By Gayleen Rabakukk

Effective immediately, Cynsations is on spring hiatus. Read the posts from our most recent series here:

• A Sanctuary for Storytellers: Authors Alison Green Myers & Alexandra Villasante Discuss Scholarships & Rebranding Boyds Mills Retreat Center
• Co-Authors Interview: Nikki Grimes & Stacy Wells Collaborate on Stronger Than
• Author Interview: Bread, Love, and the Art of Showing Up with Pooja Makhijani
• Author Interview: Cynthia Leitich Smith – The Most Awesomest Auntie
• Author Interview: Karina Iceberg Celebrates Community Connection in A Good Hide
• Authors Interview: Alison Green Myers & Alexandra Villasante on Sophomore Novels
• Throwback Thursday: Author Liara Tamani on Inspiration & MFAs
• Author-Illustrator Interview: Deborah Marcero Shares Her Creative Process
• Author Interview: Ginger Reno on Rekindling Connections & Spirit Shadow
• In Memory: Authors Peg Kehret, Robert Burleigh & Author-Illustrator Hudson Talbot

Cynsations will return in May with more inspiration, insights, and information on children’s-YA writing, illustration, literature, and publishing. In the meantime, you’re welcome keep up on those topics with Cynthia Leitich Smith at Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Threads and Bluesky.

See Cynthia in person at the Tucson Festival of Books, held on the University of Arizona Mall from March 14 to March 15. You can view the Presenting Authors’ Schedule here. Many children’s/YA authors will be participating, including Adib Khorram, Carole Lindstrom and David A. Robertson. You can also find Cynthia at the Texas Library Association Annual Conference in late March in Houston.

To our wonderful readers, we send our thanks! We’re appreciative of your ongoing attention, signal boosts, and all you do!

The post Cynsations Spring Hiatus appeared first on Cynthia Leitich Smith.

By Cynthia Leitich Smith, Gayleen Rabakukk, Suma Subramaniam, A.J. Eversole, Mitu Malhotra, and Gail Vannelli for Cynsations

Spotlight Image: Sweet, Sweet Memory by Jacqueline Woodson, illustrated by Tonya Engel (Nancy Paulsen Books, 2026).

Author/Illustrator Insights

Interview With Ryan Douglass, Author of The Great Disillusionment of Nick and Jay by Robert Kesten from the Stonewall National Museum, Archives, & Library. Peek: “[A topic] comes [to me] over a period of years…It takes living life, absorbing the truths I come to, absorbing more about who I am, figuring out what I need to say. I want to do things that are urgent and timely, but also that are timeless…I want my work to…be something that can be read for years to come.”

Interview With Nadine Presley from Kidlit in Color. Peek: “I have…learned the importance of building genuine relationships. Connect with fellow authors, librarians, booksellers, educators, and book lovers not just when you are launching a book, but because you truly want to be part of the community. Those relationships grow naturally and become incredibly meaningful over time.”

Gomi Tarō: The “Everyone Poops” Author Looks Back on a Life in Picture Books from Nippon.com. Peek: “Kids don’t read because adults tell them to, they read because they want to. Books are something that people discover on their own. If you start out with the idea of targeting kids, it becomes artificial. And there are always adults between the children and the book—reading to them, and so on….I didn’t want to do it that way.”

Somali Author Shugri Salh on the Power of Words by Shugri Salh from Publishers Weekly. Peek: “I grew up hearing beautiful stories of my ancestors, weaving survival and resilience into my identity. Words can empower or break a person, a community, a nation. But when we share stories with one another, we are reminded of our shared humanity….[R]eading aloud or sharing stories helps kids develop into smart, curious, and engaged humans….”

Interview With a Writer—Yasmin Hanif by vgemmell from Victoria Gemmell. Peek: “Motivation and finding the time to write can be two of the most challenging things. Through motivation you write, and conversely through writing you find motivation, so it goes hand in hand….[F]ind like-minded people to write with, whether that’s informal creative writing groups, workshops, retreats—somewhere where others are writing too, which helps you stay motivated and accountable.”

Guest Post With Maisha Oso (It’s Almost Time for…Easter! )! by Maisha Oso from YA Books Central. Peek: “Teen life doesn’t always allow for…joyful anticipation. Waiting can feel heavy when it’s accompanied by expectations, stress, and comparison. But even then, the journey matters. Growth happens quietly. We’re still becoming ourselves even when it doesn’t feel clear yet, even before everything clicks into place….[T]here is magic in the waiting…if you let yourself notice it.”

Equity & Inclusion

Four Questions for V.T. Bidania by Krystyna Poray Goddu from Publishers Weekly. Peek: “[T]here are a few books about Hmong refugees, but there are no middle grade novels from the point of view of a child….[N]ot many people know the history of the Hmong in Laos who fought with the U.S. in the Vietnamese war….I wanted to tell not just a refugee story, but a human story.”

Five Questions for Tori Tadiar by Roger Sutton from The Horn Book. Peek: “Today, we have a vibrant, diverse komiks (Philippine comics) community in the Philippines, but there’s still a lot of shelf space open for children’s comics specifically. I’m part of an ­organization of children’s book illustrators, and while most of our members’ focus is picture books and chapter books, a growing number have become active in the komiks space.”

Q & A With Kadir Nelson by Reggie Blanding from Publishers Weekly. Peek: “The history of basketball mirrors what was going on culturally in America at that time, so I was surprised to learn that African Americans didn’t take up the game for quite some time after it was invented for several different reasons. One was access….It started out as a segregated sport….”

Four Questions for Torrey Maldonado by Patricia J. Murphy from Publishers Weekly. Peek: “During the writing process, I thought about my own relationship with picture books as a child. I didn’t see myself in picture books—or any books. The language was completely off—not like the way any of my peers or my neighbors spoke….I now tell educators,‘If books don’t love kids, kids won’t love books.’”

Four Questions for Roshani Chokshi by Iyana Jones from Publishers Weekly. Peek: “My dad is from India, and my mother is from the Philippines. They did not want to confuse me or my siblings [growing up], and so we weren’t taught our parents’ native languages…[O]ur only access point to our heritage was through mythology, folklore, and fairy tales and superstition, all very common in immigrant and diaspora families.”

Four Questions for L.S. Stratton by Erika Hardison from Publishers Weekly. Peek: “I didn’t realize how many major cities used to be sundown towns [places that purposely barred minorities]….[S]undown towns, at least in terms of the Black community, is well-known. [However], I did not know that so many other minorities had a similar legacy of sundown towns, especially Native Americans out West.”

Writing Craft

Author Spotlight: Stan Yan by Sydney Dunlap from From The Mixed-Up Files of Middle-Grade Authors. Peek: “I don’t have a normal place I like to write. I find that I often am drawing all the time but not writing, or writing all the time and not drawing. That’s how being on a book deadline is for me….I find myself most often just writing at home at the dining room out of necessity….”

Let’s Talk Illustrators #386: Erin K. Robinson by Mel Schuit from Let’s Talk Picture Books. Peek: “I illustrate in an app called Procreate. It’s a medium that I’ve been using for a number of years and creating digitally allows me to roam free and travel more so it’s very appealing in that aspect. I always seem to have my iPad attached to me. It’s quite the visual journal.”

Cracking the Shell: Robert Apelian on “Fustuk: A Graphic Novel” by Victoria Atamian Waterman from Armenian Weekly. Peek: “The macroscopic part of writing is easy for me. I like weaving things together into one well-conceived, tight package….I love stories with multiple timelines weaving in and out…Secrets become unearthed at the climax—what really happened, what’s at the core of your beliefs, what you went through that made you this way.”

Four Minutes With Amber McBride: An SLJ Exclusive Interview from School Library Journal. Peek: “For me, the decision to write in verse always comes down to the question of feeling vs. thesis. By this I mean, do I want young adult readers to feel their way through reading, or think their way through?…[W]ith reading there is always a little bit of both happening, but which one is the focus?”

Q&A: Maggie Horne, Author of “Freddie and Stella Got Hot” by Elise Dumpleton from The Nerd Daily. Peek: “A lot of the time, a relationship or character arc comes to me first, and I create the plot around it. I liked the idea of a love triangle being told from the point of view of one of the branches, not the center of it.”

Chatting With Illustrator and Author Charnelle Pinkney Barlow with Libraria on Instagram. Peek: “For me, the [art is] more like playing around….I like to do new things, I like to get my hands on things, exploring different mediums and playing around with collage, painting different papers, and cutting them up and seeing what happens….Exploring and pushing different styles really helped. I’ve been doing a lot of hand-cut collage.”

Booksellers

Bookshop.org Teams With Draft2Digital by Ed Nawotka from Publishers Weekly. Peek: “Online bookselling platform Bookshop.org has inked a partnership with Draft2Digital, one of the world’s largest self-publishing companies, which will now offer its authors the ability to sell their self-published e-books on Bookshop.org. The deal with Draft2Digital has the potential to add 1.2 million e-book titles from some 330,000 authors to Bookshop.org.”

The 2026 Bologna Children’s Book Fair takes place Apr. 13 to Apr. 16 in Bologna, Italy. “BCBF is the premier destination for immersing yourself in the world of books and content for children and young adults, the essential meeting point for the entire industry….Through exhibitions, workshops, presentations, and roundtable discussions, it represents an international hub for discovering new trends, emerging talents, and innovative strategies in children’s publishing.”

ABA Names Children’s Institute Scholarship Winners from Shelf Awareness. Peek: “The American Booksellers Association has announced the names of the 33 booksellers who will receive scholarships to attend this year’s Children’s Institute (Ci2026) in Schaumburg, Ill., Jun. 26 to Jun. 29.” The full list of scholarship winners can be found here.

Libraries

The TLA (Texas Library Association) 2026 Annual Conference takes place Mar. 29 to Mar. 31 at the George R. Brown Convention Center in downtown Houston. “This annual gathering is a time for library workers from across the state to gather for professional development, networking, and connection.” Children’s authors and illustrators in attendance include Christian Robinson, Erin Entrada Kelly, Linda Sue Park, and Jarrett Lerner.

Library of Congress to Unveil an Interactive Youth Center by Nathalie op de Beeck from Publishers Weekly. Peek: “This spring, the Library of Congress [a research library] will open The Source: Where Creativity Sparks Discovery, a 4,000-square-foot experiential learning space for young people ages 8–15. [Shari Rosenstein Werb, Director:] ‘We’ll have four zones that invite kids to open drawers, dig deeper into film archives or sound archives, and develop media literacy and research skills….’”

