Happy Birthday

today to

Cindy Pon

for her new YA novel

SERPENTINE

This book is getting awesome reviews from from the big reviewers and has been selected as a Junior Library Guild selection for Fall 2015. See what other YA fantasy authors have to say about it:

“Vivid worldbuilding, incendiary romance, heart-pounding action, and characters that will win you over–I highly recommend Serpentine.” Cinda Williams Chima, bestselling author of the Seven Realms and Heir Chronicles fantasy novels

“Serpentine is unique and surprising, with a beautifully-drawn fantasy world that sucked me right in! I love Skybright’s transformative power, and how she learns to take charge of it.” ~Kristin Cashore, New York Times bestselling of the Graceling Realm Series

“Serpentine’s world oozes with lush details and rich lore, and the characters crackle with life. This is one story that you’ll want to lose yourself in.” ~ Marie Lu, New York Times bestselling author of Legend and The Young Elites

Hop over to Cindy’s website to find out more about it and get an eyeful of Cindy’s beautiful artwork!

The Essential Workshop for Fiction Writers

If you haven’t signed up for this workshop with Kimberly Morris yet, I think there are still a few spots available. This is a one-day workshop on Saturday, September 26. Join us for 25 years of Kimberly’s professional writing experience distilled into 4 hours of intuitive, entertaining, and easy-to-digest instruction that you can immediately apply to a new or stalled manuscript. This workshop is for writers of any genre of fiction; chapter books, middle grade, young adult and adult. Go here for more information and to register!

Here’s this week’s Houston area events:

SEPTEMBER 8, TUESDAY, 7:00-9:00 PM
SCBWI Houston
Tracy Gee Community Center, 3599 Westcenter Drive
Cost: FREE

A panel of local SCBWI members will discuss the topics covered in the recent annual SCBWI International Conference in Los Angeles. Also, this is the night local author Varsha Bajaj is presented with SCBWI’s Texas/Oklahoma Region Crystal Kite Award for her 2014 debut MG novel, ABBY SPENCER GOES TO BOLLYWOOD. The Crystal Kite is a peer-given award to recognize great books from 15 SCBWI regional divisions around the world.

SEPTEMBER 10, THURSDAY, 5:00 PM
Blue Willow Bookshop
Patricia Polacco, PB Author/Illustrator
Cost: FREE! In order to go through the signing line and meet Patricia Polacco, please purchase TUCKY JO AND LITTLE HEART from Blue Willow Bookshop. Please see Blue Willow’s event page for more information.

Patricia Polacco will share her new picture book for children, TUCKY JO AND LITTLE HEART. Tucky Jo was known as the “kid from Kentucky” when he enlisted in the army at age fifteen. Being the youngest recruit in the Pacific during World War II was tough. But he finds a friend in a little girl who helps him soothe his bug bites, and he gets to know her family and gives them some of his rations. Although the little girl doesn’t speak English, Tucky Jo and Little Heart share the language of kindness. Many years later, Tucky Jo and Little Heart meet again, and an act of kindness is returned when it’s needed the most in this touching picture book based on a true story.

SEPTEMBER 12, SATURDAY, 9:30 AM-5:00 PM
Writespace
Novel Workshop with Chris Rogers
Cost: $75 Members, $95 Non-members

This workshop will take you quickly through the basics of novel structure and will equip you to create an intriguing plot, wonderful characters and page-turning suspense. Topics we will cover include: The 12-Step Story Plan; Dramatic & Reflective Structure; Plot, Point of View & Characterization; Suspense, Tension & Conflict; Subplot & Pacing; Emotional Connections

This workshop will meet you wherever you are in your novel writing process, so feel free to come with a completed novel draft, with a completed first chapter, or without a particular plan in mind, but open to new possibilities.

SEPTEMBER 13, SUNDAY, 2:00 PM
Blue Willow Bookshop
Robin Preiss Glasser, Illustrator
Cost: FREE! In order to go through the signing line and meet Robin Preiss Glasser for book personalization, please purchase NANCY CLANCY: SOCCER MANIA from Blue Willow Bookshop. See Blue Willow’s event page for more information.

