Author Interviews

Interview with Author Mike Lowery — and a Giveway of a set of Doodle Adventure Books!

By on June 12, 2017   /   Author Interviews, Book Lists, Fiction, For Kids, For Librarians, For Parents, For Teachers, New Releases  

I’m so excited to welcome the awesome Mike Lowery to the MUF blog today!

He is celebrating the release of his new book:

The Rise of the Rusty Robo-Cat! by Workman Publishing.

A little bit about the book: Carl the Duck is back and needs help on the very important mission of discovering why the cats around town are acting like jerks. Can you track them down and break the spell they are under? (And maybe draw a space vampire along the way?)    Each page combines hand-lettered text, delightful illustrations, plus prompts and plenty of space for the reader’s own contributions. The book is sturdy paper over board with high-quality cream paper that’s a pleasure to draw on. Kids will love using their imaginations to complete the story, then reading it over and over again.

“Perfect for a summer birthday gift, a travel distraction, or for gathering out on the porch and enjoying a warm evening together.” — Geek Dad

Thanks for joining us today, Mike! Here are a few questions for you

Why do you write graphic novels/illustrated stories for middle grade readers?

I really got into comics and reading when I was around 9.  Later, when I was given the chance to pitch my own ideas for books, I tried to make something that 9-14 year old me would’ve loved.  Also, I like making jokes about pizza and pirates and slugs and silly stuff.

What comes first—the art idea or the book idea? 

All of my projects are usually based on something that I came up with in my sketchbook, so I guess I’d say art idea comes first.

You seem to love random facts—why is that? Why do you think these appeal to kids? 

We used to take a LOT of road trips when I was a kid.  My dad would get audio books on tape, and we’d listen to lots of stand up comedy…and sometimes we would listen to non-fiction interesting facts books.    You could say I started collecting weird facts at a very young age, and never really stopped.  So, it made sense years later to start drawing some of the stuff that I found particularly interesting.

How long does it take you to do the illustrations for a book?

It really depends on the book.  For some stuff it might be just a few months, but the random facts book that I’m working on has taken almost two years!

Where do you come up with your wacky and fun characters? 

Every morning,  before I start drawing for projects that I’m working on, I spend some time just making doodles and sketches in my sketchbook.  Sometimes these doodles turn into funny looking characters and I develop them to have personalities that might be funny in a book.

Why did you decide to invite kids to write in your book?

Again, I wanted something that I would’ve liked as a kid.  I loved drawing, but I didn’t always know what to draw.  I wanted a book for kids that needed a little push to help with drawing, and I’ve gotten to see some really crazy and awesome ideas from the folks who have been filling out the books.

Do you have a  favorite of all of your books?

That’s tough.  I’ll say I’ve had a lot of fun drawing the Doodle Adventures series because I get to draw a grumpy duck named Carl.

Can you give us a hint about the next book you are working on?

Yes!  But just a little hint.  One book is a collection of drawings of random facts, one is about an evil character (who turns out to be not-so-evil).

That sounds really cool! Thanks for being with us today, Mike.

If you want to learn more, please check out this information :

Mike Lowery is the creator of the Doodle Adventures series and The Kid’s Awesome Activity Calendar. He lives with his wife and daughter in Atlanta, GA. Mike shares daily sketches on Instagram @mikelowerystudio. Find out more about him and his work at www.mikelowery.com.

Workman Publishing is offering a FREE SET of Doodle Adventure Series books!

Just leave a comment below to be entered.

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7 Free Books to Celebrate 7 Years – Happy MUFiversary!

By on June 7, 2017   /   Author Interviews, Giveaways  

WARNING: This post is going to contain a lot of 7s, which have been underlined for your convenience. Keep in mind that 7 is a lucky number. If you don’t believe me, here’s the evidence:

This post includes free books for 7 lucky winners.

See. I told you 7 was a lucky number.

Anyway, if you haven’t glanced at your calendar today, please note that it’s June 7th, 2017. That happens to be exactly 7 years after MUF’s very first blog post blasted its way across the internet. Clearly, this is cause for celebration!

