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ENTRY TYPE:
WORK TITLE: The Moving Book
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://www.americanchickens.com
CITY: San Francisco
STATE:
COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY: American
LAST VOLUME: SATA 402
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born 1972, in Brooklyn, NY; married Daniel Handler (an author); children: Otto.
EDUCATION:Wesleyan University, B.A., 1993; Pratt Institute, M.S., 1998.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Illustrator, cartoonist, and author of children’s books and graphic novels. Teaches picture-book writing and illustration at the California College of the Arts; workshop instructor and field trip leader at the 826 Valencia tutoring center; presenter at schools. Has also worked as a magazine editor and administrator. Cofounder (with Daniel Handler) of Lemony Snicket Prize for Noble Librarians Faced with Adversity, 2014.
MEMBER:American Institute of Graphic Artists, Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators.
AWARDS:Best Books for Children selection, Association of Booksellers for Children, and Recommended selection, Cooperative Children’s Book Center, both 2006, and Best Children’s Books for Family Literacy selection, Pennsylvania State University/Pennsylvania Center for the Book, 2007, all for How to Be …; Popular Paperbacks for Young Adults selection, American Library Association, 2013, for Picture the Dead by Adele Griffin; honored by illustration annuals, including American Illustration and Print.
WRITINGS
Author and illustrator of “Baby Be of Use” board-book series published by McSweeney’s, including Baby Make Me Some Breakfast, Baby Mix Me a Drink, Baby Fix My Car, Baby Do My Banking, Baby Get Me Some Lovin’, and Baby Plan My Wedding, 2005-09. Contributor to Funny Girl: Funniest. Stories. Ever., edited by Betsy Bird, Viking (New York, NY), 2017. Author and illustrator of “Three Panel Book Review” cartoon series, San Francisco Chronicle, and “Welcome to the Ten-and-One” online comic. Illustrator of “Outrageous Women” book series, John Wiley & Sons, 1998-2001. Contributor of comics to the Rumpus (online literary magazine).
SIDELIGHTS
Lisa Brown has channeled her training in communication design into creating unique illustrated books for both children and adults. Her original self-illustrated works include Vampire Boy’s Good Night, Long Story Short: 100 Classic Books in Three Panels, and The Hospital Book, and she has also illustrated texts authored by her husband, Daniel Handler (the pseudonymous Lemony Snicket), including 29 Myths on the Swinster Pharmacy and Goldfish Ghost. Additionally, Brown has illustrated titles by writers such as Adele Griffin and Marcus Ewert.
Praised by School Library Journal contributor Rachel G. Payne as a “striking picture book,” How to Be … finds two children mimicking a menagerie of animals during playtime. Brown divides her story into chapters such as “How to Be a Turtle,” or “How to Be a Dog,” in which a child adopts the relevant animal actions in a mix of spare text and humorous black-and-white drawings highlighted with splashes of color. While Payne predicted that both toddlers and older children will pick up on the comedy in the book’s drawings, Booklist critic Jennifer Mattson wrote that readers “will be inspired to think of their own methods of getting in touch with their animal natures.” Describing How to Be … as “elegantly simple,” Susan Dove Lempke added in Horn Book that Brown “layer[s] enough meaning into text and pictures that children will discover new detail” with each reading.
A Halloween celebration with a twist is the focus of Vampire Boy’s Good Night, a “friendly story [that] will delight, but not frighten young readers,” according to School Library Journal contributor Carolyn Janssen. Bela is a young vampire, and his best friend, Morgan, is a witch. During their nocturnal search for young humans, which they have heard about but never seen, the two friends discover a house full of surprisingly friendly witches and vampires, as well as assorted ghosts, goblins, and even a pirate or two. In Brown’s quirky story, Bela learns that vampires are not always what they seem, and her comics-style art is characterized by “detail-rich scenes” that bring to life her “lyrical, understated prose,” according to a Publishers Weekly critic.
The Airport Book, another of Brown’s self-illustrated titles, follows a biracial family of four as they wind their way through a busy airline terminal. As they check their bags, move through security, and wait to board their plane, they encounter a variety of colorful characters, from the woman chatting nonstop on her phone to the members of a girls’ soccer team. “More than just an introduction to the airport, the story is a look at the wide world itself,” a critic explained in Publishers Weekly. “The intricate ink-and-watercolor illustrations offer a treasure trove of discoveries for detail-minded kids,” Booklist reviewer Carolyn Phelan reported, and Martha V. Parravano, writing in Horn Book, observed that Brown’s “straightforward but lively main text provides basic information … while dialogue bubbles and the pictures tell a much more complex—and wildly entertaining—story.”
