Happy Book Birthday: The Tiara and the Terrace

The Tiara and the Terrace
by Kristen Kittscher
HarperCollins (January 5, 2016)
Audience: Grades 5 to 8
Fiction * Mystery * Friendship

About the book: 
In this funny, clever novel, perfect for fans of Pseudonymous Bosch and Gordon Korman and a companion to The Wig in the Window, tween sleuths Sophie Young and Grace Yang go undercover at Luna Vista's Winter Sun Festival to catch a murderer before he—or she—strikes again.

Sophie Young and Grace Yang have been taking it easy ever since they solved the biggest crime Luna Vista had ever seen. But things might get interesting again now that everyone is gearing up for the 125th annual Winter Sun Festival—a town tradition that involves floats, a parade, and a Royal Court made up of local high school girls.

When Festival president Jim Steptoe turns up dead on the first day of parade preparations, the police blame a malfunctioning giant s'more feature on the campfire-themed float. But the two sleuths are convinced the mysterious death wasn't an accident.

Young and Yang must trade their high tops for high heels and infiltrate the Royal Court to solve the case. But if they fail, they might just be the next victims.

Check out the Official Book Trailer:

The Tiara on the Terrace spotted live: 
Several years ago, I had the good fortune to meet Kristen Kittscher at a YA event that I was a part of in Pasadena, California. Since then, I have had a chance to work with her on other local author events and to also support her books. 

Recently, I got to hang with Kristen and the gang at the Live on Green event in Pasadena. 

Kristen Kittscher with YA author, Ingrid Sundberg, and Once Upon a Time Bookseller, Romy. 

Kristen in a deep conversation with young fans.

A photobooth was set up by Russell Gearheart Photography.

Photobooth in action.

Then on Sunday, January 3rd, I was able to attend her book launch party for The Tiara on the Terrace. 

Kristen with fans.

More fun with the photobooth.

Kristen talking about her new book, The Tiara on the Terrace.

Kristen talking about her research and visiting the Wrigley Mansion in Pasadena. She based the Ridley Mansion in her book on the Wrigley Mansion.

Refreshments included root beer floats. If you don't know why, read the book. 

A view from above. Kristen spoke to a full house at the Armory Center in Pasadena.

Kristen talking with one of the young actors from her book trailer.

Many books were signed. 

Photo Credit: Alyson or Alethea (Read Now, Sleep Later)

Congratulations Kristen on the success of your book launch! Pick up a copy of The Tiara on the Terrace from your local indie bookstore or contact Once Upon a Time in Montrose, CA for an autographed copy. 

About the author: 
KRISTEN KITTSCHER is a former middle school English teacher and author of tween mystery The Wig in the Window (Harper Children’s, 2013) which garnered a starred review from School Library Journal and was named to ten Best of the Year lists. The 2014 James Thurber House Children’s Writer-in-Residence and a graduate of Brown University, Kristen frequently presents at schools, libraries, and festivals. She lives with her husband in Pasadena, home of the Rose Parade—the inspiration for her most recent novel, The Tiara on the Terrace. Visit kristenkittscher.com or follow her on Facebook and Twitter (@kkittscher).

Happy Book Birthday to The Tiara and the Terrace! Enter the Rafflecopter below for a chance to win a copy of The Tiara on the Terrace. Winners must be 13 years old or older and have a US mailing address. 

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The Little Snowplow: Guest Post by Lora Koehler

The Little Snowplow
by Lora Koehler; Illustrated by Jake Parker
Candlewick Press (October 13, 2015)
Fiction * Transportation * Perceptions

Thank you Lora Koehler for stopping by and sharing how storytime has contributed to her writing. 

In addition to being a children’s author, I am, like many of you, a librarian. I’ve been a children’s librarian with the Salt Lake County Library System for twenty years. Unlike other pursuits that might not be as harmonious, the two careers mesh well.

Take storytimes, for example. Just one part of my job as a librarian, they’ve contributed immensely to what I’ve learned as a writer. I’ve done storytimes in libraries small and large, spaces hushed and raucous, for two kids and for 200.

As a librarian, I’m always perusing the newly arrived picture books for things to use in storytime. As a writer, I’m also looking at them to understand what makes a good read-aloud. Sometimes we’ll get a book in that I wonder about. Clearly, for it to have been published, a number of people loved this book. But I don’t immediately understand why.

