Poetry Friday: “Winners, we have winners…!”

Happy Earth Day!

I’m sharing my Poetry Friday post a day early because Thursday has been Earth Day and Once Upon Another Time‘s publisher, Beaming Books, is giving away FREE COPIES of the book along with a digital ARC to various libraries, trail groups, and other organizations around the country that maintains StoryWalks™!

(What IS a StoryWalk™, you ask? It’s usually a series of kiosks set up along a trail that each feature a different spread of a book…which allows visitors to read as they walk. Here are a few photos from the inaugural installation of the Warner, NH StoryWalk™ which featured my Flashlight Night.)

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We had several folks send in entries to win copies of Once Upon Another Time! The winners are:

• The local reading council of Chadbourn, NC (Tonnye Fletcher)
• New Franklin School of Portsmouth, NH (Tammi Truax)
• Carson City Library, Carson City, NV (J Hodnett)
• Dr. Leroy E. Mayo School & their PTA, Holden, MA (Andrew Hacket)
• Pillsbury Free Library of Warner, NH (Sue Matott)
• Friends of South Cumberland State Park, Tennessee (Sarah Marhevsky)

Congratulations to all! I hope you and everyone who visits your StoryWalk™ enjoys our book!

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^{Photos of New Hampshire’s White Mountains in Franconia, NH taken by Yours Truly, August 2019}

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NOW, FOR TODAY’S “GUEST” POET…

As you may have heard from previous posts, my wife and I found ourselves homeschooling our two children in the wake of the pandemic. While it can be a trying situation sometimes with arguments, obstinence, and an utter disregard for personal space, overall they have both been doing excellent and I have no worries they won’t be prepared to return to their classrooms in the fall.

That said, my 7-year-old daughter surprised me a couple of weeks ago while finishing her English textbook (yes, we completed an entire year-long program in just 6 1/2 months!) with a poem that caught me off guard. She had learned some simple poems like “Twinkle, Twinkle” and was asked to write her own poem about a star. This is what she came up with:

^{From Master Books’ “Language Lessons for a Living Education“}

I will see the stars so bright.
So they can be my flashlight.
And as I watch I’ll see my God to light up the night as well.
.

Now granted, everyone thinks their child is a genius these days, but this are pretty thought-provoking lines for a 7-year-old who claims she doesn’t like poetry. We’ve been utilizing “Language Lessons for a Living Education” from Master Books for both kids, which teaches English while including some Christian lessons, and supplementing this with various grammar worksheets I print out as well as my own lessons. I don’t know if it was any of this, or simply my poetry genes showing up in her capable hands, but I couldn’t be more proud of her.

For the complete Poetry Friday roundup, visit Catherine at Reading to the Core where she has Padma Venkatraman in the spotlight along with a poem inspired by one of Padma’s recent poetry prompts. Also, be sure to check out all the new books this month from my 2021 Book Blast partners:

============================================================

I’m now a part of the BOOKROO family!

Create an account to add books to wishlists and be notified of special deals and dates…create custom collections…and discover and follow your favorite authors & illustrators!

Find out more about BOOKROO here!

============================================================

Talkabook is setting out to inspire children by connecting them with authors and illustrators! Click here to view my profile and learn more!

============================================================

I continue adding to my “Wit & Wordplay” videos ! These videos were created for parents and educators (along with their kids) to learn how to write poetry, appreciate it, and have fun with it. From alliteration and iambs to free verse and spine poetry, I’m pretty sure there’s something in these videos you’ll find surprising! You can view them all on my YouTube channel, and if you have young kids looking for something to keep busy with, I also have several downloadable activity sheets at my website.

===========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online? Oh, yes, you can!

You can purchase personally-signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly EVERY book or anthology I’ve been part of!

Click any of the following covers to order!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send a comment to the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH requesting my signature and to whom I should make it out. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)

============================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

FLASHLIGHT NIGHT:

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!

DON’T ASK A DINOSAUR:

• “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

============================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day) . Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: A Goblin Shark pantoum at “Poetry Boost” to kick off National Poetry Month

WOW, WHAT A WEEK!

Things have been super-crazy busy around here lately. First, I discovered that the folks from BookPage included Once Upon Another Time (Beaming Books) in their feature about using books to celebrate Earth Day! Saying that Charles Ghigna’s and my book “packs an understated, powerful punch about stewardship,” the writer of the article also includes Micha Archer’s brand-new Wonder Walkers (Nancy Paulsen Books) and our friend Joyce Sidman’s latest, Hello, Earth! Poems to Our Planet (Eerdmans Books for Young Readers).

Speaking of Eerdmans, I discovered two fantastic reviews I had missed for Lee Bennett Hopkins’ posthumous anthology, Night Wishes, which came out last September: one from Publishers Weekly and the other courtesy of The Horn Book! It was such an honor to have been asked to contribute to such a beautiful book.

It was a thrill to read such positive words! Then I had to come back to Earth when I realized last Friday that I was going to need to completely re-build my website from the ground up. >sigh< My web hosting company, Yahoo!, was switching over to a completely new website building program and if I didn’t redesign my site by the end of the month, I’d never be able to update again. Soooo…that suddenly became a priority.

^{All I can say is…“Whew!”}

Somehow, I managed to do it! I learned the new program, rebuilt everything, and got it up and running two days before the deadline.

I’m still tweaking a few things, but if you’d like to check it out and let me know what you think, I’d really appreciate it!

Now, then…today’s poem is extra-special for me because I get to share a poetry video I made for my friend and fellow children’s author, Michelle Schaub. (You may recall I interviewed Michelle here about a year and a half ago, as she was celebrating the release of her poetry collection, Finding Treasure (Charlesbridge, 2019)

In addition to writing books like Dream Big, Little Scientists (Charlesbridge, 2020) and her new Kindness is a Kite String (Cardinal Rule Press, 2021) which just came out YESTERDAY (yay!), Michelle also maintains a wonderfully intereactive blog called Poetry Boost. This year, in celebration of National Poetry Month, Michelle gathered together 30 poetry friends to share videos of each of us reading one of our poems.

I had to think for a little while about which of my poems to share, but it didn’t take me too long to decide on “Goblin Shark,” one of three poems of mine included in the children’s poetry anthology Friends & Anemones: Ocean Poems for Children (Writers Loft Press, 2020).

