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Becca Fitzpatrick, author of HUSH, HUSH, will be making an appearance at Hush, Hush fan-site, fallenarchangel.com tonight to speak about the writing and publishing process with fans and aspiring authors!

Last night’s YALSA sponsored chat, What’s Your YALSA New Year’s Resolution, was a lively discussion about YALSA member groups, what makes an Interest Group and Interest Group, what makes a Discussion Group a Discussion Group, YALSA publishing opportunities, and the process for getting involved in the Association.

The chat was facilitated by myself, YALSA President, and Kim Patton, YALSA President-Elect. It was good to have the opportunity to answer member, and potential member, questions about the organization.

The transcript of the chat is available and you can read through to learn more about getting involved in the Association. If you have questions about the committee appointment process contact Kim Patton. If you have questions about getting involved in YALSA outside of committee membership, feel free to contact me.

YALSA chats are held the first Wednesday of every month. The next chat is scheduled for Wednesday, February 3, 2010, 8 to 9 PM Eastern, and the topic is Defending Your Teen Services Budget. The monthly echats are a part of YALSA’s First Wednesdays with YALSA initiative. You can read more about it on the YALSA web site.

Tomorrow night (Thursday, December 17th) is the online holiday party for the literary agency that I'm with. In celebration of the holiday, they're holding a chat featuring my book, co-authored with the amazing Cecil Murphey, CHRISTMAS MIRACLES. Here are the details! Please join us for the fun!



And the winner of last week's CHRISTMAS MIRACLES contest is....

Llehn!

Please e-mail me directly with your snail mail information at marley.h.gibson AT gmail DOT com. I'll do my best to get it to you before Christmas.

And finally....some AMAZING news for my GHOST HUNTRESS series. My awesome film agent, Sean Daily at Hotchkiss and Associates, on behalf of my literary agent, Deidre Knight, has SOLD the option to GHOST HUNTRESS: THE AWAKENING to Shoulderhill Productions with the intention of making it into a feature film!!! Whoooohoooo!!! Merry Christmas to me! LOLOL!!!

Hope to see you at the TKA chat tomorrow night!

Hugs and Happy Holidays,
Marley = )

If you or your friends happen to be in the Little Rock, Arkansas area this Saturday...come check out the Books, Blood & Bones young adult author book extravaganza!

Books, Blood & Bones
Come meet some of your Favorite Authors
Host: Books-A-Million North Little Rock
Date: Saturday, October 24, 2009
Time: 5:00pm - 8:00pm (CT)
Location: Books-A-Million
Street: 2747 Lakewood Village Dr
City/Town: North Little Rock, AR

Book Signing By Authors: Melissa Francis, Stacey Jay, Rosemary Clement-Moore, Linda Gerber, Marley Gibson, and Chloe Neill. Creatures of the Night Costume Contest. Come as your favorite Vamp, Vampire, or Mystery Character. Paranormal/Mystery Trivia Contest.

Also, tonight, please join me and my co-authors, Patrick Burns and Dave Schrader for a live chat at The Knight Agency. Click here for the login to the chat site.

And finally, the winner of last week's givaway for CHRISTMAS MIRACLES is Girlforchrist. Please contact me at marley_gibson (AT) yahoo (DOT) com with your snail mail address and I'll get a copy of the book out to you ASAP.

Thanks so much!
Marley = )

The YALSA online chat on Advocacy is archived at http://connect.ala.org/chatrooms/archives/249. Thanks to everyone who joined us and stuck with it through the technical difficulties! Lots of great ideas and resources were shared, but of course, the topic doesn’t end with the chat session, our conversation can continue, here on the blog!

For discussion:

• What does advocacy mean, to you?
• What are some successful advocacy strategies you have employed?
• What do you talk about with people, when you talk about teens?
• What frameworks, if any, do you use, and what do you do when people don’t want to hear about developmental needs or assets?
• Do you work with community agencies in your advocacy efforts?
• Do you involve teens in advocacy (i.e. Legislative Day, Friends Board Mmber)?
• What kinds of resources or training do you find useful, in terms of advocacy?

Thanks for commenting!

Last night, YALSA members met in YALSA’s ALA Connect space for the division’s monthly online chat. This month, participants discussed Teen Read Week—exchanging programming ideas, discussing the economic crisis’ effect on Teen Read Week plans, talking about the Teens’ Top Ten and more. Read the transcript (PDF) for inspiration!

Our thanks to Carla Land for hosting and to all the participants for their contributions.

Join us for the next chat, Oct. 7, on advocacy for teen services, hosted by Beth Gallaway, chair of YALSA’s advocacy task force.

