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I'm back, writing friends, with more info about the workshops at The Writer's Plot 2012 Conference. Alan Gratz  Words from Alan Gratz Alan is a highly successful children’s/young adults’ author right here in the Carolinas. His presentation was fun and informative. If you ever get the chance to hear him (like at the SCBWI-C Conference this September) DO! Alan drilled into our

Writers often live or die by how engagingly they convey the extreme merits of something: a character’s beauty or strength, an impassioned cause, a life-altering event. But equally crucial is how convincingly writers can extol—okay, “hype”— their own work in queries and marketing.

Some editors rightly warn against over-hyping in a proposal; but a touch of deft hype may be just what wins the day, with benefits far outweighing the risks. The greater danger is to acclaim your work with feeble, tread-worn superlatives such as nerve-tingling or heartwarming, which is like a billboard saying NO DISTINCTIVE VOICE HERE.

Guest column by Arthur Plotnik, acclaimed editor and author
whose eight books include the recent Better Than Great:
A Plenitudinous Compendium of Wallopingly Fresh Superlatives (2011)
and newly revised and expanded The Elements of Expression:
Putting Thoughts Into Words (2012). He lives in Chicago.

In publishing, hype is the creation of interest by dramatic, flamboyant, or other exaggerating means; it is expected, even appreciated when done well. Through eight books, I’ve seen the best hype in my proposals picked up by agents selling the project, editors presenting it, and marketers promoting it.

In virtually all types of writing, authors need a commanding language of acclaim—an armament of fresh, inventive, attention-getting terms to describe exceptional qualities. The habitual terms won’t do. Words like great, fantastic and incredible have been gnawed to the bone in acclaiming everything from nail salons to chicken wings. How, then, are writers to describe their work or themselves as something especially excellent or affecting, distinctively intense or cool? One answer: With the help of distinctively fresh superlatives.

In common usage, “superlatives” refer to terms that confer extraordinary or exaggerated qualities on something: “She’s a goddess.” “What a celestial performance!” When positive in value they becomes high praise or acclaim; but once-worthy superlatives like amazing are almost devaluing after their billionth indiscriminate use.

To alert agents and editors to your distinctiveness, try acclaiming your work and yourself in a strikingly fresh way. That way might call for terms that quickly signal your project’s importance and impact—not clichés like major and mind-boggling, but apt choices from among such superlatives as singular, consummate, indelible, razor-edged

This past month, I finished my first full term as Wisconsin’s Chapter Councilor on the ALA Council.  It has been a great adventure and I can hardly wait for the next two years of services as I continue my term. I have spent decades as an ALSC leader – serving on committees and as committee chair on process committees and even a time or two on an award committee. I have also spent decades as a leader in my own state association.  Combining these two streams of process junkie-hood and leadership makes for a perfect preparation for Council.

When I first talked to my library colleagues both in state and nationally about my new Council service, the biggest surprise I had was how many sympathized for me and thanked me for serving in such a difficult assignment.  What?!?! Were they nuts? I was looking forward to a new level of service and leadership. Was I missing something?

Happily, no. The Council of the past and the monster nightmare of people’s imaginations is not the ALA Council I serve on.  There is certainly debate but the rancor is missing. People have been welcoming, have provided support and insight for me and I can say that after one year I am feeling like I am home. I am getting to know some smart, savvy caring people from all types of libraries and all library positions. I am making contacts across divisions as well and talking about the issues I care about and becoming more knowledgable about issues that matter to others.  I am becoming stronger and smarter (I think!).

Just one little teeny tiny thing is missing for me.  Youth colleagues and leaders from ALSC are very few and far between. I have plenty of youth peeps from YALSA and AASL but ALSC is sadly underrepresented.  Where are you, my friends?

I know in the past we have had many more folks representing ALSC as at-large members.  Would you like to consider joining our small but merry (and meaningful) band?  It’s easy. You can submit your name to the nominations committee. You can petition for a spot on the ballot with a mere 25 signatures of ALA members which you can garner online.

It is amazing feeling to effect change on a divisional level and to work on behalf of youth librarianship and kids on that stage.  It is an extraordinary feeling to do the same thing on the ALA Council level. Won’t you consider joining me there?  I promise you, the water is fine….and fun!

Our guest blogger today is Marge Loch-Wouters, the Youth Services Coordinator at La Crosse (WI) Public Library. Marge is active in ALSC and blogs regularly about youth library services issues at Tiny Tips for Library Fun

If you’d like to write a guest post for the ALSC Blog, please contact Mary Voors, ALSC Blog manager, at alscblog@gmail.com.

       At Wales Online Rachael Misstear reports that Author Julian Ruck attacks taxpayer-funding for Welsh writers, as:

He said: "The Welsh publishing industry is nothing more than a parasitical, elitist carbuncle on the hide of a struggling Welsh economy.

       In the Global Times Lu Qianwen finds Publishers turn a new page, in their embrace of publishing fiction in translation, as:

Besides the substantial demographic of readers in the country, increasing interest in this sector is due to the low-risk factor for publishers, in introducing work that is already popular in other countries.

"Many domestic publishers are publishing translated literature as a way to strengthen their status," said Han Weidong, president of STPH. "These works have been tested in the foreign market."

Please link the Slice of Life Story you write today to this post by leaving a comment. Be sure to check out other bloggers’ writing by clicking through the links in the comment… Read More →

Making mix CDs isn’t the only way outside my writing that I get my creative kicks. I also enjoy making the occasional piece of visual art, but I don’t think to do it nearly often enough. So, I’d like to thank author/illustrator Peter H. Reynolds (The Dot, among other books) for giving me the prompt I needed by inviting me to contribute a piece of art for International Dot Day.

