Mark Parisi, Author of Marty Pants: Do Not Open | Selfie and a Shelfie

The Children’s Book Review | June 22, 2017

Mark Parisi’s Selfie from the Shelfie with Marty Pants: Do Not Open

This is me showing off my new Marty Pants: Do Not Open book in front of some shelves of my books. (I tried to get my cat Purrcy in the photo with me, but he had other ideas.)

Marty Pants is a school kid who’s a little different and, most importantly, an artist. And as an artist he notices things. Except when he doesn’t. When Marty finds a mysterious note, of course he knows exactly what to do! Or maybe he doesn’t exactly head down the right path. I tried to make the book as funny as possible while Marty navigates his way through his clueless parents, his unusual friends, a bully, a cheap rival, a crazy cat, and the chief of police, all while getting his homework done on time, of course, and saving the world. His way. I hope you’ll follow the endearing, frazzled, embarrassed, and, ultimately, fearless footsteps of literature’s most unlikely hero: Marty Pants.

Looking at my shelfie, you’d get an idea of how important humor is to me. Lots of cartoon collections, and funny writers, such as David Sedaris, Douglas Adams, and Jack Handey. You might also guess I write middle-grade books because I have a good number of titles in that genre, including those written by my friends Lincoln Peirce, Terri Libenson, Dan Thompson, and Norm Feuti. You’d definitely know I’m a music fan.

Marty Pants: Do Not Open

Written and Illustrated by Mark Parisi

Publisher’s Synopsis: Move over, Wimpy Kid. Here comes the imaginative, the inquisitive, the unstoppable Marty Pants! Meet Marty in the side-splitting first book of a new series written by Mark Parisi, the award-winning cartoonist of the Off the Mark comic.

Marty Pants is different from your typical middle schooler. He has the soul of an artist, and as an artist, he notices things—the kinds of things other kids don’t seem to see.
So when Marty discovers that an alien is lurking around his town, watching him, Marty knows this is a danger he can’t just ignore. But no one, not his best friends Parker and Roongrat or his mother, father, sister, arch-enemy, Simon, or Chief of Police Pickels, believes him.

So, it’s up to Marty to save the world—his way.

This hilarious new series follows the endearing, frazzled, embarrassed, and, ultimately, fearless footsteps of literature’s most unlikely hero: Marty Pants.

Ages 8-12 | Publisher: HarperCollins | 2017 | ISBN-13: 978-0062427762

Available Here: 

About Mark Parisi

Mark Parisi is the creator of the “Off the Mark” single-panel comic strip series, which is syndicated in more than 100 newspapers around the country. It has been running daily since 1987 and won the Best Newspaper Panel Award from the National Society of Cartoonists in 2009 and 2012. Marty Pants is his debut novel.

www.martypants.com | Facebook/MartyPantsBooks/ | www.offthemark.com | Facebook/offthemarkcomic

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