I Can Read Books

Syd Hoff has given much pleasure to children everywhere as the author and illustrator of numerous children’s books, including the favorite I Can Read books Sammy the Seal, The Horse in Harry’s Room, and the Danny and the Dinosaur books. Born and raised in New York City, he studied at the National Academy of Design. His cartoons were a regular feature in the New Yorker after he sold his first cartoon to that magazine at the age of eighteen. His work also appeared in many other magazines, including Esquire and the Saturday Evening Post, and in a nationally syndicated daily feature.

Arnold Lobel (1933–1987) was the award-winning author and illustrator of many beloved children’s books, including the classic I Can Read books about Frog and Toad, and the Caldecott Medal­–winning Fables.

Lillian Hoban was the author and illustrator of many favorite I Can Read books, including Joe and Betsy the Dinosaur, Silly Tilly’s Thanksgiving, and a series about Arthur the Chimpanzee. She also illustrated many picture books, including the classic stories about Frances.

Emily Arnold McCully received the Caldecott Medal for Mirette on the High Wire. The illustrator of more than 40 books for young readers, she has a lifelong interest in history and feminist issues. She divides her time between Chatham, New York, and New York City.

John Himmelman is the author and illustrator of more than seventy-five books for children, including the Bujitsu Bunny books, The Cow Said Meow, Chickens to the Rescue, and Duck to the Rescue. As a martial arts student and instructor, he has a lot of experience with the human version of bunjitsu. He lives in Connecticut with his artist wife, Betsy.

Bio to come

Valeri Gorbachev has illustrated more than forty books for children, including his own Big Little Elephant and Skunk’s Spring Surprise by Lesléa Newman. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Barbara Bottner is the author of more than 36 books. She lives in Los Angeles.

Else Holmelund Minarik first introduced readers to her timeless character in the classic Little Bear. Publication of this book, with illustrations by Maurice Sendak, launched the I Can Read series. This much-loved author continues to write stories for children at her home in North Carolina.

Peggy Parish was born and grew up in Manning, South Carolina. Before moving to New York City, she taught school in the Panhandle country and in coal-mining areas. Her first job in New York City was with the Girl Scouts, and she now teaches the third grade at the Dalton School in Manhattan. Miss Parish is the author of several other books for children, including the popular Let’s Be Indians.

Alice Low is the author of the New York Times best-seller The Witch Who Was Afraid of Witches, a book that has been adapted into a musical and a short animated film. She has also edited several anthologies and written many children’s books and poems. Alice Low lives in Briarcliff Manor, New York.

For 30 years, Jack Prelutsky’s inventive poems have inspired legions of children to fall in love with poetry. His outrageously silly poems have tickled even the most stubborn funny bones, while his darker verses have spooked countless late-night readers. His award-winning books include Tyrannosaurus Was a Beast, The Dragons Are Singing Tonight, The Random House Book of Poetry for Children, and The Beauty of the Beast.

Lee Bennett Hopkins is an award-winning author and poet. He has published more than 100 books of poetry, including City I Love and Behind the Museum Door. He lives in Cape Coral, Florida.

Katherine Paterson is one of the world’s most celebrated and beloved authors. Among her many awards are two Newberys and two National Book Awards, and she was recently named a “Living Legend” by the Library of Congress. She has been published in more than 22 languages in a variety of formats, from picture books to historical novels.

Shirley Mozelle is also the author of Zack’s Alligator and Zack’s Alligator Goes to School, as well as several critically acclaimed picture books. She lives in Tampa, Florida.

Ann Turner is the author of many novels, picture books, and poetry collections for young children. Her novel A Hunter Comes Home was an ALA Notable Children’s Book, and her first picture book, Dakota Dugout, received the same honor. Among her other books are Abe Lincoln Remembers, an NCSS/CBC Notable Children’s Trade Book in the Field of Social Studies, and Through Moon and Stars and Night Skies, a Reading Rainbow selection. Ms. Turner lives in Williamsburg, Massachusetts, with her family.

Nola Buck (the pen name of Laura Godwin) is the author of many well-loved children’s books, including Christmas in the Manger. With Ann M. Martin she also coauthored The Doll People, The Runaway Dolls, and The Meanest Doll in the World. She now lives in New York City but grew up in Alberta, Canada, and has fond Christmas Eve memories of watching Eeyore, the family donkey, play a part in the live Christmas pageant in her hometown.

Avi is the author of more than seventy books for children and young adults, including the 2003 Newbery medal winner Crispin: The Cross of Lead. He has won two Newbery Honors and many other awards for his fiction. He lives with his family in Denver, Colorado.

