Coming October 2026 from Neal Porter Books
★★★ Starred Reviews ★★★
Kirkus Reviews, Booklist, School Library Journal
Named a 2025 BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR by
Kirkus Reviews, Booklist Editors’ Choice,
School Library Journal, Science Friday (NPR),
and New York, Chicago, and Evanston Public Libraries
Featured In
The Wall Street Journal
School Library Journal
ALA Notable Children’s Books (ALSC)
Society of Illustrators Original Art Show
Junior Library Guild Selection
2026
★ A New York Times Best Children's Book of 2020
★ Selected for 2021 Society o f Illustrators Original Art Exhibition
★ Nominated for a 2021 Ezra Jack Keats Illustrator Award
★ A 2022 Book All Young Georgians Should Read
★ 2020 Eureka! Nonfiction Children’s Book Honor Award
Illustrated by Ping Zhu
Top 10 Biographies for Youth - Booklist
Top 10 Best Sci-Tech Books for Youth 2020 - Booklist
Chicago Public Library's Best of the Best List 2020
. . . . . . . . . . . .
★ “A fascinating story beautifully told”
~ Kirkus, Starred Review
★ “Alznauer deftly uses Ramanujan’s ponderings to illustrate complex mathematical concepts”
~ Publisher’s Weekly, Starred Review
★ “An illuminating picture-book biography of a fascinating, singular figure in the history of mathematics.”
~ Booklist, Starred Review
“Eloquently written picture-book biography”
~ Horn Book Review
. . . . . . . . . . . .
Free: Goats and Tigers Game Board (illus. by Daniel Miyares!)
Explore: Kolam Tiles a game I co-designed
click here for bookshop.org or each cover for amazon ✩
click here for bookshop.org or each cover for amazon ✩
This is me now-ish. But you should know that I’m always losing my glasses. In fact, I’ve already lost the pair in this photo. Next time you see me I might be wearing one of these.
Official Sounding Bio:
Amy Alznauer is the recipient of the Annie Dillard Award for Creative Nonfiction and the Christopher Award. She is the author of several acclaimed children’s books, including The Strange Birds of Flannery O’Connor, a New York Times Best Children’s Book of 2020; The Boy Who Dreamed of Infinity, a Booklist Top Ten Biography; and The Five Sides of Marjorie Rice (Candlewick, 2025), which was selected as a Best Book of the Year by Evanston, Chicago, and New York Public Libraries, Booklist, Publisher's Weekly, and Kirkus, and just won the 2026 Mathical Award. A curator of the Emory University exhibition At the Crossroads: with Benny Andrews, Alice Walker, and Flannery O'Connor, and a mathematics lecturer at Northwestern University, she is currently at work on two middle-grade novels under contract with Neal Porter Books. The first of which, a Junior Library Guild Gold Selection - Where the Wild Horses Are - is forthcoming in October 2026. Learn more at www.amyalz.com
Amy splits her time between Chicago, where she lives with her husband, teenage daughter, and two dogs; Pennsylvania, where she grew up and where her daughter’s horse Dragonfly lives; Florida, where her extended family lives; Austin, TX where her teenage son lives; and all the various towns where her friends, cousins, and collaborators live, Rochester, Denver, D.C., Port Angeles, Altadena, New York … Whew!
Amy is represented by Rosemary Stimola.
If you want to know more, follow these links:
This is me when I was nine, holding my first ever dog. The tree behind me gave me that dog (I can’t explain, because I’m saving that story for a book!). Anyway, that tree was my tree. I could make it to the top with snacks and a stack of books under my arms and only occasionally skin my knee. I spent hours up there, even at night, even when it was raining. Almost everything I write goes back to what I saw, longed for, imagined up in that tree.
This is not me. This is Katherine Paterson. One time I drove hours and hours to a festival just to hear her speak. She said beautiful things - and the very best thing she said, they put on this poster. I have it over my desk where I write, because I desperately desire to be a spy like Katherine. She also once said that she didn’t write much as a kid, she just loved stories so much she wanted to be on the inside.
Ditto.
I love visiting schools, libraries, and homeschool groups
and I really love hearing from readers.
Or just write to me straight: amy [at] gmail [dot] com
Creative Collaborations
Collaborating with other creative people is one of my greatest joys. All my picture books are collaborations with visual artists. Here are some of the other projects I’ve worked on.
a tiny collaboration with my children
with Benny Andrews, Flannery O’Connor,
and Alice Walker
a huge collaboration with the Rose Library Archives at Emory University, curators, and exhibition designers
a collaboration with naturalist and children’s book creator Sallie Wolf &
Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s keyboardist Patrick Godon