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ENTRY TYPE: new
WORK TITLE: Owl and Penguin
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WEBSITE: https://www.vikrammadan.com/
CITY: Seattle
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COUNTRY: United States
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PERSONAL
Born in India; children: two.
EDUCATION:Bachelor’s degree in engineering; University of Washington, graduate degree; attended Gage Academy of Art.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Engineer, illustrator, artist, and writer. Worked in the tech industry, rising to middle management, until 2013; freelance painter, including for Artifact Puzzles; Art by Vikram, Seattle, WA, artist studio owner; presenter at artist groups and conferences. Exhibitions: Displays art in Seattle-area shows and galleries.
MEMBER:Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators.
AWARDS:Editorial cartooning awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and the Washington Press Association; 3-Minute Movie contest winner, Seattle Times, 2011, for “The Three Little Space Pigs”; Moonbeam Silver Award for Children’s Poetry, 2013, for The Bubble Collector; Moonbeam Bronze Award for Children’s Poetry, 2019, for Lord of the Bubbles; Geisel Award Honor, American Library Association, 2023, for Owl and Penguin.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
[open new]Vikram Madan writes and illustrates collections of playful children’s verse and lighthearted cartoon stories. His “Owl and Penguin” and “Zooni Tales” series are self-illustrated graphic novels for beginning readers, and he has also written the “Bobo and Pup-Pup” early readers. Born in India and raised in New Delhi, Madan long had a penchant for creating things. He told interviewer James Preller, “I … was rhyming and doodling from an early age but never imagined myself as an artist or poet.” He enjoyed reading comics and by his teen years maintained a sketchbook, with one of his creations, a monkey named Bobo, destined to inspire a series. Madan originally studied for a career in technology, a common track in a social milieu where stable professions were favored. Madan told the Seattle Times, “Everybody wanted their kids to be doctors and engineers, and I didn’t have any role models for artists or writers. I kept cartooning through my teen years, got cartoons published here and there, but I still went to college for engineering.”
Moving to the United States to pursue graduate studies at the University of Washington, Madan drew editorial cartoons for the widely read school newspaper, the Daily. His path nonetheless led into the tech industry, where he sustained a substantial career as a software engineer. He started a family, and reading the likes of Dr. Seuss, Shel Silverstein, and Jack Prelutsky reignited his artistic and poetic impulses. A creative kickstart came when his puppet film “The Three Little Space Pigs” won a Seattle Times contest and was shown during the Seattle International Film Festival in 2011. After finally having what he referred to, in an Artifact Puzzles interview, as “an epiphany” in a Paris museum full of wondrous art, and taking heart from an exhibition of Dr. Seuss’s original handwritten manuscripts, Madan quit his tech job in 2012. The following year he self-published his first illustrated verse collection, The Bubble Collector: Poems and Drawings. He enrolled in the Gage Academy of Art, in Seattle, and two years later was devoted full-time to artistic and storytelling work. He variously works with oils, acrylics, watercolors, and ink and marker, and he maintains a studio, Art by Vikram, in Seattle’s Pioneer Square.
Asked by Artifact Puzzles about creative sparks, Madan related: “Inspiration comes from everywhere. I study the classical masters, and follow contemporary artists, while being steeped in sci-fi and pop-culture. My work tends to blend elements from various things I like—colors from my childhood, influences from animated movies, robots from my engineering background, humor from my cartooning background, ideas from real life.”
With topics and scenes ranging from the everyday to the imaginary, The Bubble Collector includes short snappy poems, limericks, parodies, longer narratives, and nonsense rhymes. Clever characters, like Franken-Jack and Franken-Jill, and humor, as with advice not to brush teeth with garlic paste, abound. Enjoying the “wisecracking and impish” tone of Madan’s “freewheeling compilation,” a Publishers Weekly reviewer proclaimed that the “screwball, black-line cartoons” help make for a “high-spirited read-aloud.”
After self-publishing another children’s verse collection, Madan made his mainstream debut with A Hatful of Dragons: And More Than 13.8 Billion Other Funny Poems. Recurring characters like a mummy and Professor Dobbleydook, inventor of the “Page Machine,” thread scenes together as Madan’s innovative forms include a “cracked-concrete” poem with fallen words, a rebus chant with Australian animals, and comic-strip poems. A poem with blanks and lists of words to choose from produces exponential possibilities, as the title promises. A Kirkus Reviews writer declared that Madan’s “loopily meta collection of silly, interactive poetry” offers enough “foolishness” for “several giggle-filled read-throughs.”
Madan’s self-illustrated “Owl and Penguin” books are graphic novels for early readers in the spirit of “Frog and Toad,” told almost wordlessly. In Owl and Penguin, the two friends enjoy gentle interactions over spilled ice cream, trying to fly, and braving the rain. The speech bubbles for their interactions show only pictures and emojis, while scattered words offer verbal cues. A Kirkus Reviews writer commented that the friendship is “deep and delightful” and the story “accessible and entertaining” in these “engaging vignettes in the lives of two adorable friends.” Best Day Ever, the second “Owl and Penguin” book, uses short sentences as the pair figure out what to play at the beach, enjoy gazing at fish and eating popcorn, brave a talent show, and fly a kite. A Kirkus Reviews writer remarked that the “friendship lessons are sound but never heavy-handed” as the feathered pair offer “charming evidence that compromise and inventiveness can produce the best day yet!” With activities in Here and There including pizza making, playing in the snow, and hiking, a Kirkus Reviews writer affirmed that Madan’s “exceedingly simple text … tells a dynamic story, complemented by enchanting cartoon illustrations,” in what proves “another sure-to-please entry in the buddy saga.”
“Zooni Tales” is a graphic-novel-in-rhyme series inspired by Madan’s dog Zooni. The first book, Keep It Up, Plucky Pup, finds Zooni embroiled in adventures including a search for a lost shoe (ask the shrews), a hunt for Cat in caves with bats, and some maritime derring-do that demands help from a whale. School Library Journal reviewer Elisabeth LeBris appreciated the “clever use of short rhyming phrases” in these “action-packed but gentle stories of friendship,” and a Kirkus Reviews writer noted that the “fun rhymes and sweetly expressive characters are charming.” In Booklist, Rebecca Thornburgh appreciated how Madan’s “deft rhyming text combines satisfying predictability with zestful nuance” as he “spices up” early-reader vocabulary with trickier words like catacomb. Thornburgh hailed the messages of “optimism and teamwork” in Zooni’s “cheerfully bouncy tales.”[close new]
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, November 1, 2023, Rebecca Thornburgh, review of Keep It Up, Plucky Pup, p. 72.
Kirkus Reviews, March 15, 2020, review of A Hatful of Dragons: And More Than 13.8 Billion Other Funny Poems; August 1, 2021, review of We Love Bubbles!; August 1, 2022, review of Owl and Penguin; April 1, 2023, review of Best Day Ever; September 15, 2023, review of Keep It Up, Plucky Pup; July 1, 2024, review of Here and There; September 1, 2024, review of Beware the Dragon and the Nozzlewock: A Graphic Novel Poetry Collection Full of Surprising Characters!
Publishers Weekly, July 8, 2013, review of The Bubble Collector: Poems and Drawings, p. 54.
School Library Journal, December, 2023, Elisabeth LeBris, review of Keep It Up, Plucky Pup, p. 88.
ONLINE
Artifact Puzzles website, https://www.artifactpuzzles.com/ (March 30, 2017), “Interview with Artist Vikram Madan.”
Book Q&As with Deborah Kalb, https://deborahkalbbooks.blogspot.com/ (June 30, 2023), author Q&A.
James Preller website, https://www.jamespreller.com/ (June 10, 2020), “Celebrating Poetry for Children: A Conversation with Debut Author, Vikram Madan.”
Mrs. Knott’s Book Nook, https://mrsknottsbooknook.blogspot.com/ (April 24, 2020), “Spotlight Friday—A Hatful of Dragons Blog Tour.”
Picture Book Builders, https://picturebookbuilders.com/ (November 5, 2021), Michelle Meadows, “Bobo and Pup-Pup: Interview with Vikram Madan.”
Seattle Times, https://www.seattletimes.com/ (March 15, 2023), Sarah Neilson, “Award-Winning Seattle Artist Vikram Madan on ‘Owl and Penguin’ and Choosing Creativity.”
Vikram Madan website, https://www.vikrammadan.com (February 2, 2025).
YA Books Central, https://www.yabookscentral.com/ (January 25, 2023), Cherokee Crum, “Interview with Vikram Madan (Bobo and Pup-Pup: Hatch an Egg).”
Short Bio: Seattle-area author-artist Vikram Madan makes fun art and creates award-winning books for kids, including the Geisel Honor winning OWL & PENGUIN series, the award-winning funny poetry collections BEWARE THE DRAGON AND THE NOZZLEWOCK, A HATFUL OF DRAGONS, THE BUBBLE COLLECTOR, and LORD OF THE BUBBLES, the early reader series BOBO & PUP-PUP, and the graphic-novel-in-rhyme series ZOONI TALES. His whimsical paintings and public art appear all over the Seattle area.
Longer Bio: Vikram Madan is the acclaimed author/illustrator of more than a dozen books for young readers, including the Theodor Seuss Geisel Honor winning, and ALA Notable book, OWL & PENGUIN, the award-winning funny poetry collections BEWARE THE DRAGON AND THE NOZZLEWOCK, A HATFUL OF DRAGONS, THE BUBBLE COLLECTOR, and LORD OF THE BUBBLES, the early reader graphic chapter series BOBO & PUP-PUP, and the graphic-novel-in-rhyme series ZOONI TALES. His books have been honored by Kirkus Reviews, American Library Association, Junior Library Guild, New York Public Library, Bank Street College of Education, School Library Journal blogs, and have appeared on multiple state award and Best Books of the Year lists.
Vikram was born and raised in India, where he really wanted to be a cartoonist, but ended up an engineer. He spent many years working in the tech industry before finally finding the courage to follow his heart into living a creative life as a professional visual artist and author-illustrator. He currently lives, paints, draws, writes, exhibits, and creates public art in the Seattle area. Past honors include editorial cartooning awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and the Washington Press Association, and even a movie-making award from the Seattle Times. He is regularly invited to present to students, artist groups, and children's book and writing conferences. His poetry also appears in several anthologies.
HONORS AND AWARDS: Theodor “Dr. Seuss” Geisel Honor, Texas Bluebonnet Book Award (Finalist), South Dakota Prairie Bloom Award (Finalist), Moonbeam Silver and Bronze Book Awards for Children’s Poetry, Multiple Junior Library Guild GOLD STANDARD Selections, American Library Association Notable Book selection, Starred Reviews from Kirkus and Council for Children's Books, Best Book of the Year Lists (Kirkus, New York Public LIbrary, Bank Street College of Education, Denver Public Library, Evanston Public Library, School Library Journal Fuse8 Blog, ALA ALSC), Editorial Cartooning Awards (Society of Professional Journalists, Washington Press Association, Columbia Scholastic Association), painting awards.
Picture
'Self-Portrait with Vandal' - Acrylic & Charcoal, 24"x18"
Back Story, with Too-Much-Information:
Vikram Madan was born and raised in India where, despite developing an early love for humor, poetry, art, and cartooning, he ended up becoming (surprise!) an engineer.
Despite a short stint drawing editorial cartoons for a daily newspaper (which work won him numerous awards from the Society of Professional Journalists, the Washington Press Association and others, and led to inclusion in the prestigious 'Best Editorial Cartoons of the Year' annual collection) Vikram failed to become a professional cartoonist, and fell back on a more-practical passion - programming - to pay the bills, which led to a long career in tech where he eventually got lost in the swamps of middle-management.
Despite a stable career, Vikram found it impossible to ignore his callings and, convinced that there were books only he could write and art only he could make, he (after much agonizing) left his job, trusted the universe, and took the plunge into the unknown to follow his heart.
After some directionless bumbling, Vikram spent two years pursuing art studies at Seattle's Gage Academy of Art, after which he completed the ArtistTrust EDGE Professional Development Program for Visual Artists. He has been working as a full-time professional visual artist ever since, focused on whimsical studio paintings and public art projects that appear all over the Seattle area.
In 2013, Vikram self-published his first collection of humorous poetry titled 'The Bubble Collector: Poems & Drawings by Vikram Madan', which was repeatedly compared to the work of Shel Silverstein, won a 2013 Moonbeam Children's Book Award for Poetry, and was described by one reviewer as "The BEST Poetry book of 2013". Vikram's second poetry collection, also self-published, 'Lord of the Bubbles: And Other Funny Poems' was released in 2018 and won the 2019 Moonbeam Bronze Award for Children's Poetry.
The challenges of selling and distributing self-published poetry books convinced Vikram to pursue traditional publishing and Vikram eventually landed representation with Rosemary Stimola at Stimola Literary Studio. Vikram's third poetry collection 'A Hatful of Dragons: And More Than 13.8 Billion Other Funny Poems' (Astra/WordSong, 2020) received much acclaim including receiving a starred review from Kirkus Reviews, being selected as a finalist for the Texas BlueBonnet Award and the South Dakota Prairie Bloom Award, being featured on seven Best Book of the Year lists (by Kirkus Reviews, New York Public Library, Bank Street College of Education and others), being selected as one of the only poetry books on the American Library Association's ALSC 2021 Summer Reading List, being turned into a theater performance by the University of North Carolina, and also being re-released in India by HarperCollins India.
In addition to poetry, Vikram's other children's books include the early-reader graphic chapter series titled BOBO & PUP-PUP (Penguin Random House 2021, illustrated by NYT-Bestselling illustrator Nicola Slater, starred review from the Council of Children's Books), the beginning reader graphic novel OWL & PENGUIN (Holiday House, 2022, a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection) and ZOONI TALES (Holiday House 2023, a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection). In 2023, OWL & PENGUIN won a GEISEL AWARD HONOR from the American Library Association, awarded to "the most distinguished American Books for beginning readers"), and was selected as an ALA Notable Book of the Year.
Vikram currently displays his contemporary whimsical art in local shows and galleries all around the Seattle area, and enjoys sharing his love for humor, poetry, drawing and books with kids of all ages via in-person and virtual school visits. He has also created several Art Books. He is a member of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI). He is regularly invited to give talks to artist groups, to children's book authors and illustrators, and at kidlit industry conferences.
Oh, and somewhere in there Vikram's short puppet movie, 'The Three Little Space Pigs', was a winner in the Seattle Times 3-Minute Movie contest and was screened at the 2011 Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF).
Follow Vikram's work on social media: @ArtByVikram
Mar 30, 2017
Artifact Puzzles
Interview with Artist Vikram Madan
We just released Night of the Mystic Moons, painted by Seattle painter Vikram Madan. Here's an interview with the artist: AP: Could you give us a brief personal history? When did...
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We just released Night of the Mystic Moons, painted by Seattle painter Vikram Madan.
Here's an interview with the artist:
AP: Could you give us a brief personal history? When did you begin your artistic journey?
Madan: I was born and grew up in India. Was always creating something or the other as a kid, and did a lot of self-taught cartooning in my college years, but ended up studying engineering and worked in tech for most of my life. A few years ago, an epiphany in a Paris museum led me to take part-time art classes, and then 4 years ago I quit my tech career to attend art school-full time. Have been working as a professional artist for the last 2 years.
AP: What inspires your works?
Madan: It helps to be a little crazy. :) Actually, inspiration comes from everywhere. I study the classical masters, and follow contemporary artists, while being steeped in sci-fi and pop-culture. My work tends to blend elements from various things I like – colors from my childhood, influences from animated movies, robots from my engineering background, humor from my cartooning background, ideas from real life...
For example, If you look carefully at the Moons painting, you’ll see references to Groucho Marx, Frankenstein, George Melies, 1950’s golden age sci-fi...
AP: You have a such a variety of styles and mediums with which you work with. Is there any one in particular that is your favorite to work in?
Madan: I rotate frequently through oils, acrylics, watercolors, and pen & ink. I like pen & ink because of my cartooning roots, watercolors for their unpredictability, acrylics for speed-painting, and oils for their lustrous textures.
Often the nature of the project, and the looming deadline, will define which medium I use.
AP: Is there any particular topic/character that is your favorite to draw?
