Foundation Books and Macmillan Debut Publishing Partnership With Jim Benton Titles

Foundation and Macmillan introduce their first titles

Foundation Media Partners and Macmillan have unveiled the first projects from their publishing partnership, first announced in February 2025. The initial slate brings together children’s books, middle-grade fiction and a young adult graphic novel, with several projects connected to creators and entertainment properties. The announcement offers an early view of how the partnership intends to work: publishing projects that can also connect with film, animation or existing audiences.

The most prominent group of titles comes from Jim Benton, the New York Times bestselling creator of It’s Happy Bunny and Dear Dumb Diary. Three Benton projects are set to publish under Macmillan’s Odd Dot imprint. They cover different age groups and formats, giving the partnership a broader opening slate than a single franchise launch would provide.

The first, Everybody, is an illustrated meditation on life and death. It was published in February 2026, and Foundation is adapting it as an animated short narrated by John Goodman. The short is in postproduction. That pairing gives the book a second form and a familiar voice, though the source doesn’t describe a release plan or say how the adaptation will relate to the book beyond its shared title.

The other Benton projects take a different direction. Cherise the Niece is described as a “kid-ult” picture book, a label that suggests an intended appeal to both younger readers and adults. Spoonduck is a middle-grade martial arts adventure. Together, these titles show Benton working across tones and readerships, while Macmillan’s Odd Dot imprint provides a common publishing home for the group.

A slate built around existing audiences

The partnership’s first slate also includes a three-book middle-grade series expanding the Bloodsuckers universe from digital creator group Rock Squad. The announcement doesn’t specify the books’ plots, publication schedule or how closely they’ll connect to the existing digital material. Even so, the choice points to one clear strategy: take a property with an audience in one medium and develop it for readers in another.

That approach can give a book a built-in point of recognition. It can also put pressure on the adaptation to offer something that works on the page, rather than assuming that familiarity with the original property will do the work. For young readers especially, the book still has to make its own case: a distinct premise, characters worth following and a story that holds together without outside context.

A separate project brings comedians Kylie Brakeman and Patrick McDonald into the slate. Henry Holt Books for Young Readers will publish their YA graphic novel, Dead F’ing Cheerleaders From Calabasas. The title signals a comic tone, while the graphic novel format places the project in a category where visual storytelling is central to the reading experience. Beyond that, the announcement supplies no plot details, so the project’s specific approach remains unknown.

Publishing and entertainment in the same conversation

Foundation’s role in the partnership is tied to work across publishing and screen entertainment. The company’s founder and CEO, Patrick Hughes, was an executive producer on The Bad Guys (2022), The Bad Guys 2 (2025) and Netflix’s Thelma the Unicorn (2024). Foundation is also developing the animated feature Game of Pets with Rideback at Amazon MGM, based on Aaron Blabey’s book.

Those credits provide context for why the first publishing announcement includes an animated adaptation alongside books. Foundation isn’t entering the arrangement solely as a publisher; its work includes projects designed for entertainment formats as well. That creates the possibility of coordination between a book and a screen adaptation from an early stage. Whether that coordination improves the books or primarily supports later adaptations will depend on how the individual projects are handled.

Foundation’s Hughes said the goal is to bring authors, publishers and entertainment partners together from the start. Macmillan Children’s Publishing Group president Jen Besser described Foundation as a company that closely shares Macmillan’s approach to creativity and collaboration. Those statements frame the partnership as a joint process, but they don’t yet explain how creative decisions will be divided or how the companies will measure success. The announced titles will provide a more concrete test than the executives’ broad descriptions.

What the first slate signals

This is more significant than it looks: the announcement isn’t just a list of books, but an early indication of how Foundation and Macmillan want to connect publishing with entertainment development. Benton’s animated short is the clearest example in the slate. The Bloodsuckers series points to another route, bringing a digital creator property into middle-grade publishing. The projects differ, but both involve moving creative work between formats or audiences.

That model has an obvious appeal for partners. A creator may bring an existing following, a publisher can develop a book, and an entertainment company can explore screen possibilities. Here’s the thing: those ingredients don’t guarantee that any one project will find readers. A recognizable name or an adaptation plan can draw attention, but the book still has to work on its own terms.

And yet, the slate is varied enough to suggest that the partnership isn’t relying on a single format. It includes a picture book, middle-grade projects, a YA graphic novel and an animated short in postproduction. That spread gives the partners multiple ways to develop their collaboration, though it also makes the announcement difficult to assess as one unified creative strategy. (And this is the part most people overlook.) A slate can signal ambition before it reveals whether the work itself is distinctive.

If you’re working in publishing or children’s entertainment, the practical question is how early collaboration changes the creative process. The companies say they want authors, publishers and entertainment partners involved from the start. The value of that approach will depend on whether it helps creators shape work that suits each format, rather than simply preparing a title for adaptation. So far, the announcement describes the intention; readers will need the books and finished screen work to judge the results.

For now, the first titles establish the partnership’s range and its interest in projects that can travel across media. The slate is an opening move, not proof that the model will produce lasting hits. Its most useful signal is that Foundation and Macmillan are presenting publishing and entertainment development as connected parts of their work, while the books themselves will have to earn their audiences.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter.