Come Hear the Stinky Cheese Man Tell How 3 Inch Tall Robot Zot Conquers the Earth! — Solve a Case of Mistaken Identity!

October 15, 2009 by Julia
Filed under Austin (downtown), Community

Friday night of Free Family Fun at the Austin Children’s Museum

AUSTIN, Texas – October 15, 2008 – The Texas Book Festival is partnering with the Austin Children’s Museum to host a pre-Book Festival event with two acclaimed children’s authors Jon Scieszka, the National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature (Trucktown series, Stinky Cheese Man) and Mac Barnett on October 30 at the Austin Children’s Museum. The authors will be in town for the Texas Book Festival October 31 and November 1.

The two authors will give an engaging and mind-explosive joint presentation that is for children of all ages to enjoy followed by a book signing of their new works, Robot Zot! (Scieszka) and Guess Again! (Barnett).

WHAT: Family Fun Authors Event with Jon Scieszka and Mac Barnett

WHEN: Friday, October 30, 2009

3:30 p.m. doors open for free admission
4 – 5:30 p.m. Author event and Book Signing

WHERE: Austin Children’s Museum, 201 Colorado Street, Austin, 78701, 472-2499

MUSEUM ADMISSION: FREE thanks to event sponsors Austin Children’s Museum, Tapestry Foundation, Texas Book Festival and Treaty Oak Mortgage

About the Texas Book Festival:

Founded in 1995 by Laura Bush and a group of interested volunteers, the Texas Book Festival (TBF) is held every year on the grounds of the Texas State Capitol. It features readings and discussions from more than 200 of the most accomplished Texas and national authors. With the help of the Austin community, a statewide advisory committee and more than 900 volunteers, the organization has grown each year. In addition to being one of the most prestigious literary festivals in the nation, the TBF develops and manages year-round programs that foster literacy statewide.

TBF Facts:

has surpassed the $2.3 million mark in total grant awards to Texas public libraries since its inception through its Library Grant program
has reached more than 30,000 children in economically disadvantaged Central and South Texas Schools, providing for many the first book they’ve ever owned through its Reading Rock Stars program
with the University Interscholastic League sponsors a Middle and High School Fiction writing contest
entertains and informs approximately 35,000 festival attendees, adults and children alike, free of cost, with engaging author events, local foods and music
Sponsors include: Austin American-Statesman, AT &T, Barnes & Noble, Brigid Cockrum & Family, Central Market , HEB, KLBJ-AM 590, KGSR-FM 107.1, KLRU, KUT-FM 90.5, The Meadows Foundation, Texas Monthly, Republic National Distributing Company, Pearson Education, Sibley Peteet Design, and T.L.L. Temple Foundation.

About Austin Children’s Museum:

The mission of the Austin Children’s Museum is to create innovative learning experiences for children and families that equip and inspire the next generation of creative problem solvers. Located at the Dell Discovery Center downtown at the corner of 2nd Street and Colorado, the Austin Children’s Museum is one of the city’s popular cultural attractions with 200,000 visitors annually. Founded in 1983 as a non-profit organization, the Austin Children’s Museum delivers its mission through a variety of exhibits, programs and outreach activities. For more information, please visit austinkids.org.

About the Authors:

Jon Scieszka:

Scieszka is the creator of Trucktown and the author of The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs!, the Time Warp Trio series, Caldecott Honor Book The Stinky Cheese Man, and many other books that inspire kids to want to read. He has worked as an elementary school teacher and is also the founder of a literacy initiative for boys. The Library of Congress named Scieszka the Inaugural National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. Jon’s favorite color (this week) is dark green. Jon’s favorite foods are New York pizza and noodles of every kind. Jon’s favorite sports are hockey, golf, and caber tossing. Jon’s pets are: 2 Zebra finches (Poephila castanotis) named George and Martha; 2 Owl finches (Poephila bichinovi) named James and Dolly; 2 Cordon Bleu finches (Uraeginthus cyanocephalus) named Martin and Abigail; 75 Western Harvester ants (Pogonomyrmex occidentalis) named Seuss, Johnson, Eastman, Lobel, Marshall, Hoban, Briggs, Dahl, Smith, Handler, Willems,Paulsen, Gantos, Colfer, Pilkey, Shan, Marsden, Paulsen, Pinkwater, Barry, Larson, Groening, Watterson, Bushmiller, Carroll, Travers, Stevenson, Alexander, Nesbit, Yzerman, Zetterberg, Datsyuk, Holmstrom, Lidstrom, McCarty, Draper, Chelios, Maltby, Bowman, Don Cherry, Clarke, Asimov, Heinlein, Phillip K., De Camp, Verne, Stevenson, Poe, Kafka, Pynchon, Cervantes, Borges, Nabokov, Heller, Diderot, Sterne, West, Pratchett, Oulipo, Eggers, David Foster Wallace, DeLillo, Coover, Barth, Saunders, Lethem, Leonard,Beckett, Benchley, Perelman, Parker, Cuppy, Jacob and Wilhelm, and Bob and Ray.

Mac Barnett:

In The Case of the Case of Mistaken Identity, Barnett introduces Steve Brixton, a 12-year-old boy obsessed with the Bailey Brothers, two sibling sleuths featured in a popular series of detective books. Coincidentally, Steve himself becomes enmeshed in a real life mystery while working on a report in the school library; a quilt containing all of America’s secrets is stolen and he’s framed as the criminal. Steve must find a way to clear his name while being hunted by a team of secretive librarians, enlisting the help of his favorite Bailey Brothers Handbook and his pal Dana. Also new from Barnett this fall is Guess Again!, a book of poems for young children with missing words. The endings to each poem seem clear to the reader until they turn the page to discover that figuring out the missing words requires much more than a simple guess. Filled with clever illustrations and humorous wordplay, Guess Again! will leave readers puzzled and amused by Barnett’s inventiveness. Barnett is the program director of a nonprofit organization that supports students’ creative and expository writing skills called 826LA. He’s also the author of the picture book, Billy Twitter and His Blue Whale Problem and the creator of The Echo Park Time Travel Mart, a convenience store for time travelers.