Contest!

I'm holding a little contest over at the Blue Rose Girls--check it out here!

Child friendly?

cross-posted from the Blue Rose Girls.

I've been thinking more lately about what "child friendly" means in terms of children's books, and if it's a valid assessment to evaluate a book. This comes partially out of that old Newbery discussion, and partially because I've found myself using that criticism regarding some books (that will remain nameless). "I liked the book" I've said, "But I just couldn't see kids getting into it." But of course, when that same criticism is made about a book I've edited, I bristle. Who are they to say that a book isn't child friendly? They're underestimating children. A book that some kids hate, others will love. I know this! We all know this! There is a very wide range of work that can be child friendly.

So, shame on me.

I'm fairly out of touch with what kids think of the books I edit, especially picture books. I do give books to kids I know and watch them interact with them, but these occasions are few and far between. I'm mainly drawing on my memory of the types of books I loved as a kid, the ones I read over and over again, and hope that there are kids today that have the same type of sensibility I had/have. (For novels, in terms of feedback, teens will write reviews and post them on blogs. We also get feedback from our hip scouts. Six-year-olds don't generally have blogs.)

One specific example of a book whose child friendliness is in question is Wabi Sabi by Mark Reibstein and Ed Young. Perhaps you've heard of it? (I write about it enough, don't I?) I know that there are people who find this to be a book more for adults, or older kids, but from the moment I read an early draft of the manuscript, I had faith that younger kids would love this story about a cat trying to find out the meaning of her name, and that kids would also respond to the gorgeous collage illustrations. Not every kid, of course, but many of them. And now that the book has been out about six months, the only evidence I have to go on is from what people tell me and from the reviews I read. Some of the reviews on Amazon vary from:

My favorite seven-year-old girl bookworm (and cat lover) begged me to stop reading it at about page three. And my favorite nine-year-old boy bookworm and ravenous reader wanted nothing to do with it.

to:

My four-year old grandson enjoyed the story as did his nine-year old sister.

and:

What a wonderful way to expose a young audience to meaningful simplicity. One reviewer said this wasn't a children's book but I guess it depends on the child. Curled up in bed with his dog and his cat my son pays rapt attention to this story.

One of my favorite reviews was one I read recently online. Here is the bit regarding its child appeal:

This is not your ordinary children’s book. But nevertheless, my almost 3-year old was completely absorbed as I read haiku after haiku. Sometimes I mistakenly believe that complex thoughts and art are beyond my toddler. But really I think if we as adults could appreciate art and words like a toddler must, we might have an unanticipated deep understanding of truth. That is, in one sense, the beauty of wabi sabi.

One thing I've been thinking about lately is how we in publishing will categorize books as "institutional" versus "commercial"--which maybe is another way of saying: "will sell mainly in libraries" versus "will sell mainly in bookstores" and also: "the type of books teachers and librarians need to introduce to a kid in order for him or her to like it" versus "truly kid friendly." I always hope that the books I edit will be successful in both ways, but generally, when I'm acquiring a book I do believe that it will be more successful in one over the other. And in the case of Wabi Sabi, I'm sure my publisher thought it would have more institutional appeal. But now, as it reaches its tenth week on the NYTimes Bestseller list, we've realized that it has become a true commercial hit (not that it hasn't been a success institutionally, too!).

Anyway, I suppose when people say "child friendly" they mean, "will be liked by most children." A good example would be the four "butt" books that Alison Morris highlighted on her PW blog recently (my personal favorite is the last one, Chicken Butt by Erica Perl, illustrated by Henry Cole).

It would be an interesting study to see how many kids, when forced to choose between Chicken Butt and Wabi Sabi, would choose the latter. If any of you lovely blog readers want to do a test study, I'd love to hear the results!

A question: have you ever been surprised by a book, either one that you thought would be a no-brainer in terms of kids liking it, but they turned out to not be interested, or vice versa--a book you were pretty sure they would hate, that it turned out that they loved?

More censorship

School Library Journal has a great, thought-provoking piece on self-censorship here.

Here's an excerpt:

Self-censorship. It’s a dirty secret that no one in the profession wants to talk about or admit practicing. Yet everyone knows some librarians bypass good books—those with literary merit or that fill a need in their collections. The reasons range from a book’s sexual content and gay themes to its language and violence—and it happens in more public and K–12 libraries than you think.

