Author – Page 37 – Unleashing Readers

Author Guest Post!: “Taking the Fear out of Shakespeare” by Stephanie Kate Strohm, Author of The Taming of the Drew

May 22, 2016 by Ricki

“Taking the Fear out of Shakespeare”

When I started writing The Taming of the Drew, I had a very specific audience in mind. If I’m being perfectly honest with myself, I was writing it for me at sixteen.

The Taming of the Drew is a reverse-gendered retelling of The Taming of the Shrew set at an outdoor summer Shakespeare theatre in Vermont, where the backstage hijinks begin to mirror the plot playing out onstage. All of the characters have recently graduated from high school and are one hundred percent bonkers obsessed with theatre, just like I was. I was a passionate reader as a teen, but I never read any books about teens who were really into acting, and believe me, I would have loved one. So I set out to write The Taming of the Drew for past me, and, hopefully, any high school drama dorks who are currently caking on the foundation before the curtain goes up on their production of Much Ado About Nothing.

I’m not just a writer; I also work at a high school on the west side of Chicago. When my students asked me what my book was about, I found out that none of them had heard of The Taming of the Shrew – most of them, in fact, only had a vague idea of who Shakespeare was, and the ones who did know Shakespeare were most decidedly not fans of his. But the more I talked about my book, the more I realized I’d actually been writing for a different audience.

I was a Shakespeare nut from an early age – a freakishly early age – but I was first exposed to Shakespeare not from reading his plays, but from Charles and Mary Lamb’s Tales from Shakespeare. I loved the stories I read about exiled sorcerers and tragic kings. They were like fairy tales, and I devoured them. Thanks to those books, I loved Shakespeare before I’d heard a single line of his or watched any of his plays. By the time 10 Things I Hate About You came out in 1999, I was twelve and already a pretty advanced Shakespeare snob, but I loved that movie. Still do. I remember feeling a sense of supreme vindication when it came out. “See?!” I practically shouted at my friends. “Shakespeare is cool! I told you so!”

If students are first introduced to Shakespeare as seniors in a high school English class, it can be kind of a shock. The language is weird. It seems like too much effort to try and understand what anyone is saying. Frankly, the whole thing is intimidating. Shakespeare is so scary there’s even a whole series of books called No Fear Shakespeare! But I was never afraid of Shakespeare because I didn’t know I was supposed to be.

Several summers ago I taught the five to eight year old age group at the summer camp at MaineStage Shakespeare, an outdoor summer Shakespeare theatre in Kennebunk, Maine. Many people are surprised that five year olds attended a Shakespeare camp, but they made magnificent fairies in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. We wrote silly plays and learned fairy dances, but they also declaimed lines from Richard III in their vocal classes and offered lots of opinions on the nuances of Titania and Oberon’s relationship. They didn’t know Shakespeare was supposed to be hard. They knew he wrote funny stories about guys with donkey heads.

I wish we could some how introduce all five year olds to Shakespeare before they know he’s “supposed” to be scary. I realize, of course, that’s insanely unrealistic – but rest assured, if I ever become the benevolent dictator of this country, that will certainly be part of the program – but I also know there are ways to show that Shakespeare isn’t scary. That’s why I’m such a huge fan of retellings. Retellings are a great way to introduce reluctant readers who might otherwise balk at Shakespeare to the world of his plays. I know there isn’t a guarantee that everyone who reads Saving Juliet by Suzanne Selfors or The Fool’s Girl by Celia Rees or Ophelia by Lisa M. Klein will immediately search out the original source material, but I think it’s definitely a step in the right direction. The more the stigma of “scary” gets taken out of the conversation, the better students will fare when they’re inevitably staring down a Macbeth monologue in English class.

I had thought I was writing The Taming of the Drew for students like I had been, who have the entirety of Juliet memorized “just in case.” And if those students find the book, I really hope they like it. But I realized later on that this book is just as much, if not more so, for readers who have only the vaguest idea of who Shakespeare is, or who actively dislike him and his frequent usage of the word “forsooth.” I hope this book becomes somebody’s 10 Things I Hate About You: a pop culture gateway drug into classical theater.

“This sounds funny, Ms. Strohm,” one of my students said after I explained the plot of The Taming of the Shrew. “I can’t believe he ripped up her clothes like that. He’s crazy.”

“You think that’s crazy?” I asked. “Let me tell you about a guy named Titus Andronicus.”

And so I did.

The Taming of the Drew

About the Book: Cass McKay has been called stubborn, temperamental, difficult, and that word that rhymes with “witch” more times than she cares to count. But that’s all about to pay off. She has finally landed the role she was born to play—Kate, in The Taming of the Shrew—in the summer apprentice program of a renowned Shakespeare theater company in the forests of Vermont.

But Cass can barely lace up her corset before her troubles begin. Her leading man, Drew, is a complete troll, and he’s going to ruin Cass’s summer. Even worse, Cass’s bunkmate Amy has somehow fallen head over heels for Drew. Cass can’t let Amy throw herself at a total jerk, so she comes up with a genius plan to give Drew the personality makeover he so desperately needs: they’ll tame Drew just as Petruchio tames Kate! But as Shakespeare’s classic plays out offstage, Cass finds it harder and harder to resist falling for Drew herself.

The best kind of entertainment, The Taming of the Drew is smart, funny, fresh, and original. You’re going to love this badass heroine and her friends. You might even end up liking Drew, too.

