A Trio of Mice

Earlier this year I wrote a post about two new mouse books, one by Lois Lowry and the other by Cynthia Voigt. I also listed a number of great mouse books already in print.

So. With Halloween right around the corner, just begging to be a blog post, I'm really more in the mood to talk about mice again. Why? Because the great Richard Peck has thrown his hat into the ring of the mouse boxing match. (I wanted to say "mouse circus," but I looked up the origin of "throw your hat into the ring" and discovered it's a boxing expression.) What I mean to say is, Peck has written a mouse book, too: Secrets at Sea.

I have two questions about all of this. One is, why did three of the best children's books writers of all time come out with mouse books this year? The other is, quite frankly, how do the three books compare?

I'll start by summarizing each book for you, with a lot more detail for Peck's story, since his wasn't around for my February post.

Lowry's Bless This Mouse features a tribe of church mice who live in a Catholic church called St. Bartholomew's. Their leader, Hildegarde, must keep her people safe. She must also fend off attempts by a sneaky rival to take her top spot. In order to maintain the status quo, Hildegarde enforces a strict policy of birth control in the mouse population. I know, it sounds like China's Communist oligarchy, but the book is actually light-hearted, the proverbial rollicking read. It turns out Hildegarde faces a bigger threat than Lucretia—the humans have learned of the mice and are planning to exterminate them. Hildegarde decides that the best way to protect her tribe is to evacuate to the outdoors till the danger has passed. Meanwhile, the human parishioners are gearing up for a ceremony in which children bring their pets to be blessed by Father Murphy, a tradition honoring St. Francis of Assissi. Hildegarde takes note of the fact that the church mice are not exactly invited to the blessing of the animals, adding another wrinkle to the story.

Voigt's Young Fredle is a sort of Jonathan Livingston Seagull character. (If you're too young to get that reference, here's the Wiki article.) He's a house mouse living on a farm, but he winds up outside quite by accident and doesn't know how to get back inside to his family. Fredle manages to stay alive, has all sorts of adventures, and becomes such a different person that he no longer fits in with his clan. He learns about snakes, raccoons, reliable and unreliable friends, and the stars. He's a bit of a philosopher, and his growing view of the world permeates the book.

In Richard Peck's Secrets at Sea, Helena and her three younger siblings—Louise, Lamont, and Beatrice—live with a nouveau riche family in turn-of-the-century New York. Our story begins when Louise bursts in with the news that the Cranston household is in an uproar, planning to go on some kind of journey because older daughter Olive "must be given Her Chance." The sisters hardly have time to parse this information before Lamont bursts in, missing his tail.

You get some idea of just how determined and brave Helena is when she makes Lamont take her to the scene of the crime to get that tail back. They make it out alive—barely. Then Helena sits right down and sews Lamont's tail back on.

The little mouse family realizes that the Cranstons intend to take a sea voyage in hopes of finding a fashionable husband for Olive, who appears to be in danger of becoming an old maid. (The teenage Cranston daughter Camilla is actually friends with Louise, which makes Helena nervous.) Following the counsel of her eccentric, oracular Aunt Fannie, Helena and her siblings accompany the Cranstons on their voyage. Once onboard ship, they discover a large number of mice crew and passengers whose behavior quietly mimics that of the human crew and passengers. Helena and her family also intervene in the lives of the Cranstons, who could certainly use the help.

Peck's wording, as always, is perfectly crafted, and his humor is sly and witty. Here are a couple of examples:

We are mice, and as Mother used to say, we are among the very First Families of the land. We were here before the squirrels. The squirrels came for the acorns. We sold them the acorns. (8)

From the rear Lamont looked ridiculous without his complete tail. He paused and put a finger to his chin, though he has no chin. He was stalling. (27)

"Why don't boys ever want to be themselves? Why do boys always want to be somebody else?" asked Louise, who wanted to be Camilla. (124)

As Aunt Fannie points out, Helena has her hands full with her siblings: Louise consorts with humans, Lamont takes wild, life-threatening risks, and Beatrice sneaks out to meet unsuitable mouse boys. Between them and the Cranstons, Helena can hardly keep it all straight. But she's quick on her four little feet, and this ocean voyage promises to be the making of both human and mouse families in unexpected ways.

Humor, action, plot twists, romance: Secrets of Sea has it all, just as you'd hope for when reading the latest from a dab hand like Richard Peck.

Now, let's consider the three books together.

Setting

Bless This Mouse—The church mouse premise and setting makes for some very fun jokes as well as a nice counterpoint between the human and mouse users of the building. Lowry has a good time with things like the mouse-eye view of the stories of the martyrs depicted in the stained glass.

Secrets at Sea—An ocean voyage evocative of the Titanic, only without the iceberg. Throwing mice into this supposedly elegant mix is clever and often funny.

Young Fredle—The farmhouse, barn, and outlying land become an entire universe for a small mouse. This setting is the most realistic of the three, especially the way Voigt uses it.

Anthropomorphizing

Bless This Mouse—Clothes are never mentioned in the text, but the mice are depicted on the book cover and in internal illustrations as wearing clothes, something the author would have had to approve. Hildegarde and her people all talk, and they are aware of human history and doings.

Secrets at Sea—It threw me a little when Helena explained that mice wear clothes in their own homes, but not when out where humans might see them. The mice in this book act like humans in a lot of ways, but must hide from humans and especially from cats.

Young Fredle—No clothing here. The mice in this book really do act like mice, but they do think, and they talk to each other and other animals.

Main Character

Bless This Mouse—Hildegarde is determined and often exasperated, but she has courage and leadership that go for miles, or at least for feet.

Secrets at Sea—Helena has a wonderful, strong voice and you'll be cheering for her every step of the way. She's not perfect: she's bossy and she thinks she's always right. But then, that's a pretty good take on a lot of oldest sisters (I say, speaking as one)! This book is the only one of the three written in first person, which quite suits the story.

Young Fredle—Fredle is a very rich character. It's so easy to put yourself in his place and/or worry about him as he learns about the greater world. Fredle is hopeful and yearning and kind and quite bright, even though he's lacking in all sorts of knowledge.

Suspense/Plot Twists

Bless This Mouse—The peril keeps this plot popping, as do Hildegarde's attempts to deal with everything that comes up. There are two plot twists that you may not see coming.

Secrets at Sea—Peck twists his plot like a pretzel, and the ongoing threat of discovery by humans makes this book a game of cat-and-mouse, sometimes literally.

Young Fredle—Like Fredle, you will never know quite what to expect, though there is some foreshadowing about dangers such as a snake in the barn.

