Compiled by Cynthia Leitich Smith
Embrace the Struggles of Writing by Elisa Ludwig from Adventures in YA Writing. Peek: “No one is ever going to come to me and say, ‘Awesome. You did it. You can go home now.’ Which means that as long as I stay with this, I’m going to have to wrestle with doubts.”
Lisa scuba diving.
By Lisa Doan
The phrase ‘When Worlds Collide’ sounds dramatically epic – something that should come with its own background music. Maybe a YA dystopian. Or a tragically doomed romance. Or a tragically doomed romance in a YA dystopian.
But for my purposes, When Worlds Collide is the underpinning of character-driven humor.
Continue Reading Guest Post: Lisa Doan on Writing Humor: When Worlds Collide… »
Compiled by Cynthia Leitich Smith
Congratulations to Laura Purdie Salas on the release of Water Can Be, illustrated by Violeta Dabija (Millbrook, 2014). From the promotional copy:
Water can be a…
• Thirst quencher
• Kid drencher
• Cloud fluffer
• Fire snuffer
Find out about the many roles water plays in this poetic exploration of water throughout the year.
Continue Reading Book Trailers: Water Can Be by Laura Purdie Salas, illustrated by Violeta Dabija »
Crystal Chan is the first-time author of Bird (Atheneum, 2014). From the promotional copy:
It’s only natural to have silence and secrets in your family when you’re born on the same day that your brother died. At least, that’s sure what it seems like for twelve-year old Jewel.
Photograph by Katie Koster
By Eric Pinder
A teacher once learned the hard way not to tell his college class to write a children’s book without specifying a genre and topic. He anticipated a wonderful mix of fractured fairy tales, rhyming romps, and heroes’ journeys.
A week later, almost the entire the class turned in alphabet books instead.
Continue Reading Guest Post: Eric Pinder on The X Files: Why Alphabet Books Are Not as Easy as ABC »
Compiled by Cynthia Leitich Smith
Conversation about Diversity in Children’s Literature from KQED. Click below to hear author-illustrator Christopher Myers, author Mitali Perkins, illustrator LeUyen Pham, and, from the gatekeeper community Nina Lindsay, supervising librarian for children’s services at the Oakland Public Library,
The U.S. Census Bureau predicts that by the year 2020, white people will be a minority in this country.
What this means, among other things, is that increasing numbers of people will be checking that new box on the census labeled “multiracial.” People no longer required to identify themselves as of one race only will increasingly identify as multiracial.
Continue Reading Guest Post: Debby Dahl Edwardson on Lens Shifting »
Lamar Giles is the first-time author of Fake ID (HarperCollins, 2014). From the promotional copy:
Nick Pearson is hiding in plain sight. In fact, his name isn’t really Nick Pearson. He shouldn’t tell you his real name, his real hometown, or why his family just moved to Stepton,
By April Henry
When Cynthia invited me to write a guest post for her blog about some aspect of writing mysteries, I knew immediately what I wanted to write about. Tension.
The trick to writing a good mystery or thriller is to have plenty of tension. Heck, that’s the trick to writing any good book,
Compiled by Cynthia Leitich Smith
My weekend highlight was author-illustrator Jeff Crosby‘s launch of Rockabilly Goats Gruff (Holiday House, 2014) at the Writing Barn in Austin.
For the celebration, the Barn was converted to the “Shimmy Shack.” Jeff hosted a 1950’s rockabilly costume contest (with art as the prize),
Continue Reading Event Report: Jeff Crosby’s Launch for Rockabilly Goats Gruff »
