Banks, Kate 1960–

Personal

Born 1960; married; children: Peter Anton, Maximilian. Education: Wellesley College, B.A.; Columbia University, M.A.

Addresses

Home—Southern France. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Books for Young Readers, Farrar, Straus, 19 Union Square W., New York, NY 10003.

Career

Author. Worked previously as an assistant editor for Alfred A. Knopf, New York, NY.

Awards, Honors

Boston Globe/Horn Book Award, 1998, for And If the Moon Could Talk; American Library Association Notable Children's Book selection, and Charlotte Zolotow Award for outstanding writing in a picture book, Cooperative Children's Book Center, both 2001, both for The Night Worker.

Writings

Alphabet Soup, illustrated by Peter Sís, Knopf (New York, NY), 1988.

Big, Bigger, Biggest Adventure, illustrated by Paul Yalowitz, Knopf (New York, NY), 1990.

The Bunnysitters, illustrated by Blanche Sims, Random House (New York, NY), 1991.

Peter and the Talking Shoes, illustrated by Marc Rosenthal, Knopf (New York, NY), 1994.

Spider, Spider, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 1996.

Baboon, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Frances Foster Books (New York, NY), 1997.

Witch and Cat, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Galli-mard (Paris, France), 1997.

And If the Moon Could Talk, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Frances Foster Books (New York, NY), 1998.

The Bird, the Monkey, and the Snake in the Jungle, illustrated by Tomek Bogacki, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 1999.

Small Rabbit, Large Ears, Gallimard (Paris, France), 1999.

Kangaroo, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Gallimard (Paris, France), 1999.

Who Goes There?, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Gallimard (Paris, France), 1999.

The Island to Be Counted illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Gallimard (Paris, France), 1999.

The Morning of the Colors, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Gallimard (Paris, France), 1999.

One Crafty Fox, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Galli-mard (Paris, France), 1999.

The Large One and the Small One, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Gallimard (Paris, France), 1999.

Howie Bowles: Secret Agent, illustrated by Isaac Millman, Frances Foster Books/Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 1999.

Howie Bowles and Uncle Sam, illustrated by Isaac Mill-man, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 2000.

The Night Worker, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Frances Foster Books (New York, NY), 2000.

A Gift from the Sea, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Frances Foster Books (New York, NY), 2001.

Close Your Eyes, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Frances Foster Books (New York, NY), 2001.

Mama's Little Baby, illustrated by Karin Littlewood, Dorling Kindersley (New York, NY), 2001.

Dillon, Dillon, Frances Foster Books (New York, NY), 2002.

The Turtle and the Hippopotamus, Rebus Books (New York, NY), 2002.

Walk Softly, Rachel, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 2003.

Mama's Coming Home, illustrated by Tomek Bogacki, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 2003.

The Cat Who Walked across France, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Frances Foster Books (New York, NY), 2004.

The Great Blue House, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 2005.

Friends of the Heart: Amici del Cuore, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 2005.

Max's Words, illustrated by Boris Kulikov, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 2006.

Fox, illustrated by Georg Hallensleben, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 2007.

Sidelights

Winner of the Charlotte Zolotow Award for The Night Worker, Kate Banks has been writing children's books for many years. She began her career as an assistant to editor Frances Foster at the Alfred P. Knopf publishing company in New York City, and it was while working there that Banks wrote and published her first book, Alphabet Soup. Several books and some years later, she married and moved to Europe, where she has continued writing, primarily working with illustrator Georg Hallensleben. Since then, Banks has worked with both French publisher Gallimard and U.S. publishing house Farrar, Straus & Giroux to issue her books. She related in an online interview with Tana Elias for the Cooperative Children's Book Center that although her books are published in both French and English, she writes in English, and her French publisher hires someone to translate her texts into French.

On the Farrar, Straus & Giroux Web site, the author wrote about her early connection with writing. "As I grew up, I found books helped me sort out life," she recalled. "They were a good place to become familiar with emotions—confusion, sadness, anger, grief, humiliation, and love. I especially liked picture books, and the way in which words and illustrations could create a whole new world in which sometimes real and other times magical and unexpected things could happen."

Banks's books are aimed primarily toward readers between the ages of four and seven. Her first book, Alphabet Soup, is an A-B-C book that helps children draw connections between words, letters, and things. In Big, Bigger, Biggest Adventure she tells a story about three brothers who set out one morning on a bicycle adventure. Each of them is fatter than the other, and as they journey through an entire day of mishaps, including bee stings, rain, and chasing cows, the boys finally make it back home safe and sound. Similarly, Peter and the Talking Shoes relates Peter's adventures as he sets off to buy a loaf of bread wearing a used pair of shoes. When Peter loses his money on the way to the bakery, his talking shoes help him find the means to buy the bread via a series of adventures that take him from the farm, to the carpenter, and even to the locksmith. Ilene Cooper, writing in Booklist, noted that the text of Peter and the Talking Shoes was appropriate for the intended audience, in this book that presents "a new twist on a favorite style of tale."