Madan: Robots. There’s lots of robots in my work – in fact I have an entire book of robot drawings ‘A Rupture of Robots’. And octopuses. Octopuses are cool.
AP: What have you been up to lately?
Madan: I just published my second art book – ‘A Rumpus of Reapers’ which is slightly darker humor featuring a character I call Lil’ Grim reaper.
When not painting, I also write funny poems. My debut poetry book ‘The Bubble Collector’ was nominated for the WA State Book Awards in 2014.
Welcome you who enter here
Come step right up and lend an ear
And in return, for just a while
I promise you shall laugh and smile...
AP: You can check out all our Vikram Madan puzzles here. Thanks Vikram for sharing!
Celebrating Poetry for Children: A Conversation with Debut Author, Vikram Madan
June 10, 2020 / jimmy / No comments
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“When I started, I had no idea
what the poem was going to be about.
I just followed the words home.
Sometimes that is the best journey
a writer can experience.”
— Vikram Madan
I’m that guy at the party — do you remember parties? it was this thing in the olden times when people used to get together and — nevermind! — I’m the guy who tugs on your arm and says, “Have you read Vikram Madan’s new book? It’s fantastic,” and then I press it into your hands. Anyway, today we’re lucky to spend time with debut children’s poet, Vikram Madan. His clever, quirky, playful poetry includes aliens and garden gnomes, robots and dragons, instantly bringing to mind past masters Shel Silverstein and Jack Prelutsky. So put down the Swedish meatballs and let’s say hello . . .
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Greetings, Vikram. Congratulations on your new book!
Thank you, it’s a pleasure to be featured here!
I’m curious about the path that led you to this moment, a collection of playful poems for young readers. According to your bio, you spent many years working in the tech industry.
I grew up in New Delhi, India and was rhyming and doodling from an early age but never imagined myself as an artist or poet. Instead I followed the herd into engineering and ended up working in tech, with one brief detour as a newspaper editorial cartoonist. It was only after my kids were born that I encountered the work of Dr. Seuss, Shel Silverstein, and Jack Prelutsky and that inspired me to start writing poetry again, though it took me the next decade to figure out how not to do it.
Wait, how not to do it? What mistakes were you making?
I was writing rhyming poetry very instinctively, and it was largely raw –- forced rhymes, mismatched stresses and pauses, unbalanced and asymmetrical feet, lines that wouldn’t scan cleanly -– basically everything that makes an editor wince. Sometimes I could tell it was off, but not why. Only after discovering prosody did I develop the vocabulary to analyze what I was doing, and fix what I was doing wrong. For those interested in writing rhyming poetry, I highly recommend Timothy Steele’s All the Fun’s in How You Say a Thing. By 2012 it was clear to me that I needed to ‘follow my heart,’ at which point I quit tech, enrolled in art school, and started writing humorous poetry, all of which has culminated in this book.
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Bold move, Vikram. There’s a great tradition of poets and their day jobs. Wallace Stevens worked for an insurance company; William Carlos Williams was a general practitioner; Frank O’Hara worked as a clerk and published a collection titled, “Lunch Poems.”
I think most poets have had to have day jobs. Poetry is a labor of love and feeds the soul, but rarely the stomach :). Right now my day job is ‘visual artist’ so I suppose I am a little more fortunate that I can scratch my creative itch in more ways than one.
With A Hatful of Dragons, you were published by Boyds Mills & Kane. But you self-published your first book, The Bubble Collector. People have differing perceptions of self-published work, but I think it was a courageous step. Big respect. Tell us about it.
Poetry is fairly hard to place with agents and publishers, and a common submission guidance is “Don’t tell us your work is just like Shel Silverstein’s,” which was a problem, because my work is like Shel Silverstein’s! After years of amassing rejection slips, I finally decided that if no one was going to publish my poetry, I would just publish it myself, which led to The Bubble Collector. Once the book was out, I discovered writing a book is the easy part. Getting a physical self-published book in front of readers is HARD. By ‘hitting the pavement’ a lot, I was able to get the book in front of enough people that it was invited into the WA State Book Awards, won a Moonbeam Children’s Book Award, and garnered praise from booksellers, reviewers, and readers. The experience, though, gave me a healthy respect for traditional publishing!
Are there particular poets who influenced you? When it comes to funny poems for children, I guess Jack Prelutsky sort of owned that playing field for many years.
I didn’t believe I could write poetry professionally till I saw an exhibition of ‘raw’ Dr. Seuss manuscripts. I didn’t think of combining art with words till I encountered Shel Silverstein’s books. And Jack Prelutsky’s work opened my eyes to language, vocabulary, rhythm, and rhyme. Beyond those three, I particularly admire 19th century poets: Lewis Carroll, Guy Wetmore Carryl, W.S. Gilbert, John Godfrey Saxe, and Edgar Allan Poe.
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It’s interesting that you illustrate your own poems. Who is the boss, the writer or the illustrator? Or does the inspiration flow back and forth? I’m fumbling to ask: Do you start with the words or an illustration?
It depends and is different for each poem. Sometimes I conceive the art and words together, sometimes the words are in the driver’s seat, and, occasionally, a visual image will trigger the poem. Usually as I am writing I do have a good sense of how the combination will look on the page.
I imagine that your process changes from poem to poem. I wonder if we could share a specific poem from the new book here, and then you could talk us through your creative process.
Yes, every poem has its own unique back-story. When I am writing poetry, the natural cadence and in-built rhythm of words, both in how I hear them and how they feel on my tongue, can sometimes organically steer the poem one way or another. An example of this is the first poem in my book, “The Panda and the Pangolin.”
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Looking back at my notes, I had been making lists of animals as potential subjects, and at one point I wrote:
Banded Pangolins
followed by:
A band of banded Pangolins
And following the sound of that sentence, I then wrote:
The panda and the pangolin
which seemed to offer more possibilities.
You are fooling around with language, alert to the inner dynamics, without necessarily an end in sight.
Yes. I asked myself, What if it was the other way around?
The pangolin and the panda?
I tried:
At the edge of my veranda
sat a pangolin and panda
But “The Pangolin and the Panda” didn’t have the same natural rhythm as “The Panda and the Pangolin,” so I went back to the original:
Said the panda to the pangolin
I like your little mandolin
Better. And it was developing a musical theme, similar to the “band of banded pangolins.” But I needed to drop the extra “Said” syllable:
The panda and the pangolin
between them have a mandolin
a clarinet, a violin
a drum made from some beaten tin
And the rest of the poem unfolded from that starting point. The first poem then directly seeded the next poem, which then seeded more humor in other parts of the book. Note that, when I started, I had no idea what the poem was going to be about. I just followed the words home. Sometimes that is the best journey a writer can experience.
Delightful! Thank you for sharing that, Vikram. It’s been a pleasure getting to know you and your work.
Thank you for featuring me here. It’s an honor!
Hey now, don’t get carried away. Glad to have you, and good luck.
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Vikram Madan grew up in India where, despite spending his childhood rhyming and doodling, he ended up an engineer. After many years of working in the tech industry, he finally came to his senses and followed his heart back into writing, drawing, and painting. When not making whimsical paintings and public art, he writes funny poems. His self-illustrated poetry collections include A Hatful of Dragons and the Moonbeam Award Winners The Bubble Collector and Lord of the Bubbles. He lives near Seattle, Washington, with his family, two guitars, and a few pet peeves. Visit him at vikrammadan.com.
Friday, April 24, 2020
Spotlight Friday - A Hatful of Dragons blog tour - 4.24.2020
April is National Poetry Month
Join me on Fridays as I share a new poetry book for your collections. Some may be a book that is a poem, others may be collections of poetry. All books you'll want to add for {future} readers!
One of the best ways to keep kids reading is to keep them laughing. They mostly look for humorous books so when you add laughter to poetry... you keep the readers turning the page for more! And poet Vikram Madan knows that - just look at the title of his most recent collection of poems!
A Hatful of Dragons by Vikram Madan
A Hatful of Dragons:
And More Than 13.8 Billion Other Funny Poems
by Vikram Madan
published by WordSong an imprint of Boyds Mills & Kane
Full of poems that make you laugh out loud, many poems even make you turn the page before you get to the punchline of the poem. That little bit of a pause gets readers thinking about what direction Madan is going to take with his jokes, but they always leave you with the same ending - laughter. And I'm thinking that's what we may need even more lately, pages with stories and ideas and possibilities that make us laugh!
