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Thanks to you, Knuffle Bunny Too remains on the New York Times Bestseller list, hopping up to #5 for its 16th week, and joining pals Kadir Nelson, Jon Scieszka, Jon Muth, Patric McDonnell, and the very nice Antoinette Portis. And here's a bonus article about the upcoming film screening in NYC.

Thanks Athens!

Here are my mom and dad many years ago, sitting on my grandmother's front porch in Jasper County, Mississippi, fresh from a fishing trip to the Railroad Pond. They've got a string of fish between them. This house became the Pink Palace in LOVE, RUBY LAVENDER, and my parents became Bunch and Joy Snowberger in EACH LITTLE BIRD THAT SINGS. Look at that dappled sunlight. Look at those beautiful people. They are my first influences.

I'm thinking this morning about influences, especially writing influences, as I've had some exciting mail (which I'll get to in a moment). Don't you love it when you see the fruits of your labors blossom into surprising shapes and forms that you would never have dreamed of? The Buddhists (and others) tell us not to be attached to outcomes and instead to concentrate on the present moment, and I try to do that -- it's a great place to work from.

From time to time, however, I like to think about the path, which is something teachers and writers and I talked about quite a bit this past weekend: the path to reading like a writer, the path to writing and using all those conventions of good writing, the path to publication, and the path to becoming a whole human being.

So -- as I prepare to go to Chicago this afternoon to work with Scholastic Book Fairs (back Friday), I leave you with some influences on my writing, and my.... hmmm.... becoming. I thank every one of these lovely influences, every name, place,memory and moment below: Namaste.

1. There is still time, if you live near Bellingham, Washington (or even if you don't), to get yourself to the Bond Children's Literature Conference on March 1. Look at this year's lineup! Christopher Paul Curtis, Eric Rohmann, Chris Crutcher, and John Rocco! What a jackpot of stories to be gathered this weekend. I have spoken at this conference (ALL-STARS was just a twinkle in my eye) and can tell you how wonderful it is, how beautiful Bellingham is (The City of Subdued Excitement! Really!), and how fabulous are Nancy Johnson and her colleagues and students at Western Washington University.

2. If you are a Southern Writer (and even if you aren't) here are two treats: the newest issue of Juvenile Miscellany is here, detailing all happenings at the University of Southern Mississippi's De Grummond Children's Literature Collection, including the Fay B. Kaigler Children's Book Festival. I spoke at this conference in 2006 and it changed my life. That's Eve Bunting you see in the newsletter -- she was the Keats Medallion recipient last year. This year it's Pat Mora.

Speaking also during this year's festival (April 2-4) are James Ransome, Vicki Cobb, Will Weaver, and Kimberly Willis Holt. A lovely line up, and that's just the tip -- this is a conference full of concurrent workshops and southern charm. Plus, good friend Barbara Immroth is the Keats Lecturer this year, and you don't want to miss that. Hey, Cousin Ellen!

The second Southern treat is the spring edition of the Eudora Welty Newsletter, with an interview of Yours Truly in it. When you name a dog Eudora Welty, as I have done in ALL-STARS, well... folks want to know what that's all about. I am honored to be profiled by the fabulous Deborah Miller in this issue of the newsletter. If you'd like to read all sorts of scholarly goodness about Eudora Welty and one decidedly non-scholarly interview (although I think there's lots of scholarship in there, in its way, as I have studied Welty's work for so long I can recite it to you!), you can order copies here. At some point, I would like to put the interview on my website as well. We'll see.

3. Speaking of scholarship, I want to pass on a link to an excellent article written by Michael Dirda of the Washington Post about this year's AWP conference in New York City. I attended and spoke at last year's conference, here in Atlanta, on two panels; one about voice in southern literature for children, with Mary Ann Rodman and Sharon Darrow (all of us with Vermont College ties), and the other about writing about the civil rights movement in southern literature, with Tony Grooms and William Heath -- I was the only children's book author on this panel and was delighted to be asked to be a part of it.

AWP was quite the experience, to be one of a few writers for children in a sea of those writing and expounding on adult books in such academic, bohemian, important, strange, convoluted and wonderful ways. It was everything Michael Dirda says it was in NYC, too -- he captures the feeling of the conference well.

One reason I bring up AWP (Association of Writers and Writing Programs) is because I've been thinking so much lately about how we separate out literature for adults and literature for children in this country... maybe in the world. I would love to hear your thoughts on this. I was asked to be part of the AWP panel on literature about the civil rights movement and was thrilled to have FREEDOM SUMMER -- a picture book -- represented along with Bill Heath's and Tony Grooms' novels. We all had something valuable to contribute. And yet, that's not always how it works.

