Archives de catégorie : Bologna 2025 Children’s & YA

THE BUNNY BALLET de Nora Ericson & Elly Mackay

Prepare to be dazzled from your whiskers to your paws! From Nora Ericson and Elly MacKay, the creators of the award-winning picture book Too Early, comes a showstopping performance with precious performers, perfect for animal and dance lovers everywhere.

THE BUNNY BALLET
by Nora Ericson
illustrated by Elly Mackay
Abrams, November 2025

Doors are closing, lights are dimming. Strings are singing, it’s beginning.
Hop on in, take your seat, and watch the curtains rise on the Bunny Ballet! When a brother and sister stumble upon an extraordinary woodland show, they’re introduced to the magic of dance. Noses twitch, whiskers quiver, and graceful bunnies leap and soar across the stage as the audience sits on the edge of their seats.

Nora Ericson and Elly MacKay’s enchanting picture book full of fluffy plies, grand jetés, and perfect bunny pirouettes is the ultimate read-aloud for dancers and dreamers of all ages and species.

Nora Ericson studied painting at Yale University and writing for children at Vermont College of Fine Arts. Originally from central New York, she now lives in Portland, Oregon, with two kids, two dogs, and two cats. Besides reading and writing, she loves cooking, tromping in the woods, and whittling spoons while daydreaming of her future miniature donkey farm. She’s also the author of Too EarlyDill & Bizzy: An Odd Duck and a Strange Bird, and Dill & Bizzy: Opposite Day.

Elly MacKay is an internationally recognized paper artist and children’s book creator. She is the illustrator of the picture book Too Early and The Enchanted Symphony, written by Julie Andrews and Emma Walton Hamilton, as well as the author-illustrator of Red Sky at NightIf You Hold a Seed, and Butterfly Park, among others. The distinctive three-dimensional quality in her works is made by setting up layers of painted paper in a miniature theater. She lights the scene and photographs it to create her unique illustrations. MacKay lives in Owen Sound, Ontario, with her family.

MAKE NEW FRIENDS de Joshua David Stein & Mariachiara Di Giorgio

From an acclaimed team comes this empathetic and reassuring picture book about the loaded question that every “new kid” or socially anxious child dreads, “Did you make any new friends today?”

MAKE NEW FRIENDS
by Joshua David Stein
illustrated by Mariachiara Di Giorgio
Abrams, September 2025

Tomasso doesn’t know anyone at his new school and has no one to play with at recess. So, knowing his dad will ask, he resolves to make a few new friends. Each day his crew grows; there’s Roland (a foam ball), Coco (a milk carton), and Karen (a very pink eraser). But when his dad insists on having his friends over for pizza, Tomasso knows that soon his secret will be out. Will his dad welcome his new friends, even if they’re not who he expects?

Written for any child who struggles with making friends or social anxiety, and featuring warm, witty illustrations, Make New Friends is both silly and sincere, inviting kids to trust the unconditional love and acceptance of a parent.

Joshua David Stein is an author, editor, and musician. He is a professional restaurant critic and coauthor of several cookbooks and chef’s memoirs as well as many children’s books, including Can I Eat That?Brick: Who Found Herself in ArchitectureThe Ball BookThe Invisible AlphabetSolitary Animals: Introverts of the Wild; and Lunch from Home. He is the founder of The Band Books, a band that performs children’s books to music. Stein lives in Brooklyn with his two sons, Achilles and Augustus, and a doggie, Hermione.

Mariachiara Di Giorgio is an illustrator, storyboard artist, and concept designer. She is the illustrator behind two wordless picture books, Professional Crocodile with writer Giovanna Zoboli and the acclaimed The Midnight Fair with writer Gideon Sterer. Her work has been exhibited at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair and with the New York Society of Illustrators. She lives in Rome, Italy.

THE GUARDIANS OF DREAMDARK: WINDWITCH de Laini Taylor

From New York Times bestselling author Laini Taylor comes a new edition of her first cult favorite series, Guardians of Dreamdark, about a djinn hunting fairy and her quest to save her world.

THE GUARDIANS OF DREAMDARK: WINDWITCH
(Book 1, Collector’s Edition)
by Laini Taylor
Amulet Books/Abrams, September 2025

For centuries faeries have lived safely in their ancient forests, but now their peace is under threat. Devils are escaping the prisons that have held them since the Dawn Days, and only one faerie stands in their way.

Magpie Windwitch is the greatest—the only—devil-hunter of the Age. Together with her trusted band of crows, she tracks down and recaptures these ravenous beasts that devour everything in their path.

When the hunt leads them to the legendary forest of Dreamdark, Magpie finds herself outmatched. Facing the greatest foe her kind has ever known (not to mention an imposter queen, a disgusting imp, and a young faerie warrior as infuriating as he is brave), one thing is certain: If she’s to save the world, she’ll need all the help she can get.

