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A Horse Named Sky and friends

A Horse Named Sky is out in paperback this week. I’m thrilled to see a little sneak preview of A Wolf Called Fire in the back of this edition. Big thanks to Kirbi Fagan for her gorgeous art. I’ve been doing radio interviews all day chatting about this book, so here on the blog I’d like to take a moment to highlight some other new horse books that I think young readers will love.

First up is Sierra Blue by Suzanne Morgan Williams. It’s a story about a girl with a unique ability to connect with injured horses and a race horse that desperately needs her.

Fans of history will love the well-researched and thrilling story of how the famous Lipizzaner horses of the Spanish Riding School were rescued from the bombing of Vienna during WWII. It’s called They Saved the Stallions by Deborah Hopkinson.

I’ve long been a fan of the Phantom Stallion series by Terri Farley. It’s set in the same ecosystem as A Horse Named Sky. Terri is a life long advocate for wild horses and her writing in this series is brilliant. I’m so happy so see it reissued.

Finally, if you are looking for a good riding academy story you’ll love Jessica Burkhart’s new series, Saddle Hill Academy. The first four titles are out and I hope there will be many more.

And because I’m such a fan of picture book non fiction, I can’t pass up the opportunity to sing the praises of Horse Power: how horses changed the world, written and illustrated by the brilliant Jennifer Thermes.

A Wolf Called Fire

Friends, I’m thrilled to announce that my next middle grade novel, A Wolf Called Fire, will be available on February 4th, 2025. The story will be illustrated by the brilliant Mónica Armiño and the luminous cover below was created by Cindy Derby.

For years young readers of A Wolf Called Wander have asked, often plaintively, “but what about Wander’s brother?” “Why did he have to die?” “Where did he go?” It’s a rare gift to find readers so invested in someone who was not even the main character. I know that Wander had to think his brother was gone forever or he would never undertake his great journey. But I couldn’t bear for him to see his brother die, so (against the urging of my editor) I left that part of the story open; I’m so glad I did.

It has been more than ten years since I did the research for A Wolf Called Wander which came out in 2019. We’ve learned a lot about wolves and about wolf pack dynamics in the years since. The character of Fire was inspired by Wolf 8, one of the first wolves brought back to Yellowstone Park 29 years ago. Like Warm, who grew into his adult name Fire, Wolf 8 was the omega of his pack. He was small, not especially handsome, and frequently bullied by his brothers. He grew up to be a wise and compassionate leader, a gifted mentor of pups, and a fierce competitor who never killed a wolf he defeated. Wolf 8 became the patriarch of the largest and most powerful pack in Yellowstone’s history the mighty Druid Peak pack. From that lived example of leadership, I created a young omega who listens well to his mother and learns from hard earned experience the first thing she ever told him: “Big is not the only good thing a wolf can be.”

I hope this story will inspire readers to love the wilderness and to become what ever kind of leader they were meant to be.

Many thanks to my talented and tenacious agent Fiona Kenshole of Transatlantic, the wonderful team at Greenwillow, including my editor Virginia Duncan and art director Sylvie Le’ Floc’h, my critique partners, Nora Ericson and Michael Gettle-Gilmartin, and my patient and supportive family.

Happy Birthday BIG TRUCK DAY

BIG TRUCK DAY on the littlest vehicle of them all, a Vespa!

So thrilled to be celebrating my debut picture book today. In the darkest days of the pandemic my daughter and I started a picture book and song writing zoom and BIG TRUCK DAY is the happy result. I was inspired by the Big Truck Days that my public library sponsored where firefighters and garbage collectors and farmers and police persons and utility & construction workers all brought their vehicles to celebrate the care of the community. There was even a blood mobile!

Niki Stage is the illustrator and this is also her debut. Her art brought such energy and joy to the page. I appreciate her vibrant and inclusive style. I’m also grateful to Lindsay Delaney, librarian extraordinaire, who encouraged me to put in a page of back matter to answer the question, What’s a bookmobile? which was bound to come up at story time.

Many thanks to the brilliant team at Greenwillow including editor Virginia Duncan and art director Sylvie Le Floc’h. Thank you to Fiona Kenshole and the team at Transatlantic for their ongoing support. And thank you to booksellers and librarians everywhere for bringing books and kids together.

Big Truck Day!

It’s been more than a decade since I’ve had a picture book and so I’m thrilled to announce that Big Truck Day! is coming in 2022. It’s a romp of a story celebrating a Big Truck Day like the ones the Beaverton City Library hosted when my kids were young. It’s an homage to community workers and the importance of library access for everybody.

I’m thrilled to be paired with debut illustrator Niki Stage for this project. Her art is sweet, joyful, and energetic. Just the vibe I was hoping for.

Middle Grade Book Review: While I Was Away

When I was in grade school in the late 70s, I had a friend who, like debut author Waka T Brown, traveled to Japan to stay with grandparents regularly in order to keep his language skills current and connection to his culture fresh. I remember his complex feelings about the whole thing. Pride in his culture and love for his grandparents who seemed fiercely strict to me. But sadness at missing summer camp with his scout troop. I remember that kids teased him about his proficiency in martial arts. (This was before the movie Karate Kid made martial arts popular.) But I also remember how impressed we all were by his fluency in Japanese and the way he drew kanji with a brush pen. I loved how While I Was Away by Waka T Brown captured all the beautiful complexity of being a bicultural kid moving between Kansas and Japan and finding things to love in both places. The fastest growing group of children in America are biracial, bilingual, and bicultural kids. I’m always happy to find a book that celebrates them. The publisher is Quill Tree Books an imprint of HarperCollins.