Some people collect stamps. Some people collect coins. Some people collect art. And Jerome? Jerome collected words. Are you a word person? Do you ever pause in your reading just to savor a particular turn of phrase, or marvel at the way words are spelled and sounded out? Have you ever gotten goosebumps during a […]

Everything about The Purloining of Prince Oleomargarine is odd. It’s odd that the two authors, Mark Twain and Philip Stead, never met and in fact are separated by some seventy years. It’s odd that the oddly-named title character doesn’t appear until the last third of the book. The structure is odd—the chapters bounce back and […]

“Living in the moment.” What does that phrase mean to you? Is it something that we give as an excuse for risky, unwise behavior? Or an intentional unwillingness to consider a hard road ahead? I think a “living in the moment” attitude sometimes gets a bad reputation, but perhaps that’s because we have forgotten the […]

The Uncorker of Ocean Bottles has a job of the utmost importance. It is his task to open any bottle found at sea and make sure that the message is delivered. This description from the flap of today’s featured picture book, The Uncorker of Ocean Bottles, written by Michelle Cuevas and illustrated by Erin Stead, […]