Good News from the Online Author Visits Team!

Martha Brockenbrough will have a biography of Alexander Hamilton for young adults coming out next fall. Meanwhile, The Game of Love and Death made the International Literary Association’s Young Adult Choices 2016 list.

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New on the drawing table for illustrator Erik Brooks? His first board book project with Sasquatch Books! Stay tuned for additional news in future posts, but here is a cover sketch and some sample color for IF I WERE A WHALE by Shelley Gill:

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Dori Hillestad Butler skyped with classrooms in Texas, Maine and Hawaii this month and shared some behind-the-scenes stories about  Haunted Library #7: The Ghost in the Tree House (Grosset & Dunlap), which was published this Spring. She also learned that Japanese, Portuguese and Czech language rights have been sold to the first three books in the series and that book club rights to book 2 were sold to Scholastic.

Dori was excited to hear that the Washington Library Media Association has created a new transitional chapter book award (the Otter Award) and her Haunted Library #1 is on that first list. Washington kids will vote on their favorite chapter book starting in 2017.

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Joan Holub and Suzanne Williams are happy to announce that film/TV animation rights to their Goddess Girls series have been optioned to Universal Home Entertainment.

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Clare Hodgson Meeker‘s Rhino Rescue! just got a great review from Booklist (May 1, 2016). Here are a few excerpts:

“Featuring three stories of dramatic, inspiring rescues and rife with color photos, this National Geographic Kids Chapter series entry offers and engaging, accessibly written addition to animal-rescue-themed books….”

“…Word pronunciations, including locations, are helpfully embedded within the main text, and factoid-rich sidebars add helpful bonus information…”

“…Throughout, the featured animals provide a personalized account of the challenges facing endangered animal species while highlighting their human rescuers. The back matter includes information on rescue organizations.”

 

It was also chosen as A Junior Library Guild Spring 2016 Selection.

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At the end of April, Lisa L. Owens had the great pleasure of Skyping with Grade 5 students from Konawaena Elementary in Hawaii. At the students’ request, she discussed the making of her graphic novelizations of the classic tales Black Beauty and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, then answered the kids’ insightful questions about the writing life. In early May, she donned her editor’s persona to give an in-depth talk for the Northwest Independent Editors Guild on her extensive experience doing developmental editing in the children’s market. And, just last week, she learned that her forthcoming elementary-level biographies about explorers Hernán Cortés and Robert de la Salle have a publication date. Look for them from Lerner in Fall 2017.

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Laurie Ann Thompson is thrilled to share that Emmanuel’s Dream is a Notable Book in the Children’s Africana Book Awards!

It has also appeared on several more state lists, including being a Star North Nominee in the Minnesota Youth Reading Awards, a nominee for the 2016-2017 Black-Eyed Susan Book Award by the Maryland Association of School Librarians, a nominee for the the 2017 Children’s Literature Association of Utah (CLAU) Beehive Award, and a Transitional Non-Fiction Honor Book in the 2015 Maryland Blue Crab Young Reader Awards.

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Trudi Trueit is currently writing a pair of nonfiction books for the Detecting Disasters series: Detecting Avalanches and Detecting Volcanoes (ages 8 – 10). A former TV weather forecaster, she’s written a number of books about weather watching, storm chasing, and the water cycle for classroom and library use across North America. The disaster books will be published in the summer of 2017. In the meantime, look for her new nonfiction children’s titles later this summer, Mother’s Day Crafts and Birthday Crafts (both from The Child’s World). Trudi worked in a craft store through high school and college and loves all things crafty! For more of her nonfiction titles, visit her website at www.truditrueit.com

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Suzanne Williams had a great time speaking to K-5 students at Eastgate Elementary’s 27th annual Young Author’s Day in Bellevue on May 20th. She also signed 162 books!

Lisa L. Owens, Author of the Month: On Sharing My Writing Life with Young Readers

Love my office!

Kids always ask what it’s like to be a writer, so I focus one of my favorite talks on exploring that. The presentation works well for both in-person and Skype visits, and I can easily adjust the length and content for different ages and/or any curricular objectives a host school might request.

I start by giving students a peek at my office so they can picture where I work — then I briefly walk them through what they’re seeing to help reinforce the message that the writing I do to produce the books they read is my job. A fun job, for sure, but it does require dedication, hard work, and the mastery of certain skills and tools.

Yes, that’s me. Age 4.

