(Inside A Black Apple)

Tiny Nonsense Stories

I have a weakness for tiny books - anything less than 3" tall (it almost undoubtedly began with the Nutshell Library, but microscopic bibles, teensy flip books...I'll take it.) So a few weeks ago, when I brought home all those nice moldy oldies from the book fair, this 1940s box of the Tiny Nonsense Stories (from the Tiny Golden Library) was one of my prized finds.

These little books are written by Dorothy Kunhardt and illustrated by one of my very favorites, Garth Williams (Little Fur Family, forever and ever.) I already have the 1980 boxed edition, and though the books are the same, the little production details on these boxed sets are so incredibly lovely (and the prices seem to creep up steadily every time I see them) I'm so happy to have this older and more beautiful set.

Everything about these books is perfect...the colors, the type. Everything. Each of the books is about some little misfit animal-child - they are featured on the thumbelina-sized cover, and their parents are illustrated on the back. The whole thing reminds me of Wes Anderson in the nicest way (just look at that squirrel papa above with the caramel-colored suit!)

The design of the box/slipcase is a little apartment building and neighborhood, with enough tiny details and little implied narratives to make you crazy - every inch tells a mini-story, from the sunbathers on top of the box (one of my favorite things) to the little bandit cat and bow and arrow-wielding mouse facing off on the left and right corners.

Again, Wes Anderson, do you own this? If you do not, you need one. And I know you can get your mitts on the most pristine copy around.

When you remove the books, this is what you see. Naturally, Garth Williams didn't leave just regular ol' white space here or a simple pattern.

No, it's a corner grocery store with a rabbit family perusing the produce section and a bear cashier!

The endpapers of each book show a playground scene with all the tiny protagonists playing...just another perfect detail among dozens and dozens.

There is another little box from the Tiny Golden Library called Tiny Animal Stories. I had the 40's era set of that one in my collection already - perhaps that one needs a post sometime soon?

I hope you have a nice week! It's (uncharacteristically) hot as blazes here, which isn't good. I need my 60 degree days and grey sky/coffee afternoons to best get my work done.

BEA, Belatedly

(Photo of me & my wayward hairpin swiped from the BEA recap on the RH Buzzers blog)

I forgot to ever post about this!
A few weeks back, I traveled to NY for Book Expo America festivities with my publisher to start sharing Dream Animals with everyone. As a bonus, I got spoiled spending several days visiting my (lovely & beloved) editor & book designer, and another day or two to do a little non-work-related gallivanting, too. I'm going to do this in list-form, because I'm coming off one of my marathon headaches and it's all I can muster.

Itinerary & Highlights, Mostly Out-of-order

- Signed things (prints and postcards) on Thursday morning of BEA at the very well-lit and enormous Javitz center (the photo up top was taken there.)

- Arepas at the East Village Caracas, not once but twice.

- Found myself among wildly esteemed company as one of the featured authors at the Random House Cocktail party (photos & nice recap of that here). This led to surreal scenarios like posing, prom-photo style, between my author dates, extremely cool Chris So-Many-Caldecotts Raschka and lovely Steven Luminous-and-legendary Kellogg (both of these gentleman were very kind to this clearly bewildered whippersnapper).

- Walks and wanderings and lunches and dinners with my darlin F and a rascally Westie pup.

- Favorite place in the world, not for as long as I'd have liked, but still. If I'm in the city, I can't not go.

- Dinner followed with several editors, designers, agents, my own Josiah, the gentle Mr. Kellogg, and funny and irreverant Patricia MacLachlan (Sarah, Plain and Tall (!). She and Steven created a special & poignant picture book (full of children in beautiful sweaters) called Snowflakes Fall, which is a tribute to Sandy Hook, CT.

- Bagels and more bagels.

- Visited the missing-the-point-entirely Punk show at the Met

- Utterly destroyed my feet by wandering Soho late into the evening with my companions and ended up at the drugstore crying pitifully for bandaids. Worth it to peer at the glow of fancy shop windows and witness a friend very excitedly inspect the discarded shipping boxes heaped outside the Chloé store.

- Taped a little bit of video for a book trailer, which was not as terrifying as I'd feared.

 In short, it was a good little trip. 
We are all really, really excited about Dream Animals, and really excited about our next book (which I'm working on now.) Mainly, though, I just spent a handful of days getting spoiled in the company of NY people I love and work closely with and that time zones keep me from. Any time I have a chance to visit them (and/or the Natural History Museum and/or the bagels)
I'm there.

More Old, Dusty Small Person's Books

A good little stack I brought home from the Rose City Book Fair this weekend. My favorite old book dealer was there, and he had a beautiful copy of The Sea Fairies (I'd been wishing for one for a while now) waiting for me. That link will take you to the Archives, where you can page through the whole strange & beautiful thing for yourself (one of the wonders of the internet!)

I'm really excited about the new-to-me Edith Davidson titles (little foxes in pinafores!) and maybe most of all about boxed Tiny Golden Library...I have a newer edition and, while it has its charms, the 1940's version has the best box. The whole shebang deserves a post all its own.

I have collected so many dozens and dozens of old children's books with no rhyme or reason - the only common denominator is that I love each one. I always think it would be nice to post about some especially favorite or especially oddball ones, but (a classic tale) then I never do.

More soon - I forgot to ever post about my BEA trip a few weeks back!

Dream Animals

I was thinking I'd wait a bit before I posted the cover here, but lately the book keeps popping up here and there (the Publisher's Weekly Fall Previews, plus it's pre-orderable at Amazon & B&N!) These little hints decided it was time.

Remember these snippets? They come from this book, my very first picture book.

Dream Animals is, as the subtitle suggests, a bedtime journey (or series of journeys, really.) In it, a new dream-myth is born, and animals as old as time (and dreams themselves) carry each small dreamer to their own particular (and spectacular) dream.

You can catch a glimpse of one interior illustration by following the Publisher's Weekly link, but I wish I could share it all! Waiting to share more of the insides (and waiting for people to be able to hold the real, bound books) is so hard. This is my third time at this particular kind of rodeo, and I feel more impatient than ever. I think it's because I'm so terribly excited about the October release of Dream Animals and it makes me quite rabbity and twitchy to wait.

I can't wait to share more, more, more as October draws closer!
* Furred, or finned, or feathered...your dream animal is waiting. *

New Picture Book Peeks

I'm a happy rabbit today. Why?

Because I just finished turning in all the art for my next children's book! And since I can't share the full drawings and paintings just yet, I thought a bunch of snippets would be fun to post in celebration.

These puzzle pieces are little bits of much larger scenes - I wonder what kind of story you might stitch together from only looking at these?

I can't wait to share more of this project! It's been with me for the better part of the past year, and I'm so excited about it. I wanted my first picture book to be a really special project, and I think (I hope!) this one is.

I'll share more as I can - it is slated for release in Fall '13.
So this time, next year, it'll be here. (Hooray!)

I hope you're having a lovely October!

Cecil the Pet Glacier

I'm always intending to post more often about the books I'm currently taken with. Then I forget...then I'm on to new books, and the cycle continues! But the title of this new picture book alone made sure it wouldn't have such a fate.

I think everyone appreciates evocative book titles - the kinds that paint pictures in your mind right away and start storytelling all on their own. That's just one reason to love a book named, fantastically, curiously, demurely: Cecil the Pet Glacier.

Another is that it is illustrated by Giselle Potter, who was one of the first contemporary picture book illustrators to reel me in (years ago, now) with her pseudo-primitive folk aesthetic's askew beauty.

Another is that it features a father who creates pictorial topiaries for a living. (Note: even if this isn't intriguing you, I'm selling myself on this funny little book all over again.)

Yet another is the idea of a little girl who wears a uniform of a brown pinafore and black shoes, who is constantly dismayed by the quirk and rather oppressive joie de vivre of her parents.

And the final reason - the most impressive one, is that the author, Matthea Harvey, has taken one of the old chestnuts of the picture book medium (the pet story) and turned it on its head and made it hers, and made it special.

Summer Reading

What have you been reading this Summer?

For me, it's ended up skewing fairly funny:

- I'm almost finished with The Family Fang, and I hate for it to be over! It's funny, for certain...maybe veering toward the tragicomic. I resisted it at first, because it seemed too obvious a choice for me (Julie Morstad cover and all.) What a dumb reason to avoid something. I've loved it. The art-within-art in the book (the family's performances, of which there are many, but also paintings, short stories) is so incredible, and gives the novel this wonderful nesting-doll quality. There are lots of marvelous things within the shell of the novel, within each particular Fang.

- I re-read all of my favorite David Sedaris books, and (on my third or fourth readings) I think I fully appreciated what an outstanding writer he is. I've always considered him an excellent storyteller, capable of spinning marvelous things out of little strands he plucks from his life, strands uncommonly hilarious and poignant. Most funny memoirists/essayists just don't have such a knack for finding those strands, the ones that lead to heart of an anecdote. This time reading his books, I was bowled over by those same things, but also by his clarity,  word choice, just everything.

