This is a repeat because…well, we have an anniversary every year and yesterday was our fourth. I love this piece and always look for an excuse to share it, so I hope you enjoy it!

cheers, Joelle (and Victor)

I know…I usually keep my personal life out of my blogs, but hey, it’s my fourth wedding anniversary, and since these have been the best four years of my life, help me celebrate with a little piece of wedding cake humor. The picture above is of my mother and father-in-law’s wedding cake topper. It’s made of FROSTING and is from 1946. We found it on my mother-in-law’s bedside table after she passed away and used it on our cake.

Happy anniversary to my darlin’…the other pea in my pod. May our life together last as long as your parents’ wedding cake topper did, and then some. I love you.

No one ever says, “Oh, don’t be a quitter.” when you lay down the smokes, do they? Or what about if you’re bankrupt in Monopoly? Or drinking five beers a day isn’t working for you anymore. No. People really only tell you not to be a quitter when they think you’re quitting something that’s good for you. But sometimes, things that are good for you can also be tiring and the cost is too high. I think a time-out, at the very least, is worth considering when this happens.

I was reading an article in The Writer about a woman who believes her publishing success comes from networking. To a certain extent, I’m sure that’s very true, but you know…she did write a couple of books too. Networking is wearing me out. I’m the first person to admit that I don’t have very much self control when it comes to choosing hard work over fun stuff. I’ve got this first draft that needs some work and then there’s the internet. I rationalize that there are all these writing bloggers out there who are dying for my comments and contributions to the conversation and just as soon as I leave one more comment, I’ll get to that draft. But by the time I’m done with all those blogs, do you know what? I don’t feel much like writing. And then there’s the fact that they might get updated during the day, so I have to check back a couple of times too.

I was telling my husband that I’d rather knit and cook and listen to baseball and read than write and he said, “You’ve been writing since you were a little kid. That’s what you do.” He didn’t say, “Don’t quit”, but he essentially said that it isn’t an option. And honestly, I don’t want to quit writing. I want to quit networking. Now, it’s true that this might not be the very best time to disappear from the writer world since my book is out on submission, but do you know what? There will be plenty of time to network once I’ve got a book deal and edits are done and exciting things are happening, you know?

On my bio, I have this photo and the caption is: My meditation station…where I go when it becomes more about the publishing business, and less about the writing, to get myself back on track. I haven’t sat down there in a long, long while, but it’s time.

I love blogging here, and updating Need To Read, so I’ll keep doing that. It keeps me thinking and keeps my nonfiction skills sharp. But if I don’t leave a comment on your site for a while, don’t be offended. I need to think about the art of writing and not the business side for a while.

This morning I walked to the dentist. On the way, I figured out how to fix my manuscript (I’m revising). In the chair, I solved another issue that had been bugging me (all while getting my pearly whites shined up nicely). The part I need to fix is in the last quarter. I’m about a third of the way through right now and I know exactly what comes next and what I have to do, so I’m not the least bit stuck. I even have the manuscript marked up in front of me. And yet…It is now nearly four o’clock and I have only revised three pages. I have had a leisurely lunch, a good read, and done a whole lot of internet surfing, but the writing eludes me today. How can one day be an eighteen page day (yesterday) and another be a three page day? How does that happen????

Hmmm…Does all that plotting count as work for today? Can I go read now?

I know…I know…I’ve read them all, and listened to them on audio, and seen the movies…but I couldn’t help myself. I needed a fix and started reading the Harry Potter books again. I’ve never read all seven straight through before! I just read the first two, and now I’m taking a short break to read Meg Cabot’s ALLIE FINKEL’S RULE FOR GIRLS - Moving Day. It’s MG and it’s very funny. Even though the second one just came out, our library just got the first one. I wanted to read it and get it back on the shelf for others, or I would’ve just kept going on HP.

If you haven’t read this post on the daily writings page, pop over there and see how I have hit the jackpot!

