Today we are very excited to share an interview with author Maria Gianferrari!
Read on to learn more about the author, the book, and a giveaway!
Meet the Author: Maria Gianferrari
Maria Gianferrari is a picture book reader/writer, tea-drinker, dog-lover, and birdwatcher. Maria writes books that honor our bonds with creatures both domestic and wild and that celebrate the natural world around us, including Fungi Grow and Just One Oak, illustrated by Diana Sudyka; Ice Cycle: Poems about the Life of Ice, illustrated by Jieting Chen; Being a Dog: A Tail of Mindfulness, illustrated by Pete Oswald; Bobcat Prowling, illustrated by Bagram Ibatouilline; and Be a Tree!, illustrated by Felicita Sala. She lives with her family in Massachusetts in a house encircled by trees. To learn more about Maria, visit her website: MariaGianferrari.com.
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About the Book: Just One Oak
Explore an oak tree, from its leafy crown to its roots underground, and learn all the amazing ways it supports the animals, plants, and habitat where it lives in this surprising and enlightening nonfiction picture book companion to the award-winning Fungi Grow.
An oak tree is so much more than meets the eye. From tiny fungi to mighty mammals, this amazing tree contains a whole world.
For insects and birds, the oak’s leaves, branches, and bark are a home. For bears and squirrels, the thousands of acorns the oak produces are a nutritious superfood. Owls, deer, foxes, and many more creatures are drawn to the rich and healthy environment an oak creates. Because of a single oak tree, its many neighbors flourish.
~Author Chat~
YABC: What gave you the inspiration to write Just One Oak?
I’m a tree lover, and I’ve always loved oak trees in particular with their curvy and gnarled branches. Margaret Renkl’s New York Times essay, “Why We Should All Be Chasing Acorns,” about how oaks are keystone species, led me to Douglas Tallamy’s book, The Nature of Oaks and I was astounded at how many species oak trees nourish and support. I loved her idea of collecting native acorns, pl
anting them in flowerpots and them giving them as gifts—a brilliant way to restore native oaks and create biodiversity! I learned so many amazing things that I wanted to share them with readers.
YABC: Which came first, the concept, landscape, characters, or something else?
The idea of focusing on oaks as keystone species was the cornerstone of the book. After completing the research, I decided to focus on the impact of one oak tree. Once I came up with the “just one oak” refrain, the bones of the manuscript, then it became easier to shape the all of the fascinating oak facts around this. The structure is often the most difficult thing to come up with.
YABC: What research did you do to write Just One Oak?
I read Dr. Tallamy’s book, listened to his talks, and took extensive notes. I also read a bunch of the sources that he recommended in addition to scientific articles on oak trees, oak regeneration, etc. He also has a wonderful website called “Homegrown National Park.” You can watch a video there where he explains the importance of oaks to native ecosystems.
YABC: When did you know you wanted to be a writer?
I was pretty young—I knew that I loved to be alone, reflect and collect my thoughts, and write poetry, though at the time, I didn’t realize that it could also be a job per se. It wasn’t until after I had my daughter and began reading and re-reading some of the picture books that I had also loved as a child that I began to think that my dream of being a writer could possibly become a reality. Then I gave myself the permission to try, and never looked back.
YABC: What’s a book you’ve recently read and loved?
The Light Eaters, by Zoë Schlanger! It blew me away! It is everything I love in a book, part science/STEM/memoir/history. It was utterly fascinating, awe-inspiring and a moving, a poetically written account that calls into question everything we think we know/knew about plants and re-examines them—their intelligence, sentience, rights to existence and our relationship with them. LOVED it!
YABC: What’s up next for you?
Besides Just One Oak, I also have another book releasing in April 2026 called Puffins!, with funny and fabulous art by Maris Wicks (Roaring Brook Press). It’s about an Atlantic Puffin family on Eastern Egg Rock Island off the coast of Maine. We’re both bird nerds and collaborated on another bird book called You and the Bowerbird.
I also have another tree-ish book that have not yet been announced.
YABC: If you could only write one genre for the rest of your life, what would it be and why?
Nature nonfiction without a doubt! I am awed and inspired and curious about creatures and beings in the natural world—there is so much to learn about and discover! It’s wonder-full and as bountiful as the oak itself!
YABC: What is the main message or lesson you would like your reader to remember from Just One Oak?
It’s a celebration of oak trees, and the major impact that just one oak tree itself can have on an entire ecosystem, much in the same way that we as humans can help support oak trees and biodiversity in our own small ways: by planting acorns, native plants and making pollinator gardens, leaving the leaf litter in the fall, conserving energy, using less water, etc.—and how these choices can have ripple effects in our local community and beyond.
Title: Just One Oak
Author: Maria Gianferrari
ISBN-13: 9781665961042
ISBN-10: 166596104X
On-sale date: Tuesday, February 17, 2026
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Imprint: Beach Lane Books
Ages: 4 to 8
Grades: P to 3
~ Giveaway Details ~
Three (3) winners will receive a copy of Just One Oak (Maria Gianferrari) ~US Only (No P.O. Boxes)!
Trees are my favorite, but the oak is one I love the most. I’d love to read this with my students and pair it with Near and Deer by Sylvia Liu.
This would be a great addition to our school’s media center to support content instruction in science and ELA!
It looks like a fun book to read!