In Brief: February 23

Illustrator Heather Ross visited the Martha Stewart Show earlier this week to discuss her new picture book Crafty Chloe, written by Kelly DiPucchio (S&S/Atheneum, Feb.). Ross and Stewart discussed the picture book, which is about a talented young crafter, and Ross demonstrated how to make a doll bed from a Clementine crate and paint stirrers (click here for instructions and a clip from the show). Photo: David M. Russell/The Martha Stewart Show.

Last Thursday, Diesel, a Bookstore in Oakland hosted a launch party for The Disenchantments (Dutton, Feb.), the second young adult novel from author Nina LaCour. The book follows the eponymous (and not very good) band’s West Coast summer tour in a VW bus. The event featured a reading by LaCour (seen here), as well as a viewing of the book trailer and music video and musical performances by the author’s brother and one of her students at Berkeley High School.

Not every author gets to walk the red carpet during his or her career, but writer Danielle Joseph did at the Los Angeles premiere of the Disney Channel movie Radio Rebel, which is based on her 2009 novel Shrinking Violet (S&S/MTV Books). The film stars actress Debby Ryan as Tara Adams, a high school junior who is also a popular radio deejay in Seattle. Joseph (far l.) is seen here with the cast of the film at the February 15 premiere. More than 4.3 million viewers tuned in to watch the February 17 broadcast of Radio Rebel.

Minnesota-based publisher Capstone recently revealed the winner of a contest tied to its new DC Super-Pets book The Amazing Mini-Mutts. Children were invited to invent characters to be featured in the book, and the winner, chosen from more than 450 entries, was Cloey Nyberg, a fourth-grader from Lincoln, Neb. Cloey’s canine characters—Luna Moon and Sprightly Steve—join Super-Pets Krypto the Super-Dog and Ace the Bat-Hound in the chapter book, which is out this month. Here, Cloey shows off a portrait of herself and her two characters created by illustrator Art Baltazar.

Illustrator Scott Campbell got into the Valentine’s Day spirit—in a way—with a few New York City–area events built around Kelly DiPucchio’s Zombie in Love (S&S/Atheneum, 2011), which Campbell illustrated. The picture book follows the romantic misadventures of Mortimer, a zombie looking for love. Campbell read from the book and did drawing demonstrations at the events; here, he reads to attendees at an event at Barnes & Noble in Princeton, N.J.