Betsy in the News / Press Releases / Praise
Video Interviews:
Video Interview with New Books Network about POP! Goes the Nursery Rhyme 2025
he tweaked her tail a bit on this one… fun. “Mel Rosenberg, It’s fun, it’s engaging, it’s hilarious, it’s wacky. The illustrations are marvelous.”
Video Interview with New Books Network on What Makes a Perfect Picture Book? 2024
Mel Rosenberg “a perfect picture book is kid friendly and good enough so the adult doesn’t cringe.” “we are in a golden age of PB, but because there are more books, there are more to sift through.”
Audio Interview with Read to Them on funny books for kids
On humor’s role in helping kids with big topics – “An author has an ability to reach in and just grab your heart and squeeze it. If they are using humor, then they’re loosening that grip a little bit and they are letting you feel that it’s serious but that you are in safe hands.”
Video Interview with WeGrowMedia about my career
done
Video Interview with Artists Book House about my career
Video Interview with KidLit TV about my career
Podcast Interviews:
Podcast Interview with The Illustration Department about children’s literature
Podcast Interview with All the Wonders about Funny Girl
Podcast Interview with Buttons & Figs about Funny Girl
Podcast Interview with Secrets of Story about capturing the nature of children
Podcast Interview with Reading With Your Kids about Funny Girl
Podcast Interview with The Picture Book Summit about great picture book readalouds
Podcast Interview with Grace Lin on Kidlit Women about women in the children’s book industry
Blog Inteviews:
Interview with Mackin Reader on all my books throughout the years
Interview with The Children’s Book Review About Long Road to the Circus
Interview with Erin Dealey About POP! Goes the Nursery Rhyme
Press:
The Double Life of Betsy Bird – Interview with Forbes Magazine
“Betsy lives, eats and breathes children’s literature. Her book reviews are thousands of words longer than the books she’s reviewing,” he says. “She channels her oddness into this niche blog, which then extends beyond its niche. Why was she born to do this? Who knows?” —Dan Blank, Reed Business Information
Other:
A profile in Chicago Magazine 2015
“It turns out, with my propensity for destroying books, I was perfect for children’s librarianship, where the books die instantaneously in the hands of very small people who tear them apart.”
I regularly appear on Chicago Today to talk about books for kids. Here is my appearance from November 2024. (five books, majority with edge 😉
An interview alongside Julie Danielson with Little Willow about Wild Things: Acts of Mischief in Children’s Literature
“I see a LOT of books in a given year, but there’s always this sense that I’m not seeing ALL the books. And boy howdy do I want to see absolutely everything.”
An interview with BookPage (Cat, deputy editor 2019)about being a children’s book creator. 2019
“You’ll hear authors kvetch when they get the “where do you get your ideas?” question, but I don’t believe it’s because the question is overdone. It’s more that authors often have no idea what the true answer is. Writing is, by definition, strange. I’m going to sit down, create words that represent pictures that appear in my brain and put them onto a page in an order that not only makes sense but, ideally, will reach into YOUR brain and elicit some kind of a response. Humans are keen on tangibles, and nothing is more intangible than writing.” I’d like to visit a children’s librarian in every city. Nobody knows the ins, outs, oddities, peculiarities and specificities of a city like a librarian that works with kids.”
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Author Interview 2021
https://www.onlypicturebooks.com/2021/10/25/librarian-author-interview-betsy-bird/
Making informed choices about nursery rhymes to share — or not
https://www.slj.com/story/Making-Informed-Choices-About-Nursery-Rhymes-to-Share-or-Not
“she knows her stuff, especially when it comes to children’s literature.” Literacious.com
WEGROW MEDIA
https://wegrowmedia.com/betsy-bird/
(video) (audio)
Betsy Bird: From “Invisible” Introvert to Author, Critic, Blogger and Librarian
Betsy Bird’s Funny Girl on LadyBird & Friends
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-fSDtR8xO8
the great santa stakeout
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/YwpGxJjwUXg
Interviewing Erica Perl (All Three Stooges) / speaker section?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVcfDXFybuU
A Wrinkle in Time 50th Anniversary Event: Betsy Bird Introduction
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rhdh7DGW1KA
2022 Michigan Notable Book Author Interview Conversations: Betsy Bird, with Mindy Babarskis
Long Road to the Circus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JrYUi8WlBU
Betsy Bird Interviews: M.T. Anderson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZSVt1UfagQM
KidLit TV | StoryMakers with Betsy Bird PART 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rpQtIQw213M
752 views Jan 21, 2015
http://www.kidlit.tv The conversation continues in Part 2 of Rocco’s interview with über-librarian Betsy Bird! -Betsy announces her predictions for the Newbery and Caldecott. -Rocco and Betsy resurrect the “Worst Children’s Book” award. -Betsy tells us what she really thinks about celebrity’s children’s books. Betsy Bird is in the running for KidLit TV’s ‘BEST KIDLIT QUOTE’ 2015: “Poop when done well is delightful.” — Betsy Bird Betsy Bird is the New York Public Library’s Youth Materials Collections Specialist and has her very own spiffy blog on School Library Journal:
Betsy Bird & Adam Gidwitz | SLJ Summit 2018
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hPFDATd1uk
Evanston Bound Ep 32: Betsy Bird with Jamie Thome
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tExkCkwoHcQ
31 days, 31 lists of great books for kids