Not only did Review #30 of the fun kids book blog Bookgie Woogie give our book a great review (conducted by a Dad and his two kids Lily and Isaac), discussing what a concrete poem is all about, but the review included fan art inspired by the book!

See for yourself. Fantastic. The first illustration is by Lily, the bottom one is by Isaac. These remind me of the artwork in one of my favorite kids books, Kitten Nell.

Thanks guys.

xm

A Curious Collection of Cats has been awarded an Honor from the Pennsylvania Center for the Book: The Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award.

From their site: “The national Lee Bennett Hopkins Award for Children’s Poetry shall be granted annually to an anthology of poetry or a single volume poem published for children in the previous calendar year (as per copyright) by a living American poet or anthologist. The Lee Bennett Hopkins Award for Children’s Poetry shall be administered by The Pennsylvania Center for the Book and Penn State University Libraries.”

Exciting!

xm

I got a nice big package in the mail from Laura at Tricycle press this weekend. Inside was the catalog from The Association of Booksellers for Children, who have featured A Curious Collection of Cats in their Picture Books section!

“A Curious Collection of Cats
Betsy Franco, Illustrated by Michael Wertz

Kids will love the way the words become part of the visual story in this playful collection of concrete poems about cats. From acrobat-flipping to toilet-bowl-sipping, couch-scratching to dog-catching, words and pictures blend together to create a funny celebration of all things feline. Ages 8-12.”

By the way, ABC supports IndieBound! Find out more at http://www.indiebound.org. Support your local indie bookseller!

xm

A while back, the kind folks at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast did a Q & A with your truly about all things Curious and Cat-like: Behold! These are kind (and smart) folks, and their blog is definitely worth a look-see.

http://blaine.org/sevenimpossiblethings/?p=1611

xm

• A Curious Collection of Cats on Google Books.

• A CCC reviewed on Poetry for Children.

• A CCC featured on Young Adult Books Central.

• Lots of people love CCC on Good Reads!

xm

The deep rhythmic retch
of the tabby’s gags and coughs:
A nasty hairball

xm

Here’s why:

“For the child that desperately wants a cat, the child who already has a cat, and the child who has never even seen a cat, this is a great book. Basically that’s just a long and complicated way of saying that this book is for everyone. As funny and frisky as a kitty itself, this is one book of poetry you are not going to want to miss. An amazing debut and an amazing collection. Everything you need to know, you’ll learn from these cats.”

Wow.

x michael

A Curious Collection of Cats arrived on the scene in 2009 (edited by the most excellent Abigail Samoun and published by our friends at Tricycle Press), and we’ve been having a ball promoting this book. We thought we’d collect all the promotional materials in one place: here you go! Hey, if you haven’t picked up a copy of the book yet, here’s your chance. We’ll be posting images and video from our work and appearances, as well as how-tos and our favorite cat stories. We’d love to hear what you think!

If you’d like a sneak preview of the images from the book, you can head over to Michael’s Flickr site.

Here’s a little bit of video from the book opening at Diesel Books in Oakland. Andy and Michael decided to put some of the cat poems from the book to song, and perform them for the opening:

x michael