The Phantom Twin, Brown’s first graphic novel, presents “a tale of longing and belonging,” in the words of a Kirkus Reviews contributor. Sold to a rapacious carnival owner at the age of three, conjoined twins Isabel and Jane tour the country as the Extraordinary Peabody Sisters, part of a traveling freak show. When Jane, the stronger and more forceful twin, agrees to an experimental surgery that promises to separate the two, the results are disastrous: only Isabel survives. Now fitted with prosthetic limbs and haunted by Jane’s spirit, Isabel—an aspiring artist—struggles to cope with her new reality.
Critics offered praise for The Phantom Twin. A Publishers Weekly reviewer maintained that “the atmospheric story’s strengths lie in its relational nuance, in a beautifully evoked setting aided by Brown’s uncomplicated drawings,” while Julia Smith, writing in Booklist, noted that Brown “draws upon vintage sideshow banner art as well as Sailor Jerry-style tattoos, injecting the tale with just the right aesthetic.” According to New York Times Book Review critic Lucy Knisley, “ The Phantom Twin portrays carnival life with sensitivity. “Brown’s characters tussle over conflicted feelings about the sideshow’s exploitation of their unique attributes versus the home and sense of community they’ve found in it with one another. And they remind us that appearances can be deceiving.”
Discussing her graphic novel in a Fuse #8 Production blog interview with Elizabeth Bird, Brown recalled, “I did so much fascinating research into the culture of sideshows of the early 20th century and the incredible performers who worked there in order to create this book. The characters in The Phantom Twin are the heart of story, from the conjoined twins to the tattooed lady to the alligator-skinned man. Every one of them is based, at least in part, on a real historical figure.”
Brown delivers a humorous take on epic literature in Long Story Short, a collection of comic strips she wrote and illustrated. Appealing to readers who find perusing CliffsNotes a chore, Brown’s volume offers concise, witty, three-panel summaries of one hundred tales, from classics such as Romeo and Juliet, Jane Eyre, and Moby Dick to more contemporary fare, including The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Beloved, and Twilight. She even tackles Snicket’s “A Series of Unfortunate Events” books (“Adults are either incompetent or evil”). In the words of a Publishers Weekly contributor, “Brown’s simple but playful and boldly colored art carries off a visual unpretentiousness that suits the erudite-lite material.”
The Latke Who Couldn’t Stop Screaming: A Christmas Story is the first title Brown illustrated for her husband. The work centers on exploits of the title character, a talkative potato pancake that attempts to educate a candy cane, a pine tree, and other Christmas symbols about the traditions of Hanukkah. A Publishers Weekly contributor applauded “Brown’s retro-cool graphics” as well as Snicket’s “elegantly cadenced prose.”
In Snicket’s 29 Myths on the Swinster Pharmacy, a pair of youngsters consider the mysteries of a neighborhood establishment that refuses to change with the times. “Brown paints the titular pharmacy a drab gray that permeates the rest of the story like a dense fog,” Thom Barthelmess wrote in Booklist. In the opinion of a Kirkus Reviews contributor, “Brown’s simple, cartoon-style artwork against a dark background is just right: It’s direct and not overly edgy; her characters are distinctive and expressive.”
A darkly humorous meditation on loneliness, Snicket’s Goldfish Ghost concerns a young boy’s recently deceased pet who wanders a seaside town looking for an eternal companion. School Library Journal reviewer Kiera Parrott noted that Brown’s images “add to the subtle tongue-in-cheek humor, depicting the titular former pet in stark black-and-white … against the colorful blues, greens, and coral shades of the vacation town.” A Publishers Weekly critic also lauded the artwork, stating that “Brown’s subdued, moonlit landscapes resolve the story with moments of magic.”
Reviewing Brown’s illustrations for another picture book, educator Meredith Gary’s Sometimes You Get What You Want, Booklist critic Bina Willams wrote that her “cartoonlike art reflects the story nicely, using sharply outlined figures, minimal props, and bright colors.” In Emily’s Blue Period, a work by Cathleen Daly, a youngster copes with her parents’ separation by creating intensely personal artwork. Parravano noted that the “affecting but unsentimental story is elegantly supported by Brown’s simple pencil and watercolor illustrations and innovative book design.” Mummy Cat, an atmospheric tale by Marcus Ewert, centers on a feline’s devotion to its Egyptian queen. “Brown’s ink, gouache, watercolor, and digital collage illustrations are rich with beautiful ancient artifacts,” Tanya Boudreau commented in School Library Journal.
