Press

With censorship so much in the news, You Can’t Stay That! has proven to be one of 2021’s timeliest books for young readers. Now School Library Journal has also named it one of the year’s best. See SLJ‘s comment here:

Last year, Leonard, as Jury President, helped to organize and guide the first-ever international competition for picture book writing. Nearly 1,700 manuscripts were submitted by writers in five languages from 68 countries! One First Prize winner, Three Second Prize winners,and 20 Finalist [...]

In a recent blog post, artist/author/publisher Sallie Lowenstein turns her attention to the long roster of books for children and teens that have made “good trouble” by upping the ante of daring, honesty, and innovation. Read her post here.

In his review of YOU CAN’T SAY THAT!, Michael Cart tells readers what book banners most remind him of

Find out what PW thinks will surprise many readers of Leonard’s new book about censorship and the literature for young people 

PEN America CEO Suzanne Nossel weighs in on Leonard’s new book in the New York Times Book Review.

In this blog post, Leonard writes about what he learned from interviewing 13 writers for children and teens whose books have touched a cultural nerve: You Can’t Say That: Who Should Censor Our Children’s Reading? by Leonard S. Marcus | Nerdy Book Club As a historian and critic, I realized long [...]

A star from School Library Journal; a powerful comment from children’s author and poet Donna Marie Merritt: School Library Journal Review  This work is a compilation of conversations Marcus had with writers of children’s and YA titles that have been included on the American Library [...]

Leonard once again joined the dPictus.com team in culling through hundreds of recently published picture books from around the world. Here is the final list of 100 top choices for the Summer of 2021.

Hear Leonard, in conversation with book world guru Nigel Beale, trace the extraordinary career of Harper’s visionary publisher of “good books for bad children,” Ursula Nordstrom. Listen here:

Leonard puts the art of picture book writing front and center in this recent article for the Bologna Book Fair blog FairTales.

The author of The Phantom Tollbooth was a gregarious, thoughtful, funny, and wise friend–and arguably the Lewis Carroll of our time. 

In this wide-ranging interview, Leonard and Maria Russo discuss their plans and vision for mineditionUS.

Mark your calendar for this year’s virtual Carle Honors celebration on Thursday, September 23rd. A good time will be had by all as we raise a glass to another stellar group of honorees. Read the article here.

Coming this July from Candlewick Press, Leonard’s next book, You Can’t Say That! Writers for Young People Talk about Censorship, Free Expression, and the Stories They Have to Tell, was recently featured in Publishers Weekly. Read the article here.

Read the article here.

Not long after the pandemic began and talking heads with impressive bookshelf backdrops became a staple of our television viewing, the New York Times decided to take a closer look at the books themselves and asked several well-known figures to name three of their favorites. Among the famous [...]

In 2019, Everafter Books, an imprint of Trustbridge Media, introduced a journal of children’s literature studies with a uniquely global reach. Each issue is theme-based and features three sets of articles: a group from Europe, another from China, and a third (edited by Leonard) from North [...]

In November, Leonard collaborated virtually with French critic Nathalie Beau and a small group of Chinese jury panelists in selecting the winners of this year’s Original Illustration Exhibition’s top honors. This annual competition is open to published and unpublished illustrators [...]

This year, Leonard became a columnist for the Chinese monthly Meng (or “Dream”). Spurred onby the hope that China’s rising generation will play an important role on the world stage, China’sburgeoning middle-class has embraced childhood literacy as an essential skill and [...]