Are you a member of the #classroombookaday Facebook group? If not, click the link and join right now. Seriously, do it. I’ll stop and wait until you’re done. Okay, now that you have access to an amazing resource that’s going to change the way you think about and share picture books with your students, check […]
Category Archives: Author Posts
July
22
From Stage to Page: How I Discovered the Healing Power of Fiction by Margot Harrison
posted by CBethM
A fourteen-year-old girl is taking a summer theater program at a local college. She dreams of seeing her name in lights. But right now, rehearsals aren’t going well, and the director is angry. He accuses the cast of not giving their all. He goes around the room and singles out one actor after another, asking […]
July
12
The Space Between: Why Humor Matters in the Dark by Dev Petty
posted by CBethM
Humor has gotten me out of some tough spots. Though I’m reluctant to ever say I’m funny (it’s not really for me to judge), humor is certainly a big way I approach the world and the people in that world. It’s sort of a passenger who helps me find the edges and articulate the shape […]
July
08
Telling Stories with Imagery and Words by Melissa Dassori
posted by CBethM
The idea for my middle grade debut emerged from a lesson in my own fourth grade class. My teacher, whom I’ll call Ms. K, had a large collection of New Yorker magazine covers that she handed out as inspiration for creative writing assignments. Each cover was its own work of art—illustrated and free of text—and […]
June
27
Why I Wrote ‘Twas The Night Before Pride by Joanna McClintick
posted by CBethM
My coming out began joyfully: I fell in love my sophomore year of college, it was springtime, and everything about it was warm and beautiful and thrilling. At long last I had what many of my straight peers had already begun, in some cases for many years: a relationship! But aside from the person I […]
June
24
Our Boys Are Not Okay by Melanie Conklin
posted by CBethM
Last year, I overheard a conversation between my twelve-year-old son and his close male friends that alarmed me. They were talking about Tiktok challenges and how each of them had been pressured into doing something they knew was wrong by their peers. They liked the attention they got from doing these social media challenges, but […]
June
21
HOW TO CREATE A LIFELONG BOOK CLUB IN SEVEN EASY (WELL, NOT ALWAYS SO EASY) STEPS by Chris Rylander
posted by CBethM
As a writer, you get to be in charge. You decide a character’s name. What they look like. Are they liars? Do they swear a lot? Are they good or bad or somewhere in between? You get to decide what happens to those characters. You get to choose the words that make a story. This […]
June
14
The Rule of Thirds by Elana K. Arnold
posted by CBethM
When A Boy Called BAT was published five years ago, I hoped for the same things I hope for all my books—that readers would find it, and that it would have a big and beautiful life. And in the time between then and now, my hopes for BAT have come true. More than any of […]
June
02
Saying Gay In Our Household by Padma Venkatraman
posted by CBethM
“Mom, what’s a gay person?” When my child asked me this question, some years ago, when she was about eight, my first response was to give her examples of gay couples who are our friends. “You know, like ___ and ___, or ___ and ___,” I said. She knitted her brows for a while, and then […]
May
18
Who Invented TV Video Gaming? And Will His Story Inspire My Kid to Read? by Kate Hannigan
posted by CBethM
How do I make my reluctant reader pick up a book? Write about his favorite thing: gaming. When I visit schools, I often tell students that most books are written to answer a single question. And while I’d like to say that my newest picture book biography Blips on a Screen: How Ralph Baer Invented […]
Nerdy Book Club 