So…I might live in the middle of nowhere, but extraordinary things happen to me all the time that you would expect to only happen if you lived in a bigger place. Like in the post below this one, for example. Or the fact that a friend that we’ve known for almost a year brought his wife to our house for the first time the other day and it turns out that she works for Penguin Canada! And she is a sales rep…for children’s books! And not only is she very nice and personable, but SHE IS GIVING ME FREE BOOKS!!!!! Yeah, I’m THAT lucky. She said, “Oh, I have boxes of ARCs and I never know what to do with them. Would you like them?” WOULD I LIKE THEM? ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!!!

My friend Eileen swears that one of the best parts of getting deeper into this biz is that people start sending you free books, and I have gotten a few, but this is beyond cool! And you, my dear readers, will also benefit because eventually, I’ll be writing about these books on Need To Read.

If you think rejection is hard, try regret - Carolyn Hax

I love this quote. Hax made it in regards to dating (or not taking a chance with someone) in her advice column a few years ago, but it works for everything, really. Still…I’m not so sure that rejection and writing go hand in hand.

Our house is for sale (not the one we live in, but the one we moved from). Everyone knows when you sell a house that multiple offers are optimum, but really, all you need is one person to fall in love with your house and buy it. And yet, if our realtor books an appointment with someone, shows the house, and they don’t think it will work for them because they have five kids and it turns out our house only has one bathroom, we don’t feel rejected, do we? The house is just not a good fit for that family. This got me thinking about the word rejection in regards to publishing.

Why exactly is rejection the word that writers (and editors, agents, etc.) have chosen to latch on to? When you’re in the query process, or the submission process, you often hear advice to ‘not take a rejection personally’ because your writing may not be bad at all, ‘just not a good fit’. But the verb ‘reject’ means: to dismiss as inadequate or faulty. How can you not take it personally and still call it a ‘rejection’? I would like to challenge everyone to reject the term rejection in regards to writing, and switch to something more positive. Or at least neutral.

I know that some of my friends and family are surprised that “rejections” don’t seem to bother me much. I’ve always thought it was because I started out life as an actress, and in that tough field, sometimes you’re rejected right to your face! At least with writing, you get a nice snail mail letter or an email. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not Little Miss Sunshine (well, okay, I am, but that’s an entirely different post), but semantics are everything, especially to writers! Words matter. From now on I am not accepting any more rejections. It’s not like an editor says, “I reject you! Bwahahahaah!” anyway. No, they usually say….”Thank you for the opportunity to read this, but it doesn’t really fit in our house.” There you go! No rejection anywhere in that letter!

While I’d like to sell everything I write from now on, there may be an occasion where it doesn’t happen…you know, just one or two rare occasions (haha)… Here are the words I choose to use when that happens. I challenge you to do the same, lose rejection from your vocabulary, and add to my list.

• Took a pass
• Decided it wasn’t right for them
• Is giving someone else an opportunity
• Turned it down
• Bowed out of the running
• Didn’t want to buy it
• ????

Earlier in the summer I abandoned my office. It’s really cute (see it on the bio page) and I love it, but it’s sort of cave-like in the natural light department, and it was too depressing to sit in there on gorgeous, sunny days. I wrote on the porch or in the living room for the month of July, and this month I had a house guest until the other day, so I haven’t written at all. Today is the day I’m supposed to go back to writing.

Here’s the problem. My office has been destroyed! No, not by natural disaster, but by a combination of laziness and physics. You see, while we had a guest, I would run in and get stuff and then as it accumulated in the rest of the house, either I or my husband, would toss it back in the office. This includes library books, clean laundry, shoes, mail, etc. The physics part came about when the bottom storage box in the closet collapsed under the sheer weight of ten years worth of journals and the whole pile came tumbling down out of my closet and into my office.

So…while I do hope to at least re-read what I was writing back in July today, I think that my main plan will be to unearth my office. Usually it’s so nice. I must restore it to its natural splendor! Wish me luck. And by the way, does anyone have a shovel I can borrow?