“It’s probably fairly widespread, but we don’t have any way of really knowing, because people who self-censor are not likely to broadcast it,” says Pat Scales, president of the Association of Library Services to Children and author of Protecting Intellectual Freedom in Your School Library (ALA Editions, 2009). And since most people think librarians are the best champions of books, adds Scales, their jobs give them the perfect cover.

The American Library Association’s (ALA) Office for Intellectual Freedom only documents written challenges to library books and materials (there were 420 cases in 2007), and even then, it estimates that only one out of five cases are reported. But when it comes to self-censorship, it’s almost impossible to quantify because no one is monitoring it or collecting stats, and there’s no open discussion on the subject. We most often hear about it through anecdotes or if someone is willing to fess up.

“In a way, self-censorship is more frightening than outright banning and removal of challenged material,” says author and former librarian Susan Patron, because these incidents tend to “slip under the radar.”

I was especially surprised by this paragraph:

Researchers Jeff Whittingham and Wendy Rickman asked media specialists if their collections offered the most popular gay-, bisexual-, lesbian-, and transgender-themed books published between 1999 and 2005, including Alex Sanchez’s Rainbow Boys (S & S, 2001), Brent Hartinger’s Geography Club (HarperTeen, 2003), and David Levithan’s award-winning Boy Meets Boy (Knopf, 2003). Almost always, the answer came back no.

Boy Meets Boy is one of the sweetest, most delicious YA novels out there. I can't believe that it's not shelved in most/all libraries!

In terms of censorship, I must admit that on occasion I do ask authors to replace certain words that I know teachers, parents, and librarians may object to. Two of the main culprits, aside from the obvious curse words, are "retarded" and "fag." (It actually makes me cringe just to type them.) And yes, I know kids and teens really do use those words when they speak, but personally, I wouldn't mind if they used them less. But I'll only recommend changing or deleting words depending on the usage, and depending on whether the same tone and authenticity can come across using different words. I've also often asked an author to cut down on the cussing by 50% or whatever percentage I feel is appropriate depending on the type of book it is, the intended audience, and the subject matter. But I do leave it up the author to decide. And I would never not acquire a book because of the language.

For you authors and editors, teachers, parents, and librarians out there, do you self censor?


Read my other recent post on censorship over at the Blue Rose Girls blog here.

Hypocrisy

I thought this clip from last night's The Daily Show was particularly good:

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Bill O'Reilly's Right to Privacy

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Funny Political News
Joke of the Day

Kindling Words--it keeps getting better!

Cross-posted from the Blue Rose Girls:

Last weekend I attended my fifth Kindling Words. (Incidentally, I remember the first one I attended, with Grace--I read a very early draft of what turned out to become The Year of the Dog!)

Kindling Words, for those of you not familiar with it, is a children's book professional retreat. Attendees include published authors and illustrators, and editors. I wrote about the retreat two years ago here, and my very high opinion of it has not changed at all. I was sorry to have missed last year because of my trip to China (although not sorry to have gone to China!), and it was good to be back this year and see so many familiar faces--and many new ones, too. Because of the great demand for the retreat, the number of attendees was increased this year to 85 from 75. And I was absolutely shocked and thrilled to discover that the editor strand was 16 people deep! Incredible. Over twice as many as two years earlier.

Kindling Words is held at the beautiful Inn at Essex, also home to the New England Culinary Institute, so yes--the food is delicious!

This year I drove up with fellow editors Nancy Mercado of Roaring Press, Rotem Moscovich of Scholastic, and Stacy Whitman, formerly of Mirrorstone, now freelancing. We arrived in time for cocktails and dinner. Thursday nights have been unprogrammed in the past, but this year the organizers had something special planned. We split into three groups and rotated into three different rooms. My first room was being led by Gregory Maguire, and we went around the room, each composing one line of a poem (the first and last lines were provided by W.H. Auden). The result, as you'll see later, was both humorous, random, and moving.

As we were writing the poem, we could hear drumming in the background, and so it was no surprise that our next room was filled with drums. This is us before getting any guidance:

I can't remember the name of our drum leader, but he was incredible. He also left his drums for us all weekend, with the one caveat that we were not allowed to drum alone, which resulted in some spontaneous community drum circles.