Marketing

Why You Need an Audience Waiting for Your Book by Sandra Beckwith from Build Book Buzz. Peek: “1. An audience drives early sales momentum….2. Waiting readers are more likely to leave reviews….3. Your marketing is more effective [and] dramatically easier when you’re talking to people who want to hear from you….4. You reduce your dependence on algorithms….5. An audience supports your career beyond one book.” Free download: Audience-Building Timeline and Checklist.

Publishing

Simon & Schuster Relaunches Simon Pulse YA Imprint by Pamela Brill from Publishers Weekly. Peek: “This summer, Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing will reintroduce its Simon Pulse imprint with a new crop of young adult books, spanning a variety of genres….In 2001, the Pocket Pulse imprint was moved into the Simon & Schuster children’s group and renamed Simon Pulse, initially as a paperback-only [YA] imprint…The imprint went on hiatus in 2021.”

Oni Press Inks Distro Deal with PRH by Sam Spratford from Publishers Weekly. Peek: “Penguin Random House Publisher Services (PRHPS) today announced a multi-year worldwide sales and distribution agreement with comics and graphic novel publisher Oni Press, beginning on August 1. [Oni publishes adult and children’s/YA titles.] PRHPS will sell and distribute Oni’s frontlist and backlist trade books, as well as single issue comics, exclusively across all sales channels.”

Author Cynthia Leitich Smith Talks About All the People Who Come Together to Create a Picture Book by Cynthia Leitich Smith from 12×12: 12 Picture Books 12 Months. Peek: “Your picture book, when it is done, will no longer be just yours. And that is a good thing. The picture book is the project of the writer, the literary agent, the author curator, the editor, the copy editor, the art director, the designer, [and] of course the illustrator….”

Collective Book Studio Starts Children’s Imprint from Publishers Weekly. Peek: “Rebekah Lovato Piatte has joined California indie publisher The Collective Book Studio as children’s editorial director. In the newly created role, she will oversee Tiny Torch Books, a new imprint aimed at readers ages up to 8 that will launch this summer with a list of picture and board books.”

Education/Other Resources/Events

School Library Journal is holding its eighth annual Middle Grade Magic free virtual event to celebrate authors and creators dedicated to crafting literature for children ages 8-12. “Get a first look at some of the most anticipated new titles for…young readers, from modern coming-of-age tales to eye-popping graphic novels to immersive fantasy.” The event takes place Mar. 5 from 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. pacific, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. central, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. eastern.

Penguin Random House, Library Journal, and School Library Journal present 2026 Spring Book & Author Festival, a day-long event celebrating reading, authors, and librarians. “As we lead up to National Library Week, enjoy a day packed with author panels and interviews, book buzzes, virtual shelf browsing, and adding to your TBR pile.” The free virtual event takes place Apr. 16 from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. pacific, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. central, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. eastern. Register here.

Library Journal’s virtual Day of Dialog Spring takes place May 7 from 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. pacific, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. central, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. eastern. “Spanning a variety of genres, this day-long program will offer an in-depth look at the biggest forthcoming books for summer/fall 2026. You’ll hear directly from top authors as they discuss their new titles, inspiration, process, and more.” The entire event will be available on-demand for three months from the event date. Register here.

The Association of Writers & Writing Programs’ 2026 AWP Conference & Bookfair takes place Mar. 4 to Mar. 7 at the Baltimore Convention Center. There will be hundreds of events and exhibitors. Register here.

The Tucson Festival of Books, held on the University of Arizona Mall, takes place Mar. 14 to Mar. 15. You can view the Presenting Authors’ Schedule here. Some of the many children’s/YA presenting authors include Adib Khorram, Carole Lindstrom, David A. Robertson, and Cynthia Leitich Smith

Awards

Organizational Awards

Congratulations to the winners and honorees of We Need Diverse Books‘ 2026 Walter Dean Myers Awards.

The winner and honorees of the Cooperative Children’s Book Center’s 2026 Charlotte Zolotow Award.

The winners and honorees of the 2026 Jane Addams Children’s Book Awards.

The 57th NAACP Image Awards Nominees, especially in the categories of Outstanding Literary Work–Children and Outstanding Literary Work–Youth/Teens.

The authors and illustrators whose books appear on the 75th National Jewish Book Awards list, especially in the categories of Children’s Picture Book, Middle Grade Literature, and Young Adult Literature.

The authors and illustrators whose books were named to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s Best Canadian Children’s Books of 2025.

The authors and illustrators whose books appear on Literary Hub’s Most Anticipated Children’s Books of 2026 list.

Congratulations also to the winners of the Bank Street College of Education’s Children’s Book Committee Awards 2026.

Congratulations also to the finalists of the 2026 Libby Book Awards, especially in the categories of Young Adult Fiction, Best Middle Grade Book, and Best Picture Book.

Congratulations also to the winners of the 2026 Southern Book Prize, named by the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance, especially in the Young Readers category.

Writers’ Organizational Awards

Congratulations to the 2025 Edgar Awards Nominees, especially in the categories of Best Juvenile and Best Young Adult.

The finalists of the Storymakers’ Guild 19th Annual Whitney Awards, especially in the categories of Young Adult General, Young Adult Speculative, Young Adult Fantasy, and Middle Grade.

The winners and honorees of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators’ Golden Kite Awards, Sid Fleischman Award for Humor, and the winners and honors of the Spark Awards, an annual award that recognizes excellence in a children’s book published through a non-traditional publishing route.

Library Awards

Congratulations to the authors whose books were named to the Young Adult Library Association’s 2026 Best Fiction for Young Adults list.

The authors and illustrators whose books were named to the 2026 Rainbow Book List.

The authors and illustrators whose books appear on the Association for Library Service to Children’s 2026 Notable Children’s Books list, in the categories of Younger Readers, Middle Readers, Older Readers, and All Ages.

Congratulations to the winners and honorees of the 2026 ALA Youth Media Awards, which include the Newbery Medal, Caldecott Medal, Coretta Scott King Book Awards, King Author Award, King Illustrator Award, Printz Award, Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent Author Award, Coretta Scott King—Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement, Margaret A. Edwards Award, Schneider Family Book Award, Schneider Younger Children’s Award, Schneider Middle Grade Award, Schneider Young Adult Award, Alex Awards, Children’s Literature Legacy Award, Mildred L. Batchelder Award, Odyssey Award, Pura Belpré Awards, Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Award, Excellence in Early Learning Digital Media Award, Stonewall Book Award, Theodor Seuss Geisel Award, William C. Morris Award, and YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults.

Congratulations also to the winners of the American Indian Youth Literature Awards.

Congratulations also to the winners and honorees of the 2026 ALA Affiliate Asian/Pacific American Awards for Literature: Pasifika Picture Book, Asian American Picture Book, Children’s Literature, and Young Adult Literature

The Gold Medal and Silver (Honor) Medal recipients of the ALA Affiliate 2026 Sydney Taylor Book Award.

The authors and illustrators whose books appear on the 2026 Booklist from Rise: A Feminist Book Project.

The authors and illustrators whose books appear on the Texas Library Association’s (TLA) 2026 Reading Lists for young readers, including the Little Maverick Graphic Novel Reading List, 2×2 Reading List, Texas Topaz Nonfiction Reading List, YART (Young Adult Round Tables) Reading Lists, TAYSHAS Reading List, Spirit of Texas Reading List, Maverick Graphic Novel Reading List, and Lone Star Reading List. Also, congratulations to those on the TLA’s 2026-2027 Texas Bluebonnet Award List and to the winner of the Texas Bluebonnet Award.

Scholarships & Grants

Upcoming Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators’ Awards & Grants include the Karen Cushman Late Bloomer Award (for authors over the age of fifty who have not been traditionally published in the children’s literature field; the winner receives $500 and free tuition to a SCBWI conference); the Work-in-Progress Awards (assists children’s book writers and illustrators in the publication of a project not under contract, with one winner in five different categories); and the Don Freeman Grant (enables picture book illustrators to further their understanding, training, and work in the picture book genre, with two grants of $1,000 each). All submissions are open Mar. 1 to Mar. 31. Apply in the SCBWI member home page.

From This Cynsations Series

• A Sanctuary for Storytellers: Authors Alison Green Myers & Alexandra Villasante Discuss Scholarships & Rebranding Boyds Mills Retreat Center

• Co-Authors Interview: Nikki Grimes & Stacy Wells Collaborate on Stronger Than
• Author Interview: Bread, Love, and the Art of Showing Up with Pooja Makhijani
• Author Interview: Cynthia Leitich Smith – The Most Awesomest Auntie

• Author Interview: Karina Iceberg Celebrates Community Connection in A Good Hide
• Authors Interview: Alison Green Myers & Alexandra Villasante on Sophomore Novels
• Throwback Thursday: Author Liara Tamani on Inspiration & MFAs
• Author-Illustrator Interview: Deborah Marcero Shares Her Creative Process

• Author Interview: Ginger Reno on Rekindling Connections & Spirit Shadow
• In Memory: Authors Peg Kehret, Robert Burleigh & Author-Illustrator Hudson Talbot

More Personally—Gayleen

I highly recommend The Librarians, available for home viewing on PBS and with upcoming screenings in the U.S. and Canada this spring.

More Personally—A.J.

Twenty twenty six has brought many exciting things and we are only two months in! I hope to talk about them all soon, but right now I’m still caught in a humbling daze about Legendary Frybread Drive-In winning the Michael L. Printz award! To be part of that legacy is something that will warm me through my entire career!

I’ve been hard at work getting all my ducks in a row as far as what I’m going to be working on next writing wise and things are shaping up nicely. I’ve also got some more amazing Indigenous author interviews in the pipeline! I can’t wait to share them with readers.

More Personally—Gail

So far in 2026, I’ve joyfully continued my kidlit journey through my involvement with several kid-related organizations. My Kids Story Studio business passed its four-year mark last October, through which I teach free children’s story writing and drawing classes. The kids and I have a great time! I’m an assistant editor for Young Adult submissions at Lunch Ticket Literary Journal; I’ve been with LT for almost six years as a lead editor, assistant editor, interviewer, and blogger. And I’ve been with Cynsations since 2019 as a researcher, writer, and industry news reporter. My goal for 2026 is to find a literary agent for my kids writing projects, which include a middle-grade novel, a picture book, and short stories.

