Authors Chris Barton & Jennifer Ziegler; photo by Sam Bond Photography
I keep getting asked: “What is it like, living with another writer?”
Chris Barton, the love of my life, who lives with me in a not-quite-big-enough house in Austin,
Guest Post: Gail Giles on Writing Across Mental Abilities
By Gail Giles
Okay, so I’m going to try to write a book that fully explores the life of a special needs girl, two of them in fact. And I’m going to do in in alternating voices—in first person.
How do I get in the heads of people that I am not?
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Cynsational News & Giveaways
Compiled by Cynthia Leitich Smith
Sweetest Kulu by Celina Kalluck, illustrated by Alexandria Neonakis (Inhabit Media): a recommendation by Debbie Reese from American Indians in Children’s Literature. Peek: “Kalluk’s words and Neonakis’s art work beautifully together as we learn Inuit values in which people and animals coexist as caretakers of the land.”
Guest Post: Nora Raleigh Baskin on Magical Realism, Setting & Subway Love
Subway Love (Candlewick, 2014) is my tenth novel for young readers, my third YA, but it is my very first true magical realism.
It is also my first New York City setting. I was born in New York City, in Brooklyn, and although we moved when I was seven,
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Guest Post: Salima Alikhan on Private Writing Study with an Author-Teacher-Mentor
Salima at Bethany Hegedus’s Writing Barn
We’re a lucky community here in Austin to have fantastic, established local authors offering private mentorships.
When it first dawned on me that my unwieldy story was beyond the help of the wonderful critique group I’d had for years, I talked to others who had mentored with local author Bethany Hegedus.
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Guest Interview & Giveaway: Cookies for Breakfast? Janet Wong & Sylvia Vardell on Children’s Poetry
By Mysterious Anonymous Interviewer
An anonymous interviewer sat down this week with Janet Wong and Sylvia Vardell to ask some “unusual” questions…
Is Poetry Month a good idea? I mean, by the end of April, aren’t a lot of people sick of poetry?
JW: For many people, having something—anything—every day for a month is too much.
Videos: Help! We Need a Title! by Hervé Tullet
Check out these videos in celebration of Help! We Need a Title! by Hervé Tullet (Candlewick, 2014). From the promotional copy:
Take a peek inside this book and you’ll find some characters (though they’re still a bit sketchy). They’ll be perplexed to see you, so they’ll quickly try to track down their author (who has a lot more work to do).
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Cynsational News & Giveaways
Compiled by Cynthia Leitich Smith
Congratulations to Patrice Barton, Libby Martinez and Pat Mora on the release of I Pledge Allegiance (Knopf, 2014)! From the promotional copy:
Libby’s great aunt, Lobo, is from Mexico, but the United States has been her home for many years,
Guest Post & Giveaway: Brian Yansky on Teaching Writing
Merlin, circled by Homicidal Aliens & Other Disappointments (Candlewick)
By Brian Yansky
Writers often bemoan the fact that they must work a day job as well as write.
They need the day job to pay the bills, but they often don’t like it much, and it keeps them from doing the thing they love–writing.
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Guest Post: Phil Bildner on The Soccer Fence
By Phil Bildner
“Sport has the power to change the world. It has the power to inspire. It has the power to unite people in a way that little else does.”
— Nelson Mandela
I don’t have many heroes.
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