Jacqueline West's Blog, page 10
May 19, 2011
Self-Indulgent Spring Photography
Spring has finally arrived in a way that suggests it's not just going to abandon us again. Spring does that around here--it tiptoes in, backs out, convinces a few bulbs to start sprouting, then buries them in a surprise April snow shower. But I think we're safe at last.
All over town, the apple, cherry, and crabapple trees are blossoming, and the air is dizzyingly thick with their scent. When the lilacs join in, it may be dangerous to go outside at all.
Even Baby Honeycrisp is entering the pageant:
And here is Brom Bones, lounging in the sun on our defiantly weedy lawn.
I am currently enjoying a lull between events, having just wrapped up the last school visits of the 2010/2011 year, but there will be another round of bookstore and library visits this summer -- I'll post a calendar as the dates approach. The lull comes at an especially good time, because I'm smoothing out the bumps in another draft of Volume Three, and my May 30 deadline is looming.
Now I'm going to stop staring out the windows and get back to work.
All over town, the apple, cherry, and crabapple trees are blossoming, and the air is dizzyingly thick with their scent. When the lilacs join in, it may be dangerous to go outside at all.
Even Baby Honeycrisp is entering the pageant:
And here is Brom Bones, lounging in the sun on our defiantly weedy lawn.
I am currently enjoying a lull between events, having just wrapped up the last school visits of the 2010/2011 year, but there will be another round of bookstore and library visits this summer -- I'll post a calendar as the dates approach. The lull comes at an especially good time, because I'm smoothing out the bumps in another draft of Volume Three, and my May 30 deadline is looming.
Now I'm going to stop staring out the windows and get back to work.
May 5, 2011
In Which Fingernails Are Bitten
Back in March, when patches of snow were still thick on the ground but a certain writer could pretend to read outdoors without looking utterly miserable, we filmed a promo for The Books of Elsewhere, Volume Two: Spellbound. The staff at the LeDuc mansion in Hastings, Minnesota (www.dakotahistory.org/LeDuc/home.asp), were kind enough to let us use the amazing estate (and to let me skim their copy of Ivanhoe). It made a ridiculously perfect setting for a discussion of The Books of Elsewhere: Not only does it look almost eerily like the McMartin house of my imagination and of Poly Bernatene's illustrations, but the home is still filled with many of the possessions of the original owners, including a library of antique books and several paintings done by one of the family members. See? Ridiculously perfect.
I have an aversion to being photographed, so I can only watch this in the way that you might watch a horror movie or battle a Gorgon (through your fingers or reflected in another surface--preferably a sword--respectively), but here it is:
I have an aversion to being photographed, so I can only watch this in the way that you might watch a horror movie or battle a Gorgon (through your fingers or reflected in another surface--preferably a sword--respectively), but here it is:
April 17, 2011
Several Small (and Sometimes Snowy) Adventures
This is what I did last night.
(This is the Before picture. The After picture is much sadder.)
Last night was the Minnesota Book Awards Gala Celebration (or, as the MC described it, the Oscars for Minnesotan book nerds), and besides a plateful of desserts, it meant that I got to meet or re-meet some very nice people, sign books for lots of enthusiastic readers, and see the cover of The Shadows glowing on huge screens all around a massive, sparkly ballroom. Pete Hautman took home the award in the Young People's Literature category, which I think was no surprise to anyone but him. I felt flattered just to be sitting at the same signing table with Pete, Swati Avasthi, and Lynne Jonell. The Minnesotan literary community is both quite large and quite tightly knit, and almost everyone seemed to know almost everyone else, and to either have taught or have been taught at the Loft Literary Center. (Case in point: Julie Schumacher, who presented the award in our category, mentioned that three of the four nominees were her former writing students. Guess which one of us wasn't.) So I felt a bit like the new kid at school, but it was a friendlier school than most. And it was a school with cheesecake.
Leading up to that adventure was a nine-day trip to Oregon and back, during which we encountered floods, icy mountains, rising gas prices, mid-April blizzards, and the sad news that our friend George's 1976 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham d'Elegance (which, besides having the longest name, was also the longest car ever mass-produced in the U.S.) would not be up to the trip from Portland back to Minnesota. On the advice of an un-encouraging mechanic, we ended up in a much less visually stunning rented Mazda hatchback. Sigh. Oregon, however, was lovely. I made a brief school visit (Thanks, Parrish MS!), spent time with the wonderful west coast Wests, and even got to play on the beach with a wet dog, which is the very best way to visit any beach, anywhere.
