#the interpreter

No one asked, but here are my favorite picturebooks released this year.

Moon Song by Michaela Goade was my most anticipated release for picturebooks this year. I am a huge fan of Michaela Goade's work, and adored the companion work, Berry Song. Her art has a dreamy, magical quality to it. I love how she highlights nature and human connection to nature. Her work in Moon Song was about the light and the dark, fear and education, and family. As a winter lover myself, I deeply connected to how Goade showed the beauty of snow and winter.

The Littlest Drop by Sascha Alper and illustrated by Jerry Pinkney and Brian Pinkney is about a hummingbird who wants to put out the local wildfires. Jerry Pinkney was a powerhouse of picturebooks and his song, Brian Pinkney, used his sketches to create the art for The Littlest Drop. The timeless message about community and every little step counts is beautifully depicted in the detailed animals and vivid swirls of creating a whimsical atmosphere throughout. A timeless tale.

The Interpreter by Olivia Abtahi and Monica Arnaldo immediately caught my attention and I read it the second I saw the physical copy. What starts as a story about a girl, Cecilia, proud to translating for her parents in adult situations, like the DMV, turns into the pressure children are put under. Arnaldo uses an office setting to emphasize the responsibility Cecilia has, Abtahi emphasizing through the language that to Cecilia, this is a job. Arnaldo captures the slow toll this takes on Cecilia, through her facial expressions, body language, and outfit. I loved how expressive the art was, as well as the balance of humor and seriousness throughout the story. (If I were in my Picturebook class again, this is the book I would argue to write my final on).

For a Girl Becoming by Joy Harjo and Adriana Garcia has not gotten the buzz I think it deserves. Adriana Garcia illustrates a warm, welcoming, and stunning journey to accompany Joy Harjo's poem, showing mother and daughters at different stages in their lives. Her contrast of colors, unique use of spaces, and the fantastical approach she takes to illustrating creates a rich and vibrant world. And I love the use of horses throughout. Absolutely stunning.

Honorable mentions:

Every Monday Mabel by Jashar Awan

Nunu and the Sea by Isabella Kung

Let's Be Bees by Shawn Harris

MISINTERPRETATIONS_1 // SUBSTRATA

Two companion records are now basically locked and waiting for Bandcamp.

MISINTERPRETATIONS_1 The scroll cover is a close crop of the Signal Scroll printout – dot-matrix description of Crossed Wires slipping in and out of focus. It’s the right visual for what the album is doing: eight AI-assisted reinterpretations of the SIGNAL side of signal // NOISE, rebuilt from stems, run through Between Lines, and then fed to Suno as prompts.

Same source material, same emotional spine – but heard twice removed. Caption errors, memory seams, the brain trying to “fill in” what it never properly heard in the first place. INPUT ≠ COMPREHENSION as a whole album pass.

(eight tracks: 43 minutes)

--//---

SUBSTRATA The CRT/static image is the induction underworld of The Interpreter. SUBSTRATA is built almost entirely from H2n induction recordings of the rig: chargers, CRTs, waveform monitor, dot-matrix, CI dehumidifier, demand unit, power blocks. EM fields and transformer hums you can’t normally hear, pushed through Suno in a tighter Emptyset / Ben Frost orbit.

Where signal // NOISE is lived experience, SUBSTRATA is what hums underneath it – the machine-room nervous system of the installation. Darker, slower, more physical: pressure, infralux, structural drone.

Both albums are openly AI-assisted (Between Lines + Suno), but rooted in very specific, very material recordings: miscaptioned text and electromagnetic noise from the actual hardware. Think of them as two second copies of signal // NOISE: one misheard, one buried.

Some OCs for a thing of mine

I'm still trying to improve with lighting and other things, drawing underwater is a fun challenge.