Tag Archive for James Preller

Moose: “I love the world.”

I’m happy about putting this character out into the world.

Art by Abigail Burch, from our upcoming book, Two Ballerinas . . . and a Moose. August, 2025, I believe. 

This art, and this text, is not final-final. We’re still tweaking, fretting, overthinking, at this point.

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COLLECT ‘EM ALL!

FLASHBACK PHOTO: Me & My Mom in Washington, D.C.

While I am the youngest of seven, which suggests a crowd, there was a lot of time when I was the only game in town. The straggler left behind. For a couple of years, I was the only kid in the house. 

I have fuzzy memories of this (mandatory) weekend in Washington, D.C.  I think my sister Jean was there, too. 

I don’t recall it as a super great time or anything. We went to the U.S. Mint. Nixon was probably in the White House at the time. Tricky Dick: “Let me make this perfectly clear about that.”

AND COINCIDENTALLY, my new book!

 

My Favorite Color Is . . .

When I visit schools, young readers often ask questions in superlatives. What’s my favorite book? My favorite author, color, food, etc. And perhaps because I am an adult, I tend not to think about things in those terms. So I always fumble for answers, offering lame responses, since nothing I say makes sense to me. Except for color. I have, at last, a satisfactory answer to that one.
My favorite color is gray.
It wasn’t always that way. I guess it grew on me.
(Sidenote: For blog purposes, I have to categorize posts. I didn’t know whether to put this under “School Visits” or “Scary Tales.”)

Welcome Back to School!

Here in the northeast, I think everyone is back to school. To celebrate that, here’s a page that captures some of that first-day feeling, a little senryu (haiku format w/ a focus on human activities rather than nature). This comes from our book, All Welcome Here, gloriously illustrated by my wonderful pal, Mary Grandpre. (Mary illustrated the first editions of the Harry Potter books, so you are likely familiar with her work.) All Welcome Here was a back-to-school book and one of the many casualties of the pandemic. It landed with a thud and is already out of print. So much for immortality!

“Two Birds and a Moose” Named JUNIOR LIBRARY GUILD SELECTION

Good news! I’m pleased to see that my new book, Two Birds and a Moose, illustrated by Abigail Burch, has been named a Junior Library Guild Selection.
Those folks at JLG have been amazingly generous toward my books, as this is the 5th time I’ve been so honored, including: Bystander, The Courage Test, Blood Mountain, and Upstander.
Honestly, I’m impossible to live with these days.
Thanks so much, JLG!
Two Birds comes out in 6 days. It’s a simple little story — so don’t get your hopes too high. Although, come to think of it, maybe the message of this story is quite the opposite.
Hope away!