A comic for brand new readers that will excite the imagination and warm the heart! 

When Penelope the Fox drops her heart into the sea, she’s swept off on a perilous journey, dodging sharks and royal cat- guards until a cartwheeling chicken leads her to the land of lost things. And as readers follow Penelope (and her heart!), they will learn what is truly precious. Brazilian-British artist Thereza Rowe brings her bold, graphic, and imaginative illustrations to the storybook format for the very first time in a stunning visual narrative that works as a gorgeous stand-alone picture book while incorporating all the best qualities of a level one TOON Book. Hearts is a perfect entry-level comic picture book for brand-new readers, with a message that readers of any age will appreciate. This tale of heartache, friendship, and adventure will dazzle readers with its exotic settings and animals, and warm the hearts of parents and children alike.

Hearts  by Thereza Rowe Price: $12.95 Page: 32 Dimensions: 9" x 6" Available January 7, 2014 ISBN 978-1-935179-59-7  TOON Level: 1 Lexile Level: BR  Guided Reading Level: G Reading Recovery Level: 11-12

Praise for Thereza Rowe

About the Author Thereza Rowe is a Brazilian-British artist living in London, England. She says: "My favorite tools are color, shape, and imagination. I daydream about magic clocks, flying fish, enchanted forests—the list goes on. I work alone in the studio, so my cats, Flash and her sister Kitty, have always been my best companions (we talk to each other in five languages: English, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, and...Meow-purr.) When Flash went to cat's heaven, it was like half of my heart had been ripped out. As I was wallowing in my own misery, suddenly came a wee voice: 'Whatever happens, never lose your heart. Everything is going to be just fine.' That's when I started doodling Penelope—I think of myself as a fox—sitting on a cliff, and I wondered what would happen if I really lost my heart..."

Learn more about Thereza at TherezaRowe.com, Instagram, and Twitter

— Order your copy of Hearts today --
The perfect Valentine's gift for someone you know!

Françoise Mouly - Photo by Sarah Shatz

The decision from Françoise Mouly: Thank you to everyone for reading and giving thought to Neil Gaiman's compelling lecture on the importance of reading and libraries for young people (if you missed it, click here!). I so enjoyed reading through your comments and hearing about your favorite quotes and why.  Special congratulations to Helena Juhasz who submitted this post and is winner of the TOON Books New Releases Hardcover Gift Set: Helena's Favorite Neil Gaiman Quote: "I do not believe that all books will or should migrate onto screens: as Douglas Adams once pointed out to me, over twenty years before the kindle turned up, a physical book is like a shark ... sharks are better at being sharks than anything else is."  Helena's Reason Why: This quote is spot on!! There's nothing like the tactile experience of reading a dog eared book on the beach, blowing sand out from between the pages, closely inspecting the printed lines and imagining how the artist created the illustrations, delicately propping up the book in the bathtub or curling up with the book while under the covers - or under the stars (with a flashlight). They require no power other than our dedicated attention. Long live the book!

More good news...Everyone is a winner!

If you submitted a comment to the TOON's Gaiman Blog Post by November 18th, TOON Books would like to send you a complimentary copy of Liniers' The Big Wet Balloon. In the spirit of Gaiman's lecture, we ask that if you don't have a child at your own home who can enjoy the book, please consider donating it to your local library or to a holiday gift drive for children in need.

Gaiman Delivers Compelling Lecture on the Importance of Reading and Libraries for Young People

Here at TOON Books our mission is to create quality comics that children will want to read. Last week Neil Gaiman, the award-winning author of short fiction, novels, comics, and graphic novels, delivered a "spot on" lecture at The Reading Agency. He reminded us in no uncertain terms of our obligation to young readers: "We have an obligation not to bore our readers, but to make them need to turn the pages. One of the best cures for a reluctant reader, after all, is a tale they cannot stop themselves from reading...We have an obligation not to preach, not to lecture, not to force predigested morals and messages down our readers' throats like adult birds feeding their babies pre-masticated maggots; and we have an obligation never, ever, under any circumstances, to write anything for children to read that we would not want to read ourselves."

Neil Gaiman speaking at The Reading Agency. Photo by Robin Mayes.

