Missing This Weekend's SCBWI Conference? Follow the Blog!

SCBWI's 10th annual NYC conference is under way. I've attended once in the past and have always wanted to go back. It's a great weekend. Full of useful information, packed with interesting peers, and buzzing with a wonderful positive energy. Plus, you're just steps — or a quick cab ride — from Broadway, jazz clubs, and too many restaurants.

I couldn't go this year. I am, however, enjoying the conference blog right now. CWIM's Alice Pope is blogging from the floor, keeping everyone updated on presentations and other happenings. It's perfect! I'm sitting here in my West Coast living room still drinking my morning coffee, and after just 20 minutes of reading I'm all caught up on the goings-on. It's not the same as being there. But it's still pretty cool. The best part is that I can go about my Saturday and then check back in later to see what I've missed.

Give it a try!

Award Winners' Circle

Has the weekend started yet? No? Dang.

While you wait, enjoy these articles about a few of this week's big kid-lit award winners:

ALA press release about Laura Ingalls Wilder winner Ashley Bryan

All Things Considered article and audio interview with Coretta Scott King Author winner Kadir Nelson

The Brown Bookshelf interview with CSK–John Steptoe winner Shadra Strickland

Just One More Book podcast interview with Newbery winner Neil Gaiman

NYT review of author-illustrator Uri Shulevitz's Caldecott Honor Book

PW interview with Neil Gaiman

PW piece on Caldecott winner Beth Krommes

Reading Rockets video interview with Kadir Nelson

SLJ interview with Newbery Honor Book author Kathi Appelt

Teenreads.com profile of Newbery Honor Book author Jacqueline Woodson

It's Newbery Day, 2009

The 2009 ALA Midwinter Conference is in full swing in Denver right now, and this morning was IT for ALA's Youth Media Awards, such as the Newbery, Caldecott, Geisel, and more.

Some of this year's distinguished honorees include:

Newbery Medal
Neil Gaiman for The Graveyard Book

Newbery Honor Books
The Underneath by Kathi Appelt

The Surrender Tree: Poems of Cuba's Struggle for Freedom by Margarita Engle

Savvy by Ingrid Law

After Tupac & D Foster by Jacqueline Woodson

Caldecott Medal
Beth Krommes, illustrator of The House in the Night by Susan Marie Swanson

Caldecott Honor Books
A Couple of Boys Have the Best Week Ever by Marla Frazee

How I Learned Geography by Uri Shulevitz

A River of Words: The Story of William Carlos Williams, illustrated by Melissa Sweet, written by Jen Bryant

Coretta Scott King Author Award
Kadir Nelson for We Are the Ship: The Story of Negro League Baseball

Coretta Scott King Author Honor Books
The Blacker the Berry by Joyce Carol Thomas, illustrated by Floyd Cooper

Keeping the Night Watch by Hope Anita Smith, illustrated by E.B. Lewis

Becoming Billie Holiday by Carole Boston Weatherford, illustrated by Floyd Cooper **This was one of my absolute favorites this year. Stunning writing, stunning art.**

Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award
Floyd Cooper for The Blacker the Berry, written by Joyce Carol Thomas

Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor Books
We Are the Ship: The Story of Negro League Baseball written and illustrated by Kadir Nelson

Before John Was a Jazz Giant written by Carole Boston Weatherford, illustrated by Sean Qualls

The Moon Over Star by Dianna Hutts Aston, illustrated by Jerry Pinkney

Michael L. Printz Award
Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta

Theodor Suess Geisel Award
Are You Ready to Play Outside? by Mo Willems

Laura Ingalls Wilder Award
Ashley Bryan

Congratulations to all the honorees! For a full list of the 2009 awards, check the ALA site for updates later today.

Fellow writer/blogger Darcy Pattison has put up a poll to see how interested writer-types have found today's news. Did you watch the webcast or track the awards on Facebook (that's what I did)? Or are you reading about the awards here? (Lucky you if you were in the room — I've witnessed the awards announcements with my own eyeballs once in the past, and that was exciting!) Click on over to Darcy's blog to take the poll.

Also, just for fun, here's a fresh AP piece with author Neil Gaiman's reaction to winning the Newbery this morning.

Six Books in Six Weeks

Writing six books in six weeks sounds insane, doesn't it? But I'm doing it. The books are short, about 1,000 words each (illustrated nonfiction). The schedule is tight but doable.

Starting next week, I have one title due each of six Tuesdays in a row. This project came along just as I was starting to plan a little vacation that I need but wasn't quite ready for, so for me the timing was right and the distraction factor (from what has created the need for a break) was perfect. Really, it's no fun to vacate if you're not entirely up for it.

So. Six books. Six weeks. That's what I'm doing.