Friends & Anemones is a great big book 70 pages long, filled with poetry and illustrations from nearly 70 New England creators including Peter H. Reynolds, Jane Yolen, Kip Wilson, Josh Funk, and many more. Yesterday, Michelle kicked off the series by spotlighting a poem from another fellow New Englander, my friend Leslie Bulion, who read her poem “Bolas Spider” from her new anthology, Spi-Ku: A Clutter of Short Verse on Eight Legs (Peachtree Publishing, 2021).

And today…I get to share “Goblin Shark!” (And many thanks to Bob Thibeault for his amazing illustration!)

^{Click here to see my video!}

I hope you enjoy it! And I hope you’ll enjoy all the poetry you’ll find at A Year of Reading, where Mary Lee Hahn is hosting today’s Poetry Friday roundup.

~ ~ GIVEAWAY!! ~ ~

Many thanks to everyone who entered to win a personally-signed copy of ONCE UPON ANOTHER TIME! I gave away one copy a couple of weeks ago, and today I’m giving away another copy to one of the many folks who shared the news about my new book on Twitter. And that person is…drumroll please…

Gennie Gorback!

Congratulations, Gennie – and thank you so much for your support! Email me your info and I’ll be sure to get your copy in the mail, pronto!

And folks, be sure to check out all the books coming out this month from my 2021 Book Blast partners:

============================================================

I’m now a part of the BOOKROO family!

Create an account to add books to wishlists and be notified of special deals and dates…create custom collections…and discover and follow your favorite authors & illustrators!

Find out more about BOOKROO here!

============================================================

Talkabook is setting out to inspire children by connecting them with authors and illustrators! Click here to view my profile and learn more!

============================================================

I continue adding to my “Wit & Wordplay” videos ! These videos were created for parents and educators (along with their kids) to learn how to write poetry, appreciate it, and have fun with it. From alliteration and iambs to free verse and spine poetry, I’m pretty sure there’s something in these videos you’ll find surprising! You can view them all on my YouTube channel, and if you have young kids looking for something to keep busy with, I also have several downloadable activity sheets at my website.

===========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online? Oh, yes, you can!

You can purchase personally-signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly EVERY book or anthology I’ve been part of!

Click any of the following covers to order!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)

============================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

FLASHLIGHT NIGHT:

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!

DON’T ASK A DINOSAUR:

• “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

============================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day) . Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: Score one for Poetry: A school project becomes fun!

I always feel vindicated when my 4th-grader realizes I was right, all along. Not that I’m vain or egotistical or anything – it’s just that it happens so rarely, it’s kind of a nice change of pace! So imagine how proud I was of him last week, after he groaned about a poetry project he had to do for his remote-learning schoolwork…and then realized it was fun.

It was an online “magnet poetry” sort of thing. On the right side of the computer screen, there were dozens of words on multiple pages from which he could choose to make a poem; he simply needed to pick words and put them into some semblance of a poem. He started off whining and complaining about not knowing how to do it, and then (as anyone with kids could guess) started whining about not knowing what to say.

So of course, I jumped in to help provide him some direction and guidance – “All my years of writing poetry have prepared me for this moment!” – and show him it wasn’t as difficult or as boring as he was thinking. Once he got the first couple of lines down, I told him he’d done a good job and might want to add one more line and he could be done.

But he wasn’t going to stop there. Oh, no.

He wrote another few lines, and I told him I really liked what he’d done. He could finally turn it in! But no.

He continued for at least an hour, putting words together and fine-tuning it until he got to this:

(click to enlarge)

 

Through the water
blue wings show dark rain
dinosaur ghosts roar
in the monster moonglow
storms sail to sea
cool black tigers see red summers
wild adventures begin wonder.
.

Dinosaur ghosts? Monster moonglow? Who is this kid?? Yep, what could have been a short, 3-line haiku turned into a 7-line opus. I’ll be honest: this is far better than the first poem I ever wrote! Moreover, he was so happy and excited about it he almost didn’t want to stop. I had told him not to look at it as work (even though, as a writer, I know it is) but to look at it more as a word puzzle and to have fun. Sure enough, he did!

Vindication!!!

The 2020 Progressive Poem continues all month…

The annual Progressive Poem, begun several years ago by poet/author/blogger Irene Latham, is a way for the Poetry Friday family and other kidlit bloggers to join together and create a crowd-sourced poem for National Poetry Month. One person writes one line, then another adds another line, until a completed poem appears on April 30. This year, Irene handed off the organizational duties to Margaret Simon, who has pulled everyone together once again. I added my line last week, and it continues to grow! Here’s where you can follow along and find all the contributors:

.
1 Donna Smith at Mainely Write

2 Irene Latham at Live Your Poem

3 Jone MacCulloch, at deo writer

4 Liz Steinglass at Elizabeth Steinglass

5 Buffy Silverman at Buffy Silverman Children’s Author

6 Kay McGriff at A Journey Through The Pages

7 Catherine Flynn at Reading to the Core

8 Tara Smith at Going to Walden

9 Carol Varsalona at Beyond Literacy Link

10 Matt Forrest Esenwine at Radio, Rhythm, and Rhyme

11 Janet Fagel hosted at Reflections on the Teche

12 Linda Mitchell at A Word Edgewise

13 Kat Apel at Kat Whiskers

14 Margaret at Reflections on the Teche

15 Leigh Anne Eck at A Day in the Life

16 Linda Baie at Teacher Dance

17 Heidi Mordhorst at My Juicy Little Universe

18 Mary Lee Hahn at A Year of Reading

19 Tabatha at Opposite of Indifference

20 Rose Cappelli at Imagine the Possibilities

21 Janice Scully at Salt City Verse

22 Julieanne Harmatz at To Read, To Write, To Be

23 Ruth, There is no such thing as a God-forsaken town

24 Christie Wyman at Wondering and Wandering

25 Amy at The Poem Farm

26 Dani Burtsfield at Doing the Work That Matters
27 Robyn Hood Black at Life on the Deckle Edge

28 Jessica Big at TBD
29 Fran Haley at lit bits and pieces
30 Michelle Kogan at Michelle Kogan

.
Molly is hosting Poetry Friday today, so head on over to Nix the Comfort Zone for all of today’s links and poetry fun – and…can you smell it? Fresh bread, too!

