New York Teen Author Fest 2012!!

I know!  I'm delighted to no end about being involved with the best Teen Author Fest in the world next week!

Writing is so weird.  You do it alone.  Or if there are people around, you ignore them and pretend you're alone.  So when you have an excuse to meet other writers, writers who ALSO write for teens, it's like being in an enchanted fairy land where Libba Bray and  E. Lockhart flit about on sparkly wings and David Levithan is the mayor of Young Adult land for one week.

It's really interesting and fun and emotionally satisfying in a way that surprises me. Mr. Levithan is a genius and I'm always grateful and happy that he is the amazing wonder he is.  Thank you for including me!

I'm reading here:  (MY NEIGHBORHOOD!!)

Thursday, March 29:

The NYC Big Read, 10am

Inwood Branch - 4790 Broadway, 10am

with theses charming authors:

Eugene Myers                         

Jessica Rothenberg                  

Lena Roy        

Mark Shulman             

Arlaina Tibensky  

And I'll be signing  on  Sunday April 1  at Books of wonder from 3:15 - 4:00 with these lovely writers:


3:15-4:00
Melissa De La Cruz (Lost in Time, Hyperion)
Alyssa Sheinmel, (The Lucky Kind, RH)
Jennifer Smith (The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight, Little Brown)
Jeri Smith-Ready (Shift, S&S)
Jon Skovron (Misfit, Abrams)
Victoria Schwab (The Near Witch, Hyperion)
Mark Shulman (Are You Normal?, National Geographic)
Margaret Stohl (Beautiful Chaos, Little Brown)
Arlaina Tibensky (And Then Things Fell Apart, S&S)
Siobhan Vivian (The List, Scholastic)
Melissa Walker (Small Town Sinners, Bloomsbury)
K.M. Walton (Cracked, S&S)
John Corey Whaley (Where Things Come Back, S&S)
Alecia Whitaker (The Queen of Kentucky, Little Brown)
Maryrose Wood (The Unseen Guest, Harper)
Natalie Zaman and Charlotte Bennardo (Sirenz, Flux)





Anyhoo, here's the WHOLE schedule:

2012 NYC Teen Author Festival

Monday, March 26 (Mulberry Street Branch of the NYPL, 10 Jersey Street b/w Mulberry and Lafayette, 6-8): 

Plotting Dangerously: Doing What it Takes to Find the Story

Coe Booth
Jen Calonita
Paul Griffin
Deborah Heiligman
Melissa Kantor
Morgan Matson
Kieran Scott
Melissa Walker

moderator: David Levithan


Tuesday, March 27 (McNally Jackson Bookstore, 52 Prince Street, 7-8:30):
The Mutual Admiration Society Reading

Madeleine George
Ellen Hopkins
David Levithan
Jennifer Smith
John Corey Whaley


Wednesday. March 28 (42nd St NYPL, Bergen Forum, 6-8): 
Things Fall Apart: World Building and World Destroying in YA

Anna Carey
Sarah Beth Durst
Anne Heltzel
Jeff Hirsch
Andy Marino
Lauren McLaughlin
Lissa Price
Jon Skovron

moderator: Chris Shoemaker


Thursday, March 29:
The NYC Big Read

NOTE: SPECIFIC MANHATTAN LIBRARY LOCATIONS TO COME

Queens – Long Island City branch of the Queens Public Library (37-44 21 StreetLong Island City, NY 11101)

Tara Altebrando
Brent Crawford
Gina Damico
Jeff Hirsch
Andy Marino
Jon Skovron
Alecia Whitaker

Manhattan – Locations to come

Jen Calonita
Anna Carey
Matthew Cody
Jocelyn Davies
Melissa De La Cruz
Hilary Graham
Christopher Grant
Leanna Renee Hieber
Anne Heltzel
Gwendolyn Heasley
PG Kain
Kody Keplinger
Lauren McLaughlin
Sarah Mlynowski
Eugene Myers
Micol Ostow
Stephanie Perkins
Jessica Rotherberg
Lena Roy
Erin Saldin
Leila Sales
Eliot Schrefer
Samantha Schutz
Mark Shulman
Arlaina Tibensky


Brooklyn – Brooklyn Public Library, central branch, Grand Army Plaza
Kate Ellison
Gayle Forman
Melissa Kantor
Barry Lyga
Michael Northrop
Matthue Roth
Victoria Schwab
Melissa Walker

Bronx -- Bronx Library Center - 310 East Kingsbridge Road, Bronx
Elizabeth Eulberg
Paul Griffin
Alissa Grosso
David Levithan
Sarah Darer Littman
Kieran Scott
John Corey Whaley


Friday March 30, Symposium (42nd Street NYPL, 2-6)

2:00 – Introduction

2:10-3:00: Being Friends With Boys

Elizabeth Eulberg
Jenny Han
Terra Elan McVoy
Stephanie Perkins

moderator: Sarah Mlynowski

3:00-3:50: The Writer as Time Traveler: Writing the Past While Sitting in the Present

