For Teachers

Librarians and Teachers, Take Note! Debut Author Groups Are Great Resources

By Gail Shepherd on June 20, 2018 / Author Interviews, For Librarians, For Teachers, For Writers, Publishing & Promotion

Kidlit authors Julia Nobel (Novel Nineteens) and Joy McCullough (Electric Eighteens) talk to us about how you can take advantage of author debut groups to introduce the year’s hottest new fiction to your middle-grade readers.

Author debut groups are a great way for librarians and teachers to get an early preview of books coming out for kids. They also help educators get to know their authors more personally. “I think debut groups can really help the children’s book market in general,” says Julia Nobel. Nobel founded the Novel Nineteens for middle-grade and young adult authors debuting in 2019. “Some books that might be overlooked get more exposure because there are a lot of other authors talking about them.” Nobel, whose first novel for middle graders, THE MYSTERY OF BLACK HOLLOW LANE appears next year, says that some debut groups concentrate on marketing. Others are focused on mutual support. They all share a mission to introduce their books to new readers.

Joy McCullough is a member of the Electric Eighteens whose debut verse novel BLOOD WATER PAINT published this year. McCullough says debut groups are a place for authors “to ask questions, vent frustrations, and remember that whatever we’re going through, someone else is probably going through the exact same thing.”

“Writing can be a fairly solitary experience,” McCullough says. “When going through the publishing experience for the first time, that solitude is paired with heaps of anxiety and uncertainty and the unpredictable, uncontrollable nature of the publishing business. Having a group of people who are all on similar journeys and timelines can be incredibly comforting and encouraging. There are no expectations to promote each other’s books, though that happens organically as we form relationships with each other and read each other’s books. But the primary purpose, as I see it, is as a support group.”

For Librarians and Teachers: School Visits, Giveaways, and Personal Author Connections

Debut groups offer a wealth of information for teachers and librarians looking for new fiction to share with young readers. The groups’ websites provide summaries of the novels, author bios and social media links. There are also opportunities for giveaways and promotions. This year, Nobel added a feature to the Novel 19s website specifically for teachers and librarians.

Nobel says the feature includes “an author locator for those of us who do school visits, and a list of comparative titles (in case you’re looking for a new book that’s similar to Harry Potter). It also features a document that organizes books thematically. So, for example, if you’re looking a book with LGBTQIA+ characters, you will find a list of titles to explore.”

Use the Hashtag: #Novel19s

Librarians and teachers can also plug in the debut group’s hashtag to keep up with other resources, contests, and giveaways.

“We are really encouraging our authors use the hashtag when they are doing giveaways,” Nobel says. “That way, people can easily find them. Type the phrase #Novel19s into the Twitter search bar. You’ll find authors who are doing book giveaways, pre-order thank you gifts, newsletter goodies, and lots more. You’ll also be able to find new authors you want to connect with. A lot of us love interacting with educators on social media!”

McCullough agrees. “New authors are a great opportunity for schools and libraries to get in on school and Skype visits with an author at the ground floor. It’s important for authors to be paid for these visits. But at the same time, brand new authors are often charging lower rates. And some may not be charging at all as they get their feet under them with school visits. As for things like teacher guides and mailing lists, authors are super eager to connect with teachers and librarians. Author newsletters are a great source of insider info. You’ll find information on the process of publishing, extra content, and a way to connect with authors. A teacher or librarian who reaches out to a debut group asking for swag, teacher guides, etc., is likely to get lots of response!”

Big Trends in Middle Grade

I asked McCullough and Nobel if they were seeing any themes or trends in middle grade books debuting in their respective years.

“Contemporary is king in 2019! The majority of MG books in our group are set in our current time and place,” Nobel says. “Although a handful of those have a twist of magic thrown in. There are only a few fantasy novels, but they really are exceptional. Family dynamics are a common theme in every genre. So is dealing with loss. I’m excited by the number of different ways authors are approaching both those themes. With subjects including the war on drugs, baking competitions, secret societies, and living with nuns, no two books are alike, that’s for sure!

