An Interview with Happy Friendsgiving Author Marcie Colleen
AN INTERVIEW WITH MARCIE COLLEEN,
AUTHOR OF THE NEW PICTURE BOOK,
HAPPY FRIENDSGIVING
Illustrated by Laura Sandoval Herrera
(Doubleday BYR; $18.99, Ages 3-7)
FROM THE PUBLISHER:
Thanksgiving gets a fresh and friendly new look in this heartwarming picture book that celebrates the joy of friendship and community—at a table where all are welcome.
Capture the true essence of Thanksgiving through the lens of friendship and togetherness in this joyful and inclusive celebration of the holiday.
With its rhythmic text and vibrant illustrations, this book shows readers how family takes on many forms, as friends, neighbors, and relatives arrive for a busy day of cooking, crafting, sharing, and celebration. It also shows young readers how to remember and honor those who must work on the holiday so that others might celebrate, including transit workers and first responders.
This book is an ideal choice for friends and families who open their hearts and homes to everyone, cherishing the spirit of community and togetherness, and the simple pleasures of coming together over a meal.
INTERVIEW:
GoodReadsWithRonna: Welcome to the blog for the first time, Marcie. This interview is way overdue, so I’m excited to ask you a host of questions in honor of your latest picture book, Happy Friendsgiving: A Thanksgiving Celebration of Found Families, illustrated by Laura Sandoval Herrera.
GRWR: Talk about a feel-good book! I really enjoyed HAPPY FRIENDSGIVING! It’s a timeless story that I can see kids wanting to read every holiday, and maybe even be inspired to ask their families to rethink their Thanksgiving plans in the future.
Reading Happy Friendsgiving filled me with such joy because it described exactly the kind of get-together that my family and I have attended over the years, though not quite as large. Have you ever participated in a celebration similar to the special one you’ve written about in this story?
Marcie Colleen: Thanksgiving hasn’t always been a holiday when I could travel—especially when I lived in New York City. I often had to work the Friday after, which meant there just wasn’t enough time to fly home. Because of that, Friendsgiving became my tradition. I’d gather with friends and neighbors, and sometimes I’d even host at my apartment.
Some of my closest friendships actually started at those gatherings—meeting new people around someone else’s table, sharing food and laughter, and realizing by dessert that we’d be in each other’s lives for years. Those celebrations always felt incredibly cozy: mismatched chairs pulled from every room, everyone bringing a dish, and that warm sense of belonging that builds when people show up for one another.
That feeling is really what inspired Happy Friendsgiving. The book is my love letter to the years when we created our own version of the holiday—one filled with community, gratitude, and the joy of making a place for everyone at the table.
GRWR: I love how your picture book focuses on found families and inclusivity. For multiple reasons, it can often be hard to find people to celebrate with. As Happy Friendsgiving beautifully conveys, welcoming friends, neighbors, and even those we don’t know very well provides an opportunity to build community while sharing gratitude. Did you feel a book like this was needed to show children the importance of opening up our hearts and homes? Are there other takeaways you’d like young readers to get from this book?
MC: Absolutely. I think so many of us—kids and grown-ups alike—know what it feels like when a holiday doesn’t look or feel the way we hoped. Friendsgiving, at its heart, is about creating belonging wherever you are and with whoever is around you. I wanted to show that family can be something you’re born into and something you build, one invitation or act of kindness at a time.
My hope is that young readers come away with a sense of warmth and possibility—that they see how small gestures (saving someone a seat, sharing food, making space at the table) can make a big difference. And maybe they’ll be inspired to start their own traditions, especially if their holidays look a little different from what they see in books or on TV.
Ultimately, I hope children feel seen, included, and empowered to create the kind of community they want. If Happy Friendsgiving helps a reader feel less alone—or helps them welcome someone else in—that feels like success to me.
GRWR: The folksy illustrations shout autumn, my favorite season. They’re warm, inviting, and I wanted to jump into many of the spreads. Is there one that resonates with you most of all?
MC: I love the parade spread. It brings me right back to the years when my family and I went to the Macy’s parade. It was always so chilly, but there’s nothing quite like a parade to bring out that child-like sense of excitement and wonder. The music, the floats, the crowds all bundled up, and of course the moment when Santa arrives at the end—it felt magical every single time.
