Happy Valentine's Day!!!

I love having my birthday on Valentine's Day!!! :-)

As a kid, I always knew how to decorate my birthday parties.

I always received a heart-shaped box of chocolates from my grandpa until I turned 12 and he died later that year.

My darling husband picked up the tradition when we got married and he surprises me with it somewhere - like under my pillow. Today it was hidden under my computer keyboard when I got home from class this morning. Gosh, is my computer habit that obvious? Hubby knows what I like - Turtles! Gooey, chocolate, carmel-ly, nutty Turtles. I get the whole box. I usually eat nothing else all day until the birthday dinner.

When our three boys were younger hubby gave them instructions NOT to eat any of my birthday chocolates. But I get each of them their own box and everybody is happy. ;-)

Today darling husband got up at 5:30 a.m. to bake my heart-shaped Valentine Birthday Cake. Heart-shaped cake pans. My mom found them somewhere when I had my first birthday and passed the cake pans to my husband when we got married.

At 1:00 I'm getting a massage. And girl-talk. Aah, heaven.

Today I'm extremely grateful for my LIFE, my FAMILY AND FRIENDS and God's incredible blessings!

Go tell the people who matter most to you that you love them. Go eat chocolate, go read a great book - or go write one.

Author@Author Book Giveaway!

This is a great Journal to read about several recently published, soon to be published or aspiring writers. Very fun and intriguing women with good posts about the writing and publishing world. They're also running a book give-away contest every day this week. Some great YA books to snatch so run over and post a comment to enter the drawing. It's as simple as that. Hope you win! And I hope I win, too! ;-0

Author2Author book Giveaway Link HERE!!!

Envelopes

REJECTIONS always arrive in brown manila envelopes – unless you purchase the pretty white 9x12 envelopes which is only slightly better than manila because it’s still a REJECTION after all.

We hates seeing big manila envelopes in the mailbox. (I'm channeling Golum for some weird reason.)

GREAT things come in #10 size envelopes. I got two of them this week.

#1. A lovely fan letter from Abby, Age 10, who reads Cricket magazine and wanted to let the editors know that she liked my story “Rattlesnake Rain” from the August issue. Cricket made me a copy and forwarded it my way. Thank you!

#2. A second envelope from Cricket WITH A CHECK!!!

My story, "The Mummy Tent", about ancient Egypt will appear in the March issue and "Crawfish Boil on Alligator Swamp" will be in July - YAY!

That means two more #10s with MONEY coming my way. I’m so mercenary. But I like the cash validation. Who's with me?

You Get to Vote Today!

No, not American Idol or Survivor or Super Tuesday which is tomorrow, silly blog people, but THE FIRST PAGES CONTEST AT NATHAN BRANSFORD'S snazzy and very informative agent blog. And he's not anonymous which I do appreciate and admire, unlike Evil Editor or The Rejector. Don't get me wrong, Evil and Rejector are great to read, but sometimes the anonymous aspect just - BUGS.

Okay, so first off, I did not place. No crying or boohooing allowed, although you may allow a tiny tear in the private recesses of your heart if you need to.

Out of 675 entries, Nathan and his hilarious cohort Holly whittled it down to 6. They read them all and made their decision in a mere 5 days. Good golly, Miss Molly! They must have NO life, ha, ha!

Enjoy reading these fabulous first pages (actually 500 words was the cap which is really more like two pages and maybe next time Nathan will decide to limit the word count to 250 so he doesn't go blind.)

You get to VOTE FOR YOUR CHOICE. Winner takes all.

I'm off to revise my first pages. Again.

I got brave

For the first time ever I entered an online agent critique with the first page of one of my WIPs called The Death of Pharaoh Tutankhamun - for lack of anything more brilliant. But hey, maybe it is brilliant. At least everyone will know right off the bat what the story is about.

Nathan Bransford, an agent with Curtis Brown based in San Francisco (and I'm a sucker for him because he lives in my hometown) represents some great stuff, at least I discovered him through an author, Brad Geagly who writes adult novels about ancient Egypt. I read Geagley's two novels and found out who his agent was by reading the acknowledgments page - a must do if you are an aspiring author.

So Nathan is running a first pages contest with the prize being a query critique, a manuscript critique or a ten minute phone conversation with him. Winner's choice. He is very generous and received well over 600 entries! That is a WHOPPING number!

You can read all the entries on his blog where we had to post them for all the world to see. See them here.

Go here for one of his readers - and another aspiring writer - who has volunteered to do brief critiques for those entrants who want a bit of feedback. He calls himself Chro.

I'm #370 on Nathan's original post if you want to read it. Just look for my name and picture, that's probably easiest. We had 48 hours to post and the time is already up. The semi-fnalists will be chosen and then blog readers will vote on the winner. There was some great stuff posted. I am impressed.

Enchanted Runner is Back In Print!

Enchanted Runner was my second published novel, but my first book about the Snake Clan and the magical power of their runners at Acoma, the city built two thousand years ago on top of a 400 foot cliff in the gorgeous New Mexico desert. Runners and rattlesnakes and wild horses fill the pages of this gripping novel and due to a publisher buy-out and a total editorial upheaval at Avon the year it was originally published, the book went sadly out of print. But it is now back in a beautiful paperback with the original cover art and the Southwest Book Award Gold Sticker! (I have a sticker, how cool is that?)This book in its short life-time was also on the Land of Enchantment List, the Battle of the Books list, and The Pennsylvania Reader's Choice list.

You can get copies through me by posting on my blog or my web site and at Amazon.com, too.