One of Banks's early collaborations with Hallensleben is Spider, Spider, in which a child spends an afternoon with his mother play-acting what life would be like if he was transformed into a spider. A Kirkus Reviews critic noted that, although some of the antics the two engage in—such as washing the boy-spider down the drain—may at first seem threatening to young readers, text and illustrations work together to "assure readers it's all a game." Another collaboration between Banks and Hallensleben, Baboon, finds a baby baboon exploring

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the forest surroundings he is born into. Complemented by pictures that evoke the mood and texture of the forest he is exploring, Ilene Cooper wrote in Booklist that "Banks's simple, eloquent text … convey[s] worlds with a few measured words." Other works by Banks and Hallensleben include And If the Moon Could Talk, A Gift from the Sea, and the Zolotow award-winner, The Night Worker.

Critics have remarked on the successful melding of text and pictures created by Banks and Hallensleben. For example, a Publishers Weekly reviewer noted that the duo's "quiet phrases and luxurious color" work well together to "evoke a perfectly peaceful bedtime" in And If the Moon Could Talk. John Peters, writing in Booklist, characterized this same book as "a study in verbal and visual harmony from the title on," likening the work to the classic children's tale Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown. A comparison to Brown's book was also made by Lauren Adams in Horn Book. Noting that many of Banks's works—including And If the Moon Could Talk, Baboon, and Spider, Spider—all "pay homage to the creations of Margaret Wise Brown and Clement Hurd," Adams added that in And If the Moon Could Talk "Banks and Hallensleben deserve high praise for creating a classic picture book of the highest caliber."

The Banks-Hallensleben collaboration The Night Worker is an award-winning story about a little boy who accompanies his father to a construction site for one special night. Wearing matching construction hats, father and son watch as the cement mixer prepares the concrete needed to pour the foundation of a big building. As the work continues, the little boy and his father look on until it is time for the two to head home. The rhythmic text and gentle pictures depict the little boy's introduction to his father's world in "a loving, gentle manner, making it perfect for sharing," enthused Linda Ludke in School Library Journal. Booklist writer Gillian Engberg called The Night Worker "a lovely, affecting portrait of a father and son and of the night world."

Other collaborations between Banks and Hallensleben include The Cat Who Walked across France, The Great Blue House, and Fox. The first is the tale of a cat who is removed from its home after his owner dies. When the cat journeys home, it is welcomed by its old home's new residents. "Rich in theme and evocative in tone, the cat's quest will resonate with young readers," wrote Margaret Bush in School Library Journal, while Horn Book critic Susan Dove Lempke complimented Banks's "nicely understated writing." The Great Blue House recounts the story of a summer home, and what happens when the human owners are not there. "Banks's precise sounds and cyclical rhythms amplify the hypnotic sensory impressions," wrote Booklist critic Gillian Engberg. A Kirkus Reviews called Banks and Hallensleben an "accomplished picture book team" and noted that The Great Blue House contains their "signature simplicity and gentle insight." Rosalyn Pierini, writing in School Library Journal, commented on the "spare, evocative text," and a Publishers Weekly critic wrote: "Banks's soft phrasing and Hallensleben's velvety, blurred paintings make the place seem pillowy and inviting in deepest winter."

Banks teams with illustrator Tomek Bogacki on The Bird, the Monkey, and the Snake in the Jungle, a picture book about the adventures of three animals as they wander through the forest in search of a new home. Although many critics remarked on the fine collaboration between art and text in this work, author Banks explained to Elias that she and Bogacki did not actually work together on the project; in fact, the two did not meet personally until after the book was done. Susan Dove Lempke nonetheless praised the team effort in Booklist as "something really special," citing the gracefulness of the text and the effectiveness with which story and pictures combine to create "a splendid collaboration between artist and writer."

Banks is also the author of the "Howie Bowles" chapter books, a series featuring Howie and his boyhood adventures at school and at home. In Howie Bowles, Secret Agent Howie struggles to adjust to a new school, new home, and new teacher following a move brought about by a job-change by his father. In order to cope, Howie pretends that he is a secret agent and is soon involved in solving a real mystery when he attempts to discover the culprit responsible for putting gum in the water fountains at school. Writing in Booklist, Hazel Rochman noted that Banks's young readers will know that "this is not just the usual starting-a-new-school scenario but a real story" that deals with some real issues and tensions in young Howie's life. In his next adventure, Howie Bowles and Uncle Sam, Howie is beset by a string of bad luck, including stepping in dog poop, getting a bad grade in math class, and courting trouble with the IRS, which has sent him a letter notifying him that he owes them one hundred twelve dollars and fifteen cents. In a comical series of adventures and mishaps, Howie tries to raise the money by himself, while hoping to avoid telling his parents about his latest fiasco.

