LIPS TOUCH named as 1 of 5 Y.A. finalists for the National Book Award!

We are SO honored and excited! And I'm SO proud of my wife and her beautiful writing!

Go here for a list of all of the nominees.

Booklist Starred Review for LIPS TOUCH that compares Laini's writing to Neil Gaiman and Charles de Lint!

*Lips Touch: Three Times*
Taylor, Laini (Author) , Di Bartolo, Jim (Illustrator)
Oct 2009. 272 p. Scholastic/Arthur A. Levine, hardcover, $16.99. (9780545055857).
"...Taylor’s three novellas form a triptych of beautiful fantasy writing reminiscent of Charles de Lint and Neil Gaiman. Kisses are the unifying theme, with each story offering a different sort of locking lips, from giddy seduction to harsh power play. In “Goblin Fruit,” misfit Kizzy meets a fascinating new student, an unbelievably gorgeous young man who ignores the popular girls to seek her out. Taylor tantalizingly foreshadows the ambiguous ending, teasing and enticing the reader much as Jack Husk entices Kizzy. “Spicy Little Curses Such as These” is set in India and offers intriguing and culturally respectful glimpses of both Indian religion and British colonialism. “Hatchling” reveals a fully- realized world of sometimes malevolent immortals who steal and raise human babies as their pets. Present-day teen sensibilities blend with artful allusions to mythology and magic, pulling the reader into rich fantasy realms. The cover’s close-up of a lovely woman’s red lips, with red-orange flames licking at the super-imposed title, lacks the powerful, delicately structured, and subtle poetry of Taylor’s stories. But Di Bartolo, Taylor’s husband, provides skillfully detailed pen-and-ink illustrations that are a fine match for the lyrical, romantic text."

— Debbie Carton

Congrats Laini (and LIPS TOUCH!! (well, OK, and to me too) That makes TWO starred reviews so far!!

So in honor of the comparison (or "honour" as Mr. Gaiman might write) this morning I read Clementine one of Mr. Gaiman's more age-appropriate books. Plus it's a great early introduction to the amazing work of Dave McKean for her!! You can see that she enjoyed it! (Now I'll need to see if Mr. de Lint also has picture books, or if she'll need to wait until she's older to delve into his creations).

Messin' about with art

I'm working on some projects I can't show here for a while, but here are a couple of non-project-related cartoony portraits I screwed around with for fun recently. Thanks for stopping by!

LIPS TOUCH starred review in Publisher's Weekly and book trailer!

From Publisher's Weekly today:

Lips Touch: Three Times Laini Taylor, illus. by Jim Di Bartolo. Scholastic/Levine, $17.99 (272p) ISBN 978-0-545-05585-7
Taylor offers a powerful trio of tales, each founded upon the consequences of a kiss. She explores the potentially awkward conceit in three dramatically different fantasies, each featuring a young female protagonist out of place in the world she inhabits: contemporary Kizzy, who so yearns to be a normal, popular teenager that she forgets the rules of her Old Country upbringing and is seduced by a goblin in disguise; Anamique, living in British colonial India, silenced forever due to a spell cast upon her at birth; and Esmé, who at 14 discovers she is host to another—nonhuman—being. The stories build in complexity and intensity, culminating in the breathtaking “Hatchling,” which opens with a spectacularly gripping prologue (“Esmé swayed on her feet. These weren't her memories. This wasn't her eye”). Each is, in vividly distinctive fashion, a mesmerizing love story that comes to a satisfying but never predictable conclusion. Di Bartolo's illustrations provide tantalizing visual preludes to each tale, which are revealed as the stories unfold. Even nonfantasy lovers will find themselves absorbed by Taylor's masterful, elegant work.

WOW! Thanks Publisher's Weekly! (And congrats Laini for the glowing comments on your writing!) More reviews are pending and I'll try to remember to post them here. Also, here's some of the interior art from the book:




And a trailer for the book that the Marketing people at Scholastic put together! How cool of them to do this?!!

A bit more...

A larger clipping excerpted from the (larger) final piece:

An angry me with a mustache...

...(and thicker hair) from the White Wolf pieces I'm finishing up today:

Art snippit & baby pic

An in-progress art-snippit from the new White Wolf job I'm doing. I'll post more later on.

And...

...a pic of our new addition to the family! Clementine Pie Di Bartolo! We're crazy about her!!