Author Stephanie Strohm photographed for her “Pilgrams don’t wear Pink” book. Copyright Melissa Lynn 2011

About the Author: Stephanie Kate Strohm is the author of Pilgrims Don’t Wear Pink and Confederates Don’t Wear Couture. She graduated with a dual degree in theater and history and has acted her way around the United States, performing in more than twenty-five states. She currently lives in Chicago with her fiancé and a dog named Lorelei Lee.

Thank you to Stephanie for this honest post.

Thank you to Cheryl at Skyhorse Publishing for connecting us with Stephanie!

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Author Guest Post!: “Science Fiction and Science Fact: World-building in The Riven Chronicles” by Amalie Howard

May 15, 2016 by Kellee

“Science Fiction and Science Fact: World-building in The Riven Chronicles”

According to the laws of physics, time travel and inter-dimensional travel are both possible. Having been a science fiction fan for most of my life (Star Wars, Dune, Aliens, and The Fifth Element all grace my top 10 movie list), when I wrote The Riven Chronicles, I knew the world-building and the concept of jumping between universes, had to be complex but relatable, especially for a young adult market. As a fiction writer, any world has to have rules, and those rules have to be consistent or the world falls apart. So step one was definitely research.

I really disliked physics in high school. Disliked is probably an underestimation—I loathed it. During class, I took excessively long bathroom breaks. At home, I agonized over pages of homework I could barely understand. And yet, when I was researching worm holes and parallel universes for The Almost Girl, the first book in my series, I found myself completely fascinated by the laws of physics—a nightmare realm that had instigated far more than its fair share of cold sweats during my teen years. I became sucked into a deliciously dark underworld of sub-quantum mechanics, astrophysics, advanced robotics, nanotechnology, and claytronics.

Building off of Albert Einstein’s space and time theories, physicists throughout history have been hell-bent on reverse engineering the universe and explaining it at its most basic level—discovering the so-called Theory of Everything. Who knew that Hugh Everett’s “Many-Worlds Theory” was an interpretation of quantum mechanics where every possible outcome could happen causing multiple universes (though we wouldn’t be aware of them)? Or that Michio Kaku would come up with String Field Theory demonstrating that gravity could interact between two parallel universes? Or that Stephen Hawking would contend that wormholes exist in a phenomenon called quantum foam? Mind blown. Literally.

Using quantum theory and the microscopic gaps in the universe to allow two distinct points in time and space to connect, I could jump off of Kaku’s string theory, and bolster it with Kip Thorne’s theories of anti-gravitational quantum vacuums to engineer my wormholes, and then tie it into zero-point energy as my “launch” spots to jump between universes (for which I invented the term eversion). Ultimately, I had to take whatever theory I decided to use and make it work for my intended reader. I was looking for complex simplicity—something rooted in the laws of physics, but also accessible to my readers of any strata … meaning making it credible for savvy, erudite sci-fi readers and making it relatable for high-concept teen ones. It was a delicate balance.

Here’s an excerpt from The Almost Girl where I explain this element in my mythology.

A picture forms on the flat-screens in the center of the room. It looks like an hourglass broken up into small squares. “That is a two-dimensional drawing of a traversable wormhole. It’s basically a bridge in space with two different end points. Think of the universe as made up of an infinite number of universes. Some of these universes are coupled by a gravitational field, which means that we can communicate between them.” […] “How it works is a whole other story. We’re talking string theory and sub-quantum mechanics, basically the relationship between space-time, gravity, energy, and matter.”

~ The Almost Girl

As I indicated earlier, I also came up with the concept of “eversion” or “to evert,” which in my mythology means to jump between universes. It’s based on the words trans-inversion (reversal of position) and trans-eversion (turning inside out). I knew I wanted something unique that would work within my framework and wouldn’t be something too generic. I wanted the word to convey an inimitable sense of what it intended—not just something as ordinary as jumping. The word itself had to be a process, one of flipping inside out, and one that conjured thoughts of its own journey.

All in all, writing The Riven Chronicles was an incredible learning experience, especially as it related to science fact and science fiction. I learned that the world of physics is a fascinating one, and that there is so much more to who we are and the universe in which we exist. I learned that something you experience in middle school or high-school could evolve into something extraordinary when approached in a different way—even something as painful as physics (gasp). I learned that science fiction is an awesome space to be in as a writer—it’s a world of infinite possibility with so many opportunities to create. I’m pretty sure that we aren’t the only intelligent life out there, whether that’s in alternate or parallel universes, or in other galaxies. And until that’s proven, for now, I’ll continue to exist in the universes of my own making.

About the Author: Amalie Howard is the award-winning Indie Next author of Alpha Goddess, the Aquarathi series, and the Cruentus Curse series. Her debut novel, Bloodspell, was an Amazon bestseller and a Seventeen Summer Read. Visit her website at www.amaliehoward.com and follow her on Twitter at @AmalieHoward.

FallenPrince_cover

About The Almost Girl: Seventeen-year-old Riven comes from a world parallel to Earth, a world that has been ravaged by a devastating android war. As a Legion General, she is the right hand of Prince Cale, the young Prince of Neospes. In her world, she’s had everything: rank, responsibility, and respect. But when Prince Cale sends her away to rescue his long-lost brother, Caden, who has been spirited to modern day Earth, Riven finds herself in uncharted territory.

Armed with the mindset of a soldier and racing against time to bring Caden home, Riven must learn how to blend in as a girl in a realm that is the opposite of all she’s ever known. Will she be able to find the strength to defy her very nature? Or will she become the monstrous soldier she was designed to be?

About The Fallen Prince: When a new enemy threatens her home, Riven’s only hope may be the man who made her a monster.