- I read Let's Pretend This Never Happened at the beginning of the Summer, which probably set the tone for the Summer and sent me digging through my shelves for the above books. It's really funny, raucous, and almost gratuitously self-effacing (but still light and zippy). The perfect thing to bring on a trip.
(For anyone who's read it, two words: Raccoon Jams!)

- I spent the last few nights up late with this book of interviews, Daniel Clowes: Conversations, which, like their subject, are wry and smart and sincere (and funny.) A few months back, when his beautiful monograph, Modern Cartoonist came out, I dragged the big thing into bed with me and pored over all the interviews included therein. This little paperback of interviews has even more to read, and was much easier to hold. That Mr. Clowes is such a hero of mine is a little funny - my work isn't very much like his in tone or aesthetic. But something about his technical perfectionism, wary sensitivity and grouchy beauty just kills me.

This Summer, reading-wise, has been a far cry from the dark delights of the 2011 Summer of Angela Carter, but I'm sure I'll be heading down that path again soon.

I'd love to hear about anything (funny or otherwise) you've read and liked lately!

The Country Bunny

Yesterday, before my Powell's storytime, I was chatting with two (lovely) children's book room ladies about gathering a few picture books in case the littles wanted more stories after my Oddfellow's reading. "Maybe something Spring-y? Something Easter-y?" they suggested. "Or just a book you really love..."

And immediately, The Country Bunny came to mind, because it's all of those things.

I first happened on this book at Books of Wonder a handful of years ago, and lured by the candy-colored cover, I snapped it off the shelf. A few days later, I found myself at the end of a New York visit, sitting at the gate of Newark airport, reading it near-breathlessly. The illustrations are absolutely beautiful, aglow in Easter egg colors grounded by inky blues and blacks. And the story, about a brave bunny who is both an extremely good mother and has her own dreams and ambitions, is enchanting and emboldening.

As I wound through the pages (it's quite wordy by today's picture book standards) I found myself, cross-legged on the airport carpet, with tears slipping down my face. This book, about something as whimsical as the plight of a would-be lady Easter bunny, reminds me of everything good and real and true. Of the different kinds of hopes we carry around, and how those hopes don't need to cancel each other out. Of how many things a book can be, and a person can be. It reminds me of my own mama.

This interesting little New Yorker piece gives a brief history, if you're interested.

And I didn't end up reading it at Powell's yesterday, simply because of the length. But today's the perfect day to read it, anyway (preferably with a side of Cadbury eggs.)

Virginia Wolf

I originally thought I'd post about this book in a round-up with other picture books, but Virginia Wolf, by author Kyo Maclear and illustrator Isabelle Arsenault really deserves its own post.

Loosely based on the relationship between the sisters who grew up to be painter Vanessa Bell & writer Virginia Woolf, this unusual (and unusually lovely) picture book imagines a day in which Virginia "wakes up feeling wolfish", and Vanessa tries with all her might to surround her sister with beauty.

Virginia Wolf, copyright 2012 Kyo Maclear / illustrations copyright 2012 Isabelle Arsenault 
Published by Kids Can Press

Vanessa makes her a garden, full of real and imagined flowers, pink-eyed rabbits, and good things to eat.

This book went straight to my heart for a few reasons: I went through the throes of a serious Virginia Woolf phase in college and I have been prone to pretty profound bouts of the blues at times. How could I imagine the likelihood of a picture book book about either, let alone both? And stitched above the rather serious underpinnings of the story, there is a lively, adorable little book : "The Wolfish" Virginia is perfect, with her little snoot and ears, and the fresh, bright colors mingle with sooty black lines and crisp white so nicely.

For further reading, this interview with Kyo Maclear talks about the beginnings of the book (I love hearing about book beginnings!)

There is also this extremely endearing book trailer, if you'd like a little sound & movement with your preview of Virginia & Vanessa's tale:

Just perfect.
One of those things that makes a person hopeful - about the continued delight and ingenuity of illustrated books, but in the bigger, larger sense, too.

A Powell's Interview

Powell's just posted an interview with me in which I talk a bit about Oddfellow's as well as cover topics as wonderful and varied as "Favorite teacher", "Favorite fictional characters" and "Favorite kid-friendly curse word."

It was quiet here this week, but keep your eyes out for more about what I'm working on behind-the-scenes, upcoming book events, etc. soon!

Oddfellow's Release Day!

Today is the day that Oddfellow's Orphanage lands on shelves!
I'm all jittery - full of excitement (and tea and a very sweet blueberry muffin.)

