The Third Annual Princeton Children's
Book Festival Saturday, September 13, 2008
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Marcie Aboff Marcie is the author of more than 30 picture books including "The Giant Jelly Bean Jar", "Uncle Willy's Tickles", and a new series of four books due out later this summer. Marcie also writes beginning readers, chapter books, activity books, and magazine stories. Her short stories have been featured in a variety of children's magazines. Marcie lives in New Jersey with her family. |
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Danny and Kim Adlerman Kim and Danny first met somewhere around 1989 when they were both working for Macmillan Publishing, a children's publishing house in New York City; Kim was a children's book designer, and Danny was a production manager. People who used to hear that would sometimes think, "So, she illustrates the books, and he writes them". This couldn't be further from the truth, but a more accurate foreshadowing we have never seen. Together they have written many fun titles including "How Much Wood Could a Woodchuck Chuck", "Rock-A-Bye Baby", and "Africa Calling". |
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Laura T. Barnes Laura lives in a converted barn on her farm, Barnesyard, in Hunterdon County, New Jersey. Many of the farm animals live on the ground floor of the barn while Laura and her husband live in the top floors. Ideas for the stories and tales stem from day-to-day life watching and loving her animals at Barnesyard. She is the author of the popular "Ernest and Twist" series. |
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Lisi Barros-Sehringer Lisi Barros- Sehringer is the author "Una Noche En El Calchaqui" which is a re-telling of the story of the Magi into a Latin American folktale. The three kings set out on a search for the baby in the arid lands of Calchaqui in northwest Argentina and discover a world filled with myths and legends. Ms. Barros-Sehringer was born in Argentina and resides in Princeton, NJ with her family. |
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Linda Bozzo Children's author, Linda Bozzo, enjoys writing fiction and nonfiction. Many of her fiction stories are inspired by her love of dance. Her work has been published in several children and adult magazines. Linda's first book, Five Apples, was published in 2004. Her nonfiction series, My First Pet Library from the American Humane Association series is now also available in bilingual. Her recently published series, Creature Features, is a nonfiction series for the educational market. |
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Peter Brown Peter Brown says making picture books is the perfect job for him. He loves drawing and painting and writing. And for him the most satisfying part of making picture books is finding the perfect balance of storytelling with words and storytelling with art. When he has an idea he usually writes writes writes and get most of it down in word form. Then he starts visualizing those ideas with sketches. Peter is the author and illustrator of "Chowder" and "The Fabulous Bouncing Chowder". He resides in Brooklyn, NY. |
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Michael Buckley "The Sisters Grimm" series is Michael’s first venture into the world of children’s book writing. His mom and dad insist they are proud of him, even if the whole “I’m going to write a book” idea sounded like another one of their son’s poorly thought out money-making schemes he claimed was “life experience.” "The Sisters Grimm" was selected as the One Book NJ children's fiction book this year. Michael lives in New York City with his wife Alison and their dog, Daisy. |
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Sally Cook Sally Cook is the coauthor of "Another Season: A Coach's Story of Raising an Exceptional Son". Her articles and reviews have appeared in many national publications, including The New York Times, Family Circle, and Parenting. "Goodnight, Pillow Fight is her first picture book. Sally's most recent book is Hey Batta, Batta Swing: The Wild Old Days of Baseball. Sally, her husband, Bob, and their two children, Liz and Alex, enjoy walking their dog, Rover, around the corner to visit Laura Cornell and her daughter, Lilly. |
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Pamela Curtis Swallow Pam grew up in Connecticut and was a tomboy. At a young age she was very influenced by her brother who loved nature. After high school, Pam attended Skidmore College and New York University. She earned a Master of Library Science from Rutgers in NJ. Pam is the author of the "Melvin and Dewey" series, "Groundhog Gets His Say" and several other titles. She resides with her family in NJ. |
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Margery Cuyler Because of her love for stories and children, Margery wanted to write children's books and edit them. She’s been lucky enough to do both. She worked for 21 years as Editor-in-Chief of Holiday House, Inc. as a children's book publisher in New York City. She is the author of many books including “Skeleton Hiccups”, Battlefield Ghost” and “Kindness is Cooler, Mrs. Ruler”. Margery lives in Princeton, New Jersey, in the same house where she grew up. Her husband, John Perkins, and her two sons, Thomas and Timothy, live with her, as do our two cats, Boomerang and Nikki. |