This book is in demand by teachers and librarians all the time so I'm thrilled it's alive again. Class sets are available from me at half price, too, so all the teachers/librarians out there please spread the word.

Enjoy an exciting read that boys will especially love, but watch out for Trina, that feisty cousin of Kendall's with her stories about the runner's feet getting cut off and blood stained rocks on the old rock trails . . .

So I had a ton of stuff to do yesterday and . . .

I didn't get to blog about the big ALA Children's Literature Awards yesterday, but in between the errands and appts and having company for dinner (made my famous chicken enchiladas and peach/blackberry cobbler) . . .

I DID get a quick chance to find the awards and realize that I have only read ONE on the list - The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick.

I'm not familiar with ANY of the other Newbery and Caldecott and Prinz books. Unfortunately. (Because I did not get to cheer or wring my hands in anticipation for any of them).

Fortunately - I now have a whole new list of books to read!

Go straight to the full award list page here: www.ala.org

BUT here's a quick list of the top three awards - and I do know that there are readers of my blog who probably aren't aware yet (cough, cough). Not that I'm going to mention any NAMES.

Hey, enjoy some great books!

John Newbery Medal for the most outstanding contribution to children's literature.
“Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village,” written by Laura Amy Schlitz, is the 2008 Newbery Medal winner. The book is published by Candlewick.

Three Newbery Honor Books were named:
“Elijah of Buxton,” by Christopher Paul Curtis, published by Scholastic;
“The Wednesday Wars,” by Gary D. Schmidt, published by Clarion and
“Feathers,” by Jacqueline Woodson, published by Putnam.

Randolph Caldecott Medal for the most distinguished American picture book for children.
“The Invention of Hugo Cabret,” illustrated by Brian Selznick, is the 2008 Caldecott Medal winner. The book is published by Scholastic.

Four Caldecott Honor Books were named:
“Henry's Freedom Box: A True Story from the Underground Railroad,” illustrated by Kadir Nelson, written by Ellen Levine, and published by Scholastic;
“First the Egg,” illustrated and written by Laura Vaccaro Seeger, and published by Roaring Brook/Neal Porter;
“The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain,” illustrated and written by Peter Sís, and published by Farrar/Frances Foster; and “Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity,” illustrated and written by Mo Willems, and published by Hyperion.

Michael L. Printz Award for excellence in literature written for young adults.
“The White Darkness,” by Geraldine McCaughrean, is the 2008 Printz Award winner. The book is published by HarperTempest, an imprint of HarperCollins.

Four Printz Honor Books were named:
“Dreamquake: Book Two of the Dreamhunter Duet,” by Elizabeth Knox, published by Frances Foster Books, an imprint of Farrar, Straus and Giroux;
“One Whole and Perfect Day,” by Judith Clarke, published by Front Street.
“Repossessed,” by A. M. Jenkins, published by HarperTeen.
“Your Own, Sylvia: A Verse Portrait of Sylvia Plath,” by Stephanie Hemphill, published by Alfred A. Knopf

Newbery Predictions anyone?

Many of you are probably in body and person AT the ALA midwinter conference - but I won't let my jealousy give me vapors. (I have my smelling salts handy).

What is the best book YOU read this year? Who/What are you rooting for??? I love to talk about this every year, but seems like it's been pretty quiet and no one is talking much.

I have heard lots of chatter about Sherman Alexie's THE ABSOLUTELY TRUE DIARY OF A PART-TIME INDIAN which I haven't gotten to yet. I didn't even make his talk/booksigning in Albuquerque a couple of months ago. Right in my own backyard. I had another commitment that evening, but I've heard he's hilarious and the book superb, but I've gotten the impression it's a book more for YA's so maybe he's really in the Prinz category.

Here are the books I finished the year 2007 off with (read between Thanksgiving and New Year's.):

CHILDREN'S/YA:

THE AURORA COUNTY ALL-STARS by Deborah Wiles - This is definitely a Newbery contender. Loved it!

A CROOKED KIND OF PERFECT by Linda Urban - Another definite Newbery in the running. I adored it and, amazingly, I think I liked it even better than Wiles book even though I've been one of her fans since Ruby Lavender. Maybe it's because I grew up with an organ playing mother and I play myself, but I DID get to play the piano too and ended up a piano major in college.

CROSS MY HEART AND HOPE TO SPY by Ally Carter

HOW TO RUIN A SUMMER VACATION by Simone Elkeles

TOP TEN USES FOR AN UNWORN PROM DRESS by Tina Ferraro

HOW TO TAKE THE EX OUT OF BOYFRIEND by Janette Rallison

ADULT BOOKS:

THE HIPPOPOTAMUS MARSH
THE OASIS ROAD
THE HORUS ROAD
All by Pauline Gedge - a trilogy of ancient Egypt, my research passion of the last three years or so

NEFERTITI: A NOVEL by Michelle Moran - another, um, Egypt book in case you couldn't tell, but Gedge's books are much better. Nefertiti was just annoying in this book and the characters were pretty one-dimensional.

WE ONLY HAVE TWO MORE DAYS BEFORE ANNOUNCEMENTS.

GIVE ME YOUR LOVES AND HATES AND HOPEFUL WINNERS!

Happy, Um, Everything!

Hi guys and girls . . . Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Christmas, Happy New Year!
I can't believe it's been 6 weeks since I posted. No, make that 7. I am SOOOO bad. But I have to say that I have missed y'all.

