How to use this Page

Marvel characters are becoming more relevant everyday. Since the Guardians of the Galaxy characters became a part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, one question has been littering the minds of long time Thanos fans: where the hell is Adam Warlock? With the release of The Infinity Entity #1, we get our answer. Not only that, we also get the launch of […]

Swept is a magazine based in Toronto that promotes and investigates arts and culture with an emphasis on Canadian content. Currently looking for short stories, poetry, photos, and journalistic stories/articles/op-eds. Presently unpaid; goal to start paying contributors by September 2016. Deadline: ongoing.

Vallum: Contemporary Poetry is accepting poetry, reviews, essays, and interviews for an upcoming issue. Theme: “The Wild.” How do you interpret “The Wild,” what does it bring out in you? What forms are still wild? Deadline: May 15, 2016.

The Minola Review welcomes arts and letters from all female-identifying writers. Interested in work that is fearless and unsympathetic and goes where others are uncomfortable or afraid to go. Open to submissions of poetry, fiction, essays, and reviews. Deadline: rolling.

I am truly blessed to have parents who plan their own vacation around my once per year Spring Break excursion to North Myrtle Beach. They move into my house, and together, my mom and dad take over my parenting role, which involves everything from doing laundry, making meals, chauffeuring the kids to school and activities, helping with homework, playing games, and making sure no one burns the place down while I get the week off.

I am a lucky girl indeed. Here’s how I traditionally enjoy my six days:

Walking the wide expanse of white sand beach on gorgeous cool and sunny days interacting with very few humans.

Look at this day! Low 70s and a slight breeze. Perfect.

When I’m not at the beach, I do a little bit of this:

Jigsaw Puzzle Southern-Style

Stop and smell the flowers…

Writing, eating, visiting family, binge-watching HBO and Netflix, shopping, touring the gardens, working on puzzles, reading, visiting the aquarium, weaving, doing my nails, bike riding…

It’s not all fun of course. I usually bring about one hundred or more assignments/reports to grade. I just make sure I shake out the sand before I pack up to leave.

I would be a much nicer person if I could put my feet here once a day.

YABC: What surprised you most while writing your latest book? Chandler Baker: Which character would present themselves as the main character for Book 2! When I went into drafting Teen Frankenstein, we knew High School Horror 2 would be a companion, picking up the thread of another character in the...

Controversy! The title of "First Great Comic of 2016" is hotly contested this year!

Adventure! Laughter! Rhinoceros Beetles!

Darkus Cuttle’s dad mysteriously goes missing from his job as Director of Science at the Natural History Museum. Vanished without a trace! From a locked room! So Darkus moves in with his eccentric Uncle Max and next door to Humphrey and Pickering, two lunatic cousins with an enormous beetle infestation.

Darkus soon discovers that the beetles are anything but ordinary. They’re an amazing, intelligent super species and they’re in danger of being exterminated. It’s up to Darkus and his friends to save the beetles. But they’re up against an even more terrifying villain–the mad scientist of fashion, haute couture villainess Lucretia Cutter.

Lucretia has an alarming interest in insects and dastardly plans for the bugs. She won’t let anyone or anything stop her, including Darkus’s dad, whom she has locked up in her dungeons! The beetles and kids join forces to rescue Mr. Cuttle and thwart Lucretia.

Beetle Boy is the story of a brilliant boy, his loyal friends, and some amazingly intelligent beetles.

Read an excerpt.

Watch a video with the author. 

  The Atlantis Rising Series takes inspiration from the myth of Atlantis as Plato wrote it. He described the island as lush with vegetation, meadows, and streams. The original inhabitants lived simple lives. They were unique because of the equality in their economics, government, and justice. Seeing this as a virtue,...

Hello and Welcome to our first installment of the Read Kid’s Classics Challenge! I’m so glad you’re here and I can hardly wait to see what you’re reading as well. As many of you already know, I am a huge fan of children’s classics and over the years my family has actively read old classics and discovered new ones. In 2016 one of my many goals is to discover even more classics and share them with you, my valued readers.

So from now on, every month during my Read Kids Classic Challenge, I am going to present one classic that I simply can’t live without!

Joining me in this book-ish and fun campaign is a handful of powerhouse bloggers who are excited to share their very own #readkidsclassics picks!  Please feel free to visit these five #ReadKidsClassics bloggers to see what classic book reading fun they have created.

