My kids and I love this series! Highly recommended!

My February #kidlit recommendations are here!

Yesterday, five-year-old Liam and his dad Adrian were released from Dilley detention center. I picked them up last night and escorted them back to Minnesota this morning. Liam is now home. With his hat and his backpack.

Kids deserve to stay safe. When they are marching peacefully with their parents. When they are at school. When they are trying to learn and love and get through the day and do the right thing. In every country in the world. No matter their background, language, or beliefs. Kids deserve to stay safe.

I’m not sure how you could reasonably spend LESS than four hours discussing Hexwood. I had to read it at least 4 times before I understood the gist of what was happening!

Oh, Catherine. Thank you for making me laugh so hard my face hurt. youtu.be/fKWP-PcEwyY?...

Have been out shoveling and checking on neighbors, and forgot the ALA awards are being announced! CONGRATS TO ALL—I need to catch up on the details! Thank you for your beautiful stories.

Go watch Taskmaster! It will take your mind off all the garbage in this world.

Kare 11 local news just read, in full, this statement from Michael and Susan Pretti, the parents of Alex Pretti. "Please get the truth out about our son."

Join Light up the Night tonight, not a mass gathering in any one place but to get people out of their houses with candles and flashlights in every neighborhood at 7:00. Please spread the word.

“I’m not mad at you.” “Are you okay?” These are the final words of the Minnesotans murdered by ICE in the past two weeks. Please reflect on their kindness, humanity, and grace in the days and weeks and months to come. These people were the best of us.

The NBA is cancelling games because a fascist secret federal police are executing Americans in the street; school systems, businesses, and museums are closing because of the threats from the federal government. This is as grand an emergency as we have had in modern American life.

You cannot murder and then be indifferent to it. You cannot murder and then lie about it. You cannot murder and then relish it, brag about it, use it to sow further harm. A society that permits and encourages this violence is not a society any of us can accept.

As clergy pray, arrests begin

Singing

Carbon monoxide deaths spike during power outages. Many times, this is due to portable generators being placed too close to people's homes or run indoors. Make sure you have working carbon monoxide alarms. Run your generator outdoors, at least 20ft away from your home.

What to you do if everyone says the market for your book is "tough" right now? Whatever you want. #booksky www.agentsandbooks.com/what-if-edit...

I’m currently coping with All This by writing a terrible first draft in bed, watching The Traitors, and going head to head in a Garmin steps competition with a user named Feral who I think might be a cat. No, it’s not really helping.

My daughter's school in Richfield, MN (adjacent to Minneapolis) is closing tomorrow due of out-of-control federal agents. Fourth graders spent the week building walls of snow at recess to protect their classmates from ICE. This isn't about immigration enforcement, it's about terror.

Whenever we visit my parents, my 9-year-old stays up late reading the old FoxTrot and Calvin & Hobbes anthologies that my brother and I collected. They absolutely hold up!

I appreciate this thread. When I’m wearing my review hat and sorting through advance copies and publicity pitches, I spend 80% of the time muttering to myself, “This is all the same book.” The 20% of books that are NOT the same book are the ones I’m actually excited to read.

I had a huge amount of fun compiling this list of reading recommendations from smart and savvy creators of books for kids! lithub.com/the-most-ant... #kidlit

is there some way I can quickly unlearn all of history so as to feel better about recent events

Well, if it’s 31 December, it’s... yes, of course: 172nd anniversary of the dinner Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins, creator of the Crystal Palace dinosaurs, gave for 21 leading academics and other VIPs inside the Iguanodon

I would love to see a practical book about how to improve our media literacy! There is a great kids’ book called KILLER UNDERWEAR INVASION that I use to teach my kids about identifying fake news, bias, and scams, but kids are not the only people who need this info! We could all use some help tbh.

This is a good reminder for those of us making best of lists that if yours looks like everyone else's, it's a sign that you need to read more widely. There is so much great work that often goes unnoticed because it doesn't get a splashy marketing campaign.

