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 Today is release day for Laurel Snyder’s Baxter, the Pig Who Wanted to Be Kosher. I’m excited about this book for a number of reasons. One, of course, is that it’s a wonderful book. (Humor + heart + Judaism – overkill + some terrific illustrations + meaning + humor. Did I mention humor?) The other is that this is the book that introduced me to Laurel in the first place. (I’d seen the title at a conference and, sick of reading Jewish children’s books with somber, brown covers, I was ready for something FUN. Baxter — and Laurel — were definitely it.)
I was tempted to go with the Gourds’ Cracklins for my musical welcome, but ultimately that just seemed wrong, not to mention a little sick. As did Black Sabbath’s War Pigs. I finally decided it was safer to go with Les BAXTER. No lyrics on this one, you see. And maybe Laurel’s Baxter could dance to it…
Welcome, Baxter, congratulations, Laurel, and stay tuned for the release of her middle-grade, Dreadful Penny, in September.
So my quandary about what to write first has been solved: childhood won out over Maine. It was an easy place to slip back to, and I got a few memory jogs from some old neighbors, which helped, too, even if a lot of times I decided to go with fiction instead of the truth. This is pretty much the fastest I’ve written anything of length. It boiled down to: Two weeks, 15 chapters, 21,263 words, though there was a lot of head time in there beforehand and I’m not quite sure how to add that in. Surely there’s a scientific formula somewhere that accounts for head time.
As a result of the speed of the whole thing, I’m not 100 percent sure I trust my manuscript. Which means I have to put it away. My instinct is to start revising now, right this second, TONIGHT. But I’m trying to force my practical side (you didn’t know I had one, did you?) to win out. I’ve got to let things age. Not much mind you — my publishing career didn’t start going anywhere until I hit my 40s, so I can’t really afford to let things age that much before dealing with them. But I do need to put my pages away long enough to know that I’m not delusional. I’ll still have plenty to do while I’m letting things gel. There are a few solid weeks of steamy summer left. There are places to go and people to see. And if I feel like one more trip before summer is over, the Maine story awaits.
Clearly this blog went on vacation along with me, but I had to come back this week to welcome two new books.
 Today is the official release date for If Trouble Don’t Kill Me, the true story of musical brothers Clayton and Saford Hall. Ralph Berrier, Jr. used to tell stories about his Papa Clayton and Great Uncle Saford when I sat next to him at the Roanoke Times. My desk is nowhere near Ralph’s anymore, but I can hear his voice in every page of this book about the Hall twins’ rise to almost-fame and almost-fortune, a rise that was interrupted by their call to serve in the war to end all wars. In case you’re prone to motion sickness, I’m not taking you through all of the turns here; suffice it to say this is a great read. I interviewed Ralph for the September issue of Bluegrass Unlimited. Meanwhile, let’s welcome his journalistic memoir with “Don’t Let Your Sweet Love Die,” recorded in 1940 when the Halls were with Roy Hall and His Blue Ridge Entertainers. You should probably also go listen to “Cool Water.” This version is by the Sons of the Pioneers, but the Halls sang it, too, and I still remember the first version I heard, with Ralph’s voice joining Clayton’s and Saford’s at a packhouse party at the Berrier family apple orchard. Congratulations, Ralph!
Note to readers: the above book, released by Crown Publishing, is not for kids. The below book, from Scholastic Book Clubs, is.
 I haven’t actually read this one yet, but I’m giving it a grand welcome anyway. With balloons and cake and party hats. The book is called Never Ever Talk to Strangers and it’s the first of what I hope will be many books by Anne Marie Pace. I met Anne Marie years ago through SCBWI. Not to get too misty-eyed here, but she’s taught me a lot about generosity and support. (If support hose hadn’t already been invented, believe me, Anne Marie would have invented them.) The book is only available through Scholastic Book Clubs fliers — the firefly ones. If you have a preschooler who needs to learn about stranger danger, this is the way to go.
