Essays, interviews, and short dispatches from the small office on Clousson Road. Published roughly monthly, by whichever of us has the time.
It costs more. It takes longer. It is also, without exaggeration, the difference between a book that survives a childhood and a book that does not. Here is what Smyth-sewn binding actually is, why almost no mass-market children's publisher uses it anymore, and why we will keep using it for as long as the printer in Dallas will keep doing it for us.
Mira walked us through the sixty-seven preliminary watercolor studies that became The Lantern Keeper. We talked about color, about light, about why she always paints the cover last, and about the small girl in Maine who wrote to her last summer to ask whether the lantern keeper had a name.
What happens in a child's brain on the fifteenth night of the same story? Quite a lot, actually. A short essay on repetition, comfort, and why the worn-out spine of a favorite picture book is one of the most useful objects in a household.
We received 412 manuscripts during our September submission window. Here is what we learned, what we wish more first-time authors knew, and what we ended up acquiring.
A picture book is read by an adult and looked at by a child. Most picture books are designed for the adult. We have spent eight years trying to design for the child instead, and here is what that has meant in practice.
From Caldecott to Sendak to the strange present moment. A short and very partial history, written by Clifford for the Houston Public Library's annual lecture series.