MAGAZINER: How many veterans have you deported? NOEM: We haven't deported veterans MAGAZINER: We are now joined on Zoom by a combat veteran you deported to Korea

At the gym just now, the sniffling exerciser on the machine next to me gave a mighty sneeze, and it GOT ON MY HAND. Please, if you are not feeling well, stay home if you can, or at least mask up! I will be scrubbing like Lady Macbeth for the rest of the day if you need me…

@carolinecarlson.bsky.social shines a light on 10 great children’s books you might have missed in 2025.

I have kind of a complex friendship situation and could use some advice... lmk if you think this relationship is over for good?

My kids were restless and cranky last night at bedtime. I stomped downstairs, retrieved The Lives of Christopher Chant from the shelf, brought it up to kids, started to read. Instant silence & awe. Cannot wait to share the rest of this book with them (and then listen to the podcast!).

@carolinecarlson.bsky.social shares 10 new children’s books that take readers from the cosmos all the way back to Earth.

On my way to my mammogram, wondering if you’ve scheduled your mammogram yet? Today is a great day to do that! 🩷

INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE SECOND INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE OVER ZOOM TO MEET MORE OF THE TEAM UNFORTUNATELY, YOU HAVE NOT BEEN SUCCESSFUL ON THIS OCCASION, BUT WE HOPE YOU'LL APPLY FOR FUTURE POSITIONS WITH THE VAMPIRE

Also, and hear me out, the world of The Lord of the Rings would be a miserable place for most of us to live, and we should not be trying to emulate it.

I absolutely loved chatting with brilliant author Uma Krishnaswami about how I wrote THE TINKERERS. Find the whole craft-y chat on Uma’s blog here: www.umakrishnaswami.com/blog/process...

🧵It has been clear for years that a key difference between past instances of book banning and the present censorship cataclysm is that the banning happening now targets not only books, but librarianship as a profession and libraries as an institution. 1/4

The Stressed-Out Hero’s Journey: Writing About Anxiety in Middle Grade Fantasy, a post by Caroline Carlson What would you do if you found a magical device that could turn back time—but only by five minutes? teenlibrariantoolbox.com/2025/10/13/t... @tltkaren.bsky.social @carolinecarlson.bsky.social

Tonight at White Whale Bookstore in Pittsburgh, come celebrate the launch of THE TINKERERS, my new novel for young (and not-so-young) readers! whitewhalebookstore.com/events/48225

repost this if an editor has ever saved you from yourself

Q&A with Caroline Carlson about her new middle grade novel, THE TINKERERS. tinyurl.com/y7t4472k @carolinecarlson.bsky.social

CONFESSIONS FROM THE GROUP CHAT is about a popular girl who ✨spectacularly✨ implodes her friend group, only for them to humiliate her by posting every brutal text she ever wrote about other students--including the ones about the unpopular boy she has just begun to befriend . . . and fall for. 10/21

THE TINKERERS is on sale today! I’m so proud of this weird, magical, cozy, mini-time-travel book, and I really hope you enjoy it. www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/787553... #kidlit #mglit

Oh no, this is really sad news. Thinking of all the B&T employees and everyone in publishing, library jobs, and bookselling who will be negatively affected.

The nice folks at @candlewickpress.bsky.social are giving away 10 finished copies of THE TINKERERS over on Goodreads, and there’s still a day or so left to enter. Here’s the link if you need it! www.goodreads.com/giveaway/sho... #kidlit #giveaway

Yes, I do have a book coming out in 6 days, but I am currently on an hourly eye drop regimen, so forget the author thing; I am now a full-time Eye Drop Application Professional. Please stay tuned for interesting eye drop facts.

The Unexpected Lives of Ordinary Girls is out today! This pro-immigrant, pro-freedom to read #middlegrade #historical is inspired by the life of my grandmother, and I'm so happy to share it with you all. www.jandersoncoats.com/the-unexpect...

Dermatologists often recommend nicotinamide — a form of Vitamin B3 — following skin cancer. A study of nearly 34,000 veterans finds this supplement reduces the risk of skin cancer recurrence.

I had a question about trends in marmalade exports (don’t ask). My husband offered to ask ChatGPT. I told him that was like if a guy broke into our house and stole all of my stuff, and then my husband tracked the thief down a few days later and asked him what he knew about marmalade.