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Are any of your books loooking for a new home? Here's a novel idea. Pun intended. It's awkward it never occurred to me before: bring your books to homeless shelters. Head on over
to the ABC news site for an eye-opening piece on book clubs forming in these shelters. In my book, food, clothing, and shelter provide the traditional necessities, but let's not forget that other basic need: to read, to connect, to share, to see ourselves in stories and to feel less alone.

From the article:
"At a time when book-reading is declining and is especially low among poorer people according to a recent Associated Press-Ipsos poll, the book club at 2100 Lakeside seems ill-fated. But, while 1 in 4 people polled admitted to having read no books in 2006, homeless men here are reading two a month."


I know I am preaching to the choir when I say there "is no frigate like a book." (Why argue with Emily Dickinson?)

There is no frigate like a book (1263)
by Emily Dickinson

There is no Frigate like a Book
To take us Lands away,
Nor any Coursers like a Page
Of prancing Poetry –
This Traverse may the poorest take
Without oppress of Toll –
How frugal is the Chariot
That bears a Human soul.

Many moons ago, I found refuge in the pages of a book. That was X thousand books ago as well. (Numbers schmumbers.) One of the first books I ever read to myself-- and then to my parents-- was AND TO THINK THAT I SAW IT ON MULBERRY STREET. The man who launched 10,000 children's book editors pleas for "No Dr. Seuss imitators" celebrates his birthday today, March 2nd. Happy Birthday, Theodor Seuss Geisel. I'll always love you. Not green eggs. Not ham. (The food. LOVED the book.) When I realized I Could Read it Myself, hello, I found nirvana and I never, ever looked back. Not sure what would have become of me but I suspect none of it would have been good.

I guess you could say what I found on Mulberry Street was... me.


Dr. Seuss, still looking good at 104

P.S. Seuss's Mulberry Street was in Springfield, Massachusetts, Geisel's birthplace. Not the infamous Mulberry Street in Little Italy more familiar to residents of the New York area. In a 6 Degrees from Kevin Bacon way, it pleases me to know I touched Seuss DNA somewhere, sometime in the course of the six years I lived in Springfield, Mass. His love was in the air. Everywhere. And now that I look back on those years, I sort of miss Springfield, too. Oh the things I could think about, all those things that happened in my life in Springfield. But that's another story.



"Nothing," I said, growing red as a beet,
"But a plain horse and wagon on Mulberry Street..."



As the Good Book says, according to Dr. Seuss:
“Today was good. Today was fun. Tomorrow is another one.”

(In truth: today was okay. Too busy for a Saturday. A little too much pressure and angst. But tomorrow is another one and another chance to make it better. You know, as in Hey Jude... "Then you can start to make it better..." I'm here, I'm not. I know. I'm lost in the bowels of parenting and real life and calendars and checkbooks. Wake me up when the bat mitzvah's over.)

Don't ask. It's all right, Ma. Just accept. Yes. That's Bob Dylan. Must See Hava Negila. ;>

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This week’s interview is with illustrator/author Jane Ray. Unfortunately, we have been unable to successfully upload the show to our file host provider, Libsyn. A ticket with their support team has been opened and the show will be published as soon as the problem is corrected — likely during business hours on Monday (Jan 21).

We apologize for the delay.

Tags:Libsyn, serviceLibsyn, service

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Author: Michael Bedard
Illustrator: Barbara Cooney
Published: 1992 Dell Dragonfly Books (on JOMB)
ISBN: 0440417406 Chapters.ca Amazon.com

Warm, evocative illustrations and beautifully worded, thought provoking narration make this fictional encounter with poet Emily Dickenson a stirring introduction to poetry, eccentricity and the power of understanding.

You can read more about social anxiety in children’s book here.

Tags:Barbara Cooney, childrens book, Emily Dickenson, Michael Bedard, Podcast, reviewBarbara Cooney, childrens book, Emily Dickenson, Michael Bedard, Podcast, review

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by Darcy Pattison

JMPrince asked how to set up feeds. Here's my non-technology expert answer:

You can use several platforms for reading RSS feeds. I've been using Google Reader. For that, you simply go to google.com/reader and follow instructions. There are other RSS feed readers, such as BlogLines (which I used for a long time, until it stopped adding LiveJournals, for some odd reason). Or I've been told you can read RSS feeds through Firefox browser (or is it the Thunderbird email reader from Mozilla?).

Anyway, once I decided on a reader, then I just click on the program's ADD feature and type in the URL (such as www.darcypattison.com) and it automatically searches for and finds the feed.

I really like the Google reader. Shrug. But there are lots of others out there.

Janni says she set up my feed so you can add it to your Friends page, too. Janni, how does that work? Is there a FAQ somewhere to explain it?

Does that answer the question? Usually, the Feed reading program will do the work for you, if you just know the URL.

Anyone else want to chime in on the Mozilla options?

