Author Lui Sit shares her experiences and how they impacted her writing of Land of the Last Wildcat. If you told me, thirty odd years ago, when dressed as a koala doing acrobatics under the baking Australian sun, that the experience would culminate in my writing a children’s middle-grade book with underlying themes of conservation […]
This year’s National Share–a–Story Month theme, “Changing the World, One Book at a Time”, celebrates the power of storytelling to inspire environmental awareness, hope, and action. In February, Guppy Books and the Federation of Children’s Book Groups launched Stories for Change – a short story writing competition for children aged 7-12, inspired by the themes […]
We have an enchanting blog post today from Tamsin Rosewell about being the illustrator for The Seamaiden’s Odyssey. Imagine if… Imagination is one of the most powerful forces on earth. As William Blake put it: ‘What is now known was once only imagined’. The human imagination is the driving force of huge things: it the […]
Emily Gravett’s captivating books about Pete the Badger and his woodland friends introduce children to the importance of environmental issues in a gentle, hopeful, entertaining way. Tidy shows the need for wild spaces. Too Much Stuff looks at over-consumption. The latest in the series, Bothered By Bugs, explores the importance of insects to the ecosystems […]
The Federation of Children’s Book Groups is excited to be partnering with Sweet Cherry Publishing to launch a special competition inspired by the environmental theme of National Share-a-Story Month 2025. Blue’s Planet by Lucy McRobert has been selected for our booklist partly because it’s a rollickingly good story with appealing illustrations. We also liked the […]
National Share-a-Story Month: ahead of its time Great stories are the greater for sharing! Humans have known this since the birth of language although it’s easy to forget that in our global but fragmented world. The start of National Share-a-Story month Almost 50 years ago the Federation of Children’s Book Groups launched National Tell-A-Story week: […]
Author, Graci Kim, writes a fascinating blog for us today about the power of dreams and her book, Dreamslinger! When I was a kid, I had this recurring dream where a ghost would fly through the glass wall of our house and take something from my gut. It didn’t hurt, but in the dream, my […]
The CLiPPA Shortlist was recently announced and we are thrilled to welcome one of the shortlisted poets to the blog to share information about his experience with poetry! Poetry has been part of my life since I was very young. Shortly after our mum left, when I was eight, our dad became our primary […]
We were recently given the opportunity to read Tull Suwannakit’s beautiful book, Higher Ground. We had a few questions to ask Tull, please see the answers below. How long did the book take you to create? The entire book has taken me around 7 years to create, the longest I have ever undertaken on any […]
Board books are the first ones shared with our youngest readers and we have a blog today about the challenges and wonder of writing board books from author, Sumana Seeboruth. As a girl, I could sit for hours writing stories, imagining adventures for my characters to pursue. Back then, my protagonists were often older than […]