Next, I take them back in time (way back!) to what I consider the beginning of my writing life. Some of the milestone activities I discuss as I track that life to the present include:

• being read to, which ignited a deep emotional attachment to books 
• learning to read, which expanded my world; helped me understand myself and cultivate empathy for others; exposed me to storytelling techniques; and developed my sense of language patterns
• frequenting the library, where the possibilities for what to read next were endless 
• learning to write, which freed me to experiment with words and all the ways one might try to arrange them
• beginning a personal writing practice (I kept diaries for more than 30 years, starting as a pre-tweener; these days I write daily Morning Pages instead, as that practice better supports the writing I do “on the job”) 
• studying the craft of writing in school and, to be frank, doing so forevermore
• scoring my first publication credit, which led me to different jobs in the publishing industry before I wrote my first children’s book . . . which in turn led to my now having written upwards of 90 titles (and counting)

Only in hindsight did I recognize just how early those stepping stones on my path to becoming a writer started appearing in front of me. Is that destiny in action? I can’t answer that, but at this stage of my life, I can confidently say that writing is one of my body’s basic needs. I’d still do it even if I knew I’d never publish another thing. I’d have to.

Because writing is so much a part of me, I truly enjoy showing young people how I was able to turn something I love into a career. And I especially like helping them see the variety of ways writing, whether they do it seriously or just for fun, can enhance their lives now and in the future, no matter what paths they choose to follow.

For the privilege of doing all that, I am thankful indeed.

A few of my books, clockwise from the upper left: an early chapter book set during the Chicago World’s Fair; a graphic novelization of Anna Sewell’s classic tale; an in-depth study of the Great Chicago Fire for MG/YA; and one of the titles from my nonfiction picture book series on the solar system

 

Around the Web with OAV Authors: October 2015

It’s the fourth Thursday in October, which means it’s time for our monthly roundup of links to a few interesting tidbits featuring Online Author Visits members:

Mother Daughter Book Reviews enjoyed Goldilocks Breaks In, a book in the Grimmtastic Girls series by Joan Holub and Suzanne Williams.

Looking to schedule a Skype visit with one of our terrific authors? As always, we encourage you to visit our Author Profiles page to see bios, presentation topics, fee structures, and contact information!

Speaking of virtual visits, a reminder that OAV’s author of the month, Trudi Trueit, is running a contest through October 31 — and one of her prizes is a FREE half-hour Skype visit. You’ll find details about how to enter that giveaway online here.

In this Sounders FC video, Clare Hodgson Meeker discusses her inspiration for the chapter book Soccer Dreams: Playing the Seattle Sounders FC Way.

Registration is still open for Dana Sullivan’s fall graphic novel workshops scheduled at several Seattle-area King County Library System locations.

Ooh, here’s a super-fun find: the trailer for I Remember the Sky, Sony Japan’s film version of Janet Lee Carey’s novel Wenny Has Wings.

And, we’ll close with this wonderful photo of Dori Hillestad Butler and one of her adorable young fans, taken during last weekend’s Humboldt County Children’s Author Festival.

Posted by Humboldt County Children’s Author Festival on Saturday, October 17, 2015

Good News from the Online Author Visits Team!

Here’s a peek at what our members are up to this month:

Martha Brockenbrough’s Game of Love and Death is a finalist for the Kirkus Prize. It was also an ALA Booklist pick for Top Ten Romance for Youth, and is a finalist on the YALSA Best Books for Young Adults list. If you’re in the Seattle area, she’ll be speaking with Nancy Pearl and Steve Scher this Sunday at Town Hall about grammar.

                       

                                                                        

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Dori Hillestad Butler has online author visits scheduled with schools in Kansas, New Hampshire, Minnesota and Iowa this month. She will also be participating in the Humboldt County Children’s Author Festival in Eureka, CA from October 15-17, and she’s looking forward to promoting her new Haunted Library #6: The Ghost at the Fire Station in early November. She’ll be traveling to schools and bookstores near Denver, Chicago, Miami and around the Seattle area.

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Joan Ho-Ho-Holub “launched” her new picture book, The Knights Before Christmas at Quail Ridge Books with cake and catapults! Publisher’s Weekly called her book’s premise “great”: On Christmas Eve, three young knights guard the king’s castle against a red-and-white invader–Santa Claus!

And more jolly reviews just in for The Knights Before Christmas:
“This rousing, ridiculous Medieval “Night Before Christmas” parody jingles with castle and holiday wordplay. Cheeky digital illustrations brim with good cheer.” – Horn Book

“An excellent interplay between the amusing illustrations and the polished text, with lots of clever jokes for readers to discover in the art. These knights know how to keep the castle safe and readers entertained.” –Kirkus Reviews

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Dana Sullivan is hard at work on final art for Digger and Daisy Plant a Garden, the sixth in the Digger and Daisy early reader series, written by Judy Young. He reports that this book has not improved his attitude toward kale, but the unusually hot summer in Seattle did produce some delicious cherry tomatoes in his own garden.

He’s also teaching graphic novel workshops for the King County Library System. They are for all ages and FREE to library patrons. If you’ve always wanted to create your own graphic novel or comic book in two hours, check out the details and schedule here.

