THE EGG THIEF
(No pub date yet)
Margaret Ferguson Books, an imprint of FSG, has bought my picture book story THE EGG THIEF, which will be my first collaboration with Shadra Strickland, a prize-winning illustrator who also happens to be my friend and neighbor here in Baltimore. THE EGG THIEF tells the story of one of the great 19th century biologists, Philip Henry Gosse, whose specimen collecting expedition to Jamaica changed the course of natural history.

The story is told from the point of the view of the island boys who are hired to help Gosse collect Jamaica’s rarest flora and fauna — including the eggs of the swallow-tailed hummingbird. Gosse hopes to take the eggs back home and introduce the species to England, but the boys have second thoughts about exporting one of the island’s natural treasures.