Most Popular Books by Marthe JOCELYN

In all their permutations, these unforgettable stories explore one of the irresistible facets of human nature, the fact that everyone has a secret. Marthe Jocelyn has selected twelve stories by several of the best authors in North America to explore the nature and the power of secrets. Sometimes secrets can be downright funny – how would you like to be the front person for your fake, clairvoyant mother? Secrets can also be scary – if you are pretending that your father is dead so you don’t have to introduce him to your teacher. And sometimes secrets can break your heart, and heal it – when they have to do with the ties that bind generations together. Contributors include Susan Adach, Anne Carter, Gillian Chan, Nancy Hartry, Marthe Jocelyn, Julie Johnston, Dayal Kaur Khalsa, Loris Lesynski, Anne Gray Sarndal, Martha Slaughter, Teresa Toten, and Elizabeth Winthrop.

What am I going to wear? The question that diverts us all is first presented in the toddler years when the mastery of getting dressed is a triumph and opinions about clothing are emphatic. These four board books illustrated by collage-artist Marthe Jocelyn are a unique tribute to the colors, textures, and patterns that make clothes a child’s favorite pastime. Ready for Summer displays a full wardrobe, introducing lovely words like turtleneck and galoshes, and allowing even the very young reader to be an expert on what should be worn next season.

"A wordless board book that follows the journey of one yellow ribbon as it transforms into many other objects."--

WOULD YOU RATHER know what’s going to happen or not know? A summer night. A Saturday. For Natalie’s amazing older sister, Claire, this summer is fantastic, because she’s zooming off to college in the fall. For Natalie, it’s a fun summer with her friends; nothing special. When Claire is hit by a car, the world changes in a heartbeat. Over the next four days, moment by moment, Natalie, her parents, and their friends wait to learn if Claire will ever recover.

One Some Many by Marthe Jocelyn and Tom Slaughter is an excellent early introduction to numbers and to the principles of modern art. It is the perfect companion to 1 2 3, a counting book with a difference. Slaughter’s bold, Matisse-inspired paper cuts illustrate basic artistic elements, including color, form, and line, while the playful and inventive text introduces the concepts of quantity that children find most puzzling (and that adults have the most difficulty explaining!). After all, how many is many? Some? A few?

Forget about differences! Here’s a wonderful new concept book to explore and enjoy! Marthe Jocelyn and Tom Slaughter team up again to deliver a delightfully simple book. Jocelyn’s marvelous concept — finding common characteristics in different creatures and objects — coupled with Slaughter’s masterful paper cuts makes Same Same a clever introduction to similarities, as well as a preface to modern art. The duo’s previous titles have received numerous awards worldwide; from Japan to Denmark, from France to Mexico. Fashioned in the traditional and stunning style of the pair’s past books, Same Same is a wonderful addition to their already impressive library.

With a fresh cast of animal characters — and what they eat — the creative team of Marthe Jocelyn and Tom Slaughter has produced another work in their award-winning series for very young book and art lovers. Marthe Jocelyn’s simple concept of matching creatures — familiar and unusual — with their favorite foods is brought to life by the sparkling colors and masterfully cut paper shapes of Tom Slaughter’s illustrations; a first taste of modern art. And the surprise final picture makes a satisfying dessert. Previous titles have received acclaim from Japan to Denmark, from France to Mexico. Enhancing a child’s visual and verbal vocabulary, Eats makes a joyful addition to the collection.

Annie''s mother has special powers.Annie''s mother is a master at drawing out secrets.Annie''s mother is the one and only, the irresistible Madam Caterina.Annie and her mother come to Peach Hill, the latest in a string of towns where Mama sets herself up as a spiritual adviser who can put people in contact with the "dearly departed." Fifteen-year-old Annie is Mama''s invisible secret weapon—she gathers important information about clients by pretending to be an idiot. After all, people will say anything in front of an idiot.But Annie isn''t invisible, she''s smart as a whip, and she longs to break out of this role and into a real life with friends and school. Annie may be under Mama''s spell—but not for long.

What am I going to wear? The question that diverts us all is first presented in the toddler years when the mastery of getting dressed is a triumph and opinions about clothing are emphatic. These four board books illustrated by collage-artist Marthe Jocelyn are a unique tribute to the colors, textures, and patterns that make clothes a child’s favorite pastime. Ready for Spring displays a full wardrobe, introducing lovely words like turtleneck and galoshes, and allowing even the very young reader to be an expert on what should be worn next season.

What am I going to wear? The question that diverts us all is first presented in the toddler years when the mastery of getting dressed is a triumph and opinions about clothing are emphatic. These four board books illustrated by collage-artist Marthe Jocelyn are a unique tribute to the colors, textures, and patterns that make clothes a child’s favorite pastime. Ready for Autumn displays a full wardrobe, introducing lovely words like turtleneck and galoshes, and allowing even the very young reader to be an expert on what should be worn next season.

What am I going to wear? The question that diverts us all is first presented in the toddler years when the mastery of getting dressed is a triumph and opinions about clothing are emphatic. These four board books illustrated by collage-artist Marthe Jocelyn are a unique tribute to the colors, textures, and patterns that make clothes a child’s favorite pastime. Ready for Winter displays a full wardrobe, introducing lovely words like turtleneck and galoshes, and allowing even the very young reader to be an expert on what should be worn next season.

In this YA novel, Malou, a mixed-race orphan, is on her own for the first time, trying to discover her parents’ identities.

