Brian Floca

Thank you to Samantha Balaban, Scott Simon, and @npr Weekend Edition for giving @sydneydraws and me the chance to talk ‘Island Storm’ for their special series Picture This! It was a privilege to follow the audio footsteps of many other authors and illustrators I admire: /series/787467815/picture-this-authors-and-artists-in-conversation. Thanks in particular to Samantha for kind editing. (There was about an hour of conversation behind this eight-minute segment. That’s fifty-two minutes of stammering left on the metaphorical floor!) And as it happened, I was back on Peaks Island itself when we recorded this, and so a final thank you to @scottnashillustration and @nancygibsonnash for the loan of quiet and interview-facilitating studio space. Waves, whispering leaves, and buoys in the background would have been nice, in theory, but would have complicated the lives of the sound engineers, too. Link in bio for now and here, too: /2025/08/09/nx-s1-5485308/picture-this-island-storm-brian-floca-sydney-smith If you listen I hope you enjoy! @nealporterbooks @holidayhousebks )

‘Island Storm’ is out in the world! Words by me, pictures by @sydneydraws , published—today!—by @nealporterbooks @holidayhousebks . I’m grateful to @illustration_institute for the gift of a residency on Peaks Island, Maine, from which this story grew. I’m grateful to Sydney for taking on the text and bringing it to full and beautiful life, and to Neal @brownie_girl_42 @taylornorm and everyone at Holiday House for shepherding the book into reality and onto shelves. I’m further grateful for the generous reviews we’ve received. (See below, he says subtly.) I hope you will enjoy the book we’ve made! ★ “Caldecott Medalist Floca and Hans Christian Andersen Award–winning illustrator Smith tell the story of two youngsters braving a gale.... Readers will experience this tempest alongside the characters, every step of the way. Yet the true heart and soul of the book resides in the siblings’ relationship as they weather the weather—and more—together.… The power of nature captivates and compels in this phenomenal tale of pushing limits.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review) ★ “[A] thrilling story about how a shared exploit can deepen camaraderie and trust—and a dynamic look at the dual powers of nature and volition unleashed.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review) ★ “[T]he recurring refrain when the siblings hold hands, “You pull on me, I pull on you, and we decide to go on,” reflects their deep trust in each other, reassuring young readers that, even in the face of life’s storms—both literal and figurative—they do not have to face them alone.” —BCCB (starred review) ★ “Floca's poetic text carries all the quiet suspense and crashing weight of an approaching gale, colored by enough loving detail of setting that it finds something powerfully universal in the specific. An oddly moving ode to childhood, home, and sibling bonds, set to the awesome bass line of nature.” —Booklist (starred review) ★ “Floca’s writing is pure poetry; Smith’s expressionistic watercolor and gouache illustrations are utterly gorgeous.... Picture-book making at its best.” —The Horn Book (starred review)

Weekend surprise! It’s an honor to see ‘Locomotive’ on this list and a pleasure to see so many friends and fellow bookmakers and sometimes collaborators on it as well. Good company! A deep bow of thanks to @meghancoxgurdon and @wsj , and I feel I probably owe a particular nod to @annagodeassi for how she arranged this room, too, thank you. I have no reason to believe that placement of covers means anything in particular, if anything at all, but I’ll take it. I’ve been feeling a little scrambled and a lot behind deadlines lately, apologies to those concerned, and this was an uplifting reminder that I spent stretches feeling scrambled and behind deadlines on this book, too, and that it nevertheless worked out. Not that feeling scrambled and being behind on your deadlines is a guarantee of success, no, I do not mean to go that far, and I am trying to unscramble and catch up, really. My thanks and gratitude to @SimonKids and @ssedlib for their support of the work and the book — and books — during stretches both difficult and easy, thanks to everyone who has given ‘Locomotive’ a look over the years, and, again, thanks to Meghan and the Wall Street Journal. Full story here: /arts-culture/books/the-20-best-childrens-books-of-the-past-20-years-2f359e7a?st=wPFHDP&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

Goose, goslings, Gowanus, good luck!

A semiquincentennial thank you to @bklynlibrary for the inclusion of MOONSHOT: THE FLIGHT OF APOLLO 11 on this 250 FOR 250 list! (If you only read 250 books this year, make it these 250!) “Brooklyn Public Library is celebrating our country’s 250th anniversary the best way we know how: with a thoughtful, surprising, irresistible booklist. Organized by genre and category of interest, this all-ages list is a deep dive on the stories, voices and moments that shaped America. Selected by our expert librarians—with help from a few notable New Yorkers!—here are the 250 most influential books in United States history.” Find the full list here: /america-250/booklist/ It’s a happy honor to see the book in such company! Thanks again, BPL! @SSEdLib @SimonKIDS

My friend @dsullivan7476 ’s classroom, in this week’s @newyorkermag ! Photographed by @durzt for a portfolio of images on the theme and traditions of high school debate (or high-school debate, the New Yorker would have me type, but come on). That’s Dr. Deirdre Sullivan, originally of Springfield, MA, mind you, for those with sharp eyes wondering what the @redsox and the @celtics are doing on the wall in San Jose, California. Lucky students, and the decor is the least of it. Congratulations, Deedee! See the whole series here: /magazine/2026/05/11/the-very-american-very-intense-world-of-high-school-debate

