Horn Book Guide editors

Ann A. Flowers
co-founder of The Horn Book Guide, editor from 1989 to 1992

In 1989, Ann Flowers co-founded The Horn Book Guide (with Anita Silvey, editor of the Horn Book Magazine) and served as its first editor. She brought an impressive background as a librarian and a critic — as well as the deep reservoirs of humor, enthusiasm, and energy that are essential to the successful launch of a new journal. In addition to her twenty-three-year tenure as children’s librarian at the Wayland (MA) Public Library, Ms. Flowers was a long-time Horn Book Magazine reviewer and contributor, a member of many ALA committees (including Newbery and Batchelder award committees), and an instructor at the Center for the Study of Children’s Literature at Simmons College in Boston.

Sample editorials

Hanna B. Zeiger
editor from 1992 to 1998

The Guide stayed in well-qualified hands when Hanna Zeiger took over its helm. A former teacher, Ms. Zeiger was school librarian at the Pierce School in Brookline, Massachusetts, for twenty-one years, a reviewer for The Horn Book Magazine, and an instructor of children’s and young adult literature at Boston University. She oversaw the publication of the Guide with gentle yet decisive authority, working closely with managing editors Kelly Ault (1991 to 1993), Anne Deifendeifer (1993 to 1994), and Jennifer M. Brabander (1995 to 1998).

Jennifer M. Brabander
executive editor from 1998 to 2001

The Guide’s first homegrown editor, Jennifer Brabander took an entry level job at the Horn Book soon after earning her MA from the Center for the Study of Children’s Literature at Simmons College in Boston. She worked her way up the masthead, serving as Hanna Zeiger’s second-in-command for several years before taking over the top spot in 1998. Three years later she moved over to the Magazine, where she is now a senior editor.

Kitty Flynn
executive editor from 2001 to 2006

Kitty Flynn began her professional career at the Horn Book soon after graduation from college. After her start in Boston, she moved to New York City, where she was an editor at Morrow Junior Books. In 1996, she returned to the Horn Book, serving as associate editor at the Guide for several years before her 2001 promotion. In 2006 Ms. Flynn scaled back her editorial duties at the Guide, where she is now a senior editor, to focus more of her attention on the Horn Book’s online content.

Elissa Gershowitz
managing editor from 2006 to present

Formerly a freelance reviewer, Elissa Gershowitz made a seamless transition from Guide contributor to Guide editor. An Oberlin College graduate with an MA from the Center for the Study of Children’s Literature at Simmons College, she previously worked as an editor for an educational publisher.