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Introducing…

By on November 1, 2014   /   Book Lists  

We’ve added new members to our blog! Please join us in welcoming the following new Mixed-Up Authors:

Julie Artz
Dori Hillestad Butler
Dorian Cirrone
Barbara Dee
Laurie J. Edwards
Louise Galveston
Mike Hays
Michelle Houts
Katharine Manning
Stacy Mozer
Andrea Pyros
Joanne Rocklin
Valerie Stein

We are so excited about the talent and enthusiasm these new people bring to From the Mixed-Up Files. You’ll be seeing blog posts from them in the next month or so, but until then, please check out their bios in our About Us section.

Welcome aboard, new blog members!

Also a public thank you to members who have left our blog for other adventures. You’ve each brought something special to From the Mixed-Up Files, and you will be dearly missed.  We wish you all the best of luck.

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Indie Spotlight: Quail Ridge Books & Music, Raleigh NC

By on October 31, 2014   /   Book Lists, Indie Spotlight  

Quail Ridge logoQuail Ridge Books & Music of Raleigh, North Carolina, now in its 30th year, has received, among other awards, the Publishers’ Weekly Bookseller of the Year Award and the Pannell Award for Excellence in Children’s Bookselling. We’re speaking today with Carol Moyer, Children’s Department Manager at Quail Ridge(www.quailridgebooks.com)Quail Ridge front

MUF: Please spell out for our readers what being an independent shop allows you to do at Quail Ridge Books?
Carol: Being independent means that we hand-select the inventory in the store, an inventory of the best books that is broad and diverse. We can decide what to display, how and where to display it. We decide which titles to promote in newsletters and other advertising. We decide which authors to invite for a program.

MUF: Customer reviews praise Quail Ridge Books as a place where booksellers lead you to the perfect books and can make you a book-source hero in a child’s eyes.   How do you do that?
Carol: The children’s staff stays up to date with children’s books and can recommend titles for all ages. We get to know our customers and their interests, and we help them find books for each occasion. Knowing books and knowing customers is the key.

Quail Ridge Book CakeMUF: I notice your shop extends this to personal shopping service online. How do you choose the books you carry in your shop?
Carol: We order inventory after reviewing pre-publication copies and other materials from publishers. We read reviews all the time and look for more books by our favorite authors.

MUF: Many independent bookstores combine books with or cards and gifts, but not so many with music. Tell us how combination of books and music works with your community of customers.
Carol: Our former owner added a classical music CD department to enhance the bookstore. Great music and great books make a winning combination.

Quail Ridge Jacqueline Woodson

Jacqueline Woodson

MUF: So many events every month at your store, some with signing line tickets!   What’s coming up that might especially interest middle-graders?Quail Ridge Brown Girl DreamingQuail Ridge Revolution
Carol: This month we’ve had Tommy Greenwald who writes the Charlie Joe Jackson series and Jacqueline Woodson with her brilliant new memoir Brown Girl Dreaming. Coming up Nov 5 is Deborah Wiles with her fascinating novel of the 60’s, Revolution.

MUF: You have some fun-sounding book clubs for our age group— First in Series and Middle School Girls Book Club. What have they been reading?
Quail Ridge Charly Joe JacksonCarol: First in the Series Book Club have been reading Tommy Greenwald’s book Charlie Joe Jackson’s Guide to Making Money Deborah Wiles’s first book of the 60’s series, Countdown. The club meets before the author event and then stays to meet the author and hear the program.Quail Ridge Countdown
Middle School Girls Book Club read Brown Girl Dreaming and stayed for the program.

MUF: As middle-grade authors, we have to ask: what are some titles new and old, fiction and non-fiction, that you are especially recommending to middle-grade readers at the moment?  Also tell us about Wake County’s Battle of the Books.
Carol: North Carolina School Library Media Association selects titles for the Battle of the Books list each year. Quail Ridge crowdThis is a middle school reading incentive program that has been very successful over the years. The list includes are range of reading levels and interests, but all of the books have been well reviewed and are on recommended lists.   We are certainly recommending books by authors coming to the store, and then we all have personal favorites.