Sarah Weeks was born and raised in the United States. She is the author of numerous award-winning novels, including Save Me a Seat with Gita Varadarajan, Honey, Pie, So B. It, Oggie Cooder, and Oggie Cooder: Party Animal. She lives in New York and teaches in the MFA program at the New School in New York City. She can be found on the Web at www.sarahweeks.com.

I am a former classroom teacher and reading specialist, and I love to write about the elementary school world. I visit schools to encourage teachers and children to look at the stories all around them because I believe these are the most important ones of all. I’ve written poems and stories about pencils, bathrooms, book bags, sharing time, recess, the school bus, gym, and all the dramas that go on in classrooms everywhere. My school programs are an interactive celebration of this world, and I bring many funny props with me. One of them is a six foot inflatable pig from OUR PRINCIPAL PROMISED TO KISS A PIG. The kids are 100% involved when it is time for the principal to kiss Hamlet, the pig! I love to see the spirit of childhood in our schools, and my program is a celebration of this spirit!

Judyann Ackerman Grant and her family have raised numerous chickens as well as assorted cats, dogs, rabbits, birds, and goldfish on their farm in upstate New York. Ms. Grant was inspired to write Chicken Said, “Cluck!” by watching chickens scratch in the new-turned garden every spring. This is her first book.

Joanne Rocklin is the author of many books for children, including The Five Lives of Our Cat Zook, which won the Golden Kite Award, and Love, Penelope, which was an NCIBA Golden Poppy Book Award winner.

Alyssa Satin Capucilli is the award-winning creator and author of the Katy Duck series and the bestselling Biscuit series, which has sold over twenty-four million copies. A dancer as well as a writer, she lives with her family in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York.

Jean Craighead George wrote over one hundred books for children and young adults. Her novel Julie of the Wolves won the Newbery Medal in 1973, and she received a 1960 Newbery Honor for My Side of the Mountain. She continued to write acclaimed picture books that celebrate the natural world. Her other books with Wendell Minor include The Wolves Are Back; Luck; Everglades; Arctic Son; Morning, Noon, and Night; and Galapagos George.

Margery Cuyler has written more than 50 books, most recently The Little Fire Truck, The Little Ice Cream Truck, and Bonaparte Falls Apart. When asked why she writes children’s books, she answers that it’s a privilege to write for the best people in the whole world. In addition, she says she was raised by children, being the youngest of nine children. Her earlier titles include the classics Skeleton Hiccups and 100th Day Worries. She and her husband, the parents of two grown sons, live in Lawrenceville, NJ.

Judy Sierra, who holds a Ph.D. in folklore, puts a hilarious new spin on some of the most familiar storybook characters in her two books starring B.B. Wolf. She is the author of other highly acclaimed picture books such as Wild About Books, a New York Times #1 Bestseller, Born to Read, and The Sleepy Little Alphabet.

Liz Marsham began her storytelling career as an editor for DC Comics and Disney Publishing. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband, a cat who thinks she is a princess, and a cat who thinks he is a dog.

Maurice Sendak was born June 10, 1928, in Brooklyn, NY. He received the 1964 Caldecott Medal for Where the Wild Things Are. In 1970 he received the international Hans Christian Andersen Medal for illustration, and he remains the only American ever awarded this honor. In 1983, Sendak received the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award from the American Library Association, given in recognition of his entire body of work. He also received a 1996 National Medal of Arts in recognition of his contribution of arts in America. He illustrated over 80 books. He died May 8, 2012.

Fritz Siebel was born in Vienna and now lives in New York City with his family. He is well known for his pictures in Cat and Dog; David and the Giant; and Tell Me Some More . . ., all Harper I Can Read Books. Among the other books he has illustrated are A Fly Went By and Who Took the Farmer’s Hat?

Jane Manning is the illustrator of dozens of children’s books, including the I Can Read books Baa-Choo! by Sarah Weeks and the New York Times bestselling The Witch Who Was Afraid of Witches by Alice Low. She lives in Connecticut.

Mrs. Udry’s first book, A Tree Is Nice, illustrated by Marc Simont, won the 1957 Caldecott Award for the most distinguished American picture book. Mrs. Udry is also the author of Glenda, Let’s Be Enemies (also illustrated by Maurice Sendak), Mary Ann’s Mud Day, The Mean Mouse and Other Mean Stories, and Thump and Plunk.

Bestselling author Geoffrey Hayes has written and illustrated over forty children’s books, including the extremely popular series of early readers Otto and Uncle Tooth, the classic Bear by Himself, the Patrick Bear books, and When the Wind Blew by Caldecott Medal-winning author Margaret Wise Brown.