More Personally—Mitu

In 2026, in addition to writing, I plan to spend time drawing and painting in an effort to develop my own signature style of illustration. I designed my first postcard of the year—image below:

The post Cynsational News appeared first on Cynthia Leitich Smith.

By Gayleen Rabakukk

Peg Kehret, award-winning author of more than 50 books for middle grade readers, died on Dec. 7, 2025; at her home in Bellevue, Wash., reported the Seattle Times. According to her website, Kehret’s first book for young readers was Winning Monologs For Young Actors (Meriwether, 1986).

That book was soon followed by Deadly Stranger (Dodd, Mead, 1987), edited by Roseanne Lauer, who went on to edit many more of Kehret’s books after moving to Dutton Children’s Books in 1989. Lauer recalled to Shannon Maughan at Publishers Weekly how much Kehret enjoyed interacting with young readers and replying to their letters. “In the early years, she and her husband Carl traveled in their RV across the country visiting schools and accepting the many Children’s Choice awards she won,” Lauer said.

Kehret’s longtime literary agent, Ginger Knowlton told Publishers Weekly, “Anyone who has read Peg’s books knows how deeply she loved animals.” About 10 years ago, Knowlton visited Kehret at her cabin near Mt. Rainier. “It was a magical place, brimming with life and filled with calm and peace—much like Peg herself—and so many wild and domestic animals and birds to keep her company.”

Kehret shared this advice about writing on her website: “Read as much as you can, and practice writing. Writing is a skill, and the more you do it the better you get.” She also noted that she wrote ideas on scraps of paper and kept them in an Ideas Box in her office.

Author Robert Burleigh died Jan. 12 at the age of 90. Burleigh was a poet and visual artist, showing work in Chicago and New York galleries under the art name Burleigh Kronquist. He also wrote more than 50 children’s picture books and is best known for his poetic picture book biographies.

Burleigh, first children’s book, A Man Named Thoreau, illustrated by Lloyd Bloom (Atheneum, 1985) He went on to write many more picture book biographies on an array of subjects, working with illustrators like Raúl Colón, Barry Root, Mike Wimmer, and Ed Young, reported Shannon Maughan for Publishers Weekly. In 1992, Burleigh received the NCTE Orbis Pictus Award for Flight: The Journey of Charles Lindbergh, illustrated by Mike Wimmer (Philomel, 1991).

Burleigh worked with illustrator Wendell Minor on Into the Woods: John James Audobon Lives His Dream (Athenum, 2003), and afterward, they collaborated on many more titles. Minor shared with Publishers Weekly’s Maughan about the dynamic he developed with Burleigh: Minor would suggest a biography subject, then Burleigh would think about it and later send Minor the manuscript. “I discovered very quickly that that was such a unique relationship. I don’t think I met another author and illustrator who worked as closely as we did,” Minor said. “…we’d have these long conversations, and out of those conversations would come the idea for a book.”

Burleigh received the Illinois Prairie State Award in 2011 and was recognized as the state’s children’s book author of the year. His most recent book was Winter Magic, illustrated by Wendell Minor (Little, Brown/Ottaviano, 2024).

Hudson Talbott, an award-winning author and illustrator of more than 30 children books, died Jan. 22, 2026 at age 76 after a brief illness, reported the Courier-Journal.

Talbott grew up in Louisville, Kentucky and was drawn to art at an early age. After high school, Tallbott studied art at Temple University’s Tyler School of Art campus in Rome, and earned a B.F.A. in 1971. From there, he continued working and studying art in Amsterdam and Hong Kong before moving to New York City in 1974. He worked as a freelance illustrator, creating calendars, greeting cards and posters for museums, arts organizations and department stores.

One of Talbott’s calendars featured funny dinosaurs and drew the attention of David Allender of Crown Children’s Books. That led to Talbott’s debut picture book, We’re Back! A Dinosaur Story (Crown, 1987) about a gang of dinosaurs to New York City and end up in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. A few years later the book became an animated film with the same title.

Talbot published nearly 30 more books, sometimes writing and illustrating, other times creating images to accompany others’ words. In 2006, Talbott illustrated a Newbery Honor book, Show Way by Jacqueline Woodson (Putnam, 2005). His 2021 book A Walk in the Words received a Schneider Family Honor Award.

Cynsational Notes

Gayleen Rabakukk holds an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Vermont College of Fine Arts and is currently a student in the Library Science Master’s program at the University of North Texas. She also has an undergraduate degree in Journalism from the University of Central Oklahoma. She has published numerous newspaper and magazine articles, and two regional interest books for adults. She is represented by Terrie Wolf of AKA Literary Management.

She works part-time as a Library Assistant at the Lago Vista Public Library, where she leads a book club for young readers. She also teaches creative writing workshops and loves inspiring curiosity in young readers through stories of hope and adventure. Follow her on Instagram and Bluesky.

The post In Memory: Authors Peg Kehret, Robert Burleigh & Author-Illustrator Hudson Talbot appeared first on Cynthia Leitich Smith.

By AJ Eversole

Excited to chat with kidlit author Ginger Reno (Cherokee) today. Her debut novel, Find Her (Holiday House, 2025), was an Edgar Award Nominee and won the Oklahoma Book Award. Today she talks about her debut picture book, Spirit Shadow, illustrated by Mary Lupton (Cherokee) (Holiday House, 2026), on sale March 17th.

How is Spirit Shadow part of your own journey of connection with Cherokee heritage?

Spirit Shadow is mostly my story … An always-there feeling somewhere in the background, like something I was supposed to remember. A vivid childhood memory of a visit to a Cherokee village. Found moccasins. Willa, the main character, is named in honor of my mother who always wanted us to remember our Cherokee heritage. It took a while to come together, but I hope she’d be proud.

Willa has always had two shadows—one physical and one spiritual. Can you talk about where this central image came from and what it represents?

“Different than the shadow that danced at her feet in the sun, her Spirit Shadow followed her everywhere.”

Growing up, I was always proud to be Cherokee, but as time went by, work, marriage, and fast-paced life happened, unfortunately, I let that part of me fall into the shadows. It wasn’t intentional, I didn’t even realize it had happened.

When the pandemic forced everything to slow down, I was finally able to feel that part of me that was missing. I’ve been trying to bring my Spirit Shadow into the light ever since.

After writing Find Her (Holiday House, 2025), a powerful middle grade novel about Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG), what drew you to explore Cherokee identity and belonging through a picture book?

Spirit Shadow was, and is, an expression of my own desire to reconnect with my Cherokee heritage—to express the feelings that had been tapping me on the shoulder for some time. I wrote and sold Spirit Shadow first but Holiday House was determined to take the time to find just the right illustrator – and boy, did they!

Mary Lupton has truly brought Willa’s story to breathtaking life. I can’t wait for everyone to see it! SO worth the wait!

Diligwa was a real place. A replica of a 1710 Cherokee village. What was it about this specific location that made it essential to Willa’s story?

As children, mom took us to Diligwa one summer and it’s a memory that has always stuck with me. How could it not? To be transported back in time, to walk through the history of your ancestors and see how they lived was such a powerful experience.

Even now, when I think back, it was as if we were walking on sacred ground.

You’re working with debut illustrator Mary Lupton, who is also Cherokee Nation. How has this collaboration shaped the visual storytelling, particularly the incorporation of Cherokee beadwork, weaving, and syllabary?

The more I learn about Cherokee heritage, the more I realize just how much I don’t know.

It is very important to me that all things Cherokee be presented accurately and respectfully in everything I write. I am extremely fortunate that there are so many willing to share their knowledge and answer my questions.

I know Mary worked very hard to ensure every detail was represented correctly—and beautifully, I might add—in every illustration, for which I am thankful. I am definitely a member of the Mary Lupton fan club!

The description includes the beautiful phrase “brown hands crafting.” Can you talk about the importance of showing Cherokee people actively engaged in traditional practices?

Hands can tell you so much. Are they strong? Nimble? Calloused? Old? Young?

Finished wares can obviously be appreciated, but seeing for yourself the actual skill, knowledge, and time required to create takes it to a whole other level. I also believe it inspires others to want to learn and hopefully carry on the traditional artistry.

The story emphasizes Willa joining a Nation of over 400,000 people. Why was it important to convey both the individual journey and the collective identity?

We are one. We are many.

Look at everything the Cherokee—all indigenous people—have suffered through and endured. Terrible, without question. But the personal and collective strength required to survive and even thrive is awe-inspiring. For those who discover/remember they have that same overcomer spirit within them, that same shared strand of resilience in their DNA, it can be life changing.

The book ends with a message for all children to embrace their own ancestors. How did you approach making this specifically Cherokee story also universally resonant?

I believe the desire to be true to oneself is a universal concept.

Although others may have a different ancestral Shadow, chances are it still tugs at their sleeve—wants them to remember. I hope this story encourages them to make that connection.

Spirit has been “quietly beside her since the night of her birth,” beckoning Willa to claim her heritage. How do you see the relationship between ancestral presence and cultural identity?

I’m a perfect example of having one without the other. For most of my adult life, there was definitely a disconnect. Even though it was gradual and unintentional, it’s hard not to feel a certain degree of shame for allowing it to happen, and most of all, sadness for the time missed. But fortunately, my Spirit Shadow didn’t give up trying to get my attention. I am grateful.

The description calls this a powerful tale about reclaiming culture and finding your way home. What does home mean in this context, especially for Cherokee children who may be disconnected from their heritage?

Here, home is making a connection to a ginormous extended family you didn’t know you had—and it’s never too late for a family reunion.

What are you working on next?

I have two picture books I’m very excited about coming out soon:
Many Ways of Being Native – Charlesbridge, Fall, 2026
The Longest Walk – Crown Publishing, release date to be determined.
And I’m currently working on a spooky middle grade – Fingers crossed!

Cynsational Notes

Ginger Reno is a citizen of the Cherokee Nation. Her desire to learn about Cherokee history and culture naturally spilled over into her writing. Spirit Shadow is part of that journey. Her debut novel, Find Her, received the Oklahoma Book Award, an Edgar Award Nomination, and was a Jane Addams Children’s Book Award Finalist. Ginger lives in northeast Oklahoma, within the Cherokee Nation, and spends a lot of lakefront porch time with her two favorite people—her unpaid proofreader husband and their German shepherd.