Favorite Scenes

Bless This Mouse—The mousey interpretation of the church and its doings is amusing throughout (e.g., thoughts on the edibility of crayons), but I particularly liked the town meetings Hildegarde holds, filled with interruptions, colorful personalities, and political maneuvering.

Secrets at Sea—There's a lot to love here, but I was especially fond of a scene in which Helena and a little boy with a bed full of contraband sweets face down a mean nanny.

Young Fredle—One of the most intriguing sections of the book has to do with a group of rowdy raccoons who take Fredle prisoner. Their captain finds a fellow thinker in Fredle, but he's perfectly realistic about the likelihood of eating the mouse should other food options fail to present themselves.

Themes and Spirituality

Bless This Mouse—Lowry has interesting things to say about which animals humans value and which they don't. (I suspect the author is a vegetarian, but couldn't find confirmation of that.) Other themes are the importance of community and of focusing on what needs to be done rather than on status. Religion plays a key role in the book, but you will feel you are wrapped in a warm blanket of spirituality rather than being urged to follow any particular tradition.

Secrets at Sea—We are told more than once that mice must live in the moment because their lives are short and indeed, are often cut short. Helena tries to control her siblings and their fates, but she learns to let go in many ways. Another message is that you have to take risks, and just plain take action, to make your life better. On another note, the mouse perspective on human antics makes those interactions seem sillier than ever, for a nice slice of satire.

Young Fredle—This feels like a very philosophical coming-of-age story, but it manages not to preach. What matters most in life? Is surviving all there is to our existence? These are the kinds of questions Voigt raises in her book.

Illustrations

Bless This Mouse—Eric Rohmann is the illustrator. The jacket art shows a handful of very cute mice, with Hildegarde front and center. Interior illustrations, some full page, continue to highlight mouse personalities, focusing on body language and facial expressions. The artwork adds to the book.

Secrets at Sea—Illustrator Kelly Murphy's jacket art shows the four mouse siblings jauntily holding onto some sort of ship's tackle, with the sea in the background. These mice are a bit less cute than the ones in Bless This Mouse, but are still appealing. Interior illustrations do include some full-page spreads. The art is nice, but I didn't pay a lot of attention to it. Peck's words outgunned it at every (page) turn.

Young Fredle—Louise Yates is the illustrator. The cover art makes Fredle look a little too cartoony for my taste, with a touch of Quentin Blake to the style. But having him look up at the stars is nice, as well as thematically correct. He does appear a bit hapless, which also fits. The interior illustrations are sparse, mostly spot art. They actually distracted a little from my experience of the story when I noticed them.

Overall Success

Bless This Mouse—A very fun story. I wasn't sure the ending worked with everything that had come before, but maybe that's just me.

Secrets at Sea—Clever and outrageously entertaining.

Young Fredle—Deeply involving and moving. Fredle instantly leaps to the front of the pack when it comes to animal and even people stories about young people finding their place in the world.

Of course, now that I've done it, I'll admit it's entirely unnecessary to compare these books. I can happily recommend all three for your bookshelf. Unlike the Disney group, this Mouse club consists of exalted company indeed.

So why did three Newbery award-winning authors write mouse books at this stage of their careers? The obvious answer is, to have fun. To take it a little farther, however, I think once you pass a certain point in your life and work, you might just have room for real, I-know-exactly-who-I-am humility. And what could be more humble than a mouse? Through the little voice at the baseboards, these authors give us timeless truths, whether in Lois Lowry's comfortable church lady-running-a-committee persona, Peck's erudite tongue-in-cheek style, or Voigt's yearning, wondering tones.


Note: If you're feeling deprived on the spooky front, please visit my best Halloween post ever, "Enter Three Witches."

A Review of Three Quarters Dead by Richard Peck

I first heard about this book a couple of years ago at an SCBWI Conference where Richard Peck spoke, mentioning his upcoming projects, and I've been looking forward to it ever since. How would one of the greatest craftsmen in the field of children's books handle YA paranormal?

Of course, you could argue that he's already done that with his Blossom Culp books, which I always thought were middle grade, but which are now being called YA, at least in the front matter of this new book. But the Blossom books are also historical fiction, and Three Quarters Dead is about a contemporary teen.

Kerry is a sophomore attached to a popular, powerful trio of senior girls: beautiful Tanya, graceful Natalie, and lively Makenzie. Kerry earnestly assures us that the three of them aren't mean girls. Her reasoning? They talk to her. (Never mind the little zingers they throw in.) They sort of include her. And even though events—along with outside observers—conspire to convince Kerry that she is being used, the heady wine of hanging out with this particular group has her too drunk to admit things aren't so great.

Readers will be quick to see that Tanya, the leader of the pack, is a little obsessed with a particular boy and with destroying the girl she thinks stole him from her. She enlists Kerry's help without giving her any real information, then leaves Kerry hanging when her plans go south. Which is just one example of the small and large clues we get about Tanya's true nature. Another key point in the early chapters is Kerry noticing Tanya's seeming ability to stop time, or rather, to draw it out to suit her purposes.

[SPOILER, THOUGH IT'S IN THE PUBLISHER'S BOOK BLURB AND NONE OF THIS WILL MAKE SENSE IF I DON'T TELL YOU!] Then the unthinkable happens: Tanya, Natalie, and Makenzie are killed when they wrap their car around an apple tree. Here's where Peck's premise gets extra good. Kerry goes into a fugue state, until one day she gets a text message from Tanya telling her to meet the three dead girls in the city at Tanya's Aunt Lily's apartment. Kerry's reaction is relief: "I'd known all along this entire...situation had been too bad to be true."

The haunting of Kerry, which she participates in fervently for pages, is horrifically satisfying. Here's a brief sample, when the four girls dress up in old-fashioned clothes from Aunt Lily's closet to go out on the town. Note the author having fun with macabre puns, the eerie scent of apple blossoms (referring to the tree the car hit), and narrator Kerry's oblivious acceptance of the fact that the dead girls need "major makeup":

There wasn't a mirror on any wall, and that was better. There'd been thousands of us in the mirrored dressing room. Now it was just us four. Taller in our heels, swirlier in our skirts, bigger and bustier in our bras. I was the only one who didn't need major makeup. Just a little something to make my eyes pop. Too much makeup too young is always a dead giveaway, Tanya always said. Too much makeup is always about being the most desperate girl in ninth grade.
Though as Tanya also said, "A little lip gloss wouldn't kill you, Kerry."
There we were in a room that had never changed, the four of us in a dangle of earrings, a wobble of heels, in a cloud of Arpège perfume out of a swag bag. The Arpège fought a little with the lily of the valley, and just under that, apple blossom.

Peck uses the archaeological dig that is Aunt Lily's closet to suggest timelessness, then embroiders these scenes with elderly women hiding from the ghosts in a neighbor's apartment. Of course, the old women represent the way Kerry should be reacting.