McCullough adds, “It’s been strange for me to debut as a young adult author, since I wrote a ton of middle grade before I got my debut. As a Pitchwars mentor, I’ve always worked with middle grade authors. I really feel like I am a middle grade author! Some middle-grade stand-outs [from 2018], from what I’ve read so far, include PEASPROUT CHEN: FUTURE LEGEND OF SKATE & SWORD by Henry Lien, THE THREE RULES OF EVERYDAY MAGIC by Amanda Rawson Hill, PS I MISS YOU by Jen Petro-Roy, THE UNICORN QUEST by Kamilla Benko, and LOVE SUGAR MAGIC by Anna Meriano. A few I’m super excited to read include EVERLASTING NORA by Marie Miranda Cruz, MEET YASMIN by Saadia Faruqui, FRONT DESK by Kelly Yang, THE HOTEL BETWEEN by Sean Easley.

A Community for Writers

Debut groups also offer a huge learning opportunity for writers. McCullough says, “It’s been fascinating to see the very wide a range of experiences in the publishing journey. It’s really helpful to have fellow travelers on the journey. It’s also incredibly important to keep your eyes on your own suitcase.” Nobel concurs. She says she’s amazed how many authors genuinely want to support each other. “There are a lot of people taking time out from their extremely busy schedules to work on the website, host Twitter chats, and create documents. Or to simply be there to answer questions and offer support. So far it’s been really great!”

Visit the Electric Eighteens at www.Electriceighteens.com and the Novel Nineteens at www.Novelnineteens.com.

Julia Nobel is a middle grade author from Victoria, Canada. Her childhood obsession with The Babysitters Club turned into a lifelong passion for reading and writing children’s literature. She offers writing master classes and courses for writers in all genres. Nobel was also a Pitch Wars Mentor in 2017. Her 4-year-old daughter likes to help her write by unplugging her computer and pressing the escape key. Her debut middle grade novel, The Mystery of Black Hollow Lane, will be published by Sourcebooks Jaberwocky in Spring 2019.

http://julianobel.com; @nobeljulia

Joy McCullough writes books and plays from her home in the Seattle area, where she lives with her husband and two children. She studied theater at Northwestern University, fell in love with her husband atop a Guatemalan volcano, and now spends her days surrounded by books and kids and chocolate. Blood Water Paint is her debut novel.
www.joymccullough.com; @jmcwrites

Dealing with envy in the classroom or at home? Here are some chapter books to the rescue!

By Hillary Homzie on June 3, 2018 / Articles, Book Lists, Fiction, For Librarians, For Teachers, Nonfiction

When awesome things happen to my friends and family, I’m happy for them.

But sometimes I also feel sad. For example, when my family’s economic situation was tenuous, it was hard to hear from a relative that so and so’s new beach house was twice as big than our own house, which we could barely afford at the time.

Or when I was a teen, it was painful to hear how somebody’s father was taking her on a trip to glistening Florida beach town when my own father was dying.

Or something as simple as being a first grader, and being jealous of a friend’s ability to read quickly when I was still stumbling along.

The list goes on. I know you know what I’m talking about. It’s envy. And it’s understandable and so very human. So what do we do with it? How do we celebrate the success of others while finding our own when, for a variety of reasons, we are feeling diminished?

I wish I had an easy answer. But one thing I know is true–we need to talk about it. And an author, I might be biased, but I think that kids also need to read about it.

When looking at some of the themes running through my forthcoming chapter book series, Ellie May, which will be debuting the end of December, I’m seeing a common motif of a kid struggling with envy (in the classroom) running through the books.

In Ellie May on Presidents’ Day, the titular character would like to be flag leader just like her high-achieving classmate Ava.

And in Ellie May on April Fools’ Day, she would like to be as funny as the class clown Mo.

In both of these books, Ellie May yearns for success that she sees others having and goes about claiming it for herself in an exuberant but ultimately wrong-headed way.

I decided to look to see what else there is out tackling this subject for kids 6-9.

What to Do When it’s Not Fair: a Kids’ Guide to Handling Envy and Jealousy by Jacqueline B. toner and Claire A. B. Freeland Is a nonfiction book created to help kids deal with envy. The authors identify triggers that may indicate jealousy and offer alternative ways to reduce envy.

