I am so excited to announce that Dreamworks Animation is currently wrapping up a feature animated film based on my book, The Wild Robot. The movie will open in theaters on September 20, 2024, and they’ve just released the movie poster and the first teaser trailer and announced the cast of voice actors. I’ve known about this movie for quite a while now, and I’m so glad I can finally share the details. My love of animation is what first made me want to go to art school. I grew up watching classic Disney animation and going to animation festivals… 

I was blown away by the amazing response to my first novel, The Wild Robot. Thank you to everyone who read and shared it! I’ve been hard at work on the sequel, The Wild Robot Escapes, and I cannot wait for you all to find out what happens to Roz after she leaves the island. What I love most about writing children’s novels is how it forces me to focus on what’s truly important to the story. I don’t want to bore young readers with unnecessary details. And so, when in doubt, I keep the story simple. This approach worked… 

So, I wrote my first children’s novel. It wasn’t a graceful process, but I survived the stress and the solitude and the crippling self-doubt, and now my novel has entered the world. It’s called The Wild Robot. If you have a few minutes I’d like to tell you about it. Back in 2008, while working on a picture book called The Curious Garden, I spent a lot of time making sketches like this- I loved imagining scenes of nature living in surprising places. And that got me thinking about scenes of unnatural things living in surprising places, and I made…