First things first. The illustrations are amazing. I hope it gets nominated for a Caldecott, but i can see judges saying the illustrations are too dark. Of course they are, we are talking about Shelley and Frankenstein. This is a picture book biography about Mary and what brought her to write the most famous monster ever. It’s well done, entertaining and informative.

Mary Who Wrote Frankenstein is a picture book written by Linda Bailey and illustrated by Juliet Sarda. I was excited about the opportunity to read this book because I wanted to share it with my girls. They always enjoy the books I receive, and their feedback is useful in helping me write my reviews.

This is a children’s biography about Mary Shelley, the woman who wrote Frankenstein. Because this is a picture book rather than a chapter book, there is a limited amount of space in which to convey a great deal of information. Mary’s childhood is briefly covered; most notably, that she hid behind the sofa to listen to Coleridge recite the Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Much of the book covers her relationship with Percy Bysshe Shelley and the circumstances that led to her inspiration for writing Frankenstein. The prose is quite evocative, and one can quite easily picture spending rainy days in a castle with two of England’s most famous poets. The book ends with the enduring legacy of the Frankenstein story.

Because this book is intended for children, Percy Shelley presents as adventurous and benign, and not nearly as much of a dirtbag as he was in real life. The book skips over the salacious details of their courtship as well as the tragic loss of three of her children in infancy.

The illustrations are absolutely gorgeous. Sarda uses a subdued palette, and the realistic illustrations conjure up ghostly imagery that pairs nicely with the morose story.

I read this book with my nine-year-old twins, and they liked this book. It held their attention, and they liked looking at the pictures. They have heard of Frankenstein before, so this was a good opportunity to introduce them to the story behind one of the most famous horror novels, in all its gothic glory.

I would absolutely recommend Mary Who Wrote Frankenstein for middle grade readers. 2018 marks the 100 year anniversary of the publication of Frankenstein, so there has been a resurgence of interest in Mary Shelley. This is an interesting- albeit sanitized- look at Mary’s life and the inspiration for writing Frankenstein.



I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book.

Beautiful, morose illustrations for the dark-hearted child in us all. While I question what parent would buy this for their child, or what child would pick up a book about the author of Frankenstein, I must admit I thoroughly enjoyed reading this simplified biography of Mary Shelley's life. Written like a picture book with illustrations of grave stones and dissected frogs, this book impresses the reader with the truly amazing story of a strong-headed 18-year-old girl who defied her culture and wrote something truly horrid and wonderful at the same time.

The illustrations alone are worthy of a 5-star rating. Thankfully, the text is equally worthy in this introduction to Mary Shelley’s life and masterpiece.

Beautiful illustrations. This story is best suited for readers who know of Mary Shelley. I'm thinking it would be a fit for middle school students or older.

I received this book from the publisher and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Wow! What a brilliant little book! I love this idea of encouraging kids to dream big by looking at historical figures! I hope that it becomes a series about women in history or women authors or just authors in general! The opportunities are endless! And the book was very informative without being boring. It was just perfect to inspire little dreamers to use their dreams! It will be perfect for fall and Halloween with this subject matter as well.

And can we take a minute to talk about the illustration?? I absolutely loved it! Beautiful illustration! Totally enhanced the creepy factor of the book, but was gorgeous enough to hang on the wall.

5 stars - highly recommend!

Mary Who Wrote Frankenstein
by Linda Bailey
Penguin Random House Canada

Tundra Books
Children's Fiction
Pub Date 28 Aug 2018


I am reviewing a copy of Mary Who Wrote Frankenstein through Tundra Books and Netgalley:


This beautifully illustrated Children books tells the story of Mary Shelley the author of Frankenstein! It tells of a Mother who she never really knew but always missed her mother died when she was eleven days old. A stepmother who she didn't care for and one. Mary is angry and unhappy at home and when she is only fourteen her Father sends her away to live with strangers in Scotland. She stays with the family who she likes until she is sixteen, she comes home and then runs away with poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, her stepsister Claire goes too. Mary’s family is horrified.


The trio travel Europe by horse and donkey with very little money, and take a boat down The Rhine River.


