1-About Jules
July 2010 by illustrator Mark Crilley. Follow this link to see the image up close and personal. A huge, hearty thanks to Mark.
and is used with his permission.
Jules here. Welcome to 7-Imp. Here is a bit about me, lest you wonder why I feel the need to gab about books. (For the record, there is a lot more info about the blog and why the hey I do it at this page, too.)
I worked first — for nearly a decade, if you include college — as a sign language interpreter (my Bachelor’s Degree is in Sign Language Interpreting) and then a children’s librarian, and for a little while I did both at the same time. I received my graduate degree in librarianship at the School of Information Sciences at The University of Tennessee, where I took every single children’s literature class I possibly could. My most recent librarian position was at the Tennessee School for the Deaf in Knoxville, but I am currently in middle Tennessee.
Now I work from home as a freelance writer. I write about picture books and contemporary illustration. (I occasionally write about middle-grade novels.) I review for Kirkus (after nearly a decade of blogging over there), BookPage (and sometimes do Q&As over there), and the Horn Book. I blog at the Horn Book’s Calling Caldecott and sometimes write Horn Book features. I write about picture books for Tennessee’s wonderful Chapter 16. I am also a Lecturer for the University of Tennessee’s Information Sciences program. In 2014, Wild Things! Acts of Mischief in Children’s Literature was published by Candlewick Press. I wrote it with Betsy Bird and the late Peter D. Sieruta.
As you can see, I fill my days with various freelance jobs having to do with children’s lit. I do lots of Q&As, primarily (but not only) with illustrators.
I’d like to think of 7-Imp as a sort of literary salon where authors and illustrators stop by to share their craft. After getting a cup of cyber-coffee.
That’s my story, and I’m stickin’ to it. If needed, here’s my official bio:
Julie Danielson (Jules) conducts interviews and features of authors and illustrators at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast, a children’s literature blog focused primarily on illustration and picture books. Julie received her Master’s in Information Sciences, with a focus on children’s librarianship, and she is currently a Lecturer for The University of Tennessee’s School of Information Sciences, her alma mater. She has juried for the Society of Illustrators’ Original Art Award, as well as the BolognaRagazzi Awards for the Bologna Children’s Book Fair in Italy. She recently chaired the 2020 Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards. She reviews and writes about picture books for Kirkus, BookPage, the Horn Book, and Tennessee’s Chapter 16. Wild Things! Acts of Mischief in Children’s Literature, written with Betsy Bird and the late Peter D. Sieruta, was published by Candlewick Press in 2014.
Enjoy the blog.
— Julie Danielson (a.k.a. Jules); Murfreesboro, Tennessee
{To contact me, email “seventhings *at* blaine *dot* org”} . . .
