Unleashing Readers

Kellee’s NCTE/ALAN Reflection 2017

November 29, 2017November 29, 2017 by Kellee

Every year when I am applying through my district to attend the NCTE (National Council of Teachers of English) Annual Conference followed by the ALAN (Assembly on Literature of Adolescents of NCTE) workshop, I have to write up a rationale about why I like to attend the conference, and it is always hard to put into words. And each year the conference seems to be getting better and better.

I consider myself lucky that I get to attend this conference each year because it really does recharge my professional battery. I would not be the teacher I am today without my NCTE and ALAN peers, and I know I will keep growing because of these conferences and the people I know through them.

Like Ricki shared yesterday, we are huge advocates for ALAN. It is the organization where I have found all of my like-minded educators who believe that reading and access to a diverse and wide-range of literature is the key to a literacy education for our adolescents. (PLUG!: It is only $30 a year to join, and you get our newsletter and The ALAN Review!)

A few of the highlights this year include:

1. I am going to start with the same thing as Ricki: The “YA Lit IS Complex: Authors and Teachers Reframe the Conversation About Young Adult Literature and Text Complexity” session. It featured YA authors Laurie Halse Anderson, M. T. Anderson, Matt de la Peña, A. S. King, Julie Murphy, Jason Reynolds, and Angie Thomas. I was in charge of moderating Laurie Halse Anderson’s round table, and I had the pleasure of working with her and her brilliance. The session, chaired by the incredible Jennifer Buehler, was based on her book Teaching Reading with YA Literature which is a must read also. I really hope I get to be part of any future sessions Jennifer decides to propose!

Please feel free to check out my handout about the complexity within and activities to do with The Impossible Knife of Memory by Laurie Halse Andersonthat I shared at my round table on Slide Share (click here).

Also, check out the notes I took while Laurie talked on Twitter (click here).

2. I was also very lucky to be part of the “The Vision of ALAN: Rationales and Strategies for Using Young Adult Literature in Secondary Classrooms” an ALAN-sponsored session with some of my favorite ALAN people (including the one and only Dr. Ricki Ginsberg! And we forgot to take a picture together! We’re the worst!). Five roundtables, each hosted by a past chair of the Walden Award, focused on different young adult literature (YAL) topics including the literary merit of YAL, using YAL in the classroom, and research supporting YAL. Attendees will be free to move to the roundtable of their choosing, and will have opportunities to switch tables/topics during the session. Roundtable leader(s) will provide materials for attendees to take back to their school sites, including book lists, teaching strategies, and rationales for challenged titles.

Please feel free to check out my handout about text sets that I shared at my round table on SlideShare (click here).

3. Author panels are some of my favorite to attend and be part of! First, I was lucky enough to be the chair of an amazing author panel on the use of unconventional narrators within the author’s books and within the classroom. Katherine Applegate, Lisa Bunker, Josh Funk, and Adam Rex each shared some about their writing process and then also shared a way their book could be used in the classroom.

Please feel free to check out the presentation on SlideShare (click here).

4. I then attended an teacher dream come true session called Reading as a Personal Art which included Nancie Atwell (my education hero and this was the first time I’ve seen her speak!), Kelly Gallagher, and Penny Kittle. The focus was on how they include reading in their middle and high school classes, how they get include rigorous and thought-provoking activities with the reading, and how English teachers need to think of themselves as literacy teachers, not literature teachers. One of my favorite thing they shared was the cross-country social justice book clubs Penny and Kelly are doing in their classrooms.

5. The next panel I went to was another awesome author panel: Positive Social Engagement moderated by Michele Knott with Lisa Yee, Jennifer Ziegler, J. Anderson Coats, Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich, and Ammi-Joan Paquette. The panel looked at ways to use literature, and their books specifically, to help students find their place in our world and make sure that they are a positive part of the future.

(P.S. These are only some examples of the panels! Wowza, right?!)

