If anyone who reads this blog is in New York City, I'll be down on Monday. I'm going to a political event at a restaurant called Dip on 29th and 3rd. Really, it's just an informal cocktail hour and meet-n-greet. My close friend, Darius Shahinfar, is running for Congress and I'm going to show a bit of support.

I'm also going to meet my editor during the day. I can't wait to see FSG's new offices (and maybe pick up some ARCs!!!).

In any case, if you are interested in some free hors d'ouvres and some time to chat face to face, drop me a note via my website and I'll get you on the list for the triple-secret VIP members-only mezzanine level. It's supposedly a really cool place. And it would be great to meet some of you guys!

Hope to hear from you!

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to speak with the 7th and 8th graders at Hudson Middle School. What a great bunch of young men and women. We began the day with lunch (how can a day begin any better?) and I had the chance to sit and chat with teachers, administrators, and a few authors and illustrators. And I had the chance to eat the yummy wraps donated by a local deli.

Here I am between Caldecott Honor recipient, Barbara Lehman, and author and blogger extraordinaire, Nancy Castaldo.



Then author, Liza Frenette, came along so we took another picture.



We were scheduled willy-nilly all over the building so it was great to have the chance to spend time with them. Unfortunately, I did not have a chance to see any other presentations with the exception of about 3 minutes of Nancy's:



Then it was off to my auditorium.



Now, imagine this auditorium filled with 150 energetic 8th graders. Then imagine it filled with another 150 7th graders. Here I am talking to them.



I talked about how a book is born, in other words how an idea for a book becomes a novel sitting on the shelves. I talked about the writing process, the submission process and the editorial/publishing aspect of things. Afterwards, I found out that Todd Strasser had been there earlier in the week and he talked about many of the same things I did. Grrr.

But everything was good after that when several of the teachers took me to Spotty Dog Books, one of my favorite bookstores in the world, and bought me a beer. Yes, you read that right. They have beer in a bookstore. If there is a heaven, there is a Spotty Dog Books there.

question-how in the heck do you get rid of junk e-mails for good! Yesterday I checked my e-mails after a two day break (believe me that was a challenge) and there were 134 emails in the in-box and 78 in junk mail. At first I was like, hey I am a well-liked girl but then when I read the message captions I realized they were nothing more than ads or junk. Yuck, I had to sort through and delete a lot it was a pain. I don't know maybe I'm stuck on one of those horrible mailing lists. This is my personal e-mail address I have one of those "typical" e-mails that you get when signing on with your internet company I use that for businesses that insist on having your e-mail. But this one-how could they just invade my time with their shiny words about creams and potions that I don't need or use! I feel so violated and abused! Who do I report to-to complain. I know that for my home phone I put myself on one of those "do not call lists" and I swear the minute I did I sat by the phone and dared anyone to call who was selling something just so I could tell them they were in violation-but they didn't-so it worked! I wonder if there is something like that for e-mails!

# of queries read: 86
# of partials/manuscripts requested: 0
genres of partials/manuscripts requested: N/A

This week's pet peeves:

* people who don't send the first five sample pages with their query, as requested in our guidelines
* over 200K lengths for first novels in a series
* people who sign with other agents and don't bother to inform you before you spend time reviewing their material
* people who take months, or even years, after you request material to submit it and then start emailing you for a response within a week or two of receipt
* people who reply to friends of mine like this: http://lyonsliterary.blogspot.com/2008/05/running-with-crazy.html - "I received a rude email in response, telling me that I clearly did not read her query letter. Offended, I told the author that this was my subjective opinion and that she should not take it personally. She wrote again, telling me to grow up." This also happens to me on an almost weekly basis, I kid you not.

We have an interview with Lisa McMann the author of the NYT Best Seller Wake here today -- http://the5randoms.wordpress.com/2008/05/16/random-qa-lisa-mcmann/#comments

WON'T LEAVE ME ALONE!