Riven has fought for a hard-won peace in her world, and has come to shaky terms with who and what she is—a human with cyborg DNA. Now that the rightful ruler of Neospes has been reinstated, Riven is on the hunt for her father in the Otherworld to bring him to justice for his crimes against her people.

But when she receives an unwelcome visit from two former allies, she knows that trouble is brewing once again in Neospes. The army has been decimated and there are precious few left to fight this mysterious new threat.

To muster a first line of defense, her people need help from the one person Riven loathes most: her father. But what he wants in return is her complete surrender. And now Riven must choose: save Neospes or save herself.

This exciting sequel to The Almost Girl combines science, action, and romance in a compelling, hard-to-put-down package.

Thank you to Amalie for the guest post!

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Blog Tour, Giveaway, and Author Guest Post!: “When Characters Come Alive” by Beth Vrabel, Author of Camp Dork

May 23, 2016May 8, 2016 by Ricki

“When Characters Come Alive”

“Do Lucy and Alice know each other?”

A young reader asked me this recently when I met with their class to talk about writing and reading. The students had read Pack of Dorks as a classroom read-aloud and several of them went on to read A Blind Guide to Stinkville on their own.

The grin on my face had to look ridiculous as I tried to figure out how to answer this question. Did Lucy, my snarky and loyal protagonist in Pack of Dorks, know quiet and brave Alice from A Blind Guide to Stinkville?

Luckily another student piped in. “There is no way they’d like each other, if they have met. Alice is way too mature for Lucy.”

“But Alice and Sam would get along,” replied the first student, mentioning Lucy’s best friend.

“Actually,” I said, and there really is no word to describe the thrill pulsating through me at that moment. “Sam and Alice are cousins.”

“What?” they said together, minds blown.

I nodded. “Look for clues in Camp Dork.”

As an author, that was the best conversation ever, one that’s making me grin like a scary clown as I write about it now. These readers weren’t asking if Alice and Lucy would meet in further books. They wanted to know if they knew each other now, in the land fictional characters live when we close our books. To them, Lucy and Alice aren’t personas I created. They’re real.

I see the same thing in my son when he talks about his current literary obsession—Harry Potter. “I wish he’d be a little more careful with his Invisibility Cloak,” he mused as I put him to bed. “It makes me nervous that he just leaves it lying around.”

Ask my son anything about Harry Potter, and he can immediately give you the answer. What’s in his pocket? “A golden snitch.” What’s on his bedroom floor? “Chocolate Frog wrappers.” What’s his biggest fear? “Dementors.”

This ability to talk about characters with the same conviction and intimate understanding we would use to describe as our friends happens because of one thing: Voice.

When a character has a distinctive and authentic voice, not only do the stories become alive, so do the characters.

Finding that voice is the hardest aspect of writing for me. Even writing the dreaded synopsis is easier than this essential step.

It’s tricky because it feels like I’m not working. It feels—and looks like—a lot of staring into space, eating candy and drinking coffee. But really, I’m thinking of my characters, trying to unravel what makes them meaningful, how they view the world, what makes them unique.

Assigning them quirks is easy. Making those quirks meaningful and capable of moving forward characters’ stories is tough.

A Blind Guide to Normal (releasing in October) tells the story of Ryder Raymond, a fourteen-year-old boy who always has a pun or a joke at the ready. The reason for this is pretty obvious: He wants to make you laugh before you can laugh at him.

But sometimes, as an author, I’m the only one who understands a character’s quirks. Take for example Sheldon in the Pack of Dorks series. He is completely obsessed with dinosaurs. He wears shirts with iron-on dinosaurs and shoelaces with dino prints. Every conversation with Sheldon will eventually go back to dinosaurs. I haven’t yet shared in the series why Sheldon is obsessed—how when he was a toddler, he and his dad used to go for walks looking for tracks and spend hours playing with toy dinosaurs. I haven’t mentioned that Sheldon’s dad isn’t part of his life any more, but the dinosaurs still are. But I know that, and it helps me move Sheldon through the series.

When I’m to the point where I can talk about my characters the way those students did Lucy and Alice—putting them in new situations and seeing how they’d respond—only then am I able to write their stories.

And it’s only when I see that these characters have blossomed to life for readers, too, that I know all that space-staring potato-chip-eating coffee-drinking was time well spent.

Young writers who are just beginning to tap into their own ability to story tell might benefit from continuing the stories of characters they already know and love.

I remember doing this myself when I was in middle school. Winnie Foster went on to have many more adventures in my mind after finishing Tuck Everlasting. I told myself stories about her growing older, times when she would run to the stream and debate drinking from it. Times that she was so glad she never had.

Another classroom I visited offered up another pinch-me moment as an author. The students told me they loved to play Pack of Dorks at recess, taking turns being Lucy, Sam and the rest of the gang. The character most coveted was Lucy’s baby sister Molly.

The teacher told me she encourages them to put these new adventures on paper during classroom free writing time. What an incredible idea!

Young writers given the freedom to continue their favorite characters’ stories will no doubt give them the confidence to tap into their own storytelling, find their own voice.

“I still think Lucy and Alice should meet,” the student told me as our classroom discussion ended. “It’d be a good story.”

“I think so, too,” I told her. “And you should write it.”

Camp Dork

About the Book:

Lucy and her pack are back, in this sequel to Beth Vrabel’s heartwarming and humorous debut, Pack of Dorks. Sheldon convinces Lucy, Sam, April, and Amanda to join him at a weeklong sleep-away summer camp—Camp Paleo: Live Like a Caveman. Like cavemen, they’re going to have to make do without air conditioning or a heated pool. They’ll learn archery and dig for fossils. And Grandma’s coming too; she’s taking a job as lunch lady for the camp next door.