The driving force in this book is Kerry's unwillingness to let go—and her problem with being such a follower. You could read the entire haunting as taking place in Kerry's mind if you really wanted to, but I don't think that's what Peck is doing here. Kerry's eagerness to be haunted is just as creepy as the ghosts themselves, and as painful. When Kerry finally snaps out of it, readers will be cheering for her emancipation.

By the way, there's a touch of romance here, but nothing that overwhelms a story that's essentially about girls and their friendships.

Now, as far as suspension of disbelief goes, Tanya's powers work best when they're not examined too closely. There was one point late in the book where I felt like we got a little too much explaining and I found myself doubting Tanya's abilities, but for most of the story, I was completely sold on these events.

Other than that, the only false note qualifies as a quibble: Dear Mr. Peck, Teenage boys today are not called Bob or Sandy. You might get a Rob, an Alex, or a Xander, but that's about it. The youngest Bob I know of is my brother, and he's 49. While Sandy is a 63-year-old plumber. (Fortunately, the key boy in this story is named Spence!)

Quibbles aside, I think the most gorgeous thing about Three Quarters Dead is the tone, Kerry's voice and the way it interacts with pacing to build suspense. Peck has Kerry recount her experiences by looking back on the whole thing. In another book, this might create a sense of drag, but here it suits the genre, evoking a hushed midnight rendering of a ghost story lit only by a sleep-over flashlight. Considering the framing, there's an amazing feeling of suspense as we watch Kerry make a series of mindless mistakes, putting complete trust in someone who doesn't deserve it whether she's alive or dead. Reading Three Quarters Dead feels like watching one of those movies where the girl walks down the long hall of the haunted house, and you tell her on the screen, "Don't open that door!" You know, the door with the monster behind it? But of course she does.

And isn't that what high school is like sometimes, when you can be enthralled by a "friend" who is nothing but trouble, nothing but selfish? Even so, Three Quarters Dead isn't preachy; it's just scary. And—no surprise here!—beautifully well written. It's a slim book, but then, there's never a wasted word in the work of the fantastic Mr. Peck.

If you like this ghost story, try Margaret Mahy's The Tricksters (for older teens).

Note for Worried Parents: Three Quarters Dead is a book for teens, though it's pretty wholesome other than some teen drinking, a scene in a nightclub (mostly dancing), and a little talk about dressing to enhance one's breasts.

Christmas Books Old and New

The radio's playing Christmas music, with a strangely repetitive emphasis on "There's No Place Like Home for the Holidays," and apparently everyone in the United States except me is Christmas shopping today, so I thought it would be a good time to tell you about some Christmas-themed children's books. I'll start with two I just added to my library.

A Season of Gifts by Richard Peck

I read Richard Peck's new book, A Season of Gifts, last week, and I thought, Richard Peck doesn't need me to write a review of his book. But then I thought, I need to write a review of his book. The back jacket flap quotes the Washington Post as describing Peck as "America's best living author for young adults." I don't know about young adults vs. children, so I'd just say Peck is "America's best living author for young people." The companion novels, A Long Way from Chicago and A Year Down Yonder, made the American Library Association notable lists in both the children's and young adult categories; they also won a Newbery Honor and Newbery Medal, respectively.

I really hope you've already met Grandma Dowdel in those previous books, but if you haven't, I recommend you read all three. In the first two books, she is hosting her grandchildren. In this book, she is much older but still going strong. We catch a glimpse of her great-grandson, but mostly we see her with the children who live next door.

It's sort of astonishing that a book about an old lady could be such a great read for children, but then, Mrs. Dowdel isn't your run-of-the-mill old lady. When children come into her orbit, they are not only baffled, entranced, and entertained, they are also altered. Mrs. Dowdel is more than just irreverent and unpredictable, she is kind, though her kindness is hidden beneath a veil of eccentricity and toughness. Mrs. Dowdel is pretty good friends with her shotgun.

The story is told by a boy named Bob who moves into the next-to-last house in a small town, along with his preacher father, his worried mother, his Elvis-crazy older sister, and his lost puppy younger sister. The last house in town is Mrs. Dowdel's. At first Bob and his family catch only glimpses of their strange neighbor, but pretty soon their lives are enmeshed in surprising ways. Mrs. Dowdel manages to be a hero and a friend subtly, without taking away the dignity or decision-making power of the people she helps, in this case Bob's family. Bob is being bullied, his father needs a congregation, his older sister is secretly seeing the town bad boy, his mother needs help with all of the other family members, and his little sister needs a grandma.

But this would be just another feel-good book without the author's humor, or without his spare, perfectly constructed prose. And I do mean perfect. Here's a sample:

I followed her across the hall and jumped back at her door. To help her settle in, Mother had let Phyllis paint her room in her choice of color. She'd picked a Day-Glo pink that really yelled at you. It was like being inside a stomach.

Then Phyllis had painted a stripe of that same Day-Glo pink down the center of the floor and warned Ruth Ann never to set a sandal across it.

Phyllis had hung her Elvis Presley posters, all eight of them, around both sides of the room. I know for a fact Phyllis wrote letters to Elvis Presley regularly, though she never heard back. Ruth Ann sat bunched up on her bed, clutching her dolly. Looming above her was a giant poster of Elvis in a cowboy rig and neckerchief, strumming a guitar. Another was Elvis in the gold coat he wore on his tour last year. Elvis was all swooping hair and sideburns and showing teeth in life-size sneers, all over the room. He was everywhere. It was like being in a revolving door with him.

"I'm scared," Ruth Ann said over her knees. She made big eyes up at a poster. "Don't go out and leave me with him." She whispered for fear Elvis would hear.

A Season of Gifts is solidly posed as a holiday book, building up to Christmas. Between Mrs. Dowdel's gruffly kind tendencies and Bob's preacher father, you will find messages about being a good person here. But the book really isn't limited to one denomination, and the holiday setting ends up being a lot less important than the shotgun-wielding granny's good intentions and the often-sly way she goes about getting what she wants.

The antagonist in A Season of Gifts is the aforementioned town bad boy. The war between Roscoe Burdick and Mrs. Dowdel has apparently been going on for a while, but in this book, we first meet Roscoe when he bullies Bob in a really creative way involving Mrs. Dowdel's privy (leading to the funniest joke in the book, referring to a famous Bible passage). Later Roscoe takes advantage of Phyllis's Elvis fetish to win her heart, or at least to capture her imagination. But Mrs. Dowdel isn't through with Roscoe, and though she loses a few skirmishes, there's never any doubt she'll win this war. The only question is how she'll do it.