Robin Preiss Glasser, illustrator of the wildly popular FANCY NACY series, will share her new book, NANCY CLANCY: SOCCER MANIA. Normally Nancy doesn t like dressing like everyone else. But wearing a soccer team uniform well, that’s different. Nancy adores being on the Green Goblins she loves cheering for her teammates, sharing refreshments, and painting her fingernails bright green before every game. If only she wasn t cursed with slow legs All Nancy wants is to be mediocre or maybe even a little better than average. Will she reach her goal? Here’s a brand-new chapter book with plenty of humor and sports action, written expressly for kids like Nancy who aren’t the star of their team.

Happy September! This is the month that always makes me want to buy boots and sweaters, even though in my part of Texas neither of those things is really necessary more than one or two weeks out of the year, and then not until January. Being the first of the month, I’ve added a slew of September book babies to the slider on my conference pages. Check it out to get a peek at all the delicious new reads!

Happy Book Birthday

this week to

Linda Joy Singelton’s Cinderella-inspired YA, NEVER BEEN TEXTED,

to Dax Varley’s YA horror novel, BLEED,

and to Josh Funk’s LADY PANCAKE & SIR FRENCH TOAST, illustrated by Brendan Kearney.

NEVER BEEN TEXTED: When Ashlee’s stepdad completely forgets her birthday she takes matters into her own hands to get the one thing she really wants: her own cell phone. But text messages start rolling in from a broken-hearted boy, and though Ashlee knows not all stories end happily, she’s determined to make hers the best it can be. Balancing a bit of magic, the love of a pet dog, the support of a well-meaning and meddling friend, and the dream of a sweet romance, Ashlee must decide whether or not to pursue a boy who’s been recently entangled with her high school’s most vicious girl.

BLEED: Life is a nightmare for Miranda Murphy. Without knowing when or why, blood oozes from her palms—an anomaly that makes her feel like a freak. But her abnormality is now the least of her worries. She’s just enrolled at “Suicide High.” Three deaths in three months—one occurring just days before her arrival. When she bumps into a cute boy named Jake, things don’t appear so glum. Especially since Jake’s a psychic who can predict the immediate future. But his gift of sight can’t prepare her for the horrors that await. Through Jake, Miranda meets three other extraordinary students: Topher, who can heal by touch; Sam, who eats the sins of the dead; and Xyan, who speaks and understands all languages. It’s then that Miranda learns the secret behind why she bleeds. When it becomes evident that supernatural forces are at play, the five determined friends team up. Now it’s up to them to destroy the evil infecting their school. Head over to Dax’s website to read an excerpt!

LADY PANCAKE & SIR FRENCH TOAST: A thoroughly delicious picture book about the funniest “food fight!” ever! Lady Pancake and Sir French Toast have a beautiful friendship—until they discover that there’s ONLY ONE DROP of maple syrup left. Off they go, racing past the Orange Juice Fountain, skiing through Sauerkraut Peak, and reeling down the linguini. But who will enjoy the sweet taste of victory? And could working together be better than tearing each other apart? The action-packed rhyme makes for an adrenaline-filled breakfast . . . even without a drop of coffee!

Now for this week’s Greater Houston Area events:

SEPTEMBER 5, SATURDAY, 9:30 AM – 12:30 PM
Writespace
Writers’ Workshop with K.J. Russell
COST: $30 Members, $45 Non-members

Dialogue: Let Your Characters’ Words Bring Your Story to Life! Tell your exposition to take a break and let your characters do some of the talking for you! There’s no better tool to give your fiction and nonfiction a unique new voice and grounded perspective than well-crafted dialogue. Cut back on static narration and character description by letting the characters demonstrate themselves and the world around them. In this workshop, K.J. Russell will discuss the many uses of dialogue, what craft problems dialogue can solve, and how to execute it with a confidence that will lend your story the kind of life that readers are looking for.

SEPTEMBER 8, MONDAY, 7:00-9:00 PM
SCBWI Houston
Tracy Gee Community Center, 3599 Westcenter Drive
Cost: FREE

A panel of local SCBWI members will discuss the topics covered in the recent annual SCBWI International Conference in Los Angeles.

This week I want to wish a Happy Book Birthday to two books which debut on the 15th:

I THOUGHT THIS WAS A BEAR BOOK

by author Tara Lazar and illustrator Benji Davies

After an unfortunate bookcase collapse, Alien suddenly finds himself jolted out of his story and into a very strange world, complete with talking bears. Desperate to return to his book, Alien asks the Bear family for help so he can get back to his story and save his beloved Planet Zero from total destruction before it’s too late.

