adorable children's book jewelry

What could be better than jewelry inspired by children's books? Thanks to Betsy Bird over at Fuse #8 for posting about the new jewelry based on Oliver Jeffers books such as Heart in the Bottle, The Great Paper Caper and Lost and Found.




You can see the whole collection here.
I wish we could do this for some of the Simply Read books.
It would be so cute to have a little Saffy or Ollie necklace. Or something inspired by one of Julie Morstad's lovely titles.

interview with illustrator Abigail Halpin

Here's a wonderful interview on 7 Impossible Things Before Breakfast with Abigail Halpin, illustrator of The Melancholic Mermaid.

Pussycat, Pussycat, where have you been...

In glowing reviews and starring in book trailers, that's where!
Check out the adorable book trailer below for Dan Bar-el and Rae Mate's book.

yoyomama's 5 favourite books for gifts!

Yoyomama just wrote an article about their 5 favorite books to give as gifts to babies... and out of five, three are Simply Read books!

ABC by Matthew Porter


Calling All Animals by Matthew Porter


Monkey World by Matthew Porter


Thanks, Yoyomama!

Chotto Motto - new work by Kaori Kasai

Come to the opening of a new art show of Kaori Kasai, author of the adorable Simply Read Book, Monchan's Bag.
When: Friday, December 2, 8 pm to 11 pm (Show Runs December 2-29_
Location: 115 Pender St. E, Vancouver BC Canada V6A 1T6
What: Little creatures pop out of Kao's brain around midnight and tell her, "more, more...". They demand more room,
so she puts them onto large canvases. Other creatures do not stop moving, so she makes a short animation of
them. Come to BLIM to see Kao's work. Enjoy chotto motto holiday gifts by Kao, including prints, dolls, lucky-charms, and a little more.

Under the Mound Book Launch

When: Sunday November 20th, 2:00 pm
Where: Christianne's Lyceum of Literature and Art, 3696 West 8th Ave, Vancouver
Join us for the wonderful launch of Under the Mound by Cynthia Heinrichs.
Light fare and beverages will be provided.

Cybils Award Nominations

The Cybils Nominations have been announced and two of our picture books are included in the Fiction Picture Book Category!
Singing Away the Dark by Caroline Woodward and illustrated by Julie Morstad

Pussycat, Pussycat, Where Have You Been? by Dan Bar-el and illustrated by Rae Mate

The Cybils is a great program that advocates rewarding books that combine literary merit and kid appeal. (As they say, they like books that are both "yummy and nutritious"!) They also are run by children's literature bloggers and help foster a sense of community among children's lit bloggers. Yay!
More about the Cybils here.

70 million by hold your horses

Check out this amazing music video that references classic, famous paintings. Love!

draw me a lion!

Lisa Cinar, author and illustrator of Paulina P. for Petersen and The Day It all Blew Away, has just launched a new site called Draw Me a Lion where she is selling prints, color your own postcards, coloring posters and even a story activity kit, which is awesome!
Check it out!

exploded flowers

Beautiful series of photographs by Qi Wei called "Exploded Flowers". They really show how amazing and complex nature is. Thanks to free people blog for the link.

make way for stories!

This is an interesting article by Anita Silvey from School Library Journal that we here at Simply Read Books agrees with.
Her main argument in her article is that picture books shouldn't shy away from having longer texts!
Some of our recently published picture books definitely do have more of a story to them--such as The Boy in the Oak, The Melancholic Mermaid, Oliver's Tantrums to name a few. It's something we believe in.