6. The ALAN Breakfast was by far one of my biggest highlights for a few reasons: A) RICK RIORDAN spoke, and I actually got to meet him. I’d seen him here in Orlando two years ago, but it was an auditorium tour. You should have heard my students squeal when they saw my picture with him! B) NEAL SHUSTERMAN was awarded the ALAN Award for his outstanding contribution to young adult literature and gave a truly enthralling speech. C) I was the chair of the ALAN Award committee, so I GOT TO INTRODUCE NEAL!

Please feel free to check out my introduction on Google Docs (click here).

7. I also have to give a shout out to the publishers who sponsors dinners, cocktail hours, book signings, and so much more for the educators at the conference. We are lucky to have you!

8. The ALAN Workshop should probably have its own top ten list because it isn’t fair to give it only one spot when those two days are such a joy in my life, so I will share my top five panels I loved at ALAN:

MINE! 🙂 I presented with Julia Keller and Jodi Lynn Anderson on their science fiction books The Dark Intercept and Midnight at the Electric.
Joseph Bruchac was entrancing and also such a pleasure to talk to afterwards. I wish I could absorb all of his knowledge and stories.
The key notes were ON POINT this year! Monday opened with Brendan Kiely and Jason Reynolds and Tuesday started with Meg Medina. True brilliance.
The “In Conversation” panels were fascinating this year! Two examples: Chris Crutcher and Laurie Halse Anderson talked about sex, and Donielle Clayton and Cindy Pon spoke about diversity in sci-fi/fantasy.
The line up in general was fantastic. I am in awe of Laura Renzi and the vast array of authors that she put forth for us to experience.

9. Friends! My heart always feels just a little bit empty when I leave. I have some educators, publishers, and authors who I consider friends who I only see at conferences, so it is always hard to leave them. (Shout outs to Jennie, Michele, Aly, Jason, Dani, Wendy, Daria, Katie, Beth, Beth, Lee Ann, Sarah, Jennifer, Ricki of course!, and all of my other wonderful PLN friends! Also, I was so happy to meet Amber and Kristen!)

10. Books and Authors! So. Many. Books! I already had a problem choosing, and now it is worse. And so many authors to swoon over! I have so many photos; too many to share, but if you want to check them out, you can view my Google Drive folder (click here) if you’d like.

Ricki’s NCTE/ALAN Reflection 2017

November 28, 2017 by Ricki

Every year, I think to myself, “Golly, that was the best conference yet.” This year was no different. I was fortunate to be invited to be a part of several phenomenal sessions. I learned so much from my colleagues and from the many wonderful authors who attended the conference.

It’s no secret that the ALAN Workshop is my favorite part of the conference. I live and breathe ALAN. If you aren’t an ALAN member and love young adult literature, I highly recommend this organization. Please feel free to contact me (or Kellee, for that matter) if you’d like to learn more!

My favorite part of the conference was the ALAN Workshop. This should come as no surprise to readers. I am a diehard ALAN member. As we say during the workshop, #IamALAN. If you aren’t an ALAN member and love young adult literature, I highly recommend that you join. The assembly is like a family—the members are extremely accepting and their passion shines.

I so enjoy the time I spend with old friends at NCTE and ALAN. Two of my students attended this year, and one commented, “It’s so interesting how well you know these people because you only see each other once a year.” It’s quite true. I consider some of my greatest friends to be the folks that I have met at this conference. Based on my work with The ALAN Review, I was able to meet new friends this year, particularly the reviewers for the journal. It is is such a wonderful community to be a part of, and for that, I am very grateful.

A few of the highlights this year include:

1. The “YA Lit IS Complex: Authors and Teachers Reframe the Conversation About Young Adult Literature and Text Complexity” session. It featured YA authors Laurie Halse Anderson, M. T. Anderson, Matt de la Peña, A. S. King, Julie Murphy, Jason Reynolds, and Angie Thomas. I was in charge of moderating M. T. Anderson’s table, and I was shocked at the turnout for this entire session. Someone counted 300 people in the tiny room. I feel so, so lucky to have been a part of this session, which was chaired by the incredible Jennifer Buehler. I have my fingers crossed that she does the session again next year.

