Buzz

Los Angeles Times “Best Children’s Book[s] of 2000”

School Library Journal “Best Children’s Book[s] of 2000”

Publisher’s Weekly Star

School Library Journal Star

Horn Book Star

American Booksellers Association Pick of the Lists

As I wrote the free-verse story poem that makes up this picture book, I became a child again, hearing the buzzing sounds of the morning, from the buzzing of a bee to the buzzing of snoring to Daddy’s silver razor to the blender to the lawn mower outside the window. And as it sometimes happens when we writers are lucky, the process of writing this book transformed me, as I buzzed out loud to the song of my hair dryer, buzzed in unison with the coffee grinder, buzzed in sync with the computer’s low hum. It was pure and silly fun, to buzz with my six-year-old son, to become sponges soaking up the sounds of the neighborhood.

I feel so lucky to be a writer of books for children, to be able to make it my work to send children buzzing into the world with wonder, buzzing with ideas, buzzing with hope for another good day.

“Not every writer can make a smooth transition from one genre to another, especially when there’s a vast difference in intended audience, but here an established poet for young adults proves that she is more than able to do so with her first picture book for preschoolers. Wong’s poetic vision serves her well in this story of early-morning family rituals written from the point of view of a young child.”
– Horn Book

“Wong turns from the nearly surreal, hypnotic world of Night Garden to this wide-eyed, cheerful tale offering a boy’s view of a busy weekday morning. From the opening spreads, an industrious bee acts as the guiding spirit and its buzz as the leitmotif: the boy translates its hum to the ‘BUZZZbuzzzBUZZZbuzz’ of his parents’ snores, an alarm clock, a coffee grinder, a doorbell and his toy airplane’s ill-fated flight over the breakfast table; bold type emphasizes the onomatopoeia. It’s a hectic household, but Wong’s story emphasizes the boy’s reassuring routine in her insistent staccato prose. . .This joyful book will strike a resonant chord–especially for the many children with two working parents.”
– Publisher’s Weekly