to join the Nosy Crow team – an Editorial Assistant, an Assistant Editor, a Production Executive, and a Head of Non-Fiction and Activity – and today’s the closing date for applications for each of these fantastic jobs.

We’re looking for a Head of Non-Fiction and Activity.

Nosy Crow has won exclusive children’s publishing partnerships with National Trust and the British Museum and we have non-fiction plans beyond those exciting partnerships too.

You’ll be combining shaping Nosy Crow’s nascent non-fiction list with hands-on editing of your own projects. You’ll already have a strong background, and convincing track record, in editing full-colour non-fiction for children and you may have experience of activity, novelty and picture book publishing too. You’ll be creative and dynamic with a strong aesthetic sense – you’ll be working closely with our design team – great organisational skills and a passion for accuracy. You’ll know what authors and illustrators to go to for different projects, and may well have worked with them in the past. You’ll be a diplomat and capable ambassador, as you’ll be a key contact for our high-profile partners as well as with the authors and illustrators (and their agents) who will work on the books.

The books you work on will be distinctive, beautiful and informative and will, above all, engage the child reader.

This is a full-time role based in our offices in Borough. If you can’t work full-time, but would like to be considered, then it might still be worth applying. And if you’re not quite at Head of Non-Fiction and Activity level, but might be at more of a Senior Commissioning Editor level then, again, it might still be worth applying.

To apply, please send your CV with a covering letter to kate@nosycrow.com by 30 October 2015.

We’re looking for an Assistant Editor (fiction).

Working on Nosy Crow’s growing fiction list, you’ll be working with the Head of Fiction and the Fiction Commissioning Editor, desk editing titles from final manuscript to finished book; writing copy from blogposts to blurbs; liaising with freelancers; and providing administrative support. You’ll have a passion for fiction for children aged between 5 and 12, will be widely read in this area and have a good sense of the current market. You’ll need excellent copy-editing, proofreading and organisational skills, a great eye for detail and superlative communication skills both in writing and face-to-face. InDesign skills would be an advantage. You’ll probably have at least a year’s experience of working in a children’s fiction editorial department. This is a full-time role based in our offices in Borough.

To apply, please send your CV with a covering letter to kirsty@nosycrow.com by 30 October 2015.

We’re looking for an Editorial Assistant (illustrated books).

Working across the whole of Nosy Crow’s illustrated publishing programme (board books, picture books, activity books and non-fiction), you’ll be providing admin support for the editorial team, writing copy, liaising with authors, illustrators and their agents and generally doing whatever needs doing. You’ll be organised and creative, with a passion for illustrated children’s books. You’ll be able to spell and punctuate perfectly, and do basic arithmetic (we’ll be checking!). You’ll be a good team player, quick on the uptake and able to prioritise multiple and sometimes conflicting demands. Basic InDesign skills would be an advantage. Ideally, you’ll already have some experience of children’s full-colour illustrated editorial work. This is a full-time role based in our offices in Borough.

To apply, please send your CV with a covering letter to kate@nosycrow.com by 30 October 2015.

We’re looking for a Production Executive.

Working across the whole of Nosy Crow’s illustrated publishing programme (board books, picture books, activity books and non-fiction), you’ll be working closely with the Head of Operations, liaising with printers and print-brokers to ensure that Nosy Crow’s illustrated books are delivered looking great, on budget and on time. You’ll be organised, numerate (we’ll be checking) with a great eye for detail and an ability to communicate effectively in writing and face-to-face. You’ll enjoy working collaboratively, and solving the problems that the conflicting demands of editors, designers, sales people and printers create! You’re likely to have at least two years’ experience of working in a full-colour production department working on children’s books. This is a full-time role based in our offices in Borough.

To apply, please send your CV with a covering letter to imogen@nosycrow.com by 30 October 2015.

You can find out more about all of our current vacancies here.

Nosy Crow’s next fairytale app will be out in one week

We are INCREDIBLY pleased to say that Nosy Crow’s next fairy tale app will be out in exactly one week’s time.