This is a pretty interesting article about S&S’s new involvement with Gotham Group, a Los Angeles management firm, and their plans for bridging the whole teen book publishing & movie production biz. I read several times in the article about how “the publisher” will get more of the pie with a plan like this intact, but nowhere did it say the writer gets a slice! Of course, if a successful movie is made of your book, or you write the book based on a successful movie, you would in theory probably have more book sales and earn more royalties (although with the latter, it might be write for hire). S&S doesn’t always secure the movie rights in every MG/YA deal they make though, and I have to wonder if these books will be left out of this project, or if they will try and secure more movie rights, or what? There are interesting things going on all the time, aren’t there? It seems like a really important time to have a great agent. Lucky me, I’m covered!

Five reasons I feel good about reading fewer books this year than I usually do:

5. I’ve always wanted to learn to do something sort of artistic, like sew. Sewing didn’t really work out, but I’ve learned to knit this year and I really love it.

4. I’ve discovered the joy of audio books, which I rarely listened to before.

3. I felt a lot of pressure to keep reading everything and to blog about it…it was like I’d said, “Oh, I read 150 YAs a year” and I was holding myself to that even when I didn’t feel like reading. The pressure has lifted!

2. Without a huge pile of Must Reads, I’ve allowed myself to browse a bit. I’ve read a fair amount of adult fiction this year, which has been kind of nice. There’s some great stuff out there, and the break from teen troubles has broadened my world too!

1. I’m really enjoying what I’m reading instead of just ploughing through it like I’m on some sort of mission!

When my new article was first published, it was called Red Hair Is Not As Uncommon As You Think. The version that just came out in The Writer Magazine is slightly revised and renamed Of Wicked Stepmoms and Dorky Heroines, but for the most part, the same piece. I’m very excited that it’s getting this second chance at life, and that even more people will see it. And there are some great articles surrounding it in this issue too, so you should definitely pick up your copy of the September issue (not that I’m telling you what to do)!

For the record, I do have something to say though based on the last time it was published. I am not trying to tell anyone what to do. While I got loads of funny and cheerful emails last time telling me that it was a useful (or amusing) piece, I also got a bunch of emails from people saying things like, “What’s wrong with calling parents by their first name?” as if I’d personally attacked their WIP with my article. I even got a few emails from people telling me their whole family AND their best friends had red hair. On one hand this made me laugh, but on the other, I found myself answering a lot of emails with something like this: I am hardly in a position to tell people what to or what to not write. I’m just pointing out what I’ve noticed. So, you know…it’s just an observation and if you can use the info or it makes you laugh, then I’ve done my job!

I hope you enjoy the article and that maybe you find it useful! Feel free to leave comments about other things you’ve noticed. I’ve come up with a few more myself, but I’m too tired right now to remember what they are. Still, maybe I’ll be up to fifty before you know it!

Don’t miss these great reads that I’ve just added to Need To Read!

As I mentioned yesterday in the post below this one, my husband just did a really fun music gig and a lot of it is on youtube. We have a friend visiting from the South and she sang a few songs with my husband. One of the songs they did was written by Victor’s friend, David Olney. David’s publicist just sent out his newsletter and included this link to Victor and Chelsea Nye singing his song, Where Do the Good Times Go?

Are you still with me (because I really do intend to get to the writing bit in just a second)? We hadn’t visited David’s myspace page recently, so we dropped by there just now and the audio file that plays automatically is a radio interview with Olney. Okay, here’s where I tie this into writing. The announcer asked him what advice he would give to songwriters just starting out and this is what he said: Learn other people’s songs. Serve a kind of apprenticeship where you learn other people’s songs…you can just sort of see how they go together and then when you’re ready to make your move, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel.

I looked at my husband and I said, “It’s exactly the same as the need to read when you’re a writer.”