I've had three bouts of illness, out of town school visits, an Author Fest, a trip to California to visit my darling sister and her family for a week (it's been 8 years since my whole family saw her whole family at the same time - needless to say we had a fabulous Christmas together and a blast except my mom fell in the kitchen and sprained several body parts and had a horrendous toothache the whole time and went back to Phoenix for a root canal), then I came home 10 days ago to stomach flu and eye surgery and the news that my 19 year old son wants to marry his girlfriend.

I'm numb.
And my eye hurts. Like there's stuff in it - eyelashes and sand. It really bugs.
And I haven't written or revised anything in two months even though I have three projects waiting for my attention.

Good things: it was sunny in the Bay Area during the Christmas week. So unusual. No rain or fog. It was great.
I also realized how much I've missed the ocean and walking on the Golden Gate and eating at Fenton's. And I realized how much I've missed all my relatives. We got together on Christmas Eve at my aunt's house for dinner and a Christmas program - my sister and I even sang the Christmas duet, "Star Bright", that we used to sing as teenagers and my youngest brother accompanied us on his guitar and we also got to see his adorable twin boys Kohner and Kyler. Soooo cute!!!! And huggable. Even though I may have picked up the stomach thing from them. Still, they're absolutely worth it. My aunts and uncles told funny stories about my dad (who was killed in an airplane crash when I was 14 just a few days before Christmas) and it was so great. I told them how much I appreciated hearing those stories, and it made me weepy, but what's Christmas and family for?

Now I'm trying to breeze through everyone's blogs, but I think it will take 40 hours to read everything from the last 2 months. Sorry, but I don't think that's gonna happen! But I think y'all will forgive me, right?

Hope your New Year has started well!

TTFN - and More Later!
Kimberley

Books and Trips

Here it is, my beloved childhood book, Two Are Better than One by Carol Ryrie Brink, and it was a delight and a pleasure to read once more after so many, many years. (We won't say how many, a little secret I'll keep to myself, ahem.)

Alas, the cover art here is a later paperback version and not nearly as fine and wonderful as the original hardback version, but I was able to find the original and purchase it for my collection. Gosh, I have a book collection. How fun! Of course, all my books are spilling over the bookcases and under the desk and under the bed and on top of things. One of these days I'll get more bookcases and organize my "library".

A library of his own is something my middle son dearly wants when he has his own house someday. He's talked about it for years and he will ONLY purchase hardback editions of all his favorite books since that is what a true library should have. So all the bookcases I purchase end up in his room. Well, when he moves out and takes all those books with him . . . I'll confiscate the suckers for my own!

I've been a busy bee the past two weeks and not blogging, shame on me. I did manage to finally finish the rewrite for Secret Rites of the Goddess and get it off to three agents who requested within hours. Heady stuff. I also sent off The Healing Spell manuscript to an editor who wanted to see it again. Fingers crossed. Gosh, I cross my fingers and toes so much I swear they're soon going to drop off my body.

Tomorrow, I take off for the north country of New Mexico. 200 miles in the car and then two days of school visits and the Farmington Public library. Should be fun! My bags are packed, I'm ready to go . . . sing it with me . . .

I also just finished reading DRAGON'S KEEP, a terrific novel by an author I haven't read before. Stunning writing, incredibly brilliant storytelling about an old Merlin legend and a princess who fulfills a 600 year old prophecy.

P. S. to Sarah sarah_create whom I big-time owe an email. If you have a child you're looking to purchase a book for that loves dragons and medieval stories and will be enjoyed for more than one reading and by the whole family I definitely recommend this one! Janet Lee Carey is the author, of course.


See you all next week!!!
Be good.

Screaming with Unexpected Delight!

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU to Laura Bowers, I love you!!! laurabowers

Your Tuesday's post was an answer to my prayers. You thought your procrastination on the computer was time-wasting, but you helped me SO much I still can't get over it.

Your link to Shelfari solved a 20 year old mystery because I found a book I've been looking for forever.

The book? TWO ARE BETTER THAN ONE.

I read this when I was about 10 -11 years old - ADORED IT - and have been trying off and on to find it for so long. I've put out questions to other writers and in fact, I was about ready to post on my blogs to see if anybody recognized the book and could help me locate a copy.

I've searched every online new and used bookstore on the net without luck for so many years. I started wondering if I dreamed up the whole book! Was my memory just totally gone? Did I ever actually read this book? Why couldn't I find it? I also could not remember the author's name to save my soul.

Turns out I had the title slightly wrong. I kept Googling TWO HEADS ARE BETTER THAN ONE which is a quote from the book. Adding that one word HEADS threw off every search engine and online bookstore.

But SHELFARI didn't! (Yay for them to do a slight variation). I went to Laura's link to Shelfari on a total whim yesterday, plugged in the title and the book came up!

It was real.
I wasn't dreaming!
It's the right book!
My jaw dropped right to my keyboard.
I started screaming.
My son ran in to see what was wrong?
I was laughing and crying with delight! I'm SOOOOOOO THRILLED!

And I ordered a copy of the book in its original hardcover edition with a dust jacket no less. I cannot wait to get it and read it again.

That is the power of books on a kid's life.
This kid.
Me.

P. S. The author of TWO ARE BETTER THAN ONE? None other than Carol Ryrie Brink - Newbery winner of Caddie Woodlawn. That just about freaked me out, too. The book wasn't by some obscure author at all like I'd been supposing for so long.

P. P. S. Laura, can I take you out to dinner sometime???

*Practice Thoughts*

A quote from the inimitable Madeleine L'Engle:
"I know writers who write only when inspiration comes. How would Isaac Stern play if he played the violin only when he felt like it? He would be lousy."

