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Author Interview with Aaron Reynolds

By on August 28, 2025   /   Articles, Author Interviews  

Author Interview with Aaron Reynolds

KATE: Our Mixed-Up-Files readers would love the inside scoop on your latest book, Troubling Tonsils! Can you tell us a bit about where the idea for this story came from?

AARON: I’ve had some newer, weirder, creepier stories brewing for quite a while, slowly taking shape in the recesses of my imagination. A story about tonsils was percolating, but I didn’t really know what it would consist of until I sat down to begin the writing process. The story slowly revealed itself to me in all its strange glory.

KATE: Troubling Tonsils! is book 4 in your Jasper Rabbit’s Creepy Tales! series. And I have soooo many questions about this! I am a HUGE fan of Creepy Carrots. Creepy Crayon on the other hand, lol, might hit too close to home for me since I like to write. And Creepy Underwear is purely fun to read. All three of these are, 1) picture books, and 2) feature Jasper Rabbit. So obviously I’m curious about:

  1. How the decision came about to move mid-series from picture book to chapter book?
  2. How Charlie Marmot landed the starring role?

AARON:

  • Kids (and librarians!) are consistently asking for more CREEPY stories. While I may do more Jasper picture books, part of me wondered how much more can I continue to put that poor bunny through? I thought, What if Jasper, as the expert in all things creepy, brought readers some new older stand-alone stories? This opens the lid on endless possibilities of creepy tales, while at the same time letting Jasper in on the storytelling. That idea excited me a ton.
  • Whatever the new stories, I knew they had to be set in Jasper’s world and mirror some elements from the picture books. They needed to be stories about animals, they needed to be creepy but also funny, and they needed to have the possibility of great twists. Charlie Marmot’s story began to take shape. Each new book will have a brand new fuzzy protagonist and a brand new set of creepiness. But Jasper will be the touchstone and narrate us through all the weirdness.

KATE: In Troubling Tonsils! We meet Charlie Marmot for the first time. He’s highly imaginative and one might even say has his hand in creating the creepy story he gets involved in. What was your inspiration for choosing Charlie to be a marmot?

AARON: A big part of writing for me is the playfulness of language and sound. Jasper’s name and species sound really good together. JAAAAsper RAAAAbbit. I wanted to stay away from alliterative names like Bucky Beaver and the like, but the assonance of vowel sounds can be just as fantastic, if not more so. As I thought about the series, I spent a good bit of time brainstorming good character names but also species possibilities that would mirror the great soundplay of Jasper Rabbit. I also loved a slightly unexpected species of fuzzy creature. Charlie Marmot ticked a lot of boxes for me.

KATE: Kids are sure to relate to poor Charlie needing to get his tonsils removed. I feel I need to ask if this was a terrifying experience from your own childhood which you’ve brought to page.

AARON: No, I never had my own tonsils removed, but I do vividly recall having my wisdom teeth taken out. I was konked out for the experience itself, but I clearly remember waking up and being covered in blood! Actually it was just the bib that was bloody, but it was very dramatic in my seven-year-old mind. It never occurred to me that there would be blood. And so much of it! I was horrified by the thought of whatever had taken place while I had been asleep and thankful I had been unconscious for it.

KATE: The voice of your stories is always so playful. Characters have over-the-top ideas and the consequences of said ideas have great twists. Talk to us about how you tap into the innocence of youth which makes your books page-turners even when they are creepy.

AARON: I appreciate that! Beyond anything else, I want my books to be FUN to read. I want kids to return to them time and again because they view it as a fantastic way to spend time. I think we’ve lost sight of that as adults…the power of JOYFUL reading for its own sake. The benefits are wide-reaching, but beyond any tangible educational benefit, reading is and should be an amazing way to spend time. I NEVER regret time spent reading. I want kids to feel that when they pick up my books. 

It also helps that I’m still 100% a fifth-grade kid. I remember those years deeply and feel like they are core to my mindset and outlook, both in life and in writing.

KATE: Let’s talk creepy. One doesn’t typically think of a classroom’s Show and Tell project as being creepy. And yet, that’s the fun of your books – there’s always something unexpected. Were there other ideas and mashups you thought up which didn’t land? Or was bringing tonsils to school always the story?

AARON: I’m sure there were other ideas that got noodled around as I logged hours in front of the keyboard. I don’t remember what they were. For me, writing is a very organic LIVING thing. I don’t outline anything. I usually have a nugget of an idea, but I don’t always know where it’s going to go. The act of creation happens best for me when I’m sitting at the keyboard, spinning what-ifs as I throw words and ideas messily around on the page. Stuff gets sifted and sorted in those hours until (hopefully) the best stuff rises up.

KATE: When writing creepy stories for children, what’s your best tip for not getting too dark or gruesome for young audiences?