And it truly is. If you read, you get a sense for how a novel is structured, put together. You might be a great writer, but a novel is a monster of a project if all you’ve ever written are fifty page papers for college or articles for the newspaper. I think people fear that by reading they will “lift” ideas from other writers, but the opposite is true. I mean, the more you read, the less likely you are to write something that’s already been done because you know it’s out there. The learning curve you get from reading novels in your genre is almost immeasurable. So…if you want to write music, take it from a pro…learn other people’s songs. And if you want to write novels, well…I won’t say I’m a pro, but I will say I’m experienced in this. Make sure you read.

  We have a house guest which makes me totally guilty of neglect. I blame it on Zarr’s great writing! It is true that yesterday, I left the entertaining to my husband (and also made our guest fend for herself) while I read SWEETHEARTS straight through. I liked Zarr’s other book, STORY OF A GIRL (along with about a zillion other people and the NBA judges), but this one really kept me on the edge of my seat. Well, okay, I was slouched back in the big, blue velvet chair for hours, but you know what I mean. The pacing and the way this story unfolds is really well done. Sometimes I read a book and think, “Ah…yes. This is the type of book I write. I could’ve written this.” but with Zarr’s books, I just think, “Yeah, right. Who am I kidding? This is just amazing!” It’s not that I want to write like her, it’s more that it could just never, ever happen, and in a way, that makes it even better. It’s like when you go to a restaurant and you order a dish and when it comes you get all excited and start thinking, “Ooooh…I could make this at home.” vs “Wow! So glad I came here because even though I’m a good cook, this could never happen in my kitchen.” Both are great, but sometimes eating (or reading) something you could never replicate yourself is a real treat.

Anyway, I highly recommend this. Especially to anyone who has read all of Sarah Dessen’s books and is looking for something else fabulous by a storyteller who writes in a similar vein. Plus, isn’t it a wonderful cover? Enjoy!

Wow! Another MG book that I love. Maybe I was just reading the wrong MGs before when I said I didn’t like MG that much. This one is really good. I think Caroline Hickey does a great job of tackling a subject that I haven’t come across before in a book (not that I’m saying it hasn’t been done, I just don’t recall reading any books about this topic). I’m not going to tell you what it is because it’s fun to find out while you’re reading. It makes you feel all smart too if you figure it out before it’s actually spelled out for you. Anyway, I’m excited because Caroline has a new book coming out called Isabelle’s Boyfriend. Of course, I should’ve known Caroline would be a good writer because she’s one of those Longstocking Girls!

More on music and writing…

I read a lot of writers’ blogs and many of them create playlists for their characters and listen to them while they write. I cannot listen to music while I’m working, but music is a huge part of all my writing. Before I met my husband, I owned seventeen CDs and three of them were his (yes, I was a fan who met her rockstar and married him!). In other words, I didn’t really listen to much music and what I did listen to, I listened to over and over again. Here’s a side note: One of the artists I listened to all the time was Lyle Lovett. My husband’s record reviews often stated that he sounded like Lyle. And one of both Lyle and my husband’s greatest musical influence was Walter Hyatt. So I was listening to them both, loving all their music, and not even making the connection why. Not only had I never heard of the late great Walter, but I didn’t know that they both listened to him and (eventually) played with him every chance they got.

Anyway, back to writing and music. Once I became exposed to music daily (my husband’s vast CD and vinyl collection), his playing and singing, and the many, many amazing musician friends that came to our house to play, music began to creep into my writing. It snuck up on me at first, but now music is a huge part of every manuscript. Many of my characters are musicians and are surrounded by music. Music has become another character in my writing. I hope that someday when I have several books out, people will say, “Oh, she’s the one who always writes about music”.

The truth is that while every word of this post is true, I’m really just posting about music and writing so that I can link to all these wonderful videos of my husband’s gig last Friday night that our friend Steve Orsatti put up on Youtube. So, for your musical listening pleasure click here and have fun . He is joined by the fabulous musicians/singers Nathan Tinkham. Kathy McIntyre, and Chelsea Nye.

