Calgary based duo break ground with new emotions with the release of their sophomore book The Mad Book
By Hannah Caparino, February 23 2026—
Calgary author and illustrator duo, Carla Shafer and Laura Ambrosone, return to Calgary’s literary scene with their second book titled The Mad Book. Their book follows a similar premise to their predecessor, The Sad Book. The children’s book allows for readers and families to explore how to deal with emotions similar to anger and frustration at a young age. The author and artist sat down with The Gauntlet to explain how the success and message of The Sad Book gave them space to create a new book and explore a more complicated emotion.
“I’ve been noticing a lot of dysregulated people, adults and children alike that are just very quick to anger. You see it when you’re driving down the street, you see it in the mall, in the grocery store. So I thought that if we’re going to go with another book, The Mad Book would be an appropriate theme,” said Shafer.
While this book will strike in similarity to The Sad Book, the overall messaging covers more ground in terms of how individuals may handle frustrating emotions. The book is written and presented to teach children and families how anger affects their personal relationships and development. Ambrosone explains how the illustrations, referenced as the ‘bloops’, had grown in a way that reflects the emotion.
“I mean I think the bloops have kind of evolved a bit more. We’ve gotten more elements and different things that they’re reacting to. I would say they’re a little bit more expressive than the first, but it’s been a journey learning how to illustrate for Carla and I’m enjoying the process,” said Ambrosone.
The two speak on how the success of The Sad Book inspired the two to use the bloops to convey their experiences and how the Calgary community had responded to both books. From pilot readings, classroom libraries and community support; both Shafer and Ambrosone knew that they had the confidence from the community to continue sharing their story.
“You just hope that it is just as well received. So we’re just in the beginning phases of introducing it to an outside audience,” said Shafer.
Shafer also described the process of pilot readings as a testing ground for what emotions and characters are most impactful. There’s a lot of laughter and learning when interacting with the kids and how they receive the emotions being explored by the bloops. There are new expressions being explored in this book and the more expressions and environments comes the challenge of implementing these emotions in the illustrations that everyone can interpret.
“I think it’s just like, it’s trying to personify this very simple character that can work for everybody. So I think, I like to think that the groups are a little bit of me expressing something,” said Ambrosone.
With The Mad Book, the book follows the daily lives of the bloops and looks at different events and how they respond to it. The book illustrates the different ways to respond to anger and how younger readers can utilize different techniques to calm themselves down in a variety of settings.
“There’s a lot of reasons why you should be angry. But there are also times where we allow that any emotion, really, but where we can allow that anger to kind of overwhelm us,” said Shafer. “And so instead of allowing it to overwhelm us and to kind of cloud our judgement, there are some tools that we can use to kind of just calm ourselves down.”
In response to this scenario-type concept, Ambrosone had explored how humour can be depicted to express these feelings.
The two are developing goals to expand their local community and beyond, aiming to partner with a literary agent and using social media to continue reaching out. While the duo has lofty goals, the heart and soul of their project are when they can directly interact with community members. Partnerships with Calgary staples like Cherry Tree Lane gives them access to the families that their stories directly impact, as well as provide physical and emotional representation for all folks. The books and greeting cards that are being sold are meant to represent those from all walks of life and connect one another in a tangible and real way.
The primary goal that the writer-illustrator duo share is to continue fundraising for the Matteo Shafer Legacy to continue raising money for pediatric cancer research.
“The profits for The Mad Book are also going into the Matteo Shafer Legacy fund. And so we are doing it to better the community on multiple levels., said Shafer.
Information on The Mad Book can be found here.