Mama Bear and Papa Bear try all kinds of zany contraptions (with some help from their nemesis, Goldilocks) without much luck. Baby Bear might have the perfect solution to get the Alien out of the woods and back to his planet…but will anyone listen to the littlest voice in the story?

and

FOR THE RIGHT TO LEARN:

MALALA YOUSAFZAI’S STORY

by Rebecca Langston-George, Illustrated by Janna Bock

from Capstone Press

This week’s Author Event:

August 15, Saturday, 3:00 PM
Blue Willow Bookshop
Tom McNeely, MG/YA Author

Tom McNeely will discuss and sign his book, GHOST HORSE. Set amidst the social tensions of 1970’s Houston, Ghost Horse tells the story of eleven-year-old Buddy Turner’s shifting alliances within his fragmented family and with two other boys–one Anglo, one Latino–in their quest to make a Super-8 animated movie. As his father’s many secrets begin to unravel, Buddy discovers the real movie: the intersection between life as he sees it and the truth of his own past. In a vivid story of love, friendship, and betrayal, Ghost Horse explores a boy’s swiftly changing awareness of himself and the world through the lens of imagination.

Three writing events in Houston this week:

AUGUST 11, TUESDAY, 6:30-8:30 PM
The Houston Writers’ Guild
Trini Mendenhall Community Center, 1414 Wirt Rd.
Julian Kindred: Bringing Structure to the Organic Writer: Helping “Pantsers” Give their Plots Direction
Cost:$10 Members; $20 Nonmembers; $5 Students w/ID.

Writers tend to fall into one of two categories: gardeners and architects. This former group is also sometimes called “pantsers” for the way they write “by the seat of their pants.” This workshop is for this group, for whom writing is an almost external force and aims to help these writers explore methods for giving their work a cohesive plot, solid ending and overall sense of structure. Exercises will include methods for predicting character reactions and utilizing a fluid plot outline.

AUGUST 11, TUESDAY, 7:00 PM
Writespace
Elizabeth White-Olsen: Critiquapalooza
Cost: $25-$35

Have you ever wondered what a critique from a professional editor is like? Do you wish you could have an editor’s support and feedback, but you don’t feel ready to incur the cost? Or, are you just starting out and you would like to know what aspects of craft to consider when you’re writing a novel? Join us for Critiquapalooza, a fast and fun, yet in-depth look at dozens of craft elements essential to creating great stories. At Critiquapalooza you’ll learn what an editor looks for when he or she is determining whether to publish a submission.

AUGUST 18, TUESDAY, 7:30 PM
Bay Area RWA
Kirkmont MUD Building, 10102 Blackhawk Road
Fern Brady: Conflict

In this presentation Fern will discuss how the four types of conflict can be integrated within individual scenes to add depth and tension.  Come prepared with your work in progress, if you want to try the technique out as a revision strategy or come ready to write. The objective is for each participant to be able to use the strategy and discuss its impact on the story.

Today I’m celebrating three book birthdays: a Young Adult, a Middle Grade and a Picture Book!

Happy Book Birthday!

SCBWI Western Washington author Shannon Grogan

and

SCBWI Oklahoma authors Tammi Sauer and Sonia Gensler!

FROM WHERE I WATCH YOU by Shannon Grogan, Soho Teen

Sixteen-year-old Kara is about to realize her dream of becoming a professional baker. Beautifully designed and piped, her cookies are masterpieces, but also her ticket out of rainy Seattle—if she wins the upcoming national baking competition and its scholarship prize to culinary school in California. Kara can no longer stand the home where her family lived, laughed, and ultimately imploded after her mean-spirited big sister Kellen died in a drowning accident. Kara’s dad has since fled, and her mom has turned from high-powered attorney into a nutty holy-rolling Christian fundamentalist peddling “Soul Soup” in the family café. All Kara has left are memories of better times.

But the past holds many secrets, and they come to light as Kara faces a secret terror. Someone is leaving her handwritten notes. Someone who knows exactly where she is and what she’s doing. As they lead her to piece together the events that preceded Kellen’s terrible, life-changing betrayal years before, she starts to catch glimpses of her dead sister: an unwelcome ghost in filthy Ugg boots. If Kara doesn’t figure out who her stalker is, and soon, she could lose everything. Her chance of escape. The boy she’s beginning to love and trust. And even her life.