It is available now for purchase via Amazon, Powell's, B & N, and most everywhere else (you can check IndieBound to find bookstores local for you.)

Working on a book like this is a highly collaborative process...your part is writing the story and making the artwork, but there are lots of other people (editors, designers, and art directors, etc) who do their part to help the book become, hopefully, the very best version of itself. In the case of Oddfellow's, everyone did such a lovely and thoughtful job on their respective parts that when the finished, bound book came to my door, I was in tears over how special the final version turned out to be.

The designer (the excellent Nicole De Las Heras) even had little  golden bees set into the spine!

Little details like that make me so proud of what a lovely object this book is to hold in your hand.

Oh! And if you're curious about the the complete scene on the jacket...

My aim when working on Oddfellow's was simple - all I wanted to do was answer this question:

What's the best thing that could happen to you, if the worst thing happened to you?

I hope small people and big people alike find comfort and delight between its pages.

xoxo

Some Nice Things Given to Me Recently

Butterfly photo source here

1.) The Armed Garden by David B.: a collection of legends from one of my favorite comics artists. Epileptic, the book he is probably best known for, is one of the most memorable and special graphic novels I've ever read, and fascinatingly entwines dreams and memoir.

2.) The Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm: as you might expect from Taschen, this is a large, beautifully presented anthology of Grimm stories which culls images from a startling variety of illustrators. I didn't know this book existed 'til it was given to me, and it was such a nice surprise! I was really pleased with how thoughtfully it is edited, and especially with the range of visual styles on parade in this lovely purple book.

3.) Framed Butterflies from Bug Under Glass: I have an informal collection of framed moths and butterflies, and I was so happy to acquire a few new sturdily framed specimens (including my favorite winged beauty of them all!) from this excellent Etsy shop. I love the ones mounted on patterned paper, but the standard presentation is quite elegant itself.

4.) The Fujifilm Instax 210: I've wanted an instant camera every since I laid eyes on my Aunt's Poloroid when I was just a button, so receiving this wide-format version of the Instax made me bounce off the walls wildly with excitement! I'm still getting to know it, and experimenting with the film, but it is pure magic.

5.) Mail Order Mysteries: If Josiah is reading a comic from the early 80's or before, my favorite thing to do is to peer over his shoulder at all the amazing ads, so this book could not be more fascinating to me. The extremely funny commentary about the real items received, which are contrasted with the original (very compelling) ads, couldn't be better.

6.) The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland In a Ship of her Own Making: I'm only ankle-deep in this story, but I can report that Ms.Valente's sparkling knack for the weaving of words makes this book feel absolutely worthy of the bittersweet homage it pays to Alice, Oz, etc. It is at once markedly post-modern (the heroine is constantly reminding herself of what other children in books have done when whisked away to magical places) but it is also sincere, enchanting and devil-may-care enough to never feel too awfully much like a hollow metafictional commentary on fantastical stories for children. I like it very much!

Publisher's Weekly Review of Oddfellow's

It was a Thanksgiving-week treat to see this nice review from P.W. today!

 

Oddfellow’s Orphanage 

Emily Winfield Martin. Random, $14.99 (144p) ISBN 978-0-375-86995-2

Martin’s poignant and gently humorous debut novel is set in an unusual orphanage. The story grew out of portraits of the characters Martin drew, which appear throughout, accompanied by pithy explanations of how each resident came to live at the orphanage. The headmaster is Oddfellow Bluebeard (“a distant relation of the more famous Bluebeard”), who is “as gentle and kind as the other Bluebeard was cruel.” The story centers on newcomer Delia, a silent albino girl whose fellow orphans include a kind girl with pet finches; a spunky tattooed girl; a ravenous hedgehog; and Ollie, an upbeat boy with an onion for a head. Their adventures (pictured in the book’s abundant spot art) balance fantasy and reality: they discover a lake monster, enjoy a sumptuous picnic, view a mermaid fossil, watch the orphanage’s resident bear family perform at a circus, and enjoy a traditional Christmas. The novel’s cheerful tenor is occasionally tempered by the orphans’ memories of their former families, yet the new, loving bonds they’ve formed shine through. Final art not seen by PW. Ages 7–10. Agent: Sanford J. Greenburger Associates. (Jan.)

 Can't wait 'til January 24th!

Oddfellow's Orphanage: The Book!

I was trying to wait 'til every single last piece of final art was scanned and everything was finished up neatly and tidily, but 1.) the final art is thisclose to done and 2.) I can't wait any longer! For the last year, this has been my primary project behind-the-scenes, and it's finally time to reveal.