It took me a while to catch on, since Coyote and Loki don't usually come dressed up as cranky old women in small-town America in 1958, but yes, I think Mrs. Dowdel is actually that classic mythological character, the Trickster. But mythology or no, I have to say: lucky, lucky us. Because 'tis the season, and Richard Peck has given us another marvelous gift of a book.

Voices of Christmas by Nikki Grimes and Eric Velasquez

The second Christmas book I've acquired this year is Voices of Christmas by Nikki Grimes, with illustrations by Eric Velasquez and even an audio CD. In case you haven't heard of Nikki Grimes, she's a famous writer of poetry and novels for children. In this book, she presents a poem for each character in the story of the birth of Jesus Christ. Each poem is introduced by the character's name and a quote from the Bible at the top of the page, followed by a poem at the bottom, all encased in the artwork.

The obvious characters are included, but we also get the thoughts of a neighbor and of less well-known Biblical figures such as Simeon and Ana at the temple when the baby Jesus is taken to be blessed. Each of the magi is given his own page, drawing out their portion of the story in a way that echoes the shape of their journey in its elongation. Grimes even uses something implied by the Biblical narrative—that by the time the magi arrive, the baby is now a child, living in a house with his parents. (Most versions show the magi arriving at the stable, a chronology that doesn't work well even without the reference about the child and the house.)

The poems in Voices of Christmas are simple, yet well crafted. As the title might imply, the voice of each character is as important to the success of the poetry as the story they are telling. Mary speaks of her bedroom walls "[beaming] brighter than moonrise" even after the angel is gone, Zechariah laments being "a dim-witted man" for having questioned the promise of a son in his old age, and the innkeeper, shown as a smug woman in the artwork, justifies herself with an irony readers will recognize even if she does not:

I led them to a dry spot
in my stable,
and a bed of hay
on which to lay themselves.
It was the most I could offer,
other than to share
my own, warm room.
And who would care
to do that for strangers?
It's not as if they were royalty, right?
A stable would do for the night.

This book is very beautiful. It is also very somber. Even the colors are dark, with an emphasis on blues and grays and browns. I don't know that those who lack an interest in the Christmas story will be drawn to this one, which ends on a note of faith, addressing You, the reader, as the last character. But for anyone with the slightest bit of belief, let alone a strong commitment to Christianity, Voices of Christmas is a book to add to your collection.

I will confess that I have not yet listened to the CD enclosed with this book, but it's something I look forward to this holiday season! The 20-minute CD is narrated by the poet and Craig Northcutt, with music added by Keith Ward.

An African American writer, Nikki Grimes has earned Coretta Scott King honors for several books, most notably winning the Coretta Scott King Award in 2002 for her novel Bronx Masquerade. There is often an unabashedly spiritual component to her work, and I especially like her poetry.

Now I'll share some Christmas books that have been in my library a little longer...

The Story of Holly and Ivy by Rumor Godden and Barbara Cooney

My favorite Christmas book for children is this one, the old-fashioned, magical story of a little girl who gets off a train at the wrong stop on purpose to go looking for her grandmother, even though she is an orphan and truly doesn't have one. The author tells us right up front, "This is a story about wishing," and oh, is it ever! Ivy wishes for a home and a doll, while little doll Holly wishes for a child to hold her and the policeman's wife is wishing, too. Unless you've read any of the author's other doll stories and recall her matter-of-fact tone, you might not understand how a book can be this sentimental without being irritating or schmaltzy. But it works. There's even a highly original villain in the form of a toy owl named Abracadabra. I get this book out every Christmas and read it with just as much joy as the year before. Cooney's illustrations are equally simple and direct, yet with a touch of softness, complementing the story exactly as they should. Especially if you have daughters ages 5-7 or even 8 or 9 in the house, give Holly and Ivy a try. (Trivia extra: Demi Moore named her oldest daughter after this author.)

I should tell you that my love of Christmas-themed stories began with my mother, who told us her favorites every Christmas Eve for years. She eventually collected most of the stories in a book which is now out of print, Under a Christmas Star. Among the stories she told us was Rumor Godden's "Holly and Ivy." As I recall, my mother had found it printed in a women's magazine and kept it with her Christmas things until it was falling apart.

One year when I was far from home in Argentina, my American roommate and I decided to celebrate Christmas in June, since it was winter where we were and thus, to our homesick twenty-one-year-old minds, should have been Christmas. I had a little stash of American food someone had sent me, so we made tuna sandwiches and I recounted the story of Rumor Godden's "Holly and Ivy" in great detail. A few years later, after my friend and I were back in the States and had gone our separate ways, the story was made into a picture book with illustrations by Barbara Cooney. Kathy discovered it and sent me an inscribed copy—a keepsake to this day.

Christmas Day in the Morning by Pearl S. Buck and Mark Buehner

Are you familiar with this often-anthologized story about a farm boy who gets up early to surprise his father by milking the cows? In the hands of a lesser writer, the story would be didactic. Here the characterization is so strong and the telling so stark that the sentiment is rich without being cloying. Because let's face it: there is a place for tenderness in this world, and the very fact that here it is expressed between a father and son who don't usually talk about that sort of thing makes it all the more moving. Mark Beuhner's illustrations, as somber-hued as the ones in the Nikki Grimes book described above, are well suited to evoking both the winter darkness and the deepest, truest places in the human heart.

How Many Miles to Bethlehem? by Kevin Crossley-Holland and Peter Malone

This British author is currently best known for his heavy-duty children's novels about a flawed King Arthur, beginning with The Seeing Stone. Here he writes a picture book about the Nativity, and like Nikki Grimes, he gives voices to the characters in the story. Peter Malone's illustrations are deliberately medieval in feel and also rather dark, although with more warm browns and yellows than the books I've told you about so far. The author's tone is much lighter, however, and his characters' voices more contemporary in style. For example, here's Crossley-Holland's version of the innkeeper:

Sorry, Joseph! Every space is taken, and there's nothing left to eat—I'm even out of figs and grapes.

We'll all be hungry tonight. My guests. My cats. Everyone except the stone-hearted Emperor.

Each character in this narration is lightly linked to the character on the proceeding page, creating a cumulative feel. I recommend How Many Miles to Bethlehem? to you as an artful and unusual Christmas book.

B Is for Bethlehem: A Christmas Alphabet by Isabel Wilner and Elisa Kleven

Last month I talked about Elisa Kleven's artwork in my review of Tony Johnston's The Whole Green World. This nativity-themed alphabet, also illustrated by Kleven, is another gorgeous book. Each letter is accompanied by an appropriate couplet from the author. For example, we get "N is for Night, so quiet, so still./Peace in the stable. Peace on the hill." The words are nice, but not extraordinary. The illustrations are both giddy and grand, however, well worth your time.

