Author – Page 50 – Unleashing Readers

Author Guest Post!: “Reaching Reluctant Readers with Action and Suspense” by Jake Bible, Author of Scarescapes

September 25, 2015July 19, 2015 by Ricki

Reaching Reluctant Readers with Action and Suspense

by Jake Bible

I really had no concept of what a reluctant reader was until my daughter started reading. My son is exactly like me and will devour books without blinking. My daughter? Not so much. Getting her to read past the first few pages in a book is like pulling teeth. As a writer, this has been more than frustrating.

Being a concerned father, I asked her questions about why she’d start a book, but never finish it. I asked lots of questions. Yet no matter the question I always received the same answer (or a version of the same answer).

“It’s boring.”

Huh. Boring? The characters? The plot? The story? The cover? What was boring?

“I don’t know. It just was.”

Double huh.

This troubled me. That bit of fear in the back of my head was that maybe she had a learning disability. Of course, the Voice of Reason spoke up and said, “She’s just a reluctant reader.”

That voice was my wife’s. I say she was the voice of reason not because of some ingrained, antiquated notion of gender roles within the household, but because my wife is an elementary school teacher with nearly two decades of experience, a master’s degree, several certifications in various subjects, and is a reluctant reader herself.

That’s a voice of reason, folks.

To grab a reluctant reader’s attention you need relatable characters, you need fast pacing with short chapters, you need the prose to be clear and interesting, you need to give them a reason to keep reading. This is basically what all good writers strive for anyway. But the big difference is you can’t slack. One misstep and that book is down and forgotten.

In my research on reluctant readers I found out that the make or break age is 8-12. Those are the ages where so many kids decide whether or not reading for fun and pleasure is their thing. It just so happened I was writing a series of scifi/horror books aimed at middle grade ages. That 8-12 year old danger spot. No pressure, right?

So, I decided to do what I do best: write six books that packed as much non-stop action and suspense into them as I could get away with while considering my target age group.

I went with the classic serial structure of one book ending on a cliff hanger and the next picking it up right from that exact same spot. I also wrote each book as told from a different character’s point of view. This made sure that no matter what gender or race my young readers turned out to be, there would be a character, and a specific book in the series, that they could personally relate to. I put the characters into an impossible situation of being alone on a space ship in deep, deep space without parents around, all of them having to band together and fend for their themselves.

Then I set things in motion.

Writing action isn’t hard. You just keep things moving. The trick is to keep things interesting. Constant running does not always make for great story. That’s where the suspense comes in. And you only have so much time for suspense before boredom kicks in. It’s a delicate dance.

I began each book with some explanation of the situation the children were in. For this series, a giant asteroid outfitted for deep space travel and human habitation so people could find a new home in the universe after Earth has been polluted beyond repair. Explanation done, I immediately moved to danger. Got to have danger to motivate the characters into action. Once danger was established, and the characters were active, I threw in roadblocks.

Roadblocks are key to good action. The reader, and especially a reluctant reader, will get bored if the action just goes from point A to point Z. You need to send them off into tangents. You have to destroy points B, C, and D so the characters are forced to figure out how to skip to point E directly. Give those characters roadblocks and the action becomes believable, no matter how fantastical. And believable is another key to keeping a reluctant reader’s attention.

Okay, so I had explanation, I had motivation, I had action, I had roadblocks. But where was the story?

That’s where I got to sneak in the suspense. My story revolved around a mystery. And not just a mystery of why all the danger and chaos was happening to these characters. I introduced a new character. One that should have been a danger sign immediately in any “normal” situation. Is that suspense?

You bet it is. Who is this new entity? Where did it come from? What is its motivation? If the characters trust it will they regret it later?

Suspense is the anticipation of the unknown; the fear of something beyond a character’s understanding, beyond the reader’s understanding. Suspense requires trusting that moving forward is the only option even though moving forward is the most dangerous option.

To complete my formula (and for middle grade I needed a formula) I twisted the action and the suspense together, intertwining them in a narrative that would continually keep the readers off balance, afraid, excited, interested, and engaged. I wove the suspense within the action so that the story was layered in a way to keep reluctant readers from drifting off. I did my job as a writer and made it impossible for them to stop reading without stopping in the middle of an action scene or a bug reveal in the plot.

Or that was my goal, at least.

Did I succeed?

Well, my reluctant reader of a daughter didn’t put the manuscripts down.

Whether the books are received well out in the world or not, I count that as a success. No question there.

About the Book: On the Earth Colony Asteroid Scorpio, something has gone terribly wrong. Millions of light years off course and 900 years late, the ship’s AIs wake up only seven kids, leaving the adults stuck in cryosleep! Damaged from the long journey, the AIs must repair the awakened seven with the only thing available–cybernetic robot parts.

Along with learning to function with new cyber parts, the all-kid crew must unravel the mystery of what went wrong with the Scorpio. As if the nightmare of deep space isn’t enough, the kids soon find themselves battling the ship’s maintenance robots while their cyber parts begin taking on a life of their own!

Scarescapes: Phantom Limbs! is the first book in the middle-grade YA series Scarescapes series by Bram Stoker Award nominated author Jake Bible. The ebooks are $2.99 and are available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Smashwords, Google Play, and Kobo. Paperback copies will follow later this year.