In Griffin’s Picture the Dead readers are taken back in time to Brookline, Massachusetts, during the U.S. Civil War era. Jennie Lovell is mourning the death of her twin brother, Toby, when she learns that her fiancé and cousin, Will, has also been killed. Although the recently returned Quinn, Will’s younger brother and also a Union soldier, now informs the distraught young woman that her lover died on the battlefield, Jennie begins to experience choking sensations and strange visions that lead her to question Quinn’s story. Certain that these visions are messages from Will, she is aided by a spiritualist photographer named Mr. Geist in bridging the gap between the living and the dead in order to uncover a sinister truth.
The visual backdrop crafted by Brown evokes elements of Victorian culture, such as the penchant for carefully preserving such tokens as hair, cards, flowers, and paper ephemera in scrapbooks, still photographs, or other means, as well as the vogue for spiritualism. In recreating Jennie’s scrapbook—a collection of newspaper clippings, pictures, letters, and notes—the artist provides readers with what School Library Journal contributor Nora G. Murphy characterized as an “unique perspective” on this “period of American history.” In addition to revealing clues to the mystery, her “darkly inked, realistic drawings” effectively capture the late-nineteenth-century aesthetic by incorporating handwriting in “the elaborate cursive style of the era,” noted a Kirkus Reviews writer.
The Hospital Book features a little girl who becomes ill suddenly and goes to the hospital. This new experience causes anxiety, and she narrates the process of getting an appendectomy for readers. The story is framed by the number of times she cries, beginning with her stomach pain and ending with happiness when the surgery is over. The book aims to demystify the experience of a hospital stay and features a nurse taking her blood and temperature, a doctor performing tests to determine the issue, a parent staying overnight, and her recovery the next day. Maryann Owen, writing in Booklist, summed up the work, “Brown and her graphic-novel-inspired illustrations offer children significant insight into what might be expected if they ever need to have surgery.” “A wonderfully effective, reassuring look at an often scary experience,” concluded a Kirkus Reviews writer.
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, July 1, 2006, Jennifer Mattson, review of How to Be …, p. 64; May 15, 2008, Bina Williams, review of Sometimes You Get What You Want, p. 50; May, 2010, Carolyn Phelan, review of Picture the Dead, p. 49; July 1, 2014, Lolly Gepson, review of Emily’s Blue Period, p. 86; February 1, 2014, Thom Barthelmess, review of 29 Myths on the Swinster Pharmacy, p. 69; May 1, 2015, Julia Smith, review of Mummy Cat, p. 101; March 15, 2016, Carolyn Phelan, review of The Airport Book, p. 64; March 1, 2017, Sarah Hunter, review of Goldfish Ghost, p. 73; March 15, 2020, Julia Smith, review of The Phantom Twin, p. 48; May 15, 2020, Terry Hong, review of Long Story Short: 100 Classic Books in Three Panels, p. 38; February 15, 2023, Maryann Owen, review of The Hospital Book.
Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books, April, 2017, Deborah Stevenson, review of Goldfish Ghost, p. 382.
Horn Book, July-August, 2006, Susan Dove Lempke, review of How to Be …, p. 422; May-June, 2008, Christine M. Heppermann, review of Sometimes You Get What You Want, p. 293; July-August 2014, Martha V. Parravano, review of Emily’s Blue Period, p. 75; July-August, 2015, Susan Dove Lempke, review of Mummy Cat, p. 112; May-June, 2016, Martha V. Parravano, review of The Airport Book, p. 76; May-June, 2017, Sarah Ellis, review of Goldfish Ghost, p. 82.
Kirkus Reviews, April 15, 2010, Adele Griffin, review of Picture the Dead; January 15, 2014, review of 29 Myths on the Swinster Pharmacy; March 1, 2016, review of The Airport Book; March 1, 2020, review of The Phantom Twin; January 1, 2023, review of The Hospital Book.
New York Times Book Review, May 24, 2020, Lucy Knisley, review of The Phantom Twin, p. 18.
