Cover Reveal! Q&A! Introducing the Upcoming Betsy Bird / Andrea Tsurumi Collaboration: Pop Goes the Nursery Rhyme!

Before we go any further, I have two animals I would like to introduce to you. The first, is the common weasel. Observe the following video:

Cute, right? That video was sent to me by artist Andrea Tsurumi.

Now allow me to direct your attention to another animal. This is a bird, and one that I only just relatively recently learned about. Have you heard of the secretary bird? You really should:

Folks, today it is my incredible pleasure to announce that I have created a book with the aforementioned Andrea Tsurumi. It is full of weasels, secretary birds, and (most important of all) nursery rhymes!

Introducing, Pop! Goes the Nursery Rhyme, out with Union Square Press on March 18, 2025:

If you’re a parent who has ever read nursery rhymes to your small children, you probably have found them to be a bit samey. I mean, the rhymes never change! So can you blame me for getting a little punch drunk when I was a young parent and inserting the weasel from “Pop Goes the Weasel” into other nursery rhymes? It got to be so much fun (and the kids enjoyed it so much) that with the help of editor Maria Russo and artist Andrea Tsurumi, we’re bringing that sneaky weasel to life! Here’s the plot description:

“In this laugh-out-loud spin on a classic nursery rhyme collection, a feisty weasel continuously interrupts the narrator’s carefully prepared recitation—adding exuberant mischief to the timeless rhymes we all know and love.

The sensible Secretary Bird wants nothing more than to get on with their job of simply enjoying a classic nursery rhyme book. But something is afoot in the orderly land of nursery rhymes . . . a zippy little Weasel has entered the scene! As the Secretary Bird tries to get through the rhymes—from Little Miss Muffet to Jack and Jill—the Weasel bursts in, throwing everything into a comical tailspin. Can the Secretary Bird put an end to the chaos?

In POP! Goes the Nursery Rhyme, influential children’s librarian Betsy Bird and acclaimed illustrator Andrea Tsurumi remix beloved nursery rhymes, serving up a classic-in-the-making packed with hilarious surprises that will have little listeners riveted.”

Today, we’re doing this book release announcement just a little bit differently. I’ll be interviewing not just the illustrator (Andrea Tsurumi) of this book, but its editor (Maria Russo) as well. That’s right! The author is doing an illustrator/editor twofer just for your enjoyment!.

Enjoy!

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Betsy Bird: I am so pleased to speak with you both here today. And Maria! Such a delight getting to talk to you about POP! Let us start at the very beginning. When first you saw POP!, what were your thoughts about the potential for the book? What drew you to it?

Maria Russo: Hello Betsy! I do remember my very first read-through of your manuscript, and thinking, Wow, Betsy nailed it! POP! felt instantly iconic, and yet entirely original. I thought it was just terrific and I could see right away how much fun an artist would have with it. Your text created so much room for joyful visual chaos, all in the service of celebrating the nursery rhymes we know and love. But it was also a “refresh” of the nursery rhyme experience for those of us who may have gotten a little jaded. And then of course my geeky, scholarly side loved your extra material about the history of nursery rhymes, which explained so much about the mysterious staying power they have. 

So POP! was a very quick “yes.” 

Somehow right from the start I had an image of you, Betsy, reading POP! out loud to a group of, say, 3, 4, and 5-year-olds. I could just hear you doing the different voices: a serious one to read the straight nursery rhymes, then a wacky Pop Goes the Weasel voice, then a whole different one – full of righteous outrage! – for the character who was hating how the weasel interrupted all the other nursery rhymes. 

I am going to admit something here. Back then, I pictured that voice as just a voice, maybe the voice of some mysterious teacher-like persona, coming from a speech bubble. But as we know, when Andrea Tsurumi sent their first sketch dummy for the book, it turned out that they had created the character of the Secretary Bird to be the one tussling with the weasel. You and I and our Art Director, Amelia Mack, were all blown away by that addition. Secretary Bird felt so right. And Andrea schooled us on this particular bird, who was given that name because the plumes of feathers on the sides of its head look like pencils stuck behind its ear, secretary-style. It was the perfect creature to convey the bossy, officious, increasingly frantic persona captured in your words. Your text cued up Andrea to bring their own originality and genius. 

BB: I’d be the first to admit that the secretary bird is both genius and entirely the product of Andrea’s incredible imagination. And Andrea! God almighty am I glad you’re involved in this book. Some authors have a list that they carry about on them of artists they’d kill to work with someday. You were #1 on my list from day one. But let’s get this from your perspective. How were you approached about doing this book? And why, great god in heaven, did you agree?

Andrea Tsurumi: Short answer is an emphatic “likewise.” Ever since I read your anthology Funny Girl, and started reading Fuse 8, I wanted to work on a comedy book with someone who thought this hard about comedy. 

So when Stephen Barr, my wonderful agent, emailed me about Pop, I saw your name in the preview field and got one of those cartoon big exclamation points above my head. That plus Meta comedy? check. Chaotic animals? Double check. 

