Bartography Express, October 2020 |
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The story I'm focusing on this month is beyond tense — it's wildly suspenseful, a real nail-biter that grows increasingly difficult to turn your attention away from as the events reach their climax. Sound familiar?
I'm talking, of course, about a new middle-grade nonfiction book about the 2018 cave rescue of the Thai boys' soccer team. Why — what else would you think I was referring to?
Oh. That.
Well, since you brought it up, let me just say that when I vote, it's going to be 1) as soon as possible, and 2) for candidates all the way down the ballot who exemplify and encourage empathy, decency, curiosity, compassion, humility, humanity, respect, and responsibility — and against candidates who have demonstrated, defended, or enabled the opposites of these values.
I hope you'll join me on both counts.
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The 30-minute session will remain available to registrants for the following week.
During that half-hour, we'll do a joint readaloud (she'll be Dragon, and I'll be Fire Truck), a how-to-draw-like-Shanda demonstration that I fully intend to learn from, insights into how we made the book, and answers to attendees' questions.
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If pre-recorded presentations work out better for you, I'm scheduled to be part of the Texas Book Festival's children's programming the first week in November, along with Derrick Barnes; Lee Merrill Byrd and Francisco Delgado; Michael Genhart; Rebecca J. Gomez and Elisa Chavarri; Chris Harris; Meena Harris; Jarrett Pumphrey and Jerome Pumphrey; Isabel Quintero and Zeke Peña; Raúl The Third; Gianna Ruggiero; Don Tate; and Sam Wedelich — just to name the Festival's featured authors and illustrators for the youngest readers.
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In just the first two minutes, you get to see my dog, the first book I ever wrote, and the Dazzle Ships print that hangs over my breakfast table — all of that before I even start talking about both of my new picture books, Fire Truck vs. Dragon and All of a Sudden and Forever.
If that doesn’t qualify as a Palooza of some sort, I don’t know what does.
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Speaking of Jennifer, she and I have both been busy revising or otherwise working on upcoming books of ours.
Her next middle grade novel, Worser, is on the way from Holiday House/Margaret Ferguson Books, and I can't wait to read the next draft of a book I've loved for a long time already.
Meanwhile, I've been juggling revisions, supplemental research, sketch reviews, and whatnot for four upcoming nonfiction books, starting with next year's How to Make a Book (About My Dog).
That one is about how nonfiction picture books get made — a topic that I imagine I'll know better than ever by the time this cluster of work is over.
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A few other quick things I think you might like to know about:
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Good Todo, an organizational app that I've used daily for more than a dozen years. I cannot recommend it enough. It's how I keep track of all the things I need to keep track of.
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Now it's time for this month's Q&A and new-book giveaway. This time, I'm featuring Christina Soontornvat's All Thirteen: The Incredible Cave Rescue of the Thai Boys' Soccer Team.
Geared toward middle grades, All Thirteen makes for riveting reading for all ages — an especially impressive accomplishment considering that the whole world already knows how things turned out. It's a testament to the value of an author's not rushing, of her taking the time to tell a story right.
If you’re a Bartography Express subscriber with a US mailing address and you want to be the winner of All Thirteen, just say so in a reply to this email before midnight on October 31, and I’ll enter you in the drawing.
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