About the Author: Jake Bible lives in Asheville, NC with his wife and two kids. Novelist, short story writer, independent screenwriter, podcaster, and inventor of the Drabble Novel, Jake is able to switch between or mash-up genres with ease to create new and exciting storyscapes that have captivated and built an audience of thousands. He is the author of the Young Adult horror novels Little Dead Man and Intentional Haunting, as well as the best selling adult horror series Z-Burbia and adult thriller/adventure series, Mega. Find him at jakebible.com. Join him on Twitter and Facebook.

Thank you to Hannah at Permuted Press for connecting us with Jake!

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Author Guest Post!: “Be Careful or You Might Learn Something…” by Linda Fausnet, Author of The Joyville Sweat Sox

September 25, 2015July 12, 2015 by Kellee

“Be Careful or You Might Learn Something…”

I always hated summer reading lists as a kid. Teachers gave us a list of super-educational, historically accurate, classic books of literary significance to read over the summer so we could either write a book report or pass a test when we got back to school in September.

For me, this was the literary equivalent of brussels sprouts.

I actually liked to read in the summer. The trouble was, every time I picked up a book I actually wanted to read, I’d think to myself, “Ugh. I need to read those awful school books first.” I put off reading those books until later, so I ended up reading very little. Toward the end of the summer, I forced myself to read the brussels sprouts books, but really didn’t get much out of the experience.

It’s understandable that teachers want kids to learn from the books they read, but forcing kids to read Johnny Tremain isn’t likely to get them all fired up about reading. I remember reading Johnny Tremain at some point, but I remember precious little about the book.

Know what I do remember? My fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Garrett, reading to us for a few minutes at the end of the school day. I remember her reading Lenny Kendall, Smart Aleck, Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing, and Superfudge. The books were uproariously funny, and I can clearly remember the sound of Mrs. Garrett’s voice; the inflection, the enthusiasm, the fun. I eagerly went to the library and got some of those books and reread them on my own.

A few years ago, I went to a wonderful used bookstore called Books With a Past. I asked if they had Lenny Kendall, Smart Aleck so I could read it to my kids. The lady in the store said she hadn’t heard of the book, but she put me on the list in case it ever turned up. Then I went to the barbecue restaurant next door with my kids. A few minutes later, the bookstore lady showed up there. She must have heard us mention where we were headed. Anyway, she showed up with Lenny Kendall in tow. She found it after all!

We took the book home and I happily read it aloud to my kids. It was such a wonderful experience. It brought back such great memories and I loved hearing my kids laugh.

I am a passionate writer who happens to be married a to a man who is dyslexic. He hates to read because it’s hard for him, and, try as I might, I’ve been unsuccessful at getting my kids to love reading. I’ve written several grown-up books which they are not allowed to read, but I’ve written two middle-grade ones that are appropriate for them. It’s been tough even to get them to crack those books!

I recently published a middle-grade book about baseball entitled The Joyville Sweat Sox. (as in, there is no mud in Joyville. Baseball fans will get that…) I dedicated the book to my son, Noah, who plays Little League. I didn’t have to force him to read that one because 1. Mommy wrote it and, 2. It’s about baseball. Noah is a good-hearted kid who would tell me he loved it no matter what, so it was hard to tell if he really liked it. Then one day I came home from work and heard him laughing in the other room. He didn’t know I was home yet, so I knew his reaction was real. Sure enough, he was reading my book and though it was really funny. Is there any higher praise than that?

The Joyville Sweat Sox is about a young woman who is forced to coach a baseball team full of clueless kids as punishment for breaking her town’s No Anger law. It’s won’t be easy to teach them the rules of the game without losing her temper… The book does have some teachable information in it, I suppose. Okay, it would mainly be for physical education teachers… Kids who know how to play baseball will giggle at the players in the book who are a bit slow on the uptake to learn, and kids who are unfamiliar with the sport will easily learn it as the poor coach teaches her hapless players what to do. However, the overarching lesson can be summed up when Konnie, the coach with anger management issues says, “Sometimes mean people aren’t mean. Sometimes they’re just sad.”

Konnie would know. Her anger and bitterness started when her father died, the same year that a mean guy stole baseball from the town of Joyville. Some of her happiest memories were of her times at the ballpark with her dad, and the idea that his last summer on earth was spent without baseball just hurts too much. At first, Konnie is annoyed beyond belief by these crazy kids she’s suddenly saddled with. Then she comes to care deeply for her little guys as she is able to teach them to love the game that meant so much to her and her father. At the end, the judge who sentenced her for getting mad in the first place actually comes to her defense for getting angry. This time, she got mad and risked severe punishment by standing up for her little players. The judge tells her that he’s proud of her, and that he saw a lot of her father in her that day.

My favorite type of book to write – and to read – is one that has both humor and heart. Joyville is funny (ask my son!) and definitely has heart. It made both my critique partner and my daughter cry – in a good way!

Kids want to be entertained as much as we want them to be educated. My philosophy is to encourage them to read something fun and hope they might learn a thing or two along the way.

About the Book: It’s against the law to get mad in Joyville. Will Konnie Mack be able to coach a ragtag team of kids who are clueless about baseball without completely losing her cool?

Twenty-one-year-old Konnie has broken the No Anger law for the third time. She has two choices for punishment: coach Joyville’s Little League baseball team for the summer, or spend five years in jail.

Konnie used to be the best baseball player in town, but she hasn’t played the game she loves since she was sixteen. That was the year Bobby Hearsay stole Joyville’s team in the middle of the night. It was also the year her father died.

