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From Cynthia Leitich Smith's Cynsations


Kidlit TV:

"BookPeople, the leading independent bookstore in Texas since 1970, is proud to announce the BookPeople Modern First Library initiative. This initiative is all about pairing beloved picture books that will never go out of style along with other favorites that reflect the diverse, global society of the 21st century.

"Author Phil Bildner interviewed award-winning author Chris Barton and BookPeople's head buyer, Meghan Goel about the Modern First Library -- learn how you can start one of your own!"

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The recent KidLit TV segment on Modern First Library would not have happened without the enthusiastic support of my friends Phil Bildner and Joe McDermott. Phil’s role was obvious — he was on-camera with me and BookPeople‘s Meghan Goel. But what part did Joe play? Well, who do you think was behind the camera? That’s […]

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On Saturday, December 5, Jennifer and I will celebrate the release of our new holiday-themed books — her Revenge of the Angels and my ‘The Nutcracker’ Comes to America — with an open-to-the-public event at Austin’s BookPeople benefiting the store’s Giving Tree charity program. Giving Tree provides a way for BookPeople customers to provide books […]

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Modern First Library — the program that BookPeople and I began last year to encourage the purchase of diverse new titles along with classic picture books — was featured this past Friday on KidLit TV, with children’s buyer Meghan Goel and me interviewed about the program by author, pal, and all-around dynamo Phil Bildner. I’m […]

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When Jennifer and I celebrate our new holiday-themed books with an event at Austin’s BookPeople on December 5, we’re going to spotlight the store’s annual Giving Tree charity program. Guests buying any hardcover children’s book to donate to Giving Tree will be in the running for the giveaway of signed sets of Jennifer’s Revenge of […]

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When Jennifer and I celebrate our new holiday-themed books with an event at Austin’s BookPeople on December 5, we’re going to spotlight the store’s annual Giving Tree charity program. Guests buying any hardcover children’s book to donate to Giving Tree will be in the running for the giveaway of signed sets of Jennifer’s Revenge of […]

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Those of you who loved my wife Jennifer’s 2014 novel Revenge of the Flower Girls might just be interested in what’s coming this August:

And if you’re sensing a theme running through the books Jennifer and I have coming out later this year, you’re right:

Between her Revenge of the Angels — in which the Brewster triplets find themselves woefully miscast in their church’s Christmas pageant — and my ‘The Nutcracker’ Comes to America arriving in September, we’ll start celebrating the holidays around here when it’s still 102 degrees.

But if you’re inclined to put off getting into the spirit of the season until you reach a more reasonable page on the calendar, that’s quite all right. We’ll be celebrating both books — and encouraging donations to the Giving Tree program — at Austin’s BookPeople on Saturday, December 5 (only 204 shopping days away).

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This month, at least one subscriber to my Bartography Express newsletter — maybe more! — will win a copy of my new brand-new book.

To celebrate next week’s publication of The Amazing Age of John Roy Lynch (illustrated by Don Tate, and published by Eerdmans Books for Young Readers), the children’s department staffers at Austin’s BookPeople came up with several questions for me to answer. I hope you enjoy my answers as much as I appreciate their questions.

If you’re not already receiving Bartography Express, click the image below for a look. If you like what you see, click “Join” in the bottom right corner, and you’ll be in the running for the giveaway next week. Good luck!

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The past day has brought this review from game developer and enthusiast Eduardo Baraf:

And this appreciation (and giveaway!) of Attack! Boss! Cheat Code! A Gamer’s Alphabet from librarian Margie Myers-Culver:

Games, video games, can foster creativity, problem solving skills, desire to increase knowledge about a specific subject, healthy competition, and connections with like-minded people. Attack! Boss! Cheat Code! A Gamer’s Alphabet (POW!, October 14, 2014) written by Chris Barton with illustrations by Joey Spiotto is a guide every gamer will enjoy. It’s a starting point to promote understanding of the basics.

