Archives par étiquette : Kaplan DeFiore Rights

THE NATURALIST OF AMSTERDAM de Melissa Ashley

Set in 1700s Amsterdam, this historical novel explores the life of entomologist and artist Maria Sibylla Merian’s daughter Dorothea Graff.

THE NATURALIST OF AMSTERDAM
by Melissa Ashley
Affirm Press (Australia), September 2023
(via Kaplan/DeFiore Rights)

Credit: David Merrylees

Set in 1700s Amsterdam, The Naturalist of Amsterdam follows the life of Dorothea Graff, daughter of the famed artist and naturalist, Maria Sybilla Merian. From her early years within the confines of the Labadist community of Walter Schloss to her mother’s artist studio in Amsterdam and the wilds of South America, Dorothea’s story charts an amazingly rich and colourful period of discovery and explores the challenge of being the offspring of one of the most famous female artists in history. For as long as she can remember, Dorothea Graff has served her scientist-artist mother, Maria Sibylla Merian, in the family atelier with her older sister Hanna.
At just twenty years old, Dorothea decides to join her mother on a once in a lifetime expedition to the Dutch Colony of Suriname to observe and paint its insect and plant life. A commercial artist, businesswoman and printmaker, Maria has previously published illustrated volumes of her studies of European butterflies and plants, but entranced by displays of Suriname insects in the collections of Amsterdam’s rich burgher merchant-traders, Maria decides to travel to their source, where she will conduct studies in their habitat to feature them in a magnificent, hand-coloured publication.
All Maria and Dorothea’s savings have been ploughed into the expedition, which is fraught with danger and peril, but fame and greatness are never achieved without enormous sacrifice and suffering – The Metamorphosis of the Insects of Suriname will one day make Maria world-famous.
THE NATURALIST OF AMSTERDAM
asks the question: who are we really outside of our work, and given another chance at happiness, should we take it?

Melissa Ashley is a writer, poet, birder and academic who tutors in poetry and creative writing at the University of Queensland in Australia. Her first novel, The Birdman’s Wife, has been printed in three formats and sold more than 35,000 copies in Australia, and her follow-up novel The Bee and the Orange Tree was also a bestseller. She lives in Brisbane, Australia.

THE CAVE d’Amani Ballour

Written in the tradition of I Am Malala and based on the Oscar-nominated documentary The Cave, this searing memoir tells the inspiring story of a young doctor and activist who ran an underground hospital in Damascus, illuminating and humanizing the enduring crisis in Syria.

THE CAVE:
A Woman’s Story of Survival in Syria
by Amani Ballour
National Geographic, March 2024
(via Kaplan/DeFiore Rights)

Simply put, there is no one in Syria with a story like Dr. Amani Ballour. The only woman to have ever run a wartime hospital, she saved her peers from the atrocities of war while contending with the patriarchal conservatism around her.
Growing up in Assad’s Syria, Dr. Ballour knew she wanted to be more than a housewife, even as her siblings were married off in their teens. As the revolution unfolded, she volunteered at a local clinic and was immediately thrown into the deep end of emergency medicine. Here, she found her voice and the courage to continue.
Among the facets of this powerful tale: Becoming a hospital director. Shielding children from a horrific sarin attack. Losing colleagues. Starvation during the hospital siege. Attempting to employ more women in the hospital and challenging the patriarchy. Abandoning the hospital. Becoming a refugee. Living with trauma. Moving forward.
Amani Ballour is a role model and a game changer who, like Malala Yousafzai, will be remembered as one of history’s great heroines. She is an incredibly brave, passionately committed young humanitarian who, though deeply wounded by her experiences, is not content to quietly deal with her own trauma. Instead, Ballour is determined to seek justice and to do her utmost to ensure that others will not have to face the horrors that she survived.

Amani Ballour graduated from the University of Damascus in 2012. She began her pediatrics specialization before abandoning her studies to help the people of her hometown, under attack from the Assad regime, in an underground medical facility known as The Cave. In 2018, as Assad’s forces closed in, Ballour was forcibly displaced to northern Syria before settling in the United States with her husband in 2021. She is the recipient of the Council of Europe’s prestigious Raoul Wallenberg Prize. She lives in Patterson, New Jersey.
Rania Abouzeid is a multi-award-winning Lebanese-Australian journalist who has reported from across the Middle East for some two decades. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, Time magazine, National Geographic, and other outlets. She lives in Beirut, Lebanon.