ON READING FOR PLEASURE... "The simplest way to make sure that we raise literate children is to teach them to read, and to show them that reading is a pleasurable activity. And that means, at its simplest, finding books that they enjoy, giving them access to those books, and letting them read them." "Well-meaning adults can easily destroy a child's love of reading: stop them reading what they enjoy, or give them worthy-but-dull books that you like, the 21st-century equivalents of Victorian "improving" literature. You'll wind up with a generation convinced that reading is uncool and worse, unpleasant." "I believe we have an obligation to read for pleasure, in private and in public places. If we read for pleasure, if others see us reading, then we learn, we exercise our imaginations. We show others that reading is a good thing."

ON COMICS AND CHOICE... "Comics have been decried as fostering illiteracy.  It's tosh. It's snobbery and it's foolishness. There are no bad authors for children, that children like and want to read and seek out, because every child is different. They can find the stories they need to, and they bring themselves to stories. A hackneyed, worn-out idea isn't hackneyed and worn out to them. This is the first time the child has encountered it. Do not discourage children from reading because you feel they are reading the wrong thing. Fiction you do not like is a route to other books you may prefer. And not everyone has the same taste as you." "Fiction can show you a different world. It can take you somewhere you've never been. Once you've visited other worlds, like those who ate fairy fruit, you can never be entirely content with the world that you grew up in. Discontent is a good thing: discontented people can modify and improve their worlds, leave them better, leave them different."

ON PHYSICAL BOOKS... "I do not believe that all books will or should migrate onto screens: as Douglas Adams once pointed out to me, over twenty years before the kindle turned up, a physical book is like a shark. Sharks are old: there were sharks in the ocean before the dinosaurs. And the reason there are still sharks around is that sharks are better at being sharks than anything else is. Physical books are tough, hard to destroy, bath-resistant, solar operated, feel good in your hand: they are good at being books, and there will always be a place for them."

ON DAYDREAMING... "Look around you: I mean it. Pause, for a moment and look around the room that you are in. I'm going to point out something so obvious that it tends to be forgotten. It's this: that everything you can see, including the walls, was, at some point, imagined. Someone decided it was easier to sit on a chair than on the ground and imagined the chair. Someone had to imagine a way that I could talk to you in London right now without us all getting rained on.This room and the things in it, and all the other things in this building, this city exist because, over and over and over, people imagined things. They daydreamed, they pondered, they made things that didn't quite work, they described things that didn't yet exist to people who laughed at them."

WIN A HARDCOVER GIFT SET!

You'll be entered to win our New Releases Hardcover Gift Set, comprised of Patrick Eats His Peas and Other Stories by Geoffrey Hayes, Otto's Backwards Day by Frank Cammuso with Jay Lynch, and The Big Wet Balloon by Liniers!  Winner to be selected by Françoise Mouly in November, just in time for the holidays. ACT NOW for a chance to foster the love of reading with more young readers! Visit the TOON Store for great savings on all of our Hardcover Gift Sets!

Win the New Releases Hardcover Gift Set with free shipping to any U.S. address

Argentina’s most famous cartoonist publishes his first English-language book.
 
The Big Wet Balloon by Liniers is “sure to be a favorite.” (Kirkus) 
 
Appearances at Small Press Expo (SPX) and Brooklyn Book Festival to coincide with U.S. National Hispanic Heritage Month

Ricardo Siri Liniers is beloved in Latin America for his wildly successful decade-long comic strip Macanudo, published in the prestigious Buenos Aires newspaper La Nación, and for his colorful, on-stage concert collaborations with Grammy-nominated musician Kevin Johansen.   His work has earned him comparisons to cartoonist legends Charles Schultz (Peanuts) and Bill Watterson (Calvin and Hobbes), as well as hundreds of thousands of fans on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.                  Liniers’ U.S. debut, The Big Wet Balloon, is officially released today by TOON Books, the innovative publisher of award-winning, high-quality comics for kids, directed by Françoise Mouly, longtime art editor of The New Yorker. Liniers’ new book, described as “memorable” (Kirkus) and “expressive” (Horn Book), coincides with U.S. National Hispanic Heritage Month and will be available in both English and Spanish-language editions. The Big Wet Balloon tells the story of sisters Clemmie and Matilda, who learn to revel in the delights of a rainy afternoon. Inspired by Liniers’ two young daughters, the book’s “intimate ink-and-watercolor vignettes” (Publishers Weekly) promise to deliver on the hype surrounding the famed Argentine author, who calls his style “observational, dark, absurd, sweet, and strange.”