And this inclusion of A Gamer’s Alphabet in the “For Early Career Guidance” section of the Austin Chronicle‘s Video Game Gift Guide:

Local author Chris Barton guides your game-obsessed 8- to 12-year-old to the engrossing world of books. Each illustrated page features a term that may or may not be familiar to little joystick jockeys. It might even help adults understand what their kids mean when they talk about “griefers” and “sandboxes.”

In addition, if you act fast, you can get a signed, personalized copy of Attack! Boss! Cheat Code! sent directly to the gamer(s) on your holiday gift list.

Thank you, thank you, thank you to all of you who have shown your support for Attack! Boss! Cheat Code! You’re all top scorers in my book.

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I’m guest-blogging over at Cynsations today with a behind-the-scenes account of how the Modern First Library program came about. Here’s a taste of what I’ve got to say:

A widespread urge to Do Something About This led to lots of conversations among authors, editors, librarians, and other champions of children’s literature. It led to the #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign. And it led me to email Meghan Goel, the children’s-book buyer at my beloved local indie BookPeople, to discuss a new spin on the notion I’d had on that recent walk.

Wait — email Meghan in what capacity? As an author? Yes, but also as a BookPeople customer, and as a dad, and as a member of the community. Of various communities, in fact, large and small. What’s important is not whether I felt especially qualified to lend my voice but rather that I had an idea that I thought might be worth trying, and I decided not to keep it to myself. Sharing an idea was the least I could do.

Thank you, Cynthia Leitich Smith, for inviting me to share that story. And thanks to Meghan and the BookPeople staff for the fact that we have this story to share in the first place.

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Cynthia Leitich Smith has a second guest post for BookPeople’s new Modern First Library program, and it’s about the one negative experience she’s had in the store. Check it out.

And then check out the latest episode of the Books on the Nightstand podcast, in which hosts Michael Kindness and Ann Kingman discuss which picture books they’d include in their own Modern First Library. Thanks for featuring the program, Ann and Michael!

Besides, if you like books (and I’m pretty sure you do), and you like podcasts (I know I do), why wouldn’t you want to listen to a podcast about books? I just this moment subscribed to Books on the Nightstand, and I can’t wait to hear more.

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This month, several of us Austin authors are guest-blogging for BookPeople’s new Modern First Library program. The latest to do so is Cynthia Leitich Smith, author of the Feral series and Tantalize series for young adults as well as several picture books, including Jingle Dancer.

Here’s a little of what Cyn has to say:

When we talk about diversity in books, we often mention the concept of “windows and mirrors.”

I ached for a mirror. Books, for all their blessings, had failed me in this regard. However, I saw Star Wars in the theater over 380 times.

For the rest, pop on over to BookPeople’s blog.

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My list of contemporary picture books that I’d include in a Modern First Library is up over at the BookPeople blog. Have a look, and let BookPeople and me know which books you’d include on your list.

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I wrote in my newsletter last week about my new project with BookPeople. “Our hope,” I wrote, “is that by leveraging the longstanding popularity of Margaret Wise Brown, for instance, Modern First Library will get more great new books representing an increasingly broad swath of our society into more homes and into more readers’ hands. If this grassroots approach works, we hope that other booksellers will emulate it in their own communities and that it will encourage publishers to create and support more books reflecting the diversity in our world.”

Today, I’m pleased to share the Austin indie bookseller’s blog post officially launching the initiative:

Under the banner of this program, we will be featuring a broad range of books, new and old, that we think belong on the shelves of the very youngest readers.

BookPeople is committed to helping all kids find books that broaden their idea of what’s possible, provide fresh perspectives, and open windows to new experiences: all the things that great children’s books always do. And because we live in the vibrant, global society of the 21st century, our book suggestions have been purposefully designed to reflect the diversity of that experience. After all, a child’s first library offers his or her first glimpses of the world outside the family’s immediate sphere, and we think that view needs to reflect a reality that’s broad, inclusive, and complex, just like the world we all live in.