[image error]
(With Ryan and said wet dog, who is creating the illusion of having only two legs.)
I've let far too much material pile up since my last entry, but for now I'll just make brief mentions of other fantastic school visits, and of filming a promotional trailer/preview/interview for Spellbound, and of weaving my way through a round of Volume Three revisions, and of spending a week as writer-in-residence at Glacier Hills Elementary School of Arts and Science...in large part because this will just give me more material to gush about later.
(This is the Before picture. The After picture is much sadder.)
Last night was the Minnesota Book Awards Gala Celebration (or, as the MC described it, the Oscars for Minnesotan book nerds), and besides a plateful of desserts, it meant that I got to meet or re-meet some very nice people, sign books for lots of enthusiastic readers, and see the cover of The Shadows glowing on huge screens all around a massive, sparkly ballroom. Pete Hautman took home the award in the Young People's Literature category, which I think was no surprise to anyone but him. I felt flattered just to be sitting at the same signing table with Pete, Swati Avasthi, and Lynne Jonell. The Minnesotan literary community is both quite large and quite tightly knit, and almost everyone seemed to know almost everyone else, and to either have taught or have been taught at the Loft Literary Center. (Case in point: Julie Schumacher, who presented the award in our category, mentioned that three of the four nominees were her former writing students. Guess which one of us wasn't.) So I felt a bit like the new kid at school, but it was a friendlier school than most. And it was a school with cheesecake.
Leading up to that adventure was a nine-day trip to Oregon and back, during which we encountered floods, icy mountains, rising gas prices, mid-April blizzards, and the sad news that our friend George's 1976 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham d'Elegance (which, besides having the longest name, was also the longest car ever mass-produced in the U.S.) would not be up to the trip from Portland back to Minnesota. On the advice of an un-encouraging mechanic, we ended up in a much less visually stunning rented Mazda hatchback. Sigh. Oregon, however, was lovely. I made a brief school visit (Thanks, Parrish MS!), spent time with the wonderful west coast Wests, and even got to play on the beach with a wet dog, which is the very best way to visit any beach, anywhere.
[image error]
(With Ryan and said wet dog, who is creating the illusion of having only two legs.)
I've let far too much material pile up since my last entry, but for now I'll just make brief mentions of other fantastic school visits, and of filming a promotional trailer/preview/interview for Spellbound, and of weaving my way through a round of Volume Three revisions, and of spending a week as writer-in-residence at Glacier Hills Elementary School of Arts and Science...in large part because this will just give me more material to gush about later.
February 21, 2011
Les Bon Temps
Last Saturday, we drove into New Orleans at sunset while listening to Tom Waits and feeling absurdly jealous of ourselves. The next four and a half days were magical.
We watched a wedding party parade along Bourbon Street, complete with brass band, waving handkerchiefs, and elaborate bride-and-groom umbrellas. We had an amazing dinner at the Green Goddess, where I spotted chef Chris DeBarr at work in the steamy kitchen (to me, a celebrity sighting of the first magnitude). We saw nuns in full habits strolling up Royal Street, and crosses made of human bone at the voodoo museum. After mass at St. Louis Cathedral, I bought a chaplet of red glass beads that look just like pomegranate seeds. We ate beignets and pain au chocolat with chicory coffee. We had Sazeracs at the Napoleon House and absinthe in Pirate Alley, among the ghosts of Faulkner and Williams and Capote. And we wandered for hours in the cemeteries, miniature cities of the dead.
(Me, in front of the house where Faulkner wrote his first novel.)
(In Lafayette Cemetery Number 2.)
To add to the magic, just before we left the city, I learned that The Books of Elsewhere, Volume One: The Shadows had won a Cybils Award in the fantasy/science fiction category: www.cybils.com/2011/02/winners-of-the-2010-cybils-awards.html. I couldn't be more grateful. Thank you, Cybils bloggers.
And, in other long-delayed awards news, The Shadows has been named a finalist for the Minnesota Book Awards in the young people's literature category:www.thefriends.org/programs/mnbookawards/award_winners_and_finalists.html#finalists. This also means that during the month of March, book-loving Minnesotans can vote for it (or for one of the other, magnificent, finalists of their choice) to win the Readers' Choice Award: www.thefriends.org/programs/mnbookawards/mba_gala.html#readers_choice.
After all this wonderfulness, I'm waiting for the big karmic boom. For now, though, I'm on Cloud Nine.
January 22, 2011
Awards Season
So, the Today Show decided to feature Snooki (Hey, she wrote a book, too!) instead of the Newbery and Caldecott medalists this year, but just like Christmas in Whoville, the ALSC Book Awards came just the same. I met Clare Vanderpool, whose Moon over Manifest won the Newbery this year (www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/alsc/awardsgrants/bookmedia/newberymedal/newberymedal.cfm) at last fall's MBA trade show, and she was down-to-earth and lovely, and I'm so happy to see her (and a debut author, to boot!) rewarded with this success.
In other awards news, I hopped up and down in my office when I learned that The Shadows was a finalist in the MG fantasy/science fiction category of the Cybils: www.cybils.com/2010-finalists-fantasy-science-fiction-middle-grade.html#tp. The Cybils are awarded annually by a community of children's and YA literature bloggers, and the work that they do to support literature for young readers is fantastic and much appreciated.
The Friends of the St. Paul Public Library have also just posted their list of eligible books for the 23rd annual Minnesota Book Awards, and the Young People's Literature category (www.thefriends.org/programs/mnbookawards/award_winners_and_finalists.html#young_peoples_lit) has many, many amazing entrants -- including Margi Preus's Heart of a Samurai, which is also a 2010 Newbery Honor Book. Go, Minnesotans! We know how to put these five months of enforced indoor time to use.
In other awards news, I hopped up and down in my office when I learned that The Shadows was a finalist in the MG fantasy/science fiction category of the Cybils: www.cybils.com/2010-finalists-fantasy-science-fiction-middle-grade.html#tp. The Cybils are awarded annually by a community of children's and YA literature bloggers, and the work that they do to support literature for young readers is fantastic and much appreciated.
The Friends of the St. Paul Public Library have also just posted their list of eligible books for the 23rd annual Minnesota Book Awards, and the Young People's Literature category (www.thefriends.org/programs/mnbookawards/award_winners_and_finalists.html#young_peoples_lit) has many, many amazing entrants -- including Margi Preus's Heart of a Samurai, which is also a 2010 Newbery Honor Book. Go, Minnesotans! We know how to put these five months of enforced indoor time to use.
And, at last, I've received my author's copies of the German edition of The Shadows: Olive und das Haus der Schatten. Behold!
(Complete with upside-down title on the spine!!)
What a treat it is to see how artists envision these characters and their world.
January 7, 2011
Yet Another Reason to Love Independent Booksellers
This warmed my heart and irritated my nose -- a list of bookstores with resident cats:
www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/78757
And, more personally, here are two more reviews for The Shadows, one from the blog Beyond Books (beyondbooks.ca/), and a video review from Devvour, who has named The Shadows the book of the month (devvour.blogspot.com/2011/01/devvour-book-review-books-of-elsewhere.html). Thanks, folks!
www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/78757
And, more personally, here are two more reviews for The Shadows, one from the blog Beyond Books (beyondbooks.ca/), and a video review from Devvour, who has named The Shadows the book of the month (devvour.blogspot.com/2011/01/devvour-book-review-books-of-elsewhere.html). Thanks, folks!
January 6, 2011
In Which a Certain Road is Paved with Certain Intentions
My resolutions for 2011 are as follows. For some reason, there are seventeen this year...
1. Waste less time online.
2. Waste less time online.
3. Waste less time online.
4. Waste less time in general.
5. Rewrite the dratted play.
6. Come up with title for the dratted play.
7. Write at least one poem each month.
8. Recall how wonderful writing longhand used to feel, and try to make it feel that way again.
9. Revise Book Three without undue mental anguish.
10. Come up with title for Book Three, too. Grrr.
11. Travel. (Plans are made. Now FOLLOW THROUGH.)
12. Make and can absolutely massive batch of homegrown tomato soup, so that next winter, you won't have to daydream about it and sigh longingly.
13. Grow enough tomatoes to supply said absolutely massive batch of soup.
14. Stick with exercise routine that involves flexibility.
15. Write what wants to be written.
16. Be less afraid.
17. Forgive yourself when you fail. Even at New Year's resolutions.
There we are.
1. Waste less time online.
2. Waste less time online.
3. Waste less time online.
4. Waste less time in general.
5. Rewrite the dratted play.
6. Come up with title for the dratted play.
7. Write at least one poem each month.
8. Recall how wonderful writing longhand used to feel, and try to make it feel that way again.
9. Revise Book Three without undue mental anguish.
10. Come up with title for Book Three, too. Grrr.
11. Travel. (Plans are made. Now FOLLOW THROUGH.)
12. Make and can absolutely massive batch of homegrown tomato soup, so that next winter, you won't have to daydream about it and sigh longingly.
