Shelley Tougas's Blog, page 3

Shelley’s Laura Ingalls mini-tour

My Laura Ingalls project (release date fall 2017) is taking me to her homesites, including last week’s visits to Missouri and Iowa. Look for lots of random Laura posts from me.

First I went to Rocky Ridge Farm in Mansfield, Missouri, where she spent most of her adult life. The farm isn’t included in the Little House series, which ends with the devastating first four years of the Wilders’ marriage. But Rocky Ridge is the museum with all the goodies: Pa’s fiddle, her friends’ yellowed calling cards, the little teapot jewelry box she got for Christmas in Walnut Grove, the first sampler she ever sewed, and much, much, much, much more.

In addition to the museum, you can tour the farmhouse Laura and Almanzo built one room at a time, plus the “Rock House,” which daughter Rose built for her parents so they’d have an easy-to-maintain retirement home. They moved into the cottage while Rose took over the farmhouse. As soon as Rose moved east, however, they moved right back into the farmhouse.

There’s a no-photo policy inside any of the buildings, including the gift shop. That’s right: You can’t take photos of their t-shirts and mugs. All I have are photos outside, including these:

This is the bank in Mansfield where Laura and Almanzo secured a loan to buy the farm. We ate lunch at a Mexican restaurant across the street, which was the only restaurant in the tiny town square.

Here’s the outside of the Rocky Ridge Farmhouse. It hasn’t been changed since Laura’s death. Almanzo’s stash of medications from the late 1940s still sit on the table next to his bed. There’s a jar of Vicks Vapor Rub stored with the glass prescription bottles.

I was joined by my significant other, who graciously indulged my Laura time and listened to me talk about the books for hours on end. We’re standing in front of the Rock House that Rose built. She ordered the plans from a Sears catalogue.

This is a little disgusting: Almanzo, like many farmers, built a small shed by the spring. Because the water was cold, it kept the spring house, as it was called, cool enough to store milk and butter. Sorry, but I need assurance that my dairy products are stored at a consistent temperature of 35 degrees.

St. Peter Reads and Michael Perry

I suppose it’s bad marketing strategy to plug someone else at an event in which you’re a presence, but here goes:

Author Michael Perry is the keynote at St. Peter Reads this Saturday (May 16 in St. Peter, Minn.), and you shouldn’t miss him. He’s as funny in person and he is on paper. Check out his web site here. After he speaks, there’s a brunch in which authors circulate among the tables. I’m among that group of authors.

(For more information and tickets for St. Peter Reads, go here.)

The others include:

Rachael Hanel. Full disclosure: She’s been a friend for more than 20 years. I also happen to adore her writing. Her memoir, We’ll Be the Last Ones to Let You Down, will knock your socks off. Her web site is here. She’s been critiquing my writing in one way or another since the mid-1990s when we worked together at the Free Press in Mankato. As a copyeditor, she once spared me the embarrassment of misspelling my own name.

Allen Eskens. I didn’t know Allen when I lived in Mankato. He’s an attorney there. I met him at a Twin Cities book conference and fell in love with his debut mystery novel The Life We Bury. Check him out here.

Geoff Herbach. Geoff was a new professor when I started (but never finished – sigh) the MFA program at Minnesota State University, Mankato. He’s a YA rock star and an incredibly nice guy. Learn more about him here.

Other authors include Jan Holte, Roger McKnight, Charles Quimby, Dale Redlin, James Rogers, Curt Stolee, Sarah Stonich, and Laurie Wetzel.

Maybe we’ll see you there!

The book club

My neighborhood has its own Facebook group, which is super handy when you’re looking for a sitter or recommendations for a plumber. Recently someone posted this question: Who’s up for a neighborhood book club?

Me me me! I gave it a big neighborly thumbs up.

Then came the next question: What would you like to read?

Here’s my novelist anxiety: internal pressure to suggest Very Important Books. Faust. Anna Karenina. Wuthering Heights. You are what you eat, and you are what you read. Will eyebrows raise if I admit I’d rather read The Girl on the Train?

