Judy Moody

I'm a children's book writer.

Most people know me for my Judy Moody books, probably, but today we're going to be talking about a new series of books I'm doing called The Fairy Door Diaries.

And can you talk a little bit about the series and our main character, Eliza? Sure.

Well, this series, oh gosh, it's probably been about 10 years in the making altogether and had a lot of different starts, but it all began with, I was visiting family in Minnesota, in Minneapolis, where there are a lot of lakes, right? And we were taking a walk around the lake.

open the door and eliza being such a young girl is just a character who is full of wonder and imagination can you talk about the importance of imaginative imagination and creative play for young people and the way that you kind of brought that about with the character in this book

Sure.

I think, well, it's interesting for me, this has really stretched me as a writer because for so many years, you know, 25 years I was writing about Judy Moody and her family and her school and her everyday antics.

So that series of books is grounded in reality and it's much more brings in stories from my own life.

I'm a writer of books for children.

And I would say most people know me as the writer of the Judy Moody series.

That's like my greatest hits, you know, that they would scream out at the concert.

But I also have a series of books about Judy's little brother, Stink.

But in my day, you know, I had I basically had that relationship with Richard Jackson for 15 years.

So I had somebody always ready and willing to read the next thing and support that.

And then with Judy Moody, at that point, Dick was sort of semi-retiring.

And so I started working with Mary Lee Donovan at Candlewick Press.