The next Maurice Sendak plays wide receiver for the New England Patriots.
Tom Brady target Malcolm Mitchell signed a three-book contract with Scholastic. The deal presumably pays less than the $721,000 the 23-year-old makes annually on his rookie contract with the Patriots.
Scholastic re-releases Mitchell’s self-published first book, titled The Magician’s Hat, next May. The debut redo features pictures by an artist. Two more tomes follow sometime thereafter.
The rookie played an integral role in the historic comeback that saw the Patriots rally from a 28-3 deficit halfway through the third quarter against the Atlanta Falcons to win the Super Bowl 34-28 in overtime (magician’s hat, indeed!). The University of Georgia product caught six Tom Brady passes for 70 yards.
Mitchell’s eventful offseason witnessed reading rallies, library lectures, and literacy programs aimed at children in the wake of his Super Bowl-champion celebrity status. Through his ReadWithMalcolm website and Share the Magic Foundation, Mitchell seeks to place books in homes that do not emphasize reading and enhance childhood literacy.
Mitchell read at a junior high level entering the University of Georgia. The combination of him taking the gift of his free college education seriously and a consequential invitation to join a women’s book club resulted in a jock becoming a bookworm. He read voraciously after reading hardly at all.
“Somebody called me a nerd,” Mitchell told CBS News earlier this year. “It’s not a word that I’m used to hearing. I was proud of it…. It’s like a badge of honor to me, knowing where I came from.”
Ramona Quimby, Mr. Toad, the B.F.G., Wilbur, the Man with the Yellow Hat, and Sylvester McMonkey McBean all wish him the best of success.
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