I've often wailed over all the *practice* novels I've written and why it took so many of them before I got published. Why do I have to practice more than other people? Why aren't I more talented? Why does this feel harder for me than other writers?

Whine, whine, whine. Oh, woe is me.

Maybe I just have more to learn.

Maybe I spent too much time in my early years of writing waiting for inspiration. Or the dishes to get done. Or a clean house so I could concentrate. Or the errand list was finished. Or waiting for the babies to take a nap. (Which mine rarely did, even as infants. They were born wide-awake and stayed that way!)
Or. Or. Or.

Maybe I really did not practice enough.

Great Books I read in October

Call me totally lazy for not blogging for 3 weeks, but I took an enforced *blacation*. "Blog Vacation" as created by the cute jmprince due to total craziness around here.

But I gotta mention some incredibly terrific books. I REALLY wish I could have posted pictures of the covers. I want to figure out an easier way of posting pictures without having to copy and save them into my personal files, then upload them. Anybody have a faster way? It makes blogging SO time-consuming. I don't know how y'all do it every day with pictures, too! Check out these author's websites and you'll see the books for yourself! FABULOSO COVERS for FABULOSO NOVELS!!! Delicious until the last word . . .

SUCH A PRETTY GIRL by Laura Weiss

WUTHERING HEIGHTS by Emily Bronte

BROTHERS, BOYFRIENDS, AND OTHER CRIMINAL MINDS by April Lurie

WICKED LOVELY by Melissa Marr

EMILY GOLDBERG LEARNS TO SALSA by Micol Ostow

CASTING THE GODS ADRIFT: A TALE OF ANCIENT EGYPT by Geraldine McCaughrean

DEVILISH by Maureen Johnson

CURES FOR HEARTBREAK by Margo Rabb

Adult Novel: THE THIRTEENTH TALE by Diane Setterfield

Slammed. And a klutz!

Slammed with stuff right now and the big revisions for four novels (same ones they just take a long time!). So I'm a little scarce lately. I hope things will calm down in a couple more weeks.

In the klutz news: I've been notorious since I was a kid for hurting myself. My family used to laugh at me and now my husband does. Sliding across the blacktop on my bare knees during Steal the Bacon or falling off the clothes hamper (60 stitches in my leg) or cutting myself with a knife in the kitchen or burning my finger on the stove.

In the last week:
1. Almost burned the house down when the oven caught fire. Yeah, I hadn't cleaned it in a while. See, I've been slammed with work lately. Anyhoo, I thought it would stop if I didn't give it any oxygen and when I checked a few moments later the whole oven was ablaze. Smoke pouring out, alarm going off. I almost called the fire department, but I managed to get close enough finally to douse it with baking soda. It took the rest of the afternoon to get all the smoke out of the house. Later that night I cleaned the darn thing. My cookies burned.

2. On Saturday we went to the BYU/UNM football game with a big group of friends. We rooted for BYU, our alma mater - of course! - and the game was SO exciting and we clapped and pounded the bleachers so hard I completely bruised up my left hand. It swelled and now it's all purple. Embarrassing. BYU won - whadda ya think? 31 - 24. And that was after the referees took away one of the touchdowns five minutes after the fact. Sheesh.

3. That same night I was finishing up some dishes and I was washing a very large glass lid that goes to the frying pan. It slipped and SHATTERED into a thousand pieces into the sink. Gravity defying glass. It flew UP! My hands were literally covered in about two dozen tiny shards. Blood dripping. I didn't move. Screamed for my husband and he and my son slowly and carefully picked out all the shards and pieces over the next 10 minutes while I stood there trying not to freak out.

See, I have weird accidents.

Two at once - read the bottom one first!

I'm sure you were all waiting with baited breath to see if I could pay my mortgage yesterday when we had a debit card defraud of $1500 smackers. The bank reversed the charges, they took out the mortgage payment, and I'm back at $0.00. So what's new?
Wow, you are all very chatty today! Pages and ages of posts to read.
Today pamm wrote about reading all her friends posts every day, but not having time to post comments or thinking she doesn't have anything new to add to the discussion. I feel the same way, especially on a day when everyone is posting all kinds of cool stuff, but I don't have that hour or two to post comments. Please know that I read, enjoy, laugh, cry and feel like I've still connected with you. It's like having a conversation between friends via diaries. I mean, isn't that the whole point of Live Journal? Which I think is totally, absolutely COOL.
A few responses within my own . . .
susanwritesYour post about the guy planning out his proposal and his girlfriend getting wind of it and then thinking he was breaking up with her was hilarious and sweet. I loved your interview, too, but alas, did not post. :-(
barboconnor
I've loved the pictures this summer of your garden and all your writing spots. How sad that it's all torn up! But it looks like it'll be even BETTER next year!
bluemalibu
I can't believe you wrote until 3:30 in the morning, got up at 5:30 and went to work all day. AND that you plan on writing tonight! You have way too much energy, girl! Pass some my direction!
carriejones
You are just too funny!!!!!!!
crissachappell
Good luck on your first book signing!
selimsa803
I am appalled right along with you! That yellow color makes me feel like I'm putting something radioactive into my mouth.
lisaalbert
Enjoy your book buying frenzy!
jmprince
Love that word! I need to force myself to take a blacation so I can get my rewrites and critiques finished . . .'
kidlit_kim
What a bummer about your dream bedroom set. I say just knock that old darn staircase to the ground! It's only a bunch of wood. Your hubby can whip up another staircase this weekend, can't he?!
lisa_schroeder
I feel your son's algebra pain. What a horrible, no good, very bad day!