The final room was filled with large canvases and lots of paint. We were to paint until all of the white of the canvas was covered, and paint using our poem as inspiration.
Here's a video of us painting while Gregory reads the second half or so of our poem:


And here is our painting farther along:
The next morning, the "regular programming" began. This year, KW regular Nancy Werlin led the author's strand. She spoke about matching your writing with a reader's appetite, accepting the fact that not every reader will have the right sensibility for your work, and making sure you satisfy their craving at the end. I found a lot of what she discussed helpful in thinking about how I edit.
Mary Jane Begin led the illustrator's strand. Now I've seen first-hand why her courses are in such demand at RISD. She was extremely informative and the images she showed were inspiring. Here she is using sketches from Ratatouille to discuss characterization and development. I also found her presentations helpful to my own work as an editor, in terms of evaluating art.
The amazing Ashley Bryan was the keynote speaker for Friday night. I had heard him speak before, but just briefly at the Eric Carle Honors and the Original Art Show opening. I realized that those had just been an appetizer for the main event. He read poem after poem in his wonderful, rich voice, so expressive and inspiring. He also had us repeating lines after him. I, for one, was energized! It made me want to read more poetry. And that's the whole idea, isn't it?

Saturday night was the traditional candlelight reading. One change was to divide the readers into two rooms so that everyone who wanted to read would have the chance--personally, I didn't prefer this set-up, as not everyone had the same experience to discuss later. But still, as always, it was such a wonderful and varied event, as people read five minutes of their unpublished work--from humorous picture books, to tragic young adult novels.And the grand finale was the bonfire where we burned pieces of papers with goals and/or things we'd like to let go. I chose to write down something I wanted to let go (the secret stays with me and the fire!). And, as always, we sang song around the fire. It was a bit too cold to stay outside for very long, though. But each night we retired to the hospitality suite for wine and socializing.
Over the weekend, the editors met in three closed sessions (two planned, one spontaneous). Our topics ranged from the economy (bad), technology (eBooks), the child safety act (frustrating), our editorial processes (varied), dealing with agents (auctions), relationships with authors (fulfilling), and more. We also held a panel with the larger group where we answered pre-submitted questions, the majority of which were about the economy. I was coming from a very different perspective in that regard, as I work for one of the few publishers who is doing quite well right now (Stephenie Meyer!), but everyone, even us, is bracing for the worst and being extra-cautious. That's not to say that we all are not continuing to buy books and publish them carefully and well. In some cases, the editors welcomed a bit of a slow-down in acquisition, as that allowed them to focus on special projects that they've been meaning to work on for a long time. I think we can all sympathize with that.

Oh, and another thing I discovered with horror was that many other companies were discouraging their editors from taking agents to lunch, to help cut costs. You know how I love those agent lunches!

In all seriousness, though, these are tough times. I've been seeing friends lose their jobs, both in publishing and out. For all of you authors and illustrators out there, it probably will be true that publishers are buying fewer books right now. But don't despair--if you can't sell your project now, do what you always have done--keep creating art. Keep writing, keep painting, keep on keeping on. This too shall pass.

Special thanks to all the organizers: Marnie Brooks, Tanya Lee Stone, Alison James, and Mary Lee Donavan. This truly was the best KW yet!

25 Random Things About Me

This meme is going around Facebook like wildfire, and so I decided to cheat and use it as a blog post, since I'm already falling behind in my resolution to post more often. So, here goes:

1. I'm a morning person in that it doesn't take much for me to wake up and be alert, but I'm also a night person, because if I don't have to wake up at a certain time, I'll stay up forever doing nothing.

2. I don't believe in fate, but I do believe in love that can last a lifetime.

3. I'm an atheist. I've spent a lot of time (especially in college) thinking about religion and what I believe. I was raised Catholic, but I don't know if I ever truly believed. I did a stint at a Protestant church in college, but that didn't stick, either. I know I may change my mind in the future, but for now I've settled on secular humanism/atheism.

4. I love Karaoke. It's in my blood. Some of my stand-bys are Un-break My Heart, Total Eclipse of the Heart, Hello, Don't Speak, Suspicious Minds, A Whole New World (with TS), All Cried Out (with Tracy--I'm the boy's part), Against All Odds, and more. But I try not to do the same songs each time.

5. I wouldn't call myself clumsy, but I do have a knack for knocking things over. For example, I often tip my coffee mug (full of coffee) out on my desk at work (I had to buy a travel mug for work to lessen the spillage). My boyfriend calls me "The Alvina Monster" because of my tendency to knock things over in his apartment.

6. I almost never wear makeup. I never really learned how. When I do wear it on special occasions (weddings), I feel a little like a clown.

7. My first word was "hammer." My first sentence was "It's a bumpy, bumpy road!"

8. I've kept diaries fairly faithfully since I was 10 or so. I love reading them over. But it's always a little shocking to find how much my thinking hasn't changed.

9. My favorite picture book is A SNOWY DAY. My favorite novel is LITTLE WOMEN.

10. I'm more energized by cold weather than warm.

11. I'm a very fast reader. But unless I'm editing, I'm not a very careful reader.

12. Since moving into my current apartment about 4 years ago, I was determined to save money by walking to work every day (about a 40 minute walk to my old office, 35 minute walk to my current office). I'm proud to say that the only time I've ever taken public transportation between work and home is because I was carrying something too heavy to manage. And that's been, I think, a grand total of twice. Yes, I walk even when the weather is crappy. And yes, sometimes that sucks.

13. I'm a horrible speller. Spell check is my cruch. I mean crutch. I'm not great with grammar, either. Thank goodness for copyeditors and proofreaders.

14. I'm not an adrenalin junkie, but I do love having adventures and experiences. Like skydiving, traveling, eating bugs, running a marathon...

15. Over 6 years ago, after realizing that I ate way too much candy, I decided to give it up entirely as a New Year's Resolution. I've kept my resolution every year since then, but decided to just eat candy on my birthday (and last year added Halloween), because a life completely devoid of candy is a dismal life indeed.

16. When I was a kid, I wanted to be a veterinarian. This lasted many years, until one day I read a book about a girl who also wanted to be a veterinarian--her father was one--and then one day, her dog got sick and her dad asked her to help care for the dog and help him give the dog a shot, and she realized that she didn't have the stomach for it. And so I decided I didn't want to be a veterinarian anymore. I always remember this as a reminder of how powerful children's books can be to a child reader.

17. I grew up watching and loving a lot of "boy" tv shows (prob. because I have two brothers). I loved the A-Team (can still recite the opening sequence), Airwolf, Knight Rider, Robotech, Transformers, Voltron, Battlestar Galactica, etc. My main girly show love was FAME. I had a huge crush on Rand from the Third Robotech War.

18. Some of my friends think of me as a human jukebox, because I have a song for everything, but I don't actually know the correct lyrics to most songs, I kinda wing it. I almost always have a song stuck in my head. I can sing most of the theme songs from the shows listed above. The music from the video game "Moon Patrol" is also forever imprinted in my brain. This one entry could have actually been 4 separate items.

19. I am incredibly adaptable, annoyingly optimistic, and generally capable.

20. I feel extremely lucky to have found my dream job on my first try. My second choice career after college was working in radio. Sometimes I wonder if I had decided to try for a career in radio first, if I would have decided that was my dream job. That's kinda how I am. If I weren't a children's book editor today, I'd want to work for NPR.

21. I have Temporomandibular Joint Syndrom (TMJ) and my jaw clicks when I chew. I have to wear a mouth guard when I sleep because I grind my teeth. It seems that everyone in publishing grinds their teeth, have you noticed?

22. I was born in Atlanta, GA, but only lived there for 9 months. I've also lived near Pittsburgh, in Edison, NJ, upstate NY, in LA County, in Berkeley, Taipei, Oakland, Somerville, East Boston, and NY. I've never lived anywhere for more than six years, until now. I never know how to answer the question, "Where did you grow up?" or "Where are you from?"

23. I believe that positive thinking, hard work, and perseverance can get you anywhere.

24. I used to be in introvert, but now I'm a fairly extreme extrovert.

25. I like making lists, but I can't believe I finally got around to making this one. And I think I cheated by combining many different random things into a single entry.


As I was writing this list, I remembered doing similar shorter lists on my blog a few years ago. I went back to find them, and was interested to find that the only item that overlapped with any of them was #22 above.

Six Weird Things
and
Eight Things About Me

I'm happy to see all of your lists!

hoping, and praying, and wishing

A week from today, we will know the winners of the Caldecott, Newbery, Printz, Coretta Scott King Awards, and more. I will be in beautiful Denver at ALA for the announcements, and I have very mixed feelings about it. Last year Grace and I were in China during the announcement, and therefore were literally far away from it all, and I really didn't have too much invested in it, except to think/hope that Sherman Alexie's Absolutely True Diary of the Part-Time Indian would win the Printz (it didn't). This year, I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Wabi Sabi by Mark Reibstein, illustrated by Ed Young, will get a mention. I'm not really superstitious--I tend to believe in the power of positive thinking, but in this case, when I know that it's completely out of my control at this point, I go back and forth with how to feel.