In the late nineteenth century, in a dot of a town called Westley, lives the smallest girl in the world. Josephine stands only twenty-two inches high and her parents charge gawkers a penny a piece to see her – until they realize that the headmistress of MacLaren Academy for Girls will pay even more. At the Academy Josephine is treated like a slave and is tormented by the fine young ladies who attend, until she takes five gold dollars and runs away. She finds a new life with R. J. Walters’ Museum of Earthly Astonishments. Among the other human curiosities in the Coney Island freak show, Josephine finds the family she has never known…and dangers greater than any she’d ever dreamed. This riveting novel of adventure and injustice, new in paperback, has received many honors, including selection as a finalist for the Canadian Library book of the Year for Children Award, and as a shortlisted title for the Hackmatack Children’s Choice Book Award and the Red Cedar Book Award.

Illustrations with strong colors and simple drawings of animals to demonstrate some opposite concept like short and tall, over and under, and black and white.

Winner of the 2005 TD Canadian Children''s Literature Award It is 1901 and Mable Riley dreams of adventure and of becoming a writer. When her older sister leaves home to become a schoolmistress in the small town of Stratford, Ontario, Mable is sent along too. Mable hopes her new world will be full of peril and romance. But life at the Goodhand Farm (where the sisters board), is as humdrum as the one she’s left behind. Then Mable encounters the mysterious Mrs. Rattle, a peculiar widow with a taste for upsetting the townspeople with her strange opinions. Mrs. Rattle is a real writer, and Mable eagerly accepts her invitation to a meeting of the Ladies Reading Society. But the ladies are not discussing books at all, and Mable may soon have more peril than she’d bargained for! Composed of the letters Mable sends home, the poems she writes for her classmates, and chapters from her own work-in-progress, Mable Riley is the funny, inspiring, (and reliable) record of a young girl finding her voice, and the courage to make it heard.

In a parallel narrative set in late nineteenth-century England, teenaged country girl Mary Finn relates the unhappy conclusion to her experiences as a young servant in an aristocratic London household while, years later, young James Nelligan describes how he comes to leave his beloved foster family to live and be educated at London''s famous Foundling Hospital

Marthe Jocelyn’s ability to present important-to-learn concepts to the very young has garnered accolades from around the world. Ones and Twos is her first book collaboration with her nineteen-year-old art student daughter, Nell, and, together, they explore numeracy, sorting, and pairing. Each brightly illustrated page invites children to identify familiar objects ranging from kites to socks, from one nest to the two birds sitting in it. Ones and Twos gives little toddlers and their caregivers much to discuss and to enjoy together, and it introduces an exciting new creative team.

An engrossing novel-in-stories that paints a tapestry of secrets and lies: why we keep them, why we tell them, and what happens next. Americans Jenny and her brother, Tom, are off to England: Tom to university, to dodge the Vietnam draft, Jenny to be the new girl at a boarding school, Illington Hall. This is Jenny''s chance to finally stand out, so accidentally, on purpose, she tells a lie. In the small world of Ill Hall, everyone has something to hide. Jenny pretends she has a boyfriend. Robbie and Luke both pretend they don''t. Brenda won''t tell what happened with the school doctor. Nico wants to keep his mother''s memoir a secret. Percy is hush-hush about his famous dad. Oona lies to everyone. Penelope lies only to herself. Deftly told from multiple points of view in various narrative styles, including letters and movie screenplays, What We Hide is provocative, honest, often funny, and always intriguing. “Poignant and often witty.” —Kirkus Reviews “An evocative representation of the tumultuous ’60s.” —Publishers Weekly “Juicy, fast-paced.” —SLJ

Now in paperback. From two of Canada''s most renowned children''s authors comes a hilarious, action-packed comic adventure novel! When chubby, geeky Wylder Wallace spills lunch on cool and aloof Addy Crowe at Toronto''s Comicon, she dashes to the bathroom, leaving behind the latest issue of her uncle''s steampunk comic hit: FLYNN GOSTER in GOLD RUSH TRAIN. Wylder, a fan of the Flynn comics, opens this new one eagerly, astounded to see the girl who was just yelling at him inside the comic. Fascinated, he follows Addy into the bathroom, and the adventure begins ... Is there a personality conflict? Oh, yes. Addy wants to go home; Wylder wants to stay and explore the world of Viminy Crowe''s comic book. Do things go wrong? You bet they do, from the very start, when Addy loses her pet rat, Catnip, and almost gets shot by a Red Rider. All the while the actual comic book story is going on around them. The train carries a fortune from the Yukon goldfields, and both dashing Flynn Goster (hero of a thousand disguises and thief extraordinaire) and villainous Professor Aldous Lickpenny (criminal genius, aided by malevolent robots but somewhat hampered by doltish nephew Nevins) have plans to steal the gold. There''s romance too -- Flynn''s old flame, the brilliant aviatrix, Isadora Fortuna, is traveling across Canada with her balloon, and her strangely familiar protégée Nelly Day. Addy and Wylder navigate the story with the aid of the comic book itself. Every page turn sends them to a different setting, from the Banff Springs Hotel to an alligator-wrestling arena in Florida. But when they finally find a portal back to the real world, catastrophe follows ... A hilarious thrill-ride of a story that will have kids laughing and on the edge of their seats with every turn of the page.

Marthe Jocelyn is back with another clever concept book to follow Hannah''s Collections, Ones and Twos and Where Do You Look? This time, she tackles counting and categories. Sam''s things are in a heap. Time to tidy up! He starts to organize his things, but quickly runs into trouble. He can make a pile of black and white things. But the penguin also belongs in the things with wings pile. He can make a pile of rocks. But the round rock also belongs in the round things pile. How will he ever sort his 100 things? Marthe Jocelyn takes a fun look at categories and counting in this very cleverly conceived story. Kids will delight in the cut-paper images of everything from a zipper pull to a robot, and Sam''s surprising solution makes for a tidy end to this unique story.