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In getting to know Jennifer we've learned her husband has been a strong influence on her writing, but we wondered if there was a teacher or librarian along the way who set her on her path to publication. Here's her heartfelt answer....


I'm pretty sure the expectation for this question was that I'd talk about a teacher or librarian from my own schooling that influenced me. And I had some great ones—Gail Kirkland at Daviess County High School and Linda Tatum from Tamarack Elementary to name two—but the person who really got me started writing in the way I'm writing now is Cathy Belben.

Cathy is the librarian at the school where I taught for eight years, Burlington-Edison High. She was assigned as my mentor my first year, and I'm so lucky for it. Cathy is an amazing teacher, a passionate librarian, and absolutely one of the funniest people I know. But she is also a gifted writer. She's published hundreds of articles on all sorts of topics. From incorporating crafts in the library for professional magazines to her piece on donating her own remains to the body farm for Bust Magazine. She's published award winning fiction, spent a season living in Hollywood writing for Veronica Mars, and generally inspires everybody who comes into contact with her. She's the one who really got me hooked on great YA, and who invited me to join her writing group even though I didn't really write much at the time. She's just one of those people who make you want to join the party of words and story and craft, and we're so lucky to have her in our community.

She's also a great friend. Here we are on one of our homecoming dress up days at school. I think it was superhero day, and we came dressed as twin triathletes. Goggles, running pants, towel capes. We took our bike helmets off for the photo so we wouldn't, ahem, look dumb.

Cathy truly is a superhero. (But she might need to hire a new costumer.) Tomorrow we learn why some writing contests left Jennifer wondering if she'd ever get published.

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NEW FROM DAGOBERTO GILB
Good news that Dagoberto Gilb's second novel, The Flowers (Grove Press), is set to hit the book shelves this month. Here's the publisher's blurb about a book that is already getting high praise:

"Sonny Bravo is a tender, unusually smart fifteen-year-old who is living with his vivacious mother in a large city where intense prejudice is not just white against black, but also brown. When Sonny’s mother, Silvia, suddenly marries an Okie building contractor named Cloyd Longpre, they are uprooted to a small apartment building, Los Flores. As Sonny sweeps its sidewalks, he meets his neighbors and becomes ensnared in their lives: Cindy, an eighteen-year-old druggie who is married and bored; Nica, a cloistered Mexican girl who cares for her infant brother but who is never allowed to leave their unit. The other tenants range from Pink, an albino black man who sells old cars in front of the building, to Bud, a muscled-up construction worker who hates blacks and Mexicans, even while he’s married to a Mexican-American woman.

"The Flowers is about breaking rules. Dagoberto Gilb, in arguably his most powerful work yet, has written an inspiring novel about hate, pain, anger, and love that transcends age, race, and time. Gilb’s novel displays the fearlessness and wit that have helped make him one of this country’s most authentic and original voices."

How about this for an intriguing quote about the book: "But for the fact that he lacks a younger sister and an older brother, has never attended prep school, or ventured within 2,000 miles of Radio City Music Hall, and comes from a working-class Mexican background, Sonny Bravo could be Holden Caulfield." Stephen G. Kellman in the Texas Observer.

COMEDY FUND RAISER FOR CHIC CHICANA

This is the first comedy night of 2008 to support the CHIC CHICANA SCHOLARSHIP Program.

With the 2008 Chic Chicana Class the program will have graduated 900 students.

Visit the website at www.chicchicana.com

ROMANTIC READS
In honor of Valentine's Day, the Tattered Cover staff came up with a list of favorite romantic reads. One of these books teamed up with a rose and a cup of hot chocolate might just be the perfect li'l sumpin' sumpin' for a cold and wintry Valentine's Day.

Is it time for Yeats yet?

AMERICAN BOOK AWARDS
I want to offer belated congratulations to two friends of La Bloga who received a 2007 American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation : Rigoberto Gonzalez and Reyna Grande. The announcement of these awards included the following:

"The American Book Awards, established in 1978 by the Before Columbus Foundation, recognize outstanding literary achievement from the entire spectrum of America's diverse literary community. The purpose of the awards is to recognize literary excellence without limitations or restrictions. There are no categories, no nominees, and therefore no losers. The award winners range from well-known and established writers to under-recognized authors and first works. There are no quotas for diversity, the winners list simply reflects it as a natural process. The Before Columbus Foundation views American culture as inclusive and has always considered the term multicultural to be not a description of various categories, groups, or special interests, but rather as the definition of all of American literature. The Awards are not bestowed by an industry organization, but rather are a writers’ award given by other writers."

The winners are an impressive list:

2007 Daniel Cassidy, How The Irish Invented Slang: The Secret Language of the Crossroads
(CounterPunch/AK Press)
Michael Eric Dyson, Come Hell or High Water: Hurricane Katrina and the Color of Disaster
(Basic Books)
Rigoberto Gonzalez, Butterfly Boy: Memories of a Chicano Mariposa (University of Wisconsin Press)
Reyna Grande, Across a Hundred Mountains (Washington Square Press)
Ernestine Hayes, Blonde Indian: An Alaska Native Memoir (University of Arizona Press)
Patricia Klindienst, The Earth Knows My Name: Food, Culture and Sustainability in the Gardens of Ethnic Americans (Beacon Press)
Gary Panter, Jimbo's Inferno (Fantagraphics Books)
Jeffrey F.L. Partridge, Beyond Literary Chinatown (University of Washington Press)
Judith Roche, Wisdom of the Body (Black Heron Press)
Kali Vanbaale, The Space Between (River City Publishing)"

ACENTOS: A GATHERING AND CELEBRATION OF LATINO AND LATINA POETS
A reading of more than twenty-five Latino/a poets from New York City and around the country. Scheduled readers include Martín Espada, Sandra María Esteves, Rafael Campo, Aracelis Girmay, Willie Perdomo, Brenda Cárdenas, and more.

