New Books in Children's Literature

Award-winning author Laurie Wallmark writes mostly picture book biographies of women in STEM. Her titles include Code Breaker, Spy Hunter: How Elizebeth Friedman Changed the Course of Two World Wars; Ada Byron Lovelace and the Thinking Machine, Grace Hopper: Queen of Computer Code; and Hedy Lamarr's Double Life. In our discussion, we discuss her brand new book, Rivka's Presents (Random House Studi...

Lisa M. Bolt Simons has published over 60 children's nonfiction books, with many more in preparation. In our conversation we talk about two of her recent "Curious About" books, but focus on her recent historical fiction graphic novel The Vanished Northwest Passage Arctic Expedition (Capstone, 2022), illustrated by Eugene Smith Both and published by Capstone Press. Lisa talks about her childhood, h...

Today I speak to the wonderful Leslie Kimmelman, as we celebrate her brand new picture book, Ready, Set, Run!: The Amazing New York City Marathon, published by Random House Studio, (and also A Book about Bupkes, published by Kar-Ben). Both books launched on August 1st! Leslie is author of over forty picture books under her own name and many more written under a pseudonym (revealed in our conversat...

Anna Olswanger is an award-winning children's author and highly regarded literary agent, with clients include the New York Times best-selling author Michael Hall and the Newbery Honor Book winner Vince Vawter. Anna's middle grade novel Greenhorn (2012) is based on the true story of a young Holocaust survivor that she heard from Rabbi Rafael Grossman. Anna is also the author of Shlemiel Crooks (200...

Elizabeth Law has worked in the publishing field her whole life, first as an Editor at Viking Children’s Books and Puffin Books, as Associate Publisher at Simon and Schuster Books for Young Readers, then later as Publisher at Egmont USA, and more recently as the backlist and special projects editor at Holiday House Books for Young Readers. Elizabeth has also works as a professional consultant with...

In our interview, Sarah Sassoon celebrates the success of her award-winning children's book, Shoham's Bangle, published by Kar-Ben (2022), and discusses her life journey and career from Australia to South Africa and now as an author and poet in Jerusalem. Mel Rosenberg is a professor emeritus of microbiology (Tel Aviv University, emeritus) who fell in love with children's books as a small child an...

This is my second interview with the wonderful Shelli R. Johannes, who is the author of 18 books with more due out in 2024. She is the co-author (with Kimberly Derting) of the popular Cece Loves Science series and Penny (An Engineering Tale of the Fourth Pig). In addition to her tween and teen novels, she is also the author of the Theo Thesaurus series and Shine Like a Unicorn. In our interview we...

Today I get to interview one of my favorite children's book authors, Ariel Bernstein, and celebrate her new book, You Go First, which was published only two weeks ago by Simon & Schuster/Paula Wiseman Books (June 13, 2023). We talk about her rapid rise from anonymity to international success and acclaim starting with her first picture book, I Have a Balloon. Ariel shares her thoughts about writing...

In this funny, engaging and candid interview Lili Rosenstreich talks about her career leading up to her current role as founder, publisher, and creative director at Kalaniot Books, an up-and-coming US-based publisher of books for Jewish children. We discuss her wishlist for manuscripts, and her thoughts on the publishing industry. Prior to founding Kalaniot Books, Lili was the design director of C...

Holly Hatam is illustrator of several dozen children's books, published by Random House, Harper Collins and others. She is also author-illustrator of Unicorns are Real and several other board books. In our lively and candid conversation, we discuss her career, her breakthrough, her thoughts as an illustrator, her illustration process and advice for aspiring writers and illustrators. Holly is the i...

In our wonderful conversation, Anne Roos Kleiss, a Dutch author-illustrator based in Rotterdam, and I talk about her new book, When a Friend Needs a Friend (which just launched in February, 2023 (Scholastic). Her pen name, which is the name appearing on her children's books is Roozeboos. We talk about how she was discovered at an exhibition featuring her work as an MA student in the Children’s Boo...

This is my second interview with the wonderful children's author Anna Lazowski, this time celebrating the launch of her new picture book Dark Cloud, published last month by Kids Can Press. Anna Lazowski wrote her first picture book for a class assignment in the sixth grade and has been creating stories ever since. Now an award-winning radio producer whose journalistic work has been published in va...

