Publications about books for children and young adults
It’s Byron Barton’s Planes (March) and Boats (April) in app format from Oceanhouse Media and HarperCollins. Matching the books’ engaging simplicity and directness, both apps enhance the print versions without distracting users with over-the-top interactive elements. The text is read by an enthusiastic narrator, whether the sound is on or off. If you choose to [...]
If you were like me, you applauded Press Here, the ingenious book by Hervé Tullet, for its anti-app bravado. If the news that there is now an app version (Chronicle, April) of the book disgusts you, please don’t be too quick to judge. The first thing to realize is that Press Here was translated from [...]
We’ve just put up a brief list of recommended apps for kids and YA. What apps and ebooks are you sharing with your children, students, or young library patrons?
The apps recommended below were developed within the last two years. Grade levels are only suggestions; the individual child is the real criterion. PRESCHOOL A Present for Milo by Mike Austin (Ruckus Mobile Media) Kitten Milo chases a mouse until they reach—surprise!—a birthday party. Clever interactive elements and crisp sound effects accentuate the cleanly drawn [...]
Dan Yaccarino has an aficionado’s old-fashioned regard for picture-book artistry and a techno-geek’s new-fangled fascination with screen-based storytelling. He has illustrated more than thirty children’s books and is the creator of the Nick Jr. television series Oswald and the Emmy Award–winning Willa’s Wild Life, which currently airs on NBC and Qubo. Having recently played an [...]
Circumstance as well as preference dictated that I read the 2012 Newbery Medal– and Scott O’Dell Award–winning Dead End in Norvelt in four flavors: advance reading copy, finished book, iBook, and as an audio download from Audible.com. I read the ARC and bound book in editing the Horn Book Magazine review; when I needed to [...]
Early in the summer of 2009—many digital generations ago—HarperCollins set out to experiment with several iPhone/iPod Touch apps. We decided to create two apps based on easily searchable and popular topics (example: ABC), and one app based on a classic and best-selling picture book. The staff at Greenwillow Books was charged with figuring out how [...]
With the digital literary world ever-expanding and evolving, picture book apps are multiplying like Wanda Gág’s cats. In this rapidly changing climate, what gives a book-based app staying power? A successful picture book app… Is interactive—but not too interactive What distinguishes a picture book app from a traditional picture book or an e-book is the [...]
Big Nate: Comix by U! (based on the books by Lincoln Peirce; HarperCollins and Night & Day Studios, December) is a kind of Colorforms set for new media starring Nate Wright, a sixth-grade antihero who makes Greg Heffley look like a wimpy kid. In this app, Nate’s fans and budding playwrights press-and-place a variety of [...]
Benji Davies’s illustrations for the Bizzy Bear board books (Nosy Crow) are like catnip for young children. I defy any toddler or preschooler worth her salt to walk by a Bizzy Bear book and not pick it up. The wide-eyed, cheerful animals on the construction site (Let’s Get to Work!) or traveling to the beach [...]