Publishers Weekly, May 29, 2006, review of How to Be …, p. 57; October 29, 2007, review of The Latke Who Couldn’t Stop Screaming: A Christmas Story, p. 56; April, 2008, Anna Parker, review of Sometimes You Get What You Want, p. 108; May 17, 2010, review of Picture the Dead, p. 52; August 16, 2010, review of Vampire Boy’s Good Night, p. 52; November 25, 2013, review of 29 Myths on the Swinster Pharmacy, p. 56; March 31, 2014, review of Emily’s Blue Period, p. 63; May 4, 2015, review of Mummy Cat, p. 118; February 15, 2016, review of The Airport Book, p. 68; March 13, 2017, review of Goldfish Ghost, p. 82; February 10, 2020, review of The Phantom Twin, p. 72; January 27, 2020, review of Long Story Short, p. 59.
School Library Journal, June, 2006, Rachel Payne, review of How to Be …, p. 107; April, 2008, Anne Parker, review of Sometimes You Get What You Want, p. 108; January, 2010, Caitlin Augusta, review of Half-Minute Horrors, p. 112; October, 2010, Nora G. Murphy, review of Picture the Dead, p. 116; November, 2010, Carolyn Janssen, review of Vampire Boy’s Good Night, p. 65; March, 2014, Sara Lissa Paulson, review of 29 Myths on the Swinster Pharmacy, p. 148; May, 2014, Anna Haase Krueger, review of Emily’s Blue Period, p. 79; May, 2015, Tanya Boudreau, review of Mummy Cat, p. 84; March, 2016, Lisa Lehmuller, review of The Airport Book, p. 102; April, 2017, Kiera Parrott, review of Goldfish Ghost, p. 133.
Voice of Youth Advocates, August, 2010, Rachel Wadham, review of Picture the Dead, p. 266.
ONLINE
Fuse #8 Production, http://blogs.slj.com/afuse8production/ (June 7, 2019), Elizabeth Bird, author interview.
Jewish News of Northern California, https://www.jweekly.com/ (August 11, 2017), Laura Paull, “Q&A: An Illustrator You Might Call Mrs. Lemony Snicket.”
Lisa Brown website, http://www.americanchickens.com (June 27, 2023).
Miss Marple’s Musings, http://joannamarple.com/ (September 16, 2015), Joanna Marple, author interview.
MUTHA, http://muthamagazine.com/ (May 11, 2017), “A Couple of Art Monsters: Summer Pierre talks to Lisa Brown.”
Publishers Weekly, https://www.publishersweekly.com/ (May 11, 2017), Sue Corbett, “Q&A with Daniel Handler and Lisa Brown: A Series of Unfortunate Deaths Inspires Picture Book Collaboration.”
Seven Impossible Things before Breakfast, http://blaine.org/sevenimpossiblethings/ (July 15, 2014), Julie Danielson, “Seven Questions over Breakfast with Lisa Brown.”*
About
LISA BROWN is a New York Times bestselling illustrator, author and cartoonist. Her award-winning picture books include: The Airport Book, How to Be, Mummy Cat by Marcus Ewert, Emily’s Blue Period by Cathleen Daly, and The Two Mutch Sisters by Carol Brendler. She has collaborated on three books with author Lemony Snicket: The Latke Who Couldn’t Stop Screaming, 29 Myths on the Swinster Pharmacy, and Goldfish Ghost, and is the creator of the “Baby Be of Use” series of board books for McSweeney’s, (including the absolutely essential Baby Mix Me a Drink). Her first graphic novel, The Phantom Twin, and Long Story Short, her first collection of comics, both came out in 2020, right before the world locked down. Therefore, her latest book for young children is The Hospital Book, published in March, 2023.
Lisa is married to the novelist Daniel Handler and lives with him, their teenager, and their ridiculous little dog in an old house on a hill in San Francisco, where she teaches in the illustration department of the California College of the Arts, and chairs the board of 826 Valencia. In her down time she drinks coffee.
For news and events, check out Lisa’s social media.
Hey! Why is your site called AMERICAN CHICKENS, anyway?
July 8, 2025
Let's Talk Illustrators #368: Lisa Brown
It is my pleasure, honor, and privilege to present a very special interview today with Lisa Brown, author and illustrator most recently of The Moving Book. The first book in this series, The Airport Book, holds a special place in my heart as one of the first books I ever shared on this site, back when I was doing my undies reveals flat on a table! Lots of things have changed since then, but Lisa's books haven't lost a single ounce of that specialness. I'll let Lisa take it from here!