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Pegi Deitz Shea Pegi is a mother, wife, chef, landscaper, coach, dog trainer, and scullery maid and the author of more than 250 articles, essays and poems for adults and children. Her latest book is "Patience Wright: America's First Sculptor and Revolutionary Spy". Pegi also teaches writing to adults and young adults through the Institute of Children’s Literature. She lives in Northeast Connecticut with her family but Pegi grew up in NJ and her character; Patience Wright grew up in Bordentown, NJ. |
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Sarah Beth Durst Sarah Beth grew up in Central Massachusetts. At age 10, she decided she wanted to become a writer. Her first story was a cross between the Wizard of Oz and G. I. Joe. With lions. She wrote a lot more after that without lions, including a stage play for her senior thesis at Princeton University. Sarah Beth currently lives in Stony Brook, NY, with her husband, their daughter, and their cat Perni. Her second book "Out of the Wild" is a story about more fairy tale characters who have escaped their story books and live in our world. |
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Joan Elste Joan's book, "True Blue" the story of a wonderful family pet is in it's 12th year of publication. Joan presently reviews books for national publications. She lives with her family on a quiet farm in Pennsylvania. |
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Ponder Goembel Ponder grew up in Baltimore, a cultural city with an artistic community. Her family enjoyed block parties, hard shell crab feasts, art festivals and concerts. She has illustrated many books including "Dinosnores", "Castaway Cats". Ponder and her family live in Pennsylvania. |
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Dan Gutman Dan was born in New York but grew up in New Jersey. He is a graduate of Rutgers New Brunswick and has had a very interesting life so far. He has written essays, computer gaming magazine articles, non- fiction for adults until he discovered his passion in life; writing children's fiction books. Dan's knowledge of sports shines in books such as "Babe and Me". His sense of humor shines in the "My Weird School Series". Dan is the author of over 80 books for children. |
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Amy Hest Amy Hest lives in the part of New York City known as Manhattan. Her first book was published about the time her first child was born. In fact, families are important in many of her books. Amy Hest's own childhood was very happy. She spent time reading, riding her bike — and spying! She thinks that writers need to be good spies in order to know what they are writing about. Amy is the author of many books for children including "In the Rain With Baby Duck","Kiss Good Night", and "When Jessie Came Across the Ocean". |
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Marthe Jocelyn Writing has been a family trait among Marthe Jocelyn's relatives for over a century, although the children's book author only recently discovered that fact. Before becoming a full-time writer and illustrator, Marthe Jocelyn spent time as a theatre usher, a cookie salesperson, a waitress, a sailor, a photo stylist, and a toy designer. She now lives in Toronto with her husband and two teenage children. |
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Kevin Kammeraad Kevin makes things, writes, sings, reads, draws, thinks a lot, presents at schools and other places, and wonders about possibilities. And a bunch of other things. He is the author of "The Tomato Collection" which is a collection of stories and poetry. |
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Alan Katz As a print and television writer, Alan has majored in silliness for more than 25 years. During that time, he has written for a whole bunch of Emmy-nominated TV shows , animated series like Taz-Mania, Disney’s Raw Toonage and Goof Troop, network specials, game shows, articles for publications including the New York Times and the New York Daily News, and created hundreds of comic books, trading cards and other special projects for kids and their parents. He is the author of "Take Me Out of the Bathtub", "OOPS!" and many other titles. He lives in Connecticut with his family. |
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Daniel Kirk Daniel Kirk is the author and illustrator of over thirty books for children, including "Snow Dude", "Dogs Rule!", "Cat Power", and his latest, award-winning picture book, Library Mouse. His newest work of children's fiction is "Elf Realm". He resides in New Jersey with his family. |
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Steven Kroll Steven loves writing books for children, whether they are picture books for younger readers or non fiction or novels for older ones. But he says, writing is not just about writing. It's about travel. As a writer of children's books, he has been invited to speak at schools and conferences all over America and as far away as Africa, India, China, and South America. Steven has written many books including " That Makes Me Mad", "Patches Lost and Found: An Art Story". |
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Sally Lloyd-Jones Sally is a British- born children's author who came to the US for "a year or two" and never left. Until 2000, Sally worked in the publishing industry but left that career to take up writing full time. She is the author of many children's books including "How to Be a Baby" and "Time to Say Goodnight" |
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Wendy Mass Wendy Mass is the author of six novels for young people, including A Mango-Shaped Space (which was awarded the Schneider Family Book Award by the American Library Association), Leap Day, the Twice Upon a Time fairy tale series, and Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life, which earned a starred review in Publishers Weekly magazine. She tells people her hobbies are hiking and photography, but really they're collecting candy bar wrappers and searching for buried treasure with her metal detector. Wendy lives with her family in New Jersey. |