=========================================================

I hope you’ll check out my “Wit & Wordplay” videos on my YouTube channel! These videos were created for parents and educators (along with their kids) and focus on how to write poetry, how to appreciate it, and offer tips on having fun with it. Be sure to subscribe or check back often, as more videos continue to be created. You can view them all on my YouTube channel, and if you have young kids looking for something to keep busy with, I also have several downloadable activity sheets at my website.

What is Talkabook? Details coming soon!

=========================================================

Pre-orders are available now!

In stores Aug. 18, 2020!

I’ve teamed up with several other children’s authors to promote our upcoming books this year – and there are a LOT of them, too! In addition to April’s two releases, there are new books out from folks like Diana Murray, Corey Rosen Schwartz, Lori Degman, Michelle Schaub, and many others. I’m very proud to be part of this group of dedicated, talented writers.

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

     

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: Remembering Tomie dePaola AND the 2020 Progressive Poem arrives

It’s been a happy week, a sad, somber week, and a bittersweet week.

Last Thursday, March 30, the inimitable Tomie dePaola passed away, following complications from surgery he underwent after taking a bad fall at his home in New London, NH. All who new him are still in shock at this sudden loss.

There will never be anyone quite like Tomie dePaola.

Although we lived just 20 minutes away from each other, we had never met until about 10 years ago at my first New England SCBWI Spring Conference. (Tomie is the reason the original SCBW, as it was called, changed its name to include illustrators) I had a chance to chat with him and the SCBWI’s Lin Oliver during lunch and it was during that conversation that Lee Bennett Hopkins’ name first came up; I eventually connected with Lee and my career as a children’s writer officially began to gain some momentum!

After lunch, I told Tomie about my occasional trepidation about writing, how I will sometimes write something I think is really good, and worry that that might be the best thing I’ll ever write! I wonder if I’ll ever be able to top it…if anything I ever write again will b as good as this particular piece. So I asked him if he ever felt that way, and if so, what advice he’d offer. His suggestion?

“The first thing I’d do is go have a drink!” he chuckled.

But he added, on a serious note, that we all have doubts about our abilities and question what we do sometimes, and the best thing to do is just keep moving forward, doing what you love and doing it to the best of your ability. And that’s what I do.

My wife and I will both miss him. He was always giving of his time and knowledge, helping to build his fellow humans up. Tomie loved cats and dogs, too, and although he didn’t have any at the time of his death, he enjoyed hearing some of my wife’s stories about our own menagerie of 5 dogs, two cats, a rabbit, and several other critters.

This week is also bittersweet. My friend Lee Bennett Hopkins, whom Lin and Tomie suggested I reach out to way back at that first conference, passed away last August and never had a chance to hold his latest book in his hands. I’m very proud to have known Lee and to be a contributor to Construction People (Wordsong, 2020), one of his final poetry anthologies.

He had been able to see the F&Gs (folded and gathered copies), so he could see what the final product would look like, but it’s still not the same as holding the actual book in yours hands. Lee – whose birthday fittingly falls smack-dab in the middle of National Poetry Month, April 13 – has three more posthumous anthologies on the way, two of which I am also a contributor to, so I’m grateful for that. (One of them, Night Wishes (Eerdmans, 2020), is due out this September)

And it’s an exciting week, as well! In-between helping my two kids with their ‘remote-learning’ – which admittedly takes up the majority of my time these days – I’m in the process of working on a new poetry collection with a friend of mine who is one of the most respected folks in the industry, and we’re about halfway to completion. Meanwhile, Once Upon Another Time (Beaming Books, 2020), another collaboration with another highly-regarded fellow, Charles Ghigna, is just about ready to go to print! Charles and I had the opportunity to view the art-final ARC (Advance Review Copy) and it’s BEAUTIFUL! We can’t wait for everyone to see it when it comes out August 18. (And it’s available for pre-order at the link below!)

The 2020 Progressive Poem arrives here today!

The annual Progressive Poem is something that poet/author/blogger Irene Latham began several years ago as a way for the Poetry Friday family and other kidlit bloggers to join together and create a crowd-sourced poem for National Poetry Month. One person would write one line, and then it would travel from blog to blog each day, with each blogger adding a line, until we had a completed poem on April 30. Irene has been super-busy lately, so this year she handed off the organizational duties to Margaret Simon, who has pulled everyone together once again.

This year, Donna Smith started things off with a twist: she offered two lines for the following blogger to choose from; that happened to be Irene, who offered up two other lines from which the third blogger, Jone MacCulloch, could choose. So far, here’s what the poem looks like, with my two potential new lines added in bold:
.

Sweet violets shimmy, daffodils sway
along the wiregrass path to the lake.
I carry a rucksack of tasty cakes
and a banjo passed down from my gram.

I follow the tracks of deer and raccoon
and echo the call of a wandering loon.
A whispering breeze joins in our song.
and night melts into a rose gold dawn.

Deep into nature’s embrace, I fold.

Splinters of sunbeams pierce young sky
Promise of spring helps shake the cold

.
These took me quite awhile to nail down, I’ll admit; with the rhythm and assonance of the line endings, I kept feeling like the poem needed to rhyme, but with no discernible rhyme scheme I figured I’d just let it grow the way it felt best. So now I’ll let my friend Janet Fagal decide which of these she wants to seize upon! Have fun, Janet!

.

Like to follow along? Here’s where you can find all the contributors to this year’s Progressive Poem:

.
1 Donna Smith at Mainely Write

2 Irene Latham at Live Your Poem

3 Jone MacCulloch, at deo writer

4 Liz Steinglass at Elizabeth Steinglass

5 Buffy Silverman at Buffy Silverman Children’s Author

6 Kay McGriff at A Journey Through The Pages

7 Catherine Flynn at Reading to the Core

8 Tara Smith at Going to Walden

9 Carol Varsalona at Beyond Literacy Link

10 Matt Forrest Esenwine at Radio, Rhythm, and Rhyme

11 Janet Fagel hosted at Reflections on the Teche

12 Linda Mitchell at A Word Edgewise

13 Kat Apel at Kat Whiskers

14 Margaret at Reflections on the Teche

15 Leigh Anne Eck at A Day in the Life

16 Linda Baie at Teacher Dance

17 Heidi Mordhorst at My Juicy Little Universe

18 Mary Lee Hahn at A Year of Reading

19 Tabatha at Opposite of Indifference

20 Rose Cappelli at Imagine the Possibilities

21 Janice Scully at Salt City Verse

22 Julieanne Harmatz at To Read, To Write, To Be

23 Ruth, There is no such thing as a God-forsaken town

24 Christie Wyman at Wondering and Wandering

25 Amy at The Poem Farm

26 Dani Burtsfield at Doing the Work That Matters
27 Robyn Hood Black at Life on the Deckle Edge

28 Jessica Big at TBD
29 Fran Haley at lit bits and pieces
30 Michelle Kogan at Michelle Kogan

.
It’s Poetry Friday, which means there’s plenty more links and poetic fun over at Amy Ludwig VanDerwater’s The Poem Farm – she’s handling the hostess duties today, so please visit and say hello!

