Publisher Spotlight Preview: Fall/Winter 2024 – Lantana, Little Island, and Marble Press

Thanks to Publisher Spotlight’s own Ellen Myrick, we’re continuing to give you a brief peek into some of the books slated for release in the coming months. You can find the first of these round-ups of small publishers here, the second here, the third here, and the fourth here. This next batch includes a slew you certainly aren’t familiar with. That is to say, not yet:

Freedom Braids by Monique Duncan, ill. Oboh Moses

ISBN: 9781915244802

Publication Date: September 10, 2024

I am perpetually fascinated by how certain themes, ideas, and facts will appear in multiple children’s books in a single year by complete coincidence and without any particular reason. Take, for example, the fact that enslaved African women would braid maps to freedom in people’s hair. I saw this in the upcoming Rapunzel-inspired story The Magic Callaloo by Trish Cooke, ill. Sophie Bass. Now I’m also seeing it in this book, Freedom Braids. Written by an American author (of Jamaican descent) with a Nigerian illustrator, the book explores how braids were once a part of the language used as maps. The endpapers then show the different kinds of braids in a truly stunning array. This book’s truly beautiful.

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Step Into My Shoes by Alkisti Halikia, ill. Fantini Tikkou

ISBN: 9781915244925

Publication Date: October 1, 2024

Ah, this one’s nice. An empathy story, you might call it. One day, a girl walks to school in Paris and then sees all the shoes outside a mosque. Out of curiosity, she tries them on. In doing so, she comes to learn more about people and what they do. And at the end, she actually gets for own self the favorite pair of shoes that she saw. Illustrated with fun collage art, it’s a lovely little bit of storytelling.

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The Language of Flowers by Shyala Smith, ill. Aaron Asis

ISBN: 9781915244864

Publication Date: September 10, 2024

In this story a girl’s Appa owns a flower shop. Our heroine, Juhi, grows to become quite fond of one of the patrons. Then one day he’s in the hospital so Juhi picks out a flower for him that looks like the dancers in Sri Lanka. When he passes away, she has to process her grief somehow, so she does it by figuring out the best possible final bouquet in his honor. With an author who’s Sri Lankan and an illustrator that Filipino, this title stands out in the field.

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Dinosaur Pie by Jen Wallace, ill. Alan O’Rourke

ISBN: 9781915071491

Publication Date: February 8, 2025

The thing that I tend to forget about Little Island Press is their tendency to lean into chapter books for kids that are heavily illustrated. This latest from Wallace and O’Rourke is a prime example. In this story, a kid with ADHD accidentally eats a magical pie that turns him into a dinosaur. This, unsurprisingly, makes things really complicated with thing after thing happening to this kid. As a result, he has to figure out how to handle his life in this new way. It’s a sweet, heart-felt little story.

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Chasing Shy Town by Erika McGann, ill. Toni Galmés

ISBN: 9781915071514

Publication Date: October 8, 2024

It’s difficult to resist a book that apparently won every award in Ireland. This one’s got humor, as it tells the tale of a boy and his grandmother, searching for a kind of shy Brigadoon-type town that keeps moving around. Anyone else getting a faint hint of Miyazaki here?

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The Dogs Next Door by Patricia Carlin

ISBN: 9781958325230

Publication Date: October 8, 2024

As irresistible covers go, this one’s right up there. One day, a bunch of dogs move in next door. Are they just dogs or are they bad dogs? Turns out, when you get to know them, they’re actually a third option: fun dogs. They like to have a good time. When a girl comes to check them out, the dogs teach her to have fun too. But then people start to complain. With art that is fresh, energetic, and hilarious, this book is equal parts silly an subversive.

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Sophie: Jurassic Bark and Sophie: Frankenstein’s Hound by Brian Anderson

ISBN: 9781958325148 & 9781958325254

Publication Date: October 15, 2024

Here’s something fun. The creator of the popular webcomic Dog Eats Doug has come up with a new graphic novel series that definitely hits one as being on the younger end of the scale. It can’t come a minute too soon either. As any librarian will tell you, finding younger GNs is a challenge in and of itself. Each book in this series is based on a movie where Sophie is the hero. For doggie GN kids, this will be right up their alley.

And that’s all for this week, folks! Enjoy what’s on display here and expect the next preview of titles soon!

Filed under: Publisher Previews