A.J. Eversole is an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation and a writer of adult and children’s literature. Her work appears in Legendary Frybread Drive-In (Heartdrum/HarperCollins), a Michael L. Printz Award–winning anthology, Beyond the Glittering World, and Never Whistle at Night Part II (Vintage, 2026). She also reports on Native voices in literature for Cynsations. Find her online @ajeversole.

The post Author Interview: Ginger Reno on Rekindling Connections & Spirit Shadow appeared first on Cynthia Leitich Smith.

By Mitu Malhotra

Today I am excited to welcome author-illustrator Deborah Marcero to Cynsations to talk about her seventh picture book, The Great Escape (Penguin Random House/Putnam, February 2026). Reading The Great Escape took me back to the moment in time when I first met Deborah during an exceptionally cold Vermont winter. Deborah’s magical sibling story has all the makings of a classic—it will appeal to children and the adults responsible for reading it aloud to them.

In The Great Escape, I was immediately drawn to protagonist Evie’s three siblings dressed up in animal suits, their adventure and return home…For me, an immediate throwback to Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are (Harper & Rowe, 1963). What inspired you to write this book and create this particular cast of characters?

In the fall of 2022, I gave myself an assignment to write and illustrate a fantasy-fairy-tale-like-story with a female protagonist who had tenacity and faced conflict with agency and courage. From there, I found Evie and her siblings.

Evie is inspired by my childhood. I grew up with five siblings on a small family farm in rural southern Michigan. As the oldest girl, I remember the bickering, the play, the caretaking, the make-believe and most of all, I remember the fierce bond we created and shared, especially when we worked together.

In addition, the winter I wrote the first drafts of this book (2022-23), it snowed a record 140 inches in Duluth, Minnesota. The snow was deep and wild, full of wonder and beauty. It provided the perfect catalyst for Evie’s portal and escape.

As an author-illustrator, how do you work with a story-seed idea, test its viability to form a 32-page or as in this case a 48-page picture book? Any story-mapping techniques that you can share with beginning picture book writers and illustrators?

In general, and with The Great Escape, I start by finding my main character and their internal and external story arcs. Then I ask a lot of questions.

What do they want? What do they need? Where does their story begin and how are they changed by the end? Why?

From there, I start sketching my main character and discover more of their character traits. Once I’m happy with the character design, I move to see if I can identify the broad-brush strokes of their story. What is the main theme or themes and what is the beginning, middle and end?

When I can identify those basic elements, I move to storyboarding, breaking the book into thumbnail “spreads” where I jot down only what “happens” in each spread, thinking about story beats and page turns. Regarding story beats, I mostly let the main character lead me, but I do have anchoring devices to help keep me on track for a picture book length work.

For example, by spread three, I hope for the reader to know: the setting, the main character, what the main character wants, and the main theme or themes. Throughout the book, I use “but” and “therefore” between scenes to make sure there is a strong sense of logical cause/effect that keeps the story moving forward. This is a very simple, yet key lesson I learned from Matt Stone and Trey Parker, the creators of South Park.

In the last third of the book, I also want there to be a surprise or an unexpected twist that gives the sense of “I didn’t see that coming, but, of course!” in the reader’s mind. For The Great Escape, that moment is when Evie finds, “…the whale wasn’t trying to harm them. She needed their help…” which then brings the siblings together to work toward a common goal.

Once I have a strong storyboard (this often takes 4-6 drafts), I launch into sketching the full dummy. One spread at a time, I sketch and write the manuscript. I usually need to work out what the images will be in pencil sketch first (showing visually “what happens” from the storyboard) and then I write the text. If anywhere along the way, I can’t fill in the storyboard or find the story’s ending or a surprise, the idea shows me that it’s not yet viable. But I will keep drafts of these roughs and return to them from time to time, because the more I do this work, the more I find that these unfinished pieces hold keys to other stories in me, waiting to be discovered.

On the sixth spread, the text of The Great Escape leads the reader to move the book around, the terrestrial flora and fauna transitions into an underwater scene. This clever interactive element enhances the reading experience—during the creation of this picture book at what point in your artistic journey did you decide to use this interactive turn?

The idea for turning the book upside down came in my second and third sketch dummy revisions in direct response to comments and questions from my agent and writing groups (before submission). Turning the book upside down allowed Evie to fly up into the stars. When I stumbled upon this possibility, turning the book became a compelling way visually distinguish the magic realm from reality –turning the book changes the experience of the reader.

In the magic realm the images are full bleed spreads, reading from left to right, so the reader must turn the pages backwards to move forward in the story. The “real world” is illustrated with frames and comic panels, reads right to left and follows the rules of gravity. Turning the book wasn’t a plan. It came out of rigorous revision to make the story better.

I love the stippled and detailed textures that are your signature illustration style. How did you develop your painting technique? You mentioned that images taken by the James Webb Space Telescope were used to create some of the artwork for this picture book. What prompted you to incorporate those photos into your art-making?

With a B.F.A. from the University of Michigan, I am formally trained in drawing, printmaking and photography. As a fine art student, I learned how to give and take structured “critiques”, which were thoughtful, rigorous sessions of commenting specifically on what was working and not working in peer’s work and why. I attribute most of my learning and growth as an artist to these sessions.

After my formal training, I found my illustration style over many years of practice, journaling in my sketchbooks, life drawing classes, and sketching and revising those early picture book dummies. Studying photography and being a professional photographer taught me how to compose a frame to tell a story. In my illustration practice, I prefer to work analog, but for the ease of revision, I have learned to adapt. For most books I work on now, I render line work and my painting into separate analog layers, scan, then assemble and collage them together in Photoshop. This creates a polished image that I can easily play with and revise.

In The Great Escape, I tried something new. I rendered intensive line work onto hot press watercolor paper, then digitally collaged my hand painted watercolors into the scenes. When trying to amplify the visual atmosphere of the magic realm, I had the idea of merging the sea and the stars into one setting. But the watercolor painted skies alone didn’t feel as magical as I wanted.

Meanwhile, I had been following the news of the Webb Space Telescope and learned that the photographs taken by NASA would be entered in the public domain immediately for anyone to use. So, with some trial and error, I merged those starry galaxies and nebulas into my hand-painted watercolor textures using various layering techniques in Photoshop.

The combination of the two mediums alongside the line-work makes a fantasy realm that feels distinctly its own, while also fitting into a cohesive illustration style for the whole book.

For more information on the photographs being taken by the James Webb Space Telescope, please visit: https://science.nasa.gov/mission/webb/

For me the composition below was a showstopper, the deep sea is a mirror of the sky with the sun and constellations, the scale of the characters awe-inspiring and the words “Her baby was caught in a net of constellations.” intriguing! Please tell us about this double spread.

This is one of my favorite moments in the book too. When drafting the siblings’ adventure, I didn’t want them to ever be in real danger, but I did want them (and the reader) to feel the suspense of possibly being in danger… while all along leading them to a surprise. This dramatic reveal came once again from my revision process. In early drafts I only had one whale in the magic realm whom the siblings found stuck in a human made fishing net. But the cause/effect, chase and magic weren’t as strong, logical or surprising. This was also before I found the turn-the-book-to-enter-the-magic-realm idea. So, I pushed deeper.

I asked a lot of questions. What else could be going on? What are the siblings running toward or away from? Why?

In flipping the book and discovering the starry watercolor sky full of nebulas and galaxies, including constellations as part of the setting made more sense than a human-made fishing net. Constellation maps always have lines drawn between the stars to help us identify them in the sky as objects or beings, for example “Ursa Major” or “Pegasus”.  From there it wasn’t a far leap to imagine them as literal cords of light, holding the constellation together as kind of net, and that perhaps, a magical baby space whale might get tangled into it.

In your collaborative partnerships, with your editor/art director in the publishing world, how do you navigate creative tension when you or others see things differently?

I am always open to making a book better. I also like to be challenged. I have seen the power of what critique can do to evolve work to a higher level. I love working with people who make many beautiful, compelling, award winning books every year. They see things I can’t always see and I am eager to learn and become a better writer and artist.

The best feedback comes in the form of explaining why something isn’t quite working and why, but then the team makes me solve it. Having ownership in the solution makes me better at my craft too.

I wasn’t sure, for example, that my publisher would go for the turn-the-book element, but they did. I push back when something is really important to me, and if we need to, there is a conference call with my team to talk through everything. Overall, I feel very supported and challenged at Putnam; I trust them to help me make a better book than I could on my own.

Do you have any suggestions of mentor texts or craft books beginning picture book writers may peruse for inspiration?

I recently found Mary Kole’s craft book Writing Irresistible Picture Books (Good Story Publishing, 2023). I highly recommend it to anyone working in children’s literature. While I have read it cover to cover, I dip into it often when reflecting on the inner workings of my own developing picture books.

Specifically for The Great Escape, two of my main mentor texts (that I also used as comps) were Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak and Journey by Aaron Becker. I also studied Are We There Yet? by Dan Santat and Mel Fell by Corey R. Tabor because they both use variations of “turn-the-book” in their storytelling. 

In what ways has joining the children’s book community shaped you as an artist and a person?

Teachers, librarians, agents, editors, art directors alongside creators who write and illustrate in the field of children’s literature are so generous with their wisdom and efforts to lift up books and those who make them. I find this energy genuine and contagious.

But it wasn’t until I attended my first regional SCBWI conference in 2013, where I experienced this up close with the incredible presenters there–Jane Yolen, Laurent Linn, Peter Brown, among others – who shared tangible steps of what it took to become an author-illustrator. They were direct and clear about what they were looking for and how to build a career in this industry.

I wasn’t naïve. I knew there would be a long road ahead of me, but I was able to see that there was indeed a path to making books. There are many gatekeepers to be sure, but at those gates, are a lot of human beings (agents, editors, art directors) eager and passionate to find and make beautiful stories and books.

How are you adapting to the realities of today’s publishing landscape?

I put my head down and try not to believe things are hard or slow in publishing (even though they are). I try not to worry about A.I. I mostly try to channel my energy and focus on my next story. I have worked hard and am also fortunate to have a steady workflow.

I also have an incredible team behind me without whom none of my books will be possible: a stellar agent, Laura Rennert, an amazing editor, Stephanie Pitts at Putnam, a brilliant art team, Cecilia Yung (now retired) and Eileen Savage, a fantastic publicist and an out of this world foreign rights team. I try my best to keep busy with a contracted book while working on a proposal for my next book. But it hasn’t always been this way, and I don’t take anything for granted. The world feels in a precarious place right now, and some days I just try to focus on what I need to do that morning, that day, to keep myself afloat.

What allows me to have hope in the face of it all, is that I know publishers, readers, librarians, kid-lit enthusiasts are always looking for a book that will touch their hearts. Readers are hungry for stories that make them feel a little changed after they read them. And this is my life’s work now.

There are a handful of new main characters dancing around my drawing table at the moment, yelling, “Pick me! I want to be the main character of your next story!”

You have maintained an active publishing career, which is arguably a bigger challenge than breaking into this field. How have you managed to achieve continued success?

Continued success has only come after years of failure, persistence, revision, rejection, a little luck, a desire to learn and the motivation to keep going. My whole life has been a quest of how to be an artist in the world. In my adult life the question was, “How can I be an artist, not compromise my values, and support myself financially with my art?” It took me until my mid-thirties to pursue the path of being an author-illustrator professionally. But once I made the decision, I could look back and see that everything I had done or worked on up until then had led me to that moment – and my life had been simply been waiting for me to make this choice all along.

I was willing to take illustration-only jobs early in my career, which opened doors for my author-illustrator work. I worked with smaller houses and accepted lower advances. But all the while I was learning, developing, growing, and most all, I felt so lucky to be steeped in the magic of picture books and stories, words and illustrations for young people.

I worked part time doing other jobs as a photographer or teacher to help pay the bills until about four years ago. My advances started to grow and my backlist is now continuing to earn royalties, so I am able to make a good living by working on my own books.

There have been a lot rejections, disappointments, revise-and-resubmits with ultimate passes, but with every revision I learned more about this medium and myself as an artist. I could feel myself becoming a stronger storyteller. I wish I could whisper into the ear of my seven-year-old self as she wrote little poems and illustrated them with crayons, “You’ll never guess what you get to do when you grow up.”

Finally, what message would you like the young readers to take away from this book in particular?

At its heart, The Great Escape is about the sacred spaces of 1) being alone and 2) being together. It’s about the unique bonds and frustrations of sibling love. It’s about wonder, magic, imagination and working together. I hope when readers reach the final page, they are filled with awe and inspired by the possibilities waiting to be unlocked in their own imaginations.

Cynsational Notes

Deborah Marcero is the author-illustrator of My Heart is a Compass, In a Jar, Out of a Jar, Hope in a Jar, the Little Bunny Board Book series, and more.  Her books have been translated into twenty languages. She lives in Duluth, Minnesota and you can find out more about her art and books at deborahmarcero.com.

 Mitu Malhotra holds an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from the Vermont College of Fine Arts. A finalist for the 2024 Lee & Low New Visions Award and the winner of the 2021 Katherine Paterson Prize for Literature for Young Adults and Children, Mitu has won scholarships from the Highlights Foundation, Tin House, and a writing residency at the Djerassi Program. Her short story “Toxins” is part of ELA curriculum. Her writing has appeared in Hunger Mountain, Thin Air Magazine and elsewhere. In previous avatars, Mitu was a textile and fashion designer, and has taught in India, the Middle East and the US. Mitu is an active member of CBIG: Children’s Book Illustrators Group, NYC and NJ SCBWI. She currently interns with Cynthia Leitich Smith (author-curator of Heartdrum, a Native-focused imprint of HarperCollins) and interviews authors for the blog Cynsations. Mitu also reviews books for Kirkus Reviews. During September 2025 her banner design was selected for use by the Kidlit 411 Blog website. More here: www.mitumalhotra.com

The post Author-Illustrator Interview: Deborah Marcero Shares Her Creative Process appeared first on Cynthia Leitich Smith.

Congratulations to Liara Tamani on the publication of This Ain’t Our First Rodeo (Greenwillow, Feb. 3, 2026). From the publisher’s website:

This ain’t Josie’s first rodeo. Her parents own several fancy restaurants in Houston, and they just opened a new one right outside the stadium. Josie is expected to stay inside the restaurant and help, and maybe take over their growing empire one day, but that isn’t what Josie wants. She’d rather be at the rodeo itself than in a high-end restaurant next to it. Or eating funnel cakes and Texas-sized corn dogs at the carnival on the grounds. Or better yet, riding her horse at her grandparents’ ranch, the very place her mom wants to sell.

It ain’t Shawn’s first rodeo either. He’s been riding bulls since his mom died, doing everything he can to live up to his rodeo-champion stepfather’s sky-high expectations. But as Shawn’s stardom rises, so do tensions in their relationship. His stepfather’s drinking and gambling problems sure don’t help.

After one unforgettable night leaves Josie and Shawn wanting nothing but each other, their lives become entwined in increasingly complex ways. Can they save Josie’s family land? Or will Shawn’s stepfather and his shady plan be the ranch’s ruin? Will one wrong move cost them everything? Rodeo after rodeo, year after year, can Josie and Shawn keep their hearts open through the secrets, twists, and turns?

Take a look back to Liara’s first Cynsations interview in 2017 for her debut, Calling My Name (Greenwillow, 2017).

New Voice: Liara Tamani on Calling My Name

By Robin Galbraith

Liara Tamani is the debut author of Calling My Name (Greenwillow/HarperCollins, 2017). From the promotional copy:

This unforgettable novel tells a universal coming-of-age story about Taja Brown, a young African American girl growing up in Houston, Texas, and it deftly and beautifully explores the universal struggles of growing up, battling family expectations, discovering a sense of self, and finding a unique voice and purpose.

Told in fifty-three short, episodic, moving, and iridescent chapters, Calling My Name follows Taja on her journey from middle school to high school.

Literary and noteworthy, this is a beauty of a novel that deftly captures the multifaceted struggle of finding where you belong and why you matter.

What was your initial inspiration for writing this book?

I started writing Calling My Name to explore and heal the wounds of my teenage self.

Like Taja, the protagonist of Calling My Name, I grew up in a very loving and religious family. My family was always in church—Bible study, choir rehearsal, Sunday services, Vacation Bible School, Church conventions—you name it, we were there. Also like Taja, I had a lot of doubts and questions about religion but quickly learned that I wasn’t supposed to have these doubts and questions, that their presence meant I might not be saved. So I dealt with them internally, fighting against the fear of hell, which was very real to me at the time.

And when I became sexually active in my later teenage years, my fears were compounded by guilt and shame. Let me tell you, it wasn’t fun.

While Calling My Name is not my story, it was definitely born out of my experience. And I wanted to share my truth, to give voice to the struggle of sexual shame and guilt (which a lot of teenagers deal with, especially girls), and to speak to the terrifying experience of departing from one’s family and community teachings to find one’s own way.

What model books were most useful to you and how?

Because Calling My Name is written in vignettes, I mostly studied novels that were composed of interrelated vignettes and short stories.

The post Throwback Thursday: Author Liara Tamani on Inspiration & MFAs appeared first on Cynthia Leitich Smith.

By Mitu Malhotra

Today, I am excited to welcome to Cynsations Alison Green Myers, author of the middle grade novel This Way to Happy (Dutton Books for Young Readers, 2025), and Alexandra Villasante, author of the young adult novel Fireblooms (Nancy Paulsen Books, 2025), to share their sophomore novel journeys.

As an author what was your artistic approach to book two, and how did it compare to your debut?

Alison Green Myers: Thanks for this opportunity to chat about our books, our friendship, and a little about our work lives–outside of writing for kids and teens. Your first question really gets into it—“the second book.” (Which, let’s be real, is like the eleventh manuscript, and second published book…) I had the idea for This Way to Happy when A Bird will Soar (Dutton Books for Young Readers, 2021) sold to Andrew Karre.

But, it was just that: an idea, so when Andrew asked, “What else are you working on?” I talked about a book set on an amusement park or a carnival and a creek involved and crossing over it as some kind of thing about grief. (Or some version of this not-very-cool pitch.)

I mean, to be fair, the book became a book set on an amusement park about grief and crossing over a creek… so… Cool or uncool the book never wandered too far from that initial idea. The writing process was tricky because I had a lot of ideas coming at once and because of work, the state of the world, and other things–there was not too much time to work on the book itself—so I had stacks of journals, and screenshots from my phone, voice memos, and the like.

With the launch of A Bird will Soar, my mental health really struggled and my physical health, too (not all related to the book launch, of course). This mental and physical space wasn’t a place from which I could create a book that was for kids was going to have enough hope—something I think middle grade readers deserve.

By the time I turned in my draft for This Way to Happy, I was in rough shape, and so was the novel. My editor, as kind as ever, asked for my “satellite documents”… of course he couldn’t mean my journals & screenshots & ramblings… Of course, he did mean all of that.

I joked that he was digging through my junk drawers. He’s just that kind of editor. He wanted to see the kind of story that I meant to tell, not what I had turned in. And through several long conversations with him, the true voice and vision of the book came together. It was a slow process. One that involved a lot of late nights and texts to friends saying, “I can’t do this!” I even snuck a dear friend into the narrative so that I was talking to them while writing the book: See the character Alex with the purple hair… And with that, let me turn this over to Alex with the purple hair.

Alex Villasante: I love being even a partial inspiration for a very cool character, and I love This Way to Happy so much. It’s a beautiful story that invites folks to expand what it means to be family and the ways you can get at least on the road to happy!

I agree with Alison; publishing book two is hard…the sophomore book, the expectations, the fear that you’ve somehow missed the mark. After all, your first book has ooodles (a technical term) of time to develop. Book two is on a deadline. Having said all that, Fireblooms was published six years after my debut, The Grief Keeper (Nancy Paulsen Books, Penguin Random House, 2019).

This was due to a combination of upheaval in the publishing world, the pandemic and personal circumstances. I wondered if anyone would be interested in hearing from me again after that long. (I know this is a very relatable fear!) But I’m also really proud of Fireblooms because I challenged myself as a writer.

Fireblooms has a dual point of view—a first for me—and I needed to make sure both POVs had distinct, engaging voices. I wrote deeply about difficult families, bringing those relationships to the foreground. And I pushed myself to write a story where trying to figure out who’s right, wrong, who is redeemable and who can’t be forgiven is not easy, or clear…just like life.

Also, and this is embarrassing, but ultimately something I’m proud of…. I’m not a poet, like at all, but I had to write poetry for my main character, Lu to write. They (unlike me) have a poet’s heart, and a lot of how they see the world is in poetic fragments and imagery.

