Comedy Writing
It’s Two-Book Tuesday!
Guess what? It’s Two-Book Tuesday! That’s because I wrote two children’s books which came out today. They are:
- The Bad Guys Joke Book, which is out now from Scholastic, and which was designed by Stacie Zucker with Sophia La Torre
- The Fantastic Four Little Golden Book, which is out now from Penguin Random House, and which was illustrated by Eda Kaban
Here’s the official publisher description of The Bad Guys Joke Book:
Get ready to laugh out loud with Mr. Wolf, Mr. Snake, Ms. Tarantula, Mr. Piranha, and Mr. Shark! Packed with puns, funny fill-ins, limericks, and so much more, this joke book is the perfect companion to the Bad Guys Movie 2.
And here’s the official publisher description of The Fantastic Four Little Golden Book:
Marvel’s iconic first family of super heroes, the Fantastic Four, arrive to save the day in their first ever Little Golden Book! When a team of four daring space explorers get bombarded by mysterious cosmic rays, they return to Earth changed forever. Given incredible powers, Mister Fantastic, the Invisible Woman, the Human Torch, and the ever-lovin’ blue-eyed Thing band together to keep the world safe from super villains and alien invaders.
These action-packed full-color pages will introduce these heroes’ amazing powers and their friends and foes! Kids 2 to 5—along with Marvel fans and collectors—will love this Little Golden Book based on The Fantastic Four.
For more info on The Bad Guys Joke Book, click HERE.
For more info on The Fantastic Four Little Golden Book, click HERE.
To buy The Bad Guys Joke Book, click HERE, HERE, and HERE.
And to buy The Fantastic Four Little Golden Book, click HERE, HERE, and HERE.
I Wrote Two Episodes of “Hey! Fuzzy Yellow”!
Recently, I wrote two episodes of the animated preschool series Hey! Fuzzy Yellow. The first episode I wrote is called “Sculpture Jam Abstract” (Season 1, Ep 20), and it’s currently streaming on the Irish video service RTÉ Player, along with 30 other episodes of the show.
(I don’t know when the second episode I wrote will air (or stream). And I also don’t know when Hey! Fuzzy Yellow will start airing in the United States. But when I find out both of those things, I’ll write up another blog post to spread the word. In the meantime…)
Here’s an official description of the show: “In Hey! Fuzzy Yellow, we meet a blurry bundle of fun and friends who want you all to know the world is full of possibilities.”
The series is produced by Curiosity Ink Media, Toon2Tango, Treehouse Republic, and Hotel Hungaria Animation, in partnership with Måns Swanberg. Learn more about the show HERE.
And here’s an official synopsis of the first episode I wrote, “Sculpture Jam Abstract”: “Fuzzy Yellow’s friends play soccer in the mud, then decide to make clay sculptures. Fuzzy Yellow models for them.”
I penned the script for “Sculpture Jam Abstract” as well as the lyrics for both of the songs in the episode, and I’m quite proud of how the whole thing came out. Working with the show’s head writer McPaul Smith and the series creator Måns Swanberg was such a blast!
The way you see and interpret the world creatively has value and is one of the things that makes you special. And that’s what “Sculpture Jam Abstract” is all about. I think it teaches a good lesson to kids, and it does so with silly, over-the-top slapstick comedy (the best way to teach an audience a lesson).
But if you don’t have RTÉ Player, you probably can’t see what the episode looks like. So here are some screen-grabs from “Sculpture Jam Abstract”:
And here’s the trailer for Hey! Fuzzy Yellow:
Last but definitely not least, if you’d like to find out about my other television writing credits (the ones that are neither fuzzy nor yellow), you can check out my IMDB page, as well as the Television Writing section on this very website!
Hey, Check It Out: I Wrote a Joke Book!
As you may know, in addition to my work as a children’s book author, I’m also a television comedy writer. And for quite some time now, I’ve wanted to write a children’s joke book, which seemed like it would be a nice way to combine those two disparate sides of my career: the “kid lit” side and the “joke writer” side. Call it a short-term goal. Well, a few months ago, I got a chance to realize that goal.
That’s because I wrote a children’s book called The Bad Guys Joke Book, which will be published by Scholastic on July 1st, 2025.
Now, I should mention a couple of things, just because I don’t want to give you the wrong idea here: This book is not set in the world of the Bad Guys books written by Aaron Blabey. It is set in the world of the Bad Guys animated movies (and Netflix specials) which are based on those books.
You also might’ve noticed that the book is coming out on July 1st, just a few short weeks before the Bad Guys 2 movie opens. (That movie comes out on August 1st.) Does this book tie into that movie in any direct way? I’m afraid I can’t quite answer that question at this early date. You’ll have to read the book to find out!
And in the meantime, here’s the official publisher description of the book:
Get ready to laugh out loud with Mr. Wolf, Mr. Snake, Ms. Tarantula, Mr. Piranha, and Mr. Shark! Packed with puns, funny fill-ins, limericks, and so much more, this joke book is the perfect companion to the Bad Guys Movie 2.
The Bad Guys Joke Book is available for preorder HERE, HERE, and HERE.
But if you click the link to the Scholastic Kids site – aka the third “HERE” link directly above – you’ll have to scroll down on that link to find The Bad Guys Joke Book, which is listed on that website as “Bad Guys Movie 2 Joke Book.” That’s the way it’s listed on most other book-related websites as well. I think the folks at Scholastic phrased it that way in the listings on these websites in order to make it clear that this joke book is set in the continuity of the Bad Guys movies, and also to remind readers that it’s coming out roughly around the same time as the second Bad Guys film. After all, as the official publisher description says, this book is the perfect companion to that movie!
I couldn’t agree more.