The Nativity, slightly adapted from the King James text, illustrated by Julie Vivas

I'll end with my favorite version of the Christmas story, The Nativity, which is illustrated by Julie Vivas. Vivas, an Australian illustrator and Dromkeen Medal winner, is probably best known for her artwork in Mem Fox's Possom Magic, but I am enamored of her take on the birth of Jesus. Vivas gives us a Mary who is wildly, obviously nine months pregnant. All of these characters, including the angels, look like peasants, but not medieval ones. No, they look like they could live in some small Australian town in the 1940s or so.

For instance, the passage from the Bible about the Anunciation shows us Mary (in house slippers and an apron) and the angel (in unlaced boots) sitting at a kitchen table—chicken standing beside them—deep in conversation over cups of what might be coffee or soup. As they talk, Gabriel's wings are spread behind him like parchment scrolls, glimmering with lavender and gold and tattered at the edges. Some might find this rendition of the story facetious, but I think it's touching, not to mention a nice change from some of the books I'm not listing here, which tend to look like so many failed attempts at painting like the Renaissance masters.

Here are a few more memorable Christmas titles, plus one Hanukkah favorite:

The Story of Christmas by Jane Ray
How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss
Mr. Willoughby's Christmas Tree by Robert Barry
The Legend of the Poinsettia by Tomie DePaola
The Legend of Old Befana by Tomie DePaola
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson
The Miracle on 34th Street by Valentine Davies (better known as a movie)
The House without a Christmas Tree by Gail Rock (a movie on TV, I think)
Let It Snow: Three Holiday Romances by John Green, Lauren Myracle, and Maureen Johnson (Young Adult)
Herschel and the Hanukkah Goblins by Eric A. Kimmel and Trina Schart Hyman

Feel free to note your own favorites in the comments. And in the coming weeks, I wish you much happiness!

Notes from a Children's Book Conference

This weekend is the SCBWI (Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators) Conference, conveniently located just across town from me here in Los Angeles. I'll try to squeeze in a book review later this weekend, but for the moment, let me give you a few observations from the conference. I'll continue to add to these as the conference progresses. (For more extensive blog notes, go to the SCBWI site, where a team of bloggers is reporting on the conference.)


DAY ONE

Keynote speaker SHERMAN ALEXIE made me think, Wow, I would have paid the $450 just to hear this talk! He was passionate, funny, and (deliberately, I suspect) more than a little nuts. It's not the kind of thing I can recreate here, but hearing him prompted me to retrieve The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian from slightly lower down in my massive To Read pile and move it to the top. He joked around about the banned book elements in his work and the odd friendliness of our crowd, as opposed to the world of publishing for grown-ups. (That world is cannibalistic; the world of Young Adult literature, he said, is still a little ruthless, but you'd only come away with a pinkie toe missing, not your whole body.) By telling the story of a poignant personal experience with a reader, Alexie reminded us that if, as authors, our books touch only one kid, we've done our job and it's all worth it. He also pointed out (sharing examples from two groups of readers who sent him fan male, one from a rich prep school and the other from the Crow reservation) that most teens, rich and poor, sound a painfully common theme: "My choices are being made for me."

The second speaker was brilliant picture book author-illustrator DAVID WIESNER. He started with some video from the old movie, Frankenstein, in which Igor cries, "It's alive." Using this as a repeated theme about how inspiration strikes, Wiesner walked us through the genesis of his ideas for key books. It turns out early science fiction films and books are major inspirations. 2001: A Space Odyssey, particularly its match cut from the thrown bone to a spaceship, is one such influence. Match cut-style illustrations and worlds within worlds appear over and over in Wiesner's work. It was fascinating to see how the bits and pieces of Wiesner's visual inspirations came together to help create his unique work. For example, Flotsam was originally the story of a round piece of crystal shown traveling through time till it washed up on a beach, but the boy who appeared late in that draft came to dominate the story, as did a single sketch of a girl holding a picture of another child holding a picture of another child. We learned that Wiesner painted each of the children in the series of photos-within-photos separately and inset them using the computer rather than painting them with what would have been an increasingly rough brushstroke relative to the size.

Naturally, I couldn't attend all the workshops. To start with, I chose INGRID LAW, curious to hear from the woman whose debut book won a Newbery Honor award earlier this year. Law's topic was supposed to be "Writing a Strong Voice in a Willly-Nilly, Namby-Pamby Way," but someone accidentally typed it up as "a Strange Voice," so she incorporated the error into her presentation with panache. The most important thing I can tell you about Law is that she loves and collects words. As she told us, "Words sort of rule voice for me." Law recommended a book called Spunk and Bite (a parody of the classic Strunk and White); she also encouraged us to have a piece of cake (which she brought on the plane as part of an object lesson) and to take creative risks. Law said she was unhappy with the manuscript she was working on one day, so she took out a piece of paper and just put down the craziest sentence she could think of: "When my brother Fish turned thirteen, we moved to the deepest part of inland because of the hurricane and, of course, the fact that he'd caused it." With a minor word change, that sentence became the first sentence of Savvy; it also contained the seeds for much of the book. I am happy to report that Law is nearly done with a companion book, tentatively titled Scumble. It's about a boy in Wyoming (cowboy country) named Ledger Cale. Let's hope for a 2010 release!

Next I went to RICHARD PECK's workshop on the topic of setting because I had heard one of his presentations a few years ago and knew he was an amazing teacher. Peck walked us through various examples of setting, helping us see that setting details have to earn their pay by telling us things about character and plot instead of just lounging around. He told us that a story always works from the idea of an epiphany, "a sudden new awareness that is acted upon" by the main character--unlike in real life, he quipped, where we generally run from epiphanies and the thought of change. In addressing authors' tendency to "overdress the set" with too many details, Peck observed, "Happy writing makes for sad reading" and encouraged us to cut back. "I'm not fifteen; I don't want credit for everything I write," he noted. The author also gave us a look at his next book, a YA ghost story called Three-Quarters Dead. It's due out in 2010 and sounded wonderfully creepy, so put it on your list. One more thought from Richard Peck: "Setting is the exterior landscape that reflects the interior of our characters."

The last speaker I heard was BETTY BIRNEY. She's the author of a middle grade series about a class hamster named Humphrey. Her sense of humor made me want to take a look at this series for younger readers, which sounds clever and appealing. The first book is called The World According to Humphrey. Fun facts: Birney worked at Disneyland for years, and she does not own a hamster. She's pretty sure her dog wouldn't like it!


DAY TWO

I wasn't going to mention yesterday's panel of editors, but I've realized that JENNIFER HUNT from Little Brown offered us a nuanced categorization of the best kinds of books on what she calls (beautifully) a publisher's "well-curated list." Hunt spoke of (1) A backlist gem, a book which just seems to quietly stay in print, year after year--e.g., Wendy Mass's A Mango-Shaped Space, (2) The great debut, a book which quickly acquires a solid fanbase looking forward to the next book from that author--e.g., Sarah Ockler's Twenty Boy Summer, (3) A book in which an author noticeably finds his/her voice, creating a true and unique style in comparison to previous publications--e.g., Julie Anne Peters's Luna, (4) A career changer, a book which solidly puts a previously less-noticed author on the map and off the midlist--e.g., Sarah Zarr's Story of a Girl, (5) [A work with] Vision, a book which may be unconventional, a risk on the publisher's part, but which is a unique success--e.g., Peter Brown's The Curious Garden, and (6) The phenomenon, a book which shoots meteorically to the top, not only of the list, but of the national/international consciousness--e.g., Stephenie Meyer's Twilight and J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter books.

I missed most of a panel on picture book collaboration with Melinda Long, Eve Bunting, and Kadir Nelson, conducted by Arthur Levine, because I was upstairs having breakfast with a group of fellow fantasy writers from the Enchanted Inkpot. (It's always nice to eat scrambled eggs while watching famous authors like Richard Peck stroll by.) What I caught at the tail end of the panel was that illustrators don't mind talking to authors as much as editors seem to think they might, and that the illustration process truly is a separate creative endeavor--most of this from the great KADIR NELSON (see We Are the Ship and Abe's Honest Words, among others).

KAREN CUSHMAN, creator of Newbery honor winner Catherine, Called Birdy, and Newbery Medal winner The Midwife's Apprentice, was up next. She shared some great quotes, including this one from W Somerset Maugham: "There are three rules for writing. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are." She went on to caution us, "Don't listen to advice. Even mine, which of course I am going to give you anyway." Cushman then talked about the ways in which her own writing process bucks conventional wisdom. I was surprised to hear how late her own writing career started--she said she had been telling her husband story ideas for years, and he always listened. When she was about fifty, she came to him with an idea, and he refused to listen. "Write it down," he told her, "and I'll read it." She was irritated, but she did it, and the book became Catherine, Called Birdy. Cushman scoffed at the idea of "writing what you know," pointing out that if she did that, she'd write this: "Got up this morning, made stuff up, went to bed." Instead, she told us, "I say, write what you want to know." The author said that she is concise to a fault. Her first drafts are usually only fifty or sixty pages long, prompting her editor, Dinah Stevenson, to call one such manuscript "a bouillon cube of a book."

I attended HOLLY BLACK's workshop on "How to Be Good Critiquers and Critique Partners" mostly because I like her writing and wanted to hear from her. I won't give you a lot of what she said because it's pretty off topic for this blog, but she did say she thinks that by working with a critique group or partner, you can learn things from watching someone else go through the revision process. She also mentioned "The Envy Test," saying that if someone's work makes her a little envious and angry, she figures it's ready to go out to the publisher. Speaking of generosity, Black said, "You have to believe that there will always be more ideas." The author was delightful! This may sound obvious, but one of the nicest things about attending an SCBWI Conference is finding out how fun, funny, smart, and kind the author presenters are, almost without exception.

ELLEN HOPKINS then addressed the entire conference. She was self-effacing and light-hearted, in contrast to her books--young adult (YA) novels in verse about extremely difficult topics, or rather, teens in extremely difficult situations. She explained that her first book, Crank, came out of a painful personal situation: Ellen was forced by a judge to send her bright high-school age daughter to spend time with her drug dealer father. The girl took up with a bad boy and became a drug addict. Hopkins talked about getting as far as she has in the world of children's books by "sheer stubbornness," explaining that while people like Stephenie Meyer take a helicopter to the top of the mountain, most of us are in for a long, hard climb.

After Ellen spoke, we heard from a panel of agents, who agreed that even if these tough economic times, children's books are doing fairly well. That is, the publishers have had lay-offs, but they are still buying and selling books. A few factoids: YA is going strong, especially since more adults are reading them. Brenda Bowen, a senior editor who was laid off and switched to being an agent earlier this year, said she looks for strong voices; confident, assured writing; creative language; and humor in acquiring books. All six agents--BRENDA BOWEN, SARAH DAVIES, STEPHEN FRASER, DAN LAZAR, KELLY SONNACK, and MARIETTA ZACKER--said that they usually work with authors on editing manuscripts before sending them on to editors. As Sonnack concluded, "All of us here want to fall in love. We want to fall in love with your work."

I then attended a workshop with EVE BUNTING called "What Makes a Good Picture Book Better." The author had some good advice, but best of all was hearing her talk about her books. In case you weren't aware, Bunting has written a number of picture books about serious topics like the Vietnam Memorial, the Holocaust, and homeless people living in airports. However, Eve Bunting is not a somber person, and even though she looks like a dear grandmother type, she is nice and feisty. Perhaps the best thing she said was during the Q&A at the end, when someone asked her "When do you do your thinking?" (Bunting had said that she spends a lot of time pondering her ideas before writing anything, which she considers part of the writing process.) The author's answer? "While my husband is talking." Perhaps her best advice was "Never be boring." She pointed out that parents will have to sit through repeated readings of picture books. "You can escape this pitfall with a little humor and a fresh idea." She also advised us that if someone asks us what we do and we say we write for children, and they get a condescending look on their faces, "Slap them!"

Wow, I am so running out of gas... Conferences are rewarding, but draining. I will try to add to these notes in a few days. Meanwhile, I've posted a book review!

DAY THREE

Author-illustrator-animator DAN YACCARINO spoke to the group on Sunday morning. His theme was "Yes!" After years of hard work and training in illustration (doing pieces for newspaper editorials, for example), he broke into children's illustration and animation partly because if anyone asked him whether he could do something, he'd say he could, even if it was new to him. I like this line, which belies a lot of misconceptions about creating for an audience of children: "You can't be precious about this stuff." He later added, "Kids can smell it on you a mile away when you're insincere."

Yaccarino is inspired by things like robots, cartoons, Mad Magazine, and toys and packaging from his childhood. He showed us a page from his first book, My Big Brother Mike, with the comment, "I still haven't forgiven my big brother for breaking my toys." Later in his presentation, he showed us a picture of his art studio, which is filled with cool gadgets and toys. "This is my studio. So I got back at my brother." Yaccarino showed us that he works on personal art projects on the side to fuel his work; some of the styles he tries end up appearing in later projects.