2. The CEE-sponsored session about YA voice, culture, family and identity. Benjamin Alire Sáenz spoke, and he (once again) captured my heart.

3. The Meet the Editors session. This is my third year with this session as a presenter (with The ALAN Review). I love hearing what scholars are working on, and this year, I was able to connect with some people who I’ve always wanted to meet.

4. Getting to dine with some of my favorite bibliophiles and authors. Kellee Moye makes me so happy!

5. The “Vision of ALAN” session. It was so fun to work and present with some of my favorite colleagues. Our roundtable was focused on research in YAL, and I loved sitting beside my friend and soulmate, Wendy Glenn.

6. The “Future is Now” session. WOW! This is a massive session that features preservice and new teachers. It’s incredible!

7. Taking fangirl photos with some of my favorite authors, and capturing these moments with my two students.

8. Neal Shusterman‘s ALAN Award speech and Rick Riordan‘s breakfast speech. My goodness. These two men are FORCES.

9. The ALAN Workshop keynotes! Both were incredible! Jason Reynolds, Brendan Kiely, and Meg Medina make my heart feel full.

10. All of the books! I don’t even know where to begin! I am going to cut this post short. It is time to READ! 🙂

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? #IMWAYR 11/27/17

November 27, 2017November 27, 2017 by Kellee

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? From Picture Books to YA!

It’s Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme started by Sheila at Book Journeys and now hosted by Kathryn at The Book Date. It is a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It’s also a great chance to see what others are reading right now…you just might discover the next “must-read” book!

Kellee and Jen, of Teach Mentor Texts, decided to give It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children’s literature – picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit – join us! We love this meme and think you will, too.

We encourage everyone who participates to support the blogging community by visiting at least three of the other book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

We’re back!!

Thank you all so much for understanding about our time away. NCTE and ALAN were as amazing as always, but we are happy to be back 🙂

Last Few Week’s Journeys

Kellee

Ironically enough, while I am at NCTE and ALAN, a conference about teaching English and adolescent literature, I get very little reading done because I am going from about 6AM to 11PM! But traveling to and from the conference then 5 days off when I get back do help on the reading front.

Before leaving for NCTE, I made sure to read This is Not a Valentine by Carter Higgins and Hidden Dangers by Lola M. Schafer because I was lucky enough to spend a dinner with them at NCTE, and I wanted to make sure I’d read their newest. Both are ones I highly recommend though for very different reasons! I love the innocence and sweetness in Valentine and Hidden Dangers is terrifyingly interesting!
Dude by Aaron Reynolds isn’t coming out for a while still, but when I saw a galley, I made sure to check it out, and it made me actually laugh out loud.
Matt de la Peña is having a really big Winter 2017/18! First, let me tell you about Love. At ALAN last year, Matt read the poem that would become Love to us, and I flat out cried because it was such a beautiful love letter to his daughter. I couldn’t wait to read the final picture book, and MAN! it did not disappoint. Loren Long took Matt’s beautiful poem and added art to turn the poem into a picture book about love for all humans. BEAUTIFUL! Miguel and the Good Harmony is a perfect companion to Coco! The movie and book are about passion and family.

I have a tradition of reading the new Diary of a Wimpy Kid book on my way to NCTE each year because it comes out right before the conference. This year, the story fit because Greg is going on a family vacation, but as with all DoaWK stories, everything does not go as planned. I just really love these books!
I’m still listening to the Whatever After series, and I finished with book #3 which was a retelling of “The Little Mermaid,” but with a MUCH better version.
My book club is Skyping with Michele Weber Hurwitz on Friday, so I wanted to make sure to read all of her books. Last but not least is her newest Ethan Marcus Stands Up which looks at school and ingenuity and family and friendship. I know my kids are going to love this one!
Emily and the Spellstone by Michael Rubens is a pun-y and adventure-filled story about Emily who gets thrown into quite a predicament when she finds out she is a Stonemaster and has a demon at her beck-and-call. I’ll definitely be reviewing this one here.