TEN THINGS ON A MONDAY - READ FIRST! :-)

I'm four days behind in my blog reading - and I'm usually totally addicted so this is HIGHLY unusual!

Is anybody else out there going crazy over just plain life *stuff*. Here's what's been on my docket in just the last few days:

1. Cars breaking down again. Continually. In the last 4 months we've spent $6,000 in car repairs for 4 different vehicles. Enough already! Took 15 hours on Friday just to get the flippin' car to the flippin' mechanic. Tow dolly's are not that easy to come by. Or to hook up. And the one person in town that had one didn't want to stay open long enough for my husband to go pick it up. It was only 3 o'clock in the afternoon. And then hung up on him! Weird.

2. My son, my baby, is moving out of state so I'm very weepy.

3. A girl from Israel (Jerusalem to be precise) is here on a 2 year internship with the local prison as a counselor and I've been helping her out with housing, sightseeing, dinner, finding a bicycle, taking her places, etc. Marif is doing her doctorate internship for psychology. She's very sweet, but is paranoid about how much sunshine New Mexico has and is slathering on the sunblock so heavy her face is sort of white. A little amusing I have to admit.

4. Drama, drama, drama, with my seminary class lately. Six weeks worth and I hope things are going to calm down now so I can focus on teaching and not talking to parents and unhappy students. (Not in my class, one of the other classes. I had all these students last year and they've been begging to come back to my class. Not a happy situation.) Resolution is in sight now.

5. Drama with my Asperger son - although that rarely ever goes away completely. Need to get him back into the doctor and do a meds evaluation or more counseling.

6. Critiquing 45 manuscripts for the Abilene Writers conference. Due this weekend and I haven't even started!!!

7. Reprinting my novel, , which won the Southwest Book Award, because I get so many requests to purchase during school visits which I have several coming up in November and December. Lots of work to get a book ready to reprint, but the artist gave me permission last week to use his original cover art - yay!

8. Another MAJOR revision for Secret Rites of the Goddess coming along slowly, but surely. The first person POV is working well and I've finally nailed down the premise and character arc. Only took me 2 years. Hey, I'm a slow learner!

9. Another revision for The Healing Spell is almost done. I came up with some really fun additions to the story and the *spell* itself for which I made a recipe and I'm quite excited about it. Editor at FSG is very interested! And I'm querying dream agent with the novel tomorrow!!!!

10. Last, but not least. Somebody in Greece used my husband's debit card number to charge $1500 worth of stuff on Friday!
HOW does this happen? This person does not have my husband's card in hand or his pin number or ID to match the name on the card. Who would let somebody do that? Unless it's someone in banking or who worked for this particular store outside of Athens.

11. Okay, so it's 11 things on a Monday. You get a Bonus # or a Bonus Question - Anybody got ideas for how I can pay my mortgage tomorrow? The bozo in Athens spent my mortgage $$$ on SHOES!!!

Childhood Favorites with My Twin

I get to be a twin today! Barbara O’ Connor, one of my favorite children’s writers – and one of my *best* writing friends EVER is my look-alike. We're doing twin blogs about our favorite childhood books. Be sure to read hers, too! barboconnor and Greetings From Nowhere.

1. The books I read the most in just sheer numbers were NANCY DREW mysteries. I also read just about every Phyllis Whitney mystery too. I received my very first Nancy Drew, THE HIDDEN WINDOW MYSTERY, when I was eleven from a 3^rd grade teacher. At lunchtime I'd go into her classroom and grade papers or cut out bulletin board art. I loved helping Miss Aungst and she was so nice and so pretty. She gave me THE HIDDEN WINDOW as a thank you gift at the end of the school year. In 6^th grade at an orthodontist appointment I was, of course, reading a Nancy Drew mystery, probably THE CLUE IN THE ATTIC while reclining in the chair waiting for the doctor when the assistant told me that she had some Nancy Drew’s at home that used to belong to her mother. At my next appt. she brought me AN ENTIRE BOX of First Edition Nancy Drew’s, published in the 1940s. I wonder what they’re worth? I still have them. They have blue covers and no cover art, published before the yellow ones in the 60s and 70s.

2. THE LITTLE WHITE HORSE by Elizabeth Goudge. My mother found this book in a magazine that had a “Books to Check Out” list. I was always looking for the next book to read since I read one every single day. I loved, loved, loved this book. It’s got everything - the *olden days* as I used to call the 1800s as a kid, mystery, danger, magic, and a bit of romance and fairy tale.


3. HARRIET THE SPY by Louise Fitzhugh. I became Harriet. I kept a notebook. I spied on people. I wrote my own stories. But I never got in trouble or dissed my friends.

4. MAGIC ELIZABETH by Norma Kassirer. I couldn’t even tell you how many times I read this book I loved it so much. And I still have my original copy.



5. SUZIE AND THE BALLET FAMILY by Lee Wyndham. I love ballet and devoured this wonderful series over and over again. My mother let me buy the whole set through the Scholastic book club. 35 - 50 cents for a book back then! Mind-boggling.

6. TO DANCE, TO DREAM by Maxine Drury. 10 stories about the real lives of famous dancers through the last three centuries: Maria Taglioni, Isadora Duncan, Anna Pavlova, Margot Fonteyn and ending with Maria Tallchief. My favorite was Anna Pavlova – I was mesmerized reading about Anna’s ballet slippers and how she tore them apart and re-sewed them before each performance.