I did figure out how to squeeze more action into the WIP I'm working right now by dragging in 'that family member no one talks about'....plus a couple of train rides and the criminal underworld in Perisen. (Which were not directly seen in my original outline, but were there, so I'm just dragging them out into the light.)

Now, TFMNOTA is angling for a story of her own.

Dagnabbit! She's supposed to be tertiary at best!

My third round of revisions on Knife, the Hunter are DONE. It took a phone call to my editor to be sure I understood what the problems were and got some ideas on how to fix them, but once we'd talked that through, making the changes wasn't nearly as difficult as I'd feared.

In case anyone's interested in the process, here's my revision experience so far:

REVISION #1 (December '07-February '08):
Work required: Major structural and plot changes, changed main characters from adults to mid-teens
Length: Reduced from 104K to 94K
Total time to completion: Nine weeks (working 2-3 hours a day)

REVISION #2 (April '08):
Work required: Streamline and clarify plot, full line edit to fix pacing and clarity issues
Length: Reduced from 94K to 74K
Total time to completion: Three weeks (working 2-3 hours a day)

REVISION #3 (May '08):
Work required: Several additions and clarifications, minor line edits
Length: Only slightly reduced to 73K
Total time to completion: Four days (working 3-4 hours a day)

Coming up next should be copyedits, where a new editor looks at the ms. and marks it up for punctuation and grammar, while also noting continuity and fact-checking issues. And once that's done, oh glory, they'll send me galleys and I'll get to see how my story will look in actual typeset, book-quality print!

And also: *wrings hands* OUCH.

Wootie hootie hoo! 

My great friend, 

nancy_v  is having a contest to win an ARC and other cool stuff to celebrate her novel which debuts in August, called:



So head on over and "dig" the "rockin'" details!

Here's my entry:

My elementary school science teacher taught me that baking soda + vinegar + red food coloring = molten lava ooze!

Move over, Ramona Quimby…
Samantha Hansen is ready to ROCK! 
Look for Nancy Viau’s middle-grade novel, Samantha Hansen Has Rocks in Her Head, this September. Get your signed ARC at BEA or ALA this summer!  http://www.nancyviau.com 
http://www.classof2k8.com 

 

 
Rock on, Nancy!
                                

1.
Fifty percent of the members of my critique group (The Garret) have sold their novels this year!

Okay, there are only four of us in the group. :-)

But we’ve been writing, revising, editing, and cheering each other on for several years, so to have TWO of us sell our books within the space of a few weeks felt like winning the lottery twice. We’re hoping to celebrate 100% in book sales before the year is through! Go, Garretistas!

Here’s the Publishers Marketplace blurb for Lee’s - sealy38 - book:

C. Lee McKenzie's BAD ASS ATTITUDE, in which a high school teenage girl, a cutter abandoned by her mother, flees Vegas to find refuge at her unknown paternal grandmother's ranch in California, to Evelyn Fazio at Westside Books, for publication in Fall 2009 (World).

2.
I’m going to the Oregon SCBWI conference tomorrow. [Edited to add: At which the talented lisa_schroeder will be speaking!] I haven’t been to a conference in, like, five years. The last one I attended was the national SCBWI conference in New York, where I met my friend Yvonne. We bonded over lunch, and stayed in touch via email. She invited me to apply to her crit group, I did, and was accepted. A few years later, I felt ready to start my own group. The old one was wonderful, but I had trouble keeping up with all the deadlines and requirements. The group I started is much looser and anti-deadline. We manage to provide timely feedback for each other even without deadlines, because we want to read and respond to each other’s work.

3.
My son and I have been reading THE TRUE MEANING OF SMEKDAY together. (I read it first, and loved it so much I couldn’t wait to start reading it to him. I was dying to do the Boov’s voice!) Even though the main character is an eleven-year-old girl – which might have been a deal-breaker for a 10yo boy – she is accompanied by an alien (the Boov), who is on the run from the rest of the aliens. It’s fast-paced and sooo funny. My son laughed so hard at one point that a new space opened up in my heart which now belongs to the author, Adam Rex. “My chest feels like it’s going to explode,” said my son, when he could breathe again. The next day he asked if we could read “some more of that book about the Boov.” This is huge. He’s more of a comic book reader, so to see him eager to return to a novel warmed the cockles of my heart. (Oh, and SMEKDAY has comics in it, too!)

