My thanks to everyone for celebrating RETURN TO ME at the book launch party on Sunday at the University Bookstore. There, for two hours, we celebrated the transformation of dust to stardust in stories and lives. After laboring over RETURN TO ME for the better part of two years, it was utterly surreal to see … Read More
Lorie Ann Grover
Readergirlz Love Letter
A video love letter to readergirlz everywhere, care of Lorie Ann Grover. Love this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjfxj7qrWZ0
Vision Board
With every new novel–and heck, to kick off every new phase in my life–I turn to my vision boards. These collages ground and guide me, reminding me of what’s truly important. What I need to focus on. Here, my good friend Lorie Ann Grover created a collage for me on our new fave site, Polyvore! … Read More
Filling the Creative Pot
In the throes of my rewrite for my upcoming novel, RETURN TO ME, I’m finding that I need to constantly replenish my creative pot. So the readergirlz co-founders, Lorie Ann Grover (l) and Dia Calhoun (c) and I hit the Triple Door downtown for a fabulous concert with Lucy Woodward. Oh, yes, her lyrics were … Read More
Fangirl: Gary Schmidt & Wednesday Wars
One of the best parts of attending librarian conferences has got to be meeting beloved authors. For me, this just doesn’t get better than going to TLA and meeting Gary Schmidt who wrote two of my all-time favorite middle grade novels: The Wednesday Wars and Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy. Pitch perfect in humor … Read More
Hi, Y’all! Off to Texas Librarian Association
The readergirlz co-founders–Dia Calhoun, Lorie Ann Grover, and I–are off to TLA in Houston today for a whirlwind of presentations and dinners! If you’re planning on attending this conference, join us at our key events: Wednesday, 4/16:30-8:30 YART Dinner Thursday, 4/210:30 a.m. TT4L Discussion with Teens 2:00 p.m. readergirlz: making literacy hip and relevant for … Read More
Awww…a love letter…to me!
People are uploading their Find Beauty videos! It’s so exciting…and here’s one from the readergirlz divas: Awwww… I beg to differ. But what are you waiting for? Make your voice heard! Tell the world what True Beauty really means. You’ve got 90 seconds. And for every video that’s uploaded, I’m donating $10 (up to $1,000) … Read More
North of Beautiful: The Official Geocache!
One of the most truly beautiful gifts anyone has ever given to me was made by the multi-talented Dia Calhoun. (She creates art! Writes fantasy! And verse! And fights off cougars!) A few weeks before I left for China last summer, she and Lorie Ann Grover met me in Winthrop–the setting for North of Beautiful. … Read More
Climbing Walls: Rite of Passage
Anyone who has read Dia Calhoun’s FIREGOLD knows a thing or two about rites of passages. Harrowing rites. In the real world, there are the bar mitvahs and bat mitvahs. Quinceneras. And I suppose, Sweet Sixteens. But…what about a rite of passage that’s uniquely American to celebrate the crossing from tweendom to teendom? So as … Read More
Vision Boarding 2009
I am a visual person: I remember passages in books based on where they are on the actual page. I learn from watching and then doing. For as long as I can remember, I’ve created vision boards for each of my new novels and for my yearly goals. Each image and word on these boards … Read More
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