YOUR ALIEN by Tammi Sauer, Sterling Children’s Books

“One day, you’ll be looking out your window when something wonderful comes your way and you will want to keep him. ”
When a little boy meets a stranded alien child, the two instantly strike up a fabulous friendship. They go to school, explore the neighborhood, and have lots of fun. But at bedtime, the alien suddenly grows very, very sad. Can the boy figure out what his new buddy needs most of all? This funny, heartwarming story proves that friends and family are the most important things in the universe . . . no matter who or where you are.

GHOSTLIGHT by Sonia Gensler Alfred A. Knopf /Random House

Nothing ever happens on Avery’s grandmother’s sprawling farm, where she and her brother spend the summers. That is, until Avery meets Julian, a city boy with a famous dad, whose family is renting a nearby cottage. When Julian announces his plan to film a ghost story, Avery jumps at the chance to join him.

Unfortunately, Julian wants to film at Hilliard House, a looming, empty mansion that Grandma has absolutely forbidden her to enter. As terrified as Avery is of Grandma’s wrath, she finds the allure of filmmaking impossible to resist.

When the kids explore the secrets of Hilliard House, eerie things being to happen, and the “imaginary” dangers in their movie threaten to become very real. Have Avery and Julian awakened a menacing presence? Can they turn back before they go too far?

And it has a cool trailer!

Houston, we have two writing workshops this week!

AUGUST 11, TUESDAY, 6:30-8:30 PM
The Houston Writers’ Guild
Trini Mendenhall Community Center, 1414 Wirt Rd.
Julian Kindred: Bringing Structure to the Organic Writer: Helping “Pantsers” Give their Plots Direction
Cost:$10 Members; $20 Nonmembers; $5 Students w/ID.

Writers tend to fall into one of two categories: gardeners and architects. This former group is also sometimes called “pantsers” for the way they write “by the seat of their pants.” This workshop is for this group, for whom writing is an almost external force and aims to help these writers explore methods for giving their work a cohesive plot, solid ending and overall sense of structure. Exercises will include methods for predicting character reactions and utilizing a fluid plot outline.

AUGUST 11, TUESDAY, 7:00 PM
Writespace
Elizabeth White-Olsen: Critiquapalooza
Cost: $25-$35

Have you ever wondered what a critique from a professional editor is like? Do you wish you could have an editor’s support and feedback, but you don’t feel ready to incur the cost? Or, are you just starting out and you would like to know what aspects of craft to consider when you’re writing a novel? Join us for Critiquapalooza, a fast and fun, yet in-depth look at dozens of craft elements essential to creating great stories. At Critiquapalooza you’ll learn what an editor looks for when he or she is determining whether to publish a submission.

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Hey folks, there’s a new hedgehog in town! Happy book birthday to SCBWI Oklahoma member Tammi Sauer’s GINNY LOUISE AND THE SCHOOL SHOWDOWN! Illustrated by Lynn Munsinger. The Truman Elementary Troublemakers are a bad bunch. Especially these three: Cap’n Catastrophe, Destructo Dude, and Make-My-Day May. But they are no match for Ginny Louise, the new hedgehog in school. Her unwavering cheerfulness in the face of their bullying will make young readers holler with glee. Full of rhymes, wordplay, and comic misunderstanding, this book will lend itself well to reading aloud as well as discussions about peer dynamics.

I’ve got some great reading lined up this week. I wasn’t able to attend SCBWI Houston member Jennifer Mathieu’s launch for her second young adult novel DEVOTED on Saturday, but I went by Blue Willow Bookshop yesterday and picked up the book she signed for me. I’ve heard great things about it, and I loved her first book, THE TRUTH ABOUT ALICE, so I’m really looking forward to reading DEVOTED. While I was there, a middle grade fantasy CROWN OF THREE caught my eye. I’d never heard of the author, J. D. Rinehart (who also uses the name J.D. Blackthorne) but I loved the cover and the blurb sounded like my kind of adventure, so I got that one, too.

You can read an excerpt here.