Asked if he knew how to do animation, Dan Yaccarino said, "Yes!" He ended up creating multiple TV shows for children, including Nickelodeon's terrific program for preschoolers, Oswald. Yaccarino did the initial character design for the Backyardigans, another well-known show. His newest animated program will appear on cable this fall: Willa's Wild Life. He is very proud of his work re-envisioning the Little Golden Books for a new audience; for example, take a look at his urban Mother Goose. I'm interested in reading his biography of Jacques Cousteau, as well, and the book he has coming out next spring sounds hilarious: Yaccarino described Lawn to Lawn as "The Incredible Journey meets lawn ornaments."

HOLLY BLACK addressed the entire conference on the topic of fantasy writing, "Examining the Strange." It was very fun to hear that she grew up in a decrepit Victorian with a mother who believed in the supernatural. Black said that as a child she asked her mother, "Mom, are there things out there like vampires, werewolves, and witches that might come get me?" Her mother's response? "Well, probably not." Black's mother also warned her never to astral project because if she left her body empty, something might come and take it over before she got back!

The author of Tithe and the Spiderwick Chronicles told us, "I believe that all writing is a conversation with what came before," so we should "Read enough that we are part of the conversation." She had an interesting take on the audience we write for: "As children's book writers, we are in a genreless genre." She said that since children don't know a lot about categorizing books by genres, we can invent things that are entirely new, and the kids won't know that. They're a wonderfully fresh audience.

Black explained that she doesn't think fantasy is more escapist than any other kind of literature. "Fantasy is the language of metaphor; it actualizes metaphor." This lends itself to working with themes in rich ways. For example, "When we write about something alien, we will also write about alienation." Black expounded on this idea, saying that fantasy gives writers and readers a safe place to deal with difficult issues such as anger. "You can't be mad at someone for being a werewolf. You can't say, 'It's not nice to be a werewolf.' You have to say, 'Okay, now what?'"

The author differentiated between horror and fantasy, saying that the latter may evoke both awe and fear, but the former only evokes fear. With fantasy, "You get the sense that the world is bigger and stranger and greater for having those strange things in it." And she quoted adult fantasy writer Gene Wolf as saying, "All novels are fantasies. Some are just more honest about it." She went on to say that Gene Wolf had said that realistic fiction made him feel like something was missing--the spiritual, the mysterious, the divine. Then she quoted from a rather caustic essay from Ursula LeGuin which stated, "A writer may use all the trappings of fantasy without ever imagining anything." Black added that we have to believe in Elfland when we read fantasy. It has to feel real. Like historical fiction, good fantasy convinces readers that they've been somewhere they've never actually been.

Holly Black then told us about "closed fantasy" with "day logic," or fantasy which has predictable spells and rules, e.g., Harry Potter. She contrasted this with "open fantasy" that has "night logic," where the rules are seldom spelled out and magic users must work more intuitively. The example she gave for this is Charlaine Harris's Southern Vampire series (Sookie Stackhouse/True Blood).

I next attended a workshop about the current children's book market given by agent (and former editor) STEPHEN FRASER, who said, "I think this is an era of no mediocre books." He explained that in tough economic times, publishers are unwilling to buy books that don't have strikingly fresh plots and voices supported by amazing craftsmanship. The bar has been raised, which is good news for readers! Picture books are the part of the market that is shrinking the most, while middle grade books are holding steady and YA is on the upswing. On the whole, children's books are doing better than most adult genres in terms of sales these days, the exception being mysteries and thrillers. I liked what Fraser said of middle grade kids: "They're really fervent readers." He said something thought-provoking about YA, as well. He talked about the increase in edgy books, but said that he didn't mean edgy in terms of shocking topics. Rather, the newer books are edgier when it comes to authentic writing, humor, and over-the-top drama. They're "extra special," he said. (Printz winner Jellicoe Road is an example that came to my mind when he said that.) Asked about the effect of publishing house mergers on the market, the agent said that yes, it has an impact on writers. He quipped, "There's this little corporate quirk called greed."

As far as trends, Fraser predicted that the current vampire fad (prompted by the success of Stephenie Meyer's Twilight) will end soon. He sees a need for books about boys, especially by male authors, and really good books about Latino and black characters.

At the GOLDEN KITE AWARDS luncheon, we heard from the following:

BONNIE BECKER, winner for A Visitor for Bear for picture book text, quoted E.B. White as saying, "All that I hope to say in books, all that I ever hope to say, is that I love the world." Becker changed the quote for herself, saying that she would end it, "I love people." Hence her lovely characters, the bear and the mouse in her book.

HYEWON YUM won for best illustration with her lovely book, Last Night. SCBWI president Steve Mooser introduced her with a quote from editor Arthur Levine, "We're looking for books that show unmistakable originality." Yum was very soft-spoken, apologizing for her limited English--which kind of matched her wordless winner! I did look at her book later, and it's a darling read for 2- to 5-year-olds.

PAMELA S. TURNER is part of my group over at Enchanted Inkpot, since she's currently writing a fantasy. But she is best known for really terrific nonfiction. Turner spoke about her winner for nonfiction, A Life in the Wild: George Schaller's Struggle to Save the Last Great Beasts. We were touched to hear that she's donating her royalties and her winnings to George Schaller's wildlife conservation foundation. It turns out George Schaller is the father of the modern conservation movement, and the first to suggest studying live animals in the wild (as opposed to their corpses!). He went out in the wild all alone and showed that it could be done, and that it was highly effective, studying gorillas, lions, and pandas, among other animals. His work with gorillas inspired Diane Fosse. Well, anyone who studies animal behavior in the wild is following in his footsteps. (Turner's new book The Frog Scientist also looks fascinating--plus the scientist is black, which I appreciate as an educator. I picked up a copy at the conference.)

STEVE WATKINS won the Golden Kite award for fiction. His book, Down Sand Mountain, is set in the late sixties. I didn't take a lot of notes, but the author was very personable, and his racism-themed coming-of-age YA is obviously a troubling and touching work, intended to make readers think about what it means to be human.

DONNA GEPHART won the Sid Fleischman humor award for her book, As If Being 12 3/4 Weren't Bad Enough, My Mother Is Running for President! Sid Fleischman was unable to attend, but Steve Mooser quoted him as saying, "The author knew the secret of comedy: it's tragedy wearing a putty nose."

Then RICHARD PECK spoke, and I have to tell you, he's the most quotable person on the planet. What a way the man has with words! I'm trying to think of the male equivalent of the term grand dame, but the closest I can come is grand master, as in chess. Here are some of the lines I caught on paper:

--"You have to read 1000 books to write 1."
--"J.K. Rowling never attended Hogwarts, and Beatrix Potter was never a rabbit."

--"A story is always about going forward because you can never go back."

--"Nobody ever grows up until he has to, and in our stories, everyone has to."

--"Boys do not wish to make imaginative leaps; boys like to make clear connections."