A post about music and my writing.

I am in the process of compiling a complete archive of Need To Read that will include all the original posts starting way back when it was a Live Journal. Since it might take a while (because my arm is already falling off from all the mouse clicking), I am posting it as I go and then adding to it periodically. I would’ve liked to be all organized and done it by author or alphabetical but that would’ve taken a lot more time so it’s in the order I wrote the entries. Check it out here.

The Essays & Lists:

Need To Read - The beginning

Candy - an essay about reading

Fave Fifteen of 2007

Driven to Insanity - an essay about coincidence

The Question of Age

The book reviews start here:
SWEETHEARTS by Sara Zarr

CASSIE WAS HERE by Caroline Hickey

Dustin Grubbs - Take Two by John J. Bonk

Goose Chase by Patrice Kindl

Teen, Inc. by Stefan Petrucha

SHUG, TELEGRAPH DAYS & THE YEAR MY SISTER GOT LUCKY

Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips

6X The Uncensored Confessions by Nina Malkin, Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine, Saving Juliet by Suzanne Selfors, Anyone But You by Lara M. Zeises

Jessie’s Mountain by Kerry Madden

THE ART OF RACING IN THE RAIN by Garth Stein

THIS LULLABY by Sarah Dessen, LOCK AND KEY by Sarah Dessen, THE CELBUTANTES IN THE CLUB by Antonio Pagliarulo, PRINCESS MIA by Meg Cabot

The No.1 Ladies’ Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith

The Mediator Series by Meg Cabot

SPANKING SHAKESPEARE by Jake Wizner

AUSTENLAND by Shannon Hale

A LITTLE FRIENDLY ADVICE by Siobhan Vivian

THE OPPOSITE OF LOVE by Julie Buxbaum (adult fiction)

JUST LISTEN by Sarah Dessen

ANOTHER KIND OF COWBOY by Susan Juby

Mistik Lake by Martha Brooks

THE TRUTH ABOUT FOREVER by Sarah Dessen

THE ABSOLUTELY TRUE DIARY OF A PART-TIME INDIAN by Sherman Alexie

RULES and THE YEAR OF SECRET ASSIGNMENTSTYRELL by Coe Booth

FROZEN RODEO, PRIVATE PEACEFUL, & STIFF UPPER LIP, JEEVES

STORY OF A GIRL by Sara Zarr

B FOR BUSTER by Iain Lawrence

SPELLS & SLEEPING BAGS by Sarah Mlynowski

LESSONS FROM A DEAD GIRL by Jo Knowles

THE LIFE AND CRIMES OF BERNETTA WALLFLOWER by Lisa Graff (MG)

To Catch a Mermaid by Suzanne Selfors

DAIRY QUEEN & THE OFF SEASON by Catharine Gilbert Murdock

A Crooked Kind of Perfect by Linda Urban (MG)

Repossessed by A. M. Jenkins

A Tree Grows In Brooklyn by Betty Smith

BROKEN MOON by Kim Antieau

BOY PROOF by Cecil Castellucci

WHITE MAGIC by Kelly Easton

UNPREDICTABLE by Eileen Cook (adult chick lit)

MERCY UNBOUND by Kim Antieau

THE CELEBUTANTES ON THE AVENUE by Antonio Pagliarulo

BEIGE by Cecil Castellucci

EGGS by Jerry Spinelli & SAVING GRACE by Darlene Ryan

But I Don’t Want To Be A Movie Star by Margaret Pinder

Benny and Babe by Eoin Colfer

The Thing About Jane Spring by Sharon Krum

Benny and Omar by Eoin Colfer

Reality Chick by Lauren Barnholdt

SOMEDAY I’LL LAUGH ABOUT THIS and LONG TIME PASSING by Linda Crew

Louisanna’s Song by Kerry Madden

Love, Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli

Five or so misc. titles I’m too lazy to type up.