And then there’s the book club itself. What if I miss allegories or metaphors? I surely can’t say something like, “I liked that chapter because it was good.” After two glasses of wine, anything goes. It’s possible I might use the word “goodly.” Who knows?

Honestly, most of my neighbors probably don’t even know I write books. There’s no sign in the yard. I haven’t handed out Graham Cracker Plot bookmarks. I’m not that neighbor who hangs out in my yard, chatting with the dog-walkers. I like my air-con.

So, the book club. I’ll just try to enjoy it.

By the way, here’s my wish list of summer reads (adult-style). Notice I’m putting it here, on my blog, and not on the book club page. Baby steps.

The Girl on the Train

Orphan Train

The Goldfinch

We Were Liars

Wild

The most recent The Best American Nonrequired Reading

Finders Keepers

My second novel, Finders Keepers, has an amazing cover. I’m thrilled to show it off here. The release date is Sept. 1, which happens to be the release date for the paperback edition of The Graham Cracker Plot.

Here and there

Friends!

Two appearances I want to tell you about:

I’m going to be at the Spring Valley Library Book Club on May 2. We’re reading The Graham Cracker Plot. If you want to participate, contact the Spring Valley (Wisconsin) library at 715-778-4590.

I’m part of the Author Brunch at the annual St. Peter Reads event in St. Peter, Minn. There will be a group of about a dozen authors circulating among the brunch tables, including Rachael Hanel, Allen Eskens, Geoff Herbach, Jan Holte, Roger McKnight, Charlie Quimby, Dale Redlin, Jim Rogers, Curt Stolee, Sarah Stonich, and Laurie Wetzel. The event features author Michael Perry, who’s one of the funniest writers I’ve ever read. St. Peter Reads is Saturday, May 16. Learn more at the event’s Facebook page.

Happy read and happy spring!

An Open Letter to Stampy

Dear Stampy (aka Stampylongnose aka Stampycat),

First, let me congratulate you on your success as a Minecraft YouTube star. I suspect you’re among the first YouTubers who managed to build a following of millions by simply recording yourself playing Minecraft.

Now that the pleasantries are out of the way, I demand the return of my daughter.

I know you’ve arrived at our house when I hear your high-pitched British accent announcing yourself. Hellooo. This is Stampy and welcome to another video of Stampy’s lovely world!

An Internet search tells me you’re making a full-time living as a top-ten YouTube Star. Now that you’ve passed Katy Perry and Justin Bieber in YouTube popularity, you’ve been able to move out of your family’s basement and build a Minecraft Commentary Empire. Good for you.

Bad for me.

My daughter used to disappear into her playroom with her dollhouse, Barbies, and American Girl Dolls. On summer days, she’d go to the park. Her electronic time consisted of binge-watching “Good Luck Charlie.”

Now she’s a Stampy addict who sneaks the iPad into the bathroom and props it next to the tub for her bath. I can hear the splashing and your comments about “googlies,” which I suspect have nothing to do with Google.

For Mother’s Day, she went to a pottery studio and made me a mug. A Stampy mug. She has a Stampy shirt, which she bought with her own money. She quizzes me endlessly on Stampy trivia. She regularly submits entries to your contests, including writing and recording her vision for a Stampy theme song.

I’ve always understood and respected her call for “one more minute.” We all need a minute to pause a video and collect ourselves before heading out the door. But when she’s watching your video, she doesn’t mean one or five more minutes. She means forty.

All this has led to limits I never thought I’d need to impose on my kid, who’s biggest rule violation has been reading past bedtime.

You’re no longer allowed in our house during sick days because she was developing too many mysterious ailments. You can’t visit during dinner. You can’t show up for viola practice–she thought she could watch your videos while squeaking through “Mary had a Little Lamb.” You can’t hang out with her for hours during the weekend. You see, the only voice she should hear more often than mine is her teacher’s.

I’m supposed to be happy that you’re family friendly and that Mindcraft is creative and, wow, you’re not associated with games that involve shooting prostitutes from a racecar. You respect your young audience. Thanks for that.

Still, you’ve overstayed your welcome. You know what they say about visitors? Guests, like fish, begin to smell after three days.

