Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast

I almost forgot about this post, you guys, since these holiday days are running together. But here I am. Notice the number up above. ONE HUNDRED AND NINETY-NINE. I am not even making that up. Next week, the first Sunday of 2011, we’ll all be kickin’ it 200-style. Two hundred weeks of taking some time here at 7-Imp to reflect on Seven(ish) Exceptionally Fabulous, Beautiful, Interesting, Hilarious, or Otherwise Positive Noteworthy Things, whether book-related or not, that happened to you. Whew. Pretty neat timing, huh?

I’m going to forego seven separate kicks this week (by all means, leave your seven kicks, though) and simply say hi and, once again, happy holidays. I’ve been short-and-sweet posting some holiday illustrations this week, one for each day, thanks to some nice illustrators, so if you missed ’em, go have a look. Today’s illustrations are from the one and only Julie Paschkis, who has graced this blog many a’times, seeing as how I’m a huge fan. Read the rest of this entry »

Today’s illustration comes from illustrator Lauren Castillo. You can see this spread and more of Lauren’s beautiful work in the October 2010 Simon & Schuster release, Christmas Is Here (adapted from the King James Bible). I haven’t seen this book yet, but Adrienne likes it, and I always listen to her.

Thanks to Lauren for sharing her artwork, and merry Christmas to all . . .

Image copyright © 2010 by Lauren Castillo. Reproduced by permission of the illustrator.

This October, Random House re-released the 1987 picture book adaptation of e.e. cummings’s poem, “little tree,” illustrated by author and artist Deborah Kogan Ray. (It was also released as a paperback edition in 1994.) Here’s the low-down.

This re-printing makes me happy, as it’s always been one of my favorite holiday picture books. Today, Deborah is sharing two images from it, and I thank her.

Merry Christmas Eve from 7-Imp . . .

LITTLE TREE. Text copyright © 1923 by e.e. cummings. Illustrations copyright © 1987 by Deborah Kogan Ray. Published by Random House, New York. Images reproduced with permission of the illustrator.

Here’s today’s holiday image. (See below for yesterday’s from illustrator Shadra Strickland.) This comes from illustrator Kelly Light, who single-handedly created the blog Ripple this year to raise money for the oil-drenched Gulf.

Enjoy, and happy holidays from 7-Imp…

Image copyright © 2010 by Kelly Light. Reproduced by permission of the illustrator.

I’ve decided to—last-minute, which seems to be normal for me—post some new holiday images from some very talented illustrators this week. I’ve got a few I’ve collected anyway. Here’s an image from Shadra Strickland. Don’t you love its joy?

Happy holidays from 7-Imp, which means…uh, happy holidays from Jules! (I really should stop referring to myself as a blog, huh?)

See you tomorrow with another festive illustration. Until then . . .

Image copyright © 2010 by Shadra Strickland. Reproduced by permission of the illustrator.

2010 is grinding to a halt, but before it does, I wanted to invite over to the 7-Imp breakfast nook Barbara Bottner, the author of one of my favorite picture books from this year, Miss Brooks Loves Books! (and I don’t). Those of you who saw this post from May of this year know why I (and many others) cheer the book so enthusiastically. (And if you haven’t seen the book yet, by all means, go take a look at the post, though I am re-posting the spreads from it below in this interview.)

Barbara has had a long, rewarding career in children’s literature, writing more than thirty-six books, including picture books, beginning readers, middle grade novels, and YA novels. As discussed below, she’s also dabbled in other fields, including theatre and animation (Sesame Street, The Electric Company). In addition to her writing, she gets a great deal of joy from teaching. Barbara teaches both privately and at Parson’s School of Design in New York City, something she also touches upon in the chat below. “She leads a really tough but also a wise and supportive critique,” author Denise Doyen told me. “I’ve learned a lot from Barbara Bottner (and the seven other writers in her master class who regularly gather ’round her dining room table.) Mainly: to work from passion; to find one’s inner child and then write to, for and with that child in your head and heart; and not to stop at ‘a nice little story’ but to push onward until you find something fresh and uniquely yours.” Read the rest of this entry »

I can’t let the holiday season slide by without featuring some illustrations from at least one holiday title, and this year it’s Steve Light’s The Christmas Giant (Candlewick, September 2010), which endears itself to me more and more with each reading. And I suppose now is the time to feature this, if one celebrates Christmas. This is the last Sunday before Christmas, which gobsmacks me. Can gobsmack be a verb? I doubt it, but let’s just pretend it can be, okay?