NILA’S PERFECT COAT de Norene Paulson

An engaging and accessible picture book about having enough and helping others in need.

NILA’S PERFECT COAT
by Norene Paulson
illustrated by Maria Mola
Beaming Books, February 2023
(via Kaplan/DeFiore Rights)

Nila and her mom love shopping at the thrift store. But when Nila finds the most perfect, shiny, puffy coat, Mom says no: Nila’s winter coat still fits her just fine. With a lot of determination and some birthday money from Dad, Nila sets out to prove the coat really is perfect–but along the way, learns maybe it’s perfect for someone else. Someone who needs both a coat and a friend.

Norene Paulson writes picture books that celebrate friendship, acceptance, and inclusion. She is the author of Benny’s True Colors and What’s Silly Hair Day with No Hair? A former language arts teacher, Norene is passionate about sharing her love of words with young readers. She’s a member of SCBWI and lives in Iowa.
Maria Mola is an illustrator from Barcelona currently living in Boston with her husband and their three children. She has illustrated Sparkle BoyMaya PapayaKoala Challah, and more.

A SPARK IN THE CINDERS de Jenny Elder Moke

Holly Black’s The Cruel Prince meets Jennifer Donnelly’s Stepsister in this epic YA fantasy about a kingdom on the brink of ruin, and one wicked stepsister’s journey from side character to heroine of her own quest.

A SPARK IN THE CINDERS
by Jenny Elder Moke
Disney-Hyperion, June 2023
(via Kaplan/DeFiore Rights)

The story has reached it’s happily ever after, the peasant girl has married her prince and become queen, all is well in the kingdom. . . But for Aralyn, the princesses stepsister, the story is only just beginning. 
The kingdom of Novador has had a streak of misfortunes, with drought, famine, and disease plaguing the lands. According to a prophecy, restoring an ancient magical artifact—the Protector’s Blade—is the only thing that can pull the kingdom back from the brink of destruction. With inside information from her fairy godmother, Aralyn teams up with lady knight Vee to go questing for the shattered pieces of the blade that have been scattered to the furthest reached of Novador. To win each element of the dagger, the girls must prove themselves by using their strengths to conquer their greatest fear. Aralyn uses wisdom, Vee physical prowess, and Queen Ellarose who is ruling the kingdom, uses benevolence. Together, these three powerful women fight to take their place as the rightful heirs to the kingdom.

Jenny Elder Moke is a young adult author of Hood and the Samantha Knox series. When she is not writing, she’s gathering story ideas from her daily adventures with her two rapscallions and honing her ninja skills as a black belt in Tae Kwon Do. Jenny lives in Denver, CO.

MAKE ME A LIAR de Melissa Landers

The detective story gets a fantastical twist in this novel about a girl with a transferrable consciousness, who uses her power for good, only to have it turned on her when someone uses her body to commit murder. Now she must solve the crime before the killer comes after her.

MAKE ME A LIAR
by Melissa Landers
Disney-Hyperion, December 2023
(via Kaplan/DeFiore Rights)

Caught red handed… for a crime she didn’t commit. Within the secret circles of Harvey Davis High School, everyone knows Tia Dante is worth her weight in hall passes. Using her genetic gift of transferable consciousness, she can slip inside your mind and do your dirty work—humiliate your cheating boyfriend, bring a bully to his knees, tell your boss where to stick it—and then return your body with no one the wiser. No task is too awkward, and unlike the competition, she takes care of business without peeking at your goods.
But while Tia is occupied during a routine payback mission, someone uses her body for a few dirty deeds of their own…like murdering the town prosecutor. With the crime caught on camera and no concrete alibi, Tia is forced to ask her infuriatingly gorgeous ex—Nash Brock–to help unravel the mystery. The heat is on, in more ways than one, and a few stray bullets later, Tia is in a frantic race against the clock to find the killer before they find her.

Melissa Landers is a former teacher who left the classroom to pursue other worlds. A proud sci-fi geek, she isn’t afraid to wear her Princess Leia costume in public—just ask her embarrassed kids. She lives outside Cincinnati in the small town of Milford Ohio, where she writes romantic space adventures for teens and the young at heart.