Megan Lloyd has illustrated more than forty books for children, including The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Linda Williams, Thanksgiving at the Tappletons’ by Eileen Spinelli, and The Mixed-Up Rooster by Pamela Duncan Edwards. She lives with her husband on a farm in Pennsylvania, where she raises sheep, chickens, and cows. Some of the rabbits from her vegetable garden have even been kind enough to allow Ms. Lloyd to sketch them as models for this book.

Bruce Degen illustrated all the Jesse Bear books. He was the author and illustrator of Jamberry, and the illustrator of the acclaimed Magic School Bus series. He taught courses on art and the writing and illustrating of children’s books to children and adults. Mr. Degen lived with his wife and their two sons in Connecticut in a renovated farmhouse with ducks on the pond, bats in the barn, and a family tree that Jesse Bear himself would love to climb.

James Watts is a published author and illustrator of children’s and young adult books. He also illustrated Zack’s Alligator and Zack’s Alligator Goes to School. He lives in San Francisco.

Sue Truesdell has illustrated many children’s books over her two-decade career, including Betsy Byars’s I Can Read! series about the adventuresome Golly Sisters and Chicken Said, “Cluck!” by Judyann Ackerman Grant, winner of a Theodor Seuss Geisel Honor in 2009.

Jennifer Plecas is an illustrator, designer, and author who has illustrated over thirty books for children, including the beloved Good Night, Good Knight books. She also lives in Kansas City with her family.

Nadine Bernard Westcott has illustrated more than 100 books for young readers, including I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly, Big Picnic, Down by the Bay, and Peanut Butter and Jelly, the latter of which she also wrote. Nadine lives in Nantucket, Massachusetts, and divides her time between illustrating and designing her own line of fabrics.

Ashley Wolff is a children’s book author and illustrator in San Francisco, CA. She has created over 40 books.

Laura Rankin is the illustrator of Rabbit Ears, Swan Harbor, and The Handmade Alphabet. She lives in York Beach, Maine.

Steve Bjorkman is the celebrated illustrator of numerous books for children, including Jeff Foxworthy’s New York Times bestsellering picture books DIRT ON MY SHIRT and SILLY STREET, as well as EMIILY’S EVERYDAY MANNERS by Cindy Post Senning and Peggy Post, and Jay McGraw’s LIFE STRATEGIES FOR DEALING WITH BULLIES. He lives with his wife in California. SPLIT! SPLAT! is his first book with Scholastic Press.

Robert Neubecker is an award-winning illustrator whose work has appeared in The New York Times, Time Magazine, Newsweek, The Chicago Tribune, The Wall Street Journal, and just about every magazine in print. He helped create the look of Slate.com and was on staff there from 1996-2015. Robert won the prestigious 2004 Key Award for Best Comedy Poster for the movie Sideways. Robert’s first book for children, “Wow! City!” won the ALA Notable Book Award for 2005. Over thirty books have followed including: “Every Corner Needs a Monster” with Jean Reidy, 2013 Colorado Book Award winner “I got Two Dogs” with John Lithgow, “Air Show!” with Treat Williams, and “Sophie Peterman Tells the Truth” with Sarah Weeks.” In 2012, Robert’s “What Little Boys are made of” won a Kirkus Review Best Books of the Year award. Spring, 2017: “Keith Haring: The Boy Who Just Kept Drawing” by Kay Haring, Keith’s sister. Summer 2017: “King Louie’s Shoes” with DJ Steinberg was released from Beach Lane Books. Fall 2017: Robert’s “Fall is for School,” Winter 2017: “Space Boy and the Snow Monster” by Dian Curtis Regan from Boyd’s Mill Press. Spring 2019: “King Louis’ Shoes” by Sarah Aronson Spring 2019: “Just Like Rube Goldberg” by Sarah Aronson Fall 2019: “Little Smokey” Robert has taught at School of Visual Arts in New York, BYU, and the University of Utah. An ex-New Yorker, Robert now lives on the side of Iron Mountain in Park City, Utah. He is married with two teenage kids and lives in the woods at the edge of town with a whole bunch of dogs and cats. Moose come around and eat his garden.

Paul Meisel, who holds a master’s degree in graphic design from Yale University, has illustrated many books for children, some of which he also wrote. Two of his I Like to Read(R) books, See Me Run and I See a Cat, are Theodor Seuss Geisel Award Honor books. His Nature Diary series began with My Awesome Summer by P. Mantis, a finalist for the AAAS/Subaru SB&F Prize for Excellence in Science Books and a Virginia Reader’s Choice. The Schmutzy Family, written by Marilyn Rosenberg and illustrated by Paul Meisel, was a National Jewish Book Award Finalist. Paul lives in Connecticut.

Barry Gott has illustrated numerous children’s books as well as written and illustrated greeting cards.