Presented by El Centro de Estudios Puertorriqueños and Acentos Bronx Poetry Showcase.

The School of Social Work at Hunter College
129 E. 79th Street, NYC

Later.

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Manuel Ramos

SHERMAN ALEXIE WINS NATIONAL BOOK AWARD



Congratulations to Sherman Alexie and his book, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (Little, Brown, 2007). Alexie won the National Book Award in the category of Young People's Literature. He has described his book as "highly autobiographical" and a blurb for the book says that the "heartbreaking yet funny story chronicles the adolescence of one contemporary Native American boy as he attempts to break away from the life he seems destined to live." A short interview of Alexie on the National Book Foundation website, conducted by Rita Williams-Garcia, offers some insight into the author's process and his intimate relationship with the characters in the book. During the interview Alexie says that his protagonist would think that "if one reads enough books one has a fighting chance. Or better, one's chances of survival increase with each book one reads." Well-said, and well-done.

DAGOBERTO GILB, ROLANDO HINOJOSA-SMITH GIVEN TEXAS BOOK FESTIVAL BOOKEND AWARD
At the recent Texas Book Festival, Dagoberto Gilb and Rolando Hinojosa-Smith were presented with the 2007 Bookend Award. According to the Festival website, each Festival honors a Texas author with its Bookend Award in recognition of a lifetime of contributions to Texas literature. Former honorees include Sandra Cisneros, Mary Margaret Farabee, Larry L. King, Walt McDonald, T. R. Fehrenbach, Horton Foote, William H. Goetzmann, John Graves, A. C. Greene, Shelby Hearon, Elmer Kelton, Stanley Marcus, Cormac McCarthy, Américo Paredes, Louis Sachar, Edwin "Bud" Shrake, Texas Monthly magazine (publisher Mike Levy; editors William Broyles, Gregory Curtis, and Evan Smith), and Bill Wittliff. There's a damn good interview of Gilb and Hinojosa-Smith here at this link, which features an audio presentation. These two writers open up in the interview. They offer opinions about the past and future of Chicano Lit; the influence of other writers and their own impact on literature; how the world, as opposed to North America, views and appreciates what they write; and other subjects that should be of interest to La Bloga's readers. Congratulations to both gentlemen. Well-deserved. The interview was conducted by John M. Gonzalez for the Austin American-Statesman.



MICHELE SERROS
Looks like this is the week to mention online writer interviews. Michele Serros has one that you can find by clicking here. She talks about her latest book, ¡Scandalosa! ( Simon Pulse, 2007), as well as writing YA fiction with "serious themes"; compromising, rather than selling out, to meet editorial demands; her writing process; and the pros and cons of being compared to Sandra Cisneros. The interviewer is Marissa Landrigan for the V.C. Reporter. And check out Michele's website. It's so pink.


JESSE BORREGO RETURNS TO SU TEATRO
Film and television actor Jesse Borrego will reprise his lead role in Su Teatro’s production of Drive My Coche. The play was written by Roy Conboy (El Cucui Walks) and is directed by El Centro Su Teatro Artistic Director Anthony J. Garcia. It runs one weekend only: November 29 through December 1, 2007. Drive My Coche is a bittersweet drama about a Chicano reflecting on his first love, his tested friendships, and the joy and turmoil he experienced the summer before he shipped out to Vietnam. The production also features local actress Concetta Troskie, who recently appeared in the Aurora Fox production of Anna in the Tropics and can also be seen in Su Teatro’s touring productions Papi, Me and Cesar Chavez and Francisca y la Muerte. Borrego is best known, perhaps, for his four-year stint on the television series Fame. Borrego can be seen in the recurring role of Nurse Javier on NBC’s ER. As part of his visiting artist activities, Borrego will be a guest instructor for El Centro Su Teatro’s Cultural Arts Institute—the organization’s arts education program.

For more information about Drive My Coche, or to set up an interview, please contact John at (303) 296-0219 or [email protected].

El Centro Su Teatro, 4725 High Street Denver, Colorado

POKER FUND-RAISING TOURNAMENT FOR EL CENTRO HUMANITARIO
The proceeds from this fund raiser will benefit El Centro Humanitario, a human-rights advocacy center for day laborers, and will help to open a new gathering place for day laborers in Aurora, CO. The mission of El Centro Humanitario is to "promote the rights and well-being of day laborers in Denver through education, job skills and leadership development, united action and advocacy." The tournament is set for December 7, starting at 6:00 P.M. Each player contributes $30, and the grand prize is one quarter of the proceeds.

El Centro Humanitario: 2260 California St. Denver, CO
Questions, or to RSVP: [email protected] 303-292-4115


RENÉ COLATO LAÍNEZ
And last but certainly not least, I want to give a shout-out to one of my fellow blogueros - René Colato Laínez and his book, Playing Lotería (Northland Publishing, 2005) on recently winning the New Mexico Book Award for Best Children's Book. Congratulations René. You make us all proud, and each week here on La Bloga you give us the best in children's and young adult literature.
Way to go, señor.




Later.

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