While the poems in the collection can be read and enjoyed individually, readers will notice certain plot lines and characters are often woven throughout the collection. The ending of a poem might not be the ending of that particular poetic story! Readers will enjoy going back to these quick little stories and seeing there is actually more to read.
Poet Vikram Madan stopped by to tell our readers more about writing poetry. Thanks, Vikram!
How do you approach writing for a young audience?
With my prior two books (The Bubble Collector and Lord of the Bubbles) I was very intentional in making sure the books had a lot of poetic diversity, from really simple to complex/nuanced, so they would be easy to get into for younger kids, and have some lasting value for older ones. And I also wanted the books to expose kids to how varied poetry could be and how much fun you could have playing with words. This Bubble Collector discussion guide will give you some idea: https://www.vikrammadan.com/uploads/2/0/3/8/20386603/bubblecollector_teachersguide.pdf I do need to create something similar for ‘Hatful of Dragons’.
In general when writing poetry I prefer to write poetry kids can grow into over time, rather than outgrow quickly. For example, somewhat like Jack Prelutsky (this is a comparison my editor made), I’m not artificially limiting my vocabulary to specific age ranges, but I am keeping in mind that the poems still make sense to the young reader. Humor really helps engage the kids, as do the illustrations. That way they have words to read, pictures to enjoy looking at, and fun with the whole experience.
When I do school visits, I am often surprised by which poems the kids seem to like the most. I’ve found I’m not a good predictor of what they will like so the more variety I can provide, the more the likelihood kids will find something they favor. Incidentally, by not keeping the vocabulary too simple, the books are also enjoyable for older readers.
What can readers expect when diving into your newest collection?
Hatful of Dragons has a lot of visual variance among the poems (Including some comic-strip formats), recurring characters and interweaving plots. So I am hopeful kids will find it enough of a fun experience to come back to it again and again. And in that process read some poetry. :)
I know you have a visual background. How do you incorporate that into your poetry?
I used to do a lot of cartooning in my college years so I’m naturally attuned to visual humor and punch-lines. When I’m gestating a poem, a part of my brain is exploring visual ideas in parallel, so that words and visuals start emerging together. Sometimes the visuals play a supporting role and let the words lead the dance. Other times, I’ll be enamored with a visual gag and then I have to mold the words to get to the visual endpoint. The book has a lot of visual variety mostly because I give each poem space to evolve into whatever form suits it best, whether it’s a rebus or a comic strip or a concrete poem or something more traditional.
Writing rhyming poetry isn't just coming up with the many rhymes, you also have to think of the rhythm and beats of the lines. How do you do that?
I find every word has a physical aspect to it, in how we say it, hear it, and feel it. And when you string words together, they have a natural in-built rhythm that can’t be controlled, only harnessed. As I assemble words, I am listening to how they sound and then I might build a structure around their cadence - or if they don’t fit into the structure I am trying to create, well then I have to find different words or a different structure. A few examples:
* The first poem in my book is titled ‘The Panda and the Pangolin’ (page 4). Looking back at my notes, it apparently started as a poem about pangolins:
‘A band of banded pangolins’.
And following the sound of that sentence, I then wrote:
‘The panda and the pangolin’
which seemed to offer more possibilities. What if it was the other way around: ‘The pangolin and the panda’ ?
I tried
‘At the edge of my veranda / sat a pangolin and panda’
But ‘The Pangolin and the Panda’ didn’t have the same natural rhythm as ‘The Panda and the Pangolin’ so I went back to the original
‘Said the panda to the pangolin / I like your little mandolin’
Better. But I needed to drop the extra ‘Said’ syllable:
‘The panda and the pangolin / between them have a mandolin / a clarinet, a violin / a drum made from some beaten tin’
And the rest of the poem unfolded from there, with active guiding to make sure it ended where I needed it to.
(Note that, when I started, I had no idea what the poem was going to be about. I just followed the words home).
* Another example is the poem ‘The Flippy, Floppy Flappers’ (page 13), which was inspired by a painting of energetic, bouncy creatures with big flapping ears. For this poem, I had a concrete subject and I just needed to find the right words to express their energy. I consciously used a lot of alliteration hoping that repetitive tongue movements would make the poem feel like it too was bouncing and flapping when read aloud.
A first version, a rough sketch trying to get the idea down, went like this:
‘They keep lapping they keep looping as they vault and spring and leap / They can barely bear to stand still and they rarely stop to sleep’
My tongue kept tripping on ‘vault and spring’ and on ‘stand still’ and ‘stop to sleep’, so after experimenting with many variations, I finally arrived at:
‘ They keep leaping, lapping, looping as they flop and flip and flap / They can barely bare to idle and they rarely nab a nap ‘
Says the same thing, but flows so much better and I really like how the words feel in my mouth.
Here’s a video of me reading ‘The Flippy, Floppy, Flappers’: https://youtu.be/hiOkWkdLmwY?t=72s
Thank you to Vikram for stopping by today!
Be sure to find A Hatful of Dragons and check out the other stops on the blog tour:
More about Vikram Madan:
Vikram Madan grew up in India where, despite spending his childhood rhyming and doodling, he ended up an engineer. After many years of working in the tech industry, he finally came to his senses and took a leap of faith to leave his tech career behind and reboot himself as a professional visual artist. When not making whimsical paintings and public art, Vikram writes and illustrates humorous poetry. His first self-illustrated book of funny poems, The Bubble Collector, won a 2013 Moonbeam Silver Award for Children’s Poetry. A follow-up collection, Lord of the Bubbles, was released in 2018. Vikram’s third collection, A Hatful of Dragons, was released by Boyds Mills & Kane in Spring 2020. Vikram currently lives near Seattle, Washington with his family, two guitars, and a few pet peeves. Somewhere along the way he has also won editorial cartooning awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and the Washington Press Association. Visit him at vikrammadan.com.
Home Uncategorized BOBO AND PUP-PUP: Interview with Vikram Madan (+Giveaway)
BOBO AND PUP-PUP: Interview with Vikram Madan (+Giveaway)
Michelle Meadows November 5, 2021
Adorable best friends, bubbles, and cake – count me in! Vikram Madan is here to tell us all about the creation of BOBO and PUP-PUP. The title alone made me want to know what’s happening.
With fun stories that celebrate friendship, this new graphic novel series will make kids laugh out loud. I admire the charming dialogue and funny interactions between the characters. Nicola Slater created the bright, high-energy illustrations.
Now let’s hear from Vikram!
What was your main inspiration for creating BOBO AND PUP-PUP (BB&PP)?
BOBO AND PUP-PUP emerged from the convergence of several disparate threads.
Bobo (the Monkey) first came to life as a doodle in my sketchbook back when I was a teen. I thought my sketch was cute, and I clung to the idea of using the character in a creation someday. Over the years, I jotted down possible book titles for Bobo such as BOBO SAVES THE WORLD and BRAINY-BOBO AND SUPER-PUP – but I never got around to writing anything more than a title.
A few years ago, I was developing an early reader series with two gentle, best-friend characters (somewhat like FROG & TOAD). One of the stories involved making a birthday cake without enough ingredients. Editors, however, found the series a little ‘too gentle’ (i.e. ‘boring and unexciting’) – so I shelved that project.
My agent, Rosemary Stimola at Stimola Literary Studio, suggested that, for early readers, I should look beyond FROG & TOAD to books like ELEPHANT & PIGGIE. The idea struck me that the cake story might work well in a less wordy, more graphic format. Could this be the right story for my BOBO character? And SUPER-PUP? Except, I changed SUPER-PUP to PUP-PUP, and that sounded just right!
I love the way it sounds! I also love how you didn’t give up. You revitalized your idea and created a new vision for it.
Then it was a matter of fleshing out their personalities and letting them loose on the scenarios – make a cake*, blow bubbles*, etc. – to see what happens.
Ironically, my agent thought my teenaged-rendering of BOBO was ‘not very appealing’ so I had to redraw BOBO before we circulated the project. In the end, I ended up not illustrating the books myself – which worked out well because the illustrator, Nicola Slater, has done a fabulous job with the art.
