Welcome to the Wonder House by Georgia Heard, Rebecca Kai, Dotlich, and Deborah Freedman

Happy Friday! I'm thrilled Georgia Heard, Rebecca Kai Dotlich, and Deborah Freedman stopped by to finish my sentences. We discussed Welcome to the Wonder House, poetry, story, and more. I wrote the words in purple, Deborah wrote the words in black, Rebecca wrote the words in green, and Georgia wrote the words in orange. Thank you, Georgia, Rebecca, and Deborah! 

Welcome to the Wonder House’s cover… I hope, will make readers wonder. What’s inside? What-in-the-world kind of house is this?

Rebecca Kai Dotlich and Georgia Heard are wondrous! Their title alone made my brain light up right away, and their poems felt like a gilded invitation — please bring your own imagination, dress for magic.

Poetry can be a form of wonder. This book begins and ends with questions, and in between, lyrically expresses awe and gratitude for the world we live in. I’m truly honored and proud that my “illustrations only” debut is this collaboration with Rebecca and Georgia!

Welcome to the Wonder House is an imaginary house to journey through, room by room, experiencing a map of wonder by way of images, questions and observations.

Our hope is that readers will be encouraged to engage in exploring the world around them and to find wonder everywhere.

Deborah Freedman’s illustrations are gorgeous and everything we were hoping for. Every page is imaginative, inventive and adds new layers to the poems themselves. We are delighted with the evocative way Deborah used color and images in each room.

Poetry is magic and curiosity woven into a small package of words. We hope that Welcome to the Wonder House inspires young poets and readers to look closely every day for possibilities of wonder as they write their own poems.

Did you know that children ask as many as 200 to 300 questions a day, and so do poets. Our hope is that Welcome to the Wonder House inspires young people to keep asking questions long after they’ve closed our book.

In the Room of Wishes children will find how to imaginatively write a wish on a kite, pedal down a hill with a blur of silver spokes, and linger over wondrous wishes sent to the sky.

Story is poetry, opening the door to many rooms filled with wonder about a myriad of marvels such as stillness between stars, paper wrinkling out its own language, dinosaurs’ final days -- all of which invite readers to travel with curiosity within their own minds and hearts.

Look for Welcome to the Wonder House on July 11, 2023. 

This collection of poems, creatively presented in the format of an allegorical house, will engage anyone who has ever wondered “why?” as it shows young readers that wonder is everywhere—in yourself and in the world around you.

Welcome to the Wonder House, a place to explore the cornerstone of every great thinker—a sense of wonder. This Wonder House has many rooms—one for nature, one for quiet, and one for mystery, among others. Each room is filled with poems and objects covering a wide variety of STEAM topics, including geology, paleontology, physics, astronomy, creative writing, and drawing, that will inspire curiosity in young readers.

This enchanting book written by award-winning poets Rebecca Kai Dotlich and Georgia Heard both sparks wonder and shows readers how to kindle it in themselves.