Every year on September 15, innovative educators around the world celebrate International Dot Day by making time to encourage their students’ creativity. After the last International Dot Day, we were overwhelmed by wonderful stories about the “outside-the-box” activities educators invented for their students. September 15th will be here before you know it — this year, we encourage even more kids and grown-up kids to “make their mark” in new and exciting ways!

You can see what I made here. As for how I made it: I found magazine pictures that made me think of heat and light (the sun setting over the University of Texas tower, a grilled-cheese sandwich in a skillet, a farmer inspecting his crops during a drought, a kid coming down a water slide, etc.), cut them into strips, then wove those strips together and overlaid them with a sheet of paper with a circle ripped out of the center. I had no idea what I was going to make when I started, but I had a lot of fun, found the whole thing both challenging and relaxing, and I could not have enjoyed the process more.

I’d even go so far as to say that making art is more fun than cleaning out my stash of “author stuff,” but that has its benefits, too — such as coming across random items that I thought would be fun to give away to teachers and school librarians getting ready to return to school.

What sort of stuff? Well, there are these:

These are three dozen signed Shark Vs. Train bookplates. Book fairs have been known to sell a copy or two of Shark Vs. Train — being able to affix the author’s signature inside the book might make that purchase all the more special.

And then there are these:

When I sign copies of The Day-Glo Brothers, I like to use daylight-fluorescent paint pens — orange and green, specifically. The thing is, they come in three-packs that include a yellow pen, and brilliant as those yellow ones are, I just don’t think that signatures made with them would be quite as dazzling as those made with orange or green. So, I’ve accumulated 10 of them, and I’m going to give the whole bunch of them away.

These giveaways will be to teachers and school librarians who are signed up for my Bartography Express newsletter through the “Win a Book!” section on my home page. As that wording on my site suggests, I give away books, too, and next week’s giveaway of these extra goodies will be in addition to the regular giveaway open to all Bartography Express subscribers.

And if that’s not enticement enough, in September and October, I’ll also be giving away copies of Marc Tyler Nob

Up! Tall! And High! (but not necessarily in that order.)
By Ethan Long
G. P. Putnam’s Sons (an division of Penguin)
$15.99
ISBN: 978-0-399-25611-0
Ages 4-8
On shelves now

There was a running gag going around earlier this year that either Dan Santat was the Matthew Cordell of 2012 or Matthew Cordell was the Dan Santat. I’ll explain. Both men have a whole SLEW of picture books out in the current year, and we found it funny how prolific both seemed. Prolific they most certainly are, but let’s be honest. Neither of them hold a candle to Ethan Long. As far as I can ascertain he has at least seven titles authored and illustrated by himself out in 2012 from publishers as diverse as Penguin, Blue Apple Books, Holiday House, and Running Press Kids. I did ask someone recently how he did it. They just shrugged in response. “He’s an animator”, they said, by way of explanation. “He’s used to working fast.” I’m not saying that isn’t so, but fast does not normally mean good. Yet good is inevitably what Mr. Long is. I’ve read all seven of those books and though there is a dip in quality from time to time, overall the man is strangely consistently above par. Of course, of all his 2012 fare Up! Tall! And High! is the top of the top. Bar none, this is one of the best toddler/preschooler readalouds of 2012 if not THE best.

In three little chapters we meet a variety of cheerful birds, more than happy to explain to readers the vagarities between terms like “Up” and “Tall” and “High”. In the first story two birds inform the reader that they are tall. When a third stilt-wearing bird is called out for not really being tall (despite its claims), he makes the pertinent point that though he may not be tall his plumage when fluffed is NOT small. In story #2 a morose penguin laments that he cannot go high. That is, until a little bird provides the perfect solution. Finally, in the third story two birds go up . . . and then come down unexpectedly. Long fills his pages with vibrant colors and clear-cut lines, just as his birds speak with simple but clever wordplay.

This is a good example of a seemingly simple book, perfect both for those with short attention spans and those first learning to read. Yet it is capable of making a pretty complex idea easy to understand. You can’t blame the kid who has a hard time distinguishing between the concepts of “up” and “tall” and “high”. All of them require a kind of vertical momentum, yet they aren’t really the same thing. It might have been tempting to Mr. Long to confuse the issue by showing things like the fact that you can be up and high without being tall or you can be tall and up without being high. Instead he keeps everything basic and understandable and funny. The first chapter has six different words, the second chapter has thirteen distinct words, and the third chapter has fifteen. That makes it easy enough to read, while also explaining compl

My friend Dan O’Shannon (writer of Redux Riding Hood, Modern Family, The Fan and The Flower) is slowly starting a new website, O’Shannonland, devoted to the many things he loves – including comedy writing, comics (his own) and the City of Cleveland. Knowing Dan, I fully expect to see posts on Fleischer’s Popeye and the Lost In Space robot relatively soon. In the meantime, he has compiled a group of music cues from the classic soundtracks to Grantray-Lawrence’s Spider-Man (1967) TV series. This is the cool-jazzy Ray Ellis music, not the public domain KPM library music that began to show up in the second season. Obscure – but someone had to do it. Thanks Dan. More about the Spider-Man TV music at WFMU’s blog.

Cartoon Brew | Permalink | 2 comments | Post tags: Dan O'Shannon, Spider-Man

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Happy reading!

Artie

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Artie’s children’s book Living Green: A Turtle’s Quest for a Cleaner Planet is now available as a free video for kids through StoryCub. A shortlist finalist for the national 2012 Green Earth Book Award, Thurman the turtle is tired of seeing the land he loves cluttered with trash and decides to take action.

To watch the Living Green video and many other books on StoryCub.org, please click on the cover below. StoryCub videos are one of the most watched programs on Apple’s iTunes Kids & Family section.

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