CHILDREN’S LITERACY EVENT in BUFFALO

WNY Children’s Book Expo

NOVEMBER 9, 2019 10 am – 3 pm Buffalo Niagara Convention Center

KidsLit Week NYS-approved CTLE Workshop 38 authors/illustrators & thousands of children

About the WNY Children’s Book Expo

Buffalo’s premier literary event for children is composed of two parts: KidsLit Week, and EXPO Saturday and is FREE TO THE PUBLIC.

During KidsLit Week, internationally acclaimed authors will visit area schools, libraries, museums and other cultural venues. The visits, scheduled Monday, 11/4/19 – Friday, 11/8/19, aim at inspiring a love of books in students grades pre-K through middle school.

EXPO Saturday on Saturday November 9, 2019 is a day-long showcase of new and beloved books written for kids. Here, authors interact directly with children through readings, book-signings, presentations and demonstrations. Educators too have a niche at EXPO Saturday. A four-hour, NYS-approved CTLE Workshop is held annually before the Expo opens to the public. Here, registered educators have the opportunity to interact with a panel of authors/illustrators featured at this year’s Expo as well as current trends in education. We hosted 127 educators from across Western New York and Southern Ontario, Canada. The workshop received excellent reviews from both the educators and the panel participants.

Contact Info

Monkey See, Monkey Do … Children’s Bookstore

9060 Main St, Clarence

Read to Succeed Buffalo

92 Pearl Street, Buffalo

Medaille College

18 Agassiz Circle, Buffalo

+1 (716) 204.8417

books@monkeysread.com

4 – 9 November 2019

Buffalo Niagara Convention Center

153 Franklin Street

Buffalo, NY 14202

From Last Year

In 2018, we welcomed over 130 educators to our professional development workshop and over 3,000 people to the Expo at the Buffalo Niagara Convention Center from 10 am – 3 pm. Click on the arrows to advance through the 2018 photo gallery.

Our 2019 Authors & Illustrators

We are thrilled to welcome the following authors and illustrators to the 2018 EXPO! Please check back often as the author listing will be updated as changes are known.

Jerry Craft

Author

Jerry Craft is an author and illustrator who has worked on numerous picture books, graphic novels, and middle grade novels. His newest book, New Kid, is a middle grade graphic novel that has earned four starred reviews, including one from Booklist Magazine that called it "Possibly one of the most important graphic novels of the year." Kirkus Reviews called it "An engrossing, humorous, and vitally important graphic novel that should be required reading in every middle school in America." Jerry's books have been Junior Library Guild selections, and he has won five African American Literary Awards. He is the creator of Mama's Boyz, an award-winning comic strip that was distributed by King Features Syndicate from 1995 - 2013. He is a co-founder and co-producer of the Schomburg's Annual Black Comic Book Festival which has drawn close to 50,000 fans since its inception in 2013. Jerry was born in Harlem and grew up in nearby Washington Heights. He is a graduate of The Fieldston School and received his B.F.A. from the School of Visual Arts. Visit Jerry's website at www.jerrycraft.com

Veera Hiranandani

Author

Veera Hiranandani is the author of The Night Diary (Kokila), which received the 2019 Newbery Honor Award, the 2019 Walter Dean Myers Honor Award and the 2018 Malka Penn Award for Human Rights in Children's Literature. The Night Diary has been featured on NPR's Weekend Edition, is a New York Times Editor's Choice Pick, and was chosen as a 2018 Best Children's Book of the Year byThe New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR, Amazon, School Library Journal, and Kirkus Rewiews, among others. She is also the author of The Whole Story of Half a Girl (Yearling), which was named a Sydney Taylor Notable Book and a South Asian Book Award Finalist, and the chapter book series, Phoebe G. Green (Grosset & Dunlap). She earned her MFA in fiction writing at Sarah Lawrence College. A former book editor at Simon & Schuster, she now teaches creative writing at Sarah Lawrence College's Writing Institute and is working on her next novel.

Amy Crockford

Author

Amy is an American Sign Language professor, teaching in several colleges across Western New York. One of her inspirations for writing is to celebrate deaf awareness. She earned her M.Ed in Student Affairs Administration from the University of Buffalo and her B.A. in Communication from the Rochester Institute of Technology. She lives with her husband Dan, two boys Dylan and Noah, and her dog Shiloh in a farmhouse in rural Western New York.

Stephanie Parwulski

Author

Stephanie Parwulski, a Buffalo, NY native, is the author of the children’s book, Beatrice and the Sunflower Gift. She received a B.A. in English from Daemen College in May 2016, further nurturing her love for literature and composition. She enjoys writing poems, children’s books, and short stories and contributes articles about her anxiety to a website called The Mighty to raise awareness about mental health. She also loves spending time with her family and friends and working as a preschool teacher aide. Her second book, Gloria’s Hope Tree, will be published by Belle Isle Books in summer 2019.

