I’ve just been reading about “Daddy and Me,” a small project at Rikers Island prison designed to encourage male inmates to read to their kids on family visit days. It’s not an easy task – the fathers often have to take a literacy class beforehand to learn how to read aloud to a child: nice [...]

I go to the hangar with Tim where he builds his airplane and I build a story.  Who would have thought there are so many similarities with building a plane and a story?  I guess because both are crafting, they just use different tools.  The grinders are grinding and the sparks are flying and compressors [...]

I’m panting toward the finish line in this marketing marathon. Eight book signings down; one to go in this crazy wonderful book launch season for Horse Indian Wolf, the Hidden Pictures of Judy Larson, by Kathleen Kudlinski. I’ve been in libraries, large and small; bookstores, chain and indie; plus a nature museum and the UConn [...]

Projections for the opening weekend of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows indicate that the Harry Potter movies will soon surpass Star Wars as the highest grossing film franchise. Reactions from children’s book authors will most likely be mixed. While some may fear that time and money spent in movie theaters means less spent reading [...]

I once heard an editor explain that for every thousand manuscripts her house received, only 2 or 3 were published in one year. Of course, that number is a bit deceiving. She also said that of the 1,000, about 900 manuscripts were rejected outright without reading more than a line because the writing was so [...]

Earlier this year, we each posted photographs of our desks. I went back to look at my photo today, the desk of a Writer-At-Work. So sunny! So clean! Probably tidied up for the camera. Certainly nothing like the desk of an illustrator approaching a deadline. What does that look like? Not pretty. Probably not inspiring. [...]