My copy of this wonderful volume is inscribed: “To Kimberley on your ninth birthday. With love and best wishes from Uncle Dave, Aunt Mabel, Debra, Greg, Scott and Lisa.”

7. HELEN KELLER’S TEACHER by Margaret Davidson.

8. LADY WITH A LAMP, Florence Nightingale. Awesome woman.

9. NELLIE BLY, REPORTER. Very cool chick. I was shocked at Nellie’s nerve to get herself admitted to an insane asylum so that she could uncover the truth about what was happening inside. Talk about guts! I also read a book about a woman who became a Confederate spy but I can’t remember the title. The thing that stuck with me was when she actually chewed and swallowed an incriminating note one time to keep from getting caught. Wow.

10. A LANTERN IN HER HAND by Bess Street Aldrich. HISTORICAL FICTION AT IT’S BEST! That’s all I have to say. This is definitely one of the first *cross-over* books that both YA’s and adults have loved - long before that term was coined a few years ago.



Now don't forget to read Barb's Favorites - after all - we're twins today!

Dreams

I rarely have very vivid dreams and if I ever remember a dream the next morning, it is usually just too weird to even relate to someone else. It never makes sense or it’s suddenly very stupid.

And yet I will share last night's dream and let my underwear hang out. Metaphorically speaking.

Last night I dreamed that I was at SCWBI LA and nobody would room with me. And when everybody went swimming in the spectacular Hearst Castle type pool, I didn’t have a bathing suit.

And I kept trying to catch up with all my friends, but I kept missing everyone by five minutes here or five minutes there or I was in the wrong location.

So instead I went over to check out the lava flowing from the volcano (what?!?!), only to run away screaming - along with all the people hanging out over there when it began to erupt in earnest.

So what the heck does this dream mean?

I’m a little afraid to even find out.

Go to my Live Journal to read the comment's on this post - lots of fun!

A fab new singer!

Even though my blog is mostly about writing for Children and Young Adults I wanted to share a wonderful new talent in the music world - Debra Fotheringham.

Debra is the sister of a very good friend of mine and she recently cut her first CD. She's been traveling all over the country as well as Europe singing her own concerts the past year. She does the guitar work as well as sings, and her writing is very impressive, too.

Debra's music and voice reminds me of Norah Jones. Check out her website. The lead song plays as soon as the site comes up. Her other songs are also listed and you can listen to them AND buy the album directly from her website.

I got to meet her for the first time last week and hear her perform. She's darling and awesome.

Enjoy a great new artist!!!

Such a powerful book!

I got to meet Erin in L.A., the author of this incredibly moving memoir, and we instantly connected when we realized that our lives took a similar, terrible path when we were both 14 and lost our parents; Erin's mother and father in a car accident and my father and my cousin Brett in a plane crash. She had me crying before I'd even cracked open the book. Talking in L.A. we were teary-eyed and hugging each other and had barely met. Meeting her and reading a book like this was something I never expected to happen when I signed up for the SCBWI conference.

The book is beautiful and moving. I think Erin is so very, very brave to write this and go through the terrible pain and depression she experienced while writing the memoir. Read her husband's heart-wrenching account here: griefgirl . I'm so amazed Erin got through it and wrote it anyway even though she could have quit. I tried once, about 17 years ago, to write about the experience of losing my father. I fictionalized it, changed people and events - and it did not work. The story was stiff and melodramatic and I never tried again. Even though it's been thirty years since the accident, it sometimes still feels too close to get the right perspective, if that can make any possible sense.

Reading GRIEF GIRL had me crying of course, but a flood of details and memories kept rushing into my mind, things I'd pushed away with the effort to move forward and go on with my life, but reading Erin's account also made me want to try to write my story again. I'm not sure I'd write it for publication, but I'd really like to put the horribleness my family lived through and the grief and pain I personally went through at 14 years old down on paper. And tell it true this time. The real story. The actual facts. What really happened. I'm getting this strange feeling like I NEED to do this, not only for myself, but as a gift, a remembrance, for my family; my mother, my brothers and sisters, my aunts and uncles and cousins when we lost two family members that horrible December day when my father's plane came crashing down to earth and burst into flames 5 days before Christmas, and the day of my little brother's 5th birthday.

It's scary to think about reliving the tragedy and loss in excruciating detail - but I'm feeling this need to have a tangible account of that time and the aftermath that went on for years. To have a record. To talk about it. Because my family didn't talk much - we mostly held all the grief inside. As well as all our secrets.

To see Erin talking about the book go to her MySpace page and click on the video. I just love her.

Home Again

24 hours of driving in three days to take my son back to college this last weekend sucks. I hope I'm done with all the car trips for awhile. I'm TIRED! And we've already been back to school for almost two weeks here. What is with that?!? Starting school on August 10th!!! I've lived in New Mexico for two decades now and I'm still not used to it. This California girl knows in her bones that school should not start until after Labor Day. So there.

At the moment I've got a tormenting question about Tracey Adams, agent extraordinaire in North Carolina.

For those of you who went to SCBWI LA, I cannot find *anywhere* in my notes what Tracey said about subbing to her. I know that she'll take submissions after a conference, but I don't know whether it's just a query letter or query with synopsis, or query with three chapters or what . . .

Anybody know and can drop me a line? I didn't make it to any of Tracey's break-out sessions, but I did get to talk to her Saturday night at the Silvery Moon party and she gave me her card!!! Does that mean anything? I hope, I hope, I hope! She did say she would remember me and we did get to talk about a couple of my projects (albeit very briefly).