At the last minute, Sam backs out to go to a gymnastics training camp instead. Lucy wonders why she misses him so much—it’s not like he’s her boyfriend or anything. Why does the word “boyfriend” make her blush, even when she’s only thinking it? She needs a distraction. Enter Mr. Bosserman, the grouchy camp leader who won’t budge on the caveman aspect of the camp. The old man needs some softening up, and Lucy knows just the person for the job: Grandma.

One successful match made, Lucy starts to see potential lovebirds everywhere. And setting up couples keeps her from facing the question tickling the back of her mind: Is she in love with Sam? But when the wrong campers fall for each other, the pack falls apart, all under the watchful eye of a super secret blogger who’s been writing about the camp’s activities Gossip Girl–style. Even worse? A thief is targeting everyone but Lucy, setting her up to look guilty. Soon Lucy again finds herself alone, left to fix the messes she’s made and face her own feelings. If she fails, the pack may be splintered for good.

For readers aged 8 to 12, this is a funny but poignant book about bullying, crushes, the harmful nature of rumors, and the importance of friendship and telling the truth. A great book to read aloud in the classroom for discussions or to simply read on a summer trip.

Goodreads Link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25898670-pack-of-dorks

Giveaway!:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

About the Author: Beth Vrabel grew up in a small town in Pennsylvania. She won a short-story contest in fourth grade and promptly decided writing was what she was going to do with her life. Although her other plans–becoming a Yellowstone National Park ranger, and a professional roller skater–didn’t come to fruition, she stuck with the writing. Beth’s backround is journalism and was editor of two regional magazines and a lifestyle columnist. Beth now writes full time.

Her books include Pack of Dorks series and A Blind Guide to Stinkville (Sky Pony Press). Her latest release, Camp Dork, hit bookstores in May.

A Blind Guide to Normal releases in October.

Author Links:

Website: www.bethvrabel.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AuthorBethVrabel/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/beth_vrabel

GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7710163.Beth_Vrabel

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/authorbethvrabel/

Thank you to Beth for this post. We hope our readers enjoyed her conversation with these students as much as we did! We’ve been fortunate to feature Beth on the blog before. Please check out her other guest post, “My Son’s Teacher’s Approach to Reading.“

Thank you to Lisa at Tasty Book PR for connecting us with Beth!

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Author Guest Post!: “Reading the Middle Grade Mind” by Sally Barlow-Perez, Author of The Unintended Runaways

May 1, 2016 by Kellee

“Reading the Middle Grade Mind”

Have you ever tried to steer one of your favorite kids toward one of your favorite books? You’re in eager enthusiasm mode. “Hey, you are going to LOVE this book!”

Then the kid rears back, looks like you asked him to drink a glass of hot chalk, gives you that look, and says, “Uh, thanks, but I don’t think so.”

Just like adults, kids pick books for their own reasons. And timing is everything. One week a reader might feel like something light that reflects familiar problems like, The Mother Daughter Book Club series; the next week he or she might relish the challenges of Wonder or maybe a visit to a whole to universe in The Lightning Thief or something as wacky as one of the Wimpy Kid books. It all depends on mood, just like it does with you and me. Or stress level. Or time availability. I’ve seen a 9-year old read and enjoy a Babysitter Club book – standard 3^rd grade level reading—during a school week, and Wonderstruck— 5^thgrade level reading–on her vacation. Makes sense. You and I don’t read Dostoevsky when we barely have time for lunch. Middle grade readers thrive on a huge variety of choice. Which is lucky, since as authors, we are just as eclectic as our young readers!

That said, I am sure there are those of us who try to shake loose a few practical thoughts before we set pen to paper to write our deathless prose. No doubt, in addition to prayer, you’ve tried to psyche out just where that sweet spot in middle grade literature is. Sure, there are trends and the Goodreads lists and I’m sure there are some left-brain writers out there who can successfully write to the formula. But since I’ve always favored on-the-spot research, I thought I’d go directly to the source: my sixth grade consultants: Sarah, Haley, Carolyn, Mia and Emily. “What have you been reading lately?” I asked them. These are just a few samples of the many titles they sent me:

Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library by Chris Grabenstein
I Will Always Write Back: How One Letter Changed Two Lives by Martin Ganda
The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone.
The Port Chicago 50 by Steve Sheinkin
School of Charm by Lisa Ann Scott
Black Beauty by Anna Sewall
Little Women by Louisa Mae Alcott
Number the Stars by Lois Lowry
Hope is a Ferris Wheel by Robin Herrera
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
Wonder by R.J. Palacio
The Egypt Game by Zilpha Keatley Snyder

Sure, it’s a girls list; not much blood and guts there but look at the variety. From dystopia to Victoriana to the serious issues of an adolescent with a disability to pure escapism. Irving Stone, no less! Remarkable that reading tastes could vary so widely among such friends from the same school in the same grade with such similar backgrounds. My point being, that predicting subject matter that will appeal to every middle grader is a losing proposition.

Picture this—and if you’ve taken your children or your students to the library, you’ve seen it many times. A middle grader sitting on the floor between the stacks taking out book after book off the shelf, looking at it very briefly, and then returning it to that empty slot among the other books. Those poor, forlorn, rejected books. Someone put his or her heart and soul into writing that book! What was wrong with it! Well, it just didn’t suit, that’s all. For reasons we, as onlookers (or the unfortunate author of said rejected volume) will never know. My conclusion: short of writing a tome on the love life of ants, I might as well forget trying to guess what will suit the middle grade reader and suit myself instead.