* I got the idea for LET’S MAKE CAKE when I read the recipe for ‘Pound Cake’: 1lb Flour, 1lb Eggs, 1lb Butter, 1lb Sugar. That seemed really simple, but it made me wonder what would go wrong if you didn’t have some – or all – of the ingredients?
* The idea for WE LOVE BUBBLES came from a summer afternoon with my kids when they were 3 and 5 years old and we did nothing but blow bubbles and pop bubbles…
Tell us about your writing process.
I usually start with a raw idea – just a couple of bullet points or possibilities. I then mull it over in my head for quite some time to see if I uncover a story arc, after which I start jotting the story down on my computer. Sometimes I know how the story will end and can work towards the ending. Other times I have to follow the characters and hope, fingers-crossed, they will lead me to some satisfactory conclusion. When I finally think I have a full story, I start sketching a dummy, which really helps me tighten the dialogue and figure out the action, pacing, and humor – and ensure the story will fit the desired page count. The dummy will then invariably force a re-write of the text, for the better.
I didn’t have a critique group back when I wrote the BB&PP books so I had to lean on my agent for feedback. Once the books were acquired, I worked with my editor, Heidi Kilgras at Penguin Random House, to fine-tune the text – such as adding evenly-spaced chapter breaks and ironing out the kinks.
What was it like working with your publishing team?
It’s always exciting to work with an editor who loves the manuscript. I view editors (and their teams) as professionals in the business of producing the best possible books. As a result, I am always happy to incorporate their feedback and defer to their business decisions.
For example, I was initially bummed when the publisher wanted someone else to illustrate the books, but in retrospect that was an excellent decision. Nicola has made the books very, very appealing for their intended audience.
What are your top 3 tips for creating children’s books?
* Write for yourself first! If you don’t love what you are writing, chances are other people – including kids – probably won’t either.
* As a kid I loved books I could grow into and re-read so I think it’s okay for a book to be just a little advanced for the targeted age. Better kids grow into a book than outgrow it quickly!
* Leonardo Da Vinci once wrote in his journals that (paraphrasing): “It’s a good sign if the work you’re producing disappoints you – that just means you are aspiring to better yourself, and are going to keep growing as a creator. Whereas if you become very satisfied with what you produce, that’s likely a sign of stagnation and lack of future growth.” I think this is a great rule-of-thumb for any creative person to keep in mind anytime we get frustrated when what we produce doesn’t match what we imagined we could produce! The journey is the adventure, and every step is taking us forward (even if it sometimes doesn’t feel that way).
What’s new and exciting?
* For those who enjoy BOBO & PUP-PUP, there are two more books planned in the series. Book #3 is slated for Fall ’22 and Book #4 for Spring ’23.
* I am writing and illustrating a beginning-reader graphic-novel series, OWL & PENGUIN, coming out in Summer ‘22 from Holiday House Books for Children. This one is about two bird friends and very, very different from BB&PP.
This all sounds so amazing – I can’t wait to read your forthcoming books! Congratulations!
Visit Vikram’s website and Twitter page.
Visit Nicola’s website and Twitter page.
***GIVEAWAY***
For a chance to win a copy of BOBO and PUP-PUP, leave a comment by November 12. I’ll announce the randomly selected winner in my next post.
Congratulations to Patricia Franz for winning a copy of MEDITATION STATION from my last post.
Thanks for reading and see you next time!
-Michelle
Interview With Vikram Madan (BOBO AND PUP-PUP: HATCH AN EGG)
January 25, 2023No Comments
Written by Cherokee Crum, Staff Reviewer
Posted in Authors, Interviews, News & Updates
Today we are very excited to share an interview with Author Vikram Madan (BoBo And Pup-Pup: Hatch an Egg)!
Meet the Author: Vikram Madan
VIKRAM MADAN, an award-winning children’s book author and illustrator, is the author of the Bobo and Pup-Pup graphic chapter-book series, which includes The Funny Book, We Love Bubbles!, and Let’s Make Cake! He grew up in India and spent many years working in the tech industry before coming to his senses and following his heart into the visual and literary arts, creating work that can be in turn humorous, quirky, fun, lighthearted, philosophical, thought-provoking, and sometimes all of these at the same time. When not painting and making public art, Vikram writes and illustrates humorous poetry. Visit him at VikramMadan.com.
Website * Twitter * Instagram * Facebook
About the Book: BOBO AND PUP-PUP: HATCH AN EGG
Bobo is a monkey. Pup-Pup is a dog. They find a hairy brown egg that they need to take care of! Perfect for fans of Elephant & Piggie who are ready to graduate to two new buddies!
It’s a bird. It’s a plane. It’s an egg falling from the sky? Best friends Bobo and Pup-Pup will discover what’s inside once it hatches. But wait…how will they help the egg hatch? Is it even an egg? Find out as they work together and discover a surprise while readers are in on the joke.
This hilarious and relatable graphic chapter book will have kids ages 5 to 8 laughing out loud while gaining confidence in reading. Graphic chapter books serve as a great bridge to graphic novels and longer chapter books. Don’t miss the rest of the books in the series:
We Love Bubbles!
Let’s Make Cake!
The Funny Book
Amazon * B&N
~Author Chat~
YABC: What gave you the inspiration to write this book?
I first sketched the Bobo character – a cute monkey – when I was a teenager. Over the years, I would jot down hypothetical book titles next to the character. One day I wrote down ‘Brainy Bobo and Super-Pup’ and suddenly that became ‘Bobo and Pup-Pup’ and I knew right away I had the basis for a book about two best friends with different personalities. The ideas for each book in the series were inspired by incidents from my own life.
YABC: Who is your favorite character in the book?
I identify most, and empathize, with Pup-Pup. Whereas Bobo is a free-spirit and an improviser, Pup-Pup likes to do things methodically and follow the rules step-by-step, and sometimes that’s hard when all your friends are like Bobo!
YABC: How do you know when a book is finished?
A book is only finished when it’s finally printed on paper! Till then, it will undergo many rounds of revision – first from myself, then from feedback from my trusted readers, and then from feedback the editorial staff helping to publish the book. Many changes can happen between when a writer first thinks they are done, and when the book is finally published.
YABC: When did you know you wanted to be a writer?
I have been writing since I was eight years old, but did not think I could be an author till, well into my adulthood, the day I saw an exhibition of Dr. Seuss’s original manuscripts. Looking at his handwritten notes, I realized that writing is 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration, and if it was primarily hard work, then maybe, perhaps, I could do it too?
YABC: How do you keep your ‘voice’ true to the age category you are writing within?
When writing, I try to imagine myself reading the book aloud to kids of the target age, or imagine myself as a kid reading the book by myself. This allows me to make decisions about concepts, humor and words that are tuned to that age category.
YABC: What is your favorite writing space?
When I am writing, I need solitude and like to find a secluded corner in a large library. When illustrating I like putting on old B&W silent films in the background to help create some visual atmosphere.
YABC: What type of scene do you love to write the most?
I love writing funny scenes and imagining ways to create situations and even ‘page turns’ that would make a reader laugh out loud. In ‘HATCH AN EGG’ some of the humor comes from the fact that the reader is in on the joke, but the characters are not.
YABC: What do you do when you procrastinate?
When I’m procrastinating, I’m usually finding other, unimportant things to do. To break out of procrastination, I find it’s best to create a working schedule with daily goals and then hold myself accountable to those.
YABC: What other age group would you consider writing for?
My current books already fall into a variety of age ranges. BOBO & PUP-PUP are ages 4-8 (although also very popular with 2 year olds). My easy reader graphic novel OWL & PENGUIN is for ages 3-6, and my funny poetry book A HATFUL OF DRAGONS is for ages 7 and up.
YABC: What’s up next for you?
After BOBO & PUP-PUP: HATCH AN EGG launches, I have two graphic novel books launching in 2023: OWL & PENGUIN: BEST DAY EVER (ages 3-6) and ZOONI TALES: KEEP IT UP, PLUCKY PUP (ages 5-8).