The current team includes the likes of Clueless Joe Jackson, Joltin’ Joanna Demargio, and Carl Repkin, Jr. Keeping her temper in check with these kids won’t be easy, and it’s going to be nearly impossible for this bunch to win any games. But Konnie has no choice. Getting mad will land her in the slammer, and her punishment for losing will be far worse than any jail sentence. She will be banished from playing baseball forever….

The Joyville Sweat Sox is available here – http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00YXUD7FI

About the Author: Linda Fausnet is the author of several books, mostly adult fiction. She has also written numerous screenplays of various genres. Two of her scripts have been optioned by production companies in Los Angeles; Mega Films, Inc. and Runaway Productions. Her screenplay, Queen Henry, was a Finalist in the national Progress Writers Competition. Linda runs an educational and promotional website for indie writers at www.wannabepride.com
Twitter – @lindafausnet
Facebook for Readers – https://www.facebook.com/lindafausnet
Facebook Group for Writers – https://www.facebook.com/groups/369053709961293/
Email List – Choose either WRITER’S or READER’S list – http://wannabepride.com/blog/?page_id=3466

We very much agree–finding the right book and doing summer reading right are both so important!
Thank you to Linda for this post!

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Author Guest Post!: “The Joy of Sharing Literature in A Classroom” by Miriam Spitzer Franklin, Author of Extraordinary

September 25, 2015June 21, 2015 by Ricki

“The Joy of Sharing Literature in A Classroom”

by Miriam Spitzer Franklin

With the push for better standardized test scores, reading workshops have increasingly turned toward focusing on building stamina during independent reading so that students will be able to read multiple passages and answer questions during a test that lasts hours. Helping students build stamina so that they can read longer independently is a worthy goal. But for some students, like my third grade daughter, being expected to read on her own for 45 minutes means she’ll lose her focus after 15 minutes and will spend the rest of the time quietly floundering on her own.

A better strategy is to have shorter independent reading sessions and spend more of the workshop teaching literature in small groups or to the whole class. During the class reading of a high-quality literary work, those students who are unable to sustain focus will be redirected if the material is engaging. Teachers can set expectations for reading, help students make predictions, and check often for understanding. In a group with a wide range of learners, some of the students can read independently while the others have a more structured approach with a combination of read-alouds, short sections of silent reading, and teacher modeling of expressive oral reading.

Literature studies should focus on higher level thinking skills. Teachers should ask questions that lead to divergent answers and deeper discussions. Teachers should choose books that lead students to think about different themes, to help them make connections with the characters, and to encourage questions that lead to better understandings of themselves and how they fit into the world.

In my middle grade novel, Extraordinary, ten-year-old Pansy decides she’s going to become an extraordinary person after her best friend suffers a brain injury. She is sure that the upcoming surgery for seizures will fix her brain, and when that happens, Pansy is going to make up for all the times she’s let her friend down in the past. My novel explores themes of hope, perseverance, self-esteem, friendship, and acceptance. Students can work in partners and small groups to identify character traits, character growth, and interpretations of the themes. Because students are all reading the same book instead of reading independent choices, peer or teacher-led discussions will lead to deeper understanding and analysis of the novel.

If we want students to dig below the surface to find meaning in text, they need to be evaluated through creative projects, written responses, and class discussions, not through a multiple choice test. In this way, students will discover a different purpose for reading; instead of reading to get the right answer, they will read to discover the joy of literature and the way books can transport them to places and situations they have never experienced before.

About the author: Miriam Spitzer Franklin taught elementary and middle school for twenty years, in both public and private school. Currently she teaches homeschooled students, designs curriculum for an online site, and is a writer-in-residence with the Charlotte Arts & Science Council. Other jobs she has held include working as a frazzled and unorganized waitress at a number of restaurants, driving the Zamboni and working the skate counter at the ice skating rink, teaching ice skating lessons, and owning a toy and gift store with her husband, Scott. Miriam lives with her husband, two daughters, and two pampered cats in Charlotte, North Carolina.

www.miriamfranklin.com

About the book: Last spring, Pansy chickened out on going to spring break camp, even though she’d promised her best friend, Anna, she’d go. It was just like when they went to get their hair cut for Locks of Love; only one of them walked out with a new hairstyle, and it wasn’t Pansy. But Pansy never got the chance to make it up to Anna. While at camp, Anna contracted meningitis and a dangerously high fever, and she hasn’t been the same since. Now all Pansy wants is her best friend back—not the silent girl in the wheelchair who has to go to a special school and who can’t do all the things Pansy used to chicken out of doing. So when Pansy discovers that Anna is getting a surgery that might cure her, Pansy realizes this is her chance—she’ll become the friend she always should have been. She’ll become the best friend Anna’s ever had—even if it means taking risks, trying new things (like those scary roller skates), and running herself ragged in the process.

Pansy’s chasing extraordinary, hoping she reaches it in time for her friend’s triumphant return. But what lies at the end of Pansy’s journey might not be exactly what she had expected—or wanted.

Extraordinary is a heartfelt, occasionally funny, coming-of-age middle grade novel by debut author Miriam Spitzer Franklin. It’s sure to appeal to fans of Cynthia Lord’s Rules and will inspire young friends to cherish the times they spend together. Every day should be lived like it’s extraordinary.

