Popular now on Kickstarter: A picture book about love, by a mom and her 6-year-old daughter

  ANN ARBOR, MI - 06/10/2018 (PRESS RELEASE JET)

Snail, I Love You, a picture book about love and the universe to release this fall, launched a successful Kickstarter campaign on Tuesday (06/05/2018) that will run to the end of June. With vibrant quilt-art illustrations and love poems co-authored by a science writer and her six-year-old daughter, the Kickstarter hit its goal in two hours and its stretch goal in two days. Further backing will help distribute the book to readers, foster meaningful connections among adult and child readers, and support its creators' goals of supporting education, diverse books, and kids in need.

This book is part love poem, part overview of the universe. Its creators are Tevah Platt, Willa Thiel, and fabric artist Becky Grover-- all residents of Ann Arbor’s Great Oak Cohousing Community-- and the book is being published through Fifth Avenue Press, a program of the Ann Arbor District Library.  This book was written to provide meaningful opportunities for connection between kids and parents or other readers.

Between the ages of 3 and 6, Willa-- just completing her first grade year at Honey Creek Community School-- came up with some amazing ways of expressing her love. “I love you as peaceful as the forest,” she’d say. Or, “I love you as endless as numbers.” This book began when her mom, a public health researcher and former news journalist, picked a selection of these phrases and started writing poems around them. Each is linked to an idea her daughter was exploring and mastering in the world, and many of the poems subtly elaborate on scientific concepts like sound or gravity. Take for example, this excerpt: 

"Blue oceans cling tight to the earth's every side

as the moon tugs them gently, creating the tide.

A coconut falls to the sand.

There it stays.

Snail, I love you. As crashing as the waves."

Using vibrant fabric, Becky Grover quilted each illustration that was then photographed for the book, and hid a snail in every picture. The book quietly celebrates diversity, girls as boundary breakers, and the wonder of nature. Mostly, this book is about love and how it can beautifully frame our experiences and infuse the way that we see the world.

"Working on this book has been satisfying, heartening and joyful," said author Tevah Platt. "Our supporters have made us feel so lucky. We hope this book might inspire other kids and families to write and be creative together, and we hope it fosters a culture of love that is so needed in the world right now."

This full-color, hardback book to be printed by Thomson Shore will be ready for distribution in fall 2018.

The book is being edited, laid out, and prepared for printing through Fifth Avenue Press, an incredible program of the Ann Arbor District Library that supports local authors and last year released another nature-themed picture book, Michigan Moon. 

Check out the Kickstarter through June 30, 2018.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/545805965/snail-i-love-you?ref=9xnm5d