Our offices are located in the Emmett building, which was built in 1912. The façade is gorgeous and the building has a history of being a former home to publishers like Dorling Kindersley (DK), Orchard Books, Kingfisher, Franklin Watts, and Millbrook. So for what was once a big publishing building, LEE & LOW remains the last publisher to reside at 95 Madison Avenue. The building has many quirks, but the main gripe all the tenants share are the elevators—they are old. Right now only one of the three is operational—barely. We all have gotten used to the habit of bringing our cell phone with us while riding the elevator in case we have to call for help.

Awards, Book News

¡Gracias por la estrella! Thanks for the starred review!

September 18, 2009 leeandlowbooks 3 Comments

Woot! GRACIAS • THANKS by Pat Mora is our second book this fall to get a starred review from Kirkus (a review journal certainly not known for dishing them out freely). Since it’s running later than our other fall titles, this is the first review we’ve gotten in, so we were all pretty excited this morning to read this:

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Book News, Interviews with Authors and Illustrators

Ted & Betsy Lewin Studio Video

September 17, 2009 JasonTLow 1 Comment

Ted and Betsy Lewin

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General

My lunch, myself?

September 17, 2009 leeandlowbooks 3 Comments

Earlier this week we posted our lunch poll because, well, at LEE & LOW we like food a lot. It plays a central part in many of our books, and here’s why. Think about the phrase, “You are what you eat.” That goes beyond guiltily scarfing down a bar of chocolate. What we choose to eat on a regular basis says a lot about the culture(s) we belong to. Vegetables or meat? Spicy or bland? What you like to eat is more than just biology; it’s the way you were raised, how your grandmother’s kitchen smelled, the kind of supermarket your parents shopped in.

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General

Poll of the Week: Lunch

September 14, 2009 leeandlowbooks 1 Comment

We’ll talk later in the week about food, culture, and books, but for now, let’s get straight to the poll:

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General

Is the term Indian Summer racist?

September 10, 2009 leeandlowbooks 11 Comments

It’s been an odd summer, weather-wise: roasting in April, cool in June and July, and just a few blazing weeks in August before the current chill September. So yesterday I mused, are we going to get an Indian summer?

And then I stopped thinking about the weather itself and started thinking about the term “Indian summer.” I had no idea where the term came from. The surface meaning—an unusually warm period between the leaves changing and the first snow—is harmless, but I had a sneaking suspicion that the origin of the term was racist.

Wikipedia gives three theories of the term’s etymology:

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General

Stuff That Steams My Clams

September 8, 2009 JasonTLow 11 Comments

I was reading an article about women’s roles in the United States military and was surprised to learn that regulations still prohibit women from serving in combat. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have blurred the lines of warfare to such a degree that women have found themselves, despite the rules that forbid it, fighting alongside men for the first time. The women have proven themselves to be tenacious soldiers and they have earned many medals of valor.