Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast

“Paola: She saw an insect for the first time. / She was so happy that for the entire morning / her heart didn’t stop buzzing.”
(Click spread to enlarge)

 
María José Ferrada’s Niños: Poems for the Lost Children of Chile (Eerdmans, March 2021), illustrated by María Elena Valdez and originally published in Spanish in 2019, is an experience — the kind of book you want to mark out some time for and take in slowly and reverently. It is a tribute to the thirty-four children under the age of fourteen who died or disappeared during Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorial 17-year regime in Chile.

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— From Fran Nuño’s The Dance of the Bees, illustrated by Zuzanna Celej

 

— From Mark Karlins’s Kiyoshi’s Walk, illustrated by Nicole Wong

 
I’m sending you to BookPage today, where I have a profile of two books that are love songs to haiku — Mark Karlins’s Kiyoshi’s Walk (Lee & Low, March 2021), illustrated by Nicole Wong, and Fran Nuño’s The Dance of the Bees (Cuento de Luz, February 2021), illustrated by Zuzanna Celej and translated from Spanish by Jon Brokenbrow.

That is here.

And below are some spreads from each book. Read the rest of this entry �

 
Today, illustrator Rob Dunlavey visits to talk about illustrating David Elliott’s In the Woods (Candlewick, April 2020), a poetry collection that explores 15 creatures in their woodland habitats — from little (the millipede) to large (the moose). Elliott kicks things off with the bear and wraps it all up, gracefully, with the deer. In between, there’s awe, humor, and always keen observation in these short, exquisitely crafted poems. Rob’s illustrations eloquently capture the light and shadows of these homes in the woods, and today, he talks about the creation of some of these spreads.

I thank him for visiting. Let’s get to it. Read the rest of this entry �

“Mindy’s FAVORITELEVISION / sits upon a ladder. /
She watches the SILLIESTUPIDESTUFF — / it doesn’t seem to matter.”

 
Today, I’ve a visit from poet and illustrator Calef Brown, who talks about his latest book, Up Verses Down: Poems, Paintings, and Serious Nonsense (Christy Ottaviano/Henry Holt, June 2019), as well as the book that came before it in 2015 — Hypnotize a Tiger: Poems About Just About Everything. He discusses why he sees them as companion books; what they have to do with The Tao of Physics and miniature paintings; and how Twitter can spawn a poem. Or two.

I always like to see what Calef, the “inveterate punster” (as Kirkus has called him), is up to. I thank him for visiting today.

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“polka dot polka dot / you are not at all what i thought …”
(Click to enlarge spread and read poem in its entirety)

 
Over at Kirkus today, I write about new picture books from Stephen Savage and Fiona Woodcock.

That is here.

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Last week, I wrote here about Shannon Bramer’s Climbing Shadows: Poems for Children (Groundwood, March 2019), illustrated by Cindy Derby. I’m following up here today with a few spreads.

Enjoy!

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“… Mrs. Vandenberg / holds up her hand.
Write about anything! / It’s not black and white.
But it is. / Charles is black, / and I’m white.”

 
Last week at Kirkus, I wrote here about Irene Latham’s and Charles Waters’s Can I Touch Your Hair?: Poems of Race, Mistakes, and Friendship (Carolrhoda Books, January 2018), illustrated by Selina Alko and Sean Qualls.

Today, I’ve a bit of art from the book.

Enjoy. …

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“Paula the cat / not thin nor fat / is as happy as house cats can be …”
(Click to enlarge and read poem in its entirety)

 
I’ve a few spreads today from Nikki Giovanni’s I Am Loved (Caitlyn Dlouhy/Atheneum, January 2018), illustrated by Ashley Bryan.

This is a collection of primarily free verse poems from Giovanni — some previously published and the rest, brand-new. The poems are about memory, loss, friendship, and family — and (delightfully) there’s one about a house cat, “not thin nor fat,” who tires of her view and heads out to sea (pictured above). “Quilts,” a poem dedicated to artist Sally Sellers, comes from the point of view of an elderly woman, who likens herself to a “fading piece of cloth.” The ending is striking in its poignancy:

When I am frayed and stained and drizzled at the end
Please someone cut a square and put me in a quilt
That I might keep some child warm …

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— From Bob Raczka’s Wet Cement
(Click to enlarge)

 

— From What Does It Mean to Be an Entrepreneur?


 
Today over at Kirkus, I write about Bethan Woollvin’s debut picture book, Little Red (Peachtree, April 2016). That is here, and next week I’ll have some art from it here at 7-Imp.

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Last week at Kirkus, I talked here to Emma D. Dryden, and I wrote here about Bob Raczka’s new poetry collection. In this follow-up post today, I have some images from Bob’s Wet Cement: A Mix of Concrete Poems (Roaring Brook, March 2016), and some of Ken Min’s illustrations from Rana DiOrio’s and Emma’s What Does It Mean to Be an Entrepreneur? (Little Pickle Press, January 2016).

Until Sunday …

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“Spades for the circling turrets / Clubs for the towers above /
Diamonds for sparkling windows / And hearts for love …”
(Click to enlarge)

 

Do you know one reason I like to keep my eye on what Alazar Press is doing? They have previously published the work of Ashley Bryan (see this older 7-Imp post), and they’re doing it again this year. But this time it’s a very unusual collaboration they’re bringing into the spotlight, one that’s been 50 years in the making.

The book is called By Trolley Past Thimbledon Bridge and was released in early May. Once upon a time, Marvin Bileck—illustrator of Rain Makes Applesauce, a 1965 Caldecott Honor Book—created the illustrations for the only children’s manuscript written by Virginia Woolf. However, her estate withdrew the text after more than a decade of Marvin’s work. Ashley Bryan then stepped in to collaborate with Bileck on a new text, securing the help of the legendary Jean Karl, who founded Atheneum Books for Young Readers. Still, though, the book has taken decades to see light of day — and now it is on shelves, thanks to Alazar.

“When [Bileck] told his friend Ashley Bryan,” an opening note from Bileck’s wife states, “they began playfully bantering back and forth with words here and there, in and out of the drawings, and that’s how By Trolley Past Thimbledon Bridge came into being.” It’s a set of ten poems with a hand-lettered text all throughout the book, as well as Bileck’s delicate, whispery illustrations. “Bileck and Bryan capture the stuff of dreams in this mesmerizing and multifaceted pageant,” writes the Kirkus review.

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(Click each image to enlarge)

 
I’ve got artwork below today from illustrator and printmaker JooHee Yoon’s first picture book here in the U.S., Beastly Verse, published by Enchanted Lion Books last month. Does anyone else remember when JooHee visited 7-Imp back in 2011 to share some art? It’s exciting to see this book now.

This is a collection of animal poems, many from poets long-gone (Ogden Nash, Hilaire Belloc, Christina Rosetti), with gatefold surprises and Yoon’s distinctive and stylized art, so vivid in its palette that the spreads pop off the page. (You’ll see this below.) Daisy Fried wrote in the New York Times that “[k]ids appreciate the bizarre and off-kilter, and are too often denied it when grown-ups edit for positive messages and sweetness. Hooray for Yoon for countering that.” I love that.

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