Sometimes children's literature is seen as lightweight and undeserving of serious attention. The folks at the De Grummond Collection would say there is nothing further from the truth, as would the organizers of the Bond Conference and the SCBWI conference I just attended, and the Eudora Welty Society -- after all, Welty also wrote THE SHOE BIRD, a children's book.

When I took a writing course at my local community college in 1995, I was trying to figure how I could learn to write the stories I wanted to tell. I told the instructor, "I'm an essayist, I don't know how to write fiction, and I also want to write for children; I'm not sure I belong in this class." My instructor, who was teaching a fiction writing course, said, "Story is story. Come in." And she was right. Story is story. I started what would become LOVE, RUBY LAVENDER in that class.

Literature is hard to make. Maybe it's even harder to make for children -- that's another argument I've heard. But in any case, I love it most when literature is inclusive; I have never separated literature into camps. In my house, THE REIVERS by Faulkner sits on a shelf alongside THE GREAT GILLY HOPKINS by Katherine Paterson, THE GOLDEN COMPASS by Philip Pullman, and DELIVERANCE by James Dickey -- these books are part of my canon -- but I'm getting ahead of myself, I'll come back to that.

I know that children's literature is an art form -- I know it to my bones, despite the stories I have heard (and can tell you) of children's literature being relegated to "those nice little stories" that "anyone can write." I know better. I have experienced how nuanced children's literature is, how complex and layered good storytelling is, how difficult a business this is to survive in, how much stamina it takes to withstand the buffeting from within, to say nothing of the misunderstandings without. I also know how important it is, and how rewarding it can be to be part of it.

So I stand tall, even in the midst of AWP and gatherings of writers of adult books, even when I am the token children's book writer at an evening cocktail reception of writers at a small conference, and someone asks, "so what do you write?" and then that someone gives me a vacant smile and turns to the next, more worthy, conversation. I know better. "Here am I," I say as I chat about writing and books with those who have never read a novel for children, "Here am I; read me."

And sometimes, they do. Which brings me to number 4.

4. I had to read it twice when it arrived in my email inbox:

Deborah, I am the Executive Secretary for the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters. You have been nominated for an award in Fiction for your book, The Aurora County All-Stars.
I need your mailing address.

What did I do? I sent my mailing address.

And lo, a letter arrived just yesterday. I will go to Jackson, Mississippi on June 14 and attend a dinner with the likes of... well, I don't know who will be there, but here are some of the past winners of the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Fiction Award: Richard Ford. Barry Hannah. Lewis Nordan. Rick Bass. Ellen Gilchrist. Walker Percy. WALKER PERCY! What company! How very humbling. I am so totally and completely in love with this opportunity to step into the world of Mississippi writers and take my place as a WRITER. Not a writer for children or a writer for adults, but a WRITER. It's breathtaking. I wish I knew who I had to thank for reading ALL-STARS and recommending it to the committee. Thank you, thank you, thank you, all of you who understand that "story is story." Literature is literature. We are all in this together.

And me? I wrote a book, a southern story, a Mississippi story about kinship, family, community, our collective southern history, poetry... and baseball. And a dog named Eudora Welty. In this book, I wanted to say that everything is connected -- the past, the present, the dancer, the ball player, the outcast, the recluse, the living, the dead, the decisions we make and the choices that others embrace.

This book has been embraced by kids and teachers and librarians and booksellers all across the country, for which I am so grateful. And now, this book is recognized in the larger context of Mississippi stories, with other Mississippi writers and in the larger world of literature, which makes me feel as if I have truly come home. Home to the heart of story.

As a largely self-taught writer, I have learned all my life from the literature I have admired, and I have been indiscriminate about it -- adult books, children's books, it never mattered. It has always been STORY I have been after: essays, non-fiction, poetry, fiction... story. I have taken it apart, have studied -- "how does she do that?" and have tried to incorporate what I learned into my own writing, giving it my own stamp, my own voice, as I learned how. I've been thinking a lot lately about canons, as I mentioned earlier, and influences, and I spoke about this at the SCBWI conference this past weekend:

What is YOUR canon? Your canon of good literature? We argue over THE canon, but no one can argue with you about your own canon of what has made you a writer and a reader. Who is it? What books? Who have you admired and studied? And why? Over the next few months I want to introduce you, from time to time, to my personal canon of literature. I wonder if every classroom would benefit from thinking about a canon that is particular to each teacher, each grade, each subject. And I'll bet that every serious reader -- and certainly every serious writer -- can tell you about her canon, chapter and verse.

