New York Times Book Review

Hi Chaps,

Well, "Small Blue and the Deep Dark Night" has been reviewed again, and this time in a real life actual paper that you can hold in your hand, which is cool.
Yesterday, 19th October, it was reviewed in the Book Review Section of the Sunday edition of the New York Times.
They say "It's a winning approach to fear of the dark: lots of physical closeness, a few flights of imagination, and a gentle dash of cold, hard logic."
See a scan of the review below, it also featured a section of the goblins spread, further down the page.

Just a small spot, but I do feel chuffed :)

Small Blue review

Hi Chaps,

There have been a bunch of really nice reviews of Small Blue and the Deep Dark Night on various blogs.
I've put a couple of them up on my website, but I thought I'd gather a bunch of them here.

A lovely review, and there was a give-away too, at the Good Reads With Ronna Blog here

A very nice review indeed at Jen Robinson's Book Page Blog here.

Another very nice review at the Books For Kids Blog here
You'll have to scroll down for this one, it was posted on the 6th Sept.

And a nice short review at the Feed A Reader Blog here.
This blog seems to be run by Kirkwood Public Library.
I checked the catalogue, and Small Blue is checked out at the moment :)

Another review for Small Blue

Hi Chaps,

There's been another review for my new book 'Small Blue and the Deep Dark Night' out soon with the lovely chaps at Harcourt in New York.
This one is on Publisher's Weekly here
And I've got the text below, and a screenshot too, just to make there's no way you can miss it :)
But it's a nice review, I like the way they describe the book, I feel like they've got the hang of it and they explain it well.

In his first outing as both author and illustrator, Davis (Stuck with the Blooz) uses gnomish pen-and-ink drawings to conjure up the “Gremlins and goblins, with empty, rumbling bellies, licking their lips, waiting for me in the dark” that Small Blue, a rabbit, feels sure are lurking in her bedroom. Davis resists the urge to draw creatures as scary as Small Blue’s thoughts: the imaginary goblins are small, blobby creatures with mild expressions, clearly anxious to please. Big Brown—who’s precisely the kind of towering, furry bear one longs to take one’s nighttime fears to—doesn’t deny Small Blue’s worries (“There could be...”), but suggests another way to look at things: “How do you know it wasn’t a delightful doggies’ Saturday-night unicycle convention?” A visit to the kitchen for warm milk develops the idea: “I can imagine the kitchen playing host to a retired- pirates’ annual sock-knitting jamboree.” Soon, Small Blue gets the hang of this kind of thinking, too. A winsome, even poetic introduction to the idea of reasoning one’s way through fearfulness. Ages 4–8

But here are some sketches from the book, as a bit of a teaser, of the things mentioned in the review, Small Blue, Big Brown and a couple of Goblins.

Small Blue review

Hi Chaps,

Well, I've got a picture book coming out in August which I have written as well as illustrated.
Which is a tad exciting.
The book is called Small Blue and The Deep Dark Night, and is published by the lovely chaps at Harcourt in the US.
But, the reviews have started, and there's a nice on Kirkus here
I'll put the text below, and a screenshot too.

I'll post some sketches from it soon, and any other reviews too.

KIRKUS REVIEW

Small Blue (a little bunny) gets a bad case of the middle-of-the-night willies, imagining what spooky creatures might lurk in the dark corners of her home.

“Big Brown, Big Brown!” she wails, in a shrill pitch familiar to all parents. Small Blue’s caregiver, a lumpy, burly bear, offers reassuringly ridiculous counterarguments to assuage the bunny’s fears. Big Brown wonders whether those “[g]remlins and goblins, with empty, rumbling bellies,” weren’t there at all, and instead there was ”a delightful doggies’ Saturday-night unicycle convention” underway. It is dark, after all. Who can tell? Children will get the hang of Big Brown’s loopy logic quickly. The dark could harbor “giant hairy spiders and flappy bats” or, just as likely, host “a smiley spacemen’s zero-gravity birthday party.” Jittery readers come to see it’s probably neither; the dark is just that, dark, and nothing more. Big Brown’s enveloping brawn and fantastically implausible nighttime scenarios turn quivering fears into giggles. Mildly cartoonish artwork, in purply-blues (lights off) and cozy yellows (lights on), offers thick linework and lots of rounded edges, eyes, noses and mouths, softening Blue’s scary fantasies and rendering Brown’s imaginings all the more comical. 

Add this original, illuminating book to any stack of in-the-dark, nighty-night anxiety tales right next to the bed, alongside that last glass of water—but leave the door open a crack!

Box of Blooz

Hi Chaps,

I got a big box in the post the other day, here it is.

And it's my copies of Stuck With the Blooz. It's great fun to open something like this. Thanks to they guys at Harcourt.

I was tempted to dance on the bed, flinging them up in the air, like people do with money in films.

But they are hardbacks, so I decided to just make a nice curved pile instead.

 

Also, there has been another review of the Blooz, this one at publisher's weekly, you can read it here - publishersweekly.com
But it strikes me as being a very intelligent review, I like the way they say the story has an impressively light touch and that the readers are given room to feel the arc of the girl’s struggle.
I think that captures it nicely. So that makes me pleased with what they write about the art too.

Hurrah, A Review For Cecily Beasley

Hi Chaps,

My book, 'Watch Your Tongue Cecily Beasley' has been reviewed by Kirkus Reviews!
This is the first review I've had, which is quite exciting, and luckily it's a good one.

It says some lovely stuff about the story, which is spot on, and says that my artwork has 'fruity tropical colour and theatrical linework', which is a great phrase.
But after working away largely alone on something, it is very nice to get some independant positive feedback.

This is the full review.

“That’s right, Cecily. If you make an ugly face, it just might get stuck.
There once was a time that little Cecily Beasley was a grade-A brat. She wouldn’t share; she slurped her food; her belches—public and smirk-enhanced—were stinky. She would stick out her tongue and waggle her fingers, and she took no heed when warned her gesture might freeze just so. Sure’s shootin’, one day her tongue won't retract, and a Mockingbeak Tongue-snatcher quickly makes a nest thereupon. A doctor counsels the family not to disturb the bird, which can be as feisty and ill-mannered a customer as Cecily. She had to wait—patience not being among her virtues, either—for the eggs to hatch.
Fredrickson’s salute to the risks of bad manners is gladdening and admonitory in all the right, playful ways. When the Tongue-snatcher hatchlings stick their collective tongues out at Cecily, it makes for a fair rebuke. Fredrickson also has her share of fun with the dexterity of her rhymes: “It’s a Mockingbeak Tongue-snatcher, rude and tenacious. / They roost on the tongues of the loud and audacious.”
Then there are Davis’ illustrations full of fruity, tropical color and theatrical line work; they are spot-on in catching Cecily in her predicament—the sheer misery of having a tongue as big as a mature sea cucumber.
This snazzy cautionary tale packs quite a bite (even with its tongue in the way). (Picture book. 4-7)”

It's available for subscribers to read now on the website here, and I believe it will appear for everyone to read two weeks before publication.
But I'll blog or tweet again when everyone can see it.
Here's an interior spread from it.