Amber Brown is Green With Envy by Paula Danziger with Amber‘s feelings of unfairness when other people‘s in tact families do not seem to have the same problems as her own.

In Judy Moody Gets Famous by Megan McDonald, third grader Judy gets a famous case of envy when classmate Jessica Finch wins a spelling bee and tries to seek fame of her own in funny and desperate endearing ways.

What are some of your favorite books dealing with envy?

Hillary Homzie is the author of the forthcoming Ellie May chapter book series (Charlesbridge Fall 2018), as well as the forthcoming Apple Pie Promises (Sky Pony/Swirl, October 2018), Pumpkin Spice Secrets (Sky Pony/Swirl, October 2017), Queen of Likes (Simon & Schuster MIX 2016), The Hot List (Simon & Schuster MIX 2011) and Things Are Gonna Be Ugly (Simon & Schuster, 2009) as well as the Alien Clones From Outer Space (Simon & Schuster Aladdin 2002) chapter book series. She can be found at hillaryhomzie.com and on her Facebook page.

Interview with Wendy McLeod MacKnight, Author of The Frame-Up

By Patricia Bailey on May 25, 2018 / Author Interviews, For Kids, For Librarians, For Parents, For Teachers, New Releases

I’m so excited to chat with Wendy McLeod MacKnight about her latest middle grade mystery, THE FRAME-UP.

When Sargent Singer discovers that the paintings in his father’s gallery are alive, he is pulled into a captivating world behind the frame that he never knew existed.

Filled with shady characters, devious plots, and a grand art heist, this inventive mystery-adventure celebrates art and artists and is perfect for fans of Night at the Museum and Blue Balliett’s Chasing Vermeer.

There’s one important rule at the Beaverbrook Gallery—don’t let anyone know the paintings are alive. Mona Dunn, forever frozen at thirteen when her portrait was painted by William Orpen, has just broken that rule. Luckily twelve-year-old Sargent Singer, an aspiring artist himself, is more interested in learning about the vast and intriguing world behind the frame than he is in sharing her secret.

And when Mona and Sargent suspect shady dealings are happening behind the scenes at the gallery, they set out to find the culprit. They must find a way to save the gallery—and each other—before they are lost forever.

With an imaginative setting, lots of intrigue, and a thoroughly engaging cast of characters, The Frame-Up will captivate readers of Jacqueline West’s The Books of Elsewhere.

What inspired this art gallery mystery?

I have always loved art — and wished I painted or drew better! — and I always wanted to figure out a way to make the world of art come alive to kids and adults. Certainly, the book has nods to Harry Potter and Night at the Museum, but I wanted to do something different; I wanted to show two worlds co-existing and not intersecting and how the hidden world would organize itself to protect itself, and I wanted to have readers think about how creativity brings things to life. Theoretically, a painting is simply a flat image on a wall. But depending upon the person viewing it, it can be so much more than that. I wanted to give kids (and the adults in their lives) ways to think and look at art that made it fun and thought-provoking and I hope I succeeded!

Please, tell us about the paintings featured in the book and/or about the real-life Beaverbrook Art Gallery.

Oh gosh, where to begin? The Beaverbrook Art Gallery is a magical place, set on the banks of the St. John River in Fredericton, New Brunswick. It was a gift to the province by Lord Beaverbrook, a native New Brunswicker who found fame in fortune in the U.K. during the first half of the twentieth century and is a towering figure in World War II history and the history of the London press. He filled the gallery with priceless masterpieces, as fine as any collection, in my opinion.

The hardest thing for me was choosing which paintings would be characters. I knew I had to include at least one Dalì, plus the massive Gainsborough, and the portrait of Mona Dunn. I chose paintings I’ve always loved and which included great characters for my story, like the portrait of Helena Rubinstein, Madame Juliette dans le Jardin, and Lucian Freud’s Hotel Bedroom.

But really, the star is Mona Dunn. I have been besotted with her portrait since I first laid eyes on it, and my affection for her has never waned. There was never any doubt that this would be the girl who would live her life behind the frame, and yet long to still be connected to the outer world. It’s as if her artist, William Orpen, knew she was destined to be in a book, the way he captured her. In the novel, I describe her as #TheOtherMona, but really, I think she is a more glorious portrait than the Mona Lisa!!!