A to the Q: Children's Book Markets Loosely Defined

A to the Q is an ongoing series of posts in which I answer questions I've received from blog readers, workshop students, and others about writing and navigating the waters of children's publishing. My aim is to share what I know and spark your search for even more information.

Q: Help! Can you define the different children's book markets?

Great question — I assume you're talking about the children's trade book, mass, and educational markets? Here's what I think I know about distinguishing among the three!

Trade books:
These books are sold primarily to bookstores, distributors, schools, and libraries. They're considered more "literary" in nature, and thus are the more expensive and widely reviewed titles. They typically come out first as high-quality jacketed hardcovers before being released as high-quality paperbacks, but these days some trade books do come out in paperback only.

Current bestselling authors in trade books include Stephanie Meyer, Kate DiCamillo, Cornelia Funke, and any celebrity-picture-book-authors-of-the-moment. Trade books generally stay in print for a minimum of two years (unless that has changed with the market downturn). Most trade-book authors are paid an advance against the royalties from future sales, and they hope, of course, that their books stay in print and earn them royalties indefinitely.

Mass-market books:
These books are seemingly sold everywhere, including bookstores, superstores, members'-only discount stores, overstock stores, supermarkets, and drug stores. You'll find books by popular mass-market authors in schools and libraries too. Mass-market books are less expensive to produce and buy, and original releases are usually designed as rack-friendly small paperbacks or jacketless hardcovers (think Golden Books).

Series such as Magic Tree House are sold through mass-market outlets. A mass-market publisher may release hundreds of titles per year, while a trade publisher will release a much smaller list of, say, 25–50. Very popular trade books often get distributed later as mass-market titles.

Note that trade and mass-market book publishers look for the same basic things: fresh, original, well-written fiction and nonfiction for all ages from infant to young adult. But each publisher has its own budget, marketing strategy, and niche to fill. It would be impossible to get more specific about what each market wants to see from writers because the next step in delineating that is to narrow it down to what each individual publisher wants. (That's where your own market research comes in!)

Books for the school-and-library/educational market:
Books in all categories can potentially be sold to this market. Trade books are often offered to this market in both their original paperback versions and in retooled versions featuring reinforced bindings. A reinforced binding is a sturdier, pricier version of a jacketless hardcover. Distributors sell single copies and classroom sets of single titles or themed sets. Volume purchases by libraries, schools, school districts, and even entire states receive special discounts.

Some school-and-library publishers specialize in either fiction or nonfiction, and most specialize further by sticking to general topic areas, such as history and biography, issue-based explorations, myths and folktales, special-interest picture books, and so on. Writers are typically paid flat rates for these projects, but some publishers do pay advances against royalties. Also, some school-and-library/educational publishers occasionally — or always — hire book packagers (also called development houses) to hire and work with writers. When your client is the packager and not the publisher, you can expect lower pay rates and tighter schedules.

I hope I've answered your question. As a companion piece, you might also be interested in this post about children's writing genres.

Writing Resolutions for 2009?

I just looked at the list of writing resolutions I posted for 2008. It is hysterical. I accomplished a pathetic 3/10 of those puppies (numbers 1, 3, and 4, in case someone cares). As a time saver for 2009, I think I'll just re-up on the 9 still-relevant items from that list (number 9 no longer applies). Why not!

I briefly toyed with adding a new tenth item — to blog here more frequently — but there's really no need. The time- and life-sapping forces that dominated my 2008 are beginning to fade into the ether. So I feel sure that I'll do more blogging as a natural matter of course. This post alone is evidence! And besides, it seems plausible that I won't even look at the list again until 2010 rolls around . . .

Happy New Year!

My (Surprise) Essay in a New Holiday Book

Last year I wrote an essay called "Snowbirds in Paradise" for a Southern publisher putting together a Christmas anthology. This was one of those quick deals . . . the assignment came up out of the blue, the writing took place over a 2-day period, and the book was to go to press and hit the shelves within a matter of 6 weeks.

The setup threw up a red flag or two in my mind, but it was a fun piece of work to create, and I decided what the heck. Who doesn't love to wax nostalgic about a Christmas past? Also, the money was such that I filed the whole experience under "Just Doing This for Fun on the Side and Half-Expecting the Whole Thing to Fall Apart."

Well, from what I could tell, the whole thing did fall apart. My contact at the publisher mentioned the possibility of a publication delay and then stopped returning calls and emails. I mean REALLY stopped. I did receive my check, thank goodness, along with the executed contract delineating my rights to the essay, so I chalked it up to half-expectations-met, took the publisher off my contacts list, and thought I might run the essay on the blog near Christmas 2008.

Guess what happened last week! The anthology called A Florida Christmas showed up in my mailbox (no return address, no note . . . sneaky!), released by a sister publisher. My first thought upon seeing the book was that someone had sent me a review copy, as the title didn't immediately register. But then the switch turned on and I scanned the TOC to see whether this was "the" A Florida Christmas.