After 7 seconds of exhaustive research (I asked both of my dogs), I determined that this is the only 7th MUFiversary ever celebrated in the combined history of Earth and the other 7 planets in our solar system. I had to make it memorable. Epic even.

But how exactly does a guy go about epically celebrating a 7th MUFiversary?

I begged people for stuff.

The results of my begging now become your reward as MUF turns the entire month of June into an extended 7th MUFiversary Giveaway Party. For the next four weeks, MUF will hold a major weekly giveaway of free middle-grade books. And today we’re going to kick things off by taking SIGNED books from 7 different middle-grade authors and giving you a chance to be 1 of 7 lucky winners.

Here are the 7 giveaways for this week, along with a bit of 1-question-each (7 total!) Q&A fun with the 7 authors.

The Secret Destiny of Pixie Piper by Annabelle Fisher1)      Let’s start with double-the-fun thanks to TWO books by MUF’s Annabelle Fisher (www.annabellefisher.com): THE SECRET DESTINY OF PIXIE PIPER and its brand-new sequel PIXIE PIPER AND THE MATTER OF THE BATTER. (Yep. One of the 7 lucky winners will get signed copies of both books!) Poetry whiz kid, Pixie discovers she’s a descendant of Mother Goose and that her rhymes have special powers. But to join the Goose Family and protect their legacy, she must be “braver than brave” and “truer than true”!

Question: What animal did you most enjoy writing about in a book and why?

Annabelle: Writing about Pixie’s goose, Destiny, was a lot of fun. Since Destiny first appears as an egg that Pixie finds in the woods, I got to go through the process of hatching a gosling in a homemade incubator, along with my character. I did a lot of research about pet geese and their humans. They have lots of personality! Pixie and her gosling have an amazing bond. It made me want to get a pet goose!

My Year of Epic Rock by Andrea Pyros2)      Another MUF author, Andrea Pyros (www.instagram.com/drelet), is giving away MY YEAR OF EPIC ROCK, which—due to its title—absolutely had to be a part of our epic MUFiversary. When Nina’s BFF dumps her for a cooler new girl, Nina’s got to find a new crew. With the help of the other allergy kids at the peanut-free table, Nina might not just survive seventh grade, but figure out how to rock it!

Question: What’s the BEST writing advice you’ve ever received?

Andrea: For me, the best writing advice was to read as much as possible. I know it’s nothing earth-shattering, but when we’re all so busy, and there are so many things to grab our attention (ahem, cough, cough, Facebook, I’m looking at you), sitting down with a book in the genre you want to write in can be an amazing learning experience—and a great motivator!

3)      MUF’s Jennifer Swanson (www.JenniferSwansonBooks.com) has us covered with some nonfiction: ZOOLOGY: COOL WOMEN WHO WORK WITH ANIMALS. Love to work with animals? Zoology: Cool Women Who Work With Animals introduces readers to three women in the field of zoology who are making an impact and inspiring the next generation of zoologists.

Question: What is the strangest fact you’ve learned while researching your nonfiction book?

Jennifer: The most interesting fact I learned in researching this book is that the very first female zoologist was Pythias of Assos, who was the wife of Aristotle. She helped him to create his encyclopedia of animals.

Greetings from Witness Protection by Jake Burt4)      Jake Burt (www.JBurtBooks.com) has a debut middle-grade novel I’ve already added to my own Goodreads to-read list: GREETINGS FROM WITNESS PROTECTION. Nicki Demere, an orphan and pickpocket, is recruited by the Witness Protection program to join a family on the run from the nation’s most dangerous criminals.

Question: How do you select the names of your characters?

Jake: I’m a fan of names with hidden meanings, so I name my characters with little Easter eggs that reveal or complicate their personalities. For example, the main character of Greetings is Nicki Demere. She’s a first-rate pickpocket, and “to nick” something is slang for stealing. “Demere” is a play off the Latin verb meaning “to subtract” or “to disappear.” Nicki was doubly fun to name because I got to do it twice; when she enters Witness Protection, she gets to pick her own new name. . . .

