I read The Stinky Cheese Man as an adult. I missed that book when I was a kid. I grew up mostly with books bought at yard sales, picture books from the fifties to 1975, which is really a lucky thing.

Too often we tell kids pleasant stories devoid of truth, and stories without truth are not good stories. Our audience deserves more from us.

Not only is a good prank harmless, but, like a good story, it reveals an essential truth that would otherwise be hidden.

Danger is the snack food of a true sleuth.

Pranking exposes the truth that underneath this appearance of order is joy, laughter, and disorder.

Every Librarian is a highly trained agent. An expert in intelligence, counterintelligence, Boolean searching, and hand-to-hand combat.

We put authors on such a pedestal, and it's a moment that humanizes the whole thing, and lends an absurdity to what otherwise is a "please sit with your hands on your lap" kind of event.

I'd much rather have a book that a few people love intensely than a book that a lot of people like okay.

I think the trick of writing a good picture book manuscript is to leave that space for illustration. An illustrated novel can do the same thing.

I'm not sure we're presenting ourselves as real role models. I don't think literature has ever been a real place for role models.

Kevin Cornell and I have worked together a bunch.

Make me, dear Lord, polite and kind, To everyone, I pray.And may I ask you how you find Yourself, dear Lord, today?

I can't be my own person if I constantly require someone else to hold me together.

As pervasive as medicine has become in modern life, it remains mostly hidden and often misunderstood. We have taken it to be both more perfect than it is and less extraordinary than it can be.

Food is the rare moral arena in which the ethical choice is generally the one more likely to make you groan with pleasure.

As you would expect, the loss of freedom and the lack of privacy are extremely difficult... I want you to know that I am well. I am safe, fit and healthy.

Being in one's 50s is a powerful time.

Beauty is simply reality seen with the eyes of love

I hang by a thread, but it is (if I may so speak) of Christ's spinning

I saw a sign: "Rest Area 25 Miles". That's pretty big. Some people must be really tired.

From now on, gang, we won't let Rudolph join in any reindeer games.