But my problem now is HOW to sub to her exactly. THANKS for any help!!!

Books I read this Summer

And the list is PATHETICALLY small. I've been frustrated not to have more time to read. It's like if I want to read a book I can do that and still get everything done that's going on in my household or if I want to write a little, maybe I can do that. But my days are too packed to be able to read a book AND write both. Maybe someday when my boys don't take so much time, attention and worrying. Because, of course, I can't NOT worry, can I? Nope. Impossible.

1. ENCHANTED, INC. by Shanna Swendson (adult chick-lit fantasy)
2. I'M NOT JULIA ROBERTS (Laura Ruby, adult novel by a fab children's writer. She's awesome with this book, too!)
3. BURIED by Robin MacCready (YA suspense)
4. ANGEL MONSTER by Veronica Bennett (Stunning historical fiction about Mary Shelley who wrote "Frankenstein")
5. GOLDEN by Jennifer Barnes (YA paranormal)
6. THE INVENTION OF HUGO CABRET by Brian Selznick (self-explanatory!)
7. THE SUMMER SHERMAN LOVED ME (MG literary)
8. THE RUNAWAY PRINCESS by Kate Coombs (MG/YA fantasy)
9. I'D TELL YOU I LOVE YOU BUT THEN I'D HAVE TO KILL YOU by Ally Carter (ADORABLE YA chick-lit)
10. WHAT HAPPENED TO CASS MCBRIDE? by Gail Giles (nail-biting YA thriller)
11. STORY OF A GIRL by Sara Zarr (YA contemporary)
12. OUR TOWN by Thornton Wilder (read for a book group. Very interesting)
13. JOHNNY VOODOO by Dakota Lane (YA romance)
14. TANTALIZE by Cynthia Leitich Smith (YA vampire romance)
15. VANISHING ACTS by Jody Picoult (adult suspense)
16. GRIEF GIRL by Erin Vincent (YA memoir) I'll be posting about this next week when I get back in town. I met Erin in LA and this is an incredible book!

Only 16 books for three months! That's gotta be a record for the least amount of reading in my entire life!!! And I have at least 20 books waiting to be read. I ALWAYS have about 20 books waiting. And research. And school lessons to be prepared. And I keep hearing about great books out there and put them on hold at the library or buy them and the stack just keeps multiplying.

Confession: I'm supposed to be reading WAR AND PEACE by Leo Tolstoy this summer, too, for my book group's discussion in September. Ha, ha, ha! (Ssh! I rented the movie.)

Get a Free Book - before it's even published!

HarperCollins is giving away free Advanced Reading Editions (ARE) of books coming out this fall. Sign up with your email and snail mail (so they can send you the copy when they do the drawing) and then you get to write a review and answer questions about the book. The books offered look fabulous.
Especially check out my friend Alex Flinn's newest book, due out in October, BEASTLY!
What a cool idea! Don't miss out.
Here's the link: http://www.harperteen.com/firstlook/index.asp#books
Hope you're a winner!
Hope I am, too!
P. S. Sign up your teenagers and tell the teenagers you know. They can get a free ARE, too!

Ergh!

Drat, for some reason the You Tube link isn't working. I've tried repeatedly. Sorry and hmmph!

Just Google "Britain's Got Talent, six year old Connie singing" and you'll go right to it. Pretty amazing. She even made one of the judges cry.

You gotta see this!

This little girl is ADORABLE! Wow, what an amazing voice, timbre and pitch! She even gets Simon smiling.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=En0A8KGMgq8

On pins and needles for news from seaheidi!

I'm also printing up my handouts for the SCBWI monthly schmooze tonight. Yep, I'm speaking - about synopses. For some strange - but very nice - reason I've been having a lot of luck with mine. I have, like, a 75% YES rate from agents on my query/synopsis who want to see my manuscript. Of course, getting a YES for representation is a whole 'nother problem - but one I WILL lick. For starters, I've figured out a couple problems that I'm going to revise before I do any more querying.

Pointers from my little presentation will be posted tomorrow! Right now I gotta get dressed and get out of here. It's a 45 minute drive to Albuquerque and I'm meeting a writer friend for dinner beforehand. And yet, I'm fixing dinner to leave for the family. Hey, how come it always works like that for us Moms? The only way we can get out of the house is to make sure everyone is fed and happy first. :-)

Juicy Bits

From the L.A. Conference that is . . .

Rubin Pfeffer, Publishing Director of Simon & Schuster:

"A great book is one which sends the reader off to find the next book."

Ellen Wittlinger, author of ParrotFish:

"Art (or books) can take you out of a small world and open the door to a larger world. Art can save you."

John Green, Author of Looking for Alaska:

"Writing is an act of translation as much as it is an act of creation. "
"The great challenge is to translate a feeling or emotion or experience into a story that lets the reader feel the same emotion and have the same experience. "
"Truth doesn't lie inside the facts, it lies inside the people of your story."

Emma Dryden, Vice-President and Publisher at McElderry Books

"If an editor doesn't feel the story and love it and have it resonate to them, then publishing the book would be a disservice to the author. "

Kate Schafer, Agent at Janklow & Nesbit

She wants a book that makes her feel like something big and wonderful is happening.
Word of the Day: Optimism

Linda Sue Park, Newbery winner for A Single Shard:

"Finish. The. Book." (borrowed from Jane Yolen)
"Write the book more than you talk about the book."

Dinah Stevenson, Publisher at Clarion

"No two people define well-written in the same way."