From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: This moving novel is narrated by Pansy, whose best friend Anna has contracted a disease that has impaired her brain. “Losing” a best friend this way can be a tough challenge. North Carolina author Franklin firmly grasps the climate and struggles among kids today. Her crystal-clear writing is filled with rich detail and believable characters. The sensitive story will resonate with young girls wrestling with friendship pains. (Sky Pony Press, ages 8-12)

Thank you to Miriam for her wonderful guest post!

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Blog Tour with Review, Author Guest Post, and Giveaway!: The Vanishing Island by Barry Wolverton

September 25, 2015June 19, 2015 by Kellee

The Chronicles of the Black Tulip: The Vanishing Island
Author: Barry Wolverton
Published September 1st, 2015 by Walden Pond Press

Goodreads Summary: Does the Vanishing Island really exist? And if so, what treasure—or terrible secret—was hidden by its disappearance?

It’s 1599, the Age of Discovery in Europe. But for Bren Owen, growing up in the small town of Map on the coast of Britannia has meant anything but adventure. Enticed by the tales sailors have brought through Map’s port, and inspired by the arcane maps his father creates as a cartographer for the cruel and charismatic map mogul named Rand McNally, Bren is convinced that fame and fortune await him elsewhere. That is, until his repeated attempts to run away land him a punishment worse than death—cleaning up the town vomitorium.

It is there that Bren meets a dying sailor, who gives him a strange gift that hides a hidden message. Cracking the code could lead Bren to a fabled lost treasure that could change his life forever, and that of his widowed father. But to get there he will have to tie his fate to a mysterious Dutch admiral obsessed with a Chinese legend about an island that long ago disappeared from any map.

Before long, Bren is in greater danger than he ever imagined, and will need the help of an unusual friend named Mouse to survive. Barry Wolverton’s thrilling adventure spans oceans and cultures, brings together the folklore of East and West, and proves that fortune is always a double-edged sword.

My Review: Whoa! Quite a book! Part swashbuckling adventure, part historical fiction, part folklore, part fantasy, part ghost story, Barry Wolverton has given us quite an intense adventure. I couldn’t predict anything that happened in the book. There were twists and turns throughout, and I never knew who to trust (though I am happy to say my favorite sailor was trustworthy). There were some really gruesome parts (blood and guts and vomit) and there were some really beautiful fairy tales. Overall, quite an adventure! (Though I warn: by gruesome, I mean gruesome!)

Discussion Questions: How did the author use folklore throughout the story to move along the plot?; What parts of history that were shared within the book were true? Fictional?; Throughout the book, stop and try to predict what you think is going to happen next then check your predictions as you read more.; As you read, make a list of all of the seafaring vocabulary that is used within The Vanishing Islands then illustrate each of the vocabulary words as they are used in the book.; Wolverton used Marco Polo’s written works throughout the book–what allusions to Polo’s text can you find in The Vanishing Island?

We Flagged: “The summer began with the grim warning that the wolves were running again. In Britannia, this was code. It meant that Her Majesty’s navy was in need of fresh bodies to replace all of the seamen lost during the year to disease, desertion, or battle. Crimping, they called it. Men and older boys kidnapped and forced to enlist, of the good of God, queen, and country. Britannia, after all, was just one of many nations fighting for nothing less than to control the world.

One boy who didn’t have to worry about being crimped was Bren Owens of Map, the dirtiest, noisiest, smelliest city in all of Britannia. (He had heard rotten things about London, too, but he’d never been there.) Bren was what they called spindly–tall for his age, but unsteady, like a chair you might be afraid to sit on. He had been born in Map because he’d had no choice in the matter.

But that didn’t mean he had to stay here. And now, too skinny for the wolves, he had been forced to take matters into his own hands.” (p. 9-10)

Author Guest Post:

“Be Careful What You Read, or Why Books Are Dangerous” by Barry Wolverton

Beginning in 1978, when Metrocenter mall opened near my home in Jackson, Miss., my family would go to the mall every Friday night. We would have dinner at one of the fine mall establishments, and then my mother would go clothes shopping, my brother would go nerd out at Radio Shack or Spencer’s, my father would go sit somewhere and smoke (you could do that then), and I would plop myself down in an aisle at Waldenbooks. I remember exactly how it felt to have that to look forward to, which is why Black’s Antique Books and Collectibles is Bren’s home away from home in The Vanishing Island. (Although the way I describe Black’s is more like I remembered Shakespeare and Co. in Paris, the ur-bookstore.)

But for a curious, receptive mind, books can do mischievous things. As I describe it in the book, “the bookstore was a blessing and a curse for [Bren]. Every few weeks seemed to bring in new adventure books, travelogues, and epic poems of war and conquest that were so popular these days. Tales from other lands and other times. For Bren, they offered proof that all things exotic and exciting lay anywhere but here.”

Books give Bren ideas. Ideas about places he’d rather be, things he’d rather be doing, possibilities that his current life doesn’t offer. Books also give him information. For instance, information about ships and the routines of their crew, so that an enterprising young man might figure out the best time to sneak aboard a ship and the best places to hide.

And it was undoubtedly in Black’s that Bren first found a copy of Travels by Marco Polo, the book that National Geographic described as “the founding adventure book of the modern world. Polo gave to the age of exploration that followed the marvels of the East, the strange customs, the fabulous riches, the tribes with gold teeth. It was a Book of Dreams, an incentive, a goad. Out of it came Columbus (whose own copy of the book was heavily annotated), Magellan, Vasco da Gama, and the rest of modern history.”