I read the first Musnet book a year ago, but I was so excited to learn that there are THREE more of them! I finished the whole series, and I cannot wait to review them!

Ricki

My sister-in-law bought these books for my son’s birthday. We love the Please, Mr. Panda book, so we were very excited to read Thank You, Mr. Panda and I’ll Wait, Mr. Panda. All three books are excellent. My son is currently sleeping with these books in his bed. This is reserved for his favorite books. 🙂

I REREAD If You Could Be Mine by Sara Farizan for my class this week. We are thrilled to be Skyping with her on Wednesday!

I also read several other books at the conference, but I can’t seem to remember the titles. I promise I’ll remember them for next week!

This Week’s Expeditions

Kellee

I’m currently listening to Whatever After #4 which is the retelling of Sleeping Beauty.
I am so excited to read the first and second book in the new Haddix series: Children of Exile and Children of Refugees.
I haven’t jumped into my NCTE/ALAN books yet because I had some books here I needed to read first, but the first two I am going to pick up are Thunderhead by Neal Shusterman and Knock Out by K.A. Holt. I CANNOT WAIT!

Ricki

I am not sure which NCTE book I’ll read first. I am actually interested in spying on other bloggers to see what everyone is reading before I make my decision. 😉

Upcoming Week’s Posts

Tuesday: Ricki’s NCTE/ALAN Reflection

Wednesday: Kellee’s NCTE/ALAN Reflection

Thursday: Ricki’s NCTE/ALAN Book List

Friday: Kellee’s NCTE/ALAN Book List

So, what are you reading?

Link up below and go check out what everyone else is reading. Please support other bloggers by viewing and commenting on at least 3 other blogs. If you tweet about your Monday post, tag the tweet with #IMWAYR!

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It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? #IMWAYR 11/20/17

November 20, 2017 by Kellee

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? From Picture Books to YA!

We encourage everyone who participates to support the blogging community by visiting at least three of the other book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

Last Week’s Posts

**Click on any picture/link to view the post**

Tuesday: Ten Books We Plan to Read this Winter

We are currently away at:

We will be taking this upcoming week off for conferencing, traveling, and family! We will catch everyone up the week of November 27th. To our US readers: Have a fabulous holiday!

So, what are you reading?

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Top Ten Tuesday: Ten Books We Plan to Read this Winter

November 14, 2017November 14, 2017 by Ricki

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created at The Broke and the Bookish. The feature was created because The Broke and Bookish are particularly fond of lists (as are we!). Each week a new Top Ten list topic is given and bloggers can participate.

Today’s Topic: Ten Books We Hope to Read This Winter

Ricki

1. American Street by Ibi Zoboi

This book has been on my to-read list for far too long.

2. History is All You Left Me by Adam Silvera

I am interested in incorporating this book into my Adolescents’ Literature course next year. I think it might be a good fit for our week that we talk about grief.

3. Dear Martin by Nic Stone

The only reason I haven’t read this sooner is that I can’t find the box that I packed it in. We moved this summer, and this is really cramping my reading style. 😉

4. The Lie Tree by Frances Hardinge

I am quite intrigued by this book, and I want to read it this winter.

5. Refugee by Alan Gratz

I just got this book on Audible, and I can’t wait to listen to it!

Kellee

These are all books my students have asked me to read “soon!”

1. Young Elites by Marie Lu

Students keep on trying to spoil this one for me because they just want to chat about it, so I need to read it so I can be as excited as they are!

2. Rebels by Accident by Patricia

One of my students is Egyptian and says very rarely does she feel reflected in a book but that Rebels by Accident does just that. How can I deny reading this when she sells it to me that way?!

3. Mark of the Dragonfly by Jaleigh Johnson

Mark of the Dragonfly is on our state list for this year, and I have tried listening to the audiobook, but I was just not having much success; however, a student who I’ve had for 3 years swears to me that I will love it. I promised her I’d read it during break.