Judy Blundell
Matthew Cody
Jennifer Donnelly
Leanna Renee Hieber
Suzanne Weyn

moderator: David Levithan


3:50-4:40: No Ordinary Love: How to Create a Satisfying Love Story and a Satisfying Supernatural World at the Same Time

Andrea Cremer
Melissa de la Cruz
Jeri Smith-Ready
Victoria Schwab
Margaret Stohl

moderator: Barry Lyga


4:40-5:30: New Voices Spotlight

Emily Danforth
Kate Ellison
Lucas Klauss
Carley Moore
Aleica Whittaker



Friday March 30, Barnes & Noble Reader’s Theater/Signing (Union Square B&N, 33 E 17th St, 7-8:30)

Andrea Cremer
Emily Danforth
Lucas Klauss
Stephanie Perkins
Siobhan Vivian
John Corey Whaley

moderator: David Levithan


Saturday March 31, Symposium (42nd Street NYPL, 1-5)

1:00 – Introduction

1:10-2:00 – Rising to the Challenge: YA Characters Facing Down What Life Throws Them

Tara Altebrando
Matt Blackstone
Susane Colasanti
Kody Keplinger
Siobhan Vivian
K.M. Walton

moderator: David Levithan


2:00-2:50 -- Killer Instincts: Death, Murder, and the YA Novel

Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Gina Damico
Kim Harrington
Barry Lyga

moderator: Marie Rutkoski


2:50-4:00 -- Moments of Truth: Characters at a Crossroads

Natasha Friend
Margie Gelbwasser
Jennifer Hubbard
Stewart Lewis
Sarah Darer Littman
Jess Rothenberg
Daisy Whitney

moderator: E. Lockhart


4:00-5:00 – Looking Forward to Fall

David Levithan
Marie Rutkoski
Eliot Schrefer
…and more authors reading from their upcoming books


Sunday April 1: Our No-Foolin’ Mega-Signing at Books of Wonder (Books of Wonder, 1-4): 


1-1:45:
Jennifer Barnes (Every Other Day, Egmont)
Matt Blackstone (A Scary Scene in a Scary Movie, FSG)
Caroline Bock (LIE, St. Martin’s)
Jen Calonita (Belles, Little Brown)
Anna Carey (Eve, Harper)
Susane Colasanti (So Much Closer, Penguin)
Andrea Cremer (Bloodrose, Penguin)
Gina Damico (Croak, HMH)
Emily Danforth (The Miseducation of Cameron Post, Harper)
Jocelyn Davies (A Beautiful Dark, Harper)
Sarah Beth Durst (Drink, Slay, Love, S&S)
Elizabeth Eulberg (Take a Bow, Scholastic)
Gayle Forman (Where She Went, Penguin) 
Natasha Friend (For Keeps, Penguin)
Kim Harrington (Perception, Scholastic)
Barry Lyga (I Hunt Killers, Little Brown)
Daisy Whitney (The Rivals, Little Brown)



1:45-2:30
Margie Gelbwasser (Pieces of Us, Flux)
Alissa Grosso (Popular, Flux)
Jenny Han (We’ll Always Have Summer, S&S)
Leanna Renee Hieber (Darker Still, Sourcebooks)
Anne Heltzel (Circle Nine, Candlewick)
Jeff Hirsch (The Eleventh Plague, Scholastic)
Jennifer Hubbard (Try Not to Breathe, Penguin)
Melissa Jensen (The Fine Art of True or Dare, Penguin)
PG Kain (Famous for Thirty Seconds, S&S)
Melissa Kantor (The Darlings in Love, Hyperion)
Kody Keplinger (Shut Out, Little Brown)
Lucas Klauss (Everything You Need to Survive the Apocalypse, S&S)
David Levithan (Every You, Every Me, RH)
Stewart Lewis (You Have Seven Messages, RH)
Sarah Darer Littman (Want to Go Private?, Scholastic)
Elisa Ludwig (Pretty Crooked, S&S)

2:30-3:15
Carolyn Mackler (The Future of Us, Penguin)
Andy Marino (Unison Spark, FSG)
Wendy Mass (13 Gifts, Scholastic)
Terra Elan McVoy (The Summer of Firsts and Lasts, S&S)
Lauren McLaughlin (Scored, RH)
Sarah Mlynowski (Ten Things We Did, RH)
Carley Moore (The Stalker Chronicles, FSG)
E. C. Myers (Fair Coin, Pyr)
Michael Northrop (Plunked, Scholastic)
Micol Ostow (What Would My Cell Phone Do?, Penguin)
Stephanie Perkins (Lola and the Boy Next Door, Penguin)
Jessica Rotherberg (The Catastrophic History of You and Me, Penguin)
Marie Rutkoski (The Jewel of the Kalderash, FSG)
Erin Saldin (The Girls of No Return, Scholastic)
Leila Sales (Past Perfect, S&S)
Kieran Scott (He’s So Not Worth It, S&S)

