For Mother’s Day, we are noticing books that demonstrate good parenting—often without the child realising. The Poo Bum series is one.
Admirable mothers in picture books
The House that Jack Built in Aotearoa New Zealand schools
This picture book tells the story of colonisation in Aotearoa for our tamariki and our rangatahi. They can look at and see and feel–what happened here, what was the impact, what changed in Aotearoa from page one to the end of the book? This book is a huge asset as a launch pad for deeper learning for our students.
An English version as entertaining and easy as the original
My primary task as a translator was to reproduce the flow and fun of the stories, making the English versions as entertaining and easy to read as the originals. Of course I didn’t try to do this by simplifying Panda and Squirrel’s plans, but by taking slight liberties in the literal content to maintain clarity.
Serendipity—one reason we attend the Bologna Children’s Book Fair
The Bologna Children’s Book Fair is a cornerstone of the Gecko Press business, and it was magnificent for me and Julia to be back under the porticos in Italy this March—four years since the last visit!
The many wisdoms of Detective Gordon
We frequently follow Gordon’s policies on small cakes, namely to introduce one to a situation wherever possible. To mark the final book in this junior fiction series, we collected five of our (other) favourite wisdoms.
Be kind to the duck
Written by Julia Marshall, founder of Gecko Press.
We are celebrating the life of Wolf Erlbruch, who died this week aged 75.
Duck, Death and the Tulip is a pivotal book for Gecko Press, one of the books I am most proud to have on our list.
Bookmaking bests of the Gecko Press year
By Rachel Lawson, Publisher at Gecko Press.
Every book is a careful process of translation, editing, design, layout, proofreading and printing — with small and big decisions from all of those involved and at every stage that change how the book will be for its readers. Here are ten decisions that I’ll remember from the year we’ve had.
Studio tour: Clotilde Perrin and her monsters
For the release of Gotcha!, Clotilde Perrin took over our Instagram for a look inside her studio and at her work in progress. She shared images and video of original artworks and a bookcase bursting with books about monsters and fairy tales.
On orphans in children’s books
What is it about orphans in books? They are tragic, with backgrounds mysterious, bruised, like Jane Eyre. They are vulnerable and burdened, like Oliver; or have learned to be trickier than the trickiest, like the Artful Dodger. They are steely, sad, often hungry with large eyes. They’re tragically young and terrifically youthful. They are tantalisingly free.
A dinosaur by another name | Translation
By Rachel Lawson, publisher at Gecko Press. When we translate a book into English from another language, one of the first questions for the translator is the names of the characters—and often that affects the title too.