Wow, some book. Especially considering how much of it is considered dubious. Polo dictated his stories to a fiction writer named Rustichello while both were in prison during the Venice-Genoa war, and between Polo’s possible exaggerations and Rustichello’s flare for embellishment, we can be pretty sure Marco Polo didn’t really see a unicorn. (He may have seen a Sumatran rhino, though, which is still magical.)

Given all that, I hope you’ll appreciate why the Polo legend figures prominently in The Vanishing Island, without making light of the terrible cost of exploration and colonialism.

About the Author: Barry Wolverton is the author of Neversink. He has more than fifteen years’ experience creating books, documentary television scripts, and website content for international networks and publishers, including National Geographic, Scholastic.com, the Library of Congress, and the Discovery Networks. He lives in Memphis, Tennessee. You can visit him online at www.barrywolverton.com.

Read This If You Loved: The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle by Avi, The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman, Emerald Atlas by John Stephens, The Dungeoneers by John David Anderson

Recommended For:

Make sure to visit other stops on The Vanishing Island blog tour!
Tour information: http://www.walden.com/8039-2/

6/15/2015 Blue Stocking Thinking bluestockingthinking.blogspot.com
6/16/2015 The Haunting of Orchid Forsythia    hauntedorchid.blogspot.com
6/17/2015 Small Review   smallreview.blogspot.com
6/18/2015 Maria’s Melange   www.mariaselke.com/
6/19/2015 Unleashing Readers    unleashingreaders.com
6/19/2015 The Hiding Spot   thehidingspot.blogspot.com
6/22/2015 This Kid Reviews Books thiskidreviewsbooks.com
6/23/2015 Mundie Kids mundiekids.blogspot.com/
6/24/2015 Paige in Training    pageintraining.wordpress.com
6/25/2015 Novel Novice novelnovice.com

Giveaway!

**Thank you to Walden Pond Press for having us be part of the blog tour
and for providing copies for review and giveaway!**

Links for Barry Wolverton:

Website: http://www.barrywolverton.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/wolvertonhill
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bwolverton
Instagram: https://instagram.com/wolvertonhill/

Links for Walden Pond Press:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/WaldenPondPress
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WaldenPondPress
Website/Blog: http://www.walden.com/books/
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/waldenpondpress/

Blog Tour, Review, Giveaway, and Author & Illustrator Interview!: My Dog is the Best by Laurie Ann Thompson, Illustrated by Paul Schmid

July 27, 2015June 12, 2015 by Ricki

My Dog is the Best
Author: Laurie Ann Thompson
Illustrator: Paul Schmid
Published: June 9, 2015 by Farrar, Straus, and Giroux

Goodreads Summary: What do you get when you combine one energetic, enthusiastic little boy with his sleepy but tolerant dog? Unconditional love. Using simple words and spare illustrations, My Dog Is the Best celebrates the special bond that exists between a young child and a beloved family pet. It’s the heartwarming story of two best friends. . . told by a boy with a very active imagination.

Ricki’s Review and Teachers’ Tools for Navigation: This charming tale will surely win the hearts of many children. It made me feel a bit guilty that I don’t have a dog for my son! I can imagine teachers reading this story aloud to captivated audiences. Teachers might ask students to compare this story with others in their classrooms. The way the illustrator and text focuses on the two subjects makes their friendship shine. You can find an example of the text’s playfulness in the flagged page below. It made me smile! After reading this story, I would encourage my students to write their own stories about friendships that they have.

Kellee’s Review and Teachers’ Tools for Navigation: This book makes me want a dog (and like Ricki said, I feel a bit guilty for not having a dog for Trent!). I loved this sweet story of a sleepy dog and a rambunctious child who is going to have fun with his dog no matter what the dog thinks about it. The play between the words and illustrations is what really made this book special and made the quiet humor really ring through. I also think that kids are really going to like the end of the book. Like Ricki, I think that this text could be a great mentor text for writing about times of imagination and friendship. What other ways could the boy have played with the dog? How do you play with your pet/toy? I also think that it is a great story to use to talk about humor and irony. Why was the ending funny?

Discussion Questions: What kinds of games do you play with your best friend/pet/toy?; Do you have a pet? How is your relationship with your pet similar or dissimilar with this story?; In what ways is it obvious that the author and illustrator worked together to create this book? How do the drawings enhance the story?; Why is the ending ironic?

We Flagged:

My Dog is the Best spread — Image from: http://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374300517

Read This if You Loved: Look! by Jeff Mack; The Poky Little Puppy by Janette Sebring Lowrey; May the Best Dog Win by Kelly Hashway; Bark, George by Jules Feiffer; Emmanuel’s Dream by Laurie Ann Thompson

Recommended For:

Interview with the Laurie Ann Thompson and Paul Schmid!

Questions to Laurie:

What inspired you to write this book?

I first wrote the text as an assignment for a course I was taking, Anastasia Suen’s Easy Reader/Chapter Book Workshop. I’ve always loved dogs, and it’s a great word for beginning readers, so I started there. I noticed that most of the time when I said, “Good dog!” to my poor old dog, Sara, she was either curling up and getting ready to go to sleep or already sleeping. She would give me this confused look that said, “What? I’m not doing anything!” She’d been a hyperactive, crazy dog in her younger years, so it was a huge relief when she finally started slowing down a little. I appreciated the humor in those interactions. At the same time, I had an awfully busy little boy at home, so both the tension between their very different energy levels and their special “best friends” relationship were natural ingredients for the story.