Watch message from Liniers:

Françoise Mouly’s September Publishing Trifecta: a New Biography, the U.S. Debut of Internationally Acclaimed Cartoonist Liniers, and a Comics Curriculum for Schools!

On September 10th, Coach House Books will release In Love with Art: Françoise Mouly's Adventures in Comics with Art Spiegelman by Jeet Heer. (Coach House: In Love With Art. ISBN: 978-1552452783) “Mouly’s invisibility springs from her gender, her profession and her milieu,” says Heer in his preface. “As a culture, we still undervalue women, even (or perhaps especially) those as accomplished as Mouly. Editing, her chosen career, involves doing backstage work; it’s an invisible profession, often made up of invisible women. And the comics field, which Mouly played a crucial role in remaking, has long been even more hostile to women than the culture at large.” A cultural journalist and academic who has written for many publications including the Globe and Mail, Slate.com, the Comics Journal, theVirginia Quarterly Review and the Guardian of London, Jeet Heer sets out to redress what he sees as grievous under appreciation of a major cultural figure. “Mouly’s achievements, remarkable in themselves, are even more impressive given the hurdlesshe’s faced.” Based on exclusive interviews with Mouly, Spiegelman and a pantheon of comics artists – including Chris Ware, Dan Clowes, Barry Blitt, Anita Kunz and Bill Griffith – In Love With Art is both an intimate portrait of Mouly and a rare, behind-the-scenes look at the making of some of today’s most ground-breaking books and iconic images. Through the prism of an uncommonly successful relationship, the book tells the story of one of the most remarkable artistic transformations of our time.

Also on September 10th, Mouly’s TOON Books, the innovative publisher that pioneered the field of “Comics Early Readers” with its award-wining “lovingly produced” hardcovers, will release The Big Wet Balloon by Liniers, a world-famous Argentine cartoonist beloved in the Spanish-speaking world.  With starred reviews from both Kirkus and Horn Book, The Big Wet Balloon  marks Liniers’ U.S. début. Available in both English and Spanish editions, Liniers first children’s comic is based on his observations on his daughters, drawn while standing in the summer rain, showcases the cartoonist’s masterful hand in a gentle, moving story of two young sisters who learn the delights of a rainy Saturday. With a self-professed sense of humor that is “observational, dark, absurd, sweet, and strange,” Liniers’ decade-long daily strip Macanudo in Argentina’s La Nación has earned him a massive legion of fans (with nearly 300,000 on Facebook and 200,000 on Twitter), a cover story in Newsweek Argentina, and routine comparisons to legendary cartoonists including Charles Shultz’ Peanuts and Bill Wattersons’ Calvin and Hobbes. This September, Liniers will travel to America to promote The Big Wet Balloon, including appearances at the Small Press Expo (SPX), the Brooklyn Book Festival, and a TOON Extravaganza launch event at BookCourt in New York.

"Comics are more than just illustrated books, but rather make use of a multi-modal language that blends words, pictures, facial expressions, panel-to-panel progression, color, sound effects and more to engage readers in a compelling narrative." —Stanford Professor Emerita Barbara Tversky

"Comic books have been shown to be useful for beginning readers, since the reduced text makes the language manageable for new readers. Comics are especially useful for improving reading development among second-language learners and children with learning difficulties."
—The Canadian Council of Learning 

Students who read comics-format material, as opposed to text-only material, retained more information. 
— University of Oklahoma study

“Every year, more comics are in more classrooms than the year before to great result."  —Josh Elder, Reading with Pictures

Then

Now	"The newly implemented Common Core Standards explicitly call for the use of alternative media – including comics–in the curriculum." —Josh Elder, Reading with Pictures

"The TOON Books are a literacy tool to teach kids how to not only read but also love to read." —Ian Chipman, Booklist

"Comics are a gateway drug to literacy."
—Art Spiegelman, 
Pulitzer-Prize winning author of Maus, A Survivor's Tale

Little Mouse Gets Ready 
by Jeff Smith

Chick & Chickie Play All Day 
by Claude Ponti 

Silly Lilly and the Four Seasons 
by Agnes Rosenstiehl