Suzie Bitner Was Afraid of the Drain is a children’s poetry collection comprised of 124 poems and over 100 illustrations. Written by Barbara Vance, the book is filled with humorous and whimsical poems that take you to a world where mice wear roller-skates, a girl turns into a peanut-butter-and-jelly-sandwich, and a baseball embarks on an unexpected trip.  Designed to entertain and educate, “Suzie” intersperses challenging and fun words like “salubrious” and “discourse” throughout its poems (and offers a special dictionary just for kids…check out the resources!).

Lauded for its unique, minimalist illustrations and creative typography, the book is a Moonbeam Children’s Book winner, an Indie Book Award winner, and was twice a finalist for the Bluebonnet Award.

Several years ago, Barbara was sitting at her desk with a rather large (no, a very large) pile of papers that she did not care to have very much to do with. From this hiccup in the workday came a poem about a little girl named Suzie with a prickly problem. The words and ideas kept coming until her poems filled up pages and pages and finally a book! Suzie Bitner Was Afraid of the Drain is about celebrating life, smiling, and finding the beauty (and the humour) in the world.