At the same time—trying with some difficulty to recall my past life as a lit. major—I tryed to find the commonalities in the lists of books my sixth graders sent me. It wasn’t in the eras, the settings or the subject matter. They varied from Hogwarts, to Ghana, to the rural South, to a dystopian future, to small town USA, to ancient Rome. Lots of variety there and choice in those areas can be a matter of cover art, flap blurb or momentary whim. But in the protagonist (Lit. 101 !) I do think young people make a conscious choice to read a book featuring one of two different kinds of protagonists:

A character with whom they can completely identify; someone who shares their sensibilities, their strengths, their weaknesses, and their secret feelings; someone who permits them to sigh in relief, saying, “I am not alone; Someone else feels or behaves that way too.”
Or
A character with whom they can partially identify, but who is perceived as an individual to emulate; someone with qualities to admire, or aspire to, even if those qualities are as basic as patience, or self-assurance, or courage rather than the ability to fly or fight dragons.

It might be simplistic to say that the former is featured in reading that requires a little less concentration than the latter. I’m sure there are examples either way. But the best authors show us well rounded characters who evolve and change in both cases. What a privilege it is to read the work of the many wonderful authors of middle grade fiction who make their characters come alive for us. I see my young friends absorbing Palacio’s Auggie, Hodgson Burnett’s Sara Crewe, Pullman’s Lyra, Selznick’s Ben and Rose; Riordan’s Percy, and Lowry’s Jonas and I think, “These characters are becoming part of who my young friends are.” How could they not?

I too feel as though I too have been influenced by the thousands of fictional characters that have filled me up over the years. A good number have come from middle grade books. Many from young adult books. One memorable one was the picture book that inspired my own middle grade novel, The Unintended Runaways, with its lively painting of a gypsy wagon and the carefree little girl who lived in it.

The tale that formed around that picture was the story I wanted to tell. I fought it. I’d been in marketing and public relations and I knew historical fiction was emphatically NOT in vogue. Would anyone read it? Newsletters and conferences told me I would never sell it. “Write it anyway,” I told myself. I already had visions of the beautiful blue wagon and the big shire horse trotting down the lovely rural roads of mid-19^th century England. market.

“Don’t be an idiot,” I argued back. “You’re a journalist. You wrote a history book. Get out there and write something that’ll sell. How about an academy for shapeshifters? A middle school mafia? An underground society ruled by 12-year olds? You can do it! Get with the program!”

“Yeah,” said my better self. “And it will suck, big time and you will hate every minute of it. This is 40,000 words we’re talking about.”

So I did it my way. I wrote my historical novel about 19^th century young people. Unfashionable as my setting might be, I knew today’s middle graders would identify with the larger themes of justice, freedom, and family. And I hoped they would fall in love with my characters just as I did.

Thus The Unintended Runaways came into being. My sixth grade consultants – who were very generous early readers!—say they like it. (They kind of have to say that.) But the proof will be in the sales figures. Because as a general rule……

There’s just no reading the middle grade mind.

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Links:

Website: www.theunintendedrunaways.com

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Summary: For a girl who loved adventure, twelve-year old Lia Leonides had the perfect life. Every summer, she and her grandfather traveled the rural roads of England in their gypsy wagon, stopping at fairs and selling horse brasses along the way. It was exactly the life Lia wanted, until the day a mysterious letter arrived. Lia’s grandfather warned her not to get her hopes up, but lifelong dreams are hard to ignore. Lia’s father was alive and looking for her. But when her grandfather suddenly passes away, Lia is sent to work as a servant in an orphanage and is left with a choice that she never wanted to make: let the world decide her future for her, or run away and decide it for herself? Lia, with the help of her beloved pets and some unexpected friends, must take her gypsy wagon south on a harrowing journey before her father disappears forever. A persistent sheriff and the constant threat of misfortune won’t make the trip easy, but Lia and her friends don’t plan to let anything stop them from forging their own destinies.

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About the Author: Sally Barlow-Perez openly admits that books have taken over a good chunk of her life. She gobbles down two or three library books a week, ranging in genre from young adult, to middle grade, to fantasy, to mystery. She tries to balance her book obsession with writing, hiking, and hanging out with the young people who inspire her. But no matter how hard she tries, she always comes back to books. As a fiction writer, Sally’s focus is curiosity. “Curiosity is a great excuse for writing, as well as for reading,” she says. “Even when I finish a book, I still wonder what the characters are doing!” Sally makes her life in Palo Alto, California. She has two grown sons, whom she believes to be her greatest contribution to mankind. The Unintended Runaways is her first middle-grade novel. More information is available at www.theunintendedrunaways.com.

Thank you Sally for this insightful guest post!

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Author Guest Post!: “Possible Impossibilities: Magic and the Middle-Grade Reader” by I. J. Brindle, Author of Balthazar Fabuloso in the Lair of Humbugs

May 16, 2016April 24, 2016 by Ricki

“Possible Impossibilities: Magic and the Middle-Grade Reader”

When my son, Theo, was about to turn four, I asked him what he wanted for his birthday. His answer was simple, only one thing: Hogwarts Castle. “A mini tree-fort version?” I suggested hopefully. Nope, he wanted the whole thing, old stones, talking portraits, moving staircases, the whole shebang, to be built in our backyard. “Or a Batcave,” he relented, seeing my expression. “If you can’t do Hogwarts, I’ll take a Batcave.”