Quail Ridge-SkinkQuail Ridge BrotherbandQuail Ridge Gooseberry ParkWe like Skink No Surrender by Carl Hiaasen, Gooseberry Park by Cynthia Rylant, Wonder by R. J. Palacio, Paperboy by Vince Vawter, World According to Humphrey by Betty G. Birney, Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart, Brotherband Chronicles by Flanagan, Three Times Lucky by Sheila Turnage, and the list goes on and on and on!Quail Ridge World according to Humphrey

MUF: And our readers’ to-read lists just got a little longer!
Carol, if a family visited Quail Ridge Books from out of town, would there be some place nearby where they could get a family-friendly snack or meal after shopping? And if they could stay awhile, are there other special family activities or sites in the area they might enjoy?
Carol: We are located in a shopping center with Whole Foods and a local restaurant, Tripps. Families are welcome at both places. We are between the North Carolina Museum of Art and downtown Raleigh where there are plenty of places to visit.Quail Ridge logo #2

MUF: Thanks so much, Carol, for telling us about Quail Ridge and recommending some good middle-grade titles. Readers, doesn’t this sound like a great shop to visit?

Sue Cowing is the author of the puppet-and-boy novel You Will Call Me Drog (Carolrhoda Books 2011, Usborne UK 2012, HarperCollins UK 2014)

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Deadline Stress

By on October 29, 2014   /   Op-Ed  

The freelance world is feast or famine. No matter how hard I try to space things out, I occasionally run into what I call a harmonic convergence of deadlines.

You know how it is. You book some author events months in advance. You have several ongoing projects and an unpredictable production and marketing schedule for an upcoming book release. You think everything is spaced out so that you can meet all your deadlines. You organize and prioritize using fancy software or color-coded lists on your whiteboard.

640px-February_calendar

Then there are unexpected delays in one project or another. Or there is a glitch that requires additional attention. Then the page proofs arrive when you are deep into another project with a looming deadline. Throw in some family crisis or health issue and you have a disaster in the making.

_hourglass_with_sand (2)For me, deadline stress starts with a dream. I arrive at a test and realize that I have not studied, or even attended any of the classes. As the deadline creeps closer, the stakes in the dream get higher. It’s not just any test; it’s the final. For a class I need to pass to graduate. And I am in my pajamas. Or naked.

Alarm_Clocks_20101107aWhen my deadlines are weeks away, I manage to find time to get to the gym most days. As the weeks pass, the gym becomes a distant memory. I start to count walking to the bathroom as cardio and lifting my coffee cup as a bicep curl.

Posture takes a hit.

Vulture_ (2)

And haircuts, and fashion, and personal hygiene.

As I devote more and more brain cells to writing, with an equal portion to stress, the number of cells devoted to memory falls below a critical level.

First I don’t remember to buy anything at the grocery store if it’s not written down.

Then I forget my grocery list.

Then I forget to go grocery shopping at all.

Some days I forget to eat. Or if it’s not going well, I eat constantly—to keep my strength up. As to feeding the rest of the family, I begin to rely on pizza delivery. Or I delegate.

“What’s for dinner, Mom?”

“There’s a packet of ramen* in the cabinet. Make me a bowl, will you?”

*If the child is less than ten years old, substitute cold cereal.

clock-334117_1280 (2)As much as we hate them, deadlines are our friends. There’s nothing like last-minute panic to boost productivity. And besides, it’s a great excuse.

“You need four dozen cupcakes for the bake sale? Sorry, I’m on a deadline.”

What about you? How do deadlines affect you?

 

Jacqueline Houtman forgot to include this blog post on her to-do list. Bayard Rustin: The Invisible Activist by Jacqueline Houtman, Walter Naegle, and Michael G. Long  (2014 Quaker Press) comes out next month. 

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