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“[W]hen every man, woman, and child can feel and know that his, her, and their rights are fully protected by the strong arm of a generous and grateful Republic, then we can all truthfully say that this beautiful land of ours, over which the Star Spangled Banner so triumphantly waves, is, in truth and in […]

Whoosh! Lonnie Johnson’s Super-Soaking Stream of Inventions was among the Notable Children’s Books Nominees discussed by the Association for Library Service to Children during the American Library Association’s annual conference in Orlando last month. I’m not sure how nervous I would have been while hearing my book discussed in such a public setting, so it’s […]

With Jupiter in the news — NASA’s Juno spacecraft has arrived to do what spacecraft do — it’s not hard for me to make a leap to Lonnie Johnson, subject of my newest book with Don Tate. Before Lonnie became known as the inventor of the Super Soaker water gun, he worked at NASA’s Jet […]

To get Bartography Express in your inbox each month — and to have a shot at the July giveaway of Maria Gianferrari and Bagram Ibatoulline’s Coyote Moon — you can sign up on my home page.

(Or rather, where I’m supposed to be during the American Library Association annual conference in Orlando. But I’ll try to be everywhere else, too.)

Updated and improved, thanks to some thoughtful feedback, and now available as a Google Document.

Until the very end of April, I’d never been outside North America, but I corrected that in a big way when I took a 14-hour flight from Dallas to Doha and then another flight — this one a mere seven hours — to Singapore. The occasion was my 12-day stint as author-in-residence at the Singapore […]

To get Bartography Express in your inbox each month — and to have a shot at the June giveaway of Mike Jung’s Unidentified Suburban Object — you can sign up on my home page.

I just got back from teaching for twelve days as author-in-residence at the Singapore American School (yes, there will be photos here). And that stretch was only part of the nearly four weeks that went by between my previous two posts, thanks to a technical issue that was tough to fix from afar for someone […]

The three-minute version, anyway, courtesy of Teaching Books. I could go on for a lot longer about why I wrote a book for kids about Reconstruction. Go ahead — try me!

Wow this is so awesome!!! I love it so much.

We are SO lucky to have a librarian with such a big heart at Charles Haskell!!!

Chris,
I am the teacher librarian at a rural K-4 school in NW Arkansas, and this program is perfect for us.
We also have a Friday food program and adding a book to each bag will be a perfect way to give book love to each of these deserving students. I am so excited! Thank you for sharing Becky’s story.

Until I visited Charles Haskell Elementary in Edmond, Oklahoma, recently, I’d never heard of the weekend backpack programs that some schools and local food banks use to provide students from low-income families enough to eat on Saturdays and Sundays. And until I met Becky Walderbach, Haskell Elementary’s librarian, I’d never considered the lengths that one […]

What a wonderful idea! Becky is spot-on in her concerns and her solution is genius. Thanks so much for sharing this idea~

I have made some good-looking flowcharts in my time. This is not one of them. But the concept for this one — a flowchart for anyone assembling a children’s literature list of any sort — has been on my mind for a long time, and I finally decided to put together a draft to share. […]

At a bookstore event last week, right after I read Mighty Truck: Me: Want me to read another book? Young customer: No, thank you.

I signed the letter below. So did Jennifer. So did 267 other authors and illustrators, a number limited only by time constraints rather than by any shortage of opposition to the recent North Carolina law through which the state government went out of its way to discriminate against its citizens. School Library Journal has more […]

To get Bartography Express in your inbox each month — and to have a shot at the April giveaway of Bears Make the Best Reading Buddies, written by Carmen Oliver and illustrated by Jean Claude — you can sign up on my home page.

So many friends to root for! That was my first reaction upon seeing this year’s finalists in the various children’s literature categories of the Texas Institute of Letters awards. I’m honored that my The Nutcracker Comes to America, illustrated by Cathy Gendron, is in the running for the Denton Record-Chronicle Award for Best Children’s Picture […]

The Texas Bluebonnet Award committee invited authors and illustrators with books on the 2016-17 Master List to answer a few questions about their books — not in writing, but on camera. Don and I each got a little gimmicky as we discussed The Amazing Age of John Roy Lynch, but we both had a lot […]

…and want to catch my first-ever public reading of Mighty Truck (a few days before it’s published)… …then plan on getting yourself to The Domain on Sunday, March 20, for Rock + Read!

To get Bartography Express in your inbox each month — and to have a shot at the March giveaway of Their Great Gift: Courage, Sacrifice, and Hope in a New Land by John Coy and Wing Young Huie — you can sign up on my home page.

Recently I’ve been on the receiving end of some pretty nifty cards and letters and artwork from students — some at schools I’ve visited, some who have connected with my books without ever meeting me. I look at all of it, and I appreciate all of it, and I thought you might like to see […]