4. Randoms by David Liss

Randoms is the longest book on our state book list but it is also the one book I haven’t heard anything negative about. I will finish all 15 books on the SSYRA list, but I want to read this one soon because I want to promote it to help get it more readers who will love it, and I also promised a few of my readers I’d read it soon.

5. Prisoner of Ice & Snow by Ruth Lauren

One of my 7th graders is so enthusiastic about this book, and I promised her that I would find time for it soon.

What books do you plan to read this winter?

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It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? #IMWAYR 11/13/17

November 13, 2017November 13, 2017 by Kellee

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? From Picture Books to YA!

We encourage everyone who participates to support the blogging community by visiting at least three of the other book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

CONGRATULATIONS
Lisa M.
for winning our giveaway of Space Boy and the Snow Monster by Dian Curtis Regan!

Last Week’s Posts

**Click on any picture/link to view the post**

Tuesday: Ten Characters Who Would Make Good Leaders

Wednesday: Teaching Guide with Activities and Discussion Questions for Maya Lin: Thinking With Her Hands by Susan Goldman Rubin

Thursday: Aliens Get the Sniffles, Too! Ah-Choo! by Katy S. Duffield

Friday: Teaching Guide with Activities and Discussion Questions for Charlie and Mouse and Grumpy by Laurel Snyder

Sunday: Author Guest Post!: “There’s No Such Thing as Pantsers” by Justin Lantier-Novelli, Author of Don’t Mess with Coleman Stoops

Last Week’s Journeys

Kellee

I started listening to the Whatever After series by Sarah Mlynowski after a student recommended it to me. I was on an audio book lull, so when I saw that my library had them all, I started listening, and I really am enjoying them! What a fun take on fairy tales! In each story, Abby and her brother Jonah get transported into different fairy tales and always end up causing a ruckus even when they try really hard not to.
For my teacher book club’s November title, we chose Burn Baby Burn by Meg Medina, and it is more than you could have expected from the summary. It is set with Son of Sam and a crazy summer in NYC as the background, but the story is so much more than the setting and historical aspects. It is a story of growing up and family and abandonment and friendship and love.
I then, on a whim, picked up House Arrest by K.A. Holt. I’ve had students recommend it, and I just randomly chose it–wow! I am so glad I did! It is a book that I wish I’d read when it came out, so I could have been recommending it since then. If nothing else, it is going to be a book I recommend highly to so many students going forward. Timothy just wants to help out his family, but after he steals a wallet to buy his baby brother’s medicine, he finds himself on house arrest for a year. This is his journal.

Trent and I had some fun this week reading some new books! I love when Trent is open to reading new stories!

If Picasso Painted a Snowman by Amy Newbold is a fun introduction to some of the best artists ever!
Up! Tall! And High! by Ethan Long is a silly book about adjectives with laugh-out-loud situations.
Boo Who? by Ben Clanton is about fitting in when you are new.
Du Iz Tak? by Carson Ellis is a book that I cannot believe I haven’t read yet. It is so interesting to try to figure out what the bugs are saying and to watch their world transform.
We’re All Wonders by R.J. Palacio is a perfect companion/introduction to Wonder as it is a perfect look at the themes that Wonder shows up.

Ricki

Thank you all for being very patient with me while I moved into a new house. I had a lot going on this week with some major work items due and moving with two kids under four. 🙂 I am happy to say that I’m back in action and looking forward to seeing many of you at NCTE and ALAN!

I read Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds a couple of weeks ago and loved it. I’ve had three students read it since then, and we all are raving about it!

I went to high school with Julia Denos. She was a year above me, and her sister and I were very close friends in middle school. She is just as kind and smart as she seems in interviews and presentations. I think Windows is absolutely brilliant. She captures Somerville so well.

The final installation in Kobi Yamada’s series is a phenomenal ending. I was reluctant to read What Do You Do With a Chance? because I love the first two books, and I was pleasantly surprised by how different and complementary the book is. I am so grateful for this series.

