The Lerner Blog

A round-up of interesting internets! How can the D.C Council think cutting school librarians is a good idea? (Washington Post) Rubber Duck Volcano –  “A Plinian eruption using a 32-gallon trash can filled with water, 100 rubber ducks, and some liquid nitrogen.” (BoingBoing) Why are kids’ e-book sales surging? Partly because adults are reading them. […]Read more "Digital Potpourri 5/15"

The Sendak interview excerpt above, from NPR Books, was making the rounds on Facebook last week and, for me, sums up Sendak’s delightful ability to find logic in absurdity. It also somehow reminded me of one of my favorite lines from Notorious, a classic Hitchcock film from 1946. At one point, secret agent Alicia Huberman […]Read more "Maurice Sendak (1928-2012)"

It’s no secret around here that I have a soft spot for the field of linguistics. While, sadly, editorial work doesn’t have me poring over sound spectrograms to analyze the formants of human speech, we do get to enjoy working with words on a daily basis and working with other editors who just happen to […]Read more "Neologisms"

I recently purchased a new camera, and so to learn how to use it, I’ve been taking a lot of pictures. This is fun, but it does mean there is a backlog of images on the memory card to review. Many things can be learned in the review process: what’s working, what’s not, necessary next […]Read more "Anonymity and Shoes—and Photography"

If you haven’t already, you have nothing better to do today than to read this (frustratingly, you may have to manually click to page 80).  Read more "Ida played her wonder horn"

Original photo credit Jennifer ball/biography.com Despite his intense hatred of eBooks, Maurice Sendak has a special place in this blogger’s heart. “Where the Wild Things Are”, and “The Nutshell Library” (“Chicken Soup With Rice”, in particular) are two of my favorite books from childhood. Mr. Sendak passed away Tuesday from complications of a recent stroke. […]Read more "Maurice Sendak, Author of Where the Wild Things Are, Dead at 83"

Well, once again here I am with more to tell you about a holiday just after it happened! I think the foods of Cinco de Mayo are absolutely delicious, but until I worked on Marco’s Cinco de Mayo, I knew very little about the history behind the holiday. The event commemorated on Cinco de Mayo […]Read more "Cinco de Mayo"

Congratulations to Joan! She is the winner of our new Martial Arts Sports Zone series! Joan, please send your mailing address to publicityinfo@lernerbooks.com and we will get your new books in the mail. Attention all Beatles fans! This week one lucky Lerner fan will win Death of a Dreamer: The Assassination of John Lennon. New York, December 8, […]Read more "Free Book Friday!"

I just returned from the annual International Reading Association conference, and wow. In spite of so much negative media lately around testing and reports of low teacher morale, I have to note that when you meet with these educators face-to-face, those reports seem off-kilter.  What did I hear at IRA? Lots of talk about the […]Read more "The Word from IRA"