Be thinking about yours. Start making a list, in your notebook. Give yourself plenty of room. I'll bet, if you start back as far as you can remember, you'll find your influences are far-ranging and deep.

I'm off to Chicago in two hours. Time to finish packing. I'm very behind on email -- I've been having email problems at home, but I'm slowly figuring it out and will get caught up soon, I promise. Thanks for all the mail -- I love the conversation, even though I am a slow correspondent.

This Sunday, come out and Rock and Romp at the inaugural Boston chapter of Rock -n- Romp. What is Rock -n- Romp? It's a stellar program that allows parents to remember what it was like to go see shows while their kids can be introduced to rock while they run wild. Neal Pollock, author of Alternadad will be in attendance as well as two great local Boston bands.

Need more info? Boston Now just wrote up an article on the event. Check it out here.

Plus: A review. A gossip-y mention (scroll down). A list. (For those of you attending Toy Fair at the Javitz, I'll be at the Yottoy Booth signing this Tuesday at 1pm.)

David Domke is Professor of Communication and Head of Journalism at the University of Washington. Kevin Coe is a doctoral candidate in Speech Communication at the University of Illinois. They are authors of the The God Strategy: How Religion Became a Political Weapon in America. To learn more about the book check out their handy website here, to read more posts by them click here. In the post below they look at Huckabee’s recent attack on the press.

With John McCain looking to wrap up the Republican Party presidential nomination, challenger Mike Huckabee is just looking for a way to remain relevant. Earlier this week, Huckabee tried going on the attack against a familiar target: the press.

At a breakfast meeting with reporters from the Christian Science Monitor, Huckabee decried journalists’ focus on his religious background, saying: “There has been an attempt to ghettoize me for a very small part of my biography. The last time I was in the pulpit was 1991.” (more…)

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Some of my products have shown up in some rawther nice magazines lately:

Holy cow, Cool Jewels was in Oprah’s O At Home Winter 2007 magazine!

And check out the February 2008 issue of Everyday with Rachael Ray magazine- they featured two of my items this month:

You can see some of the development sketches for these items on my Giftware Page on my website.
You can also visit the FRED blog and see lots more product sightings…woohoo!

Contest Continues, Contains Kids’ Comic Creations. Pittsburgh Praises Pigeon Production. Wisconsin Wants Willing, uh, Readers… (Oh, and my birthday present yesterday? An essential guide for all middle aged folks, The Complete George and Martha Books… )

While working on a project where one of the characters has a cold, I have gotten a cold. I am a method cartoonist, if nothing else. So, here are a few places to drop by: Wausau, Babble, and B&N… Ah-Choo!

Looking to beat the winter doldrums? The Akron Beacon Journal suggests Punk Farm and Punk Farm on Tour. Thank you to the librarians who recommended the books! You can see the article here.

Check out the latest Pigeon Contest entries (hit the Pigeon contest button). I love hometown pride. Thanks for the Cuffie and the bestseller list, PW. And this is an adorable story.

This March, I'll be stopping by the Foundation for Children's Literature at Boston College to speak at their "Conversation with...Author/Illustrator Series". Tonight, Walden Media will be presenting scenes from the upcoming film "Prince Caspian". And the whole series of programs was given some nice attention in the Boston Sunday Globe. Check it out here.

Poor Leonardo. Pigeon and Knuffle Bunny and Elephant + Piggie get all the love. Well, not all. The animated version of Leonardo the Terrible Monster made ALA’s notable video list. Rock on and thanks ALA! In further news, the local Brooklyn paper, the, uh, Brooklyn Paper remarks on how living in Park Slope may help you get a shiny sticker one day…

The Wichita Eagle gives Punk Farm on Tour a shout-out.

How did it get to be January 9 already? I'll swan, give a girl a chance to hunker in at home, and she starts baking her famous homemade granola that she hasn't made in five years (travel, travel), she roasts hazelnuts and puts them up in saved olive jars, she eats well and sleeps well,



and she hires her friend Jim Williams to enclose the carport and turn it into a gathering room, following her desire to implement pattern 182 of A PATTERN LANGUAGE by Christopher Alexander (who knows this book? I'm using it like a Bible as I work on this house...