BB: Let’s carry on in that vein. Maria,we could have gone in any number of directions with the illustrator, but I can’t help but think that we ended up with the best of the best with Andrea Tsurumi. To your mind, what does Andrea bring to the project that no one else could?

Maria: Well, of course, I do think we have to start with Secretary Bird, who is just a great, great picture book creation. But Andrea brought so much more. To give just one other example: perfectly calibrated chaos. You and I were both big fans of Andrea’s picture book ACCIDENT! It is such a masterful example of ratcheting up the chaos slowly, in that way kids so enjoy, spread by spread. Andrea creates pandemonium that’s aesthetically pleasing and even visually harmonious. That’s just what we wanted. I love how even though the weasel is exploding our expectations when he bursts into each nursery rhyme, the scene is still very carefully detailed. We always know where we are, which nursery rhyme we’re in.

BB: That’s a perfect segue into my next question, actually. Andrea! So you contain within you a multitude of talents. One that I have always felt surpasses the masses is your keen ability to codify chaos (see: Your picture book ACCIDENT, which Maria just mentioned). And what could be more chaotic than a sneaky weasel? This book builds and grows on that increasing anarchy in such a fun way. Do you find that you’re drawn to books like this one or MR. WATSON’S CHICKENS, where unexpected occurrences build?

Andrea: The larger answer is I’m drawn to humor because the heart of it is about noticing the contrast between what a person thinks they’re doing and what they’re actually doing. I think Ronald Searle put it better, but that gap between those things is the most concentrated expression of humanity I can think of. Sad or sweet, that contrast is always deeply relatable because it’s universal. There’s so much about being a kid and being an adult that’s “Intentions Upended by Experience,” except I think adults pretend it happens to us less. We often don’t know what we’re doing, and there’s liberation in embracing that, and power in showing that to kids. Certainly, as someone who lives with anxiety, it’s a freeing thing to realize. 

Humor is also super observational, so I love making “looking at lots of folks doing stuff” scenes, and High Detail Chaos lends itself well to that.  

BB: Maria, we’ve spoken before about nursery rhymes and how they intersect with picture books. I’d love to hear your own take on how you view them in the pantheon of children’s literature. This book plays, to a certain extent, on our pre-existing understanding of certain rhymes and upsets our expectations of them. What role do you feel nursery rhymes play with young children today?

Maria: I’ll answer this one as a mom: To me it felt both necessary and reassuring to read nursery rhymes to my kids. For one thing, from very young ages they could recognize and even memorize them, which literacy experts tell us is an important step to becoming readers themselves. Then the fact that the language is so soothing, so rhythmic and repetitive, yet also often really antiquated – so it feels like you are introducing them to “the culture” and even connecting them to history. Some of the words and the things the characters are doing seem strange. Why would someone have to go up a hill to fetch a pail of water? What even is a tuffet? So nursery rhymes can start a conversation with really young children about how our world has changed, and keeps changing. I found that rewarding. But now that my kids are in high school and college (!!!) I can’t wait to read POP! GOES THE NURSERY RHYME to current children, who will get to both revel in their hard-earned knowledge of the nursery rhymes, see some interesting new tweaks to the details, and have the mischievous thrill of watching the weasel run roughshod over them. 

Though of course, some little listeners may take the side of Secretary Bird, and want order restored!

BB: Oh, absolutely. I think I’m truly the Secretary Bird at heard. Speaking of which, Andrea, when I wrote this book I left the narrator fairly open. If you’d quizzed me I’d have said I was vaguely thinking of a Mother Goose type character. Then you sent me several videos and photos of two animals: weasels and secretary birds. First off, you are correct. Weasels are incredibly adorable. Second, how on EARTH did you discover what secretary birds are?!

Andrea: It was fun to play with how open the narrator was – up and including to being disembodied, right? When I read your manuscript and was thinking about The Monster at the End of This Book, etc. I thought the narrator had to be on the page because 80% of the fun was in flustering them. There’s nothing funnier than watching someone be Very Serious About Staying in Control while their boat sinks around them. So to build up the Chaos/Serious contrast, the Narrator had to be, upright, uptight, and the Secretary Bird worked great for that, with its long legs and neck. It’s got resting grumpy eyes like a Bald Eagle that give it Crossed Arms Energy AND it has that Foof of long neck feathers that look like a wig, so it hints at contained feathery shape chaos (which explodes later in the book. An all-smooth silhouette bird like a heron wouldn’t be as funny). And they stomp snakes to death (a lot of reference photos show them stomping on rubber snakes in zoos). THIS is an animal born to look provoked.  My spouse, Alexander, and I love learning about weird animals. We’ll watch videos about them and tell each other, “ohhh, they put you in the movie.” So it was part of the ol’ brain library. 

