Thought for the Day:
“Always dream and shoot higher than you know you can do. Don’t bother just to be better than your contemporaries or predecessors. Try to be better than yourself.”
~ William Faulkner ~
Gifts for My Writer Friends:
As I’ve mentioned here, I am working hard at trying to cut words from my too-long MG novel. When I ran across the great post HERE from Erin Entrada Kelly about How to Pass the Time in Fiction, I knew it would help me. I wasn’t wrong. I really love her examples.
Sarah Branson has a good article in Writer’s Digest HERE with 7 Common Character Arc Problems and How to Fix Them.
Janice Hardy has a great little Narrative Nugget HERE that will help you throw more obstacles in front of your characters without much work.
For those of you who read my blog regularly, you may recall that I am on a quest to see a game in every major league ballpark. I have eight parks left that I haven’t visited. I have been in the throes of planning all week. The season will start in April, and I plan to hit the road early to get the Southeastern parks out of the way before it gets hot and muggy. I’ll be flying to Miami on April 8 and will begin my journey there. The travels of the teams make it hard to plan a trip where I can see games in all the parks I have left. Last summer, I spent a lot of time in the Midwest, and try as I might, I couldn’t get to Cincinnati when the team was in town. On this trip, I’m hoping to see the Miami Marlins, the Tampa Bay Rays, the Atlanta Braves, the Washington Nationals, the Cleveland Guardians, the Toronto Blue Jays, and, finally, the Cincinnati Reds. If all goes according to plan, the real gem of the trip will be my time in Washington D.C. My beloved San Francisco Giants will have a three-game stand while I’m there. My daughter Sara is going to fly out to join me, and my daughter Maggie might be able to come from New York and join us. She will be workshopping a new musical, and the dates aren’t set yet, so fingers crossed it works out. I will be able to visit some friends along the way. It’s a lot of driving, but if I manage all that, I will only have one park left to visit — San Diego. I have lived in California for fifty years, so how is it that I never got to a game in San Diego? It’s a little crazy, but I am determined to do it this year. Wish me luck!
I was a little surprised last week to see that some are not familiar with middle-grade picture books. I saw a post somewhere this week that talked about publishers looking for picture books for high schoolers and adults! I had never heard of that before, but it might be interesting to see what’s out there in those categories. But I was looking through some of the MG picture books I’ve kept, and found a wonderful one for which I never shared my review. It is ATLAS OF PREHISTORIC ANIMALS by Radek Maly and illustrated (beautifully) by Petr Modlitba. It is oversized at 13.1 inches by 9.2 inches, which allows for wonderfully detailed illustrations. Here is the review I wrote for the Los Angeles Book Review.
Books about dinosaurs are ubiquitous, and young readers love them, but there were many more creatures in prehistoric times than the dinosaurs, and this book is a wonderful introduction to many of those, while including a few dinosaurs.
It opens with a timeline showing the Paleozoic, Mesozoic, and Cenozoic eras and the periods within those. The table of contents reflects those three eras. Following an introduction by a paleontologist are forty spreads showing creatures found during the different periods. Young readers will be fascinated by such creatures as the Archelon, similar to a sea turtle but fifteen feet long and sixteen feet wide, and the tiny dinosaur called Oculudentavis that was only about four inches long. Then there is the Entelodon that looked like a giant (up to a ton) pig!
Each spread has a full-page color illustration of the animals facing a page with a half page of black-and-white drawings of the creatures with their scientific names, period, and some measurements. A half page of text follows. It is written in a conversational tone and, while it doesn’t shy away from challenging scientific language, it is appropriate for young readers. Youngsters will read this one over and over.
Please don’t forget to check for other Marvelous Middle-Grade Monday posts at Greg Pattridge’s blog HERE.
Rosi Hollinbeck 