Special public-service announcement for new authors

Those of you who are awaiting news of the Best Fiction list and other ALA/YALSA lists might not realize that some of the lists won't be released for a couple days. Things are still being compiled and decided. The first time I was a BBYA nominee, I assumed the information would follow immediately after the Newbery and Caldecott announcements. Nope. It takes time. Needless to say, I squandered a lot of time haunting the web, refreshing the ALA news-release page, waiting for the announcements. So find a productive way to kill time and distract yourself until the news comes out. Writing might do the trick. (Video games work even better, but I have to at least maintain the illusion that reading and writing are superior to all other forms of time killing. So let's just leave that topic for another day.) But, anyhow, back to the main point of this post -- I hope this helps spare some of you from spending too much time waiting for the news. And I hope, when the news comes, it makes your day. (Disclaimer -- it's entirely possible the whole systemn has changed, and the results were actually posted while you were wasting time reading my blog. You'd better go check that ALA site again right away, just in case.)