Madelyn Rosenberg

Just letting you know that Kathy Erskine, featured here a week ago, is interviewing Amy Brecount White on her site today. Amy’s debut novel, Forget-Her-Nots, comes out in March. Click on the interview to find out more about the power of flowers. Both Kathy and Amy are members of SCBWI’s mid-atlantic chapter, and Amy is a fellow Arlingtonian (is that how you say it?) And you know what Arlington’s all about, right?

I used to collect antique hats, so I thought I’d use a different one for drawing names each time I have a contest on this site. For my first giveaway, I’m using my leopard-skin pill-box hat, a hat so great that Bob Dylan wrote a song about it.

We had 33 comments (well, actually 30, once I removed my comments and the one from author Kathy Erskine). I put the names of the other people who commented into my trusty hat and had an unbiased party close his eyes and draw the name. And the ARC of Mockingbird goes to … Paula of Arlington, Va. Paula is a Virginia Tech graduate, and though Kathy’s book isn’t based in Blacksburg or at Tech, the shootings there — and the need to heal from those shootings — helped inspire this book. Thanks to everyone for the lovely comments, and congratulations to Paula.

Whenever there’s an earthquake, I wait for the newspaper story about the sound in the rubble
where the rescuers didn’t think there was any life left. They dig anyway, until they find a small child. Maybe his mother is waiting as they dig. Maybe she’s dead, her body protecting him from the crush of stone. But the child — there’s always one — is alive, and I focus on him, because thinking about what happened to his sister is too much. Thinking about the tens of thousands is too much. Thinking of bodies piled on the street is too much. I am looking for hope here, a miracle, so I search through the fine print. I wait for the child to move.

Added, 1.14, a link to this AP photo.