WRITING THE BREAKOUT NOVEL and I’D TELL YOU I LOVE YOU BUT THEN I’D HAVE TO KILL YOU

LOVE IS A MANY TROUSERED THING, IF WE KISS, & GENTLE’S HOLLER

MISSING YOU by Meg Cabot & GEMINI SUMMER by Iain Lawrence

1-800-Where-R-You #2,3 & 4 by Meg Cabot

Lefty Carmichael Has a Fit by Don Trembath

THE WRECKERS by Iain Lawrence

ALL’S FAIR IN LOVE, WAR AND HIGH SCHOOL and PANTS ON FIRE

1-800-WHERE-R-U WHEN LIGHTNING STRIKES by Meg Cabot

You, Maybe by Rachel Vail

Beauty Tips From Moose Jaw & Size 14 Is Not Fat

FROGS AND FRENCH KISSES by Sarah Mylnowski

Love, cajun style by Diane Les Becquets

CONFESSIONS OF A NOT IT GIRL by Melissa Kantor

Hannah Divided

Children of the River by Linda Crew

Growin’ Pains by Mary Blount Christian

Julie and Julia by Julie Powell

Harry Potter - The British version

HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS - no spoiler here!

Holiday Princess by Meg Cabot

VALENTINE PRINCESS by Meg Cabot

NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH (and a few white lies) by Justina Chen Headley

WILD TREES by Richard Preston

Princess on the Brink - Meg Cabot

BRIDES OF EDEN by Linda Crew

MILLIONS by Frank Cottrell Boyce & THE GEOGRAPHY OF GIRLHOOD by Kirsten Smith

Harry Potter

More Harry Potter (audio)

THE ASTONISHING ADVENTURES OF FANBOY AND GOTH GIRL by Barry Lyga

HARRY POTTER AND THE PHILOSOPHER’S STONE by J. K. Rowling

SHACKLETON’S STOWAWAY by Victoria McKernan

THE THING ABOUT GEORGIE by Lisa Graff

FRAMED by Frank Cottrell Boyce

Parent Swap by Terence Blacker

  Half full? Half Empty?

Five Reasons Why The Fact That I’ve Written Less This Year Than Ever Before Doesn’t Bother Me

5. More time to listen to the Cubbies baseball games

4. I’m in a lot better shape than when I snack  sit at my desk every day

3.  When I do write, it seems more like fun than work because I’m loving what I’m writing

2. I have a wonderful agent working for/with me and so I don’t feel the desperation to produce something, anything, that might snag me an agent/editor like I did before

And the number one reason is…

1. What I am writing is better than anything I’ve ever written before - something about having a life, I reckon…

(next week my countdown will be why I don’t mind that I’m reading less)

Last night, I had a very surreal conversation.

I had the oddest conversation last night around the kitchen table. I have written two books that go together (not a series, just the two of them). I am hoping that after my agent sells my first book, they will eventually be published books #2 & #3. I am revising the first of these two now (I actually wrote the second one first, and then realized the back story in my head would make a good novel too, and the first one was born).

Anyway…we have a house guest right now and over the last year or so, she has read all my manuscripts. She doesn’t critique them or anything, but she likes to read, I like her, and she’s eighteen, so I thought it would be nice to have someone under thirty-five read them, since they’re YA. So last night I was sitting there with her (Chelsea) and my husband and she said to me, “You know, when I read these two books (KEEP THE FAITH & TRUE BLUE BABY - the names come from songs used in the books), I thought to myself, ‘this is what it would be like to have Joelle and Victor for parents and to be their daughter’.

We had to laugh at that one because while nothing in the books is autobiographical, I did get the whole spark of an idea by imagining what it might be like for a teenager to have such weird parents like us. That’s where the whole thing started! So I had to agree that Chelsea had nailed it. But then she asked us if we were really in the situation that’s in my book, would we actually let our daughter do the “big thing” in TBB that our character’s parents let her do. While I won’t say here what it is, it is a pretty big and unusual thing for parents to allow their seventeen year old daughter do, but Victor and I looked at each other and said, “Yeah…I think we would.”