I don’t think it will surprise anyone what my first Read Kid’s Classics Challenge pick is going to be, and I have a very good reason for that! I picked this book because it was my first kid’s classic and it became my favorite friend and companion throughout my childhood, ….no, throughout my life.

What could that incredible book be? Why The Secret Garden of course.

It was such a favorite book that I even wrote an activity guide to bring the entire book alive, month by month. What I would have done to be Mary and to live at Misselthwaite Manor but most of all to enter that garden.

OK, so knowing this about me, can you imagine my excitement this past November when I got to meet the author of the Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett) great grand-daughter? Oh it was really incredible. I had a little fan girl moment but then again so does her great grand-daughter Penny Dupree. Frances was just the most remarkable person and Penny has dedicated her life to getting her great grandmother’s story out.

While writing A Year in the Secret Garden I discovered that Frances Hodgson Burnett (FHB) started her writing career here in East Tennessee where I live. Last November was the 150th anniversary of her move from England to America and I was honored to be invited to participate with all of the fine folks of New Market, and Jefferson City.

So Let Me Share a Little About Frances Hodgson Burnett (FHB)

Now that you’re in my inner reading circle we’ll always refer to Frances as FHB. So reading friend I have to share with you that FHB was a most remarkable woman. At the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th century, FHB was accomplished woman. She started writing to support her family who had just immigrated to the United States. From the moment she penned and published her first word, she was never turned down by a publisher. At the time of her death she had over 1000 magazine articles, 55 books, and several plays.

In her lifetime she was very well-known and admired as a writer as well as very wealthy. She was an adventurer crossing the Atlantic ocean round-trip 33 times. We owe a lot of thanks to FHB because she is the person who established copyright laws. Another writer tried to steal her story Little Lord Fauntleroy by turning it into a play. FHB wasn’t having any of that, she rewrote her own story into a theater piece and opened up directly across the street from the man who had stolen her story. She ended up running him out of business. Because of this she said that nobody should be allowed to steal another person’s work and so she established the preliminary copyright laws we now hold very dear. At the bottom of that statue are the signatures of some of the most famous writers of the time in the United States.

Penny Deupree in her presentation also shared somethings that wouldn’t be considered good about her great grand mother such as she smoked, drank, and swore. She also suffered the death of one of her sons which left a huge hole in the family. The story has continued thru her great grand-daughter and now her great great grand-daughter who is writing a book about FHB.

During our time together I gave a copy of my book A Year in the Secret Garden to Penny and her family and they just loved it and were so moved. I have to share that I felt FHB was shining down on me and giving her two thumbs up. It was totally an affirmation. Since our time together in November I have felt her on a couple of occasions, like the idea of building a Secret Garden in the city where I live. I’m so glad that inspiration has led me into the Secret Garden and filled it with a lifetime of memories.

(Photo of Penny Deupree and her grandfather Viven Burnett.)

I wish the very same for you. If you sign-up for our Read Kid’s Classic Challenge, this month I’ve prepared a beautiful Secret Garden PDF with loads of activities. It’s completely free.

What’s the Read Kid’s Classic Challenge ?

Every month during our Read Kids Classic Challenge we are going to present one classic that we can’t live without. We’d like you to join as well.

To Participate:We’d like you to share one kids classic that you can’t live without every month. Share it on your blog, vlog and social media using the hashtag #readkidsclassics once a month to let us know what you’ve been reading.

If you should choose to post about your kids classic choice, please let us know the following within your blog post:

• WHEN  did you Discover This Classic?
• WHY did you Chose to Read It with your Family?
• WHAT Makes It A Classic?
• WHAT did you Think of This Classic?

Here’s how I classify classics as old or new (this isn’t an official classification it’s just sort of the way I think of it):

Old Kid’s Classics are those books written before 1950. New Kid’s Classics are those books written after 1950.

But that’s not all

When you sign up for the 2016 Read Kid Classics Challenge every month you will get a PDF that you can download which will have loads of activities on the particular book we’ve chosen to share at Jump into a Book. Each edition of Read the Kids Classics will highlight the story, have good things to eat in our kitchen called Table of Contents, give behind the scenes gossip about the author, easy crafts that kids can do on their own in our craftiness section, questions for the curious, explorations into the world of our featured books, as well as further connections via books like this one and topic booklists so you can find more good reads and finally a visit to the word wizard for some word play.

And Still There’s More-Free Books!

Sign up and join Jump Into A Book’s #ReadKidClassics Challenge to participate in our monthly adventure of sharing personal classic children’s favorites and activities.