In our animated discussion, Martin Lemelman and I discuss his latest graphic novel, The Miracle Seed (Eerdmans Young Readers, 2023), which was published only two months ago. It is the thrilling true story of an ancient plant, wonderfully reborn in the modern era through the hard work of two female scientists. It is a Junior Library Guild, as well as, a PJ Library Selection. Martin Lemelman, the ch...

Hanoch Piven is an Israeli collage artist whose colorful and witty portraits have appeared over the last 30 years on both sides of the Atlantic: in most major American magazines and newspapers such as Time, Newsweek, Rolling Stone and in many European publications. Piven has written and illustrated eight award-winning books for children, as well as Apps, TV programs and exhibitions. He received a...

Since Sophia Gholz’s highly successful debut book, The Boy Who Grew a Forest: The True Story of Jadav Payeng, appeared four years ago, she has published with several exceptional picture books for children, notably her two recent books from 2022, Bug on the Rug (Sleeping Bear) and A History of Toilet Paper (and Other Potty Tools) (from Running Press Kids). In our interview we talk about her career,...

In this interview we celebrate Lee Wardlaw's writing career, over thirty books ranging from board books to YA, with over a million copies sold! We focus on two of her many books, Won Ton and Chopstick: A Cat and Dog Tale Told in Haiku (Henry Holt, 2015) and First Steps (Harperfestival, 1999). We discuss her new award for children's books in which cats play a role, and her sage advice for authors h...

In our conversation, award-winning author Jennifer Swanson’s talks about her love for communicating science through award-winning children's books (almost fifty, and counting!). We celebrate her most recent book, Footprints Across the Planet (Reycraft, 2022) and get a sneak preview of her upcoming book Space Care. Jennifer shares her path to becoming a highly successful children's author, and prov...

In this wonderful interview with Jennifer Berne we celebrate the launch of her epic picture book How the Sea Came to Be: (And All the Creatures In It), published by Eerdmans Books for Young Readers in 2023, which amazingly covers the four plus billion years from the beginning of the oceans to the present day." Jennifer talks about her love for dance, music poetry, advertising and science and how a...

Katey Howes is a highly successful, multiple-award winning picture book author, doing things her way. She writes books in meticulous rhyme. She writes stories with clear messages. In our illuminating interview, we talk not only about her new multi-starred book, Woven of the World (Chronicle, 2023), which sold out in two months, but also about her life story as a 'science nerd' who originally wante...

In this intriguing and fun interview Stephen Fraser talks about his love for children's books, his careers as editor at HarperCollins Children's Books and as executive agent at the Jennifer de Chiara Literary Agency, and his premise that "Joy should drive the publishing industry." Along the way, he shares great advice to aspiring picture book authors: Picture book manuscripts are a 'launch pad for...

In my conversation with author-illustrator Noa Nimrodi we celebrate the launch of her first Middle Grade book in English, Not So Shy which published just two weeks ago by Kar-Ben. As a young Mom, Noa fell in love with picture books and decided to try and write her own. It was definitely harder than it seemed. After many drafts and countless rejections, Noa finally got a publishing deal for her fir...

Since Chris Haughton begun writing and illustrating children's books about a dozen years ago, he has conquered the heart of millions with his engaging stories and unique, beautiful artwork. His first book, A Bit Lost has been translated into 35 languages and has won awards in 12 countries including the Dutch Picture Book of the Year. Oh No George! came out in 2012, SHH! We Have a Plan in 2014, Goo...

African-Americans and women are increasingly visible in professional mathematical institutions, organizations, and literature, expanding our mental models of the mathematics community. Yet early representation also matters: We begin building these models as soon as we begin seeing and doing mathematics, and they can be slow to adapt. In her wonderful activity book Women Who Count: Honoring African...

Lindsay Bonilla is the author of Polar Bear Island (Union Square, 2018) and I Love You With All of My Hearts (Creative Editions, 2021). In our lively and candid interview, we celebrate the launch of Lindsay's new book, The Note Who Faced the Music (Page Street Kids, 2023). Lindsay talks about her childhood challenges and her penchant for storytelling which turned into a passion for writing picture...

Susan Johnston Taylor dreamed of writing since the age of nine, when she won a magazine contest. In our interview we celebrate the launch of her picture book, Animals in Surprising Shades: Poems about Earth’s Colorful Creatures (Gnome Road Publishing, 2023). Her book is composed of poems (each in a different style), each about a colorful animal. As a freelance writer for over a decade, Susan's wri...