Molly Leach facts for kids
Molly Leach (born October 4, 1960) is an American graphic designer famous for her amazing work on children's books. She has won many awards for making books look exciting and fun for young readers.
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Starting Her Design Journey
Molly Leach began her career in 1982. She started as a designer for Sport magazine. Later, she designed special issues for other big magazines like Sports Illustrated and Business Week. This experience helped her learn how to make pages look interesting and grab people's attention.
Designing Awesome Books
Molly Leach started designing books when she was asked by illustrator Lane Smith to help with the cover of The True Story of the Three Little Pigs! in 1989. After that, she designed more of Smith's books, like The Big Pets and Glasses Who Needs 'Em?.
One of her most famous projects was The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales (1992). This book changed how children's books looked! Other designers were really inspired by it. They saw how Molly's designs made the stories even more exciting.
Molly also redesigned many classic books. She gave a fresh new look to all the Roald Dahl books and the "Joey Pigza" series by Jack Gantos. She also designed a special Dr. Seuss collection called Your Favorite Seuss: A Baker's Dozen by the One and Only Dr. Seuss. Plus, she worked on the 50th anniversary edition of A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle.
Her design style is very unique. She uses big, bold letters and makes each page feel like it's bursting with energy. The author Jon Scieszka once said that Molly's designs tell as much of the story as the words and pictures do! She takes fun, silly ideas and makes them look really cool and professional.
Books Designed by Molly Leach
Molly Leach has designed many wonderful books. Here are some of them:
- The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs! (cover only), by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith (1989)
- Glasses (Who Needs 'Em?), by Lane Smith (1991)
- The Big Pets, by Lane Smith (1991)
- The Stinky Cheese Man, by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith (1992) – This book won a Caldecott Honor award!
- The Happy Hocky Family!, by Lane Smith (1993)
- Math Curse, by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith (1995)
- James and the Giant Peach, by Roald Dahl and Lane Smith (1996 edition)
- Squids Will Be Squids, by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith (1998)
- Hooray for Diffendoofer Day!, by Dr. Seuss, Jack Prelutsky, and Lane Smith (1998)
- The complete Roald Dahl library (paperback), by Roald Dahl and Quentin Blake (1998)
- Baloney (Henry P.), by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith (2001)
- Pinocchio: The Boy, by Lane Smith (2002)
- The Happy Hocky Family Moves to the Country!, by Lane Smith (2003)
- Science Verse, by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith (2004)
- Your Favorite Seuss: A Baker's Dozen by the One and Only Dr. Seuss (2004)
- Seen Art?, by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith (2005)
- John, Paul, George & Ben, by Lane Smith (2006)
- Cowboy and Octopus, by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith (2007)
- Madam President, by Lane Smith (2008)
- It's a Book, by Lane Smith (2010)
- Lulu and the Brontosaurus, by Judith Viorst and Lane Smith (2010)
- Grandpa Green, by Lane Smith (2011) – This book also won a Caldecott Honor award!
- A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L'Engle (2012 edition)
- Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key, by Jack Gantos (2014)
- Joey Pigza Loses Control, by Jack Gantos (2014)
- What Would Joey Do?, by Jack Gantos (2014)
- I Am Not Joey Pigza, by Jack Gantos (2014)
About Her Life
Molly Leach is married to Lane Smith, who is also a famous children's book author and illustrator. They live in both Connecticut and New York City.