A ruined Castle named Frankenstein that she sees on this trip becomes the inspiration for the well loved horror novel Frankenstein.


On the next trip together, eighteen months later Mary, Shelley and Claire go to Switzerland where they meet the world’a most famous poet Lord Byron, they end up going sailing with him. A rainy night in leads to Byron suggesting they have a contest to see who can write the best ghost story. Sometimes later a dream leads her to begin Frankenstein


Mary was only eighteen when she wrote Frankenstein, and it had rejected by two publishers until it was finally published by a third.


I give Mary Who Wrote Frankenstein five out of five stars!


Happy Reading!

I love the illustrations in this book! I think they add to the story beautifully. Mary Shelley is an interesting subject for biography for children. Whether they've read Frankenstein or kid's version of it or not, kids know about Frankenstein. I like the way Bailey not only told the origin story for Shelley's masterpiece, but also shared details about Shelley's childhood. The love message that daydreaming and imagination are powerful and valuable. And, it's a great story illustrating what young women can do!

I loved this picture book. This is a great introduction for younger readers about Mary Shelley and how she wrote Frankenstein. The pictures help to evoke the spirit of the book but are not scary for younger readers. My kids loved it.

MARY WHO WROTE FRANKENSTEIN is a mesmerizing picture book about the young woman who wrote the greatest horror novel — and one of the first science fiction books — ever written. A glorious exploration, with beautiful illustrations, of the process of artistic creation that will encinspire readers and writers of all ages. 5/5

Thank you to the author, Penguin Random House Canada and NetGalley for the review copy. Opinions are mine.

#MaryWhoWroteFrankenstein #NetGalley

I received an early copy from NetGalley. Thanks!

This short little book contains a great story based off the real-life Mary Shelley (author of Frankenstein). Like her own work, this story is a bit Gothic and spooky--both in the text (describing how Mary used to spend her time with her mother's grave) and in the illustrations (which are both beautiful and scary). I could see this book appealing very much to kids who are a bit Goth themselves, who like to read about creativity cast in a dark and stormy night type vibe. For that type of reader, this does a great job of capturing the atmosphere one might expect from Mary Shelley's life without getting too grim into the details. (I was a bit surprised, for instance, that in the author's note at the end there was no mention that Mary Shelley rewrote Frankenstein several times throughout her life, and each time it grew more hopeless--but perhaps that was left out for the sake of length or the sake of letting Mary have a semi-happy-ish ending.)

I think for more sensitive readers, or ones who are easily spooked, this might be a bit too dark. If parents/gatekeepers are worried about that, they should definitely read it themselves before passing it on.

But I feel that this was written for kids who picnic in cemeteries (*coughmecough*) and agree with the Doctor Who quote: "Sad is happy for deep people." For that audience, I think it's an excellent fit.

Awesome! I loved the information, the story and the artwork. 2018 seems to be a big year for picture book biographies, and this one is one of the best I have seen. I ordered this book for our library and will promote it in my book talks to elementary and middle school students.

In celebration of the 200th anniversary of the publication of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley's Frankenstein comes a new telling of her life and how she came to write Frankenstein's story. What makes this publication so special though are the illustrations. The artist chose dark colors like the macabre story itself and the details of each picture add a richness to the story that will make a child (or an adult for that matter) want to look at them over and over. Particularly worthy of any special anniversary edition. #MaryWhoWroteFrankenstein #NetGalley

Mary Who Wrote Frankenstein is a truly gorgeous book.  Júlia Sardà's illustrations are lush and filled with so much detail you could probably read this several times and still end up seeing new things on each page.

This is the story of how Mary Shelley came to write her still-popular story, Frankenstein. It will appeal to Mary Shelley fans of any age and is an excellent example of a biography for new readers. Linda Bailey's note at the back of the book is very informative, but I suspect that section would be beyond the reading level or interest of young readers.

Overall a great book that I would highly recommend to anyone who loves gorgeous illustrations, biographies written for children, or Frankenstein.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada for providing me with a free DRC of this book.

First I must thank Netgalley for an advanced digital copy. OMG I just loved this book! The story is very well written and the illustrations are so creative and artistic. I am amazed! The story follows Mary Shelley and how she came to write the book Frankenstein. I just love Mary Shelley and her work so I just had to read this and I am so glad I did. I can't express how much I really loved the book and the illustrations other than to say it made it to my 2018 Favorites List and I plan on getting a physical copy when released. I highly recommend this book to everyone.

Great artwork in this kid's biography. There is a lot of great information in this book too. Our kids will love it.

I LOVED THIS. So, I’ve always been interested in Frankenstein, more from at a distance but I saw Frankenstein for intro to horror class and I loved it, and then there was Young Frankenstein, which I’ve always adored. I did see the movie, a high school production (high quality!) and a London musical of it. Anyway the weirdest part of it all is I’ve never read the actual book. I KNOW!
This book has incredible illustrations, the details and the angles and the colors, it was all freaking perfect to be honest. It was so drawn in the way that I imagine the story. I think that’s what drew me to the book initially, but learning about how badass Mary was, that was incredible as well. I really feel like kids will get a sense of this badass female author and hopefully be inspired to be open to their own creative process.
I will admit, besides my intense love of the illustrations my favorite part was the authors note at the end, explaining how the info was uncovered and found and how Mary herself told the story as well.
Overall I will definitely be buying this book when it comes out!

This is not only a cool telling of the creation of the story of Frankenstein's monster, but interesting facts about Mary Shelley's life, that I was not aware of.

It is pretty amazing stuff, and all told in a frairly sparce compact picture book.

Great pictures too.

This is one of her as a child, listening to the Rime of the Ancient Mariner, in hiding, since she was supposed to be in bed.
<img class="alignnone wp-image-658 size-full" src="http://www.reyes-sinclair.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Screen-Shot-2018-06-20-at-9.18.24-AM.png" alt="Mary who wrote frankenstien-listening to poetry" />

Or these to pictures both of her envisioning the monster, and a drawing of the monster being created.

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-659" src="http://www.reyes-sinclair.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Screen-Shot-2018-06-20-at-9.17.56-AM.png" alt="Mary who wrote frankenstein- in bed" />

<img class="alignnone wp-image-660 size-full" src="http://www.reyes-sinclair.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Screen-Shot-2018-06-20-at-9.17.49-AM.png" alt="Mary who wrote frankenstein-image of the monster" />

Great way to tell a story of both a famous book, as well as a famous author, and show how the story came about.

Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.

Young Mary was a dreamer who learned to read by tracing the letters on her mother's tombstone and then began writing her own stories. She's very much like her mother, a writer and strong willed thinker and grows up surrounded by philosophers, artists, and scientists. Her family is horrified when she runs away with the poet Percy Shelley. The young couple meets famous poet Lord Byron on their adventure across Europe and stay with him at a home on Lake Geneva. During a summer storm Mary finds herself around the fire with her stepsister Claire, the poets Shelley and Byron, and a doctor who is a friend of Lord Byron's. After reading a ghost story on the stormy night, Lord Byron suggests a contest to see who can write the best ghost story.
Later in the summer after most of the group have grown tired with writing their stories, Mary is just beginning hers after a dream she has of a monster! Nine months of daydreaming and writing becomes the classic story Frankenstein.
Mary, Who Wrote Frankenstein is fascinating children's book that briefly covers key events in the life of Mary Shelley that led to her idea for one of the most enduring horror novels in history. The illustrations are haunting but beautiful and add an incredible depth to the story! Both children and adults will be thrilled by the gothic tale and illustrations and older readers will appreciate the author's note and sources for further reading.
Thanks to Tundra Books and NetGalley for providing an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Mary Who Wrote Frankenstein tells the story of how it came to be written, in words and pictures. Mary Wollstonecraft, Mary Shelley's mother died when Mary was 11 days old but in her earlier life had been an author and feminist. Young Mary ran away and married poet Percy Shelley. As they traveled, . they met the famous Lord Byron at a house party, there was a challenge to write a ghost story. Mary had a dream about animating the dead and this is how Frankenstein's monster was born. Mary suffered much loss as she got older. It's a great book for young adults and adults as well. I received this book from Net Galley for an honest review and no compensation otherwise.