Mona Dunn | Interview with Wendy McLeod MacKnight | Th Frame Up

What I didn’t realize was that it was MY responsibility to procure the rights to reproduce the images in the book, though I had no idea at the time I procured them that the book would actually be published! But Greenwillow Books has made a gorgeous book, and the fact that they’ve included a sixteen-page full-color insert of all of the paintings who are characters in the book is amazing to me! I can just imagine kids flipping back and forth as they read!

I loved your first novel, It’s a Mystery, Pig Face! And, as a little sister, really resonated with the sibling relationship. So, tell me, who is your favorite character – either from Pig Face or The Frame-Up – and why do you love them more than anyone else?

Oh my! I adore Lester (AKA Pig Face), because he is loosely based on my younger brother, although with my quirks, but if I had to pick one character that I absolutely adore, I’m going with Sir Charles Cotterell in The Frame-Up, because he just makes me sooo happy. He has a small role, but good one!

Will you tell us a little bit about your writing process? In particular how do you go about tackling a mystery story?

First of all, I do a VERY ROUGH outline, and then I write. I’m trying to do a better job of pre-plotting, but I think I may be the writer who really needs to get to know their character through writing, and however much I think I know but doing character sketches, it’s only when I put them in the scenarios that their true colors come out! And the mystery, went through several iterations, and honestly, the mad scramble at the end required LOTS of re-writing so it actually made sense. In The Frame-Up, there are several mysteries: what’s going to happen now that someone from outside the frame knows about the world behind the frame; will Sargent and his father actually come together; and is someone up to something nefarious at the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, and if so, who? I have to map it all out and try to find a way to weave it all together in a logical, straight forward way. But I’ll be honest: sometimes I trap myself in my own maze and have to ask for help to get myself out!

What would you like readers to take away from this book?

My greatest wish is that kids (and adults!) are inspired to go to their local art gallery or museum and “visit” the paintings. So often, we shuffle from one painting to the next, not knowing how we should be approaching it. Many galleries do an amazing job of talking about the creation of the art, but for some of us, the only way we can connect is by imagining the day it was painted, thinking about what the artist saw and was thinking, and depending on the kind of art, what the subject was also experiencing. My greatest compliment was when, after he’d finished the book, my husband said he’d never look at art the same way again!

In your book, Mona is eternally 13 years old. Is there a certain age that most feels like you? If so, what about being that age sticks with you?

Truthfully, I think I will always be fourteen years old. I’ll be on my deathbed at a hundred and five (!) and still be as excited and hopeful and curious to see how it all turns out as I was when I was that age. I was fourteen when I had to move away from my hometown, which was absolutely heartbreaking, but it was also the year I had an amazing English teacher, had my first date, and tramped about in the woods with my best friends, just like Tracy and Pig Face do. You know things, but you don’t know things, which I think is a delicious way to live your life!

Thank you so much for chatting with us, Wendy. I can’t wait to grab a copy of THE FRAME- UP for myself. I’m sure our readers feel the same way.

Wendy lives in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada, and wrote her first novel at age nine. During her first career, she worked for the Government of New Brunswick, ending her career as the Deputy Minister of Education. She has been know to wander art galleries and have spirited conversations with the paintings – mostly in her head, though sometimes not. Her debut middle grade novel, It’s a Mystery, Pig Face! was published by Sky Pony Press in 2017. She can’t wait for The Frame-Up to come out so she can share her love of art and her love for the world-class Beaverbrook Art Gallery. She hopes readers will be inspired to create their own masterpieces and visit their own local art gallery. And even better, she hopes they’ll come to Fredericton and visit the Beaverbrook Art Gallery and meet Mona and the rest of the characters in the book (and maybe Wendy, too!)

THE FRAME-UP comes out June 5, 2018. You can pick up a copy at your favorite independent bookstore or anywhere else books are sold.

In the meantime, feel free to keep the conversation going by commenting below. I’d love to talk more about Wendy’s books, art, mystery novels, or even your eternal age. 🙂

For Teachers

Librarians and Teachers, Take Note! Debut Author Groups Are Great Resources