We then had a long conversation about the characters in these books, who they are, what their values are, what each of them have to lose if she breeches the trust the parents give her, etc. What was so odd about it was that we were deep into this conversation before it even struck me how surreal the whole thing was! I know that many writers, myself included, think of their characters as real, but having a conversation about them like this was beyond any experience I’ve ever had with my characters. I think what it did was give me faith that these two manuscripts will eventually be books someday. And do you know what? I can hardly wait! Not because I have a huge desire to have shelves of books with my name on the spines, but because these characters are so cool…I want you to know them too.

Does it sound egotistical to say they’re cool right after I said the parents were based on us? Hmmm…well, my husband is cool. I’m maybe cool by association. Actually, I meant that Kami was cool (the daughter), but if you want to think of me as cool, I can live with that.

If you’d like to hear the two songs used in the books, click on the music tab above and you can listen to True Blue Baby (and some other music from that book) performed by my husband. And if you go to his myspace page you can hear Keep The Faith. Yes…he wrote the songs, but I’ve secured permission to use them in my books. I’m paying him in food.

P.S. The photo is of the instruments because both the guitar and mandolin feature prominently in the books.

This is a sequel to DUSTIN GRUBBS ONE-MAN SHOW. I read it when it first came out, so it’s been a while, but I remember that I loved it, so I was excited to get my hands on this one. I was not disappointed. It’s fantastic. One of the reasons I like his writing so much is because he writes about the theatre and he actually KNOWS about the theatre. He’s not working from memory of a high school play. He’s been a pro actor/singer/dancer and so Bonk captures the desire as well as the technicalities that are so often missing from books about kids who want to be actors. Being an actor myself, books about the theatre that don’t ring true really drive me crazy! This one hits its mark every time. Plus, Bonk writes so tightly, no wasted words, and tons and tons of clever phrasing, plays on words, and laugh-out-loud humor. This would be a perfect read aloud book for a fourth grade class too, so all you fourth grade teachers and librarians, add these books to your list for next school year. I hope there’s another book coming.

P.S. Those of you who know me know that impressing me with MG is hard work, as it generally isn’t my cup of tea, but this fits the bill. Bah-dum-pum!

Eileen Cook - You knew I’d start with the queen of weird stories (bats in your bra, snakes under the bed)

Alix’s funny take on…well, lots of stuff! - and because she likes Cadbury choclolate as much as I do (but Marmite? oooh…yuck!)

Victor Anthony’s myspace page - what kind of a wife would I be if I didn’t link to my husband? You can hear some of his music here (as well as on my music page). And what the heck, why not a two-fer. Check out his photo blog too!

The Longstockings blog - The girls in the know. Lots of info about writing, reading and publishing.

The Nature Conservancy Canada - because I’m feeling environmental today. How about you?

I took my husband to England for the first time a few years ago and we took a day trip with my friend, Carole, up to Beatrix Potter’s land. There’s a lovely gift shop in what was her husband’s office now and you can walk the gardens and then there’s a wonderful hike up to Tarn Hows where she used to go and watch the wildlife. Anyway, while we were wandering around the gift shop, looking at all the Potter inspired gifty items, and my husband was not trying very hard to hide his boredom, I said to him, “I’m going to get this card for Olivia (our friend’s child in the States), but I really want to get her this figurine of Peter Rabbit too. What do you think?” and he looked at me and said, “Why? She’s not even going to know who Peter Rabbit is.” !!! Apparently, if his mother read to him when he was little (probably), his memory did not reach back that far and he had NO IDEA why this gift shop even existed! He was just there for the hike (which I highly recommend). Here are some pictures he took when we finally released him from the torture of the gift shop and went for our walk.