My next book, to be released in January 2012, is an illustrated novel chronicling the goings-ons at an imaginary orphanage...Oddfellow Bluebeard's orphanage, to be exact!

Oddfellow's Orphanage will be published by Random House Books for Young Readers, and is now available for pre-order!

Some of you might remember a series of imaginary portraits I did in 2009 involving orphans, a headmaster, a nurse, a cryptozoology professor, and a family of dancing bears (this postcard set is a reminder!)

With the portraits and their corresponding histories, I already had a cast of characters, and with some changes and additions, many adventures later, (with the help and support of my marvelous editor)  I expanded the story of Oddfellow's into this series of tales.

Excerpted from the book description:

What do an onion-headed boy, a child-sized hedgehog, and a tattooed girl have in common? They are all orphans at Oddfellow's Orphanage! This unusual early chapter book began life as a series of full-color portraits with character descriptions. Author/illustrator Emily Martin has fleshed out the world of Oddfellow's with an episodic story that follows a new orphan, Delia, as she discovers the delights of her new home. From classes in Cryptozoology and Fairy Tale Studies to trips to the circus, from Annual Hair Cutting Day to a sea monster-sighting field trip, things at Oddfellows are anything but ordinary . . . except when it comes to friendships. And in that, Oddfellows is like any other school where children discover what they mean to each other while learning how big the world really is.

Making this book has been all fun and wonder, at every stage and every turn.

I hope reading the stories and poring over the artwork will just as happy an experience!

 

Wolves & Wonders - The Summer of Angela Carter

At the beginning of this Summer, on a certain day, in a certain bookstore, from a certain shelf, a small, grim-looking book leapt into my hands. And since I'm already in danger of getting too effusive and too maudlin about the ensuing word-page-girl-heart breakneck romance I fell into because of that grim little book, I'll leave it to this photo of the evidence on my nightstand to tell the tale.

Okay, I can't help it and I do have a little more to say.

I didn't know about Angela Carter until that incident with the small, grim book (which turned out to be her most famous collection of short stories, The Bloody Chamber.) Already very fond of the medium (because I am, perhaps, a flighty reader), just a glance at the table of contents revealed ten stories clearly alluding to French fairy tales.

My heart beat a little faster.

I found the bibliography of other work, to find novels with names like The Magic Toyshop and Nights at the Circus. Essays and story collections right up the alley that terminates in my front door. At this point, I'm clutching the small, grim book and looking wildly around the bookstore, feeling halfway radiantly happy to have something so stunningly Emily-ish fall right into my hands and also halfway furious and indignant at the world and circumstance and English school and everything else that had conspired to keep such a kindred spirit from me. 

To make up for lost time, she's all I've read for months.

I think this would be a good time to mention that even though I am hopelessly in love with Angela Carter's ghost, this does not mean she is for everyone. Where there are wolves and maidens and circuses, there are also...shall we say...unwholesome things, unsavory things, running wild in her forests. These wild, even brutal things won't suit everyone's sensiblity (neither would the gothic, overwrought silliness that weaves in and out of her work.)

From what I gather, she is much more famous in her native England than in the U.S., which might explain why our paths didn't meet before. Even now, months later, I still feel that odd mix of gratitude to have finally found her and grumpy incredulousness that she evaded me all these years. Mostly, I feel grateful, because to find that a writer so taken with the lush, the fanciful, the bizarre, is also whipsmart, funny, and quite earthy is nothing short of amazing. She somehow walked with her head in strange, beautiful clouds, while keeping her feet firmly planted on the ground.

I'll take the beasts and wild things and wayward women and decadent prose and bind it all up in a crimson ribbon and thank my lucky stars that our paths met at last.

I love the company of wolves.
Look out the window and you'll see them.

These Days

 

  

Lovely June has me in her clutches, and there have been lots of things (both the quiet and exciting varieties) going on around these parts.

- Most exciting, an ARC (Advance Reader Copy) of my forthcoming book project arrived at the doorstep yesterday, which is so exciting it makes my heart skip a beat.

- I'm creating all the final art for the aforementioned book right now, which is keeping all my quiet moments busy. Creating many pencil shavings.

- Realized at least half of our napkins were truly stained and dodgy, and sewed up a baker's dozen of new ones in pretty summer cottons.

- Baking a bunch. Baked Banana Bread Bittman (pictured above). It's still the perfect B.B. to me.

