It’s Greg Heffley’s birthday! And Abrams’s Amulet Books is ready to celebrate—with the October 21 publication of Partypooper, the 20th installment in Jeff Kinney’s Diary of a Wimpy Kid series which introduced Greg to the world in 2007, and with a national author tour, aka cross-country extravaganza, which kicks off on October 19.
In the new book, Greg is sure that his family is planning him a surprise birthday bash, but to his dismay, the Heffley clan has forgotten his big day altogether. Never one to be deterred, Greg decides to take full advantage of his parents’ guilt about their oversight by hosting a blowout party of his own.
“For the first time ever, I didn’t come up with the theme of my own book,” Kinney said of how Partypooper first popped onto his radar. During last year’s Wimpy Kid book tour, for Hot Mess, Kinney said he was out to dinner with his team when he asked the group what his next book should be about. “One of my employees, Vanessa, said, ‘Well, it’s obvious. It should be about a birthday; it should be a celebration.’ ”
“I was a little taken aback at how clear-eyed she was about that,” Kinney recalled. “It’s the 20th book, and we just reached the 300 million in print milestone [for the series]. So a celebration felt like the right thing, and we’ve really taken that idea and run with it.” Kinney also relished exploring the idea of Greg’s birthday, something he hadn’t done before. “A birthday is a really big event in a kid’s life,” he said. “And that’s a great theme for comedy.”
Comedy takes center stage in the interactive Partypooper Show, which Kinney and the team will present for audiences at stops from Massachusetts down to Arkansas, as they roll along in the Wimpy Wagon tour van. “The way we’re framing it is that tonight we’re celebrating the 300 million books in print moment, and almost like a New Year’s Eve countdown, tonight’s the night it’s going to happen,” Kinney said, teasing the setup. “Then we have a series of partypoopers, including a clown named Hopeless, come up on stage to create obstacles that keep us from ringing in the big moment.” Party games, a jellybean-eating contest, and other activities will all be a part of the family fun at the events.
In addition to the Partypooper Show stops, Kinney and company will be doing a series of surprise book parties at schools along the tour route. At those locations, when students gather for a fake assembly, Kinney will interrupt the boring presentation and announce his team’s gift of a collection of diverse books for the school library. These donations dovetail with a broader Wimpy Kid-inspired effort powered by Abrams and literacy nonprofit First Book. Since February, when the Partypooper book and tour were announced, Abrams has donated 20,000 books per month to First Book to be distributed to schools and kids in need. “It all adds up to a lot of books getting into the hands of kids who really deserve to have them,” Kinney said.
Though Kinney’s annual tours have grown in scope and size each year, he doesn’t feel pressure about what comes next. “It’s definitely fun to see if we can one-up ourselves,” he said. “I’m in a rare position as an author, where I’m sort of a known quantity. It’s fun knowing that we can plant a flag just about anywhere and kids and their families will show up. I never take that for granted. My team and I want to make sure that we put together an entertaining experience that’s full of surprises. More than anything, it feels like an opportunity.”
Once the U.S. tour wraps, Kinney will be traveling to eight or nine countries in support of Partypooper. Then, back in his studio, he will continue a variety of projects. “I’m going to be jumping right into a new Wimpy Kid spin-off book, and then I’m working on multiple screenplays for Disney, plus we’ve got more movies in the pipeline, which is exciting.”
And from his studio, he’ll also be admiring the progress being made on a whole different type of project: the revitalization of the town square in his adopted hometown of Plainville, Mass. He and his wife Julie opened the local indie bookstore An Unlikely Story a decade ago, and now have embarked on a five-year-plan to develop new businesses on the surrounding properties. “It’ll be a busy fall for sure,” Kinney said.