AARON: I think it depends on the type of story you are writing. There are some authors (R.L. Stine, Mary Downing Hahn, for example) who do go full tilt scary. I think dark and gruesome can work with kidlit, depending on the story. But, for me, the best of it happens in the context of weird and wonderful strangeness and silliness. I think the best example of this is Roald Dahl. His stories are WEIRD. And dark. In Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, you never 100% know if Willy Wonka is just going to let those five kids DIE. Ms. Trunchbull in Matilda actually flings kids across the yard by their hair. WHAT??? But there is no doubt that these stories are absolutely written for kids. The kind of story and voice of the story has a lot to do with how far you can push it.

KATE: Thank you for taking the time to share the inside scoop on Troubling Tonsils! You have two more stories in the Creepy Tales series coming out soon. Can you tell readers briefly about these new stories?

AARON:  Two more SO FAR. As I said, the possibilities for this series are endless and I am very excited about those  possibilities. I’m also thrilled that Simon & Schuster chose to release the first three all in this school year, rather than spacing them out one story per year. The momentum and excitement possible in that is very exhilarating to me.

 This year, in addition to TROUBLING TONSILS, there will also be UNSETTLING SALAD in which Thaddeus Badger has a monstrous encounter of the vegetative kind. That will be followed in the spring by YARN IS EVERYTHING, a story about Winona Mole and her obsession with all things crochet.

It’s going to be the creepiest year ever!

 

 

KATE: Where can readers best find you if they want to reach out?

AARON: They can find me on my website at www.aaron-reynolds.com!

 

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The World Book

By on August 21, 2025   /   Articles, Book Lists, books, For Kids, For Librarians, For Parents, For Teachers  

“What’s your favorite book?“

That’s one question that often gets asked to authors during author visits or events.

That is a tough question for me.

To some, though, it’s an easy question, and many of the authors list their favorite book titles without hesitation. I’ve always been envious of the people who express such resolution and love for a book or books, especially when it comes to naming the books from one’s childhood.

I had a tough time learning to read. It was a struggle. I’d look at the page of text and see an overwhelming mishmash of words and letters. I’m sure that now I would have been diagnosed early and prescribed a program for my reading disorder, but those things were rare in early 1970s education. Especially in a lower-middle-class Catholic school, and even more so for an early elementary school kid who seemed to keep his head above water in class.

I was lucky, though. I had parents and a few teachers who noticed my problem and put me on the road to reading. My most vivid, non-recess, non-field trip, non-playday memories of first and second grade are when my teacher or a volunteer aide would pull me aside to another room and work with me on the Controlled Reader projector.

 

In a dark, quiet, and empty classroom, I learned to focus on the left word of a sentence and move slowly to the right. I practiced and practiced from one filmstrip to the next on moving my eyes from left to right. I worked on image strips to practice moving my eyes right to left. I practiced all this without moving my head. And guess what?

Things got better!

Reading was possible.

(There’s a really cool 2018 Wired story by writer Lisa Wood Shapiro on how she works to overcome her dyslexia and how technology is helping people become readers.) 

We didn’t have a boatload of books around the house when I was growing up. I learned to be a better reader through the assistance of my teachers and parents, but still struggled through the middle grades to be a bonafide reader. I loved The Jungle Book. The Disney movie captivated me from a very early age. We had a series of illustrated classics with about twenty pages of text per illustration. Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas, Treasure Island, a few other titles I can’t remember, and The Jungle Book.

I loved that book.

But I never read that book.

I picked the book off the shelf a thousand times. I looked at the pictures a thousand times. Each time I tried to read that book but I reverted to seeing each page as an intimidating blob of letters and words. Frustration would set in, and I’d snap the book shut and return it to the shelf.

I know I should have said something to my parents or teachers. I should have sought help. But I was a big, shy kid and didn’t want to trouble anyone with this embarrassing problem.

Then something wonderful happened. A salesman came around the house and convinced my parents to buy a set of the World Book encyclopedia. My parents made a difficult decision to spend money we didn’t have on this set of books. They even splurged on the annual yearbook!

I found my reading life in those encyclopedias. Schoolwork forced me to open them, but the magic of information given in short bursts of text and pictures contained within was pure magic. Something clicked in my reader-brain. I figured it out.

I slowly became a better reader and a smarter kid. The set of World Book encyclopedias led to the Guinness Book of World Records, which led to comics, which led to the Hardy Boys, which led to eventually reading The Jungle Book. And you know what? It was as fantastic as the story I held in my head all those years.  

So next time I’m asked at an author event what my favorite book was, I have an answer.

The World Book.

Hands down.

After my Dad died and my Mom was preparing to move out of their house, she called and asked me what I wanted of their stuff. I know her idea of “stuff” meant furniture, dishes, etc., but without hesitation, I said I would like to have the World Book encyclopedias and yearbooks they’d used for the previous twenty years as a decoration on top of their kitchen cabinets.

My Mom laughed and thought I was joking, and she thought that until her eventual death. She’ll never know how important those books were to me and how huge a role they played in making me who I am today. I probably never really knew how much of a sacrifice it was for my parents to invest in buying this set of encyclopedias and the annual yearbook every year. These books are history. Part of our history.

I’m a firm believer in letting kids read what works for them. I’ve cut my reading teeth on baseball box scores, cereal boxes, baseball cards, etc. 

Reading is reading is reading is reading.

Reading is indeed a superpower.

 

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Debut author Jack Mackay creates hauntings to help characters grow

By on August 11, 2025   /   Articles  

Good ghost stories usually include a spooky haunted house, spirits, and the menacing symbols and events. A great ghost story contains all of these elements plus primary characters whose needs are woven into the fabric of their fears. Author Jack Mackay does this in his debut novel Gloam.

                Photo credit Ayesha Brown

 This talented United Kingdom writer creates a novel of depth as he traces the story of Gwen and her three siblings whose stepdad moves them to the siblings’ grandmother’s abandoned house on the island of Gloam based on the real island of Lindisfarne “which most people just call Holy Island,” where the primary causeways are only accessible during low tide. As Mackay describes it, “It’s much more vibrant than Gloam, and much less bleak than Gloam. It’s actually quite a nice place, but it does have this really long, muddy causeway leading right up to it.”

 

Stuck on the island while stepdad Henry works on the mainland, Gwen finds herself and siblings watched under the “hungry eyes and too sharp teeth” of babysitter Esme. Gwen, who helped to nurse her mother as she died of cancer while also helping with her brother Roger and the twins and doesn’t feel the need of a sitter, recognizes this sitter is a threatening presence even as Roger and the twins warm up to her. It’s up to Gwen to divide and conquer as she helps her siblings see the way Esme feeds on the children’s fears. After all, she promised her dying mom she’d take care of everyone, including Henry, her stepdad. With this vow, Gwen is determined to save her stepdad and siblings from the monsters of their nightmares and to banish Esme so that this abandoned house can once again become a home.

 

Esme feeds on the children’s fears and, as rot soon takes over the walls of the house, Gwen must protect her siblings and help them to recognize that Esme is as monstrous as their worst nightmares.

 

In doing so, readers are captured by the story of a family who has experienced the death of their mother and who must now rely on Henry, a stepdad who was an only child and never had children until he married their mother. While his intentions are loving and noble, he’s overwhelmed with his efforts to take care of the kids.

Mackay says the true joy of writing in the horror genre is that writers can take on some of the most difficult topics kids face in life and guide them through the dark side of life. He says, “[T]here are things happening in life, and that children are aware of, but they sort of lack the language to maybe understand articulately. And I think that horror fiction is a great way for kids to explore some things that they might not otherwise get to explore.”

Mackay explains, “I was a big, scaredy cat when I was a kid, so if you’d have asked me then what appeals to you about horror, I’d have said nothing.

But I think, as I got older, I started to become quite fascinated by what I was scared by, and it sort of developed into this morbid fixation of ‘this thing’s really frightening, and I can’t stop reading it, or I can’t stop like, you know, looking it up on Wikipedia and reading about it.’ And I think that children are very much drawn to things that they feel are maybe transgressive or thrilling, or, you know, is opening a door that they might not otherwise see into in other aspects of their life. And I think as a writer, now that I’m older and adult now…I love the horror genre because of what you can get away with, and…the kind of stories you can tell, and the kind of themes you can write about in horror are just so there’s basically no holds barred.”

 

Mackay studied English at The University of York and was heavily involved in theatre productions there. Today he’s a founding member of Griffonage Theatre, a York-based company “with a taste for the madcap and macabre.” The combination of literature and  theatre informed much of the action readers will find in Gloam. As Mackay says of his theatrical influences, he describes director Guillermo del Toro, writer of Pan’s Labrynth as someone who had a lifelong affinity for monsters. “He said, that he’s going to sort of have a lifelong affinity for monsters, and…he described them as living symbols, and I thought that that was just such a lovely way to think about them.” For Mackay, this translated to each of the kids inner needs. “[T]hese monsters that represent something about the interiority of these kids, and it was this sort of inner turmoil, sort of expressed physically in a monstrous form.”

 

There’s a scene in Gloam when Gwen recalls something her grandmother said, “Fear is a good thing. You can only be brave if you’re afraid. Children should be frightened of monsters. How else will you know when to fight them?”

 

For Mackay, the joy of writing this novel for middle graders is “the fear in that insurmountable challenge. And then the joy of the story is, as with so much of children’s horror—it was always the stuff that drew me to things like Goosebumps and things like that—is the fact that kids band together and they have to do it themselves. They have to rely on their own agency and their own powers to sort of make a difference and sort of take that power back.”

 

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