Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day — Review

Thought for the Day:

“The whole culture is telling you to hurry, while the art tells you to take your time. Always listen to the art.”
~ Junot Diaz ~

Gifts for My Writer Friends:

I think we can all learn some things from the greats and their thoughts on writing. HERE is an article with 20 Pieces of Writing Advice from William Faulkner.

If you are interested in submitting directly to publishers, Stephanie Bearce has a GREAT post HERE on Nonfiction Ninjas with links to a long list of children’s publishers that are open to unagented submissions.

James Scott Bell wrote a good article for Writer’s Digest HERE that will give you 5 Easy Tips to Strengthen Your Scenes.

It has been a quiet week for me. I have finished all my shopping and wrapping and decorating (Okay, all I do is dust off a small ceramic Christmas tree and plug it in, but it’s something.) and planning meals. My daughter Maggie is arriving tonight from New York and will strip down in the garage (with the door closed, I hope) and shower before giving me a long-awaited hug. My grandson Gehrig arrives from Minnesota on Thursday, and I can’t wait to see him. My daughter Sara will kick off our celebrations this week with her Christmas Eve birthday (she may never forgive me for that). Then we will have a quiet Christmas day together. Well, not too quiet. There will be presents and games and plenty of food. My goal is to not gain weight this holiday season. I know. That is a lofty goal, but I am hopeful. I hope all of you have very happy holidays and a happy new year. This will be my last post until next year.

I am an unabashed logophile. I have always loved words. I loved studying Greek and Roman root words, suffixes, and prefixes and putting them together. I loved vocabulary and spelling tests in school. I probably have more than a half dozen thesauruses. I love trying to find exactly the right word for what I want to say. When I ran across Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day for kids on the review list for the Portland Book Review, I had to have it. I am actually having a giveaway of sorts for this book. I think a middle school teacher would love to have this book in their classroom, so I have decided to make it a host gift for Greg Pattridge, a middle school teacher and our host for MMGM every week. He does a lot of work each week to help all of us have success with our blogs, so this is just a little show of appreciation. Thanks, Greg, and happy holidays. I will get the book in the mail soon. Here is the review I wrote for PBR.

If you are looking for the perfect gift for a young logophile or a youngster trying to expand his or her vocabulary, this is the book for which you have been searching. This fun little book is designed to encourage young readers to read something every day, with a different word for each day of the year (including February 29 in case it is a leap year).

Each page features a fun word, the pronunciation, the definition, and a paragraph that tells an interesting little tale starring the word. Most words have a page all to themselves with a fun illustration on a colored background. Sometimes a group of related words shares a spread such as robotic words, wild weather words, or baby animal words.

At the end of each month, readers will find the Story of the Month, which uses all the words included in that month in a fun little story perfect for the middle-grade audience this book targets. Each Story of the Month has a QR code that will allow the reader to have the story read to them. The writing is lively and youngsters (and even older logophiles) will enjoy learning these words.

Don’t forget to check for other Marvelous Middle-Grade Monday posts at Greg Pattridge’s blog HERE. He always has links to several middle-grade reviews, and he writes reviews on his own blog two or three times a week. See you here soon!