This is possibly our best app yet: it’s a fantastically imaginatively-told story, with some incredible uses of interactivity, along with beautiful artwork, wonderful music, charming child narration, and lots more. And, of course, it’s another classic fairy tale. Without giving TOO much away, we are particularly proud of the central concept of this app, which makes brilliant use of the technological advantages of telling a story on an iPad: this is a very reading-friendly and story-friendly app, with some extraordinary digital innovation.

If you’d like to find out as soon as the app is available on the App Store, you can sign up to our apps mailing list below:

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And we also have some prizes to give away! If you’d like to win a set of these fantastic postcards featuring artwork from our Jack and the Beanstalk app, just follow @NosyCrowApps on Twitter re-tweet this message.

If you’re not familiar with our fairy tale apps, you can watch a short preview of Snow White, our most recent story, below:

We can’t wait to share our next fairytale with you – sign up to our newsletter and come back to this blog next Thursday to find out more!

Use Your Imagination is shortlisted for the Bishop’s Stortford Picture Book Award!

Use Your Imagination, the incredible picture book by Nicola O’Byrne, has been shortlisted for the Bishop’s Stortford Picture Book Award!

The follow-up to the brilliant, Waterstones Children’s Book Prize-winning Open Very Carefully, this is a clever and inventive picture book all about storytelling and the power of imagination – the story of an imaginative rabbit, who outwits a wolf and becomes the hero of his own adventure. And like Open Very Carefully, this is also a brilliant celebration of the physical book in all its glory, with a STUNNING fold-out final spread.

And it is fantastic to see it shortlisted for this award, which is voted for by children: Nicola’s picture books are wonderfully child-friendly and inclusive (Open Very Carefully was recently distributed to every reception-age child in England and Wales), and enormous fun to read aloud and share.

Here’s a look inside the book:

We’re offering a 20% discount on both Use Your Imagination AND Open Very Carefully when you buy them from the Nosy Crow shop (valid for the next two weeks, until November 11)  – just enter the code “AWARD” at the check-out page. You can buy Open Very Carefully here and Use Your Imagination here.

The winner of the prize will be announced by Lauren Child in February next year – good luck, Nicola!

Meet Axel Scheffler at the next Nosy Crow Illustrator Salon

It’s been a couple of weeks since we announced the date for our second Illustrator Salon – and the event is now nearly sold out!

Once again, our host and salonnière for the evening will be Nosy Crow’s founder and managing director, Kate Wilson. And we’re absolutely THRILLED that our guest will be none other than Axel Scheffler, best-selling illustrator of modern picture book classics including The Gruffalo, Room on the Broom, Stick Man, and A Squash and a Squeeze, as well as Nosy Crow’s Pip and Posy series, Flip Flap books, and The Grunts series.

We’ll be returning to The Book Club, in Shoreditch, for Axel’s Salon, on the evening of Monday 11th January. After an interview with Kate there’ll be a Q&A with the audience, followed by a book signing and drinks.

And you can save money on a signed copy of any of Axel’s books by buying one now with your ticket! General admission costs just £7. £11 will include entry to the salon, PLUS a signed paperback copy of any Pip and Posy book, or for £13 you can get either a signed hardback copy of any Pip and Posy book, or a signed Flip Flap board book. You’ll also be able to buy copies of any of Axel’s books on the night itself.

Doors will open at 6.30pm for drinks and conversation, and the salon will start at approximately 7.00pm.

Booking is essential – get your ticket today!

If you don’t want to miss out on any of our future salon events, sign up to our mailing list below. We hope to see you there!



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Come to the next Nosy Crow reading group – we’re discussing The Marvels by Brian Selznick

Would you like to come along to the next Nosy Crow Reading Group?

In November we’ll be discussing The Marvels, by Brian Selznick, the (BEAUTIFUL) new book by the Caldecott Medal-winning author-illustrator of masterpieces including Wonderstruck and The Invention of Hugo Cabret.