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by Darcy Pattison

Ready for a Sneak Preview of the new Revision Notes?

Let me know what you think, or if you have any problems! I'll be posting on both LiveJournal and the new location for another week or ten days anyway.

Please update your feeds and bookmarks today!

Darcy

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by Darcy Pattison

The only real readers are flashlight readers.

Real writers take risks.

Do villains really have to be politically correct?

Libraries are learning to cater to digital natives.

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by Darcy Pattison

Future of Revision Notes

Since I posted about Backstory on last week, I’ve been thinking about the topic all weekend and will post more about it tomorrow. Look for it!

I am also planning to move my blog to my own domain and off LiveJournal. The change should happen about July 1, so watch for the announcement. I’ve decided to do this, so I can have more control of how I lay out things, what plugins I use on the blog, how I monitor traffic and lots of other issues. The process of moving has been interesting. I’ve always used AOL for my webpage host and only used publically available software. Moving to my own domain, I’m finding that it’s a “buyer beware” world out there. Every time I try something new, there are bugs that have to be ironed out. I’m pretty good at doing this, but it’s been interesting to see how often this happens. Of course–part of that is I don’t always know what I’m doing! But part of it is just the nature of the web community.

For example, I’m switching to WordPress as my blogging platform (probably–still looking at b2evolution, but it has much less support in terms of plugins and other flexibility). I liked one theme/skin (the way the blog looks) and downloaded it and played with it for a while before I noticed that the code didn’t validate. I was, well, shocked, that someone would release a less-than-perfect theme. Yes, I’m naive about the web! My experience has been with AOL, remember, which doesn’t release anything without making sure there are few problems (And yes, I’m sure there are some who would disagree with that, but it’s been my experience, anyway.) This Buyer Beware mentality is different, but interesting.

Anyway, I’m working through all the issues needed to switch over. I’ll post on both this journal and the other for a while to give you time to switch. But look for the change.

Interesting Links

Editor, Cheryl Klein has posted a speech she did on writing picturebooks.

Lots of changes in how the education community is using the internet to teach.

Art v. Design. The quotes here are fascinating, and relate to everything about good book design, or even to how blogs are designed, how stories are delivered online, and lots about our daily lives.

The sounds of language affect voice, yes? Here’s an article about Keats poetry and his use of vowels, interesting in the context of a voice discussion.

Fascinating discussion of the “class” differences of teens (and military personnel) who utilize Facebook v. My Space. I don’t know enough to have an opinion about it, but it’s something to watch. Particularly, as lots of writers use these social networks to publicize their new books.

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by Darcy Pattison

I think that it is totally fitting that the parents of the bride will take a trip themselves next week. My DH and I plan to float the Colorado River, the last 100 miles of the Grand Canyon. We had the trip planned long before the announcement of our daughter's engagement and decided to stick with our plans.

Next week, while we’re off on our adventure, the Revision Notes will feature guest bloggers:

Discussing revisions of their novels are the following:
Alan Gratz, author of
Samurai Shortstop (Dial, 2006). “You always want to get the phone call from a publisher, not the letter.”

Kristin Nitz, author of
Saving the Griffin (Peachtree, 2007). “After 90 minutes of studying the editor’s notes in the margins, I was too depressed to continue.”

Kristin Tubb, author of Autumn Winifred Oliver Does Things Different (Fall, 2008, Delacorte Press). “I love the revision process!”

Also guest-posting will be Dori Butler, author of Do You Know The Monkey Man? and
Trading Places With Tank Talbott by Dori Hillestad Butler, talking about our parallel projects of reading our novels aloud to an audience of kids. I talked some about my experiences here. Dori will talk about reading her work-in-progress novel to a class.

On Friday, there will be the usual Voice Friday postings.

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by Darcy Pattison

A Great Firefox Addon for Writers

Write it. With this addon, your computer will read aloud a webpage or text. Reading aloud your WIP is a great way to edit. Print out a hard copy and turn away from the computer and listen and mark up the text.

50 Writing Tools for Writers

From Poynters comes 50 Writing Tools for Writers. These are basics about good writing, of course, but they are well done. I’m not sending you directly to Poynters, because this list on lifehack.org has direct links to all 50.

In fact Roy Peter Clark has collected all these tips into a new book,
Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer

The Rites of Reviews

4 Steps to Reading Your Reviews

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by Darcy Pattison

Thanks to all who sent good wished on my daughter's wedding. There was a huge downpour about 15 minutes before it started, just as guests were arriving. But still--firends and family did come. My daugher cried through the whole ceremony, tears of joy, from the beautiful bride. It was a good day!

And now that she is officially a Mrs., I have my life back and plan to read and write all summer. What bliss!

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by Darcy Pattison




My daughter is getting married tomorrow! Here is a picture of her wedding quilt, Amy's Texas Star.

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by Darcy Pattison

I started seriously posting on this blog about April 1. I've been monitoring my efforts in several ways. I thought it might interest you--because I don't do this for me. I do it for you!

