News & Events

This picture book is a great celebration of the messy creative process and how making ‘mistakes’ can offer all sorts of opportunities. Click here to read my book review.

Am halfway through the Tale of Two Writing Cities junior high summer camp. My students are full of inventive ideas and enthusiasm — Greek gods, murders, uncovered secrets and summoned angels have appeared on the page so far. I wonder which stories we’ll uncover tomorrow.

So the results are in! And there are not one but TWO winners of my competition this year. Cooper Dunlop told a wonderfully tense story about an unsuspecting turtle signing up for gruesome science experiments in Turtle Time. Ella Happel created a vivid and atmospheric world of terrifying emporers and alchemists in Remembering Death, A Historical Fiction. To read more about the other excellent ribbon-winning entries, click here.

Have you read Superbat? This is an excellent picture book for animal lovers and superhero fans. If you’d like to read my review, including some comments by my little Story Explorers, please click here.

For my latest book review, I chose Patricia Toht’s Dress Like A Girl, illustrated by Lorian Tu-Dean. An uplifting, empowering story — check out what I thought by clicking here.

I’ll miss my little Story Explorers now that our class is over. These first and second graders were full of enthusiasm and creativity — this week, I learned about Tarantula Island, The Army Base, a black and white world in need of color and many more brilliant stories. Here are some of the books we read together… To find out more about my classes, click here.

Remember the picture book drive that I organized for my stepdaughter, a Peace Corps Volunteer in Africa? To see my initial post, click here. Thanks to the generosity of SCBWI Illinois, librarians, teachers and other donors, I ended up collecting nine boxes of books. Next challenge: how to get said boxes to Africa? Answer: the wonderful Lesotho Nutrition Initiative took them alongside their nutrition packages for the children of Lesotho. Several months later, the books arrived and Lepholisa Primary School has the beginnings of a new school library. Check out the thank you photos below.

Registration is open for the Writers’ Retreat: Mining the Story at Shake Rag Alley, an enriching three day event (April 26-28, 2019) packed with workshops, panel events and creative activities. Set in the picturesque old mining town of Mineral Point, Wisconsin, there is an artistic community right on the doorstep to explore too. I’ll be on the Pathway to Publication Panel and will give manuscript consultations alongside faculty Patricia Ann McNair, Philip Hartigan, Judith Sutcliffe, Shawn Shiflett and Christine Maul Rice. Click here to find out more. We’d love to see you!

For my latest reviews for the Awfully Big Blog Adventure, I chose two picture books that play with the gutter (that is, the inner margin of a bound book) to add another dimension to storytelling. Click here to see what I thought.

The space is set and ready to go… Last night I had fun delivering a workshop on generating story ideas at The Book Market in Glenview. We talked about the nature of inspiration, the conditions for nurturing and encouraging creativity, and we channelled our inner child/teen to uncover some new story ideas.  Thanks to all who braved the cold to join me.