This Week’s Expeditions

Kellee

I am on #3 of the Whatever After series, and this time, Abby and Jonah are in “The Little Mermaid.”
My 7th grade book club has started up again (here’s info on last year!), and our first author that we’ll be Skyping with is Michele Weber Hurwitz. I’ve already read her Summer I Saved the World…in 65 Days, so I plan on reading her other two novels, Calli Be Gold and Ethan Marcus Stands Up. Looking forward to 12/1 and the Skype visit!!!

Ricki

Moving has really cramped my style. I am halfway through Turtles All the Way Down and embarrassed that I haven’t finished it sooner. I love it thus far!

Upcoming Week’s Posts

top ten tuesday

Tuesday: Ten Books We Plan to Read this Winter

After Tuesday, we will be taking some time off for conferencing, travel, and family. We’ll be attending two of our favorite events of the year!!!

We’ll be back the week of November 27th to catch everyone up. See you then 🙂

(On the 20th, we will still have the linky available for everyone to link up, so please stop by if you plan on doing an IMWAYR post.)

So, what are you reading?

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Author Guest Post!: “There’s No Such Thing as Pantsers” by Justin Lantier-Novelli, Author of Don’t Mess with Coleman Stoops

November 12, 2017 by Kellee

“There’s No Such Thing as Pantsers”

Like every other profession and hobby, creative writing has developed its own lingo or jargon writers share with each other; these are phrases that non-writers would neither understand nor care about. Thank NanoWrimo – the month-long writing contest that takes place every November – for coining one of these terms a few years ago to describe writers who never do any planning for their stories. Imagine deciding to compose your very own novel or short story, sitting down at your favorite typewriter or laptop, starting on a blank screen and just going. No thought. No worry. Perhaps not even a developed idea…

That is the essence of being a Pantser: a writer who doesn’t think, he just writes. Maybe the inspiration came from a dream, or a conversation. Maybe there was nothing but a “Once upon a time.” This theory begs to know where the greatest stories of humanity actually come from: the head or the heart? My theory, however, is that Pantsers don’t exist. Even if a writer cracks his knuckles and begins with nothing, once he’s finished his first draft and knows the story and characters a bit, he’s invariably going to proofread, re-tool, and revise his work. Any narrative needs drafting as part of its process. Whether or not you, as a writer, plan at the very beginning (before you start on page one, line one), or you start planning using your first draft as the catalyst, none of us can write without it. Everyone’s a Plotter (the opposite of a Pantser).

Why is planning so important?

There are many reasons. To compose a story that could speak to millions of people isn’t an easy task. It takes a very delicate blend of art and science. The art, comes from the heart, but the science… science is the product of the mind. I would say that 80-90% of my time is spent in the pre-writing phase. I am a plotter with a capital P. I’m also a drafter, as much as I wish I could crank out that flawless first draft (nobody can). Planning can take many forms and has many benefits, some of which will seem obvious to you and some not-so-much. The type of planning you do is also a direct correlation to what you intend your final product to be.

My personal background is in writing for the screen. I went to college for audio/video production and minored in screenwriting. There are some really great ‘how to’ books I can recommend to teach novelists how to craft that perfect character arc or story arc or secondary plot thread – all of which have their roots in motion picture writing. Let’s face it: screenplays were born out of novels, but that doesn’t mean that novelists can’t learn a thing or two from screenwriters.

Which brings me to my first point about planning. Planning gives the writer the ability to stand back and see the story as a god would, as one big picture. Screenwriters are taught to use corkboards and notecards in their planning. Each card is a scene and the board is divided up into the typical (and formulaic) three-act structure: set-up, rising action, resolution. This simple exercise, which I have used for both my screenplays and novels, helps the writer to visualize the arcs. Where will this scene fit best in telling my tale? Is that scene even needed? Once he’s staring at his board with all the scenes displayed, a writer can ask himself: does this scene advance the plot, subplot, or character development at all? If the answer to any of those questions is yes, then the scene is kept. If it’s no, then it can be scrapped (and to use an industry term: to the cutting room floor).