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Julia Moberg
Julia Lynn Moberg grew up in Grand Rapids, Michigan and Southlake, Texas. She attended New York University where she received both her B.F.A. and M.F.A. in Dramatic Writing at Tisch School of the Arts. Skies over Sweetwater originally started out as an idea for a screenplay, but as Julia began researching the WASP, she felt compelled to tell these women's stories to a much younger audience in hopes that young girls might adopt them as role models in life. So, she decided to write a middle grade novel instead. She lives in New York City. |
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Lisa Mullarkey Lisa Mullarkey’s first book, Splashing by the Shore, is a fun activity book that contains beachy science experiments, crafts, jokes, party ideas, and recipes. It’s part of the successful Outdoor Activity Series by Gibbs Smith that has sold over 200,000 books in the series. She also has a six-book early chapter series, Katharine the Almost Great, that will be published in January 2009. She's working on writing four nonfiction books about cheerleading for Enslow Publishers. (Publication date: 2010) She loves visiting schools to talk to young authors about writing and reading and has presented her workshop, The Reluctant Reader: Squash the Resistance to dozens of libraries throughout NJ. |
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Donna Jo Napoli Donna Jo Napoli is both a linguist and a writer of children's fiction. She has five children. She loves to garden and bake bread. Right now she has only a cat named Taxi. She likes to go outside and call, "Taxi!" to make the neighbors wonder. She is the author of numerous books for children of all ages including "The Wishing Club" and Corkscrew Counts". Her books have been translated into many languages. Donna Jo resides with her family in South Eastern, Pennsylvania. |
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Dave Neuhaus I studied graphic design at the Philadelphia College of Art and received a BFA in Illustration from Parsons School of Design in 1983. Since then, I have illustrated twenty books for children, and have created many illustrations for various children’s publications. I have worked as a senior designer or art director for several children’s publishing companies including Simon and Schuster, Scholastic and HarperCollins. I now work with my wife at NeuStudio, Inc., our graphic design studio where we concentrate on children’s book illustration, art direction and related design. Dave and his family live in New Jersey. |
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Linda Oatman High Linda is a witty and talented author from Lancaster, PA. who has written poetry, non-fiction and fiction for children. Her latest books are"Cool Boppers Choppers" and "The Cemetary Keepers of Gettysburg". Her latest book for grown ups is called "The Hip Grandma's Handbook". |
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Dianne Ochiltree Dianne Ochiltree writes books for the very young. One of her easy-reads in the popular Scholastic ‘Hello, Reader!’ series, Cats Add UP!, is still in print after ten years. One of her many published picture books, Sixteen Runaway Pumpkins, was a 2005 Bank Street College best book selection. Her bedtime book, Lull-a-Bye, Little One, from G.P. Putnam’s Sons, was chosen in 2007 and 2008 for inclusion in the Dollywood Foundation’s ‘Imagination Library’ childhood literacy program. |
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Wendy Pfeffer Wendy Pfeffer, award winning author of many children's books. Some of her titles are "We Gather Together: Celebrating Fall Harvest", "The Shortest Day: Celebrating the Winter Solstice", "Mysterious Spinners", and "From Pumpkin to Seed".Wendy has also written "Writing Children's Books:: Getting Started", for adults. She has taught elementary school, directed a nursery school and led adult classes in writing. Wendy lives in Pennington, New Jersey with her husband Tom. |
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Edel Rodriguez Edel Rodriguez was born in Havana, Cuba in 1971. He left for America on a boat with his parents and sister when he was eight years old. He majored in painting at Pratt Institute (BFA) and Hunter College (MFA). His work has appeared in four picture books, on stamps for the U.S. Postal Service, and on posters for Broadway shows. His latest picture book is "Sergio Makes a Splash". |
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Karen Rostoker- Gruber Karen Rostoker-Gruber’s is the author of "Foodfright," “Rooster Can’t Cock-A-Doodle-Do!” and “Bandit”. She is also a published humorist and has written several humor books for adults. Karen has appeared on the Ricki Lake show and is a member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. She lives in New Jersey with her family. |
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Lynda Gene Rymond Lynda is the author of “The Village of the Basketeers” and “ Oscar and the Mooncats”. When Lynda’s not writing, she teaches people who have brain injuries. She lives in Upper Bucks County with her husband, the painter Charles Browning, on a place they call Goblin Farm because it's small and next to a cemetery. They share Goblin Farm with three goats named Diego, Guadalupe, and Perla, too many roosters, not enough hens, and two cats, Dayhunter and elf, who is too little to need a capital "E." |
