I read an article in this Sunday’s NY Times about a glitch at Vassar’s admissions website. Here’s the LINK if you’d like to read it yourself. Apparently, acceptance notices were posted online. Students could visit the website to find out if they had been admitted. Back in my day they sent you a letter. You [...]
I’ve noticed a funny thing about writing over the years. When you’re stuck and find yourself with no idea of what you’re writing or what you’re supposed to be doing, you can always find dozens of excuses for not writing anything. You have to go shopping; you have to run a wash; you have to [...]
An Imaginary Conversation: Author: Let’s read! Books are wonderful. Read together with your family every evening! Child: My parents don’t read. We don’t have any books in our house. Author: That’s no problem. Your school library has plenty of good books that you can check out and read. Your school librarian will be happy to [...]
Picture Book Month begins tomorrow. I’ve been asked to start the celebration with a few words about why picture books are important to me. It was quite an honor to be asked and quite an opportunity as well to state why I believe picture books are so important. I learned to love books because of [...]
I have to confess to a guilty pleasure. I love reading biographies and autobiographies of rock stars. I think it’s because I lead such a normal, controlled life. I experience such vicarious pleasure reading about people who go totally berserk. Yes, they crash and burn in the end. But what a ride! Right now I’m [...]
Good heavens! I just realized it’s been ages since I’ve posted anything on my blog. No excuses. Blame it on the last days of summer. It got started late here in Oregon. We didn’t have good weather until August. When the weather is good, you want to be outside in the sunshine because you know [...]
One of the most exciting parts about being an author is that your life is full of surprises. Your words have wings. You never really know where your books are going, who is reading them, and whose lives they are changing. In 1978 I published a picture book with Pantheon called Why Worry? It was [...]
Is there anyone who didn’t read William Golding’s Lord of the Flies when we were in junior high school? Golding’s bleak view of human nature left me depressed for a week–which isn’t hard to do when you’re in junior high school. Well, here’s something to cheer you up. There is hope for us yet. Perhaps, [...]
A librarian friend of mine asked me to write a letter of support for the librarians in her distract. The district has been considering eliminating elementary and middle school library positions. This has been happening all over the country. In some cases, the librarians are replaced with interns or teachers working toward a library certification. [...]
I was rereading my post about writing to authors when a thought occurred to me. Writing a letter to your favorite author? How 20th century! I’ve always believed that schools are 19th century institutions that never got around to dealing with the 20th century. Now they’re in the 21st! Most of the letters I get [...]