=========================================================

If you haven’t already, I hope you’ll check out my “Wit & Wordplay” videos on my YouTube channel! These videos were created for parents and educators (along with their kids) and focus on how to write poetry, how to appreciate it, and offer tips on having fun with it. More are on the way, too, so be sure to subscribe or check back often! You can view them all on my YouTube channel, and I also have several downloadable activity sheets at my website. If you think any of this information might be useful for someone you know, I hope you’ll share.

What is Talkabook? Details coming soon!

=========================================================

Pre-orders are available now!

In stores Aug. 18, 2020!

I’ve teamed up with several other children’s authors to promote our upcoming books this year! And there are a LOT of them, too – including SEVEN in March!

 =========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

     

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: Kicking off National Poetry Month with a Giveaway Winner (ALSO: the NEA Read Across America Book of the Month)

Last Friday, we celebrated the release of Vikram Madan’s brand-new children’s poetry collection, ‘A HATFUL OF DRAGONS’ (Wordsong, 2020), which officially arrives in April. Out of all the folks who left comments to enter a drawing to win a free copy, the one name that was selected at random was…

MARGARET SIMON!

Congratulations, Margaret! Be sure to email me your mailing address so the good folks at Boyds Mills & Kane can send you your copy. And thank you so much for visiting the ol’ Triple-R!

(If you didn’t get a chance to check out my interview with Vikram, you can still find it HERE)

Now, for today’s poem…I was looking through the National Education Association’s list of “Books of the Month” that they are using to promote their Read Across America initiative when I came across this cover, for April:

Former U.S. Children’s Poet Laureate J. Patrick Lewis edited this third book in National Geographic’s series of poetry/photography coffee table books, and I was so proud to contribute to this book when it came out two years ago, I felt I had to share my poem here…

And yes, Shelley’s ‘Ozymandias’ kept going through my mind while I thought about the Nevada sands, giant structures, and my blank verse sonnet…so I had to give a tip of the hat at the very end. What a book for National Poetry Month! I’m so honored to be included in a book that contains poetry from such diverse people as Robert Frost, Naomi Shihab Nye, Jane Yolen, and so many others.

(By the way, if you’d like to learn more about some of the attractions I make reference to in the poem, check out “The Strat”‘s official website!)

Since it’s Poetry Friday, you’ll probably want to check out all the other links and fun, so head over to My Juicy Little Universe where Heidi Mordhorst is handling her hosting with aplomb (we need more plombs, no that I think about it) and sharing two poems – one from H.D. (aka, Hilda Doolittle, an incredible American poet with whom you may be unfamiliar) and one from Billy Collins!

=========================================================

For some time now I’ve been wanting to help my educator and parent friends with educational videos geared to understanding poetry, and now my “Wit & Wordplay” videos, as I call them, are available on my YouTube channel! These videos focus on poetry: how to write it, how to appreciate it, and tips on having fun with it. There are several ready for viewing, and more are on the way – so be sure to subscribe or check back often!

You can view them all on my YouTube channel, and I also have several downloadable activity sheets at my website. If you think any of this information might be useful for someone you know, I hope you’ll share.

What is Talkabook? Details coming soon!

=========================================================

Pre-orders are available now!

In stores Aug. 18, 2020!

I’ve teamed up with several other children’s authors to promote our upcoming books this year! And there are a LOT of them, too – including SEVEN in March!

 =========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

     

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: Excitement for two upcoming poetry anthologies!

What a National Poetry Month it’s turning out to be! This week, I’ve received news about not one, but TWO anthologies I’ll be involved with, which are coming out within a week and a half of each other this summer…

First:  Except for Love: New England Poets Inspired by Donald Hall (Encircle Pub., 2019) is an adult poetry anthology that is one of the most important books in my adult literary career. Thirty-five New England poets share poems inspired by the late Donald Hall, former Poet Laureate of New Hampshire and of the United States. The fact that I live at the base of Mt. Kearsarge, a mountain  synonymous with Hall and his work, is humbling and makes being in this book extra special.

My poem, “Stone-Kicking,” begins:

Stone-Kicking

I kick my dreams
like stones in the road,
watching them bounce
happily ahead
while I lag
behind, dawdling.
Dirt road, still
damp from yesterday’s storm,
smells of pine and mud…

Sorry, you’ll just have to wait to see the rest of it! Except for Love is scheduled for release on June 23, the one-year anniversary of Hall’s death, but pre-orders are available HERE.

Second: I Am Someone Else: Poems About Pretending (Charlesbridge, 2019) is the newest Lee Bennett Hopkins children’s anthology, and my contributor copies just arrived in the mail! It’s a fun book, filled with poems about children pretending to be doctors, wizards, inventors, and all sorts of wonderfully imaginative people. (My poem, “The One,” is about a boy pretending to be a firefighter – but there’s a twist!) I’m proud, as always, to be part of one of Lee’s books – but also proud to be included with fellow writer-friends like Michelle H. Barnes, Amy Ludwig VanDerwater, and many others. I Am Someone Else will be in stores officially July 2, but you can pre-order now!

More news about these books will be forthcoming, but I wanted to let you know they are on the way – and I can’t wait!

Today is Poetry Friday, so be sure to head on over to Karen Edmisten’s blog, where she is hosting the festivities, and you can check out all the links along with a touching, thoughtful poem by John Ashbery.

(Speaking of National Poetry Month, my friend Tabatha Yeatts has some creative printables for teachers and other educators out there, who might be wondering how to celebrate the month. Follow THIS LINK and THIS LINK to see what’s available, and have fun with your classes!)

=========================================================

The 2019 Kidlitosphere Progressive Poem is in full swing! I started this collaborative poem this past Monday (no fooling!) and now a different writer/ blogger adds a new line each day until it concludes on April 30. You can follow along at the sites listed below…

2019 Progressive Poem schedule:

April

1 Matt @Radio, Rhythm and Rhyme
2 Kat @Kathryn Apel
3 Kimberly @KimberlyHutmacherWrites
4 Jone @DeoWriter
5 Linda @TeacherDance
6 Tara @Going to Walden
7 Ruth @thereisnosuchthingasagodforsakentown
8 Mary Lee @A Year of Reading
9 Rebecca @Rebecca Herzog
10 Janet F. @Live Your Poem
11 Dani @Doing the Work that Matters
12 Margaret @Reflections on the Teche
13 Doraine @Dori Reads
14 Christie @Wondering and Wandering
15 Robyn @Life on the Deckle Edge
16 Carol @Beyond LiteracyLink
17 Amy @The Poem Farm
18 Linda @A Word Edgewise
19 Heidi @my juicy little universe
20 Buffy @Buffy’s Blog
21 Michelle @Michelle Kogan
22 Catherine @Reading to the Core
23 Penny @a penny and her jots
24 Tabatha @The Opposite of Indifference
25 Jan @Bookseestudio
26 Linda @Write Time
27 Sheila @Sheila Renfro
28 Liz @Elizabeth Steinglass
29 Irene @Live Your Poem
30 Donna @Mainely Write

Madness!Poetry is over, and congratulations to this year’s champion, Lori Degman! Lori & I battled fiercely in Round 2, and she was able to move on through each consecutive round and eventually defeat my former Poet’s Garage member, William Peery, to take home the trophy.

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

  Coming July 2, 2019!

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it for you, and then they’ll ship it. Try doing that with those big online booksellers! (Plus, you’ll be helping to support local book-selling – and wouldn’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Amazon “Best Books of the Month,” Sept. 2017
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

The 2019 Kidlitosphere Progressive Poem begins!

National Poetry Month has officially arrived – and with it, Irene Latham‘s annual Progressive Poem, an opportunity for 30 bloggers and children’s writers to come together and create a poem over the course of the month. With so many people taking part, it’s always interesting to see how the poem grows and develops – and of course, ends!

This year, I’m excited to once again be a part of it…and honored to have the opportunity to begin the poem! Traditionally, we find the poem tends to lead a main character off on an adventure or spend time pondering life’s little joys and mysteries – so I wanted to do something different. (If there’s one thing you know about me, it’s that I always try to take the literary road not taken!)

After much thought and consideration, and days of deliberation, I’ve come up with something I hope is worthy of our poem:

Ready? Here goes…
.

Endless summer; I can see for miles
.

Now, a little backstory as to how this came to be: I wanted to set our character (or subject) up in a position where the reader is immediately wondering about the character’s location, situation, or surroundings. So I tossed ideas around and “I can see for miles” popped into my head, for no apparent reason. But I couldn’t use that – it’s the title of a song by The Who! That wouldn’t work!

Or would it?

So I thought some more and wondered if I could add to it. Perhaps something to ground the reader just a bit in understanding the setting…and suddenly the song “Private Universe” by Crowded House popped into my head, also for no apparent reason. (You’re getting an idea as to how weird the writing life is) Anyway, I thought about it and scanned the lyrics to see if there was something I could glean…and what do you know. The phrase “endless summer” – which is also, of course, a classic Beach Boys album!

I knew what I had to do.

I combined the two “found” lines into one line – which I think offers just enough exposition to get our poem/story rolling. I therefore challenge my fellow writers to do the same:  continue this method and use only FOUND lines! They don’t have to be strictly song titles or lyrics like my line…but I think this will be a fun challenge to add to the development of our poem. I hope you agree! But of course, your line is YOUR line – so if you feel a bit intimidated by the prospect, feel free to do your own thing and add whatever you’d like. (This is supposed to fun, after all!)

Take it away, Kat!

2019 Progressive Poem schedule:

April

1 Matt @Radio, Rhythm and Rhyme
2 Kat @Kathryn Apel
3 Kimberly @KimberlyHutmacherWrites
4 Jone @DeoWriter
5 Linda @TeacherDance
6 Tara @Going to Walden
7 Ruth @thereisnosuchthingasagodforsakentown
8 Mary Lee @A Year of Reading
9 Rebecca @Rebecca Herzog
10 Janet F. @Live Your Poem
11 Dani @Doing the Work that Matters
12 Margaret @Reflections on the Teche
13 Doraine @Dori Reads
14 Christie @Wondering and Wandering
15 Robyn @Life on the Deckle Edge
16 Carol @Beyond LiteracyLink
17 Amy @The Poem Farm
18 Linda @A Word Edgewise
19 Heidi @my juicy little universe
20 Buffy @Buffy’s Blog
21 Michelle @Michelle Kogan
22 Catherine @Reading to the Core
23 Penny @a penny and her jots
24 Tabatha @The Opposite of Indifference
25 Jan @Bookseestudio
26 Linda @Write Time
27 Sheila @Sheila Renfro
28 Liz @Elizabeth Steinglass
29 Irene @Live Your Poem
30 Donna @Mainely Write

Madness!Poetry is wrapping up! Voting in the Championship Final Round begins tomorrow morning, Tue., April 2!

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

  Coming July 2, 2019!

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it for you, and then they’ll ship it. Try doing that with those big online booksellers! (Plus, you’ll be helping to support local book-selling – and wouldn’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Amazon “Best Books of the Month,” Sept. 2017
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: Early spring haiku AND the 2019 Progressive Poem is coming!

(click to enlarge)

I was thinking of how long winter’s been hanging on (it barely got over 40 yesterday and probably won’t go above 45 today), and thought I’d write something about a late spring…but then I came across this photo of Lake Tahoe from Photobucket entitled “Tahoe Early Spring” and changed my mind!

Well, it’s that time of year again – National Poetry Month arrives in just a few days, and so does Irene Latham‘s annual Progressive Poem, an opportunity for 30 bloggers and children’s writers to come together and create a poem over the course of the month. Each year Irene organizes this, and each year it’s a treat to see how the poem begins and grows and develops – and of course, how it ends!

This year, I’m excited to once again be a part of it (the only guy in the entire group – how did THAT happen??) and I’m especially honored to be given the opportunity to BEGIN the poem on April 1. What, pray tell, will be the opening line? I have no idea…although I have been kicking around several possibilities in my head. Be sure to check in Monday morning, when it all begins!

2019 Progressive Poem schedule:

April

1 Matt @Radio, Rhythm and Rhyme
2 Kat @Kathryn Apel
3 Kimberly @KimberlyHutmacherWrites
4 Jone @DeoWriter
5 Linda @TeacherDance
6 Tara @Going to Walden
7 Ruth @thereisnosuchthingasagodforsakentown
8 Mary Lee @A Year of Reading
9 Rebecca @Rebecca Herzog
10 Janet F. @Live Your Poem
11 Dani @Doing the Work that Matters
12 Margaret @Reflections on the Teche
13 Doraine @Dori Reads
14 Christie @Wondering and Wandering
15 Robyn @Life on the Deckle Edge
16 Carol @Beyond LiteracyLink
17 Amy @The Poem Farm
18 Linda @A Word Edgewise
19 Heidi @my juicy little universe
20 Buffy @Buffy’s Blog
21 Michelle @Michelle Kogan
22 Catherine @Reading to the Core
23 Penny @a penny and her jots
24 Tabatha @The Opposite of Indifference
25 Jan @Bookseestudio
26 Linda @Write Time
27 Sheila @Sheila Renfro
28 Liz @Elizabeth Steinglass
29 Irene @Live Your Poem
30 Donna @Mainely Write

WINNER, WINNER!

Congratulations to the winner of a copy of Laura Purdie Salas’ new children’s poetry collection, In the Middle of the Night: Poems from a Wide-Awake House (Wordsong, 2019)…REBECCA HERZOG!! Out of all the folks who left comments on my post a couple of weeks ago (where I interviewed Laura’s “stuff!”), Rebecca’s name was drawn at random. Thanks for visiting, Rebecca, and I’m sure you’ll enjoy the book!

.

Madness!Poetry is down to the wire…my former adversary in the competition, author Lori Degman, has made it all the way to the final round and is up against my former fellow Poet’s Garage member, William Peery! Their poems will be posted soon, so don’t forget to vote in this all-important Final. And if you’re looking for more poetry, head on over to Carol’s Corner for today’s complete Poetry Friday roundup!

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

  Coming July 2, 2019!

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it for you, and then they’ll ship it. Try doing that with those big online booksellers! (Plus, you’ll be helping to support local book-selling – and wouldn’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Amazon “Best Books of the Month,” Sept. 2017
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

 

Poetry Friday: 2018 Progressive Poem audio and “Dinosaur” winners!

Well, would you take a look at that calendar!

Ah, yes…May 4th. And although Star Wars has nothing to do with poetry, dinosaurs, or flashlights, it has everything to do with my Geek roots (note the capitalization) and my love of science fiction – so I couldn’t let the day go by without wishing you salutations of the season. (And yes, I’m looking forward to the Ron Howard-directed “Solo,” due in theatres this year!)

Now, then, where where we? Oh, yes…

The 2018 Kidlitosphere Progressive Poem!

A little seed’s adventure is complete…the 2018 Progressive Poem has wrapped up! Each day over the course of April (National Poetry Month), 30 different writers/bloggers added a line to the poem, and early this week, it all came to an end.

Here’s my annual recorded version of the poem, followed by the text so you can follow along, if you’d like…

Sorry about that giant cranium, by the way – I have no control over the size of the photo! (But it’s a reasonable facsimile of the real thing, in case you’re wondering)

Poet’s Jasmine, Blooming Lovely

Nestled in her cozy bed, a seed stretched.
Oh, what wonderful dreams she’d had!

Blooming in midnight moonlight, dancing with
the pulse of a thousand stars, sweet Jasmine
invented a game.

“Moon?” she called across warm honeyed air.
“I’m sad you’re alone; come join Owl and me.
We’re feasting on stardrops, we’ll share them with you.”

“Come find me,” Moon called, hiding behind a cloud.

Secure in gentle talons’ embrace, Jasmine rose
and set. She split, twining up Owl’s toes, pale
moonbeams sliding in between, Whoosh, Jasmine goes.
Owl flew Jasmine between clouds and moon to Lee’s party!
Moon, that wily bright balloon, was NOT alone.
……………………………………………………Jas grinned,

………………………………………………………….stretched,

………………………………………………………………..reached,

……………………………………………………………………..wrapped

…………………………………………………………………….a new,

…………………………………………..     around ………tender
…………………………………………………………rootlet

a trellis Sky held out to her, made of braided wind and song.
Her green melody line twisted and clung.

Because she was twining poet’s jasmine, she
wiggled a wink back at Moon, and began her poem.
Her whispered words floated on a puff of wind,
filled with light and starsong. “Revelers, lean in –
let’s add to this merriment a game that grows
wordgifts for Lee. He’s a man who knows
selection, collection, and wisely advising
these dreamers, word-weavers, and friends.”

Jas enfolded Moon-Sky-Owl into the cup of her petals,
lifted new greens to the warming rays of spring. Sun
smeared the horizon with colour, as Jasmine stretched.
She felt powerful. She felt fresh. She bloomed and took a breath
and filled the earth with a fragrance all her own.
.

To see how the poem came to be, check out the following posts:

April
1 Liz at Elizabeth Steinglass
2 Jane at Raincity Librarian
3 Laura at Writing the World for Kids
4 Michelle at Today’s Little Ditty
5 Jan at bookseedstudio
6 Irene at Live Your Poem
7 Linda at TeacherDance
8 Janet F. at LiveYour Poem
9 Ramona at Pleasures from the Page
10 Matt at Radio, Rhythm and Rhyme
11 Brenda at Friendly Fairy Tales
12 Carol at Beyond LiteracyLink
13 Linda at A Word Edgewise
14 Heidi at my juicy little universe
15 Donna at Mainely Write
16 Sarah at Sarah Grace Tuttle
17 Ruth at There is no such thing as a Godforsaken town
18 Christie at Wonderingand Wandering
19 Michelle at Michelle Kogan
20 Linda at Write Time
21 Robyn at Life on the Deckle Edge
22 Tabatha at The Opposite of Indifference
23 Amy at The Poem Farm
24 Mary Lee at A Year of Reading
25 Kiesha at Whispers from the Ridge
26 Renee at No Water River
27 Buffy at Buffy’s Blog
28 Kat at Kat’sWhiskers
29 April at Teaching Authors
30 Doraine at Dori Reads

Care to read Progressive Poems from past years? Click HERE!

========================================================

WINNERS, we have WINNERS!

I have TWO names to announce today – each of whom has won a personally-signed copy of Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books)!

One person was selected at random for sharing the news about the book’s release; out of all the folks who commented on the original Book Birthday blog post, shared it, Tweeted about it, etc., only one name could be chosen…and that was…

KIMBERLY HUTMACHER!!

Congratulations, Kimberly – and thank you so much for your support!

Our second winner took advantage of a writing challenge I call “Poetry…Cubed!” If  you’ve ever seen “Chopped!” on The Food Network, this is the same premise, applied to poetry:

• Use 3 images as inspiration to write a poem.
  .
• Include a reference to all three images in the poem. 
  .
• Email your poem to me so I can share them throughout the month. Out of all poems submitted, one writer is chosen at random! And that winner is…

JOYCE RAY!!

Congratulations, Joyce, and thanks for participating! As I always remind folks, this little poetry contest is about participation, not perfection – so please continue to #WriteLikeNoOneIsReading!

My friend Brenda Davis Harsham is hosting this week’s Poetry Friday roundup at her blog, Friendly Fairy Tales – where she is sharing a springtime haiku in addition to all of today’s poetry links.

=========================================================

“DON’T ASK A DINOSAUR” is now available everywhere!

This is going to be another busy weekend, with TWO APPEARANCES in Massachusetts tomorrow:

• Sat., May 5, 10am: Barnes & Noble, Burlington, MA, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and Flashlight Night reading/signing
• Sat., May 5, 1pm:  Barnes & Noble, Nashua, NH, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and Flashlight Night reading/signing
• Sat., May 12, 11am:  Gibson’s Bookstore, Concord, NH, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and School People reading/signing
• Wed., May 15, 12pm: Concord Hospital Gift Shop, Concord, NH, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and School People signing
• Sat., May 19, 11:30am-3pm: Barnes & Noble, Salem, NH, National Storytime at 11am, followed by Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and School People reading/signing
• Sat., June 2, 1-3pm: Books-A-Million, Concord, NH, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and School People reading/signing

=========================================================

The Dinosaur Tour blog tour continues all month and into May! My thanks to all these bloggers for their support:

April 6:       Michelle H. Barnes (Interview w/month-long writing prompt & GIVEAWAY!)
April 8:       Kate Narita (Book trailer & activity sheet spotlight)
April 11:     Deborah Kalb (Interview w/Matt & Deb)
April 13:     Yours Truly! (Interview w/illustrator Louie Chin)
April 16:     KidLit Exchange (Blog post re: process of illustration)
April 17:     Momma’s Bacon (DAAD review)
April 17:     Yours Truly! (DAAD book birthday news AND GIVEAWAY!)
April 18:     Bonnie Ferrante (DAAD review)
April 19:     KidLit Exchange (DAAD review)
April 19:     Brenda Davis Harsham (DAAD micro review)
April 25:     Bonnie Ferrante (Interview w/Matt & Deb)
May 2:        Unleashing Readers (DAAD review)
May 30:      Bookseedstudio (DAAD review/interview) 

=========================================================

 

Purchasing personalized signed copies ONLINE? Yes, it’s true!

In case you haven’t heard, there’s a new way to purchase personalized signed copies of not only Flashlight Night, but ANY of my books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

I’ve teamed up with the good folks MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH to present an option for people who would love to have a signed copy of one of my books but don’t live anywhere near me. MainStreet BookEnds has ALL but one of my books available for ordering…and the best part is, you can get them personalized!

Just log onto my website and click the cover of whichever book you want, and they will get it to me to sign and send it off to you. Try doing that with those big online booksellers! (Plus, you’ll be helping to support local book-selling – and wouldn’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you so much to all the librarians, bloggers, and parents who are still discovering “Flashlight Night!” 

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Amazon “Best Books of the Month,” Sept. 2017!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers

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Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

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Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

National Poetry Month: Only FOUR DAYS left to enter “Poetry Cubed #5” and “Dinosaur” Giveaway!

Before we get to today’s poems, I want to encourage you to check out this past Tuesday’s post, in which I shared some 5th grade student poetry from a middle school in Redditch, England! For kids who have been struggling with literacy learning, I was so happy to learn how much they dove into this writing project, following a Skype visit I had with them earlier this year.

They should be very proud of themselves – not only for the writing itself, but for being willing to share their work with all my readers!

I also need to remind you that you only have FOUR DAYS left to enter my Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books) giveaway!

To celebrate the release of my newest picture book, I wanted to offer several opportunities to win copies. One way to win a copy of DAAD, signed by both me and my co-author, Deborah Bruss, is to simply share the news!

1. Comment on THIS POST
2. Share THIS POST via Facebook or Twitter
3. Share my interview with illustrator Louie Chin
4. Share the book trailer and activity sheets featured at Kate Narita’s blog
5. Do all four!

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Each one of these counts as an entry, which means you could have as many as four entries…and if you add in the other 2 contests, that’s SIX different opportunities to win THREE copies! Just be sure to tag me when you share these links, so I can count you. I’ll draw ONE NAME at the end of the month. Good luck, and thank you!

Today, I have more “Poetry Cubed!” poems to share – and each one of them is also an opportunity to win!

If you’ve ever seen “Chopped!” on The Food Network, you know that chefs try to outdo each other by creating dishes using specific and sometimes rather strange ingredients. So for this contest, I’ve taken the premise of the TV show and applied it to poetry! Here’s how it works:

• Use the 3 images below as inspiration to write a poem. (1 poem, to the 3rd power – “cubed!”)
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• The poem can be any form, any genre, any number of lines, rhyming or not. Most importantly, remember: #WriteLikeNoOneIsReading! This is about having fun and being creative!
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• Include a reference to all three images in the one poem – either via concrete imagery or something more abstract. (And since this is poetry we’re talking about, we play fast and loose with this rule!)
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• Email your poem to me at Matt (at) MattForrest (dot) com and I’ll share them here throughout the month. Out of all poems submitted, one writer will be chosen at random to receive a personally-signed copy of Don’t Ask a Dinosaur!