Did you have a specific dog when you were growing up that you were thinking of as you wrote this book?

It’s really a collection of all of them. My dogs were my best friends, and they put up with so much of my probably unwanted attention. I had one special dog named Sammy that I used to dress up in doll clothes, push in a baby swing, and take for rides in my bicycle basket. (He loved those last two activities, but I’m pretty sure he merely tolerated the first!) He was the best. When I was bit older, my dog Ripper used to wait at the end of our driveway—every single day—for the school bus to bring me home. He listened to all of my tales of teenage angst and always let me dry my tears on his fur. He was devoted and dependable. He was the best. Then, as an adult, there was Sara. She was the best, too. I think whatever dog we make room for in our lives becomes “the best,” just by virtue of us loving them.

You write both YA and children’s books. How is your writing process different for each?

It’s very different! For my YA books, I’m a rather obsessive planner. I research and outline, then research some more and revise the outline and so on, for a long time, before I’m finally ready to start writing. For my picture books, I like to just play. I just start writing and see what happens. As a result, I typically spend less time revising the YA books than the picture books, even though the picture books are much, much shorter! It usually takes a lot of revision to make a picture book work just right.

What was it like to work with an illustrator?

With my YA books, like Be a Changemaker, there is no illustrator, so the final product is the result of the collaboration between my editors and me—and we’re all primarily word people. As a picture book author, though, it’s always exciting to see what another person with a very different way of working and of seeing the world will bring to my original vision. Authors don’t usually get much say in the illustrations (and rightly so, as I surely am no art expert!). With my second book (and first picture book), Emmanuel’s Dream, I had never met the illustrator, Sean Qualls, and I didn’t see any of his stunning artwork until it was almost all finished. I was on pins and needles, but what a pleasant surprise! For My Dog Is the Best the experience was a bit unusual but every bit as special. It just happened that Paul Schmid and I live not far apart and had known each other for years. When he took on the manuscript, I was ecstatic! We kept in touch throughout the process, and I even got to spend a day collaborating with him in his studio—one of my all-time favorite writing days ever! We both ended up influencing both the art and the text, and we ended up with something we’re both really proud of.

Questions to Paul:

How did you decide what the characters would look like?

Initially, I form a clear picture of the characters personalities. Are they active? Sedentary? Outgoing or shy? The design of a character should provide solid clues to who they are. Our dog in the book just wants to nap, and I imagined an old, tolerant, comfortable Basset Hound of established habits. The boy is much more active, but young and naive. He is also sweet and loving, as the book is itself. So I felt the boy needed a kind, gullible, gentle look that was at the same time visually sympathetic to his dog, in order to form an emotional connection between the two for the reader. As a result, they both ended up round and gentle looking.

What does the artistic process look like?

Many many sketches. Then many more. Then a few more. Eventually I have to start the final art. I don’t think I ever really feel like I’m done improving things, but a deadline shows up and helps me stop.

Early sketch of the dog

Dog Poses

Dog sketch and boy sketch

Early design

Early cover design

Another early cover design

Second stage spread

GIVEAWAY!

Follow My Dog is the Best on Tour!:

6/6/2015 Booking Mama http://www.bookingmama.net

6/8/2015 Jean Reidy http://jeanreidy.com

6/9/2015 Watch. Connect. Read. http://mrschureads.blogspot.com

6/10/2015 5 Minutes for Books http://books.5minutesformom.com

6/11/2015 KidLit Frenzy http://www.kidlitfrenzy.com

6/12/2015 Unleashing Readers https://www.unleashingreaders.com

6/16/2015 Anastasia Suen: Booktalk http://www.anastasiasuen.com

6/19/2015 Kirby’s Lane http://kirbyslane.com

7/1/2015 Library Lions http://LibraryLionsRoar.blogspot.com

Thank you to Laurie and Paul for taking part in the interview and for having us as part of the blog tour!

and

Author Guest Post!: “How Pre-Writing Made Me a Better Writer” by Melissa Hurst, Author of The Edge of Forever

September 25, 2015June 7, 2015 by Kellee

“How Pre-Writing Made Me a Better Writer”

When I started writing my first book, I was so excited. It was a shiny new story, and the possibilities were endless. The first few chapters were easy to write. After all, I had been thinking about them for several weeks while I created character profiles and sketched out the major plot points. But soon I began to lose steam. Getting words down was difficult, and I started to dread the blank page I had to face each day.

It took me over a year to write the first draft of that book. Sure, on some days it was easy to work, but more often than not I struggled to reach my daily word count goal. The really frustrating part was that I couldn’t figure out why. I knew where I wanted the story to go. So why was it so hard to write certain scenes?

I finally had a breakthrough after reading a book that suggested pre-writing each scene or chapter. Pre-writing sounds like more work, but I found it to be incredibly useful. Before I started writing for the day, I took out a notecard, labeled the chapter number, and I jotted down what was going to happen. I didn’t include many details or use dialogue, I just wrote what I wanted to happen, and I listed what characters would be in the scene. Doing this forced me to clarify my thoughts and really think about what was necessary to move the story forward. After that, writing became so much easier. I could finish each chapter more quickly instead of wasting time trying to figure out what to type. The blank page wasn’t so scary anymore.

Looking back, I should have known that pre-writing would help me. When I was still in school and received writing assignments, I’d usually procrastinate because I didn’t know what to write about. But when I started using an outline as a guide to tell me what information I needed to include in each paragraph, it wasn’t so difficult anymore. I could usually finish a paper in an hour or two, whereas before that it would take me several days.

I know a lot of people don’t like the thought of pre-writing, especially kids. But I like to think of it this way. When you have to travel to someplace new, isn’t it easier to have a guide to show you the way?

About the author: Melissa Hurst lives in the southern US with her husband and three kids. She writes YA science fiction and fantasy, which means she considers watching Star Trek and Firefly as research. She dreams of traveling around the world and maybe finding Atlantis one day. You can usually find her with a book in one hand and a Dr. Pepper in the other. Or consuming lots of chocolate.

The Edge of Forever is her debut novel.

About the book: In 2013: Sixteen-year-old Alora is having blackouts. Each time she wakes up in a different place with no idea of how she got there. The one thing she is certain of? Someone is following her.

In 2146: Seventeen-year-old Bridger is one of a small number of people born with the ability to travel to the past. While on a routine school time trip, he sees the last person he expected—his dead father. The strangest part is that, according to the Department of Temporal Affairs, his father was never assigned to be in that time. Bridger’s even more stunned when he learns that his by-the-book father was there to break the most important rule of time travel—to prevent someone’s murder.

And that someone is named Alora.

Determined to discover why his father wanted to help a “ghost,” Bridger illegally shifts to 2013 and, along with Alora, races to solve the mystery surrounding her past and her connection to his father before the DTA finds him. If he can stop Alora’s death without altering the timeline, maybe he can save his father too.

Thank you to Melissa for her post that I cannot wait to share with students!

and

Blog Tour with Author Guest Post, Review, Book Trailer, and Giveaway!: The Dungeoneers by John David Anderson

September 25, 2015June 5, 2015 by Kellee

The Dungeoneers
Author: John David Anderson
Published June 23, 2015 by Walden Pond Press

Publishers Summary: The Dungeoneers is an action-packed, funny, and heartbreaking middle grade fantasy-adventure from the author of the acclaimed Sidekicked and Minion, John David Anderson.

The world is not a fair place, and Colm Candorly knows it. While his parents and eight sisters seem content living on a lowly cobbler’s earnings, Colm can’t help but feel that everyone has the right to a more comfortable life. It’s just a question of how far you’re willing to go to get it.

In an effort to help make ends meet, Colm uses his natural gift for pickpocketing to pilfer a pile of gold from the richer residents of town, but his actions place him at the mercy of a mysterious man named Finn Argos, a gilded-toothed, smooth-tongued rogue who gives Colm a choice: he can be punished for his thievery, or he can become a member of Thwodin’s Legions, a guild of dungeoneers who take what they want and live as they will. Colm soon finds himself part of a family of warriors, mages, and hunters, learning to work together in their quest for endless treasure. But not all families are perfect, and even as Colm hones his skills with fellow recruits, it becomes clear that something from outside threatens the dungeoneers–and perhaps something from inside as well.

My Review: This is one of those fantasy novels that transports you to another place and throws you into an adventure that keeps you guessing and reading. In The Dungeoneers, I loved going to school with Colm and learning all about dungeoneering ways including how to be the best rogue, history of dungeoneering, swordplay, and all about monsters. This aspect reminded me a bit of Harry Potter because I got so sucked into his schooling and education, like I did with Harry’s, because I wanted to know everything I could about this world. The Dungeoneers also has some majorly suspenseful moments which makes sense in a book about stealing treasure from dungeons. In addition to his world building, he really knows how to build some characters! The three other members of Colm’s guild are such well-rounded characters and all so different. I can picture each of them, and I so want to be their friends (even Lena, who is a bit barbaric). I also loved the plot twist at the climax of the book! I did not see it coming! Just wait for it everyone!

Teachers’ Tools for Navigation/We Flagged: First and foremost, if you teach middle school, you should probably buy this for your classroom. High fantasy and adventure lovers are going to eat this one up.

Also, if you want to talk to students about building characters or setting, this book can definitely be a help with either. There are specific sections in this book that could be pulled out and used to discuss imagery, word choice, and characterization:

“In the flickering torchlight it was hard to make out all of her features clearly, but he couldn’t miss the sharp chisel of her chin, like a weapon itself. Her crimson hair was cropped short in the back, falling across one eye in front, the other shining brown in the flicker of light. Her lips were pursed, pulled tight against her teeth in a determined smirk.” (p. 93)

“Except Quinn didn’t look like he could call lightning from the sky or produce fireballs from his fingers. Colm had expected the first wizard he met to be more in keeping with the descriptions from his book–white-bearded and billowing and larger than life. Quinn looked barely big enough to summon his own shadow.” (p. 96)

“In contrast to the dreary tunnel behind them, the great hall before them was filled with light. Huge chandeliers hung from chains of gold, the flicker of a thousand candles casting fiery halos against the ceiling. Giant marble pillars anchored the four corners of the room, and a hug winding staircase with gold rails led both up and down in its center like a vortex. The floors were polished marble as well, dark green and buffed to a mirror sheen. A strange clock with twenty-four separate hourglasses hung over a set of huge double doors…” (p. 115)

Discussion Questions: If you were Colm, would you have gone with Finn?; What secret do you think Wolfe is keeping?; Lena is expected by her family to do well as a barbarian because of her upbringing. How would it feel to have that type of pressure put on you?; Colm makes a decision at the end of the book–do you agree with it or not?

Book Trailer:

John David Anderson’s Top Five Dungeoneers

Obviously The Dungeoneers owes a lot to fantasy tropes and conventions that have been around since Gandalf packed his first pipe. In fact, while writing it I sometimes felt like I should roll a d20 to see what my characters would do next (here’s hoping the book is a critical hit—ah, nerd humor). Afternoons spent playing Baldur’s Gate or reading Mercedes Lackey (or in my younger days, Lloyd Alexander) coalesced into a love of sword-swinging, lock-picking, monster-bashing rogues who risk everything on the hopes of finding that fabled cache of riches at the end of the corridor. In short, I was raised by dragons. Maybe I’m a Targaryen.

Obviously popular culture is not hurting for dungeoneers of interest, but I thought I would pick five key dungeon divers that had a distinct influence on me and the book. Note: I am defining a dungeoneer as anyone who willingly enters into some dank, creature-and-trap-infested cavern, catacomb, crypt, tomb or lair with the express purpose of taking whatever shiny, valuable objects are to be had. In other words, I’m kind of liberal with my use of the word.

5. Minsc and Boo: If you’ve ever played the game Baldur’s Gate, you will know these two. Minsc, the butt-kicking, infinitely quotable ranger, and his trusty hamster, Boo. Minsc was a tank and liked to carry big swords. More than that he had a big heart and recognized a noble enterprise, especially when it required some head bashing. Favorite quote: “Make way evil! I’m armed to the teeth and packing a hamster!

4. Ellen Ripley. All right, this one is a stretch, I admit, but in Aliens she does go down into a lair and fight off monsters (lots of them, including a queen) to rescue something she treasures (the little girl, Newt). Plus ever since I saw Aliens I’ve been drawn to tough female characters. I won’t lie—there’s a little bit of warrant officer Ripley’s feistiness in The Dungeoneers’ Lena Proudmore, though Lena doesn’t get to fire a grenade launcher (much to her chagrin).

3. Bilbo Baggins. You could name several characters from Tolkien’s mythos that fought their way out of dungeons, but Bilbo gets the cake for not coming out empty-handed. In fact, it’s the Burglar’s snatching of the Precious that drives the mythology. What did you find down there in the goblin caves, Bilbo? Oh—just the makings of a gazillion-dollar franchise. Finn Argos would be proud.

2. Link. Yes, it’s another video game, but for me, Link was the start of my love affair with dungeoneering. Link never met a rupee he didn’t like and spelunking through monster-infested lairs in search of Zelda was in his spritely 8-bit blood. I can still remember playing the original Zelda and getting eaten by an undulating stack of pancakes or impaled by a triceratops all because I didn’t know I was supposed to feed it bombs. To this day I still carry around a candle and a big stick of meat. Thank you Nintendo for stimulating my imagination and sucking away my time.

1. Indiana Jones. No sword (except in the second movie, and then it’s more of a machete). No armor. No dragons or ogres or orcs (though the Nazis are monstrous enough). But Indy, for me, is the archetypal treasure-hunter. Not only was he the dashing film hero of my childhood (and what I wanted to be when I grew up until I realized that everything cool had already been dug up already), he also helped engender my love for wise-cracking, whip-smart, ruggedly-charming, and occasionally flawed protagonists. His make-it-up-as-you go philosophy and daredevil antics were often replicated by a young, eight year old boy named Dave, who would pretend the floor was made of lava as he jumped from dining room table to couch and back again. Plus Indy knew that the greatest treasures always came at a price, a lesson that struck a chord with me.

So those are my top five. I’m sure your list is different. That’s the cool thing about inspiration—there are a lot of wells, and we get to drink from whichever ones we please. Who knows, maybe in twenty years some kid will be making a list of his favorite dungeoneers and put Colm Candorly somewhere near the top.

Right behind a bald guy and his hamster.

About the Author: John David Anderson is the author of Sidekicked and Minion. A dedicated root beer connoisseur in his spare time, he lives with his wife, two kids, and perpetually whiny cat in Indianapolis. You can visit him online at www.johndavidanderson.org.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/anderson_author
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JohnDavidAndersonAuthor?ref=hl

Read This If You Loved: Hero’s Guide (series) by Christopher Healy, Harry Potter (series) by J.K. Rowling, Foiled (series) by Jane Yolen, Giants Beware! (series) by Jorge Aguirre

Recommended For:

GIVEAWAY!

Make sure to visit other stops on the blog tour:

6/2/2015 Maria’s Melange mariaselke.com

6/5/2015 Unleashing Readers unleashingreaders.com

6/6/2015 The Haunting of Orchid Forsythia hauntedorchid.blogspot.com

6/7/2015 Satisfaction for Insatiable Readers insatiablereaders.blogspot.com

6/8/2015 This Kid Reviews Books thiskidreviewsbooks.com

6/8/2015 Ms Yingling Reads msyinglingreads.blogspot.com

6/9/2015 Read Now Sleep Later http://www.readnowsleeplater.org/

6/10/2015 Charlotte’s Library charlotteslibrary.blogspot.com

6/11/2015 Nerdy Book Club https://nerdybookclub.wordpress.com/

6/12/2015 The Hiding Spot thehidingspot.blogspot.com

**Thank you to Walden Pond Press for providing a copy for review and giveaway!**

Links for Walden Pond Press:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/WaldenPondPress

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

Website/Blog: http://www.walden.com/books/

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/waldenpondpress/