Award-winning Seattle artist Vikram Madan on ‘Owl and Penguin’ and choosing creativity
March 15, 2023 at 6:00 am
Vikram Madan, author of “Owl and Penguin.” (Courtesy of Vikram Madan)
Vikram Madan, author of “Owl and Penguin.” (Courtesy of Vikram Madan)
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By Sarah Neilson
Special to The Seattle Times
Vikram Madan grew up in India, where as a child he was always drawn to art and poetry. But the expectation for him to become “successful” led him to graduate studies at University of Washington and a career as a programmer. After starting a family and working his way up the corporate ladder, Madan felt called to pursue art and writing full time. After spending two years taking classes at Seattle’s Gage Academy of Art and completing the Artist Trust EDGE Professional Development Program for Visual Artists, he now has a studio in Pioneer Square where he paints whimsical characters and scenes. Vikram has public art from murals to electrical box wraps throughout the Greater Seattle area, and writes and illustrates humorous stories, poetry and children’s books.
His latest book, “Owl and Penguin,” is a nearly-wordless story of two friends, Owl and Penguin, whose various adventures and misadventures showcase how friends with different needs navigate challenges from ice cream mishaps to a difference in flying ability with nuance and care. The book is a Theodor Seuss Geisel Honor Book (that’s Dr. Seuss’ full name), and its sequel, “Owl and Penguin: Best Day Ever,” will publish in June of this year.
The Seattle Times spoke with Madan over Zoom about becoming a full-time artist, friendship and problem-solving, and the importance of representation in creative fields. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
“Owl and Penguin” by Vikram Madan. (Holiday House)
“Owl and Penguin” by Vikram Madan. (Holiday House)
“Owl and Penguin”
Vikram Madan, Holiday House, 40 pp., $14.99
Can you talk about your journey from a career in tech to one in art and writing?
I grew up in New Delhi. My youngest memories are of drawing and doodling and reading comics, but the society was geared towards finding stable professions for their kids so everybody wanted their kids to be doctors and engineers, and I didn’t have any role models for artists or writers. I kept cartooning through my teen years, got cartoons published here and there, but I still went to college for engineering.
I came to Seattle for graduate studies at the University of Washington. I drew some editorial cartoons for The Daily, which was a fairly big paper back then. I really enjoyed that experience of drawing cartoons, but I fell back on my education, ended up working in tech and had kids. That’s when I encountered folks like Dr. Seuss — I had never read Dr. Seuss till my kids were born. I got this idea that I could try to draw or write something but bumbled around with it for a long time. I also really love poetry; I’ve been writing poetry for a very long time. But people don’t want to publish poetry that easily. Over the years, I kept trying my hand and getting frustrated with the rejections piling up and not quite knowing what I was doing. I’d start and stop, but I couldn’t ignore the itch and would come back and scratch it.
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Around 2010, I went to Paris and that was my first time visiting the art museums there. I was floored by all the art there. I thought to myself, I’ve spent all these years trying to draw and write but I don’t actually have any training. So maybe in this life I should master one medium. I was not enjoying my work; they promoted me to middle management and that sucked the joy out of my life. I couldn’t shake that feeling that I had to go create things. One of the things that helped me make up my mind was when I took part-time painting classes at the Gage Academy. I was usually the youngest person in the class. and I realized that all the other people had waited all their lives to retire before they were able to actually follow their passion, and I didn’t think that was healthy for me to follow that kind of path. I looked around for tips on how to make this hard decision between the safe choice and the choice you know nothing about. And all the signs were pointing towards trusting the universe.
Can you talk about the importance of friendship and helping each other in “Owl and Penguin,” and the motivation behind having the story containing very few words?
Every cartoonist wants to be able to tell the story without words because that’s really how they can show that they can draw. If you ask most cartoonists, secretly they will tell you that yes, they would love to do a story that had no words in it. I love watching all black and white movies and seeing how they express themselves without the dialogue. There’s a lot of that in animation and art.
One of the guiding principles of animation is that you should always be able to tell from the silhouette of the character what’s happening in that scene if it was just completely black and white. So I was tempted to try and do a wordless story, and I tested the idea on my Instagram followers. A lot of people chimed in and said they would love it. If you’re a bilingual family, it’s nice to have a book you can narrate in two languages or if someone has older kids with dyslexia or other learning disabilities, they felt the kids will not be able to get excited about reading because it was always such a challenge.
I actually spent six months researching friendship. It’s easy to have friends, but it’s not always easy to say why you’re friends with someone or what makes for a strong friendship. In friendship, you have to be not too similar, but you can’t be too different. You have to share experiences, and yet in some of your experiences you have to support each other through it or introduce each other to things you wouldn’t normally do. It’s a combination of all of those factors that makes for an interesting friendship.
What does it mean to you that this book got a Theodor Seuss Geisel Award?
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I’m very excited about it on multiple levels. The biggest thing is that people, librarians in particular, will notice this book now. And because it’s an icon Library Association award, librarians, in particular school librarians, will see it. That will get it in front of more kids. What the committee liked about the book was the fact that kids could get into it easily, but also there’s a lot of undercurrents of problem-solving, helping, kindness and empathy and consideration for others.
I think it makes a great book for teachers, librarians, caregivers and parents to discuss these topics as they’re reading them with kids. So I’m excited that the book gets a higher profile for sure. Another thing that I think is important is I’m a brown person. My daughter was born and raised here. She’s 21 now and she’s planning to be a jazz musician. She’s studying at the New England Conservatory of Music. And one of the things she says is that as a kid she did not see people like herself reflected in culture; not in the shows on TV, not in books, not in music. She keeps prodding me to raise my profile a little bit so that kids like her can see that there are brown people and people of color in the arts.
Especially in the Seattle area, which is so tech-centric, a lot of immigrant families are tech-oriented but their kids are born and raised here. It’s important for kids to see that there are paths for brown people and people of color to follow nontraditional fields and to follow their passion, without feeling they have to all become computer scientists, or go into STEM fields. I never had role models when I was growing up and so I hope I can be that for someone who really wants to draw and write or choose a creative career.
Friday, June 30, 2023
Q&A with Vikram Madan
Vikram Madan is the creator of the new kids' easy-reader graphic novel Owl and Penguin: Best Day Ever. It's a sequel to Owl and Penguin. Madan is based in Seattle.
Q: What inspired you to write the Owl and Penguin books, and how did you create your characters?
A: The Owl & Penguin characters first appeared in a series of whimsical paintings I was making in my art studio.
Link: https://www.vikrammadan.com/uploads/2/0/3/8/20386603/sale1-orig_orig.jpg
Eventually an editor I was working with asked if I would consider writing a picture book with these “cute characters.” The picture book project did not pan out but instead seeded the idea (in my mind) of telling stories wordlessly for pre-readers, beginning readers, emergent readers, struggling readers, and multi-lingual readers.
I spent a few months developing a wordless graphic novel proposal which eventually found a home at Holiday House. In the final version we added carefully chosen basic-sight-reading words to help with visual literacy.
The Owl & Penguin books are visual stories first. I conceptualize the story as images and sketch out a draft before adding additional narrative text.
Q: The Kirkus Review of the new book said, in part, “Charming evidence that compromise and inventiveness can produce the best day yet!” What do you think of that description?
A: I like that description very much. :) Part of the “charming” appeal of the books is in how much the characters empathize and care for each other, and find ways to support each other, which sometimes requires compromising and sometimes requires coming up with a new solution to a problem.
Many parents have told me these stories have helped their kids discuss problem-solving, broaching differences, showing kindness, expressing emotions, and supporting friends.
Q: How would you describe the dynamic between Owl and Penguin?
A: Owl & Penguin are best friends, despite having different personalities. Prior to developing these books, I spent a few months delving into the concept of “friendship,” including reading research papers on the topic. (One quote I won’t forget: “You can have unrequited love, but you can’t have unrequited friendship!”).
Strong friendships happen when people have some similarities and some differences, have some shared interests, empathize with, care for, and support each other, help each other grow, and when both people end up better off by being friends.
I tried to incorporate these elements in developing the characters and in how they interact. I think everyone would love to have a friendship like Owl & Penguin’s – I certainly would! :)
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I am currently working on the third Owl & Penguin book. In Fall 2023, I have a new graphic novel coming out with Holiday House, titled Zooni Tales: Keep It Up, Plucky Pup (Ages 5-9). This one is inspired by my pup Zooni, and is completely in rhyme!
