Betsy Bird's Blog, page 32

Review of the Day: We Are Definitely Human by X. Fang

We Are Definitely Human
By X. Fang
Tundra Books
$18.99
ISBN: 9781774882023
On shelves August 6, 2024

Small town America makes an interesting showing in children���s picture books. Generally by the time you get to novels for kids such places can start to show signs of, say, Main Street by Sinclair Lewis. Picture books, on the other hand, tend to retain their fondness for such places. Historically, though, what children���s picture books tended to ignore was the diversity of those small towns. I w...

When They Throw a Parade for Your Middle Grade Novel

That title to this piece is admittedly a touch misleading. It should probably read, “When Your Novel Gets Feted Alongside an Annual Heritage Day Festival”, but can you argue that that’s more kicky? Nah. If clickbait is the name of the game then I shall bait with only the finest of clicks.

To preface this, it’s important to understand that my first middle grade novel Long Road to the Circus originally came out at a less than entirely opportune time. By the fall of 2021, the lockdowns of t...

Fuse 8 n’ Kate: Tooth-Gnasher Superflash by Daniel Pinkwater

By gum, if there’s one thing this children’s literature podcast I host with my sister needs it’s more Reading Rainbow books from the days of yore. And if that’s something I need to go out and find, then surely I will. I was inspired to give this particular book a go after I saw the model of its vehicle on display at Kansas City’s The Rabbit Hole. In this episode we discuss the prevalence of the same “a” sound, why this has a Popemobile top, xenomorphs, and extra car features that create dupl...

“Complex social dynamics exist in the simplest of conflicts.” A Kyle Lukoff Interview on Sorry You Got Mad

I like to believe that in my small way, I am riding Kyle Lukoff’s coattails to fame by conducting this interview. In 100 years the name “Betsy Bird” will mean nothing, but I am entirely of the opinion that “Kyle Lukoff” may well be one of the few that can stand the test of time. He might disagree, but in him I see all the marks of greatness, and his latest two picture books are doing NOTHING to dissuade me from that notion. Penguin Young Readers has released Just What to Do, illustrated by Hala ...

Publisher Spotlight Preview: Fall/Winter 2024 – Helvetiq, Inhabit Media, & Kube

Onward we sally! Thanks to Publisher Spotlight���s own Ellen Myrick, we’re continuing to give you a brief peek into some of the books slated for release in the coming months. You can find the first of these round-ups of small publishers here, the second here, and the third here. Today’s will be a mite bit shorter, but have no fear. They’re all interesting keepers.

The Great Turkey Walk by Kathleen Karr and L��onie

Bischoff, translated by Michelle Bailat-Jones

ISBN: 9783039640638

P...

“Like insects crawling under rocks, ideas are everywhere”. Henrique Moreira and Grant Snider in Conversation

We need a proactive term to describe kismet in children’s literature circles. Unfortunately, when I try to rustle up something on my own, I come up with “kidlitsmet” which I think we can all agree is just awful. Nonetheless, while the name may elude me, the principle is sound. Just this past Friday I had the pleasure of reviewing a delightful work of poetry out in November called Beware the Dragon and the Nozzlewock by Vikram Madan. And in that very review I happen to say, “When I said earlier t...

Fuse 8 n’ Kate: Little Blue and Little Yellow by Leo Lionni

While I often prefer to hand Kate children’s picture books to consider that are chock full of details, at a certain point I am forced to come up with books that contain none of that. And you cannot get much more basic than Little Blue and Little Yellow here. Your heroes are essentially paint swatches, after all. In the course of our conversation, though, Kate surprises me by coming up with a discussion of everything from the origins and accuracy of certain nursery rhymes to whether or not Li...

Review of the Day: Beware the Dragon and the Nozzlewock by Vikram Madan

Beware the Dragon and the Nozzlewock
By Vikram Madan
Wordsong (an imprint of Astra Books for Young Readers)
$19.99
ISBN: 9781635928174
On shelves November 12th

Does poetry for kids sell? It���s an interesting question. Let���s scale it back a bit then and ask a simpler one: Does poetry for kids sell in any month other than April a.k.a. Poetry Month? Or even simpler, does anyone but teachers buy works of children���s poetry? Does anyone but teachers seek out new poets rather than just grabbing so...

Aliens, Aliens, and More Aliens: An Extraterrestrial Zoo Cover Reveal and Q&A with Samantha van Leer

So you like science fiction.

Trouble is, the children’s book world can be a cruel place for an incipient science fiction writer for kids. Yet once in a while, on occasion, a book manages to come out in the U.S. that is precisely that. And the particular someone that has written the latest, for our purposes today, is author Samantha van Leer. For the record, van Leer is also the creator of the New York Times best-selling novels Between the Lines and Off the Page, which she recently helped adap...

The 2025 Graphic Novel You’re Gonna Want to Know About: A Q&A and Cover Reveal for Ursula Murray Husted’s BOTTICELLI’S APPRENTICE

In 2020 I read just the most delightful graphic novel. It was called A Cat Story and it was from a new creator by the name of Ursula Murray Husted. The story involved two cats on the island of Malta and their various small adventures and ultimate quest. In my review I wrote of Husted that, “Her debut middle grade graphic novel A Cat Story is a lush, sprawling, ultimately very sweet story of two cats and their search for a home of their own. It is simultaneously the grandest and quietest stor...