Small Knight and the Anxiety Monster

 An adorable, heartfelt picture book debut from Manka Kasha, Small Knight and the Anxiety Monster follows the magical quest of a knight finding the courage to confront an ever growing monster.

The worry kept growing day by day, until… one morning Small Knight woke up to see a huge inky monster in their room.

When Small Knight feels pressure from their parents to be a perfect princess, an anxiety monster shows up. No one else can see the monster, so Small Knight and their best friend Tiny Bear, decide that it is up to them to save themselves. They set off on a magical quest, only to discover that the answer was inside themselves all along. Turning to face the Anxiety Monster, they learn how to keep it under control.

Personal and whimsical, Manka Kasha’s debut picture book is a beautiful story about understanding your anxiety and finding the courage to face it.

Maria Biktimirova aka Manka Kasha is a University teacher born and raised in Russia. She has a postgrad degree in English Language and Literature, and is reluctantly trying to work on her PhD in her free-from-drawing time. When she is not teaching her students (who are absolutely the best), or drawing, she prefers to read, listen to cast recordings of some musicals, or binge-watch TV-shows. Small Knight and the Anxiety Monster is her debut picture book.

"This fairy tale is partially, and powerfully, about facing anxiety, but also about finding the courage to defy expectations...The illustrations, done in watercolors and ink, provide astonishing bursts of color and comic, or sometimes scary, details. The sort of book that may stick with kids years after reading." --Booklist

"Kasha tells an encouraging story about being brave and conquering anxiety in service of being true to oneself.... The emotionally charged illustrations effectively depict Small Knight's worries about parental disappointment as a creature-shaped mass of angry, sharp lines." --The Horn Book