The Someday Birds by Sally J. Pla5)      Sally J. Pla (www.sallyjpla.com) offers us THE SOMEDAY BIRDS, a copy of which happens to be sitting on my nightstand at this very moment. Charlie, a 12-yr-old bird-loving boy who hates change, takes us along on a raw, funny, poignant cross-country journey to see his injured father—and to find a mysterious bird guru.

Question: How are you like your main character?

Sally: I am also autistic, although if you met me, you might not guess it. I have grown out of a lot of my challenges. I have a much easier time of things than Charlie does in the book. When I was a kid, however, I felt many of the feelings Charlie feels while dealing with the world.

The Unlikely Story of a Pig in the City by Jodi Kendall6)      Jodi Kendall (www.jodikendall.com) is giving away a signed ARC of THE UNLIKELY STORY OF A PIG IN THE CITY plus some bonus swag to brighten someone’s day. 11-year-old Josie makes it her mission to save the piglet named Hamlet that her brother brings home from college, as she and Hamlet each struggle to find their place in a crowded, chaotic family.

Question: What’s one event from your life that you’ve never worked into a story but you’d like to?

Jodi: Once, on a wildlife expedition for work, I tracked wild elephants through the rainforest in Malaysia. I’d love to write more about my past animal adventures in future books!

Mrs. Smith's Spy School for Girls by Beth McMullen7)      We’ll cap off this week’s giveaways with yet another MUF-member contribution, this time courtesy of Beth McMullen (www.bethmcmullenbooks.com). Some lucky soul is going to receive a signed ARC of Beth’s debut novel, MRS. SMITH’S SPY SCHOOL FOR GIRLS. Abby Hunter arrives at boarding school just to discover it’s a secret training facility for kid spies. And now that her mother has gone missing, they want to use her as bait.

Question: What is the weirdest place you’ve had a good idea for a book?

Beth: On the checkout line at Target. I had to excuse myself so I could write the idea down before it disappeared out of my head forever. The young woman behind the counter thought I was insane. And probably she was right.

Want to be one of the 7 lucky winners? There are 7 different ways to earn entries! You can leave a comment below, follow MUF on Twitter, share about the giveaway on FB, and more. Give yourself loads of opportunities to win by earning all 7 different types of entries. The giveaway closes at midnight (ET) on Monday, June 12th. Be sure to check back on Thursday, June 15th, for our next MUFiversary giveaway! (Eligible only to U.S. addresses.)

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Interview with Debut Author Leah Henderson

By on June 6, 2017   /   Author Interviews  

Today, I’m thrilled to talk to author Leah Henderson about her debut (which released today!), One Shadow on the Wall, a story inspired by a young boy she saw sitting on a beach wall while traveling in Senegal.

JA: Welcome to From the Mixed-Up Files and congratulations on your debut! I love success stories, so tell us yours. What did your journey to publication look like?

LH: My greatest success with this book isn’t just getting it published, but finally getting out of its way and letting it tell its story. A story which in every way found me—not the other way around.

After I saw that boy sitting on the wall for the briefest of seconds and jotted down what I thought his day might be like, I was shocked when my professor thought my scribblings were the beginning of a novel. I was so worried about telling this story about a boy and a place I did not know well that I was finding every excuse I could not to work on it. Don’t get me wrong, it was a story that was important to tell, but I did not want to mess up. I just knew it wasn’t my story to tell and told my professor exactly that. But what I was forgetting, and what my dad later reminded me of was that I was standing in the way of kids whose life experience was similar to that of Mor’s would be losing a possible opportunity to see themselves in a book. Growing up, I remember feeling invisible on the page and I did not want that for them, but I also remembered how hurtful harmful representation was and did not want to be the cause of any more. We have had more than enough already. So true success for me and this project came when I just let go and I realized this wasn’t about me and what I was afraid of, it was about trying to tell these kids story in the best way that I could. I put learning about them and their experiences first.