On the last day of every month, JIAB will go on a book adventure; an adventure that will put participants in the running to win a bundle of book classics to fill your shelves with. This adventure could be in the form of a Instagram scavenger hunt or as easy as commenting here on JIAB. We just want participants to have fun and earn free books!

As part of this fun book-ish adventure, I will be creating free monthly PDFs of a #ReadKidClassics book and book extensions to give to all participants for their own family reading and fun.

We’re so excited about our challenge. Sign up below and we’ll see you there

Loading…

The post Read Kid’s Classics Challenge: March’s Selection (#readkidsclassics) appeared first on Jump Into A Book.

Being able to detect if someone is about to physically harm us or those around us can be critical for survival, and our brains can make this assessment in tenths of a second. But what happens in the brain while we make these assessments, and how does it occur so fast?

The post Early detection of intentional harm in the human amygdala appeared first on OUPblog.

Pest in Show: The Buzz of Broadway

Music and lyrics by Victoria Jamieson

Meet a picture book that’s a literal production! And, it has narrative to be sure; but it’s in the guise of a sort of Judy Garland/Gene Kelly, “Let’s put on a Show” themed storyline.

And what do all musicals have? Why, songs of course. And, as in all musicals, it has conflict before the show opens and drama both back stage and on stage.

And here, in Pest in Show, there’s sibling rivalry afoot from the footlights as Ladybug, a diva, if ever there was one, wants a solo star turn.

The “fly in her ointment” is literally her  brother named, of course…Fly! Flies are known to be, well, pests, and the sibling known as Fly, in Pest in Show has honed his character to a fair thee well. It’s a role he was made for, and one his sister abhors!

Young readers may easily identify with either the much longed for solo role diva, or the younger one that’s always trying to literally get into the act here.

When you are the writer, producer, director AND star of your own vehicle, Ladybug naturally wants the full glare of the white hot spotlight on her alone; while Fly is anxious for a stage debut in sis’s production.

I can tell you there’s a lot of begging, bugging and wheedling on Fly’s part to well, get a part in this show of shows. He sees it as his breakout role.

Told to stay put, Fly is sticking like the veritable paper named after him. And by Act 2, when perspective hits such as “The Real Spiders” hummed to the “every kid knows it” tune of “The Itsy Bitsy Spider,” the one-ups-manship of these two insects kicks into high wire gear.

Act 3 sees Ladybug atop a cake singing a song named for her alone and has all the style of a Busby Berkley extravaganza with insects on each of the tiers of the cake. She’s the icing on the cake until…disaster ensues with Fly doing his own star turn on an empty hollow garbage drum he’s conveniently emptied on sis’s cake!

Super Fly is doing his own gig and drum solo to the tune of “Popeye the Sailor Man”

Can these two insects ever intersect in a show peacefully?

It takes a Finale with an all-bug dance-off. Victoria Jamieson shows young readers a  shimmying, wing flapping, foot stomping, wiggling, squiggling competition between a host of jumping and jiving insects joining in with Ladybug and Fly to see who wins.

Does exhaustion ensue? Will they be booed off the stage?

Or are two bugs better than one with a star and her more than willing co-star, named Fly?

Roger Fleabert gave it a “Six Thumbs Up!”

And if you hear your kids singing the songs, why not teach them to do Chubby Checker’s “The Fly.” It’s a kick!

Here’s how to do it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w8XBsNa8EwQ

In honor of Women’s History Month, we’ve rounded up ten of our books that feature some amazing women of color! From a baseball player to an American politician, these women have helped pave the way for many others.

1. Wangari Maathai, Seeds of Change: Planting a Path to Peace – the first African woman, and environmentalist, to win a Nobel Peace Prize

2. Marcenia Lyle, Catching the Moon: The Story of a Young  Girl’s Baseball Dream – the first woman to play for an all-male professional baseball team

3. Anna May Wong, Shining Star: The Anna May Wong Story – the first Chinese American movie star

4. Florence Mills, Baby Flo: Florence Mills Lights Up the Stage – an international dancing and singing superstar during the Harlem Renaissance

5. Augusta Savage, In Her Hands: The Story of Sculptor Augusta Savage– a sculptor during the Harlem Renaissance who carved out her own special place in art history

6. Pura Belpré, The Storyteller’s Candle / La velita de los cuentos – New York City’s first Latina librarian

7. Patsy Mink, How We Are Smart – an American politician from the U.S. state of Hawaii

8. Hiromi Suzuki, Hiromi’s Hands – one of a handful of women in the male-dominated world of sushi chefs

9. Rosa Parks, Dear Mrs. Parks: A Dialogue with Today’s Youth – Mrs. Parks changed the course of history when she was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger on a Montgomery, Alabama bus, sparking the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement

10. Zora Neale Hurston, Zora Hurston and the Chinaberry Tree – renowned African American writer

We’ve also created a Women’s History Collection, available now for purchase on our website.