If little kids have one super power it’s that power to believe random, wacko stuff is totally possible. And why not? Those kind of things are happening all the time in their worlds: steam suddenly whistling out the spout of a kettle, crusty old seeds pushing up pale green sprouts through the dirt, clear light through faceted glass turning into rainbows. I remember clearly when I was four, hammering metal coffee cans and other bits of debris to an old flat piece of plywood to make a boat I would sail across Lake Ontario. My dad, who was sorting the laundry nearby, never told me that was not going to happen. To this day, I think that was one of the best gifts he ever gave me.

Too often, well-meaning adults rush in to help children develop a sense of perspective, an understanding of what is realistic, sealing up the cracks between the world of imagination and the more reliable, tried and true “reality.” The instinct generally comes from a good place. To protect from disappointment. To make sure the child is investing his or her precious hopes and dreams in something that might actually, in a million years, have some chance of ever happening.

“If only he would ask for something we could actually give him,” I remember bemoaning to Theo’s dad after Theo finished showing us the impossibly grandiose Batcave blueprints he had found in the back of one of his Batman books. Then I thought about my boat. About that sense of possibility. I took a deep breath. “This is too big a job for us,” I admitted to Theo. “But how would you do it?” Theo was disappointed in us. But eventually he took a shovel, went out behind the house and started to dig. His friends came over later in the week and they dug as well. And the digging has gone on sporadically from then—for about nine years now. At first it might have been about the bat cave, but as the digging went on it became about something else: about the undefined, mysterious possibilities of the hole itself. Something way better than anything we, his parents, could have cobbled together for him.

By the time kids get to the middle grades, the concept “real” becomes very important. “Is that real gold?” “That is sooooo fake!” At the same time, this age is also the sweet spot for the greatest magical literature ever written: Harry Potter; The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe; The Hobbit; The Dark Also Rises. The other day, my ten-year-old, Nicholas (one of the biggest realists I know), told me that all his favorite books have some kind of magic or fantasy in them. Hardly seems a coincidence. As the concepts of reality become more practically defined and potentially limiting, fantasy allows middle-graders to keep the doors and windows open into other possibilities.

Possibilities is the key word. When your nose is stuck between the covers of a great fantasy book, it’s not because you’re so caught up with bunch of stuff that could never happen. It’s because you’ve entered a place where the outrageous and fantastical does happen and you can’t wait to see what’s going to happen next. And sometimes what happens next is someone comes along and lifts one of these possible impossibilities off the page and turns it into a reality. The Internet search engine, for example, appeared in Douglas Adam’s Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy long before the real version was created. Sci-fi author, Jules Verne, landed the first rocket ship on the moon in remarkably accurate detail in his novel From the Earth to the Moon over a century before the first real lunar landing occurred. Sometimes what looks like wall between fantasy and reality is actually a door.

These doorway-moments, these meeting points of the real and the fantastical, are essential in middle-grade fantasy. Sometimes these doorways are quite literal. Harry Potter’s first arrival at Platform 9 ¾. Lucy walking through the wardrobe into Narnia. Other times the doorways come through characters that are so powerfully human it’s impossible not to relate to them, even if they are a different species from a totally different place and time. For example, Bilbo Baggins, the furry-footed hobbit who longs for adventure but is so attached to domestic comforts he almost abandons his great adventure when he discovers he has left his handkerchiefs at home.

When writing my middle grade novel, Balthazar Fabuloso in the Lair of the Humbugs, the first doorway I discovered was through Balthazar’s family’s stage magic. When picking up a new bit of magic, they start by figuring out how to fake it, palming a coin to make it look like it disappeared, hiding a dove up a sleeve, etc. Only after they’ve mastered the illusion so fully it becomes second nature does the trick part fall away and the magic become real.

Some of my favorite doorway–moments as a writer come when magic doesn’t work out the way anyone planned. Unpaid bills that are folded into magical origami animals and sent flying away but wind up coming home again to demand payment. An invisibility charm that only works for as long as long as you hold your breath. Magic that is great for levitating sofas and turning puffs of smoke into baby turtles, but is totally useless for eliminating dry-rot or paying down credit card bills. In other words, magic that acts like life: messy and unpredictable, but kind of amazing at the same time.

Can magic help Balthazar get his family back after they mysteriously vanish in a sinister stage accident? Possibly, but first Balthazar must find his own magic, a journey which leads him down a rabbit hole of family secrets, unexpected friendships, surprise betrayals, sinister cliques and a few other twists and turns. A journey that is about messing up, figuring stuff out, banging into walls, overcoming limitations, and, ultimately, about making the impossible possible, although not quite in the way anyone had planned.

One of my favorite games to play on hikes and long road trips is the “what if” game. What if this forest was actually our home? What if the raindrops on the windshield all had personalities? What if that red car behind us is an evil road wizard hot on our trail? What if we could open the plane door and walk out onto the clouds? It’s all about finding the doorways, then seeing where they lead, the more unexpected the better. Sometimes they lead to a story or a sketch. Other times to complete absurdity. But they always lead somewhere. Which is why magical literature is so important to middle-graders. Not simply because of the magic itself, but because of the possibilities it opens up, possibilities which can lead anywhere.

Balthazar Fabuloso in the Lair of Humbugs

About the Book: Magic, humor and high adventure are used to reaffirm fundamental family values in this debut novel.|

Balthazar Fabuloso’s lovable and eccentric family performs a magic show. What makes the act so unusual is that all the Fabulosos actually have superhuman powers, except for Balthazar, a practical-minded 11-year-old who simply aspires to be a normal kid. So when everyone but Balthazar disappears mid performance, the only Fabuloso without real magical skills must save the family. Balthazar wonders if the family’s archrivals, the Furious Fistulas, are to blame or if there are other, even darker forces at work. To free his loved ones Balthazar must work with some questionable characters, including a lunatic long-lost uncle, three enigmatic senior citizens and the loathsome Pagan Fistula, whose family also mysteriously goes missing.