--"You can teach children, or you can fear their parents; you cannot do both."

--Speaking of writers, who have become today's most powerful teachers of children: "We can't be fired; we're unemployed."

--And "We are a subversive counterculture."

--At the airport, "The checked bag is the badge of the amateur."

--"We write in a time when maturing itself has become an elective."

--Speaking of despair, "...when the self-pity comes in like the tide..." and "in a world of sexting and Twitter and the communal stupidity of MySpace." Later he added to his description of "a world disfigured by sorrow and chatrooms... and the double-barreled despair of Barnes and Noble."

--"We're growing older every minute while our readers stay mysteriously the same age."

Near the end of his talk, Peck recounted visiting a group of eighth grade writers at a middle school and telling them, "All stories turn upon epiphany." He then asked the class for a definition of epiphany, and one boy responded with "An epiphany is when everything changes and you can't go back." Peck said that that was the best definition of the word he'd ever heard. After the students filed out, the teacher explained to Peck that the boy had discovered his father in the bathtub two years earlier, dead of an accidental overdose. The mother was already deceased. With great tenderness, Peck told us that as an author, when you meet a boy like that, a child in a dark place, "You wonder if story can help, and give him a little companionship." (Aha, I've got it! Peck is an elder statesman. But I still like grand master.)

Speaking of epiphanies, after that I went to a workshop on voice given by ELLEN HOPKINS, who introduced us to several teens by showing us their MySpace letters to her, their profile descriptions, and their pictures. She wanted us to understand that each kid has a unique voice, one affected by his/her experiences. Hopkins also asked us how many of us loved high school, and how many hated it. She gave us some pointers about using a YA voice, then asked us to write a few paragraphs describing a life-changing moment in our own high school experience. I have to say, the piece I wrote felt pretty epiphanic to me. It also shook me up: I cried when I read it to the group. Although I do cry easily--blush blush. But hey: I walked out of there thinking differently about teens, let alone voice! (Note for Worried Parents: Hopkins's books are not for the faint of heart, as they're about topics like drug abuse, mental illness, abuse, and teen prostitution. Yet she is really meeting the needs of her readers, many of whom are themselves struggling and clearly feel understood and connected when they read her work.)

Egmont editor ELIZABETH LAW ended our day with her address to another full session. Like many of the other editors and agents at the conference, she emphasized the need for unique, powerful premises/plots. She cited Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games, Rebecca Stead's When You Reach Me, Ingrid Law's Savvy, and Laurie Halse Anderson's "spectacular, terrifying" Wintergirls as examples of striking books that stand out in a crowded market. I have to say, Richard Peck also talked about Wintergirls, saying how superb it is! I tend to shy away from the darker YAs (because I'm a big softie), but these endorsements make me curious. One interesting observation from Law: She pointed out that although people gripe about the awards process (Newbery, Printz, etc.), the awards encourage publishers to continue to acquire literary works in a business that is increasingly oriented toward more commercial books.

DAY FOUR

Clarion/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt editor DINAH STEVENSON opened the last day of the conference with a talk about "The Four C's" required for a successful book. She included numerous brilliant quotations from various literary figures. Her Four C's are:

1. Creativity--"an essential strategy for writers" and, she noted, "something you do."

2. Craft--She talked about creativity growing in the garden and craft happening in the kitchen; you grow creativity like vegetables, then apply craftsmanship to them to turn them into something delicious. Craft is "artistry, skill, insight, and how to use language."

3. Community--although writers are naturally competitive, we must support and nurture one another. Through helping others, we help ourselves.

4. Chocolate--or some other kind of treat or celebration. Writing should be a joyful act.

Another good piece of advice from Stevenson was "Make yourself indispensible by writing what only you can write."

INGRID LAW addressed the conference next. Her talk was titled "Writing Magic: From the Head to the Heart." She told us, "Don't be too careful, because that is part of the magic that you create.... All of you are enchanters, and all of you are potion-makers." The rest of her talk was a story, an allegory about writing in which a man aspires to make magical potions but goes about it all wrong, or rather, learns a lot along the way. It is only when the aspiring potion-maker includes the shards and tears from his own years of pain and worry that he is finally able to create a true potion. The story was touching and a little funny, like Law's book Savvy.

After the two keynote speakers finished, I went to a workshop by agent SARAH DAVIES, who has one of those wonderful Gaiman-esque accents. She told us that a love of language had created the path for her life, and went on to give us five (actually six) ingredients for creating a breakout novel:

1. Unique--an inspired concept; "I see a lot of very similar stories."

2. Larger-than-life characters--A main character must be vivid and true, must leap off the page into our hearts and minds. Get to know your characters very well.

3. A high-stakes story--e.g., Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games, though in realistic fiction, the stakes may be emotional rather than physical.

4. A deeply felt theme--a moral or spiritual message delivered without preaching or teaching overtly. It's something that stays with the reader after the last page is turned.

5. A vivid setting--one that is imbued with emotion, almost becoming a character. E.g., the setting in the movie Slumdog Millionaire.

6. That special alchemy called voice--"You need to develop a musicality about language."

Davies quoted Anthony Trollope as saying, "There is no way of writing well and also of writing easily." She also quoted an anonymous person who stated, "What I like in good author is not what he says, but what he whispers." Davies noted that "[publishing] is so hard because we are at that painful interface between creativity and big business."

Then I attended a panel on cross-genre writing given by Simon and Schuster editor ARTHUR LEVINE (filling in for Sid Fleischman) and authors LINDA SUE PARK and LISA YEE. One of the points they made is that different arts and genres cross-pollinate: Sid Fleischman started as a magician and a screenwriter, Linda Sue Park was originally a poet, and Lisa Yee worked in copywriting. All three built on strengths from their previous creative endeavors when they began writing children's books. Writing across genres seemed like a natural extension of this practice. The funniest moment in the workshop came during a Q&A at the end, when someone asked the panel, "Have you ever thought about writing under a different name?" To which Lisa Yee responded immediately, "I write under 'J.K. Rowling.'"

The conference concluded (no, really!) with a talk given by KATHLEEN DUEY, who said that she revised her remarks that very day so as not to cover the same ground as the other speakers. She spoke of the need for having a reentry strategy after attending the conference--specific techniques for maximizing the ideas learned during the course of the weekend. Duey is the author of the YA fantasy Skin Hunger, which I confess is languishing in my gigantic To Read pile. The sequel, Sacred Scars, was just released. Duey wrapped up her talk by saying, "I want to talk about this thing we do, this story thing we do.... I think stories are the connective tissue for lots of things, for many things... stories don't only teach, they also shield." She added that stories "can serve a thousand, thousand, thousand uses every day of our lives."