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: My editor, Sally Morgridge, and I recently recorded an online conversation on the Making of Owl & Penguin, where I share the origin story in a lot more detail and we discuss considerations that go into writing emerging readers. Interested readers can find it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxhZP7QwbXs
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
Madan, Vikram BEWARE THE DRAGON AND THE NOZZLEWOCK Wordsong/Astra Books for Young Readers (Children's None) $19.99 11, 12 ISBN: 9781635928174
A new gathering of hazards and cautions in rollicking verse from the author ofHatful of Dragons (2020).
A dragon smart enough to see through a knight's "I DO NOT seek your gold!" might seem fearful enough. But Madan's collection of poetry, presented in comics format, features plenty of formidable characters, from the boneless "Squishosaurs" ("We glide across the countryside / And in our viscous wake, / TheT. Rexes trudge terrified, /Velociraptors quake!") to a young witch with a lucrative line of ghost pets. Perhaps worst of all is the Nozzlewock, which writhes its way into several poems to suck up the unwary with its prodigious proboscis: "Beware the Nozzlewock, my child! / The nose with super-vacuum strength!" Sharp-eyed readers will find further visual links between various poems, as when a janitor's "Little Oopsie" in a secret laboratory that "messed up time and space" goes on to turn a young explorer into a flaming "super-gal." In varied but consistently tight verses accompanying expressive cartoon images depicting a diverse cast, Madan also trots in other memorable fancies, from a theatrical chorus line of grown-ups singing away a beleaguered child's "Bad-Luck Bogeys" to a mummy happily joining a zombie rock band called the Rolling Moans, on the way to a gloriously glutinous finale in which a group of intrepid children tickle the Nozzlewock into a mighty sneeze of its own.
Juicy, joyful, and just right for reading aloud, too.(Graphic poetry. 6-10)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2024 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation
MLA 9th Edition APA 7th Edition Chicago 17th Edition Harvard
"Madan, Vikram: BEWARE THE DRAGON AND THE NOZZLEWOCK." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Sept. 2024, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A806452785/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=9f5561fe. Accessed 10 Nov. 2024.
Madan, Vikram OWL AND PENGUIN Holiday House (Children's None) $14.99 9, 24 ISBN: 9780823457120
The latest in the series sees the friends making pizza, playing in the snow, and taking a hike.
Pizza-making begins promisingly ("Mix. Roll. Pull"), but tossing the dough brings disaster: "SPLAT." The pair are determined ("Again," "pull"), but alas, the final step is always followed by "STICK," "SPLAT," and "PLOP," whether it's Penguin or Owl throwing the pie to the sky. Draped in dough, they finally have a joint light bulb moment--time for a trip to the pizza parlor to enjoy pies topped with fish and mice. In the second tale, after a snowfall, each friend wants to make a snow-self, but Penguin's creation collapses. Penguin is sad, so Owl nobly repurposes bits of the snow-owl to create a snow-penguin. Penguin thoughtfully adds owl features to one side, so they end up with a bilateral Snow-Owl-Penguin. The final tale, "Hike," is propelled by opposites: far/near, up/down, dark/light, and more. These prepositions barely hint at the drama within the illustrations: The pals fall into a cavern, plummet over a waterfall while rafting, and encounter an angry mama bear. Nevertheless, by sunset the friends are safely home, regaling each other with memories of their exciting day. Madan's exceedingly simple text--often, just a word or two per panel--tells a dynamic story, complemented by enchanting cartoon illustrations of the big-eyed, adorable duo.
Another sure-to-please entry in the buddy saga. (instructions for drawing Owl and Penguin) (Graphic easy reader. 5-7)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2024 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation
MLA 9th Edition APA 7th Edition Chicago 17th Edition Harvard
"Madan, Vikram: OWL AND PENGUIN." Kirkus Reviews, 1 July 2024, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A799332835/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=807d60fc. Accessed 10 Nov. 2024.
Madan, Vikram OWL AND PENGUIN Holiday House (Children's None) $14.99 6, 6 ISBN: 9780823451517
In their sophomore outing, supportive bird buddies recognize their differences and devise workarounds that satisfy both of them.
"Playtime" sees Owl wanting to play catch with a beach ball while Penguin holds a racquet, ready for tennis. Short sentences in sans-serif panel captions set out the dilemma: "They cannot agree." "They play alone." "Playing alone is no fun." Light bulbs indicate their simultaneous ideas: They play catch, then bat the beach ball with racquets, then play tennis--and engage in some acrobatics. "Best day ever!" In "Fish," Penguin wants Owl to see the colorful fish underwater. "But Owl cannot swim." Penguin tries to submerge Owl in a glass bowl--but "Owl is scared." So Penguin fills the sphere with fish and holds it up to Owl. While Owl loves the film they watch on "Movie Night," Penguin is terrified. But they find something to agree on: "Best popcorn ever!" When Owl plays the ukelele, Penguin pushes for Owl to take part in a talent show. On stage, Owl panics until Penguin cheers and Owl relaxes and wins. Finally, Owl finds a creative way to help Penguin fly a kite. Inside simplified outlines, Penguin is pale blue, Owl brown, both with appealing googly-eye faces. The friendship lessons are sound but never heavy-handed. The multiple-frame graphics on every page get the plot across; in fact, the visuals render the text almost superfluous.
Charming evidence that compromise and inventiveness can produce the best day yet! (Graphic early reader. 3-6)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2023 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation
MLA 9th Edition APA 7th Edition Chicago 17th Edition Harvard
"Madan, Vikram: OWL AND PENGUIN." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Apr. 2023, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A743460713/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=dff8fdfc. Accessed 10 Nov. 2024.
Zooni Tales: Keep It Up, Plucky Pup. By Vikram Madan. Art by the author. 2023. 96p. Holiday, $13.99 (9780823453573); paper, $8.99 (9780823456161); e-book, $8.99 (9780823457298). K-Gr. 2.741.5.
With narrative unfolding (mostly) in buoyant speech balloons and set in brightly colored, cartoon-style panels, Geisel Honor winner Madan presents five short tales featuring a cheerful anthropomorphic dog and his (mostly) Australia-centered animal friends. In pairing words like kazoolshrew and confused/ bruised, Madan's deft rhyming text combines satisfying predictability with zestful nuance (a tale about a lost shoe cleverly uses only words that rhyme with "oo") but also spices up typical early reader vocabulary with more obscure choices like catacomb, kelp, and askew. Always lively, with varying degrees of drama-from the slapstick shoe search and a sloppy pancake-making fiasco to silly foot races with a collection of unlikely competitors, an unflappable recovery of a cat trapped in a batfilled cave, and an inspired deliverance from being stranded after a storm at sea--the message in each misadventure is that optimism and teamwork can solve any problem. As the ever-chipper Zooni shows his friends old and new how to make the best of things, these cheerfully bouncy tales will certainly tickle emerging readers.--Rebecca Thornburgh
YA Recommendations
Adult titles recommended for teens are marked with the following symbols: YA, for books of general YA interest; YA/C, for books with particular curricular value; and YA/S, for books that will appeal most to teens with a special interest in a specific subject.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2023 American Library Association
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Thornburgh, Rebecca. "Zooni Tales: Keep It Up, Plucky Pup." Booklist, vol. 120, no. 5-6, 1 Nov. 2023, p. 72. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A774988490/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=802b4417. Accessed 10 Nov. 2024.
MADAN, Vikram. Zooni Tales: Keep It Up, Plucky Pup. illus. by Vikram Madan. 96p. (Zooni Tales). Holiday House. Oct. 2023. Tr $13.99. ISBN 9780823453573.
K-Gr 2--Three stand-alone stories, with the first featuring a napping Zooni who awakes to find her shoe missing and enlists friends to help with the mystery. Kangaroos, an emu, a cockatoo, and a group of monkeys all lead the puppy to three rascally shrews. The little thieves try to hide but are quickly found, and subsequent confessions from the shrews as well as Zooni reveal that the shoe has multiple uses. In the next tale, Zooni happens upon three friends who have lost a fourth in a cave. Brave Zooni leads the way through dark tunnels in search of Cat and meets a friendly bat colony. In the final story, a sudden squall causes havoc in the bay sending Zooni and Cat far from home in their boat. As they try to get back, they pick up their friends lost at sea, but soon discover that they have brought on more rescues than the boat can carry. A kind whale shows up just in time. Clever use of short rhyming phrases coupled with action-packed but gentle stories of friendship will appeal to early readers. The comic storytelling style makes good use of panel sizes, gutters, and dialogue balloons. VERDICT Fans of the author's "Owl and Penguin" books will welcome Zooni. A solid purchase for elementary collections.--Elisabeth LeBris
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2023 A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
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LeBris, Elisabeth. "MADAN, Vikram. Zooni Tales: Keep It Up, Plucky Pup." School Library Journal, vol. 69, no. 12, Dec. 2023, p. 88. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A779118686/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=b0da58ac. Accessed 10 Nov. 2024.
