She’s the award-winning author with the little blue-hair (sometimes green! OOPS!) Ame Dyckman is short, loud, mischievous, and often dresses like her book characters. It took a few weeks to finish the first draft, a few weeks more to polish it up for submission by my Super Agent, Scott Treimel, and then my amazing editor Mary-Kate Gaudet and Little, Brown team said, “We love it! LET’S DO THIS!”Īme Dyckman reads and writes when she SHOULD be sleeping. Paddy’s Day revelers raising the wrist, I had the beginnings of READ THE BOOK, LEMMINGS! “Says here, lemmings don’t jump off cliffs.”Īnd there we had it! Thanks to a bunch of rowdy St. I banged out the first few lines right there:įoxy found a quiet spot to read his book about lemmings. I was thinking about it from the new perspective of an Arctic fox-I like foxes, and illustrator Zachariah OHora likes foxes, and I wanted to do a third book with him-having to make sure the lemmings (celebrators) didn’t jump (fall) off a cliff (barstool) before they could go back to reading (WRITING!) their book that said lemmings don’t jump off cliffs! Only this time, I wasn’t thinking about it from the lemmings’ perspective. Patrick’s Day, watching festive folks-in MY Secret Writing Spot!-who’d already had one too many festive beverages wobbling on their comfy barstools made me think of lemmings on a cliff again. Then I’d read that line, laugh myself silly, and never get any further.īut that St. But for the longest time all I’d written was the line: I knew I had to write the book that explained lemmings DON’T jump off cliffs.įor the past generation. I found out when I was a “grown-up,” and I was indignant. Turns out, THOSE SCENES WERE FAKED! The lemmings were “encouraged” over the cliff. In some of the most famous scenes, lemmings inexplicably fling themselves off cliffs into the icy Arctic waters below! (Arctic hamsters, if you will.) I saw the documentary when I was little. Some of you might remember an old nature documentary featuring lemmings, those little rodents who live in the Arctic. There was a story idea I wanted to tinker with. However, on that day in March, 2015, my normally quiet Secret Writing Spot… wasn’t.ĪND THERE WERE INEBRIATED PEOPLE IN MY SECRET WRITING SPOT! It was a near-perfect Secret Writing Spot. Nice staff who’d let you nurse a beverage forever. I know that sounds funny! But you see, there was a normally quiet bar in Pennsylvania I used to write in once a week or so.Ĭomfy stools. Just between us, I started writing READ THE BOOK, LEMMINGS!… Hi, Kathy! THANKS for having me! Hi, Kathy’s “Writing and Illustrating” readers! So, you wanna know the Book Journey for READ THE BOOK, LEMMINGS!? And until Foxy patiently teaches his lemmings to read the book, he can’t return to reading it, either! They’re too busy jumping off.Īfter a chilly third rescue, exasperated Foxy and grumbly polar bear Captain PB realize their naughty nautical crew isn’t being stubborn: The lemmings (Jumper, Me Too, and Ditto) can’t read. Cliff, First Mate Foxy reads an interesting fact: “Lemmings don’t jump off cliffs.” But Foxy can’t get the lemmings on the Cliff to read his book, too. The team behind the New York Times bestselling Wolfie the Bunny and Horrible Bear! is back with with new Arctic characters in this hilarious learning-to-read adventure!Īboard the S.S. Just let me know the other things you did to share the good news, so I can put in the right amount of tickets in my basket for you. Reblog, tweet, or talk about it on Facebook with a link and you will get additional chances to win. All you have to do to get in the running is to leave a comment. Congratulations to Ame Dyckmanon for her new picture book – READ THE BOOK, LEMMINGS launching November 7th.
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