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Mavis Smith Sometime author and full time illustrator, Mavis Smith has worked on over fifty books for children, including creating the art for the popular Fluffy the Guinea Pig series. Mavis is also a very talented artist in various mediums such as pencil and egg tempura. Mavis resides in New Jersey. |
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Rebecca Stead Rebecca was born and raised in New York City, where you might have seen her trying to cross Broadway and read a book at the same time. She now yells at her eight-year-old for doing the same thing. Until several years ago, Rebecca worked as a public defender. Turning her life toward writing has been both a delight and a challenge. Her first children's book is "First Light" published by Wendy Lamb Books. She resides in Manhattan with her family. |
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Marc Tyler- Nobleman Since 1996, Marc has written more than 70 books. His current writing interest is picture books on people whose achievement is well-known but whose name and back story are not (i.e. who created Superman?). He prefers to write on people who have not been the focus of a trade book before. Every book offers two stories—the one in print and the one behind the scenes. His blog shares those latter stories: research peaks, rejection horrors, promotion gambles. Marc lives in Connecticut. |
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Nancy Viau Nancy Viau has worked as an elementary school teacher, a counselor in an after-school program, an instructor for reluctant readers, and a freelance writer. She now specializes in writing for children, and along with her debut middle-grade novel, Samantha Hansen Has Rocks in Her Head (Abrams Books for Young Readers/Amulet Books), her stories, poems, and activities appear in: Highlights for Children, Highlights High Five, Babybug, Ladybug, and many other magazines for children and adults. Nancy resides in New Jersey. |
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David & Mutiya Vision They come from opposite extremes of the universe, yet husband/wife team David and Mutiya Vision have found the connective thread that bridges the gap in between. They draw from that space to create works that inspire, enrich, enlighten and empower children, families, and communities reaching the world at large. They are the authors of ten published children's books. The couple resides in New York. |
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Candace Whitman Candace Whitman was born on Long Island not far from New York City. She loved art as a child, and went on to study art history in college and then teach art as a profession. She always did her own art as well, and became inspired by the children in the elementary school where she taught to try her hand at illustrating children’s books. She is the author and illustrator of many books including "Red, Yellow, Blue and You" and "Now It Is Morning". She resides in Long Island, NY. |
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Helen Wilbur Former librarian Helen L. Wilbur has loved cats all her life. Most of her cats have been rescued from the streets of New York. In explaining her goal in writing an animal book for children, she says "Animals don't care if you aren't the most popular kid in the class or whether you did your homework." She has a BA in English Language and Literature from the University of Chicago and a master's degree in library science from Columbia University. Helen lives in New York City. She is the author of several books including "M is for Meow: An Alphabet Book". |
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Carol Williams Carol Ann Williams has been a writer all her life. In fifth grade she started her first novel, Race Point: A Tale of Sunken Treasure in the Cold North Atlantic, which she hopes to finish some day. Finished and published works include poetry, short fiction, journalism, and drama. She was the founder and director of the theater program at the Johns Hopkins University and her plays have been produced at regional theaters around the country and in New York. Her children's books are Tsubu the Little Snail, which was an ABA Pick of the Lists and winner of a Marion Vannett Ridgway Honor Book Award for picture book writing, and the brand new Booming Bella. She lives loudly in Princeton with her loud husband, Peter Piccinini, her loud son, Matthew, and her two very quiet cats, Rufus and Cameron. |
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Thomas Yezerski Tom grew up in the Lancaster, PA area. When he was in high school he became serious about his artwork and took courses to develop his talents. Tom graduated from Syracuse University with a degree in Illustration. He enjoys running marathons and vegetarian cooking. Tom is an author and illustrator of many books for children and his latest illustrated book is "Miss Muddle's Holidays". Tom resides in northern New Jersey. |
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Kaethe Zemach The daughter of legendary children's book creators Harve and Margot Zemach, Kaethe Zemach has published ten books for young readers, including the classic "The Princess and Froggie", as well as "Just Enough and Not Too Much", "Eating Up Gladys", "The Character in the Book", and "The Question Song". Kaethe resides with her family in Doylestown, PA. |
The Princeton Children's Book Festival is made possible by the generosity of the Friends of the Princeton Public Library, Packet Publication of Princeton, Barnes & Noble booksellers and The Bank of Princeton. |
