Book Giveaway – Wolfie the Bunny

The talented Ame Dyckman has agreed to participate in our Holiday Book Giveaway Extravaganza with her award winning book WOLFIE THE BUNNY.

All you have to do to get in the running is to leave a comment. Reblog, tweet, or talk about it on Facebook with a link and you will get additional chances to win. Just let me know the other things you did to share the good news, so I can put in the right amount of tickets in my basket for you. Check back to discover the winner.

Families of all kinds will delight in this sweet tale of new babies, sibling rivalry, bravery, unconditional love…and veggies!

The Bunny family has adopted a wolf son, and daughter Dot is the only one who realizes Wolfie can–and might–eat them all up! Dot tries to get through to her parents, but they are too smitten to listen. A new brother takes getting used to, and when (in a twist of fate) it’s Wolfie who’s threatened, can Dot save the day?

BOOK’S JOURNEY:

The day I wrote WOLFIE THE BUNNY, I was expecting to go to jail.

Really.

I was thoroughly convinced that at any moment, there’d be a tough-knuckled knock at the door, a flash of a badge, and a gruff, “Come with us, Ma’am!” before the police dragged me away.
Not the regular police.

The Dirty House Police.
I hadn’t been cleaning because all week long, I’d been struggling to develop one particular story idea.

An old story idea.

A story idea I’d been carrying about in my little pea brain for TWO YEARS:

What would happen if a baby wolf got adopted by bunnies?

But the writing totally wasn’t working. My characters weren’t talking to me.

And our usually Passably-Tidy-If-You-Didn’t-Look-Too-Close abode… wasn’t.

If you’re saying to yourself, “This must be Author Exaggeration, Ame! Your house couldn’t possibly have been THAT bad,” you should know this:

The previous evening, a caravan of nomadic yak herders and their shaggy-smelly charges broke down outside our door. (No, this doesn’t even qualify as weird. We live in New Jersey.)

Seeking shelter for the night, the herders rang our doorbell, took a quick peek inside, and said:

“We can’t subject our yaks to THIS!”

So, shame on you for thinking I exaggerated. Let’s move on.

The next morning, I called a meeting of The Horde: Husband Guy, The Kid, and The Cat.

“Our home’s been rejected by yak herders,” I said. “And there’s no chocolate in jail! Something must be done!”

“You must help me… CLEAN!”

Yes, there were tears. But The Kid dried Husband Guy’s face with The Cat’s tail and we all got to work.

I was carrying the Mount Everest of towels up the stairs when I heard The Voice:

“He’s going to eat us all up.”

And again.

“He’s going to eat us all up!”

And once more.

“HE’S GOING TO EAT US ALL UP!”

I KNEW I was hearing one of my wolf-among-bunnies story characters at last.

But then, she wouldn’t shut up.

“HE’S GOING TO EAT US ALL UP! HE’S GOING TO EAT US ALL UP! AND WHY AREN’T YOU WRITING THIS DOWN?!”

Whether it’s “READ ME!” or “WRITE ME!”, when a character yells at you, you oughtta listen.

And she was the most INSISTENT bunny I’d ever encountered.

Even more than the dust bunnies.

“I better not go to jail ’cause of you!” I said to the bunny in my head.

And right there, I chose.

“I’m… folding laundry!” I shouted. “You guys… uh, clean DOWNSTAIRS!”

Then I zipped inside our bedroom, threw the towels to the floor, locked the door, grabbed my laptop, and whispered,

“Okay, I’m listening. Say it again.”

And Dot Bunny did.

An hour-and-a-half later, I snuck downstairs with the first draft of what was then called WOLFIE AND DOT (I told you, INSISTENT bunny!), peeked into the slightly-tidier kitchen…

…and found The Horde (even The Cat) gobbling all the cheese in the house.

I pointed at their crumbs. “AHA!” I said.

They pointed at my pages. “AHA!” they said.

(Even The Cat.)

I wasn’t going to jail, but I WAS busted.

Quickly, I did the only thing I could think of to redeem myself:

I read them my story. Dot’s story.

Luckily, they LOVED it. And everyone was happy.

Until there was a knock at the door. A tough-knuckled knock.

But it was just the yak herders again.

“Still a mess!” they said.

“Don’t care,” I said. “I have a story!”

Then I read WOLFIE to the herders, too.

And while they were distracted, The Cat stole their yak cheese.

So really, it was an awesome day.

All ’cause of one patient (albeit, dairy-addicted) family and one insistent little character who FINALLY yelled at me.

And I’m SO grateful for both.

As appeared on The Nerdy Book Club

AMY’S BIO:

Ame Dyckman is short, loud, mischievous, and often dresses like her book characters. (SEE?!) She’s also the award-winning, internationally-translated author of the fantastically illustrated (THANKS, illustrators!) picture books BOY + BOT, TEA PARTY RULES, the New York Times bestselling WOLFIE THE BUNNY, HORRIBLE BEAR!, YOU DON’T WANT A UNICORN! (on sale February 14, 2017!), and more picture books and board books in the works! Ame lives in central New Jersey with her family, ridiculously big-eared cat, book collection, closet full of hair dye colors, and of course, the characters from her stories. (For reals! She’s currently building a homemade swimming pool for the protagonist of her upcoming series, MISUNDERSTOOD SHARK—mostly so she can have her bathtub back.)

Follow Ame on Twitter (@AmeDyckman), where she posts picture book reviews, goofy poetry, and pretty much everything that pops into her (usually blue-haired, sometimes purple-haired, occasionally green-haired) head.

Ame, thanks for sharing your book and journey with us. Have a happy holiday.

Talk tomorrow,

Kathy