A Must for Every Aspiring Children's Writer

This is one book that no children's writer (or aspiring children's writer) should be without. In addition to listing just about every children's publisher and magazine known to man, Children's Writer's and Illustrator's Market (CWIM) also includes great articles by both famous and newbie authors. So, check it out at your local bookstore or library. Oh, and while you're at it, check out Alice Pope's blog. She's the editor of CWIM and has some great stuff every week, like interviews of top authors and publishers, news about the writing world, and other fun "insider" tidbits.

The 2009 edition of CWIM is coming out sometime in August, so don't rush out and buy the 2008 version. Better wait and get the most recent version.

Beach Reading

Last week at this time, I was lounging in a comfy chair on the beach in Destin, Florida (reading, of course) while my husband and kids played in the ocean. There's just something about reading on the beach that's so completely relaxing. I don't know whether it's the slight breeze off the ocean or the sound of the waves hitting the shore, or a combination of the two, but whatever it is, I wish I could bottle the feeling up and bring it home with me. For some reason, pouring sand onto my patio and sitting in it just doesn't seem to duplicate the experience.

The book I was reading was Susan Pfeffer's haunting YA novel The Dead and the Gone, which is the companion book to Life as We Knew It. Both books follow the events in two different teen-agers lives after the moon is knocked out of its orbit by an asteroid, catastrophically altering the earth's climate. The main character in The Dead and the Gone is Alex Morales, a 17-year-old New Yorker of Puerto Rican descent. When both of his parents disappear after the deadly tidal waves spawned by the asteroid crash, Alex is left to care for his two younger sisters as Manhattan becomes a deadly wasteland.

Once again, Pfeffer has produced a gripping page turner that not only makes the adrenalin pump but also makes the tears flow. On more than one occasion, I found myself thinking about the characters after I had finished the book and wishing I wasn't finished. Pfeffer's characters are so real and the emotions she harnesses are so raw that the reader just can't help but feel connected to them. This is a definite must-read for anyone who wants to write YA fiction or just loves to read YA material.

I'm with Mimi...

Want to know how to get me to go camping? This comic by Debbie Ridpath Ohi at inkygirl.com exposes my secret. Just remember to bring a generator for the outlet. Debbie never fails to crack me up with her clever comics. Thanks, Debbie!

Blog of the Week

I love reading the blogs of other children's authors. Something about reading blogs really appeals to my nosy -- ahem, I mean "curious" -- investigative reporter side. It's a bit like eavesdropping on a really good conversation, which we all know as writers, is simply "research," right?

Middle grade author Lisa Yee has a hilarious blog that I love to read. It's definitely one of my favorites. Not only does Lisa feature a TON of cool pictures on her blog but she also has a little stuffed Peep appropriately named "Peepy" who accompanies her on her adventures. It's so fun to see how a best-selling author -- we're talking Scholastic here, people -- spends her time. Maybe someday, that will be me... (Hey, a girl can dream, can't she?)

If you're not familiar with Lisa's work, check out her book, Millicent Min, Girl Genius. Like Lisa's blog, Millicent Min, is a heartwarming and hilarious book. Lisa also has several other best-selling books, including an American Girl book in the new Julie series, Good Luck Ivy. How cool is that?

Wisdom from Honest Abe...

Here's a great quote by Abraham Lincoln, a bibliophile after my own heart:

The things I want to know are in books. My best friend is the man who'll get me a book I haven't read.

Ahhhh... Summer Reading!

Whoa! How did the month of June roll around so quickly? I've been rather delinquent about posting lately -- I'll try to do a better job now that summer's here. Really. Honestly. I promise...

I took the kids to sign up for our library's Summer Reading Program the other day. They're all about the prizes, of course. My oldest is now considered old enough to be in the "teen" reading program (even though she's one month shy of her 12th birthday), and the grand prize is an I-Pod, so she's quite motivated and has had her nose stuck in a book just about every waking moment. Brings back memories of my summers as a kid in Chicago. My brother and I would ride our bikes through the park, past the White Castle, and stop at the library at least once a week -- the Scottsdale Branch is still there and looks exactly like it did when I was a kid! Deja vu! I would come home with a huge stack of books, which I devoured in a few days. Some of my favorite authors at the time were Beverly Cleary, Laura Ingalls Wilder, and Mary Rodgers. (Her book, A Billion for Boris, was one of my faves.) I also loved reading the original Nancy Drew mysteries -- what girl didn't?

Children's and young adult literature has changed and grown so much since I was a kid; the number of options and genres available now is simply amazing. But one thing has stayed the same: Kids can still get lost inside the pages of a book and are only bound by the limits of their imaginations. And that experience can't be compared to any prize -- even an I-Pod! Hurray for summer reading!

C.S. Lewis on Writing

In honor of the opening of Prince Caspian tomorrow night - which I desperately want to see, but will probably have to wait - here are a few quotes from C.S. Lewis, one of my favorite writers. Great advice from a truly brilliant mind.

Don't use words too big for the subject. Don't say 'infinitely' when you mean 'very'; otherwise you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite.

Even in literature and art, no man who bothers about originality will ever be original: whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring twopence how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become original without ever having noticed it.