So, I take it into my storytime “lab” and experiment. How do the kids react? How does the text work with the page turns? What makes it funny...or not? Why did the kids stare blankly at this book I found hilarious? How does the plot rise and fall? Where does the story fall flat? What keeps the kids involved?

The answers to my questions help me find good books for future storytimes. They also, I hope, help me to create good books for future storytimes.

The skills that librarians develop in storytimes or school presentations translate to the life of a writer in another way: an experienced librarian is probably much more comfortable in front of an audience than many writers.

Librarians know story. I like to anchor my preschool storytimes with a strong story, and this is something The Little Snowplow features. Stories like these encourage a child’s narrative skills. It’s fun to watch the kids eyes widen as they wait to see what happens. At that point you know they’re hooked. With The Little Snowplow, kids feel the injustice of the big trucks’ discrimination against the little plow from the start of the story. And they enjoy predicting whether the snowplow will be strong enough to plow the roads.

In storytime, I also find ways to physically involve kids in the story. In The Little Snowplow, kids can train like the plow does by mimicking the actions. Rolling their heads to make the light on top go around, figuring out what the beep of a little snowplow should sound like (BEEP? beep? beep?), “driving” forward and back, and raising and lowering their plow....the physical movements extend their interest in the story.

After reading so many picture books I sometimes feel like I “think in picture book.” Stories, which almost always start writing themselves in my head, start to unfold with the pictures to go with them, and with page turns in place. That doesn’t mean that it won’t change a lot once I start to get it onto paper -- it almost always does. My critique group has yet to pronounce an early draft “perfect.”

Once I’ve gotten those drafts to where I think they need to be going I usually create a “dummy” to lay out the text in the way I see it being in a book. This helps me to find things that need to be reordered, rewritten, and often, deleted.

Other parts of my job as a librarian translate to the writing life as well. I’ve learned about publishers and the kinds of books they publish through collection development work. This, of course, has been invaluable as a writer, or at least, a writer who wanted to get her book out there.

And the library is always a great source of writing ideas. Prompted by the child who comes in with her fancy hat and gloves, or the older gentleman who sits each day near the fireplace, characters spring to life in my imagination. The questions that people ask sometimes turn into book ideas as well. “Hmm, I’m not finding a book on that....but there should be one.” You would think, by now, that every imaginable topic had been written about, but if it hasn’t been, the library is a great place to discover that.

For this writer (and I know for many others), the library is a fantastic place to work. Perhaps you have a story that you’ve been thinking of writing too?

Enter to win a copy of The Little Snowplow:
Thank you to Candlewick Press for offering copies of The Little Snowplow for giveaway. Two lucky readers will have a chance to win a copy of The Little Snowplow. Complete the Rafflecopter below to enter. All participants must be 13 years old or older and have a US mailing address.

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Blog Tour: Dare to Disappoint: Growing Up in Turkey

Thank you to Macmillan Publishers for including Kid Lit Frenzy in the blog tour for DARE TO DISAPPOINT. 

DARE TO DISAPPOINT: Growing Up in Turkey
by Özge Samanci
Farrar, Straus and Giroux BYR (November 17, 2015)
Nonfiction * Comics * Biography
Audience: Ages 14 and up
IndieBound | WorldCat

About the book:
Growing up on the Aegean Coast, Ozge loved the sea and imagined a life of adventure while her parents and society demanded predictability. Her dad expected Özge, like her sister, to become an engineer. She tried to hear her own voice over his and the religious and militaristic tensions of Turkey and the conflicts between secularism and fundamentalism. Could she be a scuba diver like Jacques Cousteau? A stage actress?  Would it be possible to please everyone including herself?

Quick thoughts on this book:

Özge Samanci unique mixture of illustrations and real objects combine together with her heartfelt words to provide readers with a touching and funny graphic memoir of growing up in Turkey. 

Samanci provides readers with the challenges and pressures she faced in learning how to balance what her dreams were with the expectations of her family, and country. Readers connect over the universal similarity that all of us share in the struggle to create our own identity and as well as what decisions will we ultimately make about our lives.

And don't you just love the art? 

At each stop, Samanci is sharing something personal that is part of her upbringing and included in some format in her book, Dare to Disappoint. Today, it is a doily. 