4.
A friend of mine has launched a website for her jewelry. (I always, Anglophilically, want to spell it ‘jewellery.’) She made a gorgeous pair of custom earrings for me. If you’re in the market for some pretty new baubles, check out her site: http://www.katiejeans.com.

5.
My cold veered with unexpected violence into a sinus infection a few days ago. I’ve had sinus infections before, but never one so painful that my entire face hurt. When I looked in the mirror, I was surprised that my cheeks were not swelling into purplish-red pockets of throbbing pain … because that’s how they felt on the inside. I was able to persuade the Keepers of the Antibiotic to give me some without a pilgrimage to the urgent care clinic. Last year at this time I was suffering from a (less vicious but still persistent) sinus infection, and had to beg for a prescription two weeks after my visit to the doctor, where the primary person on duty had told me condescendingly, “You have a cold.” I can’t help but refer back to last year’s gratitude:

And it came to pass that on the 21st day, Lisa did beseech the Jealous Keeper of the Antibiotic for relief. With heart and sinuses full of hope and green mucous, respectively, she did make her petition. And lo, unto Lisa was delivered the miracle medicine. And the powerful pills did slay the infidel infection with the righteous wrath of the Lord and the might of modern medicine. And Lisa did sing hosannas unto the Lord and the Amoxicillin for many days.

Happy weekend, everyone!

What if The Last Unicorn had to fight The Last Dragon? Discuss.

EDIT: By The Last Dragon, I am of course referring to the mid-80s martial arts masterpiece about Bruce Leroy becoming the Last Dragon, a martial arts master in New York City...

In conjunction with the touring art show (which we launched at the Storyopolis Gallery last month), The Coppervale Studio had begun producing sets of high-quality, limited-edition art prints based on the original illustrations from HERE, THERE BE DRAGONS.

The first one, The Green Dragon, is the cover image, sans logo. A lot of people realized there was more to the drawing, and those queries inspired the print. We followed that one with prints of Aven, The Cartographer, and Samaranth. These are done at original size, as I drew them. And don't worry if your favorite piece isn't here - we'll be doing all twenty-four chapter illustrations as prints sometime over the next couple of months.

To order a print, just click on the images below.

Marilyn Manson is the cure for what ails me.   I swear that every time I don't listen to him for a little while I almost convince myself that he's not as incredible as I remember, must be a trick of memory or something, but then I hear his voice . . .   If you could take that feeling of temptation, that if I could bottled sin it would be this . . .  *sigh* and the voice . . . and the lyrics . . and passion . . . I've even watched YouTube videos to find interview clips and of course, looked at his art online . . . It all underlines the "yes, wow, and did I mention YES" reaction I get when I hear his voice.

I listen to others, hoping to find someone else that flicks my switches to this degree, but he's it.  There are plenty of other artists I can & do enjoy, but none come close to this never-fails-to-please reaction.  I don't even need to see which CD I'm selecting. If it's his, I'll be happier once it's on.  His music is the perfect drug--all the pleasure without any of those nasty consequences real drugs have.

So, what abt you?  Is there something--music, food,  painter, school of art,  style of poetry, etc--that is a surefire "daaaamn, that's what I needed" source for you?

Eugene Field was an American journalist and author, now best-remembered as a writer of children's poems and humorous essays. One of his most famous poems for children, originally entitled "Dutch Lullaby", was written in 1899, and generations of children have since known it as Wynken, Blynken and Nod, which has been illustrated by a number of artists, including Maxfield Parrish.

Wynken, Blynken, and Nod
by Eugene Field

Wynken, Blynken, and Nod one night
  Sailed off in a wooden shoe---
Sailed on a river of crystal light,
  Into a sea of dew.
"Where are you going, and what do you wish?"
  The old moon asked the three.
"We have come to fish for the herring fish
  That live in this beautiful sea;
  Nets of silver and gold have we!"
        Said Wynken,
        Blynken,
        And Nod.

The old moon laughed and sang a song,
  As they rocked in the wooden shoe,
And the wind that sped them all night long
  Ruffled the waves of dew.
The little stars were the herring fish
  That lived in that beautiful sea---
"Now cast your nets wherever you wish---
  Never afeard are we";
  So cried the stars to the fishermen three:
        Wynken,
        Blynken,
        And Nod.

All night long their nets they threw
  To the stars in the twinkling foam---
Then down from the skies came the wooden shoe,
  Bringing the fishermen home;
'T was all so pretty a sail it seemed
  As if it could not be,
And some folks thought 't was a dream they 'd dreamed
  Of sailing that beautiful sea---
  But I shall name you the fishermen three:
        Wynken,
        Blynken,
        And Nod.


Wynken and Blynken are two little eyes,
  And Nod is a little head,
And the wooden shoe that sailed the skies
  Is a wee one's trundle-bed.
So shut your eyes while mother sings
  Of wonderful sights that be,
And you shall see the beautiful things
  As you rock in the misty sea,
  Where the old shoe rocked the fishermen three:
        Wynken,
        Blynken,
        And Nod.

You may be asking what form this poem is in, and I will tell you that I believe it is a variation on a rondeau. A rondeau is (as fans of classical music might guess) a music-based form consisting of verse and refarin. A rondeau is usually a poem of between thirteen and fifteen lines, using only two rhyming sounds and employing a recurring refrain. A classic example is the wonderful poem by the Canadian poet, John McCrae, "In Flanders Fields". Here, the refrain is, of course, "Wynken, Blynken, and Nod". This poem, however, is significantly longer than a typical rondeau, and uses more rhyming sounds. In fact, each stanza follows its own internal pattern of ABABCDCDDR (where R is the refrain). And each stanza uses a sort of sprung rhythm akin to Gerard Manley Hopkins, with lines 1,3,5,7 & 9 having four accented beats, and lines 2,4,6 & 8 having three (as does the refrain).

Although Field wrote a number of poems for and about children (by all means check out his poem, "Little Boy Blue", which is a killer, I tell you), Field wrote in his Auto-Analysis, a pamphlet written in 1896 in wry tones in hopes of avoiding biography after his death, Field (by then a father of eight) wrote, "I do not love all children. I have tried to analyze my feelings towards children, and I think I discover that I love them in so far as I can make pets of them." Most likely Field was kidding here, as he was on the day that he dressed up as Oscar Wilde and pretended to be Wilde for hours, thereby depriving the actual touring author of the hero's welcome he expected. You can read more about that on the Denver literary tour page.

Field considered himself quite a bibliophile during life, and his final book was entitled The Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac, described as a story or a series of sketches on the delights, adventures, and misadventures connected with bibliomania. His sister, who wrote the introduction to his final tome, wrote that he "knew, as few comparatively poor men have known, the half-pathetic, half-humorous side of that incurable mental infirmity." Those of you with a weakness for books and bookshops (and particularly with tracking down out-of-print books and first editions) will enjoy reading his poem, "The Bibliomaniac's Prayer":

Keep me, I pray, in wisdom's way
  That I may truths eternal seek;
I need protecting care to-day,---
  My purse is light, my flesh is weak.
So banish from my erring heart
  All baleful appetites and hints
Of Satan's fascinating art,
  Of first editions, and of prints.
Direct me in some godly walk
  Which leads away from bookish strife,
That I with pious deed and talk
  May extra-illustrate my life.

But if, O Lord, it pleaseth Thee
  To keep me in temptation's way,
I humbly ask that I may be
  Most notably beset to-day;
Let my temptation be a book,
  Which I shall purchase, hold, and keep,
Whereon when other men shall look,
  They'll wail to know I got it cheap.
Oh, let it such a volume be
  As in rare copperplates abounds,
Large paper, clean, and fair to see,
  Uncut, unique, unknown to Lowndes.*

*Lowndes was a renowned bibliographer in London.

The artist Robert Rauschenberg died this week. I liked his art very much. Always stopped to look at it when I saw it.

But it wasn't until I read this paragraph in an opinion piece that David Byrne wrote about Robert Rauschenberg that I realized that Robert Rauschenberg had helped me with my art.

Bob was extraordinarily generous. I don’t mean he gave away art — though he did that, too — but he was generous with his time and with his ideas and spirit. He started Change Inc., a foundation that awards grants to emerging artists who can’t pay their rent, utility or medical bills. No questions asked.


A few years back, when the dot.com boom had fallen and I could not for the life of me get a job, I spent my unemployed days working on a novel because I knew that was what I wanted to do for my real life. But my money had run out and I had no idea how I was going to pay my rent or my utlities, which were all being cut off. My friend Andrea suggested that I apply for an emergency grant from Change, Inc. I did, and I got it, paid my rent and my utlities and it gave me some breathing room, bought me some time to get my poop together, find a job and pretty much saved my ass.

I sent them a thank you card, but let me say it again here and now: Thank you Robert Rauschenberg. You totally helped me.

CHANGE, Inc. awards artists emergency grants of $100-$500 for medical, living, or other expenses. Contact Change, Inc., Box 705, Cooper Station, New York, NY 10276; 212-473-3742

There is nothing quite like being sea sick without actually being on a boat. I have a BAD sinus infection and ear infection. My equilibrium is off so bad that I'm rolling even when I'm still. Bleh. Someone please throw me overboard and put me outta my misery. And still I'm writing because it's my only day off. I hope my pages aren't nauseating.

.

Some Friday miscellany for you:

1. Since Justine nicely composed this excellent post to save me from writing a far more intemperate one, the least I can do is send you toward it.  (Actually the least I can do is reward her with a delicious treat, but that's more of an offline endeavor.)

2. Who loves Joss Whedon? Meeeeeeeeeeeee! If you're raising your hand (or making a similarly undignified squealing sound), you will want to click here immediately to watch the first trailer for his new show, Dollhouse. Starring Faith. Er, I mean, Eliza Dushku.

3. Via Bookshelves of Doom, the greatest Harry Potter rapping puppet show you've ever seen. (I dare you to resist the lure of that description.)

4. A column by an English professor confessing that he cheated his way into grad school (along with numerous other acts of plagiarism before or since). This is somewhat riveting, and the big question now is: What next? Does this torpedo his career, or will it just be taken as I suspect he intends, a string of humorous anecdotes that can garner him a bookdeal?

5. Maybe it's the former debate geek in me -- defining the terms generally being the key to victory -- but I came across this today and it really struck me: "Yet does not this curious right [to define one's terms], which we have come to grant as soon as we deal with matters of importance -- as though it were actually the same as the right to one's own opinion -- already indicate that such terms as 'tyranny,' 'authority,' 'totalitarianism' have simply lost their common meaning, or that we have ceased to live in a common world where the words we have in common possess an unquestionable meaningfulness." (Hannah Arendt)

6. In my continuing -- if often floundering -- attempt to forestall the turning-30 freakout (see subject heading), I was quite cheered to encounter this thought: "Attractive women of nineteen and twenty-nine are alike in their breezy confidence; on the contrary, the exigent womb of the twenties does not pull the outside world centripetally around itself. The former are ages of insolence, comparable the one to a young cadet, the other to a fighter strutting after combat. But whereas a girl of nineteen draws her confidence from a surfeit of attention, a woman of twenty-nine is nourished by subtler stuff. Desirous, she chooses her appertifs wisely, or, content, she enjoys the caviare of potential power." (Fitzgerald) 

For the next 15 days, I think perhaps I will sign all my emails "insolently yours, Robin."

