Unleash the Magic!

Attention Children, Teens, Parents, and Grandparents of Central Texas!

November 14, 2009 more than 40 children and YA authors will be

showcasing their work and interacting with their readers at the Hill Country Book Festival for Children and Youth 2009 to be held in the Georgetown, Texas Public Library from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm.

An excellent way to kick off the Christmas season!

Nine authors will be presenting for the children and teens throughout the day along with writing activities and practice in developing and illustrating their own books.

A panel discussion on “College Preparation Tips” will be held from 1:00-2:45, and a Scrabble Tournament will be on going throughout the day.

At 3:00, the awards to the winners of the Hill Country Book Festival writing competition will be presented to the top three in each age category. The grand prize is a Dell Netbook Computer.

Activities throughout the day include a magician; face painting, and elementary oral readers. Check out the festival Web site for more details.

Come and enjoy the fun!

The Adventures of Scampy Churchmouse 

The Adventures of Scampy Churchmouse

The Adventures of Scampy Churchmouse would never have come into being if it were not for the social networking site Facebook. This is proof of its power to bring people from all parts of the country together.

This story was written in the early 1970s to explain the Trinity to my own children, Teresa and Philip. Time passed; the manuscript remained in the box. Ten years later, we were living in a small town in Montana when my first book was published. With that confidence, I considered publishing The Adventures of Scampy Churchmouse. Finding an illustrator in an isolated town of 350 seemed impossible, except my daughter, now in middle school, had a classmate who was an excellent artist. Sheree did a number of sketches for me, but the path to publication was blocked and the illustrations and loose pages went back into a box.

Time went by. The pages of the manuscript turned yellow. I changed addresses twelve times, my last name even changed. My son and daughter each had a son and daughter. I went on to publish fifteen other books, but The Adventures of Scampy Churchmouse remained in the box.

One bright Texas spring day I was walking around theneighborhood with a friend discussing the local children’s book festival. She asked if I had ever written a children’s book and I told her about Scampy. Her interest was immediately peaked and she asked to see it. We walked back to my house and I pulled the yellow pages and illustrations from the shelf and dusted them off.

With an extensive art background, my neighbor was amazed that such sketches could be done by a middle school student and encouraged me to try to publish the story again now that the technology had changed. One major problem: Twenty-six years later, how could I possibly locate Sheree to obtain her permission to use her sketches in the book? Would she even remember doing them?

Not knowing where else to turn, I turned to Facebook. I only had one Facebook friend from that area of Montana, but she did not remember Sheree. However, there was a Facebook friend of a friend on her page that I remembered. On a long shot, I contacted that friend of a friend through her Inbox. A week went by and I heard nothing so I assumed Sheree could not be located.

About a week later, a message appeared in my Facebook Inbox containing Sheree’s married name, address, and telephone number. Even more amazing, when I contacted Sheree she actually remembered the sketches she had done in middle school.

Six weeks later, The Adventures of Scampy Churchmouse wasavailable through amazon.com for others to enjoy how Scampy learned about the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Exploring Web 2.0: Second Generation Interactive Tools - Blogs, Podcasts, Wikis, Networking, Virtual Worlds, and More.

In recent months exciting changes began happening on the World Wide Web. More services and features were becoming available, but most Internet users were unaware of this new potential until the “Net Generation” began embracing thesee new Web-based tools. Within months, the business community, educators, authors, and casual internet users found these tools invaluable to communication, collaboration, and research.   

This vital resource is available in both paperback and kindle edition from Amazon.com or directly from the publisher at Katy Crossing Press.

First Annual Hill Country Book Festival

- a Huge Success -

Saturday, October 11^th the Georgetown, Texas Public Library was abuzz with activities. The children’s department had crafts, face painting, live music, along with stories and presentations from their favorite authors and illustrators.

The community rooms of the library provided an opportunity for readers to meet over forty authors representing a wide variety of genres. Whatever a person’s interest area, there seemed to be an author who worked in that field.