This coming weekend Dana will travel to Beaumont, Texas to speak at a literacy conference at Lamar University. His talk focuses on his path to diversity and inclusion, but Digger and Ozzie are really more excited about Beaumont being the reputed home of hte world’s largest fire hydrant. We’ll give you a full report upon their return.

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Praise for Trudi Trueit’s new middle grade novel, The Sister Solution (Aladdin M!X):”An insightful, engaging tale that celebrates the relationship that sisters share.” –Kirkus Reviews

Tween bloggers 5GirlsBookReviews “recommends this book for anyone that has sisters.” To learn more about The Sister Solution (for ages 9 and up) and download the reader’s guide, head to Trudi’s website: www.truditrueit.com.

If you live in the Seattle area, you’re invited to THE SISTER SOLUTION Book Release Party tomorrow night, Friday, Oct. 16th, from 7 – 8 pm at University Books in Mill Creek, WA! There will be an author chat/signing, food, a trivia contest w/prizes, a student writing display, and more!

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Laurie Ann Thompson has just wrapped up a slew of in-person events for all three of her books, especially Be a Changemaker.

She is soon heading off to Austin to read Emmanuel’s Dream at the Texas Book Festival, where she gets to meet illustrator Sean Qualls for the first time ever!

And, she was tickled to see this new review of My Dog Is the Best pop on Goodreads:

“I just hugged this book. It may be because this dog looks like my dog. But the text is cute and the dog is cute and the little boy is cute. I love it. Hug Hug Hug”  —Laela

Good News from the Online Author Visits Team!

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Here’s a peek at what our members have been up to lately …

Dori Hillestad Butler‘s Haunted Library recently made the ILA Children’s Choice list. The list is a joint endeavor by the International Literacy Association (ILA) and the Children’s Book Council (CBC) and is the result of voting by 12,500 school children from all over the U.S. Haunted Library is also part of Barnes & Noble’s 2015 Summer Reading Program. Children can earn a free book by reading any eight books, recording them in their reading journal and then bringing the completed journal to their local B&N store. Haunted Library is one of the 15 books that first- and second-graders can choose.

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 Joan Holub and Suzanne Williams‘ Goddess Girls Books 1–8 starter collection is now available at Costco! Be sure to pick them up in bulk. Also, a bound collection of Heroes in Training Books 1–4 is soon to be available through Amazon, B&N, & Costco!

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Look for an essay by Lisa L. Owens in Dr. Bernie S. Siegel’s forthcoming Love, Animals & Miracles.

 

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Dana Sullivan gave a graphic novel workshop at Third Place Books Lake Forest Park on June 15. After a quick demo, he turned them loose with these instructions: 1) Introduce the hero, 2) Introduce the villain, 3) Conflict ensues, 4) Surprise twist ending! In less than an hour they all came through brilliantly with crazy and unexpected stories. Below right is one from his friend, Annie. O … 

 
Dana also just received the text for the sixth book in the Digger & Daisy series written by Judy Young  This new title is Digger and Daisy Plant a Garden and he’ll have a few months to complete the final art.

 

In July, Dana will be speaking at the ILA Conference in St. Louis about writing and illustrating his books, focusing on Kay Kay‘s Alphabet Safari, which also made the ILA Children’s Choice List. He can’t wait to meet Shaq and tell him about the real-life inspiration for Kay Kay. (Hint: he’s a real artists in the Kenyan village where the Star of Hope school and orphanage supplies love and education to more than 120 kids). Come to their fundraiser dance July 11, 2015, if you’re in Seattle!)

                                                                              

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Laurie Thompson has had a very busy spring. Her Be a Changemaker won a Parents’ Choice Recommended Award, along with the Society of Children’s and Bookwriter’s (SCBWI) Crystal Kite Award, an honor bestowed on her by her peers in the children’s literature writing community! Laurie’s children’s book, Emmanuel’s Dream was selected for the First Book Stories for All campaign. Laurie also just had a launch party for My Dog Is the Best, which is now available at your favorite online or retail bookseller. 

 
 

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Trudi Trueit recently signed a deal with Simon & Schuster’s Aladdin MIX division for a new middle grade book. American Kestrel (working title) tells the story of an American teen who travels to Canada to help save her grandmother’s ski lodge from foreclosure. To do it, she’ll have to battle of pair of evil twins, save a rock star dangling from a ski lift, and overcome her own worst fear! Publication is scheduled for Spring, 2017. This will be her third title for MIX, following Stealing Popular (2012) and The Sister Solution (releasing this Sept. 29th). 

If you live in the Seattle area, you’re invited to the book launch party for The Sister Solution on Friday, Oct. 16th at 7:00 pm at the University of Washington Bookstore in Mill Creek. Bring your sister (or a best friend that’s like a sister!).

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