YALSA is now hosting online chats every month in our space in ALA Connect! It’s an easy, inexpensive way to be more engaged in YALSA and talk with other librarians about topics that matter in teen services. Chats take place the first Wednesday of each month from 8-9 p.m. Eastern and each one has a specific theme. Our next chat will be on Sept. 2, with Carla Land, chair of the Teen Read Week committee, moderating a discussion on Teen Read Week.

In our last membership survey, members indicated overwhelmingly that they sought more opportunities for virtual participation. The monthly online chats are one way that we are providing our members with what they want from us.

After the jump, find out topics for future chats – we’ve chosen themes through January – and how to log in and participate. Have a suggestion? Leave it in the comments.

Our scheduled chats are:

Oct. 7: Advocacy in Teen Services, moderated by Beth Gallaway, chair of YALSA’s Advocacy Task Force

Nov. 4: Inexpensive Teen Programming, moderated by Jenine Lillian, editor of the forthcoming Cool Teen Programs for under $100

Dec. 2: Teens and Technology

Jan. 6: Getting Involved with YALSA

How do you participate? At 8 p.m. Eastern on the day of the chat, log into ALA Connect at http://connect.ala.org. YALSA members should use their login for the ALA website. If you’ve lost your password, you can recover it through the ALA website. Once logged in, head to the YALSA area (it’s http://connect.ala.org/yalsa or you can navigate there within Connect by choosing “YALSA” from under “My ALA Groups”) and then click “Chats.”

If you can’t make it, visit the YALSA blog the next day, as we post all chat transcripts.

Last night YALSA’s monthly chat was on the topic of risk in teen services. A pdf file of the transcript is now available.

It was quite an invigorating discussion with a variety of risky topics covered including:

• Risks of librarians friending teens on Facebook and other social networks
• Differences that exist in risk-taking in school libraries and public libraries
• Importance of having support in risk-taking in the workplace
• Importance of being able to talk with others about risky situations, decisions, etc.
• Need to assess levels of risk and when to take risks in library services to teens
• Categories of risk
• Connections between fear and risk
• The need to be able to access stories of librarian risk-taking

And that’s just a few of the topics covered.

One of the areas that jumped out for me during the discussion was the difference between planned risk-taking and on-the-fly risk-taking. For example, it’s possible to plan to take a risk in a new program, but it’s not possible to plan for the spontaneous discussions librarians have with teens on topics that might require saying something risky as part of the discussion. (For example conversations that might lead to discussion of sexual orientation, religion, health, politics, etc.)

On-the-fly risk-taking is something I want to consider more. I definitely want to talk to other librarians about this topic. Perhaps readers of this blog have thoughts about on-the-fly risk-taking. If you do, feel free to post them in the comments. (Actually, any thoughts about the topic of risk feel free to post in the comments.)

As a reminder, YALSA will publish a book, titled Risky Business, in summer 2010. If you have stories about risk in your career and/or your library, you can send a message to [email protected]. One of the book’s authors will get in touch with you to talk more about your story and its possible inclusion in the book.

The next YALSA chat is scheduled for Wednesday, September 2, 8PM Eastern. The theme is Teen Read Week. You can participate by going to YALSA’s space in ALA Connect and clicking on the chat link on the right side of the page.

Last night YALSA sponsored a chat on how the economy is affecting YA librarians and libraries and how YALSA can support librarians in tough economic times. Those who participated had a lot of stories to tell, questions to ask, and ideas for YALSA to consider. Including:

• Looking at ways to provide mentoring for librarians moving up the leadership ladder. A teen librarian might be very skilled at how to run a teen department, but maybe needs some advice on how to move into management positions and how to be a successful manager.
• Continuing to consider virtual opportunities for members to participate in YALSA projects. As it’s getting harder and harder to attend conferences and meetings, virtual participation is key to staying involved and engaged.
• Helping librarians to become better advocates for their libraries and their services as well as for themselves as professionals.

A full transcript of the chat is available in .pdf.

If you weren’t able to attend (or even if you did attend) the chat and have follow-up ideas or questions feel free to add them to the comments.

I'm guessing that not everyone is going to find the picture of the boxes as appealing as I do (but, hey, it's my blog!). It just gave me a thrill when I saw the box labelled Nim's Island, as if somehow all the other paraphernalia associated with a film shoot - the actors, the crew, the cameras and scenery - still hadn't proved to me that it really was true, Nim was being filmed. A bit like phoning the office and hearing them answer 'Nim's Island.' Gave me a huge thrill every time.

And the directors' chairs... I just loved seeing those little pavilions of chairs scattered through the forest. Sitting on them and watching was okay too... Read the rest of this post