We’ll be meeting on Wednesday, November 18 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.

You can watch a trailer (made by Selznick) for The Marvels below – and you can order the book online from Waterstones here.

We’ll post some discussion points for the book a little closer to the date – we hope you can join us!

There’s one week left to apply for jobs at Nosy Crow

Last week we began advertising FOUR job vacancies that we’d like to fill at Nosy Crow – and there’s one week left to apply for each of these fantastic roles:

We’re looking for a Head of Non-Fiction and Activity.

Nosy Crow has won exclusive children’s publishing partnerships with National Trust and the British Museum and we have non-fiction plans beyond those exciting partnerships too.

You’ll be combining shaping Nosy Crow’s nascent non-fiction list with hands-on editing of your own projects. You’ll already have a strong background, and convincing track record, in editing full-colour non-fiction for children and you may have experience of activity, novelty and picture book publishing too. You’ll be creative and dynamic with a strong aesthetic sense – you’ll be working closely with our design team – great organisational skills and a passion for accuracy. You’ll know what authors and illustrators to go to for different projects, and may well have worked with them in the past. You’ll be a diplomat and capable ambassador, as you’ll be a key contact for our high-profile partners as well as with the authors and illustrators (and their agents) who will work on the books.

The books you work on will be distinctive, beautiful and informative and will, above all, engage the child reader.

This is a full-time role based in our offices in Borough. If you can’t work full-time, but would like to be considered, then it might still be worth applying. And if you’re not quite at Head of Non-Fiction and Activity level, but might be at more of a Senior Commissioning Editor level then, again, it might still be worth applying.

To apply, please send your CV with a covering letter to kate@nosycrow.com by 30 October 2015.

We’re looking for an Assistant Editor (fiction).

Working on Nosy Crow’s growing fiction list, you’ll be working with the Head of Fiction and the Fiction Commissioning Editor, desk editing titles from final manuscript to finished book; writing copy from blogposts to blurbs; liaising with freelancers; and providing administrative support. You’ll have a passion for fiction for children aged between 5 and 12, will be widely read in this area and have a good sense of the current market. You’ll need excellent copy-editing, proofreading and organisational skills, a great eye for detail and superlative communication skills both in writing and face-to-face. InDesign skills would be an advantage. You’ll probably have at least a year’s experience of working in a children’s fiction editorial department. This is a full-time role based in our offices in Borough.

To apply, please send your CV with a covering letter to kirsty@nosycrow.com by 30 October 2015.

We’re looking for an Editorial Assistant (illustrated books).

Working across the whole of Nosy Crow’s illustrated publishing programme (board books, picture books, activity books and non-fiction), you’ll be providing admin support for the editorial team, writing copy, liaising with authors, illustrators and their agents and generally doing whatever needs doing. You’ll be organised and creative, with a passion for illustrated children’s books. You’ll be able to spell and punctuate perfectly, and do basic arithmetic (we’ll be checking!). You’ll be a good team player, quick on the uptake and able to prioritise multiple and sometimes conflicting demands. Basic InDesign skills would be an advantage. Ideally, you’ll already have some experience of children’s full-colour illustrated editorial work. This is a full-time role based in our offices in Borough.

To apply, please send your CV with a covering letter to kate@nosycrow.com by 30 October 2015.

We’re looking for a Production Executive.

Working across the whole of Nosy Crow’s illustrated publishing programme (board books, picture books, activity books and non-fiction), you’ll be working closely with the Head of Operations, liaising with printers and print-brokers to ensure that Nosy Crow’s illustrated books are delivered looking great, on budget and on time. You’ll be organised, numerate (we’ll be checking) with a great eye for detail and an ability to communicate effectively in writing and face-to-face. You’ll enjoy working collaboratively, and solving the problems that the conflicting demands of editors, designers, sales people and printers create! You’re likely to have at least two years’ experience of working in a full-colour production department working on children’s books. This is a full-time role based in our offices in Borough.