(Although certain people would suggest that my entire life has been an Age of Insolence.)

On the way to my visit to Hudson Middle School, I had to cross the Rip Van Winkle Bridge. I love the Rip Van Winkle Bridge. It's really high, gives a great view of the Hudson Valley, and has such literary relevance. Here's a pic:



As I approached Hudson, I noticed I had about an hour to spare, so I stopped here:



Center of the world? Perhaps not, However, Olana was the home of Frederic E. Church, famous American landscape painter. He really was an interesting guy and he had a wicked cool house. Really, it's more of a fortress. And it overlooks the Hudson Valley like a sentinel. Check this thing out:



And check out the view (this is a cloudy day...there are MORE mountains back there):



Another pic:



What a great region for writers and other artists. There is so much creative history around here! Now, I just have to figure out how to sell enough books to afford a house like that. More about the actual Hudson school visit later!

Here's a recent article on the bookstore where I will be joining other SCBWI illustrators and writers for book readings/signings.



http://www.ocweekly.com/news/news/rueben-martinezs-libreria-martinez-close-to-closing-para-siempre/28747/

The first paragraph tells it all:

If you’re an Orange County resident, there’s no need to explain Librería Martinez—but here’s a quick recap: The 13-year-old Santa Ana bookstore is a county—no, national—landmark, the largest Latino-themed bookstore in the United States, owned by barber-turned-MacArthur Fellowship (the so-called “genius grant”) winner Rueben Martinez. Through his infectious enthusiasm for the written and spoken word, Martinez turned a vacant storefront on Main Street into one of the primary founts of Latino literature in the Americas, a place that has hosted every major American-born Latino author and most every Latin American titan of letters save Gabriel García Márquez. The shelves overflow with Spanish-language translations of the Western canon, Chicano-studies texts, contemporary authors and gorgeous photo books.

Am head down and revising like a mad thing. Yes, again. But dammit, I want this book to completely rock and so does my editor. However, I do have a couple of quickie items of note.

Thing the first: I blogged over at MTV Books Blog today about how each book is a special child and how it can hurt when the younger one doesn't get quite the same attention as the firstborn. *g*

Thing the second: The next Chica Lit Blog Tour is set to kick off bright and early Monday morning with a theme of Women, Words, & Wisdom, with the lineup as follows:


May 19 - Mary Castillo, author of "Switchcraft" (http://marycastillo.blogspot.com/)
May 20 - Caridad Ferrer, author of "It's Not About the Accent" (http://fashionista_35.livejournal.com/)
May 21 – Lara Rios, author of "Becoming Americana" (http://www.lararios.blogspot.com/)
May 22 – Mayra Calvani, The Dark Phantom Review (http://www.thedarkphantom.wordpress.com)
May 23 – Caridad Piniero, author of "The Calling" Vampire series (www.caridad.com/blog)
May 24 – Jamie Martinez Wood, author of "Rogelia's House of Magic" (http://jamiemartinezwood.blogspot.com/)
May 25 – Berta Platas, author of "Cinderella Lopez" (http://bertaplatas.blogspot.com/)
May 26 – Tracy Montoya, "I'll Be Watching You" (www.tracymontoya.blogspot.com)
May 27 – Kathy Cano Murillo, aka "The Crafty Chica" (http://thecraftychica.blogspot.com)
May 28 – Misa Ramirez, author of "Living the Vida Lola" (http://chasingheroes.com)

This time we've taken a slightly different approach; instead of sticking solely to fiction, some of the ladies will be posting non-fiction pieces. Me, I'm not terribly good with the non-fic, so I will have a story up on my day and like before, there'll be prizes, so be sure to spread the word and check on all our fabulous authors.

And look at our logo! Isn't it fab? Done by the very talented Nuvia Crisol Guerra.



Okay, back to revisions for me.