This title is infused with a real joy and a sweet charm. It’s the story of a giant and an elf, two very good friends, who live in the North Pole. You may be scratching your head, but child readers will just run with this. A monstrously tall, bearded giant with hairy knuckles? A wee, hooded, funny-looking elf who fits into the giant’s palm? Best buds? Santa’s helpers? Sure thing. Onwards and upwards then… Makes all the sense in the world to children, don’t you know. Light knows this and simply forges ahead. Read the rest of this entry »

I ask you, O Best Beloved 7-Imp Readers: Are you following the Top 20 Children’s Books of 2010 this week over at 100 Scope Notes, brought to us by two intrepid school librarians (with most excellent taste, I might add, not to mention a keen eye for kickin’ children’s lit), Travis Jonker and John Schumacher? It begins here, and you may have just heard me cheering loudly over today’s post, numbers 5 to 1. I can enthusiastically get behind the picture book titles on that short list.

Today I offer up no Best-Of list of my own. I figure lots of really smart bloggers, such as Travis, are out there with many of those lists in this twilight of 2010, but I do want to highlight a picture book title released by Candlewick in November that makes the Illustration Junkie in me happy. (Yes, I’m consumed by this addiction, though I don’t do things like pore over illustrations in lieu of feeding my children. Most of the time they get fed, though—after a while without a well-executed picture book—I do get a bit twitchy.)

Anyone remember this post from July of this year? That was illustrator Kevin Waldron (originally from Ireland, studied illustration in London, now living in New York, and very much likes tea and cake, as stated at his site), his picture book debut in a title he also penned. Read the rest of this entry »

Pack your bags, bring some coffee, and join me on a quick peek at some picture book titles from around the world. I’ve been meaning to do this for a while now, so let’s get right to it.

We’ll get to the illustration opening this post in a second. First, let’s travel to Iran. In February of this year, Frances Lincoln Children’s Books released a collection of stories from Iran, titled Pea Boy. Read the rest of this entry »

“Hansel and Gretel came together like two magnets meeting, like meteors that have been screaming through space toward this one moment of collision. They met in the middle with a bang, and instantly their feet went out from under them on the slick roadway. They landed, hard, in a puddle of icy mud.

They stared at each other, sitting in the puddle.

Lost and then found.

Dead and then alive.

Covered in mud.

Sitting on their behinds in three inches of filthy water.

And they began to laugh. They threw their arms around each other and laughed until tears streamed down their faces. They sat, freezing, muddy, in a puddle in the middle of the road, with the gray sky overhead, and their parents’ castle waiting just a few miles away. They sat there and held each other until their arms ached.

‘Where have you been?’ Hansel asked as they pulled themselves out of the puddle.

‘How are you alive?’ Gretel asked at just the same moment.

So they climbed up on an oxcart and told each other about every single thing that had happened since the day of the hunt in the Lebenwald—and some things twice.

And as they talked and laughed and gasped and talked some more, Ivy and Betty {the oxen} drew them closer and closer to home.

Hansel and Gretel are coming to the hardest part now.

It’s true that they’ve been nearly eaten by a cannibalistic baker woman; and they’ve talked to the fiery sun and to the child-eating moon and to the kind stars; and they’ve journeyed to the Crystal Mountain; and that Gretel has cut off her own finger, and caused somebody to be boiled alive; and that Hansel has been turned into a beast and been shot and skinned and gambled away; and that he went to Hell and dressed up like the Devil’s grandmother; and that he’s been chased by the Devil himself and has held an old man’s hand as he died.

It’s true they’ve done all those things.

But sometimes, coming home is the hardest thing of all.“