I Talk Like a River

Author(s): Jordan Scott

Kids Issues

Winner of the Schneider Family Book Award


Boston Globe-Horn Book Award Winner


What if words got stuck in the back of your mouth whenever you tried to speak? What if they never came out the way you wanted them to?  


Sometimes it takes a change of perspective to get the words flowing.


A New York Times Best Children's Book of the Year


I wake up each morning with the sounds of words all around me. And I can't say them all . . .


When a boy who stutters feels isolated, alone, and incapable of communicating in the way he'd like, it takes a kindly father and a walk by the river to help him find his voice. Compassionate parents everywhere will instantly recognize a father's ability to reconnect a child with the world around him.


Poet Jordan Scott writes movingly in this powerful and ultimately uplifting book, based on his own experience, and masterfully illustrated by Greenaway Medalist Sydney Smith. A book for any child who feels lost, lonely, or unable to fit in.

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Product Information

Finalist for the BC and Yukon Christie Harris Illustrated Children's Literature Prize An American Library Association Notable Children's Book ILA Primary Fiction Honoree Named a Best Book of the Year by The Wall Street Journal, People Magazine, NPR, Kirkus Reviews, Shelf Awareness, Bookpage, School Library Journal, Publishers Weekly, Publishers Lunch, and more! A Horn Book Fanfare Best Book of the Year A Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection A Bank Street Best Childrens Book of the Year! A Chicago Public Library Best Book of the Year A CBC Best Picture Book of the Year A Kids' Book Choice Award Finalist

Jordan Scott is a poet whose work includes Silt, Blert, Decomp and Night & Ox. Blert, which explores the poetics of stuttering, is the subject of a National Film Board of Canada project: Flub and Utter: a Poetic Memoir of the Mouth. Scott was the recipient of the Latner Writers' Trust Poetry Prize for his contributions to Canadian poetry. I Talk Like a River is his first book for children. Jordan Scott lives on Vancouver Island, Canada, with his wife and two sons.

Sydney Smith has illustrated multiple children’s books, including Small in the City, Town Is by the Sea, the winner of the Kate Greenaway Medal, The White Cat and the Monk, written by Jo Ellen Bogart, and the acclaimed Footpath Flowers, which was a New York Times Children’s Book of the Year and a winner of the Governor General Award for Illustration. Born in Nova Scotia in Canada, Sydney now lives in Toronto with his wife and son. Find him online at hutten.org/sydney and on Twitter and Instagram as @sydneydraws.

General Fields

  • : 9781529502817
  • : Walker Books Australia
  • : Walker Books
  • : 200.0
  • : 01 February 2022
  • : 250mm x 230mm x 250mm
  • : books

Special Fields

  • : Jordan Scott
  • : Paperback
  • : Sydney Smith