For those desiring in-depth learning, celebrity authors provided informative presentations in the library classroom.

I would like to say a big thank you to the Hill Country Book Festival Board of Directors, Connie Miller, Phyllis Moses, Margie Boyd, Margarite Holt and the scores of volunteers who worked on this project.

The festival was definitely exemplary and a great asset to the city of Georgetown and the encouragement of literacy throughout Williamson County.

Make plans now to attend the Second Annual Hill Country Book Festival in 2009. Check the festival website  http://www.hillcountrybookfestival.org or call 512-864-1412 for future details. 

The Premiere Hill Country Book Festival
October 11, 2008

The premiere Hill Country Book Festival will be held at the Georgetown Texas Public Library from 9:00 – 4:00. I will be among the sixty authors, illustrators, and vendors presenting their work. The festival will include celebrity authors, writing workshops, publishers and editors, door prizes, and a full day of children’s activities.

This is a great opportunity for readers to connect with the central Texas authors and for authors to network. This festival will have a personal, hometown flavor and will highlight the many talents of local authors you may not be able to meet at the Texas Book Festival in Austin, Texas, November 1-2.

At the Hill Country Book Festival, children will be able to interact with authors and increase their excitement of reading for both pleasure and information. Their exposure to such a wide variety of local authors can awaken their hidden potential.

If these authors were able to achieve their dreams, maybe I can as well.

Please join us October 11, 2008
at the Hill Country Book Festival
http://www.hillcountrybookfestival.org

Georgetown Public Library,
402 W. Eighth St.
Georgetown, TX

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Creating Effective Dialog

Dialog is conversation on the printed page. We engage in conversation many times throughout a day; yet when we develop a story, the dialog is one of the most difficult elements to master. An important requirement in writing dialog is to intimately know and understand your characters – the antagonist, the protagonist, and all minor characters, no matter how unlikable they are. How do they think? What is their goals and motivation in each scene? What is their overall outlook on life?

All dialog needs to move the plot forward in some way or it is useless and detracts from the intent of the story. Dialog should provide new information to the characters, reveal new obstacles that the viewpoint character must overcome to achieve her goal, or remind the characters and readers of their goals plus accelerate the emotion, increase the suspense, and make the situation more urgent for the characters.

While good dialog is essential for a great story, it is only one leg of a three-legged stool. Dialog, narrative, and action must be balanced to create a three-dimensional feel for the reader. Certainly, there are scenes in all of our stories that work best with only narrative or only action or only dialog, but emphasis on the other elements of fiction in the following scenes will return balance to the story and engage the reader more effectively.

The most effective way to integrate setting into a story is to use all three of the fiction elements: dialog, action, and narrative. Weaving these elements together helps the setting form a background for the story and not over power the plot line. One important aspect to remember is that care needs to be taken not to use narrative to describe the setting when you can have a viewpoint character interacting with the setting in a lively discussion with another character.

The goal in writing dialog is to engage the readers to feel what our characters feel and see what our characters see.

Preparing for a Book Interview

Proper publicity is essential for advancing book sales. Whether preparing for a TV, radio, Internet, print, or face-to-face interview, the basic criteria are the same with only minor variations. The primary author goals in promoting their books is the what/why/where/when format.

· WHAT: Describe your book in 20 words or less.

· WHY: What makes your book different for other books in the same genre? Why should people be interested?

· WHERE: Where can the book be purchased?

· WHEN: When will the book be available?

Be familiar with the format of the news source. Watch, listen to, or read the program where you will be interviewed. What type of interview is it? (newsroom, in-studio, remote, phone, or written) How does the interviewee present himself or herself? What were the other interviewee’s successes and missteps? How do they sit and handle the microphone? What kind of personal contact is between the interviewee and interviewer? How formal or casual is the interview?

