INDIANAPOLIS – The Indiana Center for the Book at the Indiana State Library has announced the 2025 recipient of the Indiana Early Literacy Firefly Award as “Ploof,” published by Tundra Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House.
Written and illustrated by Ben Clanton and Andy Chou Musser, “Ploof” is an interactive picture book that encourages parents, caregivers, and young children to interact with Ploof, a cute cloud. Readers are invited to play pretend, laug,h and talk with Ploof.
The Indiana Early Literacy Firefly Award is in its 11th year. Since the inception of the program in October 2014, more than 30,000 votes have been cast for the Indiana Early Literacy Firefly Award.
This year, votes were submitted from 50 of Indiana’s counties, and over 3,700 Indiana children aged 0-5 voted for their favorite book from a ballot of five books. This year was the third-biggest year of the award in terms of participation.
Upon hearing that they had won the award, Clanton and Chou Musser said, “As our character Ploof would excitedly say, ‘Whoosh wee!’ We are so thrilled and excited. Thank you, Indiana families, for reading and picking ‘Ploof!’ And thank you, Indiana libraries, for helping our book and others take flight. We were so honored to be one of the contenders and blown away to have ‘Ploof’ get so much love.”
The Indiana Early Literacy Firefly Award is an initiative of the Indiana Center for the Book to promote early childhood literacy in Indiana. The Indiana Early Literacy Firefly Committee chooses the nominees from a list of books nominated by library staff who work with children all over Indiana.
The nominated books are chosen for their ability to encourage parents and children to use the Every Child Ready to Read practices of talking, singing, reading, writing, and playing together. Caregivers can use the Firefly books as a resource for having fun and learning with their young children.