It's a lovely book, actually, very nicely designed. I quickly ordered the only copy "left" (at the time) on Amazon. Then I reread my piece to see how I felt about it. I'm pleased. I won't post the essay here this season, though, because I'm giving that extra copy as a gift. Wouldn't want to spoil the surprise!

Review: The Thanksgiving Visitor

I love this story! "The Thanksgiving Visitor" by Truman Capote (a favorite of mine) can be found in several of his collections.

I first reviewed the picture-book version for the Spring 1999 issue of Prevention Update (Committee for Children), and that article was later picked up in the September 2002 issue of Social Education. If you can get your hands on Beth Peck's beautiful picture book, DO. I wish I'd hung on to my review copy. I see that the book is out of print and fetching a good price.

Here's the article as it appeared in Social Education, featuring a full review and suggested discussion questions for classroom use.

*****

In Truman Capote's evocative sketch of seven-year-old Buddy's relationship with the school bully, the adult Buddy reflects on his experience.

Talk about mean! Odd Henderson was the meanest human creature in my experience. And I'm speaking of a 12-year-old boy, not some grown-up who has had the time to ripen a naturally evil disposition. At least, Odd was 12 in 1932, when we were both second-graders attending a small-town school in rural Alabama.

Capote wrote "The Thanksgiving Visitor" for adults, but it is a wonderful read-aloud for third- and fourth-graders and a great read for Grades 5 and up. Of course, older students benefit from being read to as well, and this rich, lyrical text is perfect for audiences of all ages. Furthermore, the story's events, relationships, and flawed characters are guaranteed to spark lively discussions about such issues as bullying and bystander behavior, anger management, empathy, and friendship.


The Story in Brief

The kids at school fear Odd, but no one's fear is as constant as Buddy's — he is Odd's favorite target. The bullying occurs daily, before school and after, as Buddy prays that the harassment will stop. Some mornings, Buddy is so frightened of what might happen that he begs to stay home from school.

Buddy's teacher, Miss Armstrong, suspects what is happening but doesn't intervene. One day, Buddy takes the time to clean up after his morning run-in with Odd. He is late for class, and Miss Armstrong berates him in front of the other students. Buddy reports Odd's actions, calling him a "sonofabitch" in a moment of fury; he is then severely punished for his outburst.

At home, Buddy repeatedly tells his elderly cousin and best friend, Miss Sook, about Odd's actions. Instead of rising to Buddy's defense, however, Miss Sook makes excuses for Odd's behavior because of the hard life his family leads, Miss Sook says, "The thing to keep in mind, Buddy, is that this boy can't help acting ugly; he doesn't know any different."

Miss Sook invites Odd to the family's Thanksgiving celebration. She believes that the boys will be able to resolve their differences if they get to know one another.

To Buddy's considerable dismay, Odd shows up for the holiday. Later, Buddy witnesses Odd stealing Miss Sook's beloved cameo. When everyone is seated at the dinner table, he exposes Odd's crime. Miss Sook reluctantly checks her jewelry box, then lies to protect Odd in front of the guests. But Odd confesses to the theft and leaves after paying his respects to Miss Sook.

Buddy is scolded for deliberately disgracing Odd in front of the others. Miss Sook explains that while Odd was wrong to take the cameo, Buddy doesn't really know Odd's intentions and should have no reason to think he meant to harm anyone. Buddy's actions, on the other hand, were far more serious in Miss Sook's eyes. She calls what he did "deliberate cruelty" and says, "All else can be forgiven. That, never."

Buddy listens to Miss Sook. Although his first reaction is to wish he had come up with a better plan of revenge, eventually Miss Sook's message sinks in.

As the story closes, Buddy and Miss Sook reaffirm their friendship. Odd stops bothering Buddy for good; no reason is given for this, but the reader can infer that Odd is ashamed of — and that he possibly learned from — the events of that Thanksgiving Day.


Discussion Questions

• Consider Buddy's description of how some kids watched as he was bullied: "Usually a circle of kids ganged around to titter, or pretend to; they didn't really think it funny; but Odd made them nervous and ready to please." Why do you think that nobody stepped in to help Buddy? List some ways you could help if you were a bystander in a similar situation.

• Miss Armstrong punished Buddy for his outburst and use of inappropriate language. Why do you suppose she did not punish Odd for harassing Buddy? Brainstorm other ways in which a child could report bullying to an adult. Which ways might be most effective?

• Buddy explained that he hated school — but only because of Odd Henderson. How might Buddy's situation affect his schoolwork?

• Miss Sook was willing to overlook Odd's behavior because of his difficult home life. Do you agree with her that Odd couldn't help acting "ugly"? Why or why not?

• Why do you think Odd accepted Miss Sook's invitation to Thanksgiving dinner?