Bestselling author Laini Taylor’s thrilling first novel is now available for the first time for a new generation of fans.

This stunning collector’s edition of the first book in bestselling author Laini Taylor’s beloved Guardians of Dreamdark series includes a suite of sensational features:
Premium sprayed edges
Beautiful new cover with embossing and foil stamping
Never-before-seen bonus material from Laini Taylor

Laini Taylor is a New York Times bestselling author whose work has received numerous awards including a Cybils Award, a National Book Award finalist, and a Printz Honor Book. Her work includes the Daughter of Smoke & Bone series and the Strange the Dreamer series. She lives with her husband, Jim Di Bartolo, in Portland.

STEELBORN de Taylor J. LaRue

Sizzling chemistry, incredible world building, a fiercely complex protagonist and cast of characters that will remain with you long after you’ve turned the last page. While the story zips along with truly jaw-dropping set pieces, there’s also real emotional heft as Taylor J. LaRue tells the story of a young woman who has long repressed her identity but is now realizing her power and her fully realized purpose. It is the story of someone coming to understand the rage at their core: where it came from, and where it might bring them. First in a planned trilogy.

STEELBORN
by Taylor J. LaRue
on submision
(via Park, Fine & Brower Literary)

Never run. Never bow. Never die.

These were the words that Reya Connery’s father, an Etellinian blacksmith, raised her on. But since her parents’ brutal murder, Reya has had to live by a different set of truths. One: There is no honor among thieves. Two: A good blade is key to any successful negotiation. Three: Only the dead keep secrets.

Half-human, half-immortal, Reya survives in an empire that criminalizes magic as its most notorious thief, paying off her debt to the ruthless crime lord who saved her from a life on the streets. When, for her final job, she’s tasked with delivering one of her own kind to an unthinkable fate, Reya helps them escape instead. Her employer gives her an ultimatum: two months to repay the cost of what she lost him, or she will be forever bound in his service—and if she runs or betrays him again, one of her brothers will be forced to take her place.

Desperate to protect what little family she has left, Reya takes on her most impossible heist yet when Caelan Halcyon, an immortal warrior cursed to die, hires her to steal him a fabled cure. But even she can’t steal something no one has ever actually seen—and Reya and her warrior are not the only ones hunting it. When an attack forces Reya to reveal her own immortality, and Caelan realizes she possesses a rare gift that could spare his people from annihilation at the empire’s hands, he’s determined to teach the beautiful, infuriating thief how to control her power.

Their journey takes them to the edge of the known world, and into the depths of their broken hearts. To save them both, Reya must confront the secrets lurking in the shadows of her past, the burning rage that she fears, and the ability she has spent her entire life suppressing. Because this time, her daggers aren’t going to cut it, and the fate of all immortals hangs in the balance.

Perfect for fans of LJ Andrew’s The Ever King and Callie Hart’s Quicksilver, Taylor J. LaRue is one of the most exciting new voices in romantasy in a long time: her writing has true swagger, and she weaves together a story with exciting twists and sizzling romance, set against a world that feels truly lived in. Yet it is her fierce but hurting protagonist, Reya, who will stay with you long after you turn the last page: a young woman who has been forced to bury herself in order to survive, finally stepping into her power and her purpose.

Taylor J. LaRue spent her early career as a journalist in the Windy City. Now she is living out her moody aesthetic dreams coordinating Barnes & Noble author events in the Pacific Northwest, where she lives with her high school sweetheart-turned-husband, their tiny human tyrant, and one very soggy puppy.

A PRINCE AMONG PIRATES de Katie Abdou

A foppish nobleman accidentally joins a pirate ship and falls for his debonair captain.

A PRINCE AMONG PIRATES
by Katie Abdou
Simon & Schuster, Spring 2026
(via Mushens Entertainment)

Kit Davenport is impulsive, headstrong, a little too sure of himself, and desperate to get out from under his father’s thumb. Oh—he’s also the son of a Viscount, and days away from marrying a future marchioness.

But Kit doesn’t want to marry and become trapped in his father’s world of white wigs, dull dinner parties, and odious meetings in the House of Lords.

A string of dubious choices lands him on the crew of Captain Reggie Sharpe’s galleon, the Deliverance. There’s just one problem: Kit has no idea they’re pirates.

PS: Kit can’t swim.

Katie Abdou was born and raised in historic coastal Massachusetts, USA—where she cultivated a love of history, the occult, and piracy. Her goal is for her work to be a safe space for teens and young adults to experience both the good and bad in the world by exploring topics of self-discovery, ethnicity, sexuality, found family, and acceptance—with a dash of myth and magic.