I'm not sure we're presenting ourselves as real role models. I don't think literature has ever been a real place for role models.

I read The Stinky Cheese Man as an adult. I missed that book when I was a kid. I grew up mostly with books bought at yard sales, picture books from the fifties to 1975, which is really a lucky thing.

Every Librarian is a highly trained agent. An expert in intelligence, counterintelligence, Boolean searching, and hand-to-hand combat.

I think the trick of writing a good picture book manuscript is to leave that space for illustration. An illustrated novel can do the same thing.

Pranking exposes the truth that underneath this appearance of order is joy, laughter, and disorder.

Not only is a good prank harmless, but, like a good story, it reveals an essential truth that would otherwise be hidden.

We put authors on such a pedestal, and it's a moment that humanizes the whole thing, and lends an absurdity to what otherwise is a "please sit with your hands on your lap" kind of event.