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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Posted in Book Club, Books, tagged Books, Giveaway, Wolf Hall on April 15, 2010 | Comments Off
Zoe! The one who reads everything about Tudor history she can get her hands on. Congratulations Zoe! We had lots of entries for this one, and I thank everyone who participated. These book giveaways are fun, so there will be more. Stay tuned. Zoe, you can email me with your contact information so I can [...]
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Posted in Authors, Book Club, Books, Giveaway, tagged Anne Boleyn, Book Club, Book Reviews, Books, Giveaway, Henry VIII, Hilary Mantel, Historical Fiction, Man Booker Prize, Margareaders, Tudor History, Wolf Hall 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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Posted in Authors, Books, Publishing, Write-a-thon, Writing, tagged Body Image, Books, Celebrity Authors, Children's Books, Jane Yolen, Plastic surgery, Publishing, Reality TV, Tori Spelling, Writing 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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In honor of my excitement over my new book club, I am giving away my hardcover copy, in excellent condition, of our February book – The Help, by Kathryn Stockett. We all liked the book; some of us loved it. One thing is for sure – it generated a fascinating discussion. And this book can [...]
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Posted in Book Club, Books, Friendship, tagged Book Club, Books, Civil Rights Movement, Friendship, Jr., Louis Farrakhan, Margaritas, Martin Luther King, Medgar Evars, Mississippi, Wine on February 21, 2010 | 4 Comments »
That is the name of my brand new book club, a club that combines three of my favorite things: female friendship, books and booze (in that order). One of the book club members came up with the name Margareaders (brilliant!), so one of our “club rules” is that we must have margaritas available for every [...]
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Posted in Authors, Books, Children's Books, Rhyming, Writing, tagged Authors, Book List, Children's Books, Read Aloud, Rhyming, Writing 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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Yesterday a miracle happened at our house. The school bus pulled up at its usual time, but Em still hadn’t gotten to the door after a minute or so. Why the glacial pace up the driveway? Because… she had her nose in a book! She was reading and walking. And not just any book. A [...]
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Posted in Authors, Books, Children's Books, SCBWI, Writing, tagged Authors, Children's Books, Libba Bray, Publishing, Writing, Writing Tips, YA 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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Posted in Authors, Books, Children's Books, SCBWI, Writing, tagged Jane Yolen, Publishing, SCBWI, Writing, Writing Tips 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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