Along with her books for younger readers, Banks has written several novels for teens. In Walk Softly, Rachel, fourteen-year-old Rachel discovers the diaries of her brother Jake, who died when she was a little girl. She struggles with her brother's death, and as she comes to understand what the troubled young man was going through on his own, she realizes that he was the cause of his own death. Calling the book "powerful and insightful," Carol Y. Barker in School Library Journal considered Walk Softly, Rachel to be "an exceptional novel that handles difficult and painful topics with sensitivity and honesty."

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Set in Italy, the YA novel Friends of the Heart: Amici del Cuore tells the story of four Italian teens from the perspective of sixteen-year-old Lucrezia, who looks back at the events of the summer she was age thirteen and a tragedy changed the lives of all four forever. "Banks creates a wholly absorbing story of likable, cosmopolitan young people stepping into adolescence," wrote Booklist contributor Gillian Engberg. Vicky Smith, writing in Horn Book, commented "how thoroughly, through the openness of the narrative, readers will engage with Lou's adolescent musings" and complimented Banks's "precisely fine prose." A Kirkus Reviews critic found the novel to be a "sometimes belabored, sometimes joyful, ultimately tragic story."

Biographical and Critical Sources

PERIODICALS

Booklist, September 15, 1991, Stephanie Zvirin, review of The Bunnysitters, p. 168; April 1, 1994, Ilene Cooper, review of Peter and the Talking Shoes, p. 1457; March 1, 1997, Ilene Cooper, review of Baboon, p. 1166; December 15, 1999, Hazel Rochman, review of Howie Bowles, Secret Agent; March 1, 1999, Susan Dove Lempke, review of The Bird, the Monkey, and the Snake in the Jungle, p. 1206; August, 2000, Gillian Engberg, review of The Night Worker, p. 2134; March 15, 1999, John Peters, review of And If the Moon Could Talk, p. 1302; October 15, 2000, Shelley Townsend-Hudson, review of Howie Bowles and Uncle Sam, p. 437; April 15, 2001, Gillian Engberg, review of Gift from the Sea, p. 1563; July 1, 2005, review of The Great Blue House, p. 730; December 1, 2005, Gillian Engberg, review of Friends of the Heart: Amici del Cuore, p. 34.

Horn Book, March-April, 1998, Lauren Adams, review of And If the Moon Could Talk, p. 209; November, 1999, Lauren Adams, review of Howie Bowles, Secret Agent, p. 733; May-June, 2002, Lauren Adams, review of The Turtle and the Hippopotamus, p. 321; March-April, 2004, Susan Dove Lempke, review of The Cat Who Walked across France, p. 169; September-October, 2005, Vicky Smith, review of Friends of the Heart, p. 573.

Junior Bookshelf, December, 1989, review of Alphabet Soup, p. 262; spring, 1997, review of Spider, Spider, p. 18; spring, 2001, review of Howie Bowles and Uncle Sam, p. 59.

Kliatt, September, 2004, Edna Boardman, audiobook review of Walk Softly, Rachel, p. 65; November, 2005, Myrna Marler, review of Friends of the Heart, p. 4.

Kirkus Reviews, October 1, 1996, review of Spider, Spider, p. 1464; October 1, 2005, review of Friends of the Heart, p. 1075.

Publishers Weekly, February 3, 1997, review of Baboon, p. 105; January 19, 1998, review of And If the Moon Could Talk, p. 376; March 8, 1999, review of The Bird, the Monkey, and the Snake in the Jungle, p. 67; June 26, 2000, review of The Night Worker, p. 74; April 16, 2001, review of A Gift from the Sea, p. 63; February 23, 2004, review of The Cat Who Walked across France, p. 75; August, 2005, review of The Great Blue House, p. 233.

School Library Journal, December, 1991, Jana R. Fine, review of The Bunnysitters, p. 78; August, 1994, Martha Topol, review of Peter and the Talking Shoes, p. 126; November, 1996, John Peters, review of Spider, Spider, p. 76; March, 1999, Dawn Amsberry, review of The Bird, the Monkey, and the Snake in the Jungle, p. 162; October 25, 1999, review of Howie Bowles, Secret Agent, p. 81; August, 2000, Linda Ludke, review of The Night Worker, p. 144; September, 2000, Stephanie Meyer, review of And If the Moon Could Talk, p. 72; December, 2000, Sharon McNeil, review of Howie Bowles and Uncle Sam, p. 94; March, 2004, Margaret Bush, review of The Cat Who Walked across France, p. 152; July, 2004, Carol Y. Barker, audio-book review of Walk Softly, Rachel, p. 60; September, 2004, audiobook review of Walk Softly, Rachel, p. S68; August, 2005, Rosalyn Pierini, review of The Great Blue House, p. 84.

ONLINE

University of Wisconsin—Madison Cooperative Children's Book Center Web site, http://www.education.wisc.edu/ccbc/ (June 20, 2006), Tana Elias, "The World Is Big: An Interview with Kate Banks."

Fararr, Straus & Giroux Web site, http://www.fsgkidsbooks.com/ (June 20, 2006), profile of Banks.