Fancy Nancy is a 2005 children's picture book written by Jane O'Connor and illustrated by Robin Preiss Glasser. While there are now more than 36 books in the Fancy Nancy series, selling over 16 million copies, this first book spent nearly 100 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list.[1] Fancy Nancy has been on Publishers Weekly’s bestseller list for picture books, was a Children’s Book-of-the-Month Club selection and a Junior Library Guild Selection. It also won a Borders 2006 Original Voices award [2] and has been translated into 17 languages, including Hungarian and Hebrew. Books in the series have now spent more than 250 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list.
Fancy Nancy is a wild, young girl with a larger than life personality, who adores all things fancy. She always dresses extravagantly, wearing boas, tutus, ruby slippers, fairy wings, and fuzzy slippers. Nancy loves using big fancy words such as iridescent , ecstatic , and extraordinary and anything in French.[1][3] She has redecorated her bedroom with everyday items, such as feather boas, Christmas lights, paper flowers, and hats. Her favorite doll is named Marabelle Lavinia Chandelier.[4]
In Nancy's opinion, her family is ordinary and dresses rather plainly, so Nancy decides to hold a class in the art of fanciness for her family. They oblige, and Nancy helps to dress them in bows, ornaments, top hats, and gaudy scarves. Ooo-la-la! Nancy cries in delight. My family is posh! That's a fancy word for fancy. [4]
O'Connor came up with Fancy Nancy on a summer evening. As she describes it, It was after dinner one evening that the title just came to me, she recalls. I sat down and wrote the first and last paragraphs. The rest of the story took me awhile, but the beginning and the end just flew into my head. [5][2] O'Connor is quick to point out that much of the book's success is Glasser's artwork. She wrote the book in 2002, but it didn't come out until 2005, because her editor, Mararet Anastas, insisted on Glasser as the illustrator who was busy with other projects.[5][3]
