Nicholas Day

Nice Work is out today! With pitch-perfect illustrations by the wonderful @hala_tahboub . I wrote this text many, many years ago -- almost a decade ago, long before I'd published any books for children -- and it feels deeply improbable to see finally in the world: a very real book about a very real peach. And people are saying some very kind things about it! In a starred review, Publishers Weekly called it "a gently philosophical gem" and Booklist, in their own starred review, described it "as a real peach of a picture book." Thanks to everyone @randomhousestudio for making this such a beautiful book.

How to Have a Thought is out! It's about walking, Charles Darwin, and the fine art of whacking stones with sticks. We've had a good number of very generous starred reviews and Kirkus even calls it "a masterful blend of biography, science, and philosophy that makes profound ideas feel wonderfully attainable." We'll take it! Many thanks to the spectacular @nealporterbooks and @taylornorm . I am very grateful to be paired with @hadleyhoo , whose work here is *Michelin-starred chef's kiss*. (It's a special thrill because I still remember the shiver I got many years ago from her absolutely perfect The Iridescence of Birds.) Click through to see a few highlights of her work here. And then find a stick of your own and set forth.

Last Sunday was, you know, not the worst day. (Thanks to @nytbooks for the year-end honor and congratulations to everyone on this wonderful list.)

🎉 CONGRATULATIONS to Nicholas Day and Yas Imamura on their 2025 YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction finalist, A WORLD WITHOUT SUMMER! The YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction honors the best nonfiction book published for ages 12-18. Many thanks to @americanlibraryassociation for this tremendous honor! 🎉

Stopping by to say how delighted I was to see A World Without Summer on NPR's Books We Love feature, where @fusenumber8 calls it "as ambitious as it is genius." (This is a good thing to say about the book! Feel free to drop it into casual conversation, for example: "You know, I've been reading A World Without Summer, a book as ambitious as it is genius." See! It's easy!) And since I'm here already, I should mention that WWS is now up to FOUR starred reviews. From the most recent: The Horn Book says it is "a remarkable nonfiction narrative that jumps forward and backward through time and across the globe" and Shelf Awareness calls it "a dramatic, enlightening work of nonfiction." (You can quote those as well; I don't mind.)

Look at this not-at-all posed portrait of an author who JUST SO HAPPENED to find an incredible review of his book in the New York Times! Look at how happy he looks! (This is how he looks when he's happy.) I feel immensely lucky that @nytbooks reviewed A World Without Summer -- there's a whole page devoted to it, with @yas.illustration 's wonderful illustrations. But I am yet luckier, because to have such a sympathetic, thoughtful, engaging review -- well, that's worthy of a danish.

A World Without Summer is out today! (Not all copies have a disembodied thumb attached, so act fast!) Huge thanks to everyone at @randomhousestudio and to @yas.illustration for her wonderful illustrations. This is my second book of narrative nonfiction for young readers, following The Mona Lisa Vanishes, and I am so excited to see it out there in the world. (Extrapolating from the photographic evidence, it has made it as far as the butterfly bush.) I'd tell you what the book is about, but this just-out ⭐ review in the Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books does it so perfectly that, well, here's an excerpt: "On April 5, 1815, tectonic plates underneath the Indonesian island of Sumbawa violently collided, exploding magma and ash out of Mount Tambora in the largest volcanic eruption in modern history, devastating everything around it. The damage, however, was hardly localized and certainly not short-lived. Over the next few years, the eruption’s after effects would bring catastrophic climate changes, throwing world governments and economies into chaos... The cheeky tone of Day’s previous The Mona Lisa Vanishes (BCCB 10/23) is replaced here with a measured clarity that details the volcano’s global effects, yet the author still brings a sense of intimacy and humanity through a surprising source: Mary Shelley and her writing of Frankenstein. It was Tambora that caused the relentless storms that would send Shelley and her literary companions indoors on the shores of Lake Geneva, where she would write her masterpiece about a scientist so taken by his own skills that he failed to see the impact of his creation. In an unexpected turn, Day links these two stories—one of a natural disaster and the other of human ingenuity—to modern day climate change. Tambora was just a small sampling of what current climate change could be, a monstrous result of a scientific miracle (energy development) that needed more consideration before being let loose in the world. Each element—Tambora, Shelley, the current climate crisis—is seemingly disparate but brought together brilliantly, made particularly urgent by the interspersed chapters directly addressing the reader."

A World Without Summer is on shelves in less than -- can this possibly be right -- a couple of weeks. And as we all count down to the ball drop on September 9, here's some very lovely-to-receive news. In its round-up of the best fall children's books, The Washington Post calls A World Without Summer "cinematic" and "riveting." These are some high-quality adjectives! And Publishers Weekly chimed in with a very flattering starred review. (With more adjectives! Engaging! Sardonic! Intense!)

We have a cover! How to Have a Thought is out in January 2026 from the phenomenal @nealporterbooks , illustrated by the incomparable @hadleyhoo . On Charles Darwin, thinking, walking, giant camels, and the surprisingly productive lifelong habit of hitting rocks with sticks. Many thanks to @taylornorm and @bbowen949 and everyone at @holidayhousebks

Look! A Book! Or a cover, at least, and what a spectacular cover it is. That volcano! Mary Shelley! Frankenstein! Parchment that’s literally burning as I write these words! A extremely kind blurb from the master @kaaauthor ! (Does she call it “a tour-de-force for our times”? She does!) A World Without Summer, illustrated by the wonderful @yas.illustration , is out this September from @randomhousestudio . It’s the story of the largest volcanic eruption since the last Ice Age and the climate shock that followed—or as we say on the jacket: a story taken from the archives but seemingly scripted for us today: a tale of climate change and human folly and hope—and what happens when the world suddenly goes wrong. But what I really want to say is: I cannot wait for all of you to see this book. It’s my next work of narrative nonfiction for middle-grade readers, following the Mona Lisa Vanishes, and I talked to Betsy Bird all about it: /2025/04/23/climate-shock-realizes-a-cover-reveal-and-conversation-with-nicholas-day-about-a-world-without-summer/

I'll be at ALA in San Diego very, very soon -- and I'll be signing books with @bhelquist on Monday. If you're there, please come by and say hello!

Wonderful news yesterday: The Mona Lisa Vanishes won the Boston Globe-Horn Book Nonfiction Award! Additional exclamation points implied! (Infinite exclamation points implied!) Many heartfelt thanks to @thehornbook and the judges this year for all their work. As always, they've put together a spectacular line up of books. @randomhousestudio