...I'm investigating Pools of Light (252), Warm Colours (250), Different Chairs (251), as well as Communal Eating (147) and Family of Entrances (102), Entrance Transition (112), Car Connection (113),
and more, but that will do for now. Ha!)




Oh, and she plans to build a bottle tree. (This is a photo of Felder Rushing's blue bottle tree in Jackson, Mississippi. I love Felder and I want a fire bowl like his, but I digress.)


She also opens the mail that has been piling up since the last ice age. And just look what's in the mail! EACH LITTLE BIRD THAT SINGS is still cutting a rug on the book world's dance floor. First news is that LITTLE BIRD has won the Alabama Book Award as the Young People's Book of the Year from the Alabama Library Association! Joy and Happy Day! RUBY won this award in 2004, and I know how special it is, both because I've seen how wonderful this conference is (I've met those wonderful Alabama librarians!) and because I was born in Alabama, so coming back is like going home. But the best thing about this award is that LITTLE BIRD finds its way into the hands of more young readers in Alabama. I'm so glad. Thank you so much, ALLA! (And Tim Berry, I'm trying to email you, but your email keeps bouncing...)

As if Alabama -- and the United States -- weren't enough, here comes news, too, from IBBY -- the International Board on Books for Young People -- that LITTLE BIRD "has been nominated by the U.S. Section of IBBY for the IBBY Honour List 2008 for the quality of its writing."

Be still my heart. IBBY! One of IBBY's objectives is to encourage international understanding through children's literature. Sharon Deeds, chair of USBBY's Hans Christian Andersen committee (the U.S. Section of IBBY) wrote me some months ago, but it wasn't public news until now, and I wasn't sure I believed it, but now I have official confirmation. Sharon had written me: "Each section... nominates three honor books: one for writing, one for illustration and one for translation. The Honour List began in 1956. The books are chosen to represent the best in U.S. publishing in the previous two years."

I'm floored, I'm honored, I'm humbled. And may I throw in delighted... I am. Readers! LITTLE BIRD will have international readers... what a thrill. The entire Honour List from around the world will be part of a traveling exhibition in Japan, the U.S., and Bologna. Then, according to my Official Letter, these books "will be kept as permanent deposits at the International Youth Library in Munich and other research collections in Belgium, Russia, Japan, Slovakia, Switzerland, and the USA."

I knew it. I knew it all along, that everything is connected (as Uncle Edisto says in LITTLE BIRD), that we are more alike than we are different, that we exist in community, through our stories, on this planet. This lovely IBBY award is confirmation and validation of that fact -- just imagine these books, written in many different languages, traveling together next year. Just imagine the kinds of stories they tell individually. Imagine the story they will tell together, of their journey.

Oh, thank you, USBBY committee members, for honoring Comfort Snowberger's story, she who has been to 247 funerals and thinks she knows all about death, only to find out that life is about to take some turns she can't anticipate, and that the most important thing to know about death is that it is part... of life.

There is so much life going on at my house right now, on a warm January day. The carport area rings with hammering and the stapling of screens to the framing. Husband Jim's music wafts up from his basement studio, where he is practicing. The cats want in and out every fifteen minutes. The granola is finished and sits in 12 sweet, squatty little Mason jars, ready for ribbons. The hazelnuts in their jars are standing tall next to the granola. The crepe myrtles that needed to come down (talk about death... sob!) so a new driveway can be built, have been cut and deposited on my back porch so I can gather the most earnest, most enthusiastic branches for my bottle tree.

In the book I'm working on now, a character named Partheny, who is old, wise, and superstitious, makes a bottle tree for her front yard, to ward off evil spirits. I want to make the tree that Partheny would make.
So I've got my branches now. I've been collecting my bottles. I need the just-right bucket and some cement, I think. Let me see what I can do, gathering these elements that you wouldn't naturally find together, and making something brand new out of them. Sort of like the IBBY award. Sort of like stories. Sort of like life.

My notebook is getting a workout with LISTS these days. Lists of projects I want to do, lists of supplies needed, lists of administrative tasks that need to be tackled, grocery lists, lists of stories I'm working on or want to work on this year. In January I list. (Well, I list all the time, but in January, especially, I list for myself: what would you like to accomplish this year? How might you make that happen? I start with a fresh notebook for my lists. I know that I'll fill up several notebooks this year, but this is the first for a new year, with lists, including, this year, lists of what I eat each day, how far I walk (I've walked over 25 miles so far this year), lists of my weekly WW's numbers (11.3 pounds so far -- who's still with me? I'm so serious about this...).