Further reading on Women’s History Month:

• Where Do Boys Belong In Women’s History Month?
• Resources For Teaching About Wangari Maathai And Seeds Of Change

The Secret Subway  by Shana Corey illustrated by Red Nose Studios Schwartz & Wade, 2016 ISBN: 978-0-375-87071-2 Grades K-5 In the 1860s, stagecoaches, horses, peddlers and garbage clogged the streets of New York City. Coeditor of Scientific American, Alfred Ely Beach, had an innovative solution to the city's problem: an underground train powered by a fan. Corey's engaging narrative style brings

We seem to be witnessing a broad reaction against the New Atheism movement by atheists as well as religious believers, whether undermining the idea of a long-standing conflict between science and religion, or taking a critical view of their political agenda. James Ryerson recently examined three new books (including my own) in the New York Times Book Review – a small sample of a growing body of work.

The post Growing criticism by atheists of the New Atheism movement appeared first on OUPblog.

• Take note of settings. Many of the places we've sketched in are venues I've never been to before. Making notes on all the fresh sights and sounds and smells, recording what I liked about the place (and what I didn't) has all gone into my sketch journals along with my drawing.
• Take note of details: Architecture, clothing, people watching . . . So much of what makes a story come to life depends on the details. Taking a few hours to really concentrate on every single little thing can only add to your next story project.
• Photography. Okay, let's say you really, really don't want to draw. Take pictures instead! Who knows, photography may become an entirely new vocation for you, one that fits your written work perfectly.
• Artist's Date: Before, during, and after. Most writers I know find the hardest advice to follow in Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way to be taking the "Artist's Date," probably because it involves a) going by yourself, and b) treating yourself to something fun. Writers are notoriously mean to themselves, especially when they feel they haven't written enough or to the quality they expect on any given day. Hence the need for the artist's date. Urban Sketchers allows you to start out in the security of a group, but then sends you on your way to discover your own unique path for a few hours. Take advantage of the time alone to do something that pleases your writer-self while feeding your entire creative being. (And you can buy yourself a treat somewhere along the way too!)
• Meet creative people. Who knows? They might be writers! (Or want to read your books!) Seeing the work of others is always inspiring.
• Get out of your comfort zone. Sketching, especially in public, might seem a scary thing if you've never tried it before. But if you can get over your initial fear of "What will people think?" wow, imagine how confident you'll be pitching a manuscript, or cold-calling on bookstores. Or even starting a new manuscript!
• Sketching is meditative. Remember how much fun you had when you were a  little kid and able to zone out with your crayons and paper? Believe it or not, you were meditating at the same time. Giving yourself that same childlike joy for a few hours now and then can help you solve a myriad of character and/or plot problems. 

Going back even further in time at the Natural History Museum:

If you do decide to visit your local Urban Sketchers, some essentials you'll need to bring along are: a collapsible camping-type stool, a set of color pencils (much easier and cleaner than fussing with watercolors or felt pens), a pencil sharpener, a sketch pen that you also like to write with, a hardback journal or sketchbook, hat and/or sunglasses, optional camera. Minimal tools for maximum fun.

This week JJ and Kelly discuss Voice in another installment of their Writing Mechanics series. Voice: What is it? How can you develop it? How many times can they say “voice” in a single episode?

Show Notes

• What is voice? JJ talks about it a little on her blog.
• Understand Voice and Tone in Writing by Grammar Girl
• How to Craft a Great Voice by Nathan Bransford

What We’re Reading/Books Discussed

• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
• A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket
• You: A Novel by Caroline Kepnes
• The Lover’s Dictionary by David Levithan
• Angus, Thongs, and Full-Frontal Snogging by Louise Rennison
• Wintersong by S. Jae-Jones
• Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys
• Poison Study, Magic Study, and Fire Study by Maria V. Snyder
• Bryony and Roses by T. Kingfisher

Off Menu Recommendations

• Still The Black Tapes and Tanis podcasts
• The No-Sleep Podcast (and associated subreddit)
• Kelly is still on the fence about Dawson’s Creek

What We’re Working On

• Kelly will be teaching another class on contracts at the Loft Literary Center and working on her YA novel
• JJ is juggling several different writing projects and is trying to figure out what to work on next

That’s all for this week! Next week we’ll be doing our QUERY CRITIQUE podcast!