In the first draft of Fireblooms, my editor Stacey Barney, made the comment that Lu’s poetry (my poetry) was sort of ‘meh’ and maybe we should give Lu a different passion. Wow, what a blow that was! But I insisted that Lu was a poet and that I would work harder so that their words would match the image I had of them as a teen who processes the world through their powerful words. So I got better, with the help of real poetic writers like Alison and NoNieqa Ramos. And, luckily, Lu’s poetry got a lot better!

Do you have a daily writing habit? And how do you stay grounded in the value of this work during challenging times?

Alex Villasante: In addition to working for Boyds Mills, I’m also the co-founder of the Latinx Kidlit Book Festival and the Latinx Storytellers Conference, and oh yeah, I’m doing school visits and promoting my books!

That means that I don’t always have time for daily writing. I try to carve out times in the mornings or on weekends, but again, that doesn’t always work out. What works for me is keeping my mind on my story. Meaning, it’s always percolating away in the back of my brain, even if I haven’t written a word in a while. Washing dishes, in the shower, going for walks, stuck in traffic, these are all times in daily life when I visit my story world and check in on how it’s doing. Where have I left my main character? What are they worried about?

I liken it to checking in on a witch’s cauldron that’s bubbling away in my mind. I uncover the lid and peek inside. Sometimes, the things that have developed while my conscious mind is elsewhere are really surprising!

I have an arts background so, in addition to my witch-adjacent story brewing, I do a lot of visual and drawing exercises to keep my work in progress rolling along. If I get stuck in a scene, I’ll draw a map of the story location or a portrait of the main character. Or, I’ll start a Pinterest board of images that remind me of the look and feel of the story. Not necessarily the aesthetic mood boards that you see on Instagram; this is more of a visual guide post for how I’m feeling about the work in progress and where I think the story might go.

Another way I’ve been able to keep my creativity flowing despite difficult times is that I’ve discovered writing short. I’ve contributed to five YA short story anthologies in the last five years and each one has given me a push into a new genre and allowed me to experiment.

Cynsations Notes

Alison Green Myers is a passionate educator, novelist, and speaker. As the program director at Boyds Mills, Alison supports storytellers throughout their careers. Alison is the author of the Schneider Family Award-winning A Bird Will Soar, and the Junior Library Guild recognized This Way to Happy. A National Writing Project fellow and Bethel Woods’ teaching artist, Alison is always happy in the company of curious kids! Alison lives in the woods of Pennsylvania with two extraordinary humans and their two dear dogs.

Alexandra Villasante has always loved telling stories—though not always with words. She has a BFA in Painting and an MA in Combined Media (that’s art school speak for making work out of anything). Born in New Jersey to immigrant parents, Alex has the privilege of dreaming in both English and Spanish.

Her latest novel, Fireblooms, received a starred review from Publishers Weekly and praise from Kirkus Reviews and Booklist. It was selected as one of NPR’s Books We Love 2025. Alex’s debut YA novel, The Grief Keeper, was a Fall 2019 Junior Library Guild Gold Selection and winner of the 2020 Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ Children’s Literature/Young Adult Fiction. She’s a contributor several young adult short story anthologies including, Our Shadows Have Claws, Relit: 16 Latinx Remixes of Classic Stories and We Mostly Come Out at Night: 15 Queer Tales of Monsters Angels and Other Creatures. Alex is a co-founder of the Latinx Kidlit Book Festival and of the LKBF Latinx Storytellers Conference. When she’s not writing, planning or painting, Alex works for Boyds Mills.

Mitu Malhotra holds an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from the Vermont College of Fine Arts. A finalist for the 2024 Lee & Low New Visions Award and the winner of the 2021 Katherine Paterson Prize for Literature for Young Adults and Children, Mitu has won scholarships from the Highlights Foundation, Tin House, and a writing residency at the Djerassi Program. Her short story “Toxins” is part of ELA curriculum.

Her writing has appeared in Hunger Mountain, Thin Air Magazine and elsewhere. In previous avatars, Mitu was a textile and fashion designer, and she has taught in India, the Middle East and the U.S. Mitu is an active member of CBIG: Children’s Book Illustrators Group, NYC and NJ SCBWI. She currently interns with Cynthia Leitich Smith (author-curator of Heartdrum, a Native-focused imprint of HarperCollins) and interviews authors for the blog Cynsations and reviews books for Kirkus Reviews. In September 2025, her banner design was selected by the Kidlit 411 Blog website.

The post Authors Interview: Alison Green Myers & Alexandra Villasante on Sophomore Novels appeared first on Cynthia Leitich Smith.

by AJ Eversole

Today I get to chat with author Karina Iceberg. Her debut picture book,  A Good Hide, illustrated by Natasha Donovan (Heartdrum, 2026), is about what happens after the moose hunt, when community comes together to celebrate the sustenance the animal provides. In a starred review, Kirkus Reviews had the following to say, “Simple yet utterly joyous—a testament to Indigenous identity that exudes gratitude.”

Karina grew up in Fairbanks, Alaska and is a member of the Aleut and Alutiiq Nations.

What inspired you to write about the moose hide tanning process for a picture book? Was there a specific moment or memory that made you think, this needs to be a story?

It was a specific moment! During my MFA program in Writing for Children and Young Adults, I was trying out poetry for several months with the incredible author Cory McCarthy serving as my advisor! When I turned in A Good Hide then, as a poem, Cory’s response was, “I wish my kid had a picture book like this – they would love it!” Which was the first piece of writing I’d ever submitted that had the response, and now I get to share it with kids! What a dream!

The book emphasizes community and the work of many hands rather than focusing on a single protagonist. Can you talk about why you chose this collective approach to storytelling?

I wanted to honor some of the tribal beliefs that are instilled with the process of traditions being handed down by one generation to another to another. It doesn’t happen all in one day or to just one person. It happens layer by layer, like this story. We learn these values of respect, stewardship, interdependence, and reverence as a community.

You describe the tanning process with both technical detail and celebration. How did you balance the educational aspects with keeping the narrative engaging for young readers?

As I said, it began as a poem, and really, it remains a poem! My hope is that the heart of the book shows us that the real educational part comes from learning in our community and invites readers to do so. It’s not a guide to tanning, though of course many technical elements are there; it’s the joy of recognizing the adventure and the spirit weaving through the joy, the fun, the gratitude, and the process of how we come together with something larger than ourselves.

You worked with Heartdrum, an imprint specifically focused on Indigenous voices. What was that experience like, and how did having Cynthia Leitich Smith as author-curator influence the development of your book?

Cynthia is a joy to work with and an incredible mentor. All of those who know her, both in the children’s literature sphere and in the Indigenous writing community, know that she is a force to be reckoned with! Luckily for all of us, she uses that awe-inspiring energy to lift up everyone around her, and to lead with such joy, kindness, and respect. She is the embodiment of the Native auntie, always looking out for everyone, but also wise and all-knowing!

The moose hide tanning process involves so many specific steps—from stretching and scraping to making brain stew. How did you decide which details to include in a picture book format, and were there any parts of the process that were particularly challenging to convey to young readers?

Young readers are so brilliant. I think they are capable of enjoying so much! I tried to focus less on the idea of a how-to guide, and more on the flow of the tactile experience and the movement, both for young readers but for all of us to experience what a workout the process is!

As someone who is Aleut/Alutiiq, how did you approach representing an intertribal Native Alaskan community in this story? What conversations or considerations shaped that choice?

I grew up in Fairbanks, Alaska, with a big intertribal community of Alaska Native peoples, so I think it was showing a lot of what I’ve known growing up. I was also inspired by the larger Turtle Island population, where I’m inspired by the strength of our intertribal community.

What do you hope young Native readers take away from seeing their communities’ traditional practices celebrated in a picture book?

In my MFA program, we often referenced a now-famous paper by educator Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop called Mirrors, Windows, and Sliding Glass Doors; Bishop’s thesis is that kids need to be able to see someone like themselves (mirrors) in books, see others views (windows), and be able to step into another’s perspective (sliding glass doors). I hope that my book can be some of all three for our Native community, and beyond it.

For readers unfamiliar with subsistence lifestyles and traditional practices, what do you most want them to understand about this way of life?

Hmm, this is tricky! I most hope to instill curiosity: What’s here that’s new and different to me? And also, what is familiar to me? This is a book filled with love, family, and belonging, elements of life that we all want and hope for, no matter what our ancestry is. I hope that is a safe place for readers to explore and be curious about the things they recognize and what they can learn.

What advice would you give to other Indigenous writers working on their debut books, especially those wanting to share traditional knowledge and cultural practices authentically?

In the author’s note of A Good Hide, I talk about the myriad ways of Indigenous knowing, and how lucky we are to have such an intricate tapestry of individual threads, old and new, each with something to offer and some still being woven in.

I hope that anyone who has a story to tell, tries and tries, and tries again to tell it because we are here waiting to hold your story.

Now that your debut is out in the world, are there other traditional practices, stories, or aspects of Aleut/Alutiiq life that you’re hoping to explore in future books? What stories are you dreaming of telling next?

There are so many things I’m inspired by in our community! There are so many forms of art I feel in awe to see: beading, the language revitalization programs, drumming, singing, filmmaking, tattooing. The whole world feels like a garden of ideas. I’m working on capturing glimpses here and there, of ways we can try to frame that beauty for all to see and celebrate.

Cynsational Notes:

Karina Iceberg holds an MFA in writing for children and young adults from the Vermont College of Fine Arts. Her debut picture book, A Good Hide, was published by Heartdrum in January 2026. Her work has appeared in two anthologies: Legendary Frybread Drive-In, edited by Cynthia Leitich Smith (Heartdrum 2025), and Onward: Climate Fiction to Inspire Hope, edited by Nora Shalaway Carpenter (Charlesbridge, 2026). Karina is a member of the Aleut (Unangax) and Alutiiq (Sugpiaq) Nations of Alaska.

 A.J. Eversole grew up in rural Oklahoma where the wide open spaces fed her imagination and the stories waiting to be told. An enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation, she works across adult and children’s literature to explore themes of cultural reclamation, resilience, and the ways ancestral knowledge persists in modern worlds. Her stories appear in Legendary Frybread Drive-In (Heartdrum/HarperCollins), Beyond the Glittering World (Torrey House Press), and Never Whistle At Night Part II (Vintage, 2026). When not writing, she reports on Native Voices in literature for Cynsations News Website. Find her on socials @ajeversole.

The post Author Interview: Karina Iceberg Celebrates Community Connection in A Good Hide appeared first on Cynthia Leitich Smith.

By AJ Eversole

For more than twenty five years, Cynthia Leitich Smith has shaped the landscape of children’s and young adult literature through her own award winning books and through her tireless advocacy for Native voices. I’ve had the privilege of seeing that impact up close as a contributor to Legendary Frybread Drive-In (Heartdrum, 2025), an anthology that exemplifies Cynthia’s deep belief in community, mentorship, and making space at the table. She is, in every sense, the epitome of an auntie: generous, attentive, fiercely supportive, encouraging, and always thinking about who’s coming up next.

That Legendary Frybread Drive-In went on to win the Michael L. Printz Award–one of the highest honors in young adult literature–feels especially meaningful. The book itself is so emblematic of Cynthia’s life’s work of bringing people together and creating shared space that is distinctly Indigenous. From the enduring legacy of Jingle Dancer (HarperCollins, 2000) to her recent return to picture books celebrating extended Native family networks, Cynthia’s work honors Native communities by showcasing the everyday lives of Indigenous children. In this conversation, she reflects on how her storytelling has evolved and why she remains hopeful about the future of Native children’s publishing.

Your debut picture book Jingle Dancer (HarperCollins, 2000) has become a modern classic. Over two decades later, you’re returning to picture books celebrating Native family structures. How has your approach to picture book storytelling evolved?

Jingle Dancer (HarperCollins, 2000; Heartdrum, 2021) reflects a powwow dance tradition passed down between women and girls intergenerationally and within a Muscogee-Ojibwe family. It’s a healing book, as indicated by the presence of an Elder character whose “legs don’t work so good anymore.” It’s interesting to note that when I was writing it, Ojibwe friends cautioned me to make that traditional aspect a wink to Native readers rather than spell it out. I believe now such context would’ve been more clearly integrated, but back then, there wasn’t a lot of trust in children’s books due to a long history of misrepresentation in the body of literature. Of course I honored their wishes.

I’m profoundly grateful for the support the book has received over the years and how it was able to raise awareness of Indigenous writing styles, middle-class Native people, and diversity within Indigenous Country. The book remains noteworthy for the inclusion of the character Cousin Elizabeth, a Black Indigenous attorney (at a time when few professional women were depicted at the picture book level), and Native powwow dancers, who were light-, medium, and dark-skinned. It was important to me that any child of the reflected tribes would feel reflected in that way.

The research and thoughtfulness that illustration team Cornelius Van Wright and Ying-Hwa Hu put into their artwork was extraordinary and remains a guiding light.

My initial return to Native-focused picture book writing was last year’s Firefly Season (Heartdrum, 2025), tenderly illustrated by Kate Gardiner, which is a celebration of chosen sisterhood between two young neighbor girls, one who’s Muscogee and one who’s Indian American. HERE COME THE AUNTIES! (Heartdrum, 2026) is about the role of aunties, in all their forms, in the life of a child whose mama is expecting a new baby. I could not be more thrilled with Aphelandra’s adorable illustrations. Cute as her art is—and wow, it is!—she also does a lovely job of conveying emotion, relationships, a sense of place, and energy. All three of these books highlight extended family ties and integrate the natural world in part to show the passing of time. So, some hallmarks of my writing have endured.

That said, my picture book approach is looser, more conversational, more playful and confident. I’m less worried about how to write the story and more about what I want to say. I’ve always been experimental when it comes to craft—across age markets, genres, and formats. I dearly love short-form fiction for young readers. In fact, short stories are my favorite venue for trying something new. I also adore illustrated narratives and believe that children’s-YA literature is underappreciated for what we do to build visual literacy. It’s an honor to be creating picture books again and to be connecting them to our youngest readers.

Full disclosure for my fellow writers out there: I also wrote two picture books, both published during the in-between years, which are now out of print. They were humorous and great fun, but largely fell victim to the recession, the departure of the in-house editor, and a corporate reorganization.

Many, perhaps most, long-time authors experience career ebbs and flows. Much that happens in the publishing industry is beyond our control. But books are largely ephemeral, some for the moment, a rare few for all time, and most in between. That’s how it’s always been, and if you embrace the journey, the next writing day, you’ll find there are always new stories.

As author-curator of Heartdrum, you’ve championed countless Native voices. What’s it like to step back into the author only role for this picture book? How does your curatorial work inform your own writing?

I’ve been writing steadily since I became the author-curator of Heartdrum. For many years, I had the privilege of teaching in the MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults program at Vermont College of Fine Arts. I loved the work and learned so much from my students and fellow faculty members, people like Marion Dane Bauer, Norma Fox Mazer, Amy King, Rita-Williams Garcia, Kekla Magoon, and An Na. Meanwhile, we were thin on mid-career Indigenous authors with a broad, big-house publishing history who also could act as proven mentors. If Heartdrum was to come into being, it made a certain amount of sense for me to be the one to help launch it.

Fortunately, a number of Native authors are advancing in their careers with each passing year. My goal is make myself replaceable in terms of intertribal creative-community leadership, and we’re well on our way. Anyway, much of the time that went to teaching at VCFA now goes to Heartdrum and the WNDB Native Children’s-YA Writing Intensive, sponsored by the imprint.

Setting aside the books that came to market at about the time of the imprint’s first list and my two anthologies, it was a pleasure to work on the humorous middle grade novel On A Wing and A Tear for Heartdrum as well as my latest YA novel, Harvest House (Candlewick, 2024), and The Blue Stars MG graphic novel series, co-authored by Kekla Magoon and illustrated by Molly Murakami, both for Candlewick Press. Currently, I’m focused on a YA novel that apparently wants to be a suspense thriller.

As to how being a curator informs by writing, I’m especially aware of how each book fits into the larger conversation of Native voices. For example, when I found out that my friend Laurie Goodluck also had an auntie-themed picture book in the works, I touched base with her to confirm that the books would be sufficiently different and they are. Hers is more of a concept book, and mine is more of a storybook. No doubt they’ll share readers and certainly aunties deserve all the love, but if our visions had been so similar that they’d compete in the marketplace, I would’ve shelved mine.

It’s important to me that Native books grow our body of literature in thoughtful ways and that we give each other’s contributions room to breathe. Part of that is artistic and part of it is pragmatic. While there’s a need for read-alikes and reading ladders (the next stretch book, per Dr. Teri Lesesne), we should be careful not to cannibalize each other’s sales.

A library working within a budget or bookstore buyer has to consider variety on their shelves. That doesn’t mean we can have only, say, one book that touches on a topic as important as aunties or, on a more dire note, the crisis of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, and Two-Spirit Relatives. But it strongly suggests that each of those titles should bring a different style and fresh perspective. Every book must earn its place. 

It wasn’t so long ago that it was nearly impossible to sell more than a very few Indigenous bylines. Fewer than five. Maybe two or three from the big trade publishers. I’m not taking our recent successes as a guarantee so much as a progress to be appreciated and nurtured.

However, I’m more precise and less precious in my approach. I believe that young readers deserve the very best quality that we have to offer them, but I’m also constantly reminded of the phenomenal excellence of everyone I work with in publishing. I trust in the skills, experience, and ideas that each team member contributes. It’s by no means all or even mostly about me, especially with a picture book wherein art and design does so much of the heavy lifting.

You have Here Come the Grandmas! coming in 2027, also illustrated by Aphelandra. Why was it important to create this series celebrating different roles in Native family networks?

I love your optimism! Right now, Here Come the Aunties! and Here Come the Grandmas! are companion books, but if they’re well received, I’d consider writing more along those lines. On a personal level, I had wonderfully supportive parents growing up, but also benefitted from my extended family and community. Young Native readers don’t get to see those sorts of relationships celebrated often enough. Because of the inherent brevity of a picture book manuscript, writers tend to frame them with fewer characters. It takes thought to figure out how to craft a large-cast picture book that flows seamlessly. Beyond that, I wanted to show mainstream readers another way of being beyond the razor focus on traditional nuclear families. Many kids are raised by single parents or working parents, and needs may go unaddressed. It’s so much harder now with people living far from their loved ones. With books like Here Come the Aunties!!, those relationships are vicariously accessible on the page, if not in real life.

Can you talk about the main character?

River is expecting a new sibling, which is an exciting time for a family but also one that will bring a lot of changes. More attention will be directed to the new arrival. Aunties will help fill in the gaps and continue to offer support and cheer on a day-to-day basis.

From Jingle Dancer to curating Heartdrum to Here Come the Aunties, you’ve spent over 25 years advocating for authentic Native representation in children’s literature. What gives you hope about where Native children’s publishing is headed?

You give me hope, AJ. The Indigenous apprentices like Alaina E. Roberts and Emmy Her Many Horses, new voices like Karina Iceberg and Christine Hartman Derr, rising stars like Cheryl Isaacs and Malia Maunakea, headliners like Byron Graves and Angeline Boulley, creative community leaders like Traci Sorell, Stacy Wells, Andrea Page, and Leslie Stall Widener, and so do those who’ve been doing the work all along. (Obviously, I could joyfully go on with regard to each category, but in the interests of space, I’m highlighting.)

A shoutout to Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve, who’s in her early 90s, and the author of one of my favorite 2025 new releases, THE SUMMER OF THE BONE HORSES (Harry N. Abrams, 2025). A shout out to Lee & Low for being an early leader in publishing Native voices, to David A. Robertson and his new imprint, Swift Water Books at Penguin Random House Canada. A shout out to Native-owned presses like Thomas and Elizabeth-Albert Peacock’s Black Bears and Blueberries Publishing and to tribally-owned houses like the Pechanga Band of Indians’ Great Oak Press. A shout out to Dr. Debbie Reese and Dr. Jean Mendoza for their own nonfiction children’s writing and for their scholarship and advocacy at American Indians in Children’s Literature as well as to the National Indian Education Association and to the American Indian Literary Association. A shout out to We Need Diverse Books, especially Heartdrum’s fairy godmother Ellen Oh, to the booksellers, teachers, and librarians who supported multiculturalism and then diversity and are pushing back against book bans, and a shout out to the entire Black children’s-YA literature community, without whose leadership none of what we have done would be possible. It gives me hope that our intertribal creative community is living our values on the page and behind our bylines, that we’re coming together to collaborate on books like LEGENDARY FRYBREAD DRIVE-IN, and that we’re forming deep mentorships, friendships, kinship. It gives me hope that readers are embracing our stories and that they’re being celebrated both in and outside the classroom. It gives me hope when a young reader says about any Native titles, “This is one of the best books I’ve ever read.”

Cynsational Notes

Cynthia Leitich Smith is a bestselling, acclaimed author of books for all ages, including Here Come the Aunties!, Firefly Season, Jingle Dancer, Indian Shoes, On a Wing and a Tear, Sisters of the Neversea, the Blue Stars series (with Kekla Magoon), Rain Is Not My Indian Name, Harvest House, and Hearts Unbroken, which won the American Indian Youth Literature Award. Cynthia is also the anthologist of Ancestor Approved: Intertribal Stories for Kids and Legendary Frybread Drive-In: Intertribal Stories, which won the Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature, and the American Indian Youth Literature Award. She has been honored with the American Library Association’s Children’s Literature Lecture Award and has been named the NSK Neustadt Laureate. She is the author-curator of Heartdrum, a Native-focused imprint at HarperCollins Children’s Books, and served as the Katherine Paterson Endowed Chair on the faculty of the MFA program in Writing for Children and Young Adults at Vermont College of Fine Arts. Cynthia is a citizen of the Muscogee Nation and lives in Denton, Texas.

Cynthia Leitich Smith’s Printz Win: ‘Genuinely Gobsmacked’ by Sally Lodge from Publishers Weekly. PEEK: “Smith was determined to include new as well as experienced writers in the anthology.”

Printz Award Celebrates Indigenous Authors, Stories with 2026 Winner ‘Legendary Frybread Drive-In’ by Kara Yorio from School Library Journal. PEEK: “The original concept came from Smith: ‘These would be stories in the shared liminal space. The book would be threading the needle for teens of all ages in a way that you do in conversation when you bring all the cousins of a family together. We would be leaning into stories that often aren’t shared about people like us. [Stories] that may seem universal, like a first romance or a grief story or sibling rivalry, only putting them in our context, our cultures, our world views.’”

A.J. Eversole grew up in rural Oklahoma where the wide open spaces fed her imagination and the stories waiting to be told. An enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation, she works across adult and children’s literature to explore themes of cultural reclamation, resilience, and the ways ancestral knowledge persists in modern worlds. Her stories appear in Legendary Frybread Drive-In (Heartdrum/HarperCollins), Beyond the Glittering World (Torrey House Press), and Never Whistle At Night Part II (Vintage, 2026). When not writing, she reports on Native Voices in literature for Cynsations News Website. Find her on socials @ajeversole.    

The post Author Interview: Cynthia Leitich Smith – The Most Awesomest Auntie appeared first on Cynthia Leitich Smith.

By Suma Subramaniam

I met Pooja Makhijani a few years ago through an online South Asian children’s book group, and we’ve stayed friends ever since. Pooja is an incredible baker. She taught me how to make naan. When I heard about her forthcoming picture book celebrating bread, I couldn’t wait to cheer for her and share it with the world.

Your newest picture book, Bread Is Love, illustrated by Lavanya Naidu (Roaring Book Press, 2026), is about a mother and her two children who share a weekly ritual of baking bread, celebrating the process as a labor of love, patience, and family togetherness, even when the results aren’t perfect. What was your inspiration for this story?

Bread baking entered my life during a difficult divorce a decade ago. What began as a coping mechanism grew into a grounding ritual, one that calmed my anxiety, deepened my connections with others, offered weekly sustenance, and nourished me creatively as both an artist and a photographer.

Picture books, meanwhile, have always been a love! My first, Mama’s Saris, illustrated by Elena Gomez (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 2007), found somewhat unexpected success in the aughts, but at the time I struggled to build momentum or a clear path forward in the field. The landscape for diverse—or ‘multicultural,’ as they were called then—books was so, so different.

During the pandemic, I took stock of the creative work I felt called to do and chose to return, deliberately, to picture books. Telling a story about bread and honoring everything it had come to represent for me, like science and self-care to sustenance and sharing, felt like the most natural place to begin (again).

In the author’s note, you write about the many mishaps you’ve had with over-proofed boules, gummy sandwich loaves, and burned baguettes, and how to continue to learn by just showing up. I think there’s a hidden writing lesson in there, too. How long did it take for you to write this book, and how did you find joy in the process?

In late 2021, I drafted a manuscript centered on our family practice of “baking in” the new year. Each New Year’s Eve, we choose a new recipe and aim, ambitiously, to pull the finished bake from the oven at the exact stroke of midnight. (We are not always successful; as Mama says in Bread Is Love, “Sometimes bread is moody.”) That treat becomes our breakfast on Jan. 1. My agent felt the story didn’t quite land—and, in retrospect, she was right!— so I set it aside and went out on submission with a different manuscript in 2022. A few months later, we heard from Connie Hsu, vice president and executive editorial director at Macmillan. She passed on the project we’d sent, but followed up with a question of her own: Would I be interested in writing a picture book about bread?

Connie’s email wasn’t totally out of the blue: She and I had met years earlier, when she was an editorial assistant at Little, Brown. We stayed loosely connected through social media, where she’d watched my bread-baking journey unfold.

The answer was an easy yes. In the earlier New Year’s manuscript, I’d already mapped out the mechanics of making a loaf—gathering ingredients, mixing, fermenting, shaping, and more—and much of that language carried into the new draft. With time (several months of rewriting) and Connie’s visionary editing, what I added were the elements the first version lacked: patience, adaptability, and attention as core baking skills; the way repetition teaches care, resilience, and growth; how the act of baking cultivates hope; and how bread, in its many forms, links us across cultures.

I’ve learned that the surest way to protect joy in writing is to untangle it from the machinery of publishing. The pleasure has to come from having made something beautiful, not from external validation; you will be a miserable artist otherwise!

Writing is playful and alive—even sacred. I love that feeling that you get when you know you’ve written something good, a sense that you tapped into something bigger or more otherworldly than you. I chase that buzz every time I sit down to write.

Lavanya Naidu’s illustrations in the book are stunning. How did your text change with the illustration pass?

Just stunning! Her illustrations are playful, wonderful, nostalgia-full. I appreciate her command of light and shadow. Bread Is Love unfolds over the course of a single weekend, and through shifts in color and directional light she conveys both emotional nuance and the quiet passage of time. The resulting mood is soft and meditative.

The text changed little after we received Lavanya’s initial sketches. However, when I wrote the manuscript, I envisioned a mother baking with her school-aged daughter; as writers, we often draw from our own lives. Lavanya, however, introduced a third character: a toddler sibling, buoyant and mischievous, with her own parallel bread-making adventure. Her expressions are wonderfully alive. Through this character, Lavanya wove in a wordless narrative layer—one I never could have anticipated and one that deepens the story immeasurably.

This book has a STEAM theme encouraging young readers to think about baking bread as science, math, and art. You embedded so many ways for readers to fall in love with baking. How much research did you have to do to write this book?

Not ‘research’ in the traditional sense. I’d baked hundreds of loaves by the time I sat down to write the book, and the science, math, and artistry of bread baking had been absorbed gradually, through practice. Each loaf taught me something about temperature or ratios or scoring, and I tapped into those lived lessons and experiences as I wrote. The knowledge came from doing, rather than from looking anything up, which feels true to the spirit of the book itself!

What do you want readers to take away from Bread Is Love?

I hope this book inspires readers to invent traditions of their own—birthday bread, Focaccia Fridays, or something entirely unexpected. I wrote Bread Is Love to remind readers to find joy in the process and not in the product, especially in an era in which artificial intelligence can spit out “art” in seconds. I want readers to embrace the chaos and the unexpected (and the magic!) as they learn and experiment in whatever their art form is—poetry, pottery, gardening. Life is messy and wildly imperfect, which is exactly what makes it worth living.

How do you balance being a parent, working a day job, and pursuing writing, and what advice would you give to others trying to get published while juggling similar responsibilities?

My first bit of advice would be to reject the myths of artistic meritocracy. You don’t have to be ‘struggling’ to be a great artist. Artists don’t work in solitude. Having a day job doesn’t make you a lesser artist. You have to live in the world!

I’d also encourage women writers to reject expectations that they can ‘do it all.’ My friend Olivia Campbell, the New York Times bestselling author of Women in White Coats: How the First Women Doctors Changed the World of Medicine (Park Row) and Sisters in Science: How Four Women Physicists Escaped Nazi Germany and Made Scientific History (Park Row), wrote a damning essay about balancing art and parenting, and specifically mothering, in LitHub during the height of the pandemic.

“Women writers have always been up against the expectation that they can do it all, all at once,” she writes. “Male authors are lauded as disciplined recluses for closing themselves away to write; women are praised for juggling writing and family simultaneously. But you can’t have it both ways. Either writing is a laborious, worthwhile craft requiring time alone or it’s not, no matter the writer’s gender. ‘How does she do it all?’ society muses while staring at the bedraggled mom-author clutching her book in one hand and her baby in the other. By having no work-life balance or boundaries. Losing sleep. Hiding in pantries. Getting increasingly angry by the lack of support. By nearly drowning.” Like many of the writers who Olivia quotes, I too write in my car, often in short bursts, always on my phone (Google Docs app for the win).

Lastly, I’d remind writers that for everything there is a season, and different times of life are meant for different things. Balance, in this framing, isn’t about equal hours. It’s about listening to what this season is asking of you; all are part of the same life.

What are you working on next?

Together for Mama, illustrated by Nadia Alam (Rocky Pond Books), a picture book about a girl whose extended family jumps into action to provide support when the girl’s mother begins to suffer from postpartum depression, will be out in June. Aunties, illustrated by Ruchi Mhasane (Roaring Brook) and scheduled for spring 2027, is a celebration of all of the aunties in our lives. Both books are, in different ways, about the collective care of children and families. I’m also working on a middle-grade novel (she says with trepidation)!

Cynsational Notes

Pooja Makhijani is a writer, mother, and baker. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR, Teen Vogue, and Bon Appétit among others. She lives in Central New Jersey with her daughter, the inspiration for Bread Is Love.

Suma Subramaniam is a recruiter by day and children’s book author by night. She writes picture books, middle grade, chapter books, and poetry. Her works include Crystal Kite Award winner Namaste Is A Greeting and ILA Notable My Name Is Long As A River, and the V. Malar series. When not recruiting or writing, Suma volunteers with SCBWI and We Need Diverse Books or blogs about children’s literature. Learn more at https://sumasubramaniam.com.

The post Author Interview: Bread, Love, and the Art of Showing Up with Pooja Makhijani appeared first on Cynthia Leitich Smith.