Looking at all these lists, I see patterns, too -- it's the same every year; I bring many disparate elements together to create a life. Kind of like my Southern serial-story-turned-into-full-fledged novel, THE AURORA COUNTY ALL-STARS... so many elements and so many characters fairly seething with their wants and needs and aspirations, conspiring separately but finding out that together they make one movement out of whole cloth. You do it, too, don't you? You are interested in so many things, just as I am, you make your lists, either in your head or on paper, and you pull together a life. In doing so, you see how different you are from every other human being on this earth... how different your family is from every other family, how different is your home, your mind! And yet. We are also so alike, wanting to love and be loved, to belong, to achieve something worthwhile, to understand how the world (and each heart) works, to have purpose.

Each of us individually, AND together, makes up the symphony true.

Want to avoid the Valentine’s rush? Then drop by Family Fun and send this animated e-card starring the Pigeon. (Then go see what Canadians have to say about Knuffle Bunny Too.)

The good people at the Star-Telegram are spreading the word on Punk Farm to their Fort Worth and North Texas readers. Check it out here.

Hope your holidays were good fun and your head isn’t throbbing too much. The last week or so has been spent busily working on a my new picture book (mo’ info later) and a few Willems holiday traditions, such as Christmas Pizza, the annual visit to a shopping mall, and catching up with pals and their families. Literary hanging out included of time with pals Jackie Woodson, Tony DiTerlizzi, and

To celebrate the holidays we asked some of our favorite people in publishing what their favorite book was. Let us know in the comments what your favorite book is and be sure to check back throughout the week for more “favorites”.

Stephanie O’Cain is an Exhibits Coordinator at NYU Press.

For over five years, Jeanette Winterson’s novel Written on the Body has been the book I return to when I need to renew my sense of admiration for the human body and condition. Winterson gives no hint as to the narrator’s gender in this torrid love affair, forcing the reader to cast aside any preconceived notions about love, loss and redemption and instead focus simply on the complexities of relationships. (more…)

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To celebrate the holidays we asked some of our favorite people in publishing what their favorite book was. Let us know in the comments what your favorite book is and be sure to check back throughout the week for more “favorites”.

Andrew DeSio is the Director of Publicity at Princeton University Press.

If I had to pick a favorite book I’d go with Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Raoul Duke’s romp, along with his trusty attorney Dr. Gonzo, through the desert in search of that unattainable state of euphoria, all the while experiencing American culture at its best and worst, is as pertinent now as it was in 1972.

Thompson is known for his heroic drug binges but his choppy yet flowing prose is often overlooked by his dirty deeds. The fact that he can remember so vividly his exploits in the book while being under the influence is testament to his great mind. He’s one of America’s eminent satirists and humorists, and will be sorely missed.

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The Austin-American Statesman gives Punk Farm on Tour some props in their gift giving children's book guide. Check it out here!

…The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette to plug the Pigeon, Leonardo, and Knuffle Bunny plush dolls… …The Providence Journal to plug Knuffle Bunny Too… …And Time for TIME to list their 10 best Children’s Books. Elephant and Piggie’s Today I Will Fly! clocks in at #2! Thanks, TIME!

(plus the Chicago Sun Times thinks KB2 makes a good unleaded gift.)

ReadBoston is the beneficiary of the Barnes and Noble Annual Holiday Book Drive in the Prudential Center. I was lucky enough to join Mayor Menino and Stacey Lucchino to promote the program. Below is the official press release from the Mayor's office.


Mayor Menino today joined Stacey Lucchino and Jarrett Krosoczka, author of My Buddy, Slug, winner of the 2006 ReadBoston Best Read Aloud Book Award, to promote ReadBoston's partnership with Barnes and Noble this holiday season. ReadBoston is the beneficiary of the Barnes and Noble Annual Holiday Book Drive in the Prudential Center. From November 1st through January 1st, customers can purchase a book to donate to ReadBoston. Pictured in photos from left to right, Jarrett Krosoczka, Mayor Menino and Stacey Lucchino.

Cakespy left a kind comment on my blog, allowing me to find her blog and ETSY shop...so now I'm blogging them. Look at those Dee-lic-ious cupcakes on her blog! Love her ETSY shop too.
I recently updated my ETSY shop and have more to add finally. It has been on my t0-do list for quite awhile. If you've never visited ETSY...go and visit..but be warned, the all handmade item site is very addictive. I think it's one of the best venues online to see wonderful handmade items at excellent prices. It costs very little to have a shop there. They take a percentage from sales, and only a small amount to post each item.