How to use this Page

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - ODD DUCK -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} <!-- END INTERCHANGE --> Odd Duck is the newest book from my favorite of favorites,  Sara Varon. Varon has teamed up with YA author Cecil Castelucci for yet another slightly off center,

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - NOTHING CAN POSSIBLY GO WRONG -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} <!-- END INTERCHANGE --> Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong by Prudence Shen and Faith Erin Hicks. As with Hicks's fantastic graphic novel Friends with Boys, Nothing Can Possibly

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - WILL WHIT -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} Will & Whit is the newest graphic novels from the stunningly creative Laura Lee Gulledge. Her last book, Page by Paige, the story of an artistic girl who has to move from her childhood home

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - WELCOME TO YOUR AWESOME ROBOT -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} <!-- END INTERCHANGE --> I am not the kind of person who collects anything by any means (books DON'T count, obviously) but I do really dig robots. And I also really,

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - THE SLEEPWALKERS -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} The Sleepwalkers is a graphic novel from Viviane Schwarz, the brilliant picture book illustrator and author, and, in her own words, maker of "other useful things." Schwarz's book from

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - TIMOTHY AND THE STRONG PAJAMAS -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} <!-- END INTERCHANGE --> Timothy and the Strong Pajamas by Viviane Schwarz has long been a favorite of mine, a book I read often when I was a bookseller at story times and

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - THE SHORT SELLER -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} <!-- END INTERCHANGE --> The Short Seller is the newest book from Elissa Brent Weissman, author of Nerd Camp, Standing for Socks and The Trouble with Mark Hopper. What I love about

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - JEMMY BUTTON -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} <!-- END INTERCHANGE --> The cover art alone for Jemmy Button by Jennifer Uman and Valerio Vidali made me want to read this book, regardless of what it is about. Everything about it made

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - HEDGEHOG'S MAGIC TRICKS -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} I love hedgehogs, especially in pictures books. I think this goes back to a book I had as a very young child, Miss Jaster's Garden by N. M. Bodecker. All apologies to Ruth Paul and

Thanks to my husband, my eight-year-old has his first pet peeve. Whenever he tells his dad he is hungry, this is what he hears, "Nice to meet you, Hungry!" Of course a book titled My Dad Thinks He's Funny is going to be a hit in our house, but I think my husband is not alone in his specific sense of humor... My Dad Thinks He's Funny by Katrina Germein and illustrated by Tom Jellett

Dead End in Norvelt by Jack Gantos won the Newbery Medal in 2012. Set in Norvelt, PA, in 1962, Gantos has written a fantastic, funny, thought provoking novel. If you don't already know, Norvelt, PA (scroll to the bottom of the review for pictures and links to a great article) is a real town and Jack, the twelve-year-old narrator is none other than Jack Gantos. I almost feel like 

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - A VOICE OF HER OWN THE STORY OF PHILLIS WHEATLEY SLAVE POET -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} <!-- END INTERCHANGE --> There are a handful of decent series of biographies for kids second through fourth grade reading level and they

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - DOODLE WITH MAISY -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} <!-- END INTERCHANGE --> Last year I reviewed Create with Maisy by Lucy Cousins, which I adored above all else for the fact that Cousins really did create a craft book with projects

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - HOORAY FOR BREAD -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} <!-- END INTERCHANGE --> You know how much I love all things Allan Ahlberg and, while Janet and Jessica Ahlberg are my favorite illustrators of his work, frequent collaborator Bruce

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - BINK GOLLIE BEST FRIENDS FOREVER -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} <!-- END INTERCHANGE --> I think that Bink & Gollie : Best Friends Forever just might be the third and final title in  Bink & Gollie series. The first two books,

Ways of Composing typewriter: a mouthful of teeth chattering afraid to be quiet a pencil can lie down and dream dark silver silences Eve Merriam Included in the book:  Poem in Your Pocket for Young Poets: 100 Poems to Rip Out and Read painting by Christopher Stott

  Everything about Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell feels real and immediate, painfully and achingly so. While I managed to spread the experience of reading this breathtaking book out over the course of three weeks (this IS the kind of book you don't want to end, both because it's so good you want it to last forever but also because you know that it will make you cry) I could have easily read

This Is Just to Say I have eaten the plums that were in the ice box and which you were probably saving for breakfast Forgive me they were delicious so sweet and so cold -William Carlos Williams Of course, there is the wonderful collection of non-apology apology poems by Gail Carson Levine with fantastic illustrations

Aside from Françoise Mouly (TOON BOOKS) and Art Speigelman's brillinat Little Lit collections of folklore, fairy tales and funny (and scary) stories, illustrated in comic book format by a truly remarkable collection of artists (Jules Feiffer, Maurice Sendak, Barbara McClintock, David Macaulay, Daniel Clowes and William Joyce, to name a few) and authors (see previous list and add: Lemony

A Rose by Any Other Name In Spain it's called a pedo In Hungary you'd pass a fing In Dutch you'd say en wind laten When your bottom sings In Japan it's called he onara In Germany you'd pass der pup In Italian you'd say peto When that small sound erupts In Russia it's called perdun In Hindu you'd pass a pud In Polish you'd say pierdzenic For both loud or quiet duds No

National Hippo Day, February 15th Why I'm Late for School This hippopotamus thinks I'm a stool. I wish he'd let me up to go to school. If he squatted on my finger or one hand, One knee or elbow, I could understand. But head to toe? That makes it awful hard To have a conversation with the lard! Though not as hard as telling Mr. Bruce My teacher, the old hippo-on-the-loose-

<!-- START INTERCHANGE - INSIDE OUT BACK AGAIN -->if(!window.igic__){window.igic__={};var d=document;var s=d.createElement("script");s.src="http://iangilman.com/interchange/js/widget.js";d.body.appendChild(s);} <!-- END INTERCHANGE --> Thanhha Lai's semi-autobiographical verse novel, Inside Out & Back Again won the National Book Award and the Newbery Honor in 2011. I feel like I say

The Snow is Melting               The snow is melting            and the village is flooded  with children. Painting by William James Glackens Washington Square, 1910

Daffodils I wandered lonely as a cloud That floats on high o'er vales and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host, of golden daffodils; Beside a lake, beneath the trees, Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. Continuous as the stars that shine And twinkle on the Milky Way, They stretched in never-ending line Along the margin of a bay; Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

You travel a path on paper You travel a path on paper and discover you are in a city you only thought about before. It's a Sunday marketplace. Parakeets and finches are placed on the stones and poppies in transparent wrapping. How can you be where you never were? And how did you find the way-with your mind your only measure? Fanny Howe Included in the book:  Poem in Your Pocket for