Happy Book Birthday to ALL These Incredible Titles!!

It’s here, it’s here, it’s here!! My book releases today! Pop! Goes the Nursery Rhyme, written by me and illustrated by Andrea Tsurumi, edited by Maria Russon, art directed by Amelia Mack, agented by Stephen Barbara and Stephen Barr, publicized by Nathan Siegel and a whole team of other people, and so many other people who were integral to its creation!

But you know what? Book birthdays are great and all. You get to tell people about your upcoming book release parties (Booked in Evanston, Illinois on Saturday, April 5th at 10:30). And you get to mention your cool reviews (including a star in PW and a nice recent review in the Wall Street Journal). Still, they can be a bit lonely.

Happy book birthday to me.

*tweet*

You know what’s more fun?

Celebrating a book birthday with OTHER books having the same book birthdays!!!!

Today, I want to celebrate POP! by talking about all the other cool books that are releasing today. You can see a whole slew of them in this nice Publishers Weekly round-up but even PW can miss some goodies. These are the ones that I really love (as well as a few I’d like to see firsthand because I’m curious about them):

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HAPPY BOOK BIRTHDAY TO…

Alberto Salas Plays Paka Paka con la Papa by Sara Andrea Fajardo, ill. Juana Martinez-Neal

Agricultural scientist Alberto Salas is on the hunt… for potatoes. If he finds them, they could help to feed the world. If he misses them, they might go extinct! A glorious introduction to a little known science told with fun and whimsy. Ach. This is how you do it, people. You take a serious subject and you find the kid-friendly element in it that will make it alluring to them while sneakily teaching them something along the way. Turning the research of Alberto Salas into a game of seek-and-find isn’t hard at all, and Fajardo really knows how to tap into the fun of it all while retaining the serious nature of Salas’s work. Martinez-Neal took a little break and is back better than ever, her art just leaping off the page. And then… there is the backmatter. The glorious glorious backmatter. This is everything an informational picture book should strive to be. Bonus: Simultaneously available in a Spanish edition as well! 

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We Are the Wibbly! A Tadpole’s Tail by Sarah Tagholm, ill. Jane McGuinness

“Oh my crikeys!” A tadpole watches the changes in its friends and tries desperately to catch up in this clever encapsulation of the life cycle of a frog.  There is a moment at the beginning of this book when you first encounter author Sarah Tagholm’s odd little words and it catches you off guard. “We are eggs. We are egg friends. We are the Wibbly. We float and we are all very relaxing. It is niceable.” So at that point my brain is asking, “Is this fun or is this twee?” And knowing myself as I do, I suspect that I’m going to fall on the “twee” side of the equation. But then as I read on, I just got into this book. I mean I REALLY got into this book. Because, yes, it is about the life cycle of a frog, but what it’s really about is that kid who’s always just a little behind everyone else. I felt that SO hard. And then I discovered that on top of that, the language that Tagholm is using works amazing well. The book is hilarious, it has some fantastic art that accompanies the text perfectly, AND it acknowledges the fact that frogs get friggin’ eaten all the time. There’s some cursory backmatter, but since this is a straight up fictional picture book with informational content, I’m happy with whatever Tagholm wants to provide. This is great!

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The Boy Who Lived in a Shell: Snippets for Wandering Minds by John Himmelman

Hope you like poetry because there is a LOT releasing today! Once there was a boy named Ivo who lived in a giant moon snail shell on a beach. Read the poems he writes on the wall of the shell, in this ribald, witty, and occasional touching collection. Okay, I don’t even know how to predict what John Himmelman is going to do next anymore. When I was first starting out as a children’s librarian he was basically known primarily for picture books like the incredible, fantastic, and never-to-be-forgotten Katie Loves the Kittens. Then he takes some time, pivots, and does that incredible wackadoodle early chapter book series on Albert Hopper. But then I go to his website and apparently the man is also prone to doing YA and middle grade and THEN he apparently noticed that there were a couple slots empty on his bingo card, so he’s come to us with a book of poetry. And not just any poetry either. GOOD poetry. Like, high quality this-is-better-than-90%-of-kids-poetry-out-there poetry. I’m not going to say that every single poem in here is equal in greatness, but you couldn’t say that for Shel Silverstein, for crying out loud. You’ll note the blurb from Chris Harris (My Head Has a Bellyache) on the back. That’s deserved. THIS is the poetry book of 2025 you don’t want to miss.

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In the Desert by David Elliott, ill. Gordy Wright

Come to the Sahara! Meet the creatures that make this arid location their home. Clever poetry and eye-catching art combine to make clear the desert’s allure. You know, every year that David Elliott puts out one of these landscape-oriented works of poetry (be it In the Woods, At the Pond, On the Farm, In the Wild, In the Sea, or my personal favorite At the Poles) I try to tamp down my expectations. I tell myself that this new book isn’t going to be as good as the ones that came before… and then I’m proven wrong yet again! Mr. Elliott is just good at what he does. He creates poetry that is short, sweet, to the point, funny, and original. His is the BEST kind of poetry for kids unfamiliar with the form, honestly. Plenty of cool pictures (courtesy this time of one rather Scottish Gordy Wright) and loads of facts worked in there on the sly. There’s also always at least one fact that catches me by surprise. This time: The fact that dung beetles navigate by the stars. Hubba wha?

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Words with Wings and Magic Things by Matthew Burgess, ill. Doug Salati

A clever, silly, smart, hilarious, touching, and ultimately magical collection of poems. Dive through the die-cut portals into all new worlds! There’s a lot to really love and admire in this Burgess/Salati collaboration. First up, we don’t see a ton of die-cuts outside of picture books and board books. Salati uses them here to massively great effect. In fact, if I’m going to be honest about it, Salati is on fire with this book! It’s like he won that Caldecott and decided to just start swinging for the moon every chance he got. The die-cut page turns are consistently impressive, and he elevates Burgess’s already dang good poetry to another level with these incredible full-color two-page spreads. The poetry is at its best, to my mind, in the final “Whispers and Well Wishers” section, where it gets strange and sweet and introspective. Still, even the silly poems can be exceedingly clever (I’m particularly fond of the poem “Hair Care” which starts with shampoo and then discusses Shampizzy, Shampower, and Shampunk). A cut above the rest.

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And then there are the ones I haven’t had a chance to read yet but can’t wait to. Their descriptions come from their publishers:

Echo by Adam Rex

Everyone always agrees with Junior, including the mysterious voice from across the valley.

“Junior Junior is the greatest in the world!” he shouts.
“Junior Junior is the greatest in the world!” the echo shouts back.

Until one day, a new girl moves in next door. A disagreeable, rude girl who doesn’t think Junior is right all the time. Unable to stand living next door to someone like that, Junior runs to the valley to meet his echo. But when being around someone who agrees with him all the time is less fun than he imagines, Junior must decide if a new friend is worth admitting he was wrong.

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I Witnessed: The Lizzie Borden Story by Jeramy Kraatz, ill. Crystal Jayme

Fourteen-year-old Charlie Churchill witnesses a murder at his next-door neighbor’s house and uses what he witnessed to help the police find the murderer, even facing the prime suspect, Lizzie Borden, accused of killing her own father and stepmother.

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Monty and the Mushrooms by Dev Petty, ill. Jared Chapman

Everyone knows mushrooms are the loudest creatures in the forest. They’re why worms go underground and birds have wings—to get away from the noise!

Everyone also knows marmots love quiet, especially irritable ones like Monty. All is well until he gets boisterous, cheerful, mushroom neighbors, with their endless mushroom jokes, mushroom poetry, and mushroom songs. What’s a marmot to do?

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Rap It Up by Carole Boston Weatherford and Jeffrey Boston Weatherford, ill. Ernel Martinez

Joyful text guides readers through the emotions, literary techniques, structures and motifs that go into the poetry and craft of rap, in a book that invites people to express themselves and let the world hear what they have to say.

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Stalactite & Stalagmite: A Big Tale From a Little Cave by Drew Beckmeyer

Two cave nubs, Stalactite and Stalagmite, witness the history of the world together, including watching a trilobite, an ichthyostega, a triceratops, a ground sloth and a bat pass through their cave, and eventually grow enough to finally touch.

Whale Eyes by James Robinson, ill. Brian Rea

Told through an experimental mix of intimate anecdotes and interactive visuals, this book immerses readers in James’s point of view, allowing them to see the world through his disabling eye conditions.

Readers will get lost as they chase words. They’ll stare into this book while taking a vision test. They’ll hold it upside down as they practice “pretend-reading”…and they’ll follow an unlikely trail toward discovering the power of words.

With poignant illustrations by Eisner Award–nominated artist Brian Rea, James’s story equips readers of all ages with the tools to confront their discomfort with disability and turn confused, blank stares into powerful connections.

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Happy book birthday to one and all!!

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