New book!

This week Daddy is a polar bear (Dutch title: Papa is een ijsbeer) was published at De Eenhoorn. It's my first collaboration with the wonderful Saskia Halfmouw, and I'm pretty proud of it. Thank you to her, and thanks also to Dries Desseyn, the designer.

Daddy is a polar bear started out as a short story, but Saskia Halfmouw made it into a richly illustrated little graphic novel, which also makes it an easy read. The story is about an older sister and her little brother, who one day starts repeating this sentence: 'Daddy is a polar bear'. The girl wonders: why does he do that, what does it mean? But then she watches a documentary about polar bears... 

Daddy is a polar bear is a tender, light and warm story about being the children in a divorce situation. For children from 8 year old and up. 64 pages, full colour. 

Sam to a brand new language...

Dutch version of book two

I wrote two books about a big, dreamy, almost magical white dog, called Sam. The first book was A dog like Sam (2011) and the second one Sam in winter (2012). The illustrations were by the awesome Philip Hopman and the original publishing company was Querido.

French version of the first book

The books were sold to the US, to France, Germany, Estonia and South-Africa, but now there's a whole new language for the Sam-adventures: the publishing house of Petrkov bought the rights for the Chech versions of the books. I am very happy that both books will be published in Chech Republic next year!

Thank you very much, Petr Novotný!

SAM IN THE US

Last week my first book about the dog Sam came out in the United States. In Dutch it's called TOEN KWAM SAM and in the version that Eerdmans' Publishing House issued it's named A DOG LIKE SAM. It was beautifully translated by David Colmer, and of course the original illustrations by Philip Hopman are included.
Next year also the second volume about the dog will be published!

The book came out in Holland in 2011 and was awarded with the Zilveren Griffel (Silver Slate) one year later. Further editions are the French, the German, the Estonian and the South-African one, where it was published in all the official eleven languages of the country.
Rights can be seen here, and the Dutch Literary Fund is giving out grants for the translation of this book (and others).