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Archive for the ‘Authors’ Category

Operation De-Clutter the House (ODH)

Posted in Authors, Books, Unclutter your life in a week, tagged , , , on April 24, 2010 | 7 Comments »

Just when my friends and family thought I couldn’t get any crazier for signing on to write 7 picture books in 7 days for National Picture Book Writing Week, I have decided to embark on yet another crazy quest: to de-clutter my home in one week. It all started when I was at the library [...]

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Picture Books for the Planet

Posted in Authors, Children's Books, tagged , , on April 20, 2010 | 6 Comments »

I’ve noticed a number of people recommending children’s books in celebration of Earth Day, which is coming up this Thursday.  We, too, have several books about Earth Day, recycling, saving energy and so on.  Those books are great as teaching tools, but I also think it is important for children to have books that simply [...]

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NaPiBoWriWee

Posted in Authors, Children's Books, NaPiBoWriWee, SCBWI, Works in Progress, Writing, tagged , , , , on April 12, 2010 | 16 Comments »

Perhaps you’ve heard of NaNoWriMo, short for National Novel Writing Month and pronounced “Nah-No-Ree-Moe.”  Participants sign up to write 50,000 words, or 175 pages, from November 1st – November 30th.  Research and outlining is permitted in advance, but no pre-writing.  The focus of the challenge is on quantity rather than quality.  Just get the 50,000 [...]

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Book Giveaway – Wolf Hall

Posted in Authors, Book Club, Books, Giveaway, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on April 9, 2010 | 22 Comments »

I’ll get to the giveaway details in a moment, but first, the background: The third meeting of the Margareaders was held last night.  The book of choice for this month?  Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel.  I will be honest and say this book did not go over very well with the group.  Less than half [...]

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Lessons from the Write-a-thon

Posted in Authors, Children's Books, Family, Friendship, Publishing, SCBWI, Volunteer/Community, Works in Progress, Write-a-thon, Writing, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 10, 2010 | 4 Comments »

Now that I’ve had a chance to recover from my write-a-thon, I’m ready to share the results and what I learned from the experience.  I am so pleased to report that I received $217 in donations to the American Heart Association.  Thank you so much for generosity and support, both moral and financial.  With my [...]

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Tori Spelling Picture Book – What Next?

Posted in Authors, Books, Publishing, Write-a-thon, Writing, tagged , , , , , , , , , on February 23, 2010 | 4 Comments »

Thar she blows!  Here comes a full-scale tirade.  I tried to resist.  Especially since writing this rant of a post does not count toward my write-a-thon goal.  BUT after gnashing my teeth over this issue for the past week, I could stand it no longer. It seems that Simon & Schuster’s Aladdin imprint announced last [...]

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For the Love of Rhyme

Posted in Authors, Books, Children's Books, Rhyming, Writing, tagged , , , , , on February 8, 2010 | 1 Comment »

While I procrastinate on the edits to my own children’s book manuscripts, I thought I’d give a shout-out to those authors who have inspired me with their talent for telling stories in rhyme.  These are my favorites, subject to the following rules:  1) I omitted Dr. Seuss and Shel Silverstein entirely otherwise the list would [...]

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Beware the Hot Pterodactyl Boyfriend

Posted in Authors, Books, Children's Books, SCBWI, Writing, tagged , , , , , , on February 3, 2010 | 5 Comments »

Seriously.  They’re even worse than vampires. Author Libba Bray, recent winner of the Michael Printz award for Going Bovine, gave the opening keynote at the SCBWI conference. She is also the author of the bestselling Gemma Doyle trilogy – a semi-historical fiction series featuring a beautiful Victorian teenager who discovers her “special” powers at a [...]

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Jane Yolen’s 20 Rules of Writing

Posted in Authors, Books, Children's Books, SCBWI, Writing, tagged , , , , on February 2, 2010 | 22 Comments »

Jane Yolen delivered my favorite line of the SCBWI conference: “I want to know when the word ‘literary’ became pejorative.”  Amen, sister! If you don’t know who Jane Yolen is, I’m so sorry.  You can find her biography here, but take my word for it when I tell you that you would be hard-pressed to [...]

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She Loved That Baby Up

Posted in Authors, Books, Children's Books, SCBWI, Writing, tagged , , , , , , on February 1, 2010 | 5 Comments »

The first of several posts I will write this week about my experiences at the Society for Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) goes to author Jacqueline Woodson, who handed me my most unexpected moment of the weekend. Prior to the conference, I had heard of Jackie (as everyone called her, and since I am [...]

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