In Brief: October 27

The Magic School Bus series by Joanna Cole and Bruce Degen turns 25 this year, and as part of the surrounding festivities Scholastic’s actual Magic School Bus made a stop at Pier 84 on the west side of Manhattan last Thursday. Seen here, second-grade students from New York City’s United Nations International School are joined by the inimitable Ms. Frizzle. Cole and Degen also attended the event, where they signed copies of the books for the students. Photo: The Michael Alan Group.

This past Sunday, children’s book author/illustrator Hans Wilhelm was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award for Literature by the town of Westport, Conn. Born in Germany and currently a resident of Connecticut, Wilhelm is the creator of 200 books, including I’ll Always Love You, the Bunny Trouble books, and the Noodles series. Here, Wilhelm is joined by Sybil Steinberg, Publishers Weekly’s former book reviews editor, who presented him with the award. There are more than 42 million copies in print of Wilhelm’s books in print. Photo: Dave Matlow.

HarperCollins recently concluded its third Dark Days tour, an expansion of a multi-book marketing campaign the publisher unveiled earlier this year. This third campaign kicked off on October 6 with the featured authors joining in a group chat online that was livestreamed to more than 3,000 fans worldwide; on October 12, the authors started a book tour that took them to bookstores in Washington, California, Colorado, and Illinois. Seen here at Barnes & Noble in Lynwood, Wash., are (l. to r.) an area blogger, Claudia Gray (Fateful), Anna Carey (Eve), another local blogger, Amy Garvey (Cold Kiss), and Kiersten White (Supernaturally). HarperCollins expanded the Dark Days program based on the success of the first two promotions and plans to run another Dark Days campaign in January, featuring 12 books.

The Bookstore Plus in Lake Placid, N.Y., raised more than $1,500 on Saturday for the Wells Memorial Library in Upper Jay, N.Y., which lost its entire children’s collection due to flooding from Hurricane Irene. In addition to a full program of author events, the store held an auction with 120 signed books and five pieces of art, including works by Mercer Mayer, James Patterson, and Tom Angleberger. Pictured here (l. to r.) are Bookstore Plus co-owner Sarah Galvin and authors Erin Dionne (Notes from an Accidental Band Geek), Amy Guglielmo (the Touch the Art series), Kate Messner (Over and Under the Snow), and Ammi-Joan Paquette (Nowhere Girl).

Author Jeanne Walker Harvey has been out and about in support of her new picture book My Hands Sing the Blues: Romare Bearden’s Childhood Journey (Marshall Cavendish, Sept.), illustrated by Elizabeth Zunon, a picture-book biography of the collage artist. Harvey is also a docent at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, where she first became interested in Bearden’s work, and last month she held a launch event (seen here) at the museum, where she read from and discussed her book. The author also visited Book Passage in Corte Madera, Calif., and the Mint Museum in Charlotte, N.C. This year marks the 100th anniversary of Bearden’s birth.

Using a divide and conquer approach, author Gary Rubinstein and illustrator Mark Pett have been making solo visits to bookstores to promote their new picture book The Girl Who Never Made Mistakes (Sourcebooks Jabberwocky, Oct.), about a nine-year-old girl named Beatrice who is starting to feel the pressure of her inadvertently perfect existence. Pett visited The BookMark in Neptune Beach, Fla., and Porter Square Books in Cambridge, Mass., where he did art demonstrations. Here, Rubinstein displays a copy of the book with fans during an appearance at Books of Wonder in New York City.