Shout Mouse Press Blog
It’s hard to keep up with all that our authors do (for us too)! We’ll be sharing updates from our programs, news about book releases, and pieces from our authors here. For media about our authors’ accomplishments, check out our press room.
Shout Mouse Press condemns the ongoing state-sanctioned violence towards Black people across the nation. We stand in solidarity with Black communities, racial justice advocates, and all of you who are outraged by repeated acts of racism, violence, and abuse of public trust. We support the Black Lives Matter movement and share in their mission of combating white supremacy and "creating space for Black imagination and innovation, and centering Black joy."
Read MoreWriting this book was a special exercise in stretching and strength. I’ve been uncomfortable, uncertain, nervous, tired. I had to grow during our two week writing intensive. My mind was out of words and ideas, but my soul wasn’t out of stories. I had to stretch to get out all the tales I felt obligated to tell. I drew on my fellow authors for inspiration, drive, and energy. Music, memory, stereotypes, hyphens, we talked about everything.
Read MoreRecently, an author of Voces Sin Fronteras had the opportunity to do an author talk at the District’s Central Detention Center (“DC Jail”) through our partners at Free Minds Book Club and Writing Workshop. Free Minds provides books, creative writing workshops, and peer support to DC youth who have been incarcerated as adults to help them achieve their education and career goals — and become powerful voices for change in the community. They host a book club in the DC Jail that meets once a week to read and discuss contemporary literature. The members choose what books to read democratically. In September, the Spanish book club Mentes Libres decided to read Voces Sin Fronteras, our collection of comic memoirs by young Latinx immigrants, and our partners at Free Minds invited an author to come speak! In this blog post, Erminia reflects on her experience talking to the book club.
Read MoreThis summer, I served as a story coach for a workshop with 10 Muslim-American teen writers and artists. The two-week long workshop was the first phase of a collaboration between between Shout Mouse Press (SMP) and Next Wave Muslim Initiative (NWMI) to provide young Muslim American writers and artists a place to produce a collection of art, poetry, fiction, and non-fiction that gives different perspectives on being a Muslim American in the current political climate.
Read MoreRecently, Ballou High School graduates and co-authors of How to Grow Up Like Me, Our Lives Matter, and Humans of Ballou, Carl Brown and Darne’sha Walker visited a class of 6th-8th graders at Kendall Demonstration Elementary School (KDES). KDES is a day school serving deaf and hard of hearing students from birth through grade 8 located within Gallaudet University’s campus.
Read MoreIt’s here! Voces Sin Fronteras: Our Stories, Our Truth, Shout Mouse’s first graphic memoir collection has officially launched. Voces Sin Fronteras, a collection of 16 bilingual side-by-side graphic memoir collections, is a product of a month-long workshop with the Latin American Youth Center’s Latino Youth Leadership council, a passionate group of young people dedicated to social justice in their community.
Read MoreRecently, 1st grade students from H.D. Cooke Elementary School in D.C. wrote letters to the teen authors of Drip, Drip: The Story of the Angry Sherbet, a product of our collaboration with Reach Incorporated.
Read MoreBecause the mission of Shout Mouse is to amplify marginalized voices, seeing Madison drawn on screen is more than just seeing a character come to life, it was a realization of this mission. Our picture books with Reach intend to expand diverse voices within children’s literature, both in their characters and their authors.
Read MoreThe first week working on the LAYC graphic memoir project was a whirlwind of emotion. Coming in the first day, I was surrounded by nervous teenagers speaking Spanish. I realized that the language obstacles we were tackling were more pronounced than I had expected.
Read MoreOn this last day of the Week of Solidarity with Peoples Struggling Against Racism and Racial Discrimination, we want to share our thoughts on two things: first, the importance of being an ally and second, how to be a good one.
Read MoreHere at Shout Mouse, we see Black History Month as an opportunity to look at the past and think about how and why history matters for the present and the future.
Read MoreThere is a devastating lack of multicultural representation in children’s literature. This is particularly troubling when one considers the negative effect this dearth has on literacy in underrepresented communities. That’s why it’s so important that our entire catalog is the libraries of all D.C. Public Schools, and in the public library system, and being spread across the country.
Read MoreWhen I founded a nonprofit to “amplify unheard voices” a little over two years ago, I never could have imagined the election of 2016. I believed deeply in the power of self-expression, and beyond that, in the power of engaged public expression.
Read MoreWe are days away from the launch of the 2016 series of Reach Incorporated Books by Teens. Over the summer, fourteen teen authors worked very hard to write four beautiful and insightful stories. Since then, four talented illustrators have worked to bring those stories to life.
Read MoreWe’re going to Orlando, because that's where the important work of our authors is being celebrated. Their stories of dignity and empowerment and overcoming are the messages being touted, being shouted, from the stage. These are the values that drown out all the rest. We’re going to hold up their books as refutations, books that change the story--about who can make a difference, who can be a hero, who can sow love and hope and change against all odds--because changing the story is the first step in changing the heart.
Read MoreIn one night this past weekend, two young men from the communities served by Shout Mouse were shot and killed in senseless acts of violence...
I cannot help thinking of our authors when I hear this news, and of the weight of growing up in such a world where life is taken so carelessly outside your front door. I'm thinking about the psychic pain of not feeling safe at home. It sticks with me.
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