Madan, Vikram KEEP IT UP, PLUCKY PUP Holiday House (Children's None) $13.99 10, 10 ISBN: 9780823453573
A pooch with perseverance and pals enjoys suspenseful adventures.
This collection, made up of three funny, easy-to-read tales and two brief interludes, stars Zooni, a very anthropomorphized dog (not the canine from Madan and Nicola Slater's Bobo & Pup-Pup series), and a variety of not-to-scale animal friends. In "Missing Shoe," Zooni seeks missing footwear and comes across many items and characters that rhyme with shoe, including cockatoo, stew, and emu, all of which end in different letters, though the expectation of a final rhyme could certainly help beginning readers; in a surprise ending, the other shoe drops! Varied rhymes in "Rescue" subtly convey important themes: helping others, persisting even in the face of fear, and making new friends. In "Boating Day," Zooni's desire to help out those in need while out on the water outweighs caution and common sense as a bevy of other creatures crowd into the tiny vessel. Thanks to the flat, full-face perspective, Zooni's head barely changes shape, so his nose and mouth are sometimes weirdly displaced. Readers will find occasional challenging words, like responding, weight, and gorgeous, and the Caveat-like font isn't legible enough to help emerging readers. Still, the fun rhymes and sweetly expressive characters are charming.
Despite a few wrinkles, the graphic format and rhyming text will engage young readers. (Graphic fiction. 5-8)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2023 Kirkus Media LLC
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"Madan, Vikram: KEEP IT UP, PLUCKY PUP." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Sept. 2023, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A764873205/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=45fd26af. Accessed 10 Nov. 2024.
Madan, Vikram OWL AND PENGUIN Holiday House (Children's None) $14.99 9, 27 ISBN: 978-0-8234-5150-0
Birds of a feather--and flipper--flock together.
In the first of several stories about two avian pals, Owl purchases ice cream for themself and Penguin, but disaster ensues when the ice cream falls off Penguin's cone. Penguin is unhappy, so Owl is unhappy, and a second cone is purchased. When that one falls, the friends go from sad to laughing at the absurdity of it all. The following two tales highlight the different abilities the two have. Penguin wants to fly, just like Owl, so the two get creative to figure out a solution. In the final story, Owl wants to play outside with Penguin, but it's raining; once again, the two manage to find a way to have fun. The three stories in this graphic novel are told with minimal text; Owl and Penguin communicate with word balloons, using only illustrations and emojis. Some of the panels contain simple narration in boxes; if children are still learning, however, they can deduce meaning based on the illustrations. Reminiscent of the strong bond between Arnold Lobel's Frog and Toad, Owl and Penguin's friendship is deep and delightful, and this easy reader makes the story comprehensible as it addresses themes of envy, sadness, and problem-solving in an accessible and entertaining way. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Engaging vignettes in the lives of two adorable friends. (Graphic early reader. 3-6)
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"Madan, Vikram: OWL AND PENGUIN." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Aug. 2022, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A711906635/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=dfff7bff. Accessed 10 Nov. 2024.
Madan, Vikram WE LOVE BUBBLES! Random House (Children's None) $9.99 9, 21 ISBN: 978-0-593-12065-1
Blowing bubbles almost blows up a beautiful friendship.
Pup-Pup, a dog, loves bubbles, and so does Pup-Pup’s monkey friend Bobo. And even better, Pup-Pup loves to blow bubbles, and Bobo loves to pop them—that is, until Bobo insists on popping all the bubbles before Pup-Pup can enjoy them. When Pup-Pup brings in a “SUPER BUBBLE MIX” for making “super-strong bubbles” that “NO ONE can POP,” the challenge is on. Can Bobo pop these new bubbles that Pup-Pup is working so hard to blow? No! And that creates quite a problem when Bobo becomes trapped inside a large bubble and begins to float away. After Pup-Pup rescues Bobo, the two friends recognize how important their friendship is and swear off bubbles…at least for a little while. Kicking off the Bobo and Pup-Pup series (No. 2 publishes simultaneously), this book consists of six short, fast-paced chapters generally with one or, sometimes, two short sentences on each page and plenty of pages of “PHOOO”ing (as Pup-Pup huffs and puffs), popping, and poking, all begging reader participation, for fun. Pup-Pup and Bobo are simply drawn, typically set against an ever changing solid-color background with minimal details other than bubbles. Continuity-minded readers will notice that the final illustration is inconsistent with the storyline, as it shows Pup-Pup easily popping bubbles made from the super-strong mix. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Grab some bubble mix and join Pup-Pup and Bobo for a good read. (Graphic novel. 5-8)
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"Madan, Vikram: WE LOVE BUBBLES!" Kirkus Reviews, 1 Aug. 2021, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A669986531/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=801c261b. Accessed 10 Nov. 2024.
Madan, Vikram A HATFUL OF DRAGONS Wordsong/Boyds Mills (Children's None) $17.99 4, 21 ISBN: 978-1-68437-150-1
A loopily meta collection of silly, interactive poetry.
Madan’s collection of rhymed verse lives up to its subtitle thanks to a poem with 12 numbered blanks and 12 lists of seven words or phrases each to insert, mix-and-match style, in those blanks…that equals seven-to-the-12th-power possible poems! You do the math. (All 13 billion rhyme.) The fun starts in the illustrations even before the poetry does, with characters that recur throughout the book. A mummy pops up on the copyright page, for instance, and is then seen running in the distance in one illustration and watching a movie in another before finally showing up in its own poem: “Mummy wrapped in / Hoary cloths— / Scrumptious feast for / Hungry moths.” On the page with the table of contents, a bespectacled, bearded white man peers out of a rock and keeps peeping in but doesn’t introduce himself until the end, when he is revealed to be “Professor Dobbleydook, / Inventor of the Page Machine, / Which lets me travel through this book / To spy on any page or scene.” The interrelations continue, as does the foolishness. There is a “cracked-concrete” poem (some of the words have fallen to the bottom of the page), a rebus chant composed entirely of pictures of Australian animals, and some poems in comic strips. The cast appears to be of many races and species.
This collection will encourage several giggle-filled read-throughs. (Poetry. 5-10)
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"Madan, Vikram: A HATFUL OF DRAGONS." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Mar. 2020. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A617193057/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=769a54dd. Accessed 10 Nov. 2024.
The Bubble Collector: Poems and Drawings
Vikram Madan. CreateSpace, $12.95 paper (148p) ISBN 978-1-4823-9761-1
School, family, mealtime, animals, and imaginary creatures are among the everyday and outlandish subjects Madan visits in this freewheeling compilation of 100 poems. The poetic styles represented are just as varied, including punchy short rhymes, longer narrative poems, limericks, parodies of well-known poems, and nonsense ditties. The overall tone is more uniform, tending toward the wisecracking and impish ("Franken-lack and Franken-Jill/Lurching, lurching up the hill/Testing out the new physiques/ Doctor Stein has built this week"). Another common denominator is humor (the narrator of "Things I Learned the Hard Way" shares some useful advice: "Don't stuff sausage in dad's shoe/Don't fix broken eggs with glue/Don't hide treasures in the waste/Don't brush teeth with garlic paste"). Madan also plays with words for the sake of the rhyme: "Our mums make us do yoga/They say it'll help us grow-ga/We wear our little toga/And quietly tiptoe-ga." The author's screwball, black-line cartoons work in tandem with the text, in some cases delivering the poems' punch lines. A high-spirited read-aloud. Ages 6-12.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2013 PWxyz, LLC
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"The Bubble Collector: Poems and Drawings." Publishers Weekly, vol. 260, no. 27, 8 July 2013, p. 54. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A336603318/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=4e351553. Accessed 10 Nov. 2024.