1. Using Statcounter.com, I've kept watch on daily traffic. In April, I had 4500 page views from 3400 unique visitors. In May (so far), that increased to 5500 page views from 4100 unique visitors. Nice percentage increases. Overall, by the end of the month it will be about 11,500 page views in two months. Thanks for your support!

2. Statcounter.com also displays a map showing the locations of visitors. In addition to almost every state in the US, international visitors come from Brazil, Chile, Columbia, Ecuador, Mexico, Canada, Great Britain, Ireland, Iceland, France, Spain, Germany, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Russia, Sweden, Finland, India, Indonesia, China, Japan, Ceylon, Taiwan, South Africa, Egypt and somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic. I've probably left out someone somewhere--sorry. Thanks for reading!

3. I reorganized my tags last month to reflect the most often talked about subjects. In alphabetical order, here are the topics and the number of posts for each.
Agent--4.
Authors--24.
Awards--7.
Books--12.
Characters--6.
Contracts--3.
Darcy Pattison's books--5.
Editors--9.
Marketing--9.
Notes--12 (the miscellaneous, catch-all category, including the posts where I link to lots of other stuff.)
Picturebooks--10.
Plot--1 (I just added that one for the Hero's Journey posting. Should I do more on plot?).
Retreat--4.
Revision--68.
Voice--9.

Total: 183 posts, 37% on revision.

I don't do this just for me! I do it for you, the readers. Is there any subject you'd like to see more of or less of? Any way I can meet your writing needs better?

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by Darcy Pattison

Do you listen to music while you write?

I find that music with lyrics takes my mind off the words that I'm writing. Instead, I like soundtracks from movies. Something about that kind of soundtrack works. I think it's because the music is echoing the narrative arc of the story.

But I'm going to read and write, read and write all summer. I'm looking for something new to listen to--when I can listen and still think.

Any suggestions on what I should try?

(Ha! Notice that the tag for this post is "notes," the general tag I use for miscellaneous postings. It has double meaning this time!)

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by Darcy Pattison

7th graders getting paid $1000 for an article? Why not? Here's a 13 year old CEO!

First Lines contest at Editorial Anonymous has announced winners in several categories (see the links on the right side).

Little Brown editor reports on the IRA convention in Toronto.

Booksquare weighs in on the S&S Reversions Rights Clause.

Kenyon College student Samantha Ley talks about her favorite book, Where the Red Fern Grows.

Popular blogger, Miss Snark retires from blogging. So does Nadia Cornier, Firebrand's Literary agent. You can really STOP after starting? Maybe this article on the pressures of blogging would have helped?

Comments on copyright.

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by Darcy Pattison

I've had a rough year between family situations and family's health problems. I knew the spring was going to be particulary rough, so I started doing the Friday Ideas (see yesterday's post), so I could at least generate lots of picturebook ideas, and that's worked well.

I Need Your Help

But the other thing I've done for six months is take a look around the publishing world. I want to write a series on something like "Where I Fit In?" So much is changing, and changing fast right now. If you know of any recent overviews of publishing anywhere on the internet or in a book--please send me a link. I've formed some opinions about this crazy business, but I'd like to see what others think and maybe respond to that. I'm thinking in terms of genre, which publishers (large v. small v. POD v. audio), marketing efforts (from nothing to My Space to book tours on your own), how to meet/deal with editors who move houses so fast, or anything else that strikes me between now and when I pull this together. If you have concerns, I'd like to hear them.

I'd also like to know what questions you have about revising, publishing, children's literature, etc. On the list of keyword searches of my website, I keep getting queries and cover letters. So, I'll probably try to do postings on that in the next month or so.

What other questions do you have that I might research, think about, ask others about and post some thoughts about?

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by Darcy Pattison

Notes

Personally, I don’t read many online reviews of books; I look for blogs or postings on the craft of writing (Like this posting.)

But the reviewing are of the online children’s literature community has been discussing this week who can review and why. If you take a free book from a publisher (as opposed to an ARC) does that make you biased? Things like that. This posting summarizes the arguments, provides links to the main discussion points and makes a nice statement herself.

I’m enjoying the occasional postings on the Book Design Review blogwhich shows how the book covers differ in the US and the UK. The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable is posted now.

Bookcase doors to hide a room.

If you are writing hooks for your story here are some samples with critiques of why they work. Or don’t.

Novel Revision: “I believe discipline, focus, napping and eyebrow grooming are all essential to the process.”

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by Darcy Pattison

Ellen Klagas acceptance speech for the Scott O’Dell award for the best historical fiction for her book, The Green Glass sea.

At the YA Author’s Café, join an Open Discussion on Sexual Content in YAs.

While Dori Butler is worrying about story endings here and here and here , Stacy Whitman is posting about story openings.

Want to increase your output? Type faster. You can monitor your typing speed with this new bicycling mouse!

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