At the center of these disappearances is a force so evil that the world’s most preeminent magicians cower before it. What hope could a ragtag crew of misfits have against it?

Link to the Book: http://www.holidayhouse.com/title_display.php?ISBN=9780823435777

About the Author: I. J. Brindle is an author and screenwriter. She has also produced internet games for Disney, written and directed theater in New York and Montreal, clerked in a bookstore, waited tables, and had a bunch of other adventures along the road. She is the mother of two wild monkey children and the companion of a dog named Moose.

Check Out the Other Books on the Tour:

Thank you to I. J. for this important post. We hope our readers enjoyed her words as much as we did!

Thank you to Brittany at Holiday House for connecting us with I. J.!

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Author Guest Post!: “Picture Books: Better Than Teddy Bears” By Dawn Marie Hooks, Author and Illustrator of Sarah and Her Twirling Toes

May 16, 2016April 17, 2016 by Kellee

“Picture Books: Better Than Teddy Bears”

I’ve always been a book lover. As a toddler, I fell asleep with my arms wrapped around my favorite book, The Mitten, like it was my teddy bear. A picture book can be read and reread many times for many months or years and still cherished. Kids are creative with their books. He might use his truck book for a car ramp. She might see if her mermaid book will swim. That’s not exactly what I have in mind when I encourage creativity, but you can use those cherished picture books for more than reading. Read, reread, and discover! Do you have music lovers, math wizards, or budding scientists in your home or classroom? You can explore those interests with a great book!

Fun activities with a favorite picture book can weave many topics and interests together. Choose the book the kids LOVE and do an internet search for an activity guide with that book. Many websites (like my author/illustrator website, my publisher’s website, or teaching blogs) include discussion and activity guides. Sometimes, there are printable worksheets and coloring pages. If an activity guide doesn’t fit your needs, it can spark ideas that do! Some of you are experts at creating fully customized activity guides. Others are thinking, “No way!” Either way, teaching guides can inspire you to create activities for your needs using the book you choose!

When I create materials or talks, I am inspired by what I read – whether it’s the book alone, an activity guide, or an article. As a classroom elementary teacher, I wrote lesson plans incorporating my favorite children’s books. Currently, I have the pleasure writing and illustrating picture books and the discussion and activity guides that go with them. Also, when I am presenting, I like to begin by reading a picture book that captures the attention of the group. (At least, I hope it does!) I even do this when I’m talking to parent or teacher groups. (Don’t you think these books can be just as fascinating to adults?) Whatever the topic, a great picture book can turn boring into captivating!

Do you have a favorite picture book? Think of what you can do with it while reading the 14 examples geared toward my new book, Sarah and Her Twirling Toes:

1. Reading: Look at the cover of the book (front and back). Ask kids to predict what the book will be about. Read the book and check if predictions are correct.

2. Discuss Manners: Does it bother you when other people scream? When is it okay to scream? When is it bad manners to scream? Do you have rules in your home or classroom about how loud you should be?

3. Story elements: Discuss the setting, main character, problem, and solution.

4. Writing: Rewrite the story choosing one story element (setting, main character, problem, or solution) to change.

5. Art: Create a new cover for the book. The book is painted using watercolor and gauche. Work with watercolor or choose something else (watercolor pencils, chalk, torn paper art, etc).

6. Letters: This book is full of words that begin with the letter “s.” Search the book for the words. Make a list.

7. Synonyms & Antonyms: Look through the book for the word “scream” and other words that mean the same thing. Can you think of more synonyms? Now think of antonyms for scream.

8. Music and Body Concepts: Sing “Tonsils, Tummy, Heels, and Toes” like “Head and Shoulders, Knees, and Toes.”

9. Cooking and Measuring: Sarah drank honey ginger tea to try to help her throat. Make some and have a cup of tea. Slice lemon thinly until you have ½ cup. Put slices in a jar. Slice ginger root thinly until you have ½ cup. Add to jar. Squeeze honey into jar until lemon slices and ginger are covered. Refrigerate for 24 hours. Stir contents of jar. Put one cup of warm water in a mug. Add two tablespoons of infused honey into warm water. Stir and enjoy.

10. Science: Explore the five senses. Give each child a slice of lemon. Have them describe the lemon using their five senses – touch, smell, taste, sound, and sight. Do the same with ginger and honey, if desired.

11. Health: Research the health benefits of honey, lemon, and ginger.

12. Health: Sarah had “Screamingitis Syndrome,” a fictional condition. Look up laryngitis and compare the causes, symptoms, and treatment to what Sarah suffered.

13. Math: Count how many times Tiger (Sarah’s dog) is in the book. Multiply by two to find out how many dog ears that would be. Multiply by four to see how many dog legs that would be.

14. History: Research the history of tea used for medicinal purposes.

Sarah and Her Twirling Toes doesn’t directly talk about the five senses, synonyms, cooking, measuring, or even good manners. I took actions from the story (like screaming or sipping tea) and created ideas to delve deeper.

I hope you are inspired to be creative with picture books! Pull out the book that’s being used as a car ramp. Rescue the one that’s swimming in the tub. Explore those books that are better than teddy bears! Have fun and share your ideas with others!!

About the Book: Sarah loves how screaming makes her feel. Her tonsils tickle. Her tummy dances. Best of all, her toes twirl! But one day, Sarah’s scream disappears …

This bright picture book celebrates Sarah’s spunky and endearing personality while showing that she can still be herself, with or without screaming.