3:15-4:00
Melissa De La Cruz (Lost in Time, Hyperion)
Alyssa Sheinmel, (The Lucky Kind, RH)
Jennifer Smith (The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight, Little Brown)
Jeri Smith-Ready (Shift, S&S)
Jon Skovron (Misfit, Abrams)
Victoria Schwab (The Near Witch, Hyperion)
Mark Shulman (Are You Normal?, National Geographic)
Margaret Stohl (Beautiful Chaos, Little Brown)
Arlaina Tibensky (And Then Things Fell Apart, S&S)
Siobhan Vivian (The List, Scholastic)
Melissa Walker (Small Town Sinners, Bloomsbury)
K.M. Walton (Cracked, S&S)
John Corey Whaley (Where Things Come Back, S&S)
Alecia Whitaker (The Queen of Kentucky, Little Brown)
Maryrose Wood (The Unseen Guest, Harper)
Natalie Zaman and Charlotte Bennardo (Sirenz, Flux)

It's November Already!

And I can't believe I'm surprised.  October is the busiest time of year for me.  We've got our wedding anniversary (9 years. Whut?) Two birthdays and Halloween all in one week.  This year we added a bowling party and  Scottish in-laws to the mix.  And the volunteer face painting of 1,000 children. And some regular painting drama in our bathroom and soccer and yoga and more parties, and gifts and oh on my kid's 5th birthday, I snipped the tip of his finger practically off with a pair of scissors as I was cutting a gift ribbon.  Blood all over the LEGO.  Tears, shock, guilt guilt guilt, Cars 2 Band-aid.

Mother of the year!

I've missed you, dear reader and I'm on this blogging business.  I have so much to talk about and one of those things is NCTE/ALAN 2011.

I'm off to Chicago to talk and sign and panel it up with David Levithan and John Green and some other badasses.

There is also: BUILDING BLUEPRINTS FOR BETTER GIRLS.

And BEGINNERS.

I'm going to try and do a semi-weekly book rave of a book I love.  If I don't like a book, you will never know about it.  That's not how I roll.  I'm from the if you can't say something good school.

It's like when my kid got bit after school yesterday. (And I mean bit.  Silver dollar sized bruise on his skinny little thigh.)  My husband was all outraged and furious and heads will roll!  But I know the kid.  I know his mom.  Maybe he was just hungry. And I always think about the biter's poor mother and so when it comes to talking about books-  I'm the biter's mother.

Am I making sense?

xoxo

SIGH SIGH SIGH

Hey there.  So my real life grandma is 88 years old.  My other real life grandma is 90.  I did some kind of weird Frankenstein monster sewing up of the best and weirdest parts of both of them and added a lot of made up stuff to create the Gram character in And Then Things Fall Apart.

I am terribly lucky to have both my grandmothers alive and relatively healthy.  But one of them (the brunette) fell and broke her leg last week and it's freaking me out.  Distracting me really.  I'm not near her and can't visit really and am just thinking about the meaning of life, and time, and death and all kinds of other cheery things that are totally depressing me. She's OK- however OK an 88 year old woman with a broken and pinned together thigh can be.

SIGH SIGH SIGH it's all I'm doing lately.

Booklist had a little heart attack of love over And Then Things Fall Apart which is insanely good news. They even liked Keek's poetry. Shocking, I know!  And I have some awesome and rabid Keek fans out there who have made themselves known to me through the magic of the internet.  Which is also good news. (MWAH! You know who you are...)

I'm going to a fancy conference in November with the loves of my life, English Teachers, and I'm planning not one but two birthday parties for those lovable and scrappy tykes of mine. And oh I'm supposed to be writing a book and I kind of am but not in the way I would like.  But I'm doing it in a fashion... and will sputter along until it clunks into my brain properly and then writes itself.

And here we are. Fall is upon us, pumpkin spiced lattes are on offer at various latte bars around the city and school is in full swing.  My 4.75 year old loves to play chess (!) on my iphone (?!) after school, when his homework is complete (?!).  SIGH SIGH SIGH!  The other one says please and thank you and fits into a spiffy pair of flannel pyjamas from Scotland.

So below is a sensational little book trailer for And Then Things Fall Apart  that someone other than me made.  I came upon it quite on accident and I think it is totally cool!  I might try and make one myself on animoto.  Or maybe on imovie, or I dunno.  I didn't think I needed one but I think it might me kind of fun to actually make one!  And I will do anything except write a new book so.  There was some acclaimed writer of note whose name I don't remember who famously outfitted his writing chair with a seatbelt and would STRAP HIMSELF IN to write.  It's not that I don't love writing. Oh- we are in love, writing and I- it's just--- well.  Stay tuned...




And remember: A man a plan a canal, Panama!