In other news, this afternoon the whole gang (my family that is) went to see Bourne Ultimatum. Loved it! Very thrilling. I love mysteries and thrillers, but I've been too chicken to try writing one myself even though all my books have suspense and danger built into them. But they're not considered *thriller* per se.

Speaking of movies, we finally rented "Bridge to Terabithia" a couple weeks ago and I ADORED it. I thought it was very true to the book and I cried at the end, just like I cry when I read the novel. It was very emotionally stirring and I thought Jess and Leslie were PERFECTLY cast. The movie haunted my thoughts for days. The ending was perfect, too.

Notes from Emma Dryden, McElderry Books

Emma was so smart and wise in her keynote address and in her workshop on writing the novel. I really liked her a lot.

Here are a few tidbits:

1. Write what you know, write what you feel, write what you care about.

2. Books are for the soul. Books are how we preserve our culture. (I never thought about books in quite that way before, but how true it is. We can see our culture change throughout the decades through the books we have and the books that have lasted.)

3. All writers are working their way through a darkness and into the light just like our young readers are trying to do as they grow up. (I'm realizing this more and more about myself the longer I write.)

My themes and premises change depending on what I'm going through at the moment or what I've gone through during my life in the past. Maybe I'm confessing more than I should! Ha! But a writer's theme is never written down as such in the pages of their manuscript or even spoken in concrete words by a character. And that *take away* value a reader gets from a book might be something completely different for another reader. But a good book, a meaningful, emotional story always has one.

Opening L.A. Keynote

First up: The incredible Mr. Walter Dean Myers. He was raised in a foster family. His father was a janitor and he told us that to this day his parents still don't quite *get* what he does for a living. Once he heard his mother on the phone talking to a friend and she told the friend, "Walter's job is typing stories". Ha!

The following part of is talk is where I really connected with Mr. Myers. My roommate, Kristin, and I had this very discussion on the plane the previous evening as we flew over so I was pretty wowed when Walter talked about it in the very first hour. It felt like he was talking to me.

He posed the question: Why am I - or why are you - a writer? Here are some typical assumptions from the outside world:
Is he a writer because he comes from a family of storytellers?: NO
Is it because he loves words?: NO
Is it because he loves to play with language?: NO

He's a writer because he loves to create and he loves building world that only he can envision and create and then try to bring it to life for others. Books always took me out of the boring real world and into a new, better, and more exciting place and that's the reason I wanted to be a writer, too, from the time I was very young. I think books are BETTER than real life.

Walter went on to discuss searching for the details of our *world* and our characters. Not only physical details, but emotional details. Details that explode the moment, that re-create a moment, that re-define a moment in a familiar but new way that connects you to your readers. Selecting the right detail is what we do every time we sit down to write. Find the details that convince your reader.

I'm off to search for the right details for my WIP, The Healing Spell. Happy searching to you, too!

SCBWI L.A. TOTALLY ROCKS!!!!

Gosh, why did it take me 11 years to get back to this conference? I am so psyched and so pumped and so filled with emotions and energy and inspiration I want to jump up and down and gush and cry.

Believe me, we all cried and sniffed and pulled out our tissues during so many moments throughout the whole weekend. And laughed and hugged and talked. More like yakked our heads off!

Of course, editors, agents, and keynote authors abounded the halls and dining tables, but one of the best parts of all, for me, was meeting such great new friends. Something I never expected.

Cool people I got to meet for the FIRST TIME after knowing them online:

seaheidi
bluemalibu
gneri
jo_no_anne
carriejones

Some awesome people I met and "friended" as soon as I got home:

griefgirl
pamm
lisa_schroeder
grizzlygirl1
kidlit_kim
kellyrfineman
kirkglaser

A totally cool, smart chick I got to meet again:

cynleitichsmith

And some other people I've known online that I was thrilled to meet in person in LA!

www.coleenparatore.com
www.lindasuepark.com
www.ellenwittlinger.com

Other writers I talked to during workshops and between keynote speeches like:

Carrie Watson
Rachel Rodriguez
Clark Leland Childers - who only gave me an email address and not a website, silly boy!
Vicki Thomas
Suzanne Taylor (who is gorgeous, expecting her first baby, and won a FREE conference next year!)

A few gals during the Historical Fiction writers group Sunday night:
Carole Estby Dagg
Lynda Pflueger
Sarah Wiseley Croley

MORE conference news the rest of the week so stay tuned!

SCBWI L.A. Here I come!

It feels surreal that I'm actually getting on a plane in two days. I went 11 years ago - only time ever - the year SCBWI celebrated it's 25th anniversary. About 400 people attended and it was fab of course.

I hear there are 800 + now that attend. I think I will feel like a mouse. I'm excited, nervous, terrified. Will I be brave enough to talk to people? Will I look like a dork? Will I know what to say without sounding like an idiot if I get close to an editor or agent - or one of those fantastic authors I worship? I need to go calm my fluttering heart.

Hey, please drop me a quick "Yes!" if you're going! Should we do a Blogspot/Live Journal gathering? Or will that amount to about 400 of us? Cool!!

Maybe we should wear name tags with our LJ personas. Hope to see/meet you there! Safe travels and *see* you in about a week!

Rattlesnake Rain!

Good stuff in the mailbox - my author copies of the August Cricket magazine with my story "Rattlesnake Rain"!!! It's the lead story, too - WOW! I'm thrilled. And it looks gorgeous, the illustrations are beautiful! It looks like they took the theme of my story and built the whole issue around it. Need I say, I'm excited?

Check out the issue from your library or bookstore - or if you subscribe already, enjoy! (The link shows the August issue)