2 of 2 The @nybookfair is always so full of incredible sights that it spurs the urge to sketch — but many of the incredible sights at the Fair are drawings themselves, and it would feel weird to make a drawing of a drawing (maybe it shouldn’t), and so usually instead I try to make a drawing of a booth. I need to rethink this approach. The booths may be packed with the incredible but they are not, to me, in and of themselves incredible, and so the sketching is always something of an exercise in frustration — the Book Fair Sketching Paradox! I felt I had better luck on the way back to Brooklyn with a little sketch on the Q train. A fellow passenger, who had been interacting let’s call it colorfully with other people in the car, asked to see the drawing. I complied and, I hope you’ll excuse my saying, he liked it well enough to insist on giving me a fist bump. A little awkward but I went along with it and I’m glad I did. We take our good reviews where we can get them. For completists here are past sketches of booths, including one from early March, 2020, when you could feel in the Armory’s immense drill hall, full of dealers and visitors from around the world, a palpable and coalescing sense of “Should we all be here?”: /brian_floca/p/CcwLKKUOHau/ /brian_floca/p/B9eXYS4n4aj/

1 of 2 I went to the annual and reliably marvel-filled @nybookfair at @parkavearmory this weekend. I went with friend and studio mate @johnbmarciano , saw @booksofwonder among other vendors doing their thing, maybe saw @thisispattismith , definitely saw @brendabowenwrites , who showed us pictures of a book from 1583 which featured flap illustrations depicting our inner workings so effective that they made me shudder. Later I saw the book itself. “[T]he founding monument of ophthalmology….” read the dealers description, “in vigorous German vernacular…..” This did not reduce my shuddering. At another booth a man insisted on taking off the shelf and having me flip through a tome of a book from 1716 that he had eyed me eyeing. The book opened with an image of the Sanctuary of San Luca, which sits on a hill outside the historic center of Bologna, Italy. The book closed with an image of a gate at the city center. In between, on every page (with the exception of one landscape break in the middle), was a sectional depiction of the two-mile porticoed walkway that connects the two — the longest porticoed walkway in the world! Over 600 arches, portico after portico after portico, page after page after page! My host wavered between hope and resignation. “This book is crazy. There is no market for it.” But then again, “Someone should buy it. There are a lot of rich people in Bologna, aren’t there?” €60,000/$76,700. I saw some beautiful Japanese whales from 1741 that seemed to be calling @sophieblackall ’s name from across time, space, sea, and land. (You can do your own whale voice at home.) At another booth a man walked us through the details of an old map of Brooklyn before turning to the subject of how he got into the field. Speaking deliberately, intimating darkly, he told us, “When I was younger I read a lot of books… that opened with maps… of places that don’t exist. I played games… with funny-shaped dice.” Enough said, good sir. Enough said. I saw some locomotives (a triple-header!). At the @typepunchmatrix booth I saw a good three-word summary attached to a first edition of Where The Wild Things (still available when I left the booth).

What a gathering of people and books there was at @soi128 on Tuesday night to celebrate the career of — and the man himself — @nealporterbooks . The quality of the crowd and the work, both, was a testimony, and I felt fortunate to be there, as I have felt fortunate over the years to know and work with Neal. We've made three books together. Two I illustrated: ‘Ballet for Martha: Making Appalachian Spring,’ written by Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan, one of the most happily and agreeably collaborative experiences I’ve had in the field, and ‘With Dad,’ written by our late and much missed mutual friend Richard Jackson. The third and most recent book is ‘Island Storm,’ which in a plot twist was written by me and then handed over to Neal and @sydneydraws for the hard part. (Credit to creative director @brownie_girl_42 , too!) Three very different books, three books that mean a great deal to me, three books I can’t quite imagine anyone but Neal bringing into the world. I was happy to see him getting his recognition this week and grateful to be a small part of his story. Thanks and congratulations to @taylornorm , too, for organizing, herding cats, and giving us all such a smoothly run evening. The imprint is in good hands! Congratulations and all best wishes, Neal Porter!

Small drawing from a quick layover on the return trip.

I went to @bolognachildrensbookfair and it was great! Thank you to everyone I saw there who helped make it so! Here is a sketch of @sguarnaccia , as seen at one of the discussions I attended, a sketch I also submitted to a roundup of drawings from the Fair now up at @publisherswkly : /pw/by-topic/childrens/childrens-industry-news/article/100247-bologna-children-s-book-fair-2026-illustrators-sketches-from-the-fair.html The caption I sent to PW along with the drawing: "I go to the Bologna Children’s Book Fair, I tell myself, for new art, new voices, new perspective, but running into familiar fellow travelers is part of the fun, too. From that latter category, here is author, illustrator, designer, art director, educator, moderator, panelist, sometimes mixologist, sharp-dressed man Steven Guarnaccia, with whom I seemed to cross paths every eight hours or so over the course of the week, who briefly became just an audience member like the the rest of us in order to catch a discussion of artist’s residencies moderated by Maria Russo, featuring Lynn Caponera of The Maurice Sendak Foundation, Sophie Blackall of Milkwood, and Isabelle Arsenault of Leporello. Colors are approximate." Thanks again to everyone I saw at the Fair and in Bologna, and thanks for the chance to contribute a drawing, @cinemmakantor and PW!

I’ll do what I can but to my frustration I am probably going to be away from screens (imagine) at the critical stretch tonight — but a what a week it has been, and what sights have been shared, and here is wishing @nasa and the crew of @nasaartemis the safest of reentries and returns! Back to family, back to friends, to warmth, to light, to trees and blue water! @simonkids @ssedlib