As far as book publication goes, so many people stepped in to keep me on this path. After my first professor encouraged me to start this novel, my next professor encouraged me to show him “more pages of Mor,” then when graduation day came and I thought Mor could take a bit of a rest (for a long, long time) someone else stepped onto my path and asked, “what’s going to happen to Mor?” And with her endless encouragement I finished the novel and sent it out. Although every query was met with ‘no’, one of the agents encouraged me to keep writing. Many of the other replies had mentioned their uncertainty about where a book like this might be placed in the market, but this agent focused on a hope that I continue writing. And even though I have always loved Mor and the cast of characters that fill his world, I did decide to put them away and started a new project. Then about nine months later I was at a conference with the agent who had been so encouraging and they asked to see the project again. This time their answer was different. They wanted to represent One Shadow on the Wall. Shortly after that we sent it out to a group of editors (including one who had requested it), and within the blink of an eye, Mor had found a home. Leading up to that day was a long, meandering road, but I needed to take that journey for myself and for this story.

Book jacket for One Shadow on the Wall

JA: How has living abroad (and traveling widely) changed your life?

LH: Seeing the world informs so much of who I am and how I see things. I have met some of the most fabulous and gracious people on my travels, people that have left a lasting impression of what it means to live each day with heart and thanks.

JA: What other unique settings might show up in your work because of your travels?

LH: My family lived in the Middle East for a bit and I saw and experienced so many wondrous moment that I hope to one day sprinkle in a story or two. There is also a funny story from my time in China that I would love to one day figure out, but we shall see. I really never know where my next story will come from till a character or a scene is filling my head, demanding my attention.

JA: Where are you headed next?

LH: Vietnam is high on my list, but Senegal and Mali are always calling out to my heart and head to come back to a place that truly feels like home—West Africa.

JA: What made you want to be a writer?

LH: I have always enjoyed getting lost in stories. When I was growing up and we would visit historic places and learn about the people who passed through them, I was always curious about a person’s life before and after their grand adventures. I wanted to know those stories. And sometimes I was able to find them out, but often there wasn’t much more information, so I used to wonder and create my own stories for their lives. I always wanted to know what glimpse of a possibility they saw for themselves from the beginning. Were they always brave? Did they always care? Or did something happen that profoundly changed the course of their lives? These questions often lead to even more questions, and soon I was creating my own characters and writing my own tales.

JA: Did you have a teacher, librarian, or family member who particularly encouraged you to pursue your dream?

LH: My parents have always cheered me on in anything that I have set out to do. But in terms of writing, it was something that I kept coming back to again and again. I’d always enjoyed it and one day I just said: Why not? We should always pursue the things that bring us joy. So I did. No matter the time of the day I was jotting down stories and often felt incomplete if a day went by and I hadn’t scribbled something down, even if it was only a few paragraphs.

After that, there was really no turning back. My parents have always been big on telling my brothers and me to explore any possibility, so I decided to go study the craft of writing and get an MFA. And that is really when my love of writing became so much more.

JA: What’s up next for you, Leah? Any more short stories that might turn into your next book?

LH: As far as other short stories turning into something more, a picture book idea of mine quickly morphed into my next novel. Like Mor in One Shadow on the Wall, the main character in this book had a lot more he wanted to say than a picture book could hold. It is very different from this project though it still centers around family and seeing your possibilities. Vague I know, but it’s about a boy, his love for his grandfather, and a pair of magical shoes.

JA: That sounds intriguing! I can’t wait. Thanks for joining us on The Mixed-Up Files and best of luck, Leah!!

Leah has always loved getting lost in stories. When she is not scribbling down her characters’ adventures, she is off on her own, exploring new spaces and places around the world. One Shadow on the Wall (Simon & Schuster/Atheneum) is her debut novel. Leah received her MFA in Writing from Spalding University and currently calls Washington D.C. home. You can find her on Twitter @LeahsMark or through her website at leahhendersonbooks.com.

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