This morning I was delighted to see that SCBWI Houston member Crystal Allen has shared the cover of the first book in her new chapter books series, THE MAGNIFICENT MYA TIBBS: SPIRIT WEEK SHOWDOWN! With this newest chapter book addition, Crystal has covered the full range of middle grade from the upper edges with HOW LAMAR’S BAD PRANK WON A BUBBA-SIZED TROPHY, and the smack in the sweet-spot middle story THE LAURA LINE. I can’t wait to get to know Mya!

Friends, I may be working on my website this week and next, so if things go wonky, please know the problem is on my side, not yours. The theme I’ve been using is seriously outdated and is keeping me from using a lot of WordPress’s cool plugins and even basic necessities, like a functioning mobile site, so it’s got to go. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Here’s this week’s events:

June 19, Friday, 7:00 PM
Blue Willow Bookshop
Tera Lynn Childs & Tracy Deebs, YA Authors

Tera Lynn Childs and Tracy Deebs will discuss and sign their new novel for teens, POWERLESS. Kenna lives in a world of absolutes. Villains, like the one who killed her father, are bad. Heroes, like her mother and best friend, are good. And Kenna, unlike everyone else around her, is completely ordinary—which she hates.

She’s secretly working on an experiment that will land her a place among the Heroes, but when a Villain saves her life during a break-in at her lab, Kenna discovers there’s a whole lot of gray area when it comes to good and evil and who she can trust. After all…not all strength comes from superpowers.

June 20, Saturday, 1:00-4:00 PM
Writespace
Joy Preble, Workshop: The Power of Point of View
Cost: $30-$45

Point of view is one of the most important choices an author can make because it impacts how readers see and respond to the story. Through whose eyes is the story being told? Through the eyes of a character as he experiences the story’s events (1st person present), through an unnamed narrator (3rd person omniscient), or through a narrator who shares the thoughts of just one character (3rd person limited)?

Come prepared to write, revise, and experiment. Please bring the first three to five pages of a novel or short story you are working on, as well as a laptop or a notepad and pen or pencil.

June 20, Saturday, 2:00 PM
Blue Willow Bookshop
YA Debut Author Panel

Debut authors Katie Stout, Jenny Martin, and Meredith Moore will discuss their books in a panel moderated by WISH YOU WERE ITALIAN author Kristin Rae.

Sweet, fun, and romantic, Katie Stout’s HELLO, I LOVE YOU explores what it means to experience first love and discover who you really are in the process. Grace Wilde is running-from the multi-million dollar mansion her record producer father bought, the famous older brother who’s topped the country music charts five years in a row, and the mother who blames her for her brother’s breakdown. Grace escapes to the farthest place from home she can think of, a boarding school in Korea, hoping for a fresh start. But when her roommate Sophie’s twin brother Jason turns out to be the newest Korean pop music superstar, Grace is thrust back into the world of fame.

Jenny Martin’s futuristic, action-packed debut is TRACKED. On corporately controlled Castra, rally racing is a high-stakes game that seventeen-year-old Phoebe Van Zant knows all too well. Phee’s legendary racer father disappeared mysteriously, but that hasn’t stopped her from speeding headlong into trouble. When she and her best friend, Bear, attract the attention of Charles Benroyal, they are blackmailed into racing for Benroyal Corp, a company that represents everything Phee detests. Worse, Phee risks losing Bear as she falls for Cash, her charming new teammate. But when she discovers that Benroyal is controlling more than a corporation, Phee realizes she has a much bigger role in Castra’s future than she could ever have imagined. It’s up to Phee to take Benroyal down. But even with the help of her team, can a street-rat destroy an empire?

In Meredith Moore’s debut I AM HER REVENGE, Vivian was raised with one purpose in life: to exact revenge on behalf of her mother. Manipulative and cruel, Mother has deprived Vivian not only of a childhood, but of an original identity. With an endless arsenal of enticing personalities at her disposal, Vivian is a veritable weapon of deception.  And she can destroy anyone. When it’s time to strike, she enrolls in a boarding school on the English moors, where she will zero in on her target: sweet and innocent Ben, the son of the man who broke Mother’s heart twenty years ago. But the more Vivan learns about herself, the more dangerous this cat and mouse game becomes. Because Mother will stop at nothing to make sure the truth dies with her.

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