Winnie-the-Pooh turned 100. A new book tells how.

Winnie-the-Pooh turned 100 this year, and a new children's book traces how a honey-loving bear went from a few words in A.A. Milne's head to a fixture on every nursery shelf. How a Bear Became a Book, written by Annette Bay Pimentel and illustrated by Faith Pray, celebrates the 1926 anniversary and the partnership behind it. Illustrator Ernest H. Shepard always carried a sketchbook, Pimentel explains, and he traveled to Milne's home near Ashdown Forest to draw Christopher Robin and his toys before adding his own touches back in the studio, like a rabbit hole with a working kitchen. Methuen Publishing was experimenting with offset printing, which let words and pictures share a page for the first time. Pimentel spent hours rereading the originals to get Pooh's voice right, checking whether the bear used contractions. In Pray's book, a translucent Pooh grows more solid page by page, until he is unmistakably himself.