Pride Puppy! is written by Robin Stevenson, a wonderful human and award-winning author, check out her other books! It’s published by Orca Books, who are so supportive and incredible to work with, I’ve had a lot of fun illustrating several books for them over the years!
PRIDE PUPPY! & SCOTUS
Pride Puppy is involved in an upcoming SCOTUS case, here are a few links to read more:
Watch & read about the case, including interviews with Orca publisher, Andrew Wooldridge, on Global News and CHEK News
Read the statement by the authors and illustrators of the books involved at pen.org, op-ed by Sarah & Ian Hoffman in TIME, statement by Charlotte Sullivan Wild, more in-depth analysis at Mombian
Articles in the Times Colonist and the Globe & Mail (+)
More reporting at New York Times (+), Washington Post, USA Today x 2
ADDRESSING MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT PRIDE PUPPY!
If you’re unfamiliar with the book, you can read a starred Kirkus Review HERE!
It’s a fun and colourful alphabet book which has a secondary ‘search & find’ element to it, because they were my favourite kind of books growing up! Every page tells a story about a missing puppy using each letter of the alphabet, and then I’ve included an assortment of other items starting with that same letter to hunt for on the page. There’s a word list at the end of the book with these items in case you need a hand!
There’s been SO much wonderful feedback on the book!
But of course, a bunch of joyless ultra-conservatives caught wind and plucked a handful of the 200+ words in the list, very clearly did not actually read the whole book, and caused outrage by mischaracterizing what they stood for, implying that they represented things inappropriate for children.
It’s long overdue, but as the illustrator of this book I just might be the number one expert on what is depicted in the book, and I’ve finally put together a collection clarifying and debunking whatever it is this loud minority think is going on.
I took screenshots directly from the conservative websites attacking the book then collaged the “problematic” words on top of the actual artwork, let’s go!
THE MOST FREQUENTLY QUOTED
Some of the words highlighted say more about what the critics are imagining the words to describe, rather than what is actually shown in the book. They’re making it weird! The words most frequently cited are leather and underwear.
The leather mentioned is a leather jacket, a fairly common article of clothing that even children sometimes wear! What did they think it was? Maybe I don’t want to know. This is the only piece of leather clothing in the entire book, aside from a vaguely western-style vest.
Lip ring is also mentioned, an accessory you might see any given day at say, the grocery store. And it’s very, very small.
L is also for ladybug and lion and lollipop!
Next up is underwear, a piece of clothing I assume the majority of people of every age wear on a daily basis? There’s even an award-winning kids superhero franchise based on it! The underwear is obviously part of a fun dress-up, not just someone who forgot to wear pants that day. Is no one mad about the unibrow?!
THE OTHERS
Drag queen and drag king. Honestly, if it wasn’t mentioned in the word list I doubt the average reader would even recognize these characters as being in drag. It’s fun to dress up at any age, who cares!
Well they didn’t even get her name right, but Marsha P. Johnson was a trans activist and a prominent figure in the Stonewall Uprising of 1969, which was a catalyst for the first Pride Parade in 1970. So yes, a postage stamp-sized nod to Marsha goes in the book about … a Pride Parade.
M is also for mouse and muffin and moon, N for noodles and newspaper and a net!
There is an intersex flag and it takes up 0.005% of the spread. If you’re concerned about your child hearing about this at school, I will remind you that the word list is a voluntary addition at the back of the book, there are probably 200+ other words and I’d take a wild guess that the teacher isn’t going through all of them. If you read this book at home you can decide how or even if you want to discuss this with your child.
Look at that cute Shiba Inu!
THE ABSURD
These ones are completely ridiculous, but it proves that the people criticizing the book CLEARLY HAVE NOT READ IT and are just looking for outrage.
The “green [glitter] beard” was inspired by a [straight] male friend who used to put glitter in his beard to run marathons, it’s a thing that [often straight] men do at sporting events.
You can also see the character is wearing goggles while playing a gold guitar (bonus: it’s a G chord!), there’s a corner of a gazebo with a garland off to the side! If you read the book, the full page also shows a yappy goose, bubble gum, and grandma. See, this is fun!
My all-time favourite comes from the Catholic News Agency - ZIPPER. Zipper! It’s a zipper on a jacket strewn on the bed at the end of the day, it’s not even being worn. Like, uh, what kind of zipper were they thinking of? Says more about where their strange brains are at, I guess.
A BONUS CLARIFICATION FOR SARAH ISGUR!
On January 23, 2025, Sarah Isgur had a lot of disgusting and uninformed things to say about Pride Puppy! on her podcast with David French, which is about “the law, the courts, their collision with politics, and why it all matters.” They were discussing the upcoming SCOTUS case, Mahmoud vs. Taylor, that involves Pride Puppy! and 8 other kids books.
As we’ve seen, there are a lot of misconceptions about the contents of the book, but Sarah took it a step further and made up a bunch of nonsense that literally doesn’t exist in the book. This is especially appalling, given the directive of the podcast’s parent company, the Dispatch, where Sarah is a senior editor. Let’s hear from Sarah!
Ooook, first of all, clamps?! Huh? There is nothing remotely close to clamps and I have no clue where she would even get the idea... (Every accusation is a confession?) Thanks for inventing new misinformation, doing great work here with the journalistic integrity!
Here’s the C page and I even included the word list, to clear that up.
Sorry, everyone wears leather chaps and lip rings? There isn’t a single pair of chaps anywhere in the book, and there is one (1) lip ring on one out of the 116 individuals illustrated. How would you even know that there are “super stereotyped caricatures” in here, since you obviously haven’t cracked the book? Wow, what an ally! 🙏 There are plenty of regularly dressed people, if you’re going to talk about it like some kind of expert, READ IT.
Speaking of leather, which you seem to take quite an issue with here, surely you would never do any “really graphic sex stuff” like wearing something “way overly sexual,” especially when you have children in your household? :(
Sarah Isgur shown sporting a leather jacket similar to a leather jacket shown in Pride Puppy!, I am clutching my un-Republican pearls!