To welcome Never Ever, I give you Don’t Talk to Strangers, by Rick Springfield. Because even though I didn’t go see him when he played in Rockville last summer (or was it the summer before?) I know that women of a certain age have an appreciation for Springfield that decades of quality music-listening just can’t cure. No matter how many Johnny Cash albums I listen to, no matter how much Gillian Welch or heck, Bach, I still know every word to Jesse’s Girl. And yeah, I used to watch General Hospital. If I spent a little time on the TiVo, I’d be watching it again, though not for Rick this time; for James Franco. (Whose mother is a kidlit author, in case you’re one of those people who needs a legitimate tie-in.)
You know you haven’t blogged in awhile when you can’t even remember how to log in. I’m writing this in word, hoping to figure things out later when my eyes aren’t bleary from the road.
Just back from our summer vacation in Maine. Some good camping and only one long rain storm that left my sleeping bag a little soggy because the fly on our tent doesn’t stick out far enough. We also spent a night in what I have dubbed The Rich People’s Hotel, mostly because they kept jugs of water in the lobby, flavored with strawberries and cantaloupe and lemon. And because it was expensive. (You can afford one night in The Rich People’s Hotel if you camp because camping is only $20.)
My favorite spot was New Harbor, which we visited on the recommendation of one of my husband’s archivist friends. We went on a Puffin Cruise and ate dinner at the amazing Shaw’s. The next morning we checked out the lighthouse that appears on the Maine quarter after a breakfast of pancakes with wild blueberries.
I’d started working on a new middle grade novel just before the trip, one that I was (and am) super excited about. It draws on a lot of things from my childhood, more so than other stories I’ve written. I can’t wait to go back to Valley View Drive in my mind. But while I was on the trip I started thinking about a novel I’d started writing a few years ago and couldn’t quite finish. I stopped somewhere just before the middle, when things were getting complicated. That novel happens to be set in Maine and there I was with the lupine growing by the roadways and people hawking mussels and blueberries and the lady at the post office counting the days until the tourists left. The water was clear and the message in my brain was clear, too: I have to finish that story. So I took copious notes. I looked and listened. I found some crab claws in a tide pool, which I tried to bring back with me because crab claws figure prominently in this story and I needed to know how long it took them to dry out and stiffen. Only they made the trunk smell horrible and my children couldn’t go around in Crab Clothes all week. I abandoned them in Portland. (The crab claws, not the children.) Now I’m home again and I’m still not sure what to write next.
Both stories, I know that. But which comes first? They both keep rolling in front of me, plots and characters, Virginia and Maine. Waves of mountains. Mountains of waves. 
You’ll probably see a lot of posts this week about the American Library Association meeting, and lots more about the Newbery/Caldecott banquet. You’ll see pictures of librarians and writers and editors all dressed up with someplace to go. Or you’ll see pictures of place cards and menus in swirly script. You’ll see dessert.
My dinner on banquet night was a slice of pizza from Two Chefs. The plate was paper, not China. The pattern was “frog.” I skipped dessert. But I did go to the end of the banquet in time to hear the speeches from the Newbery and Caldecott medal winners. Wendy Shang drove. She can actually drive in D.C. whereas I, who learned to drive on the quiet roads of Blacksburg, Va., have always been Super Chicken and do it only when absolutely necessary. We parked a few blocks away, walked past three guys getting patted down by the police, and entered the hotel. We found the banquet room, the doors were open, and chairs were welcoming those of us who decided to come in late and forgo the $94 ticket. The hotel put out almost exactly the right number of chairs, so clearly the ALA people had this down to a science. (I saw only one person standing and she may have just wanted to stretch her legs.) We were way in the back. But it felt like exactly the right place to be. Wendy and I got to sit near other writer-type people (Pam Bachorz and her friend Vivian, Cynthea Liu, and Jaclyn Dolamore. You’ve got to love an event where you can still name drop from the second-to-last row.) We got to cringe collectively when we remembered our warped view of relationships after Newbery Chairman Katie O’Dell invoked the name VC Andrews. We got to laugh when Jerry Pinkney said the word “finally” and we got to “awww” when he shared his honor with his wife of 50 years. We got to wipe away sneak-attack tears when Rebecca Stead talked about lightning bolts of joy. I didn’t have my camera but here at home I took a picture of my little plastic cup. (The water was in the back of the room, too.) As you can see, the cup is half full. =)
We went to the beach last weekend for two (2) days and I asked my kids to pack what they wanted to bring. This is what my son packed:
Every year I try a new vegetable in my garden. Last year it was corn, which immediately attracted a 157,000 new garden pests. The chipmunks were thrilled by the addition of the corn, but no one else really was (see: 157,000 new garden pests) so this year we replaced the corn with broccoli. My kids have never been broccoli’s No. 1 fans, but they’ll eat it so I figured it was worth a shot.