Review and practice the main points of your presentation. What inspired you to write the book? What qualifications do you have on the subject? Did anyone contribute to the writing of this book? Who do you want to reach with your message or who do you think will benefit from it? Have you or your book won any awards or recognition? Tell us about your writing process – do you have a routine?

Develop sound bites to use frequently. Authors may only have one chance to pitch their ideas and research reveals that people have to be exposed to a message three times before it will start to sink in. Author often only has less than thirty seconds to present the main intent of their book. As a result, authors will need to have different versions of the same idea tailored to the interest of the audience at any given moment.

Word selection is critical in crafting one-liners that catch the listener’s or reader’s attention. Words must be exact and specific and long words should never be used where a short one will do.

Another way to strengthen a one-liner is to place the emphatic words of a sentence at the end. The last words spoken are generally what remains with the listener or reader.

Incorporate your book into any interview as you present yourself as the expert and best spokesperson for your work. Incorporate your credentials appropriately and have statistics at your disposal, but quote them sparingly. Redirect impromptu questions back to your book when possible.

To be media-savvy, an author needs to:

1. Be passionate
2. Be flexible
3. Avoid jargon – use layman’s terms
4. Know what is considered newsworthy
5. Anticipate interests of your audience
6. Use short, concise, descriptive responses
7. Do your research!

Writing a Book Review

The purpose of a book review is to comment on a particular work and not to summarize the book.

Tips in preparing a meaningful book review:

· Read the complete book carefully. Take careful notes if it helps.

· Mention the name of the author and the book title in the first paragraph of the review. There is nothing more frustrating than reading a review and not knowing the author or the title.

· If the book is part of a series, identify the series.

· Think about whether the book is part of a genre.

· Present the main theme of the book in the beginning of the review.

· List the main points your want to cover before you begin to write the review; use one paragraph for each point.

· Explain how you feel about the book and why, not just what the book is about.

· Provide your judgment of the style, format, contents, and historical value of the book.

· Incorporate biographical information about the author to establish his/her authority.

· Avoid writing in the first person.

· Avoid slang. Reviews are formal papers.

· Avoid contractions.

· Avoid repeating items or facts which the reader can be expected to know.

· It may be necessary to refer to specific portions of the books to illustrate your statements and conclusions, but do not quote extensively from it.

· Proofread your manuscript carefully before submitting it.

Developing Characters

What do readers want in book? Most will say “Characters that they will either love or hate… Characters they can relate to.”

Characters are the common denominators of fiction. Without believable, interesting characters, you do not have fiction at all, but names walking through a plot.

Characters influence all other story components.

1. Plot depends on characters. Different people react differently to the same situation — different characters, different plots.

2. Setting depends on characters. A setting shapes characters. Characters often gravitate to settings compatible with their natural personality.

3. Style is influenced by character. Different personalities require different writing styles.

Authors obtain their characters from four sources: themself, real people they know, real people they hear about, and pure imagination. Is one sense, every character an author creates is an extension of themselves. A character’s emotions draws upon the author’s emotions. A main question to consider, whether a character is real or imagined, is if the character is strong enough to sustain a story.

Not all character will matter equally to the story. The protagonist is the star of the story. In longer novels, there may be more than one protagonist. Other characters, known as featured characters, are necessary to a story and are interesting in their own right. Choosing a given character as a protagonist can result in one novel and choosing another character as a protagonist can result in a very different story.

Characters need to be selected with care. After a character is selected, the author needs to determine their core personality and that character’s impact on the story. Will the character remain consistent and firm within the entire story or will he make substantial changes? The changes within a character are called the story’s emotional arc. These changes are either brought about by external changes bringing about internal changes, or internal changes can bring about external changes in the circumstances of the character.

After an author has selected and wisely developed their characters throughout a story, those characters will be able to stir the emotions of your readers. They will be able to develop a vicarious attachment to the characters. That attachment leads to satisfied, contented readers who are eager for the next book by the author.