BB: Honestly, Andrea, as far as I’m concerned you’re literally the only person who could have made this book because your take on nursery rhymes literally never looks like anyone else’s. Who else could have come up with swole Little Miss Muffet (does the spider have a Stanley Cup, by the way?) or thought about Mary of Mary Had a Little Lamb also being a sheep? How many different variations did you go through for each nursery rhyme in the book?

Andrea: Haha thank you! From the manuscript, the first thing I do is break down where the beats are, what the energy is doing, how to set up and extend a gag and vary the composition, etc. then I cast the animals. So each rhyme was a rough thumbnail shape first, like “Roses are Red” was always going to be a gift scene, and since I was trying to up the surprise for the Weasel’s location each time, I thought it’d be funny to go full Looney Tunes hammerspace and have the Weasel pop out of a box it couldn’t actually fit in. So that spread was always: bashful gift, page turn, terrified flailing reveal and Frilled Lizards are fantastic for Before/After because of how they flip up their necks. Mary was a lamb because there are no humans in the book and the rhyme works with a parent and kid traveling around the world. Honestly, I’ve never gotten the whey thing in Miss Muffet, it’s always been a weird esoteric detail except you know who uses wheynow? Bodybuilders! She’s bulking for those gains. Which suddenly makes the Tuffet make sense too! Poor Spider probably has a Stanley Cup – I just aimed for The Most Waterbottles.

BB: I literally never put together the fact that bodybuilders are all about the whey. That’s genius. You know, I feel like one of the great delights of being an illustrator with a bit of freedom at their fingertips is being able to include your favorite animals in your picture books. But do you have any animals on your bucket list that you haven’t tackled yet?

Andrea: There’s too many to pick from: Tawny Frogmouths, Iguanas, Capybaras, Any kind of Snake, Poodles, Tanuki, Bats, Tasmanian Devils, Binturongs . . .

BB: Oh yeah. I hear you on the capybaras in particular. And, of course, in our book the weasel wears overalls, which got me to thinking. Why the heck don’t more children’s book characters wear overalls?!? So to answer that, how did you think to include them?

Andrea: They don’t? I’m honestly surprised, they’re such a great monogarment for running around in, especially for a hyperactive weasel who’s going to be diving out of cakes and surfing into sandcastles. If you think about Weasel and Bird as core silhouettes, Bird’s is “indignant” — they’ve got stiff legs, a stiff neck, with this bristle of neck feathers at the top. Weasel’s is “long movement” – they’re fast, they’re long and twisty and they’re constantly bursting onto the page like an uncoiled spring (stretched dynamically across the action). So overalls complement that long, concentrated motion without distracting from it. I also made their overalls pink (because I don’t know what their gender is, but I feel like “mischief” gets coded so typically “cis boy” that it could stand to hang out with “femme” more) and added a heart because Weasel is actually sweet. They’re not out to “get” Bird, they’re just having and spreading fun. 

BB: Well, Andrea, I suspect you have other stuff you’re working on. Can you give us a sneak peek into your future at all?

Andrea: To continue the epic mustelid theme (because who can get enough?) I had the pleasure of illustrating Lisa Frenkel Riddiough’s hilarious Embarrassed Ferret picture book, which should be out next year. 

BB: 50 points for the use of the word “mustelid”. And Maria, I think just to round out us, I’d like to ask you, where do you think the book falls in the pantheon of children’s picture books today?

Maria: I spent many years as a book critic and book review editor, which made me wary of phrases like “classic in the making” – but I’ve dared to use it for POP! GOES THE NURSERY RHYME. To me it’s one of those books that works because you can’t jam it into any one category – it does so much and speaks to so many audiences. It’s a “meta picture book” that plays around with our expectations of how a book should proceed, it’s a “fractured” book that disrupts a traditional genre, in this case nursery rhymes. And it’s got a story you can track, a face-off between a mischievous weasel and a law-and-order type bird, that comes to a head after lots of suspense builds.

At first I thought the audience would be super-young, toddlers and Pre-K, capping out at Kindergarten. But recently I learned that in third grade, many schools do a unit on nursery rhymes, with the students now approaching the old familiar rhymes as scholars, analyzing them, looking at where they came from and how they evolved. So I’m expanding my view of what age group will love POP! And I suspect that the grown-ups will embrace it as warmly as the kids do.

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I’d like to thank both artist Andrea Tsurumi and editor Maria Russo for so patiently answering my questions about this book. But why stop there! Here’s the whole team behind it, each of them deserving of thanks, praise, and general approbation!

• Melia Parsloe, designer
• Amelia Mack, art director
• Renee Yewdaev, project editor
• Erika Lusher, production manager

Without them we simply would not have a book. Daniel Denning was integral in gathering the images here today. I’d also like to thank my own wonderful agent Stephen Barbara. Pop! Goes the Nursery Rhyme is, as I’ve said, out March 18, 2025. Pre-order it today and be sure to look for it soon!

Filed under: Best Books, Best Books of 2025, Cover Reveal, Interviews