- I've been really lucky with new/old book finds in the past week or so (also pictured above) the prize jewel being Mermaids & Mastodons. I'm always looking for old cryptozoology/peculiar natural history books, and this one is the best I've found.

- Also been quietly keeping my first flower garden this Spring/Summer. At the risk of sounding maudlin, it's one of the best and happiest pursuits I've ever begun.

Hoping June is being good to you!

 

Mister Wonderful

The much admired Mr. Daniel Clowes (if you visit his website, it is important to view this hilarious curmudgeonly little strip) recently released his newest beautiful book, Mister Wonderful. Josiah sweetly ordered a copy for me as a surprise, and I couldn't resist reading it the night it arrived.

The story originally ran in the New York Times Magazine (where I completely failed to keep up with it) but has been expanded into this lovely hardback volume. One of the nicest things about reading a Dan Clowes book is that every detail of the object is so considered -- everything from the shape/size to the lettering to the color-scheme to the Author bio/'photo" (an endearing drawing in his case) is thoughtful and clever.

This story is really humble and...well, wonderful -- very simple in scope (spanning less than 24 hours of a couple's initial meeting) but at the same time, beautifully expansive. Mister Wonderful  weaves one man (Marshall) and one lady's (Natalie) sweetly-imperfect blind date into a story that elegantly and subtly reaches into their personal pasts, presents and the futures. Over the course of the story, it feels less like a date, and feels more like these two fighting their way through a dense thicket of their respective histories, worries, neurosis and hopes.

One technique Mr. Clowes uses to this end is to overlap Marshall's thought-bubbles with the dialogue bubbles. This (very brilliantly) shows Marshall's internal dialogue - which consists of pretty normal date neurosis, like fretting over if he's saying the right thing, worrying about how he's appearing/sounding, daydreaming,  The thoughts cloud the dialogue, so you only get bits & pieces of the actual conversation. It's next level, sophisticated bubble-use, and I was quite dazzled!

 
I also think it's important to mention what a contrast this book is to Mr. Clowes' last book, Wilson, which also concerns a middle-aged fellow and his particular plight and worries. While I loved Wilson, and found it hilarious, the protagonist (Wilson) is wildly self-righteous, acidic, angry, misanthropic. Marshall/Mister Wonderful is quite a different creature: nervous, kind, inward, much more mildly misanthropic.

I read this excellent Comics Journal interview in which Mr. Clowes juxtaposed the two in this way: "Wilson is the pure id creature, and Marshall in Mister Wonderful is all superego, all repression...I made him a character that was constricted, and was self-censoring to the nth degree, to where he’s actually obliterating what’s going on around him and living entirely in his own head".

When I was thinking about the difference between the two characters/books, I kept imagining each guy's laugh. I imagine Wilson's to be a loud, harsh (probably disdainful) GUFFAW!, while I imagine Mr. Wonderful's to be a nervous, quiet, stammering sort of laugh.

I could never say I prefer one to the other, because it takes both laughs to fully explain why I love Dan Clowes so much.

Stitched Covers

I am completely spellbound by these cover illustrations that comics artist and illustrator Jillian Tamaki has created for some new Penguin editions:

The Emma jacket is lovely (and there's a sweet one for The Secret Garden, which we were just discussing the other day!) but I love the Black Beauty embroidery the most.

It's really unbelievably, almost cruelly beautiful...

Jillian's blog has more info, and some really fun-to-peek-at process photos of the embroideries in progress. What a multimedia wonder she is!
I read one of her books, Skim (written by her cousin, Mariko Tamaki) a few years back and it's one of those books that is so truthful and honest, it has a piercing loveliness.

My friend Devlin, who is always showing me beautiful things, tipped me off about the mention of these on the D+Q blog, and I was just blown over - especially considering the timing. I'm completely humbled by the beauty of these covers, especially because I'm currently doing the final bits of work to complete the cover painting for my first children's book.
(More on that later!)

I feel like I've been living in this cover painting for several months now (in addition to working on the Alice paintings.)

All I can do is hope it's even a percentage as nice as these stitched wonders!

Reading Material

Last week, after lots of particularly hard work, Josiah & I rewarded ourselves with a trip to Powell's. I got such a nice little stack of books - mostly things I had already been really wanting, but a few surprises, too!

Even better, they were mostly old copies, which are such a good deal (and I usually like better anyway!)

In the stack:

-Modern Library volumes of Thomas Hardy (I never pass up a Modern Library edition of anything we like or would like to read someday - they make perfect reading copies, and the lovely old cloth-bound editions are easy to find and usually less expensive than their modern day paperback counterparts)

-Two 1930's children's books (I never seem to be able to leave without a few of these!)