It's won the gold or honor in a few Mock Caldecotts, although didn't place in others (one said that the illustrations lacked "warmth"--hmph). I've seen bloggers say that it would either win the gold or get nothing, (yes, I'm a bit obsessed), and Fuse #8 declared it the front runner. Eek.

I don't know if it really IS the front runner, but I know it's a contender, and to be honest, it's a bit of an odd feeling to be in this situation. I do realize that this is not a bad position to be in--and I'm honestly happy to be here. It's always been my goal to edit books that are up for discussion for awards. It's just that I'm used to editing quiet books with modest expectations that surprise my publisher (although not to me) when they do extremely well. I prefer to be in the position of the underdog.

Well, all will be revealed next Monday. Think positive thoughts for Wabi Sabi (unless you hated the book, in which case, think neutral thoughts!)!


****

In other award news, I'm proud to say that Tony Abbott's The Postcard has been nominated for an Edgar Award!! Somehow, it's more satisfying to have a book that both I and the author have worked especially hard on be recognized, which is definitely the case here. Congratulations to Tony and the rest of the nominees!

Small Graces

Grace Lin has started a brand-new auction/fundraiser to benefit the Foundation of Children's Books. The Foundation was established "to help teachers, librarians and parents select and use quality children's literature in order to instill in children the joy of reading as a prerequisite for literacy and lifelong learning."

Find out more information about Small Graces here. Grace will be auctioning off an original piece of art each month. You can bid on the very first piece right now (pictured above)!

Read more about what inspired Grace to start this new fundaiser here.

Happy New Year! Mission Accomplished.

I always look forward to this time of year as an opportunity to look back, and make a list of new goals and resolutions for the coming year. Last year, I accomplished just about half of my 20 goals--not great, but I am most proud of one of them: 

Get out of debt/start saving. 

Done, and done!

I'm a little ashamed to say that my debt was purely my own fault. I was lucky that I didn't start out with school loans--I went to UC Berkeley as a CA resident, and my parents paid the relatively low tuition fee. However, I was never good at managing my money and in college started using credit cards too freely. Trying to live on a bookseller salary for about a year and a half after college while moving across the country didn't help, either. And along the way, various other unforeseen emergencies and, uh, vacations (including going to Australia for a wedding) added to the debt, which reached $20,000 less than six years ago. 

I went through a period of two+ years where I hunkered down, went on no vacations, and barely bought anything (I avoided going into stores at all to fend off temptation), slowly paying off the debt on my meager publishing salary while living in one of the most expensive cities in the world. I cancelled some and put away other credit cards (at one point, at the advice of a friend, I literally froze my credit cards in a bag of water in the freezer!), and slowly chipped away at the balance. 

About three years ago, my mother offered me an interest-free loan to cover the remaining debt, which I accepted. I learned to make purchases with cash or my debit card. My mantra was NO NEW DEBT. A few years ago I opened up an ING account to simultaneously save for certain expenses I didn't want to put off, like my computer and my trip to China. 

And finally, on my trip home last week, I paid off the remaining balance of my debt to my mother. Here I am writing the check that ended it all:

It's hard for me to believe that I'm actually debt-free, and even have an emergency savings fund started. It's a whole new world for me! Who knows, maybe I can even start saving to buy property some day.

So, what's on my agenda for next year? I generally make goals in several categories: personal, professional, and health. I'll share two of my resolutions in each category:

Personal: 

-Post on this blog at least once a month (and not just an animoto video or a cross-post from the Blue Rose Girls)

-Clean my room at least once a week for a half hour (unless it’s already clean!)

Professional: 

-Come up with plan to manage submissions in a more efficient way--do not keep authors/agents waiting for more than 3 months
-Read (including audio books) at least one adult book every three months, one published MG/YA book every month (I know this probably seems pitiful, but I always feel guilty when I'm not reading submissions)

Health:

-Get at least eight hours of sleep three times a week

-Exercise at least two times a week

What are some of your resolutions?

Holiday Greetings from the Ling Family!

Here's an animoto video I made for my family for Christmas.