Molly Leach facts for kids

Molly Leach (born October 4, 1960) is an American graphic designer. She is famous for her amazing work on many award-winning children's books.

Starting as a Designer

Molly Leach began her career in 1982. She worked as a designer for Sport magazine. Later, she designed special issues for other big magazines. These included Sports Illustrated and Business Week.

Designing Books for Kids

Molly Leach started designing books when she met illustrator Lane Smith. She helped him with the cover of The True Story of the Three Little Pigs! in 1989. After that, she designed more of Smith's books. These included The Big Pets and Glasses Who Needs 'Em?.

The Stinky Cheese Man

One of her most famous designs was for The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales in 1992. This book became very popular. It even won an award called the Caldecott Honor.

Other Famous Books

Molly Leach also redesigned many other well-known books. She worked on new editions of all the Roald Dahl books. She also designed the Joey Pigza books by Jack Gantos. Another big project was a Dr. Seuss collection called Your Favorite Seuss. She also designed the 50th anniversary edition of A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle.

What People Say About Her Work

Many people in the book world admire Molly Leach's designs.

Changing Children's Book Design

In 2002, a designer named Isabel Warren-Lynch said that Molly Leach "opened the door" for new ideas. When designers saw The Stinky Cheese Man, they wanted to create similar exciting books. This book helped move children's book design into a new and fresh time.

Design as Storytelling

Jon Scieszka, an author she worked with, wrote about her in 1998. He said a designer usually picks fonts, paper, and how things look on a page. But Molly does much more. He explained that her design tells as much of the story as the words and pictures do.

Bold and Playful Designs

In a book called Side by Side, Leonard S. Marcus talked about Molly's style. He said she liked using big, bold letters, like those in magazines. She felt that large, dramatic type showed the fun of stories where things often went wild. She wanted each page to look exciting and full of energy.

Jon Scieszka also said that when people looked through The Stinky Cheese Man, they could see something different was happening. He noted that a big part of that "something" was Molly's design. Lane Smith agreed, saying Molly could take their silly ideas and make them look classy.

Steven Heller and Steven Guarnaccia wrote in their book Designing for Children about Molly's unique style. They mentioned how the text in her books changes size and spacing. They also pointed out clever tricks, like repeating text if there wasn't enough to fill a page. In one book, when the character Chicken Licken was introduced, the words themselves seemed to fall on her head!

Books Designed by Molly Leach

Here are some of the books Molly Leach has designed:

• The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs! (cover only), Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith (1989)
• Glasses (Who Needs 'Em?), Lane Smith (1991)
• The Big Pets, Lane Smith (1991)
• The Stinky Cheese Man, Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith (1992) – Caldecott Honor Book
• The Happy Hocky Family!, Lane Smith (1993)
• Speak! Children's Book Illustrators Brag about Their Dogs, Michael J. Rosen (1993)
• Math Curse, Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith (1995)
• Purr... Children's Book Illustrators Brag about Their Cats, Michael J. Rosen (1996)
• James and the Giant Peach, Roald Dahl, Lane Smith (1996 edition)
• Squids Will Be Squids, Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith (1998)
• Hooray for Diffendoofer Day!, Dr. Seuss and Jack Prelutsky, Lane Smith (1998)
• The complete Roald Dahl library (paperback), Roald Dahl, Quentin Blake (1998)
• The True Story of the Three Little Pigs: 10th Anniversary Edition, Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith (1999)
• Baby! Talk!, Penny Gentieu (1999)
• The Very Persistent Gappers of Frip, George Saunders, Lane Smith (2000)
• Pilgrims of Plymouth, Susan E. Goodman (2001)
• Exploring Space, Toni Eugene (2001)
• Insects, Robin Bernard (2001)
• A Tree for all Seasons, Robin Bernard (2001)
• Baloney (Henry P.), Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith (2001)
• Pinocchio: The Boy, Lane Smith (2002)
• The complete Roald Dahl library (hardcover), Roald Dahl, Quentin Blake (2002)
• The Stinky Cheese Man: 10th Anniversary Edition, Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith (2002) – Caldecott Honor Book
• The Happy Hocky Family Moves to the Country!, Lane Smith (2003)
• Science Verse, Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith (2004)
• Your Favorite Seuss: A Baker's Dozen by the One and Only Dr. Seuss (2004)
• Seen Art?, Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith (2005)
• Pilobolus: The Human Alphabet, John Kane (2005)
• John, Paul, George & Ben, Lane Smith (2006)
• Cowboy and Octopus, Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith (2007)
• Bloom!, Maria Van Lieshout (2007)
• Madam President, Lane Smith (2008)
• Splash!, Maria Van Lieshout (2008)
• Big Plans, Bob Shea, Lane Smith (2008)
• The Big Elephant In The Room, Lane Smith (2009)
• Peep!, Maria Van Lieshout (2009)
• Princess Hyacinth, Florence Parry Heide, Lane Smith (2009)
• It's a Book, Lane Smith (2010)
• Tumble!, Maria Van Lieshout (2010)
• Revolution, Jennifer Donnelly (2010)
• Lulu and the Brontosaurus, Judith Viorst, Lane Smith (2010)
• It's a Little Book, Lane Smith (2011)
• Grandpa Green, Lane Smith (2011) – Caldecott Honor Book
• Abe Lincoln's Dream, Lane Smith (2012)
• A Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L'Engle (2012)
• Lulu Walks the Dogs, Judith Viorst, Lane Smith (2012)
• Kid Sheriff and the Terrible Toads, Bob Shea, Lane Smith (2014)
• The True Story of the Three Little Pigs: 25th Anniversary Edition, Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith (2014)
• Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key, Jack Gantos (2014)
• Joey Pigza Loses Control, Jack Gantos (2014)
• What Would Joey Do?, Jack Gantos (2014)
• I Am Not Joey Pigza, Jack Gantos (2014)
• The Key That Swallowed Joey Pigza, Jack Gantos (2014)
• Return to Augie Hobble, Lane Smith (2015)

Her Life Today

Molly Leach is married to children's book author and illustrator Lane Smith. They live in Connecticut and New York City.