13. Grow enough tomatoes to supply said absolutely massive batch of soup.
14. Stick with exercise routine that involves flexibility.
15. Write what wants to be written.
16. Be less afraid.
17. Forgive yourself when you fail. Even at New Year's resolutions.
There we are.
December 28, 2010
Goodbye, 2010
Downtown Red Wing in the morning, just before Christmas.
It was a quick, blurry, sugary holiday, and I ended up wishing, as usual, that I could slow it all down and savor it more, even as it was happening. There are now many lovely presents to be enjoyed, including the spanking new laptop on which I am typing (thanks, family!), many, many books, and these absolutely amazing Horatio, Leopold, and Harvey ornaments made by my brother's absolutely amazing girlfriend:
2010 has been that sort of year all around - quick, blurry, sugary, and unreasonably wonderful. It saw two book birthdays: Cherma, my poetry series, was released by Parallel Press in March, and The Books of Elsewhere, Volume One: The Shadows was sliced out of big cardboard boxes and arranged on bookstore shelves all over the country in June. Throw in quite a bit of travel, lots of school visits and dinners and readings, and our first full cycle of seasons in Red Wing, and it almost seems impossible that so much was squeezed into one year. But it was.
Here are two things that made me smile: A review of The Shadows in the San Francisco Book Review (www.sanfranciscobookreview.com/tweens/the-shadows-the-books-of-elsewhere-volume-1/) and a librarian's top five list of 2010 kidspot.wordpress.com/2010/12/22/my-top-5-of-2010/.
December 19, 2010
It's Fruitcake Weather.
Jacqueline = 1. First draft of The Books of Elsewhere, Volume Three = 0. Whew.
For the first time in a very long time, I have a poetry announcement: The fall/winter issue of Paper Crow recently arrived in my mailbox, and you can make it arrive in yours, as well (www.elektrikmilkbathpress.com/paper_crow). Poetry by Marge Simon, Bruce Boston, Jamie Lee Moyer, and many others (...including me) can be found within.
And for all you children's/middle grade/YA aficionados, Young Adult Books Central's 2010 Reader's Choice Nominations are closing today. 2010 turned out to be a massive year for debut YA/MG authors, including my fellow Upstart Crows Matt Myklusch of Jack Blank and the Imagine Nation and Shaun David Hutchinson of The Deathday Letter (...and me). If you're so inclined, show your support with a nomination at yabookscentral.blogspot.com/2010/12/2010-yabc-readers-choice-nominations.htm , or come back when voting begins on the 20th.
This afternoon, I had my first piece of official 2010 Christmas fruitcake, made by my grandmother and chock full of big, squishy dates and fresh Brazil nuts. Let the seasonal gorging begin.
For the first time in a very long time, I have a poetry announcement: The fall/winter issue of Paper Crow recently arrived in my mailbox, and you can make it arrive in yours, as well (www.elektrikmilkbathpress.com/paper_crow). Poetry by Marge Simon, Bruce Boston, Jamie Lee Moyer, and many others (...including me) can be found within.
And for all you children's/middle grade/YA aficionados, Young Adult Books Central's 2010 Reader's Choice Nominations are closing today. 2010 turned out to be a massive year for debut YA/MG authors, including my fellow Upstart Crows Matt Myklusch of Jack Blank and the Imagine Nation and Shaun David Hutchinson of The Deathday Letter (...and me). If you're so inclined, show your support with a nomination at yabookscentral.blogspot.com/2010/12/2010-yabc-readers-choice-nominations.htm , or come back when voting begins on the 20th.
This afternoon, I had my first piece of official 2010 Christmas fruitcake, made by my grandmother and chock full of big, squishy dates and fresh Brazil nuts. Let the seasonal gorging begin.
December 2, 2010
Attention all German speakers...
Great news! Olive und das Haus des Schatten, the German version of The Shadows, has made the shortlist for Der Leserpreis - die besten Buecher 2010, the German-language readers' choice awards! Voting is open to the public, and you can vote for the book here: www.lovelybooks.de/leserpreis/2010. (Be aware: the German cover is different from the American version, but still extremely cool.) If you know enough German to enter your name and email address, you're all set! Danke schon, alle!