About the book:
Moving can be sad and scary—but it doesn’t have to be. The kids in this book have done it many times before, as the older brother reminds his sister. They reflect on favorite memories from each of their past homes, and the boy talks her (and the reader) through all the steps to expect, from taping up boxes to riding in the car behind the moving truck.
Let's talk Lisa Brown!
LTPB: Where did the idea for The Moving Book come from? How does it fit into the larger series with The Airport Book and The Hospital Book?
LB: I am interested in journeys. In my two previous books starring the same family as The Moving Book—The Airport Book and The Hospital Book— I portray the kinds of journeys that many kids (and adults) will go on at some point in their lives. The spaces my characters move through, (airport, hospital), are “passing-through” places where diverse folks of different ages, genders, and backgrounds gather. They are spaces that are both universal and specific.
The Moving Book is my third book about that family, and my most personal. My family moved five times before I was seven years old. We lived in apartments, multiple family homes, and single-family homes. We moved close to my grandparents and extended family and then far away from them and then close again. We moved back and forth across state lines. We lived in a city and a suburb and a smaller suburb. Things felt vastly different every time: neighborhoods, bedrooms, food, backyards, people. At least they felt that way at the time.
So, The Moving Book is about a journey, of course, but, even more than that, it’s about memory. It’s about how things stick in your head, or don’t. About how one person might remember something you do not. And about how things change, and how that is okay. It might even be good. (Although this Brooklyn-born but Connecticut-raised author still can’t handle New England pizza.)
LTPB: What differences have you found between creating a picture book on your own (text and illustrations) versus illustrating someone else’s text?
LB: It’s actually very similar. When I paginate the book, I start to separate the text into pieces, with particular attention to incentive for the reader to turn the page. And then when I begin to draw, I revise the text, editing out what the pictures are handling all my themselves; I am conscious of creating an interplay of word and image. As Uri Shulevitz says in his brilliant Writing With Pictures: “The picture says what the words do not. And if the picture says it all, no words are used.”
In other writer’s books, of course, editing the text becomes a little more complicated! But most creators are open to that collaboration that happens between the “visual author” and the “textual author.” And of course, I occasionally illustrate my husband’s books, and he’s easy for me to boss around.
LTPB: How do you keep your process fresh with every new book? Are there any topics or stories in particular you’re still hoping to explore in the future?
LB: My ideas come from all different places, including doodles! and often float around my head for years. Of course, because my series of books that include The Moving Book are all of a piece, I have to work in more or less the same style, which becomes a little stifling, if I can be honest.
Many of my books, including the above, have been non-narrative; I tend to think in lists! I’d love to explore some different ways of telling stories in the future.
LTPB: What did you use to create the illustrations in this book? Is this your preferred medium? How does your process change from book to book?
LB: The Moving Book was created with pen and ink and watercolor on cold press watercolor paper, with some digital collage. I feel like this style is kind of like my handwriting, I come to it naturally and use it all the time. However, I’d love to brand out an experiment with different media: physical collage, more expressive mark-making with a variety of materials, less line, more paint.
LTPB: What are you working on now? Anything you can show us?
LB: I am (much too) slowly working my way through my second full length graphic novel, (the first was called The Phantom Twin), which is tentatively titled “Ghost School,” about two misfit students in a failing boarding school during the early 1970s, who can see the ghosts of the former students and teachers who haunt the decrepit building and grounds. Here are some of my sketches, which I’m creating on the iPad.
LTPB: If you got the chance to write your own picture book autobiography, who (dead or alive!) would you want to illustrate it, and why?
LB: Oh, my lord what a question. I am such a huge fan of so many living creators, that I absolutely refuse to choose anyone. So I’ll go for Adrienne Adams, an amazing artist who died in 2002 at the age of 96. She wrote and illustrated one of my favorite books as a child, A Woggle of Witches. I’m afraid that I’ve stolen a lot from her through the years. As I have from the late great Edward Gorey.
A moving truck-sized thanks to Lisa for talking me through her process! The Moving Book publishes from Neal Porter Books on July 22!
Special thanks to Lisa and Neal Porter Books for use of these images!
The Moving Book. By Lisa Brown. Illus. by the author. July 2025. 40p. Holiday/Neal Porter, $18.99 (9780823457182). PreS-Gr. 2.
