When I wrote A Boy Called BAT, I knew what I hoped: I hoped that it would reach the kids who needed it. What I didn’t expect was the response from readers. Over the past several years, I’ve received hundreds of emails from kids, parents, teachers, librarians, and grandparents, telling me how and why they […]
Category Archives: Author Posts
March
23
What Does a Human Calculator Read? by Ginger Rue
posted by CBethM
Recently, I was talking with my awesome co-author, Tiera Fletcher, about the kinds of books we enjoyed reading when we were children. I first met Tiera when I interviewed her for a magazine article. The story told about how Tiera became the amazing woman she is today. Before graduating from MIT with a 5.0 […]
March
22
Where Are the Introverts–In Your Books and In Your Classroom By Donna Gephart
posted by donalynm
Are you an introvert or an extrovert? Or something in between? An ambivert? Before researching for my book, Abby, Tried and True, I’d have told you I’m an extrovert with a sprinkle of introvert thrown in for good measure. Was I ever wrong! After reading articles and watching Susan Cain’s wildly popular 2012 TedTalk, The Power of […]
March
20
The Middle Kid and The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Steven Weinberg
posted by donalynm
Of all the questions authors are routinely asked (Where do you get your ideas? How much money do you make? What’s your other job?) the easiest to answer is usually this one: How long did it take you to write your book? Easy, because the answer is almost always, MY WHOLE LIFE. I mean, how […]
March
19
Welcome to the Party by Kathleen Lane
posted by CBethM
When I was young, I was frequently run over by cars. Mostly buses, sometimes motorcycles. At every railroad crossing my shoe stuck in the tracks. In every pool a shark made off with my leg. Some nights my bedroom would fill with water, all the way to the ceiling until there was no space left […]
March
18
Book Trailer Reveal: MARS IS: STARK SLOPES, SILVERY SNOW, AND STARTLING SURPRISES by Suzanne Slade
posted by CBethM
I’m a Mars fananatic. And with the recent Perseverance rover landing, and two other missions that arrived at the Red Planet last month, Mars is more popular than ever! Maybe it’s because Mars is our closest neighbor in the solar system, and we can see its faint reddish light with our own eyes. Whatever the […]
March
15
Announcing the Flight of the Puffin Read Aloud: Connecting Classrooms Coast-to-Coast by Ann Braden
posted by CBethM
Last week at the grocery store I was putting cans of beans in my shopping cart when I heard a quiet voice: “Ann? Is that you?” I looked up, and for an absurdly long moment the two of us studied the other’s eyes, the only part of our faces visible between our masks and winter […]
March
12
Dedicating ourselves to “This One’s Dedicated to…” by Chris Barton and Jennifer Ziegler
posted by CBethM
Eight months or so into COVID-19 lockdown, we finally gave in. After long putting off or downright dismissing an idea that the two of us had for a multimedia sideline (i.e. an unpaid and distracting tangent) to our work as authors, we recognized that conditions had become perfect for giving that idea a try. Namely: […]
March
10
Brave Storytellers by Beth Vrabel
posted by CBethM
“I like that she did things on her own.” This was the feedback I recently was gifted from a young reader about Nellie Murrow, the eleven-year-old protagonist in The Newspaper Club. When Nellie moves to a small New England town, she misses the bustle of the city. But Nellie is the daughter of […]
March
09
A TV Writer Finds His Happy Place by James Ponti
posted by CBethM
My path to becoming an author began not in a library or bookstore, but at the Royal Palm movie theater in Atlantic Beach, Florida. I could walk there without crossing any major roads, which is how it became the first “grown up” place I was allowed to go by myself. (1970s parenting at its finest.) […]