Lulu Delacre

Author

Three-time Pura Belpré Award honoree Lulu Delacre has been writing and illustrating children's books since 1980. The New York Times Bestselling artist was born and raised in Puerto Rico to Argentinean parents. Delacre says her Latino heritage and her life experiences inform her work. Her 39 titles include Arroz con Leche: Popular Songs and Rhymes from Latin America, a Horn Book Fanfare Book in print for almost 30 years. Her bilingual picture book ¡Olinguito, de la A a la Z! Descubriendo el bosque nublado; Olinguito, from A to Z! Unveiling the Cloud Forest and her story collection Us, in Progress: Short Stories About Young Latinos have received multiple starred reviews and awards. Her latest work is the art of Turning Pages by Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor. Delacre has lectured internationally and served as a juror for the National Book Awards. She has exhibited at The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art; The Original Art Show at the Society of Illustrators in New York; the Museum of Art of Puerto Rico and the Zimmerli Art Museum; among other venues. Most recently Reading is Fundamental has honored her with a Champion of Children’s Literacy Award. For more visit her at www.luludelacre.com.

Shelley Rotner

Author

Shelley Rotner is the author and photo-illustrator of 50 award-winning children’s books. Her books are mostly about diversity and the environment. It is her hope that they will lead children and their parents and/or teachers to engage in conversations and inspire observations and curiosity about the world they live in. Some of her recent books include: Colors, Hello Autumn! Grow! Raise! Catch! How We Get Our Food, Whose Eye am I?, Families, Body Actions, Body Bones and All Kinds of Friends. Some of her awards and acknowledgements include:University of Maine Correll Book Award for Excellence in Early Childhood Informational text- Families.- “packed with photographs of families of many different sizes, shapes, ages and colors.” Grow, Raise, Catch! Subaru nonfiction finalist and Green Earth Book Award. Garbage Helps our Gardens Grow- Green Earth Book Award- Hello, Spring! Starred Kirkus review: “Among the vibrant plants and baby animalsare children whose appearances are diverse in skin, hair, and eye color but alike in their exuberance at being outdoors in the spring.”

Brian Yanish

Author

Brian Yanish has held many jobs from working with the Muppets to special effects mold-maker, bail-bondsman, comedian and product designer. He is the creator of ScrapKins, a Recycled Arts program that inspires kids to see creative potential in everyday junk and has presented workshops at schools around the world and appeared on Sesame Street. He lives in Rochester, New York.

Heather Lynn Harris

Author and Illustrator

Heather Lynn Harris made her publishing debut by re-illustrating The Swing by Robert Louis Stevenson, and then wrote and illustrated Clover and the Shooting Star. In October 2018, she was awarded silver in the children’s pre-school category of the Moonbeam Awards. Educated at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, California, she is on a quest to share lost literary treasures with today’s young readers by bringing them to life with her illustrations. Her hope is that the power of wonder is stirred in all who read her books. She lives in Orchard Park, New York, with her husband and three children.

Nick Bruel

Author

Nick Bruel is the author and illustrator of the New York Times Bestselling series "Bad Kitty" books, among others. He lives in Pleasantville, NY with his wife Carina, their daughter Izzy, a grumpy old man shaped like a brown, one-eyed dachshund, and a sometimes-good, sometimes-bad cat named Rose.

Debbi Michiko Florence

Author

Debbi Michiko Florence is the author of children’s books. Her chapter book series Jasmine Toguchi, about a spunky Japanese American 8-year-old girl, has been chosen as Junior Library Guild selections and placed on select “best of” lists. Debbi is also the author of the two early chapter book series Dorothy and Toto and My Furry Foster Family. She has spoken on panels and taught workshops at conferences and book festivals, and presented at numerous schools. Follow Debbie at her website: http://debbimichikoflorence.com/.

Brigette Atlas-Callahan and Kristin Madej-Warham

Authors

Brigette and Kristin are passionate early-childhood literacy educators and love their hometown, Buffalo!

Adam Lehrhaupt

Author

Adam Lehrhaupt is the award-winning picture book author of Warning: Do Not Open This Book! (2013), Please: Open This Book! (2015), Chicken in Space (A six book HarperCollins series continuing with Chicken in School June 20, 2017), and I Will Not Eat You ( 2016), as well as the upcoming I Don’t Draw, I Color (2017), Wordplay (Scholastic, July 25, 2017), This is a Good Story (September 12, 2017), Idea Jar (Spring 2018) and several more he is not yet at liberty to discuss. He has traveled to six continents, performed on Broadway, and lived on a communal farm. Adam firmly believes that opening a book is a good thing, even if there are monkeys in it. He currently lives in the suburbs of Philadelphia, PA, with his wife, two sons, and two bizarre dogs. Follow Adam on Twitter, Instagram and Google+ @Lehrhaupt for the occasional brilliant thought or picture, and at adamlehrhaupt.com.

KidsLit Week 2019

4 – 8 Nov 2019

KidsLit Week is where we bring the authors and illustrators to the schools in the Western New York region! Schools can contact Kim at Monkey See, Monkey Do … Children’s Bookstore for more information on booking an author or illustrator for your school.

EXPO DAY

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2019

Come to the Buffalo Niagara Convention Center with the kids in your life for an exciting day of authors, illustrators, presentations, reading corners, crafts, characters and fun! FREE ADMISSION. Books for sale.