Score.
Turns out broccoli is incredibly easy to grow as it’s a crop that can be started early, before mosquitoes and heat and humidity make you wonder why you’d ever hoed a garden in the first place. It doesn’t take up too much room. And the only pests that came with it were the caterpillars for cabbage butterflies, which ate some of the leaves, but left the crowns alone. On top of that, broccoli is incredibly prolific. After the first, perfect crown is harvested, all sorts of little shoots start growing off the plant. They’re not as compact or pretty, but they taste great. When the kids need a snack, they go to the garden, break off a stalk, and eat.
So what does this have to do with books? So glad you asked!
I heard a story recently about a 15-year-old who is going to have a bummer of a summer: she’s spending it in and out of the hospital, recovering from an injury. A friend wanted to send her some books, but was told not to. “She’s not really that into reading.”
I won’t go into the rant I went into the other day. But I can’t help wondering: If you grow the broccoli, will she eat it? If you find, somehow, the perfect crown, will more shoots follow?
The fine people over at PBS Booklights have been writing recurring posts about growing young readers. The optimist in me says that readers can still grow at any age; that the expression “late bloomer” didn’t come from nowhere. So I’m on a quest to find the perfect book. If you’ve got a suggestion, leave it in comments.
Our friend David sent us a package of Cheese Puffs in the mail. In part he splurged on the shipping charges because he knows my husband really likes Cheese Puffs. Mostly he sent it because of the packaging. Our question is the same as David’s, namely what in the heck made the marketing department at Payaso feel that this particular clown, who would clearly be more at home on an Insane Clown Posse album, was a good idea?
Okay, so “payaso” means “clown” in Spanish. But it doesn’t mean “really scary clown” (that would be “payaso realmente espantoso,” if you trust my Google translator). For the record, the bright orange glow of the cheese puffs was such that my kids didn’t really notice the clown. When I pointed him out, they asked “is he a bad guy?”
I wasn’t sure of the answer there. Maybe he’s trying to do the honorable thing and scare us away from processed foods?
It’s nearly the end of National Poetry Month. And finally! A Poetry Friday post! (I know you’ve been holding your breath.) Today I’m paying tribute to Barbara Park, whose Junie B. Jones books have been cracking us up all year. I know there’s a divide over Junie B. so I’d like to come out and say I am firmly in the “pro” camp — so much so that I just don’t get why there’s a divide in the first place. (I should probably come out here and say I’m pro Captain Underpants, too.) Junie B. has taught us plenty, like how your own Grandma’s house is best, how lots of things can qualify as pets and how you shouldn’t kick a cow watering can when it’s full. She (and her teacher, Mr. Scary) also taught us how write a five-line poem called a cinquain.
Read on
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Today is release day for Laurel Snyder’s Baxter, the Pig Who Wanted to Be Kosher. I’m excited about this book for a number of reasons. One, of course, is that it’s a wonderful book. (Humor + heart + Judaism – overkill + some terrific illustrations + meaning + humor. Did I mention humor?) The other is that this is the book that introduced me to Laurel in the first place. (I’d seen the title at a conference and, sick of reading Jewish children’s books with somber, brown covers, I was ready for something FUN. Baxter — and Laurel — were definitely it.)
