BGSU’s In the Round series, which celebrates the work of indigenous creatives, will host writer Kevin Noble Maillard and artist Juana Martinez-Neal, who wrote and illustrated “Fry Bread: A Native American Family Story .”
Nealand Maillard will speak twice during their visit.
Friday, March 24, at 5:30 p.m. in Olscamp 101 on the BGSU campus.
Saturday, March 25 at 10 a.m. in the Bowling Green Library Atrium. Free copies of “Fry Bread” will be distributed to the first 100 families to attend this event. During the program, Maillard and Martinez-Neal will talk about the creation of Fry Bread, and answer questions.followed by a Q&A and a book signing.
Told in lively and powerful verse by debut author Maillard, “Fry Bread” is an evocative depiction of a modern Native American family, vibrantly illustrated by Pura Belpre Award winner and Caldecott Honoree Juana Martinez-Neal.
Kevin Noble Maillard is a professor and journalist who lives with his family on the 13th floor of a 115-year old bank in the heart of Manhattan. He is a regular writer for the New York Times, and has interviewed politicians, writers, tribal leaders, and movie stars.
Originally from Oklahoma, he is a member of the Seminole Nation, Mekusukey band.
His debut children’s book “Fry Bread” won the 2020 Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Medal and was a 2020 American Indian Youth Literature Picture Book Honor Winner. When he was 13 years old, he won a fishing derby for catching 72 fish in two hours. (Noble Maillard photo credit: Amy Lombard)
Juana Martinez-Neal is the recipient of the 2019 Caldecott Honor for “Alma and How She Got Her Name,” her debut picture book as author-illustrator. She is a New York Times bestselling illustrator recipient of the 2020 Robert F. Sibert Medal for Fry Bread: A Native American Story (Roaring Brook) and the 2018 Pura Belpré Medal for Illustration for La Princesa and the Pea (Putnam).
Juana is the illustrator of “La Madre Goose,” written by Susan M. Ely, “Babymoon,” written by Hayley Barrett, and” Swashby and the Sea,” written by Beth Ferry.
Juana was named to the International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY) Honor list in 2014, and was awarded the SCBWI Portfolio Showcase Grand Prize in 2012. She was born in Lima, the capital of Peru, and now lives in Connecticut, with her husband and three children and two dogs.