Planning your story arcs is essential in creating the emotional and logical experience that writers want, need, and expect their audience to get. It doesn’t matter if that audience is sitting in a dark room watching the screen, or curled up in their bed turning pages. But what is a story arc? If you know, great. If you don’t, a story arc is comprised of beats, or plot points. Different events throughout the course of a story have to happen to move the plot forward, or drive the character onto becoming the protagonist the writer – and reader – want him to be. And by planning, the writer can see all possible scenes, brainstorming as many as he wants before choosing the perfect one.

The first plot point is also known as the inciting incident (at least in the screenwriting world). No story – in literature or on film – is complete without one.

Would Luke Skywalker been able to destroy the Death Star without R2-D2 and C-3PO taking that escape pod to Tatooine?

Would Romeo and Juliet have ended up dead (to add a bit of high culture to this mix) if Romeo had never crashed the Capulet’s party?

Of course, the inciting incident is only one instance where planning is needed, but each act in the three (or five) act story structure has major plot points. Writers must plan them to do their stories justice and take the reader along on a wondrous journey.

Planning is important in a single, stand-alone novel, however it couldn’t be more essential when writing a series. Series contain multiple story and character arcs, A plot threads, B plot threads, even C plot threads (truly they can be infinite) that span each book individually, but also continue strands across multiple books. Two great examples of writers who plant seeds for future books as part of their pre-writing stage planning are Stephen King and J.K. Rowling – and it’s no accident that they are two of the most successful authors of all time. If you want to see how to plant ideas for future books in a series, just read Harry Potter and The Dark Tower (in fact, King literally has been planting seeds in all his books, even the non-DT works, for decades).

Still not convinced that planning is important? Think about the horcruxes in the Wizarding World… The very first one was revealed in the second book in a seven book series. Rowling didn’t wing her writing. Her seeds were intentionally planted. She knew what horcruxes were before she started typing line one, page one. The rest of us, her loyal readers, didn’t find out until book six! But we didn’t need to know. She did.

The second reason to plan is more about spring cleaning. The more ideas you get out of your system early in your drafting, the more bad ideas you get out of your system. You can easily put together a dozen versions of the same scene, chapter, or character sketch. And all that brainstorming churns the waters of ideas. Sooner or later, the writer will hit the nail on the proverbial head, and get the perfect idea for some aspect or another of his work.

So if you want to clear away bad ideas, take a step back and look at your book(s) from a 3^rd person omniscient perspective, then I cannot recommend planning more. Pre-writing is necessary to crafting a well thought out, logical, and emotional story filled with three-dimensional characters that your audience can relate to and keep them furiously flipping pages until the wee hours of the morning.

You can follow Justin Lantier-Novelli on Twitter: @jlnovelli. Find him on Goodreads, Facebook, and Amazon. His debut middle grade fiction novel, Don’t Mess with Coleman Stoops, is available in paperback and for Amazon Kindle.

About the Book: Coleman Stoops just had his twelfth birthday, but he’s not getting popular anytime soon. The kids in his grade call him “Stoopy”. He hates the cruel nickname almost as he hates himself for always managing to accidentally play into it. The clothes he wears, the hobbies he loves, and the way he behaves in school all contribute to his eternal low ranking as the butt of everyone’s jokes. Coleman’s a dork, a dweeb, a nerd. He’s the fool of the school.

So when the most popular kid in his class, B. Bradford Woffington III, approaches him with a proposition and a potential girlfriend, Coleman can’t help ignoring his instincts as they tell him not to trust “Trey”. He accepts the boy’s offer and begins the social and physical grooming that will make him fit for dating – gasp! – a real, live girl. No matter what happens though, Coleman can’t shake the sneaking suspicion that there’s something Trey isn’t being completely forthcoming about. What isn’t the most popular kid in school telling him?

Thank you, Justin! Planning is something all teaches struggle with students understanding, so this post is going to be so helpful!

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