"And through Armstrong's sure, clear prose, all of these tales have a fresh, mythic energy to them, even when they are about the familiar figures and events that have and continue to shape our cultural consciousness."
But we had a great turnout, and signed another ton of books.
My new website includes two monthly contests, with two chances to win an autographed copy of The American Story for your classroom or home library.
Actually, it wasn't Detroit proper, it was Dearborn. Great Lakes Booksellers Association (GLBA) fall trade show was this weekend. I flew out on Saturday, and presigned 225 copies or so of The American Story for the "Children's Book and Author" breakfast. The breakfast itself was Sunday a.m., and the other speakers were Nikki Grimes, Jon Muth, and Paul Zelinsky. I delivered my American Story speech, which I've been giving all fall. Nikki Grimes read many of her poems. And both Muth and Zelinsky drew/painted for us. Two Caldecott medalists making pictures before your very eyes is a huge compensation for having to give a speech at breakfast.
He made the original culprit a monkey, and the entire visual sequence snowballs from here....
If you live near Haverford, PA, come to Children's Book World on October 21 to meet me and Roger Roth. We haven't figured out yet what we're going to be saying or doing for a presentation, but whatever it is, it will end up on CSPAN. This is quite a nice thing, since CSPAN/Book TV rarely covers children's books these days. Please come and be part of the audience. I don't know exactly what time we'll be at the store (or when the segment will air) but the store can give you info on the first and hopefully I'll be able to get information on the latter. Roger Roth, illustrator of this fine picture and all the pictures in The American Story, lives in Pennsylvania, and this will be our first joint appearace.
"For the middle school crowd, here’s a perfect intro to American history from the year 1565 to 2000. True stories include those of Benjamin Franklin and his kite, Sam Wilson (aka Uncle Sam), Iwo Jima, Watergate and even the mad case of Pac-Man fever that swept the nation in the early ‘80s. Delightfully vivid illustrations accompany each story making this book a real treasure."
Bad news is, it might be hard to get your hands on a copy of The American Story right now. My editor informs me that the Random House warehouse has no copies left, and is awaiting shipment of printing #2 in about two weeks.
A chef from a local restaurant, buying food from local farmers. What a concept. And then I saw him walk back to his retaurant. It's almost un-American
Who knew? My take on the story focuses on the fact that as a "nice" woman from a "good" family, (read white and upper middle class) Lizzie Borden was considered incapable of a brutal double murder. Nice women from good families just don't hack people to death with a hatchet and then calmly send the maid out to fetch the police. The hunt was immediately on for someone more in line with the public perception of brutal murderer -- black, of course, although Irish or that old stand-by, "foreign" would do in a pinch, vagrant, maybe mentally deranged. Any suspect would be better than Miss Elizabeth Borden! The entire fabric of society might crumble to dust if we believed such things might be possible!
Formerly the Utah Children's Book Award. Photo by Brady was nominated in the information book category. I have no idea when the winners of these awards are announced. My typical obsessive trolling of the internet turns up information like this from time to time. Of course you never hear about it directly -- or almost never. I periodically find out that this that or the other book of mine was a nominee for some state's book award last year or the year before or whatever.
I arrived in Pierre, South Dakota, last night after a long journey from Albany, New York. Today, I awoke on the banks of the Missouri River (in a B&B on the banks of the river, not shivering on the mud) with a chill in the air. This is Lewis & Clark country. So a chill in the air and a thrill of excitement. This is historic territory.
... was years ago. Probably fifteen years ago at least. It was fall, and the prairie was pale gold. I was amazed at how the land spread and dipped in sudden folds. Somehow I had imagined that it was literally as smooth and uninterrupted as the ocean. As a Yankee I found the unlimited horizon to be both exciting and alarming. My psychological environment includes more hills and trees, interrupted views. More boundaries. More people. Out there, I had a sense of myself the way a child draws herself standing on the earth -- a tiny stick figure jutting up from a sphere. In other words, something that blemishes an otherwise perfect globe. You know, the whole dwarfed-by-nature thing. In the thickly-built environment of the east, it is easy to enter the fallacy that things are the other way, that the earth is dwarfed by humans.
This was largely the inspiration for my sodbusters novel of the Dakota Territory, Black-Eyed Susan. Of all my novels, this was the one that -- for whatever reason -- was the easiest to write. I knew with perfect clarity what it was I wanted to say, and how I was going to say it. I know I could not have written had I not actually experienced the prairie for myself. I am really pleased that, this week, I will be going back there for the South Dakota Festival of Books. I can't wait.
Betcha didn't even realize I was gone. I went to the New England Booksellers' Association (NEBA) trade show, where I spoke at the "children's dinner." I was very happy to be able to thank the independent booksellers of New England for getting The American Story on their bestseller list last week. Before the dinner I did a power-signing: I sat down and autographed 200 copies of the book, which were then put on every seat at the banquet. Thanks to Elizabeth Bluemle, co-owner of The Flying Pig children's bookstore in Shelburne, Vermont, to Carol Chittenden, owner of Eight Cousins Bookstore on Cape Cod, Lisa Dugan of Koen Book distributors. and Laurie Hogan, of Random House, for their assistance during the power-signing. I know I'm leaving people out, so thank you all.
You'll need a New York Times user account to read this article, but it ties in to my story, "Welcome to America," in The American Story. Annie Moore, a teenager from Ireland, was the first immigrant processed at Ellis Island. For years, an Annie Moore in Texas was believed to be this same Annie, but a genealogist has cracked the case and found that Annie remained in New York City for the rest of her life.
Thank you to the newpaper in Halifax, Nova Scotia, for a nice mention of The American Story.
"Jennifer, excuse me, you don't have kids. Why the interest in home school?"
When you live in a racing town you do get spoiled. For a few years now I've said I won't go to the races unless I have a box for the day. After today, I'm not going to track unless I get to watch from the crow's nest, high above the track.
