BOOK TRAILER for Chris Van Allsburg's NEW BOOK: Queen of the Falls, due out April 4, 2011
Chris Van Allsburg is the first picture book illustrator and author I discovered as an adult and he will always be a pillar of the craft for me, whether I like his newest book or not. For me, my favorites of his books define all that is magical, wonderful, complex and profound in the world of picture books. Everyone knows The Polar Express , but I urge you to seek out his other books and read them with your children if you are not already familiar with them. A few of my favorites are The Mysteries of Harris Burdick (a great story-starter,) Two Bad Ants , The Wreck of the Zephyr , The Widow's Broom and The Stranger . Queen of the Falls , the true story of the first person, a woman, to go over Niagra Falls in a barrel and survive, will be Van Allsburg's 17th picture book. In 1989, Mark Helprin and Chris Van Allsburg published the first book in their trilogy, Swan Lake . The Veil of Snows came out in 1993 and A City in Winter in 1996. I don't k