Here are the three images (click on any to enlarge):

Today we have two more poems to share:
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untitled cherita

after the celebration

birthday gifts sorted
thank-you cards await

in a shadowy corner
he shines his new lampe de poche
“Merci, Mémé!” he whispers

– © 2018 Diane Mayr, all rights reserved

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haiku

dark birthday surprise
clawed hand steers my shoulder-
saved by a light beam

– © 2018 Joyce Ray, all rights reserve

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This time, instead of very different imagery, we have two poems both playing with the contract of light and dark – and both make specific references to birthdays. (By the way, a ‘cherita’ is a poem consisting of 1 line, then 2 lines, then 3 lines, and is usually narrative. Find out more about the form HERE)

One final poem – not at all like these! – from another reader who preferred to remain anonymous:

untitled

Hold the light; hands
scaly
and ancient search
dry earth
one more day

– anonymous

I’ll continue taking entries until the end of the month – which is THIS MONDAY – so send in your poems to Matt (at) MattForrest (dot) com! Good luck!

The incredibly talented (and very busy!) Irene Latham is hosting today’s Poetry Friday roundup at her blog, Live Your Poem – where she also shares poetry and answers questions about her contributions to this year’s ARTSPEAK! project.

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The Dinosaur Tour blog tour continues all month and into May! My thanks to all these bloggers for their support:

April 6:       Michelle H. Barnes (Interview w/month-long writing prompt & GIVEAWAY!)
April 8:       Kate Narita (Book trailer & activity sheet spotlight)
April 11:     Deborah Kalb (Interview w/Matt & Deb)
April 13:     Yours Truly! (Interview w/illustrator Louie Chin)
April 16:     KidLit Exchange (Blog post re: process of illustration)
April 17:     Momma’s Bacon (DAAD review)
April 17:     Yours Truly! (DAAD book birthday news AND GIVEAWAY!)
April 18:     Bonnie Ferrante (DAAD review)
April 19:     KidLit Exchange (DAAD review)
April 19:     Brenda Davis Harsham (DAAD micro review)
April 25:     Bonnie Ferrante (Interview w/Matt & Deb)
May 2:        Unleashing Readers (DAAD review)
May 30:      Bookseedstudio (DAAD review/interview) 

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“DON’T ASK A DINOSAUR”
is now available everywhere!

This is going to be a busy weekend, with THREE APPEARANCES over two days – including a wild DOUBLE DINO DAY tomorrow, with author Sara Levine:

• Sat., April 28, 10:30am: Brookline Booksmith, Brookline, MA, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and School People reading/signing (with Sara Levine, Fossil by Fossil: Comparing Dinosaur Bones reading/signing)
• Sat., April 28, 2pm: Barnes & Noble, Framingham, MA, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur reading/signing (with Sara Levine, Fossil by Fossil: Comparing Dinosaur Bones reading/signing)
• Sun., April 29, 2pm:  MainStreet BookEnds, Warner, NH, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur, School People, and Flashlight Night reading/signing and discussion
• Sat., May 5, 10am: Barnes & Noble, Burlington, MA, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and School People reading/signing
• Sat., May 5, 1pm:  Barnes & Noble, Nashua, NH, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and Flashlight Night reading/signing
• Sat., May 12, 11am:  Gibson’s Bookstore, Concord, NH, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and School People reading/signing
• Wed., May 15, 12pm: Concord Hospital Gift Shop, Concord, NH, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and School People signing
• Sat., May 19, 11:30am-3pm: Barnes & Noble, Salem, NH, National Storytime at 11am, followed by Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and School People reading/signing
• Sat., June 2, 1-3pm: Books-A-Million, Concord, NH, Don’t Ask a Dinosaur and School People reading/signing

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The 2018 Kidlitosphere Progressive Poem!

A little seed is on an adventure…the 2018 Progressive Poem is underway! Here’s the list of all the writers/bloggers participating, so you can follow along:

April 1 Liz at Elizabeth Steinglass
2 Jane at Raincity Librarian
3 Laura at Writing the World for Kids
4 Michelle at Today’s Little Ditty
5 Jan at bookseedstudio
6 Irene at Live Your Poem
7 Linda at TeacherDance
8 Janet F. at Live Your Poem
9 Ramona at Pleasures from the Page
10 Matt at Radio, Rhythm and Rhyme
11 Brenda at Friendly Fairy Tales
12 Carol at Beyond LiteracyLink
13 Linda at A Word Edgewise
14 Heidi at my juicy little universe
15 Donna at Mainely Write
16 Sarah at Sarah Grace Tuttle
17 Ruth at There is no such thing as a Godforsaken town
18 Christie at Wondering and Wandering
19 Michelle at Michelle Kogan
20 Linda at Write Time
21 Robyn at Life on the Deckle Edge
22 Tabatha at The Opposite of Indifference
23 Amy at The Poem Farm
24 Mary Lee at A Year of Reading
25 Kiesha at Whispers from the Ridge
26 Renee at No Water River
27 Buffy at Buffy’s Blog
28 Kat at Kat’s Whiskers
29 April at Teaching Authors
30 Doraine at Dori Reads

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Thank you so much to all the librarians, bloggers, and parents who are still discovering “Flashlight Night!” 

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Amazon “Best Books of the Month,” Sept. 2017!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers

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Purchasing personalized signed copies ONLINE? Yes, it’s true!

In case you haven’t heard, there’s a new way to purchase personalized signed copies of not only Flashlight Night, but ANY of my books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

I’ve teamed up with the good folks MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH to present an option for people who would love to have a signed copy of one of my books but don’t live anywhere near me. MainStreet BookEnds has ALL but one of my books available for ordering…and the best part is, you can get them personalized!

Just log onto my website and click the cover of whichever book you want, and they will get it to me to sign and send it off to you. Try doing that with those big online booksellers! (Plus, you’ll be helping to support local book-selling – and wouldn’t that make you feel good?)

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Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post twice a week – on Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!