Molly Leach (born October 4, 1960) is an American graphic designer best known for her award-winning children's books.
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Molly Leach began her career in 1982 as a designer at Sport magazine and later designed special issues and annuals for magazines such as Sports Illustrated and Business Week .
Leach started designing books when she was recruited by illustrator Lane Smith to help with the cover of The True Story of the Three Little Pigs! (written by Jon Scieszka, Viking Books, 1989). She then designed Smith's The Big Pets and Glasses Who Needs 'Em? (Viking Books, 1991), before designing what would arguably be her most visible work, The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales (Viking Books, 1992).
Other notable book designs by Leach are her redesigns of new editions of the complete Roald Dahl books; Jack Gantos's Joey Pigza books; a Dr. Seuss treasury, Your Favorite Seuss: A Baker's Dozen by the One and Only Dr. Seuss; and the 50th anniversary edition of A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle.
In a 2002 Publishers Weekly article, "A New Day for Design," book designer Isabel Warren-Lynch echoed many of her colleagues when she said, "[Designer] Molly Leach opened the door in a lot of ways. When we saw The Stinky Cheese Man, designers said, 'This is what we want to do, too!' — and that it worked and sold made that possible." The Stinky Cheese Man is widely cited as having moved children's design into a new era. [1]
In a 1998 essay in the Horn Book Magazine , "Design Matters," Jon Scieszka stated, "The job of a designer, in its most basic form, is to pick the style, size, and color of type, maybe pick the kind of paper and size of the book, and arrange how the type and illustrations are to be displayed on the pages available. But Molly does so much more than that in our books. When she’s done, the design tells as much of the story as the text and illustrations do." [2]
In his book Side by Side (Walker Publishing 2001), Leonard S. Marcus stated, "Leach liked bold, headline-sized type like that often used for magazines. She thought that unusually big, dramatic type best communicated the fun of stories in which things continually went haywire. And she wanted each page to feel as if it were ready to burst at the margins." [3]
In the same book Jon Scieszka is quoted, "People leafing through The Stinky Cheese Man would see that something different was going on — and realize that a good part of that 'something' was Molly's design." Smith seconded this with, "Jon and I both appreciate goofy, second-grade humor. If it were up to us, we would use all comic-book type or hand lettered type made of twigs. Molly, with her background in magazine design is different. She'll take what we do — and make it classy." [4]
Steven Heller and Steven Guarnaccia state in Designing for Children (1994, Watson-Guptill), "while Smith's drawings are artfully primitive... it is the book design by Molly Leach that is the BRUTest of all... the type varies in weight, size and leading, but there are other witty tricks: for instance, where there isn't enough text to fill a page it is repeated, and when the character Chicken Licken is introduced the type, not the sky, falls on her head."
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Leach is married to children's book author and illustrator Lane Smith. She lives in Connecticut and New York City.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a 1964 children's novel by British author Roald Dahl. The story features the adventures of young Charlie Bucket inside the chocolate factory of eccentric chocolatier Willy Wonka.
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"The Princess and the Pea" is a literary fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen about a princess who is tested to become wife to a lonely prince. The tale was first published with three others by Andersen in a cheap booklet on 8 May 1835 in Copenhagen by C. A. Reitzel.
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The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales is a postmodern children's book written by Jon Scieszka and illustrated by Lane Smith. Published in 1992 by Viking, it is a collection of twisted, humorous parodies of famous children's stories and fairy tales, such as "Little Red Riding Hood", "The Ugly Duckling" and "The Gingerbread Man". The book won The New York Times Best Illustrated Book award, was a Caldecott Honor book in 1993, and has won numerous other awards in various countries.
Lane Smith is an American illustrator and writer of children's books. He is the Kate Greenaway medalist (2017) known for his eclectic visuals and subject matter, both humorous and earnest, such as the contemplative Grandpa Green, which received a Caldecott Honor in 2012, and the outlandish Stinky Cheese Man, which received a Caldecott Honor in 1992.
Jack Gantos is an American author of children's books. He is best known for the fictional characters Rotten Ralph and Joey Pigza. Rotten Ralph is a cat who stars in twenty picture books written by Gantos and illustrated by Nicole Rubel from 1976 to 2014. Joey Pigza is a boy with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), featured in five novels from 1998 to 2014.
The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs! is a children's book by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith. Released in a number of editions since its first release by Viking Kestrel, an imprint of Viking Penguin in 1989, it is a parody of The Three Little Pigs as told by the Big Bad Wolf, known in the book as "A. Wolf", short for "Alexander T. Wolf". The book was honored by the American Library Association as an ALA Notable Book.
Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key is a children's novel by Jack Gantos, published in 1998. It is the first of a series of books featuring the character Joey Pigza. The book was a National Book Award finalist.
Science Verse is a 2004 children's picture book written by Jon Scieszka and illustrated by Lane Smith. It received the Picture Book prize in the 2005 Golden Duck Awards. The book, published by Viking Press, is a follow-up to Math Curse.
Baloney is a children's picture book written by Jon Scieszka and illustrated by Lane Smith. It was published in 2001 by Viking Press.
Seen Art? is a children's picture book written by Jon Scieszka and illustrated by Lane Smith. It was published in 2005 by Viking Press and Penguin Random House LLC, in cooperation with the Museum of Modern Art. It is aimed at a reading age of 4 to 8.
Squids Will Be Squids is a children's picture book written by Jon Scieszka and illustrated by Lane Smith. It was released in 1998 by Viking Press.
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Guys Write for Guys Read is a compilation of essays for the Guys Read organization. Edited by children's book author Jon Scieszka, it contains contributions from Lloyd Alexander, Christopher Paolini, Ned Vizzini, James Howe, Mo Willems, Jack Gantos, Stephen King, Neil Gaiman, and other male children's and young adult authors.
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