Please have a look at what BookPeople’s children’s book buyer has to say about Modern First Library, and stay tuned for guest posts on the subject by Austin authors Cynthia Leitich Smith, Don Tate, Liz Scanlon, Varian Johnson, and me. In the meantime, check out the Modern First Library starter sets — the folks at BookPeople have worked hard to put those together, and it shows.

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Children’s book illustrator Don Tate never thought of himself as a writer, despite his many children’s author, publishing and librarian friends — a small army’s worth — and being surrounded by journalists all day in his work as a graphics reporter for the Austin American Statesman.  He’s illustrated more than 40 educational books and 11 children’s [...]

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If you were wanting great love advice from one of the world's most famous lovers, who would you ask?

I would want to talk to Juliet. After all she was a teen in love with a guy her parents hated so much that she had to fake her own death to be with him. Granted that didn't exactly work out as planned, but she has suffered for her love and probably has some great advice.

At least, that's what lots of people believe. Every year the city of Verona receives tons of letters addressed to Juliet asking for advice. Since the end of World War II, there's been an entire club devoted to answering those letters. And it's while they're in Verona studying Shakespeare and answering letters for the Juliet Club that the six characters in Suzanne Harper's new book, The Juliet Club, come together.

Suzanne was in the store the other day signing copies of The Juliet Club and her other teen book The Secret Live of Sparrow Delaney, so I sat down with her for a chat.

It turns out that she got to do lots of research for this book while she was writing it. Now normally you don't "get" to do research; you have to do it. But in this case it sounded like a whole lot of crazy fun. Suzanne can now:

• Do an Elizabethan dance


• Stage-fight with swords


• Speak some Italian - she liked this so much that she continued her lessons.

And if that wasn't enough, Suzanne got to visit Verona in Italy not once but twice. The second trip was for four days, and while she was there, she actually had the opportunity to visit the Juliet Club and read some of the letters that teenagers have sent in.

Got a question for Juliet? You too can write her. Send a letter properly stamped for international mail to:

CLUB DI GIULIETTA - THE JULIET CLUB
via Galilei 3 - 37100 Verona
Italy

And check out Suzanne Harper and her books.

(Originally posted at the blog I do for BookKids.)

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As a prelude to her World Domination Tour with Shannon Hale on the west coast, Libba Bray dropped by our little children's section at Bookpeople here in Austin. She did a lovely presentation, read from her book, and did one of the longest signings I've ever seen. Yes, part of this was because she drew a huge crowd, but some of it was due to the fact that Libba was willing to chat with every fan who came up with a book. She has to be one of the most personable and friendly authors I've seen. As a terminally shy person myself, I always admire anyone who can put more than a sentence together when talking to a perfect stranger.

But as great as Libba's large event was, my favorite part of the evening happened earlier during our "Coffee & Tea with Libba." We held a drawing for four lucky people to come chat with Libba before the event. Here's Libba with the winners making the universal "W" sign for winner. Libba is in the center.



This more intimate event was a fascinating question and answer session moderated by our kid's buyer. Since one of the winners also happened to be a writer, there were lots of writing questions asked. What I found most inspiring was Libba's frank discussion about the art of revising. Like many writers, Libba has a more organic, unoutlined method of writing. She finds that she writes best this way but does have to revise more. Her first draft of her latest novel, The Sweet Far Thing, was 540 pages. She received back from her editor a full 12 single-spaced pages of notes and comments. She then went back in 2 months and rewrote 400 of the 540 existing pages. I find this story both daunting and inspiring at once. In 2 months she rewrote 400 pages? She said she pulled 2 all-nighters and several 18 hour days, but still . . . That's impressive. I think if faced by a prospect like that, I might just cry. But it's inspiring to think that this nationally best-selling author still has to do copious rewrites just like the rest of us. She doesn't automatically generate beautiful prose. Ah, there's still hope for the rest of us.

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Architectfad.com blogs unusual and interesting fads having to do with architecture and design.

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