- A pretty 40's edition of A Little Princess. I'm interested to see what revisiting that one will be like, since I've been re-reading The Secret Garden, Wind in the Willows, Matilda, and other childhood favorites of mine with interested findings (I like some of them much more and some much less than I did 20 years ago.)

-New Vanessa Davis! This was the big surprise of the trip - I only have small anthologies and zines with her work and I'm inordinately excited about a big honkin' volume of it. I find her sweetly self-deprecating sensibility really relatable, but that's not the only feather in her cap - she's also a great storyteller and artist.

-The annotated Wind in the Willows.Hooray! I asked for a copy of this for Christmas, and Josiah gave me a beautiful 1930 edition, which I've read and re-read and keep going back to. I liked the stories when I was small, but I'm absolutely in love with them now. I'm not sure about what that says re: the adventures of Rat, Mole, Badger & Toad holding the interest of actual children, but this grown-up lady finds them one of the most lovely things ever type-set.

My sweet (but slightly crumble-y) copy:

And I'm so excited about to investigate the annotations of my new copy! I was given the annotated Alice when I was 18, and was nerdily delighted by the huge amounts of minutiae and sidebar notations. I really recommend these editions for anyone who has read the stories (others in the series include Oz, Grimm, The Secret Garden) over and over and is still curious about the particular influences of the personal life of the author, the influence of the time period, and other odds & ends.

-At the bottom of the stack is the new Lula, which I have to say, made me fall in love with that magazine again. I hadn't bought an issue for the last year, but I grabbed this one kind of out-of-the-blue, and it's one of their best issues yet. Not to disparage the magic pixies that Lula is filled with, but it was really nice that so many other ladies were featured, like Miranda July, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Sophie Calle. (Okay, maybe they're all magic pixies in their way.) The Exene Cervenka interview kept me up late reading. That she can still come up with interesting and eloquent things to say about the LA punk scene is astounding!

Oh!

Also in the haul from that day, the Adventures of a Cat Whiskered Girl is a really excellent little chapter book that was probably strewn about in the sea of books on the floor next to my bed at the time of this photograph.

Also somewhat book-related: I think I get to go see the new Jane Eyre tonight (finally!) I've been so excited for it - I hope I haven't over-hyped it in my mind.

I hope you have a nice weekend ahead!

Paper Doll Day!

Huzzah! Today's the day!

The Paper Doll Primer is now available online and in bookstores.

How am I going to celebrate?
Is cleaning one's studio considered celebratory if one is otherwise going to be choked to death by dust bunnies? What if there's a cupcake or two involved?  

 
I hoped I would have lots of thoughtful things to say on this momentous occasion, but all I really have to say is this:

We set out to make a craft/art/paper book unlike any other, and I think we did.
I do hope you like it!

I'll, of course, post here with all Paper Doll Primer signing events and such.
Happiest of Tuesdays, and Happy Paper Doll Day!

Bookish

I don't know what it is about this time of year, but I always seem to turn inward a bit and feel extra curious and ravenous about words and pictures. The pile of books coming into my house keeps stacking up, so I thought I better mention at least a few of them before the stack grows too tall!

   

1. Hillary's amazing creation, Wee Wonderfuls: 24 Dolls to Sew & Love, is one of the most beautiful craft books I've ever seen. Okay, it might just be the most beautiful craft book I've seen. From the sunny yellow cloth spine, to the substantial format, it's a really nice object. And the part that really matters, the insides, are even better. Every single one of the dolls is special and distinct...there isn't a single one that feels like filler. Hillary was one of my first blog-friends, and her impeccable craftsmanship, funny acerbic wit, and sweet sensibility have always made Wee Wonderfuls a real humdinger of a cottage industry. I am so happy that is all wrapped up in a beautiful book now.

2. Dillweed's Revenge is one of the best-looking children's books I've seen lately. Carson Ellis' illustrations are hilarious and wonderful and really make the book outstanding. I admire the heck out of her illustration chops! In fact, I think Dillweed could be wordless, because the illustrations do the lion's share of the storytelling. Ms. Ellis has a really interesting post on her blog about the book's history (it was originally slated to be illustrated by Edward Gorey!)

3. Not new, of course, but I'm re-reading The Secret Garden right now for the first time since I was a little girl. As I'm begining to work more and more on my own stories and craft my own worlds, I'm realizing (and it's being pointed out to me, in some cases) how much the sensibility and feeling of books like these took root with me. It's a really lovely feeling to go back into a familiar-but-unfamiliar place like The Secret Garden - bits and pieces come back to me, and other things had completely drifted out of my memory.