California Poppy, taken after last week’s lush rain

My formative years as a librarian were in library systems that built themselves around the concept of aggregated strength through collective action. (If you’re thinking that sounds socialist, take heed that this concept could easily describe the armed forces.)

That concept has a very weak toehold in California, across all systems. Yes, there are some shared systems and some resource-sharing and “power of this and that” and whatnot, but colleagues I know who can compare California with states with strong “systems” self-identification agree that for whatever reason, it’s different here.

Now fast-forward to early last year, when as a newly-minted CSU library dean I smoothed my starched pinafore, straightened the bow in my hair, and marched into my first statewide meeting, only to be corrected when I referred to our library “system” that the 23 state university libraries are actually a “loose federation.”

There are long-term ramifications to being a “loose federation” that are publicly available to anyone who cares to find them. To quote my doctoral cohort buddy Chuck, “We must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.” (Ben Franklin may or may not have said that, but Chuck says it a lot.) But more interesting to me is that not long before I arrived, our loose federation came together on a momentous decision that puts us on a path to systemhood by agreeing that the 23 libraries, currently independently licensing a mishmosh of library management systems from varied vendors, would move to a single system, prophetically named the ULMS (Unified Library Management System).

In all fairness, this isn’t the first collective effort of the Loose Federation. We stand on the shoulders of Biblio-Giants, which in my case is particularly helpful since it means I can see the projector screen even when taller deans are in front of me. We have a common core of e-resources that are centrally funded and brokered. In times past, there have been joint statements, strategic plans, and so on. It is because of our ancestors we can at least think of ourselves as a Loose Federation, versus 23 libraries doing their own thang.

I’m part of a committee that is deeply involved in the process to identify and answer key questions related to resource sharing. It is possible… just a wee possible… that it might have been good to ask some of these questions, if not before agreeing to move to a unified system, at least within the context of the vendor selection, but that’s spilled milk.

As we deepen the questions we pose and study the data for our answers, it’s increasingly evident that there’s a critical difference between agreeing we will provide all libraries a garden-variety database we would all license anyway versus agreeing that we’re going to move to a centralized system. This is one of those movies where two people go on a date and then find themselves married, except it’s biblio-polygamy, and most of us are opposed to polygamy on the practical ground that multiple spouses sounds exhaustingly complicated, like having more than two cats, and when you add librarians to the mix it sounds even scarier.

First, we’re losing local control to a central office, so we need to design and practice governance at a scale we haven’t experienced before. The central office needs our guidance (and they are the first to say that). We no longer have the luxury of having weak or strong governance years. We need to be always on our game. And the communication across and among the 23 libraries needs to be top-notch.

Second, the new system simultaneously provides opportunities and limitations. For example — the example I’m most intimate with — we will have the capacity to share resources among the 23 libraries as we have never done before. We’ve done it with physical books, but in a work-around-y, hodgepodge  manner, and we haven’t done it with e-resources. That opportunity/limitation opens many doors and poses many questions. The smartest folks are either thrilled or alarmed by this because they see a future where our physical and electronic library collections are managed and shared on a massive scale.

The thrilled-or-alarmed crowd also understands (at least I think they do) that some of the most keenly-desired wishes of the resource-sharing community can–in some cases, will need to–come to fruition. I particularly relished the moment earlier this week where I spoke with an expert who noted a particular limitation that would make most interlibrary loan department heads I know of faint for joy, because it would frog-march us to the Promised Land of standardized loan policies, where we would all have to–are you sitting down? Do you have smelling salts pressed to your nose?–agree on how long a borrower at another library could check out a book. (As Trotsky said, “You may not be interested in standardized resource-sharing loan policies, but standardized resource-sharing loan policies are very interested in you.”) And that’s just one teensy finding that has surfaced.

There are many more ramifications of this system move; most, I believe, will be good. But what I am also being reminded of is that change is a hurricane or a door. The people who expected this to be like things always were, except maybe a little less expensive and labor-intensive, are now spinning in the eye of the hurricane, wondering what hit them. The people who saw this as leading to opportunities both seen and unseen are slowly (not without pain, but with keen anticipation) opening a massive door to our future.

Bookmark to: