Authors & Illustrators

Tiger Eyes, the 1998 book by Judy Blume, is about to become a major motion picture, the first feature film adaptation of Blume's work. Elizabeth Bird talks to Blume and her son, Lawrence Blume, about their collaboration on the film.

Author Evan Roskos digs deep into real-life adolescent issues in Dr. Bird’s Advice for Sad Poets , including high school expulsion, self-abuse, stalking, and cliques. SLJTeen talked to Roskos about his emotionally moving and ultimately redemptive debut YA novel.

“Wimpy Kid” author/illustrator Jeff Kinney and “Fancy Nancy” illustrator Robin Preiss Glasser scored the top prizes last night at the sixth annual Children’s & Teen Choice Book Awards (CCBAs) gala, a charity event organized by the Children’s Book Council and Every Child a Reader. The honorees were selected by young readers across the country, who cast ballots at bookstores, school libraries, and on bookweekonline.com for their favorite books, author, and illustrator. The gala heralds the official start of the yearly Children’s Book Week celebration. The CCBAs is the only national book awards program in which the winning titles are chosen by kids and teens.

Happy Mother’s Day! It was Monica Edinger who alerted me to the fact that fresh on the heels of the Matilda musical is an upcoming British production of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.  She has the details and directed me to this truly unfair let’s-not-give-anything-away teaser trailer. This introduction is a bit better. You know [...]

Author Michael Dahl helped give away hundreds of copies of his new picture book Goodnight Baseball (Capstone, 2013) on “Educators Day” at a Saint Paul Saints baseball game on May 9. The day is exclusively for teachers and students, and was the first exhibition game of the minor league baseball team this season.

The Highlights Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to excellence in children’s literature, has announced its creation of James Cross Giblin Scholarship, which aims to honor the talents, contributions, and generosity of the acclaimed children’s author, editor, and publisher.

Zavala Elementary School librarian Lisa M. Lopez, the unofficial Little Free Library ambassador to El Paso, TX, and 2013 Mover & Shaker, talks to School Library Journal about her passion for storytelling, her tireless efforts to advocate for bilingual literacy through Día de los niños/Día de los libros (Children’s Day/Book Day) celebrations, and the ways she inspires her students.

Celebrate 10 years of Mo Willems's Pigeon with a visit to the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst, MA, which will be hosting an exhibit on the award-winning author/illustrator. Winners for the Jane Addams, Golden Kite, and IRA awards have been announced. Attend a one-day workshop focused on integrating games into the K–12 classroom. These stories and more, in this week's News Bites.

Junior Library Guild editors select picture books that are perfect for storytime; these titles are destined to become favorite read-alouds and will delight the imaginations of kids in kindergarten and first grade.