No offense, Stampy, but you reek.

Most sincerely,

Shelley Tougas

All I Want for Christmas is on this List

When I thought about writing a post of cool gifts for writers, I figured the list would be short: journals, cool pens and books about writing (Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird, of course). Then I started looking around and found online treasure. No offense, Anne, but Santa’s got options.

Among them:

1.  Think of this light-up pen as a gift for your significant other since it’ll stop you from turning on the bedside lamp to record nighttime ideas.

2. Some hygiene fun because, yes, some writers shower every single day.

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3. Old meets new: the tablet-typewriter. Practical? No. But it’s so cool.

4. Nobody steals from a vampire purse.

6. If this doesn’t inspire productivity, you can beat yourself over the head with it.

7. Scent of a (writing) woman.

8. The writer’s tissue box cozy.

9. Words don’t do this justice.

10. Duh:

What are little boys (books) made of?

I had an interesting discussion with some writer friends about kids and books and gender. People in the book world will tell you girls typically read books for/about girls in addition to books for/about boys. Our sons, however, will only read books aimed at boys. They simply won’t pick books with female protagonists and even avoid books by female authors. That’s why the Harry Potter series wasn’t written by Joanne Rowling.

My friends and I wondered if we’ve created a self-fulfilling prophecy — we being parents. Are boys truly wired to avoid “girl” books? Or do parents subconsciously plant those wires?

I think it works like this: Parents assume their little toddler sons will most enjoy Bob the Builder and books about cars and space. That’s what they buy and read. Why bother with The Paper Bag Princess or Shelia Rae, The Brave? Or, as they get older, stories about Junie B. Jones, Ramona Quimby, Laura Ingalls or the Gaither sisters?

After all, we know girls typically read books for/about girls in addition to books for/about boys. Our sons, however, will only read books aimed at boys.

I specifically read The Paper Bag Princess to my daughter so she’d fall in love with a story about a girl saving a prince. I wanted her to wonder why Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty sat around singing about princes rescuing them from dire circumstances.

I don’t have a son. It’s unfair to suggest I would’ve bought all the “right” books. Maybe my bookshelf would be filled with books about cars and sharks and characters named Billy and Tom and Charlie.

There’s a clear expectation that girls will consistently engage in the experience of boys via books, television and movies. Frankly, they can’t participate in our male-dominated culture if they don’t.

On the surface it sounds like I’m talking about girl power, but it’s actually boys who are shortchanged. They’re missing the stories and perspective of a big part of our world – half, to be exact.

Consider this food for thought as we head into Thanksgiving and, perhaps, a conversation that may change the way you shop for the boys in your life this Christmas.

I wanna be a middle-grade ninja, too!

I had the opportunity to write a guest post on Middle Grade Ninja, a great industry blog I follow. Check it out here. I wrote about the nonfiction market as a path to publishing novels. There’s more than one way in the door. 

The Ninja is Robert Kent, author of All Together Now: A Zombie Story and the forthcoming Banneker Bones and the Giant Robot Bees (coming this fall).

His blog has reviews, interviews and posts about the writing life. It’s my blog role model. It’s what my blog wants to be when it grows up. Maybe he gives lessons.

Meanwhile, enjoy.

Tomorrow I’ll be posting about my publication countdown for The Graham Cracker Plot. The release is Sept. 2 and I’ve got a long to-do list–including posting about my to-do list.

 

Hello, world!

In one week, The Graham Cracker Plot is officially in stores. That’s Tuesday, Sept. 2.

I’m having a launch party at The Red Balloon in St. Paul at 2 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 6. There will be books, cake and many of my amazing family members and friends. They’re the real stars of the party. They’re the people who supported my writing for so many years.

My hometown celebration is 2 p.m. Sept. 20 at Chapter2 Books in Hudson, Wisc. My friend and fellow Macmillan author S.A. Bodeen – that’s Stephanie, by the way — will join me for a joint event at our local indie bookstore.

Stephanie already has an impressive history in YA. In July, she released her first middle-grade novel, Shipwreck Island. So there you have it – shipwrecks and graham crackers.

Hope to see you at one or both.