We’d huddle together with the masses, cheering and ooh-ing and aah-ing. One year, my mom pulled homemade turkey-shaped sugar cookies out of her purse to share with us, because she knew we’d get hungry with all that standing around. Moms always know.
That spread captures for me the coziness, the anticipation, and the shared joy of being surrounded by a community of people who are all celebrating. It feels like stepping right into one of my favorite memories and makes me crave Mom’s sugar cookies.
GRWR: When the meal ends, what is your holiday ritual: watch sports, go outside for a stroll in nature, play a board game, work on a puzzle, or do something else?
MC: I almost always go for a walk after the meal.
When I lived in New York, I loved wandering through my neighborhood after Friendsgiving, passing stoops decorated with pumpkins, seeing people gathered around their tables through glowing apartment windows, and feeling part of this bigger tapestry of celebration.
These days, our walks are around the neighborhood and often into Balboa Park. That little stroll lets me stretch my legs, appreciate the coziness of the holiday, and reflect on the people I’ve just shared a table with. It’s the perfect way to end the day—quiet, grateful, and connected to the world around me.
GRWR: Two Friendsgiving/Thanksgiving truths and a lie, please.
MC: I was once part of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and even got to attend the rehearsal the night before.
One year, I invited someone to Friendsgiving that I’d only met once because they didn’t have anywhere else to go.
I once accidentally burned the entire Thanksgiving meal and we ended up eating only pie for dinner.
GRWR: Pumpkin pie or pecan pie; mashed potatoes or sweet potato casserole; canned cranberry sauce or homemade; cornbread or dinner rolls?
MC: Pumpkin pie, sweet potato casserole, homemade whole-berry cranberry sauce, and dinner rolls.
GRWR: Recipe failure?
MC: Not really a failure” but last year I discovered—on Thanksgiving morning—that the turkey breast I planned to cook in my crockpot (my favorite method because it turns out so moist!) was far too large to fit. There was no amount of angling or wedging that was going to make it work.
So I did what any panicked holiday cook would do: I sent out an SOS to my neighbors. Thankfully, someone down the block had a much larger crockpot and was more than happy to lend it. Crisis averted!
It ended up being a perfect reminder that sometimes the best part of the holiday is how everyone pitches in—whether it’s sharing food, sharing space, or, in this case, sharing a very large crockpot.
GRWR: Most memorable Friendsgiving/Thanksgiving and why?
MC: One of my most precious memories began in 2020, at the height of lockdown. That Thanksgiving, one of our neighbors baked fresh bread for everyone on our block and delivered it door to door. It was such a simple act, but after months of isolation, it felt like a lifeline. That gesture ended up sparking something beautiful and connected us all.
In 2021, as things slowly opened up, our block naturally started celebrating every birthday and holiday together—outdoors, distanced at first, but together. Kids, pets, grown-ups, new neighbors, longtime residents—it became this wonderfully mixed, diverse little community looking out for one another.
So when Thanksgiving 2021 arrived, it felt only right to celebrate what we had found. We set up a long Friendsgiving table right in a driveway. Everyone brought their favorite dish—different cultures, traditions, and flavors all represented. Neighbors who had barely exchanged more than a wave before 2020 were now swapping recipes and telling stories.
That gathering felt like pure gratitude in motion. We weren’t just sharing food—we were celebrating the community we had built, right outside our front doors. Moments like that absolutely inspire the spirit of Happy Friendsgiving.
GRWR: If you could invite anyone, from the past or present day, to join you at your next Friendsgiving gathering, who would it be?
MC: My dad. We lost him in early 2021, and because of the pandemic, I wasn’t able to say goodbye. What I wouldn’t give to share even one more meal with him—to hear his laugh, to have him sitting at the table, to feel that familiar sense of comfort.
Friendsgiving, for me, is all about gathering the people who make you feel at home, whether they’re family by blood or by choice. My dad loved good food and good company, and he had a way of making everyone around him feel welcome.
Inviting him would be a reminder of how important it is to cherish the people we love, and how meaningful it can be to share a table together, even for just one more meal.
GRWR: Is there anything you’d like to add that I did not ask?
MC: Just a thank-you for spending time with Happy Friendsgiving. It means a lot and I hope readers feel the same joy in reading it that I felt in writing it.
GRWR: A huge thank you to Marcie for her candor today and for writing this heartwarming story. I hope you’ll pick up a copy for your family and another one to share if you’re able to.