To apply, please send your CV with a covering letter to imogen@nosycrow.com by 30 October 2015.

You can find out more about all of our current vacancies here.

The Nosy Crow Reading Group Verdict on George by Alex Gino

Last night the Nosy Crow Reading Group met to discuss George by Alex Gino, a middle grade debut novel about a transgender girl, and the recipient of starred reviews from Publisher’s Weekly, Kirkus, and School Library Journal.

I had sort of feared, in advance of the group meeting, that we wouldn’t have much to discuss: that this would be one of those books that we all loved, leaving us with nothing much to talk about – and happily, George provoked a far livelier discussion than I was expecting. I don’t think there are any spoilers ahead, as such, but if you haven’t read the book yet and want to come to it with a completely open mind… well, why are you reading this blog post at all?

Overall, I think it’s fair to say that this is a book our group responded to very positively. Some people really loved it – adjectives including “important”, “wonderful”, “kind”, and “moving” were thrown around on more than one occasion – and many of us merely liked it, either a lot or a little bit.

Interestingly, it was also a book that seemed to inspire in our members a willingness to overlook perceived flaws: several of us had some problems with it, but were happy (certainly happier than usual…) to justify or dismiss these (one person thought that there were “lots of ways it could be better, but that doesn’t really matter”). A few of us, for instance, found it to be a relatively slight book – short on plot, simple in its language, a bit ephemeral – and we found ourselves rationalising this slightness as a deliberate choice on Gino’s part: a conscious decision to simplify the issues of the book, and the central theme, and distill them down into a digestible form for the broadest (and youngest) possible audience.

Similarly, one or two of us thought that the book had a slightly “pamphlet-y” tone – that it was written as an exercise in teaching people how to treat transgender children, with a series of scenes that functioned quite transparently as “what to do/ what not to do” object lessons – but we also agreed that it was an important book: a story that, in the words of one person, “needed to be written”.

It struck me, looking at my notes at the end of the evening, that it was a book that we treated on quite different terms to some of our previous choices for the book group: at various points we debated whether or not the acts of writing and publishing George had been “brave” ones, and whether or not the book had an “optimistic” tone – and optimism and bravery are certainly not thresholds that any other book that we’ve discussed has been required to meet.

For me, the simplicity (or “slightness”) of the book is a great part of its charm – and actually, the writing itself struck me as typifying that particular variety of prose (to my mind Rebecca Stead is the unparalleled master of this style) that might seem, on the surface, to be simple and straightforward, but which is actually effortlessly sophisticated.

A lot of us particularly liked the fact that it was written for such a young audience: several people commented on the refreshing absence of teen angst in the book. Very few people in our group objected to the writing style, I think: one or two of our members found it slightly awkward or repetitive, and one person thought that it was unevenly written, with a slightly inconsistent tone and point of view (which, for instance, occasionally switched from Melissa to Kelly).

There was, perhaps, a bit more frustration expressed around the plot: for some people, the book ended sort of abruptly, and for one of our members, the conclusion was slightly “evasive”, with too many questions unanswered… but for many more of us, I think we found it a satisfying, upbeat ending: open-ended, perhaps, but in an almost pragmatic way. To me it felt that by ending the book the way they did, Gino was implicitly acknowledging that Melissa’s future would be a complicated, perhaps not always happy one: the ending is an artfully contrived moment out of time, suggesting a hopeful future for Melissa, but not, by any means, promising one.

And for all the criticisms that the book occasionally came across as an instruction manual, we also admired the way that Gino subverted expectations and challenged our ideas of progressiveness in their portrayal of many of the characters in the book: the people we hoped or expected to be most supportive of Melissa (her mother and class teacher) were not always reliably so, and the characters we feared would be judgemental or strict (Melissa’s brother and school principal) revealed themselves to be open-minded or compassionate.

The Nosy Crow reading group will be back in November – if you’re interested in attending, send an email to tom at nosycrow dot com, and we’ll add you to our mailing list.