Access the “Activity & Discussion Guide” for Sarah and Her Twirling Toes here.

About the Author: Dawn Marie Hooks, M.S.Ed., combines her passion for children’s literature and painting through writing and illustrating picture books. A former elementary teacher, Dawn completed her first book, “Oh, Cookie!” as the final project for graduate coursework. Since then, she hasn’t stopped working on turning more ideas into books. She is a member of SCBWI and speaks to school, parent, and teacher groups.

Dawn currently resides in Vancouver, WA, with her husband, two young daughters, and their feisty puppy, Maui. When she isn’t working, she enjoys family time, Barre3, coffee, sunshine, reading, family vacations, and wakesurfing. Oh, she placed third in Women’s Masters at the 2015 World Wake Surfing Championship!

For the activity and discussion guide and information on giveaways, promotions, and events, follow Dawn Marie Hooks on www.DawnMarieHooks.com, Twitter: @DawnMarieHooks , Pinterest: Dawn Marie Hooks, Facebook: Dawn Marie Hooks. To purchase any of Dawn’s books, find her on Amazon Author Central, B&N, or your favorite book retailer.

Thank you Dawn for the guest post!

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“Giving Writing a Try” by Andrea Young, Author of Finny and the Boy from Horse Mountain

April 10, 2016 by Ricki

“Giving Writing a Try”

A teacher once told me I should give writing a try.

Fast-forward 20 years. I was giving a horseback-riding lesson when I overheard someone say that there are not enough good horse books out there for kids these days.

Having always remembered what that teacher said and after teaching kids to ride for almost 30 years, I figured who better than me to give it a try?

Luckily (because it made it easy), I had absolutely no expectations about writing a book when I sat down at my computer and went for it.

What I found out was that I truly loved to write. I would get so lost in the story I’d not realize hours had passed. Many times I only stopped typing because my arms grew too sore. Painful limbs aside, I had found a new passion.

Finny, the heroine in Finny and the Boy from Horse Mountain, finally got the horse she so desperately wanted. The description in the book of the still standing, but near dead, skeleton of a horse was exactly what I found when I was given a free horse at fifteen years old.

I was dropped off at an abandoned ranch to pick up my new horse. The plan was for me to ride it back home. After seeing her, and the state she was in, that certainty wasn’t going to happen. Fearing she wouldn’t survive, but having no other choice. We slowly began the eleven-mile walk home and the journey that would change my life.

That event was a defining moment for me. Not only did the horse survive, she thrived and turned out to be an amazing animal any kid would be blessed to have.

I hoped I could portray in my story how an event like that can bring so much happiness and change a life for the better.

There were two elements in my book that I wanted to stay true to. First, that all the equine information was accurate. I wanted anyone who read the book to also learn from it. That was very important to me because I teach horsemanship and safety around horses. I have read numerous horse books where the information is actually incorrect or misleading.

Second, I wanted to show that the good guys don’t always win just because they’re good and the bad guys didn’t always lose because they’re bad. I wanted to do that because that is how the world works. Another lessons kids should learn.

Finny gets a horse named Sky. Her dream is that someday he’ll become a champion jumping horse. As their story progresses, she has to modify her plans since Sky is proving to be so difficult. I didn’t want this to be a crushing end to a dream, just the beginning of a new one. I wanted my readers, like I do my students, to learn the journey is the joy, not the ribbons from the show arena.

Joe, the male hero in the story, is already years ahead of Finny when it comes to being set as the person he is. His background has been tough, but the sense of self he has gotten from working with horses is enough to get him through the bad times. Finny sees this in him, and admires him for it.

Ultimately, my characters absorb their life lessons from their experiences with horses and each other. All the bad thrown their way, they handle due to the strengths they’ve gained. I hope my real life students can achieve that, too.

Finny and the Boy from Horse Mountain

About the Book: Against the backdrop of the high-stakes and intensely competitive equestrian sport of show jumping, Finny, a fifteen-year-old girl in California, adopts an emaciated, untrained horse without her parents’ knowledge. Soon after adopting Sky, Finny meets Joe, a sixteen-year-old, who has run away from his cruel uncle in Montana. His love for horses and desire to be a trainer matches Finny’s dream of competing in the show jumping arena—against rich girls on fancier horses—and together, they train Sky to become a first-rate show jumper.

But the path is fraught with danger. Sky is not like other horses and is so destructive and difficult he gets them kicked out of the barn where Finny has been working and training. Helped by a kind woman who owns a horse rescue, Joe is able to prove both his and Sky’s incredible talents. When Joe is kidnapped by his violent uncle, Finny and Sky are the only ones who can save him. In a breathtaking finale, Sky and Finny must enter the underworld of the rodeo circuit, an after-hours, illegal race, where they will risk their lives to save the boy they love. Young demonstrates a masterful ability to set a breakneck pace and keep it up until the end of the novel. Finny and Joe are enduring characters who are sure to appear in upcoming sequels.

About the Author: Andrea Young is a highly respected riding instructor at Elvenstar in Malibu, one of Southern California’s top hunter-jumper barns. Her innovative work has been featured in Practical Horseman, Hunter/Jumper magazine,Show Circuit Magazine, Chronicle of the Horse, and others. She is currently writing a trilogy featuring Finny and Joe, the boy from Horse Mountain. She lives in Simi Valley, California.

Thank you to Andrea for this honest post. We hope it will inspire readers and writers!

Thank you to Cheryl from Sky Pony Press for connecting us with Andrea!

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