• Imagine that you are Odd, and you've just noticed the cameo in the cigar box. What thoughts are running through your mind as you reach in and take it? Why do you want it? What is it worth to you? Now imagine that you are Miss Sook. What is the cameo worth to you? Why?

• Miss Sook lied to protect Odd, and Buddy felt that she had betrayed their friendship. Did she? Explain your thinking.

• By the end of Thanksgiving, Buddy thought, "Odd Henderson had emerged — how? why? — as someone superior to me, even more honest." In your opinion, was Odd more honest than Buddy? Explain your respond.

• Why do you think Odd stopped bullying Buddy? Do you think it was a realistic outcome? Why or why not?

• Are there signs that Buddy and Miss Sook are still good friends at the end of the story?

*****

Happy Thanksgiving — I'm off to make my pumpkin pie!

7 Random Facts Meme

Oops, it is November 26, and I'm just noticing that illustrator Dawn Phillips tagged me on her blog — and mine — for the 7 Random Facts About Me meme 10 days ago . . .

Bad, bad blogger, Lisa!

Here's my list:

(1) I bailed on a writing gig last week. My role was to write a slew of Little Readers. These books truly are fun to write. But my development-group client repeatedly changed the schedule and assignment content/tasks/fees with no dialogue, no advance notice, and no pleases or thank-yous.

I'd already been increasingly uncomfortable with the company's (lack of) communication style in the months leading up to the work. And, a quick exchange with a colleague confirmed that others out there in our small-ish world of freelance children's writers had already sworn off working with this client due to BAD experiences. So when my first assignment finally arrived, late and completely different in every possible way from what had been confirmed the day before, that prompted me to finally just say no thanks.

To other writers out there: Remember, you ALWAYS deserve to be treated fairly and with a modicum of professional courtesy. Your time is valuable, and your writing is work.

(2) I am ambidextrous. Thank goodness, so says Wikipedia, that I don't shoot for sport. Apparently, though, the condition might be good for my word-processing skills. Seems I'm in pretty good company — Michelangelo, Einstein, Beethoven, Gandhi — not bad. I like this quote I just found: "Ambidexterity is neither a goal to aspire to nor is it a gift from God. Instead, it is first and foremost the mark of brain damage." That might explain some things.

(3) Speaking of word-processing skills, I never took a typing class in high school. This was back in the day when (a) people used typewriters; (b) everybody took typing class for an easy A; and (c) some guidance counselors were still telling girls that they MUST have good secretarial skills to "fall back on." I remember being insulted that my assigned counselor didn't want to talk about my college/career aspirations and adamant that I'd be the one with the secretary working for me and so shouldn't waste my academic hours on such a useless class. Instead I needed to study world domination and such.

I started needing to type nonstop right away in college, and so, luckily, typing proficiency followed. Joke's on me that I became a writer and editor, both of which require quite a lot of the clickety-clack.

Just the other day I saw a report on the average salary of executive-level administrative assistants. Upon growing up and entering the workforce, I quickly learned that administrative professionals do demanding, highly specialized, crucial work (and that EVERYONE could benefit from developing great secretarial skills). But gee whiz, I didn't realize just how lucrative the job category could be. I think I coulda been a contender. Darn you, my smug, surly, sexist guidance-counselor man!

(4) I recently brought home a bag of half-priced books, and I don't know where I put it. I know that at first it was in my office, right under my desk. But now? No clue. What's more, I'm not entirely sure I know what all is in the bag. I just know the bag exists. One might rightly guess that I experienced a wee episode of emotional book buying. (Come on, you know you've done it too!)

(5) I replaced my dog's office bed a few weeks ago. She seems to be missing her old, worn cushion and hasn't been spending as much time with me during the day. She'll come in, sniff the new cushion and kick it around, give me a forlorn look, and then go flop down in the adjacent family room. Did I mention that the old cushion was flattened out and discolored and maybe even smelly — and old? At least now I have a better picture of what the draw was in here.

(6) I'm not really working today. I'm sitting at my desk, willing to answer the phone or an email if necessary, but I'm mostly goofing off. My to-do list includes tasks like finding a new pumpkin pie recipe, scouting shopping sites for holiday gift ideas, and burning CDs of the new holiday music I've downloaded. I needed this day.

(7) I happily post a meme when I've been tagged, but I rarely tag other people. I always either feel too busy or too lazy to check other blogs and see whether they've already participated. I suppose this practice is kinda spoil-sporty of me, but I didn't forward chain letters in the 70s and 80s and I don't pass along modern-day email forwards either. Drag!

The Morning After: How Soon Before the First Children's Book Drops?

This moment will give rise to soooooo many new children's books, both immediately and far into the future.



I predict that Lincoln and Washington will have to welcome Obama to the Most-Written-About-U.S.-Presidents Club.

No doubt they'd both love the idea.