Cover Reveal: Jill Esbaum’s STINKBIRD HAS A SUPERPOWER! (plus a giveaway)

Share
  • September 28, 2022
Kids World

by Jill Esbaum

Thanks, Tara, for hosting my cover reveal for STINKBIRD HAS A SUPERPOWER!

This book idea was sparked by a work-for-hire project for National Geographic Kids, Angry Birds Playground: Rain Forest. There I was, cramming my days with Amazon animal research, and … yeesh. Life in the Amazon is a big-time, bloody example of eat-or-be-eaten. And it was starting to get me down. (Maybe watching all those gobbledy-grisly videos wasn’t such a hot idea.)

But then a breath of fresh air blew in. The hoatzin. A leaf eater. A bird that bothers nobody, and nobody bothers it. Why? Because it smells to high heaven—like cow poop, thanks to its four-chambered, slow-mo digestive system. Golly, that cheered me up. Further research showed it to be a great singer (not), a great flyer (not), and a great nest-builder (um…). Best of all, their chicks have what might be called (if you’re me) a SUPERPOWER unlike any other bird in the whole entire world!

Well, how could I not play around with THAT idea? So I wrote an informational fiction manuscript from Papa Hoatzin’s POV.

A hoatzin standing on the top of a tree. He has spiky orange feathers at the top of his head, a turquoise patch around his eye area, and long grey-brown feathers around his body. Ugly thing.

And no editor got it.

In my 25 years of submitting, this manuscript actually holds the record for most rejections (so far *knock wood*). Hmm, maybe it was a little long. And, okay, a little over-written. But I’m stubborn, so, all along the way, I kept going back and tweaking. More rejections. Finally, I hit upon the idea of adding one of Papa’s chicks to the mix, making it funny, and WHEW, everything clicked.

A dream editor at Putnam snapped up my manuscript, had me tweak again, got the hilarious BOB SHEA to illustrate (I KNOW!), and ba-da-bing, ba-da-boom, here’s the cover:

Cover of STINKBIRD HAS A SUPERPOWER. Lettering in bold bubble letters with "Stinkbird" turquoiise, "has a" small and in pink, and "superpoower" in a neon-ish green. The stinkbird is stinkin' cute, a little birdie with purple body and large cartoon eyes with the turquoise patch around them. There are cuteness "stars" surrounding him as he prances on a white and grey branch, surrounded by large cartoon leaves and foliage.

STINKBIRD HAS A SUPERPOWER will release May 16th, 2023, to be followed in 2024 by the second book in the series, the equally amazing PARROTFISH HAS A SUPERPOWER. I am so proud of these books. Kiddos will love ’em and boy, will adults have fun reading them aloud.

Get your dibs in now, because this baby is available for PRE-ORDER!

Thanks, Jill! It looks SUPER!

And blog readers, the amazing Jill Esbaum is giving away a picture book critique!

Leave one comment below to enter.

A random winner will be selected in October.

Good luck!

Jill Esbaum is a widely published author of books for young readers. She is a frequent school visitor and conference speaker. She teaches writing for children at the University of Iowa Summer Writing Festival. Visit her at JillEsbaum.com and follow her on Twitter at @JEsbaum. 

Source : Cover Reveal: Jill Esbaum’s STINKBIRD HAS A SUPERPOWER! (plus a giveaway)

You may also like...