Rhode Island Festival of Children’s Books and Authors

Oh, happy day! Lincoln School once again organized and hosted this fabulous one-day event.

Lincoln School seems like a really nice place to learn.

This is pretty much my favorite book fest for many reasons:

1. AWESOME authors and illustrators. Top-notch, every year! This year, Mary Jane Begin, Peter H. Reynolds, David Weisner, Giselle Potter, and Chris Van Allsburg were there, plus plenty more.

Here’s Peter H. Reynolds quick-sketching his character Vashti from The Dot.

2. Small, wonderful presentations by the participants. You actually feel like they are talking to you, and you alone.

Here’s David Weisner, talking to me and me alone, about his Caldecott-winning book, Flotsam.

3. Other fun stuff: crafts for the kids, book characters walking around, and this year, BIG NAZO!

The incomparable Big Nazo Band.

4. You can get your books cheerfully signed!

Peter is one of the cheerful-est guys I’ve ever met- and he stuck it out until every one of us got our books signed. We were last in line, but so help me, he was still cheerful!


Look- a hundred signatures later, and David is still cheerful, too!

5. It’s cheap! Only $3 to get into all the events, or a family rate of $10. For real! That’s always nice for those of us with bigger families.

As much fun as this festival is, this is the second year in a row that it conflicted with Escobar’s Highland Farm’s Harry Potter Day.
So, after a great half-day at Lincoln School, there was a cornfield beckoning us…

Snape took this picture.

Here’s hoping the two events don’t overlap next year…we love them both!