The idea of moving to a new home has a little girl worried, but her big brother is on hand to talk her through it. He describes their family's many moves from a child's perspective, while images show them relocating from small apartments to larger homes as their family grows and changes over the years. Some spreads require turning the book vertically, perhaps echoing how moving can be disorienting at first; careful observers will notice that certain treasured items reliably appear in every home. At one point, brother helpfully explains the literal process of packing and loading the van, but the real heart of the book lies in his warm descriptions of moments and communities they have known. While clearly acknowledging that "sometimes I don't want to move," the larger theme here is that homes are where we make memories--some good and some bad--and that moving holds the promise of making new ones, always with the people we love. An inviting and reassuring discussion starter for families preparing to pack up.--Elisha Brookover
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2025 American Library Association
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Brookover, Elisha. "The Moving Book." Booklist, vol. 121, no. 21, July 2025, p. 89. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A852212833/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=42383b6f. Accessed 1 Nov. 2025.
Brown, Lisa THE MOVING BOOK Neal Porter/Holiday House (Children's None) $18.99 7, 22 ISBN: 9780823457182
The characters fromThe Airport Book (2016) andThe Hospital Book (2023) help young readers make sense of another challenging childhood experience: moving.
"Our family moves a lot," a child in a baseball cap tells a younger sibling. "But you probably don't remember." As the young narrator reminisces about the family's "tiny apartment in a big house," the accompanying image shows Mom, clearly expecting, dressing a younger, diaper-clad version of the protagonist. Later, they relocated to "the tall building with a lot of stairs." Here, the bigger sibling rests on the stairs while Dad, baby in a front pack, lugs a grocery bag. When they lived in "the big building with three elevators," trick-or-treating took place indoors, and "Grandpa lived far away, but Nana and Poppa were near." Finally, the narrator asks, "Remember when we moved into this house?" A "sold" sign by the door hints that more moving's in store. "Sometimes I don't want to move," the narrator confides, but in the final pages, the new house, with its bunk beds and lovely garden, looks a lot like home. Relying on a pitch-perfect combination of minimal text and expansive artwork, Brown once more offers a richly vivid, honest, and reassuring depiction of a potentially unfamiliar experience. Her colorful, clean-lined cartoons are full of sweet vignettes--each scene is practically a story in itself--and charming, humorous details that often gently contradict the text. The family is multiracial; Dad and the children are brown-skinned, while Mom is pale-skinned.
An impressively understated, respectful exploration of a big change.(Picture book. 3-7)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2025 Kirkus Media LLC
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"Brown, Lisa: THE MOVING BOOK." Kirkus Reviews, 1 May 2025. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A837325634/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=a5a1fe84. Accessed 1 Nov. 2025.
August 2025
The Moving Book
By Lisa Brown
Review by Julie Danielson
Beneath the bustle and transitions, The Moving Book is a tender and funny meditation on memory, sibling dynamics and the meaning of home.
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In The Moving Book, Lisa Brown captures the bittersweet, often funny emotional terrain of moving through the eyes of children reflecting on a series of their past homes. The book opens just after a family has moved yet again. The narrator, an older brother, walks his younger sister through their shared history—house by house, apartment by apartment—recalling the people, places and feelings attached to each. The sister never knew the family’s first home, a small, cluttered apartment where Grandpa lived downstairs and space was tight. In their next home, after the sister was born, there were lots of stairs and little room to play.
Brown’s storytelling sparkles with humor, especially through the voice of an unreliable narrator whose memories often contradict what the illustrations reveal. The slide at a nearby playground is remembered with fondness, yet the illustrations show the brother too scared to go down. A trip to the natural history museum includes the claim that the younger sister was “so afraid” of the dinosaurs, but in reality she stands boldly in front of the exhibit while the narrator clings to one of their parents.
The family moves again and again, from a building with three elevators to a place near other grandparents, each move including small delights (indoor trick-or-treating, choosing a room) and emotional costs. Brown’s crisp, expressive illustrations, often organized into tightly composed vignettes, invite close inspection; fans of Brown’s The Airport Book and The Hospital Book will recognize the same blend of emotional honesty and practical observation of those previous books. There’s a deep sense of serendipitous detail in this multiracial family’s journey: glimpses of cozy, crowded spaces convey a life in motion, full of both disruption and continuity. It’s also refreshing to see lived-in spaces like cramped apartments and city high-rises, settings rarely depicted in a genre often dominated by suburban homes.
The ending strikes a hopeful note: This new home has a little garden with a lemon tree. Beneath the bustle and transitions, The Moving Book is a tender and funny meditation on memory, sibling dynamics and the meaning of home.