I saw a paper doily first time in the States and I cracked up. Doilies remind me fake fire places. A real lacework is the product of meticulous work, attention, and grace. But a paper doily is generated by using machinery. I love paper doilies and I still laugh at them. In Turkey, while I was growing up almost every furniture used to have some kind of lacework cover. Women worked hard with little needles to create these lacework pieces. There would be lacework covers everywhere. On the coffee tables, on the shelves, sometimes even on top of the television set. Some people covered their home telephone with a tiny lacework cover. I used a paper doily as a collage material to refer the laceworks from my childhood.

About the author: 
Ozge Samanci is an artist and an associate professor. She was born in Izmir, Turkey, and currently lives in Chicago, Illinois. Dare to Disappoint is her debut graphic novel.

For a complete listing of blog tour stops, click here.  For Friday's stop: The Book Wars

Dear Santa, Love, Rachel Rosenstein Giveaway

Dear Santa, Love, Rachel Rosenstein
by Amanda Peet and Andrea Troyer; Illustrated by Christine Davenier
Doubleday Books for Young Readers (October 20, 2015)
Fiction * Holiday * 
Audience: Ages 3-7 years

About the book: 
Actress Amanda Peet brings us a hilarious holiday drama in a story that every Jewish family will relate to and appreciate.

Rachel Rosenstein wonders why Santa Claus never visits her house. But this year is going to be different--even though her family is Jewish and doesn't observe Christmas. With hilarious and heartwarming mishaps, Rachel visits Santa at the mall with her special request, writes a letter to Santa explaining her cause, and clandestinely decorates the house on Christmas Eve (right down to latkes for the reindeer). And while Rachel may wrestle with her culture, customs, and love of sparkly Christmas ornaments, she also comes away with a brighter understanding of her own identity and of the gift of friends and family.

Sneak peak into the book:

The illustrations in this book are charming.

I was curious how they would handle the subject matter. 

Not to spoil it, but I do think the creative team pulled together a realistic ending for this story. 

About the Creative Team: 
Amanda Peet is an actress and playwright. Her first play, "The Commons of Pensacola," starring Blythe Danner and Sarah Jessica Parker, opened to critical acclaim in 2014 at Manhattan Theater Club. A native of New York, Peet graduated from Columbia University with a degree in American History. She has appeared in numerous films, including "Please Give," "Syriana," "Something's Gotta Give," and "The Whole Nine Yards." She also starred in the TV series "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip," and the Broadway revival of Neil Simon's "Barefoot in the Park." Peet stars in a new comedy series, "Togetherness" for HBO, debuting in fall 2014.

Andrea Troyer grew up in Minnesota and received an MFA from the University of California, Irvine. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two young boys.

Christine Davenier is the illustrator of many children's books, including Julie Andrews's "The Very Fairy Princess" series. She lives in Paris, France.

CELEBRATE TOGETHER Prize Pack Giveaway
Come together with friends celebrating different holidays! One winner will receive 2 copies of Dear Santa, Love, Rachel Rosenstein, one to keep, and one to share.

Giveaway open to US addresses only.
Prizing and samples provided by Penguin Random House.

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Wrapping Up: How to Tell A Story Week

A week ago, Jen Vincent from Teach Mentor Texts and I kicked off How to Tell a Story Week.  We introduced you to How To Tell a Story. Wow! The week has flown by and we are now wrapping you our How to Tell a Story week. 

Over the week, we introduced you to creator, Daniel Nayeri in an interview at Teach Mentor Texts, and illustrator, Brian Won in an interview here. 

Thank you to friends, Jennifer Reed and Cynthia Alaniz for sharing about how you tried out How to Tell a Story with your students at your school Libraries.  You can read Jennifer's post here and Cynthia's post here. 

Even the folks at Workman Publishing joined in and tweeted out their stories. You can read the tweets here on Storify. This brought tears to my eyes from all of the laughing I did as I read the stories. 

Jen and I would love to learn about your experiences. And today is also the day to share your stories from The Why Game. Visit our public How To Tell a Story Padlet, double click to start a new box, and then share your story. If you want to remember what blocks we're playing with, you can go here or here. Thank you Jen for creating a Padlet for everyone to post their results. 

We hope you had a great time writing stories with us! A giant thanks to Workman for making this possible. We appreciate receiving How To Tell a Story in exchange for our honest reviews and the opportunity to host How To Tell a Story Week and offer the giveaways. Thanks so much for celebrating with us!

Last chance to enter to win a copy of How to Tell a Story or a skype visit with Daniel Nayeri:

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