4. And last, the new Nara monograph (entitled Nobody's Fool)! I will confess that I just snagged this last night at Floating World, so my grubby paws haven't torn through it yet, but I'm so excited! I didn't even know about it. That's always such a great feeling - I mean, anticipating something being released is nice, too, but surprise books from favorite artists are a real treat.

Happy Friday to you!

All Ways Lead to Alice

I recently picked up what might be the prettiest addition to my Alice library - a 1930's edition illustrated by Milo Winter. It's really lovely - not completely unlike the Rackham illustrations, but much more gentle and colorful. I have about 20 different editions in my collection now - but I know ladies with more.

The new version has caused my head to be with Alice a lot lately, which is a little clue as to some of the work I'm doing behind the scenes right now!

I'm excited to be aeroplaning down to San Francisco tomorrow for a long weekend. Hopefully, unlike Ms. Alice's journey, there won't be any neurotic rabbits, catty flowers, or egomaniacal monarchs to contend with on my little trip.

Happy weekend to you!

Things Other Than Clothes

I came upon the idea of reviving my other blog, Some Girls Wander, by expanding what I'm posting about in that neck of the woods. It used to be just a place to ramble on about clothes and things, but currently I'm rambling on about all other manner of things I love, too, like old children's books. 

Dignified Bears and Bats in Hats!

Today I posted some images from a recently acquired treasure I'm still abuzz with excitement about, a copy of Animal Children: The Friends of the Forest and the Plain by Edith Brown Kirkwood, illustrated by M.T. Ross (1913).

I like them so much I had to post about them here, too, but there are more animal children and also a little more info over at Some Girls Wander!

The Book!

I've been so busy with the show and everything lately, I haven't had the chance to share this very important item of information - my book recently became available for pre-order! I am pleased as can be to announce that The Black Apple's Paper Doll Primer: Activities & Amusements for the Curious Paper Artist will be released on November 2nd!

You can find all the pre-order links right here, in the special nook I made just for the book.

The Paper Doll Primer is a 160 page fully-illustrated wondrous oddity - equal parts art and craft book. Inside await hundreds of brand-new illustrations, as well as diversions aplenty. Filled to the brim with original paper dolls and clothing, the book also holds a trove of cut + play projects like a paper theater, customizable dolls, interchangeable backdrops, and more.

This slightly peculiar undertaking (an epic paper doll book is not the most common thing in the world, I know) is what I spent most of my 2009 creating. And I worked pretty much non-stop on it - sun-up to sun-down many days. There are thousands of hours of work and care wrapped up in that little tome, and I really hope that it's a delight to look through and play with.

 

I'll keep you posted as we get closer to the release date, especially concerning events, etc. I'm so happy it's coming out in time for the Winter holidays...already my very favorite time of year.

It's a peculiar, slightly-lonely thing to make a book, especially when one is used to sharing what they make more or less when they make it. 

Which is to say: I'm so happy to finally share this here!

Handmade Marketplace + Giveaway!

I'm double...no, triple excited to share this new book with you, The Handmade Marketplace, by Kari Chapin.

One: because I illustrated and lettered the cover, as well as the book's section openers!

 

Two (and far more important and interesting):
The book really is an honest-to-goodness, exhaustive handbook on selling handmade - gathering good advice from certifiably smart cookies I like very much, such as  Ashley, Amy and Matt from Etsy (and lots more). It addresses an impressive breadth of questions and concerns, both general and  specific. The topics range from the creative/making/ideas side of things to the nitty-gritty/nuts + bolts business-running aspect. The way all of this information is gathered in one place, I must admit to being a little jealous of the lucky folks just coming into the crafty business world. With wonderful guides like this popping up, one can learn so very much in one helpful, handy fell swoop, rather than fumbling around, figuring things out the sometimes-long and sometimes-hard way.

I feel so happy to have something so thorough to direct people to in the future when I get that question: "Do you have any advice for someone starting a art/craft business online?"

And Three: I've got a little stack of four copies waiting to give away to you lovely readers!

EDIT: Comments are now closed and the winners have been notified - just waiting to verify all four!
Thanks so much for all of your lovely, thoughtful comments!

Just leave a comment below (maybe telling about the best handmade gift you've received, but of course anything you'd like will do). PLEASE MAKE SURE THAT THE EMAIL ADDRESS provided with your comment is working and current. 

I'll close the comments on the 19th, and let the RNG do its work! Best of luck!