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PW Talks with Gordon Korman
Gordon Korman has written more than 70 middle-grade and YA novels over the past 25 years, and with total sales of more than seven million copies, he has obviously accumulated quite a hefty fan base. His latest novel, Ungifted, will be released by HarperCollins’s Balzer + Bray imprint with a 75,000-copy first printing. The story centers on Donovan, a middle-school student who accidentally gets placed in the gifted and talented program and shares his own distinctive gifts with the other kids in the program.
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PW Talks with Marla Frazee
Marla Frazee, who won Caldecott Honors for her own A Couple of Boys Have the Best Week Ever and for All the World by Liz Garton Scanlon, received accolades for her book illustration early on—as a fourth-grader, in fact. Her best friend announced that she wanted Frazee to draw pictures for a story she’d written. “She was very precocious and told me that if I wanted to illustrate children’s books, I should start with hers, ” recalls Frazee. “So I did. And someone at our school sent it to the California State Fair, and we won an award. We were asked to make a duplicate copy for the school library, and every time I saw it on the shelf, I was so happy that I was a published author!”
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Obituary: Ellen Levine
Noted author Ellen Levine, whose books for young people were born of a love for teaching and her active espousal of social justice, died on May 26 of lung cancer. She was 73.
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Obituary: Peter D. Sieruta
Peter D. Sieruta, author, reviewer, and respected voice behind the blog Collecting Children's Books, died suddenly at his Michigan home on May 25, after suffering complications from a fall. He was 53.
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Illustrator Leo Dillon Dies at 79
Renowned illustrator and artist Leo Dillon died on May 26 from “complications of a sudden illness requiring lung surgery,” according to Bonnie Verburg, his longtime editor at Scholastic's Blue Sky Press imprint. Dillon was 79. With his wife and collaborator Diane, he illustrated over 40 children’s books spanning a career of more than 50 years.
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Maurice Sendak Remembered
Friends, including Jules Feiffer, Chris Van Allsburg, Roger Straus III, and Iona Opie, pay tribute to the legendary author and illustrator, who died on May 8.
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Q & A with Susane Colasanti
In YA novelist Susane Colasanti’s new book, Keep Holding On, protagonist Noelle is neglected at home and bullied at school. She endures a lot of abuse before she finds the strength to “start shaping my life into the one I want.” Here, Colasanti talks about her own difficult teen years, how her book fits into the current conversation about bullying, and what she’s doing to support today’s teens.
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Oliver Jeffers: A U.S./U.K. Production
Author-illustrator Oliver Jeffers, a Belfast native who has lived in Brooklyn since 2007, is enjoying his greatest U.S. success to date with Stuck, his eighth and most recent picture book. His latest book is The New Sweater. Like other Jeffers titles, it is being released simultaneously with HarperCollins in the U.K. and with Penguin/Philomel in the U.S., thanks to an unusual publishing backstory.
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Oh, The Places We Went: My Travels with Jean
Jean Craighead George, author of more than 100 books – including the Newbery Medal-winning Julie of the Wolves – died on May 15 at the age of 92. Wendell Minor pays tribute to his friend and longtime collaborator.
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Obituary: Jean Craighead George
Distinguished children's book author and noted naturalist Jean Craighead George died on May 15. She was 92. Best known for the Newbery-winning novel Julie of the Wolves and the Newbery Honor title My Side of the Mountain, George penned more than 100 books for young people.
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Every Picture Tells a Story
In Show Me a Story! Why Picture Books Matter: Conversations with 21 of the World’s Most Celebrated Illustrators, children’s literature historian Leonard S. Marcus interviews a diverse group of artists about everything from their own childhoods to the mechanics of their craft.
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PW Talks With Garth Nix
In his rollicking new novel, the space opera A Confusion of Princes, Australian writer Garth Nix, author of the classic Abhorsen Chronicles and the recent Keys to the Kingdom series, introduces a galaxy-spanning empire ostensibly run by the 10 million princes of the title, all working under the rule of a mysterious emperor but, as the protagonist gradually discovers, things are not at all what they seem.
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Brian Selznick and David Levithan Talk Shop at the PEN World Voices Festival
Onstage at a Saturday, May 5 afternoon session during the week-long PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature in New York City, David Levithan and Brian Selznick had freewheeling discussion that careened from Selznick’s work specifically to film and literature in general, with plenty of laughs in between.
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Tracking Amazon: Sendak's Sales Skyrocket
The day following his death, Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are has jumped to #14 from #204 on the Amazon bestseller list.
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Obituary: Maurice Sendak Dead at 83
Legendary author and illustrator Maurice Sendak died in Connecticut on Tuesday, May 8, following a stroke. He was 83.
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Q & A with Paolo Bacigalupi
Paolo Bacigalupi's first novel for young adults, Ship Breaker, won the Printz Award and placed him firmly on the radar of the YA world. He returns to the post-cataclysmic realm of Ship Breaker with The Drowned Cities. The author spoke with PW about the differences between writing for adults and for teens, and the distinction he draws between dystopias and science fiction.
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YA or Bust! Hits the Road
How do authors know when romance is working in a novel? Gayle Forman answered that question bluntly: "When I want to have sex with my male character more than my husband," quipped the author of bestselling novels If I Stay and Where She Went.
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Q & A with Barry Lyga
Barry Lyga’s latest novel, I Hunt Killers, tells the story of Jazz, the son of the world's greatest serial killer. Going beyond the usual tropes of the thriller genre, Lyga explores the effect of murder on the family of the killer and on the community as a whole.
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Q & A with Alyson Noel
Alyson Noel has hit her stride in both the YA and middle grade arenas. In the former, the six-book The Immortals series from St. Martin’s Griffin has more than eight million copies in print worldwide. The author’s first foray into middle grade fiction, the Riley Bloom paperback series, has more than 800,000 copies in print, and Square Fish will release the fourth installment, Whisper, on April 24. Noël further expands her reach into the YA market with Fated (St. Martin’s Griffin), the debut novel in her new series, The Soul Seekers.
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Q & A with Patricia McCormick
National Book Award finalist Patricia McCormick's new book, Never Fall Down, is a haunting but hopeful YA novel about a boy who survives the tyranny of the Khmer Rouge by joining a band in prison camp. It is based on the true story of Arn Chorn Pond — who survived the Cambodian Revolution in the late 1970s and now works as an activist, musician, and speaker.
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