Read All About It!: Win a Poetry Book

I thought I’d let everyone know that I’ll be giving away children’s poetry books as prizes at Wild Rose Reader and books of light verse at Political Verses to people who leave comments at my posts during National Poetry Month. There will be a weekly drawing of names each Sunday in April and on May 1st. If, for example, you leave a comment at one of my posts dated April 1-4, you will be eligible to win a book in the first drawing--which will be held tomorrow, April 5th. (See the schedule below.)

Drawing Dates for Poetry Book Prizes

- April 5th—for comments left on posts dated April 1-4

- April 12th—for comments left on posts dated April 5-11

- April 19th—for comments left on posts dated April 12-18

- April 26th—for comments left on posts dated April 19-25

- May 1st—for comments left on posts dated April 26-30

The Poetry Book Prizes

Read the following Wild Rose Reader and Political Verses posts to find out the fabulous poetry books you’ll be eligible to win—just for commenting at my posts.

- Where Is the Wild Rose???

- Political Verses: National Poetry Month Prizes

Magnetic Poetry, Part 2

Last week, my Poetry Friday post was about composing poems using online Magnetic Poetry kits. I invited blog readers to write their own “magnetic” poems and leave them in the comments. Here are the poems people submitted:

Mary Lee of A Year of Reading

young woman
translucent universe
warm trust
wild worry
velvety questions
poetry window


Pam Coughlan of Mother Reader

translucent in youth
secretive,
your question
lingers less than
you
asking
me


Our own Meghan McCarthy of the Blue Rose Girls

young wild life
your genius
so vivid
a world
masterpiece
dead


I decided to write another poem this week using the “poet” magnetic kit. Here it is:

Untitled

I wake here
lie open
above the sky
see smoke seep
from a starry universe
kiss the morning
with lips of steel
remember your velvet voice
my desire
and melt like poetry
on a breeze


NOTE: At my solo blogs Wild Rose Reader and Political Verses, I’ll be giving away poetry books as prizes in celebration of National Poetry Month. All you have to do to have your named entered into each week’s drawing is to comment at one of my April posts. In addition, I’ll be doing a special drawing for people who commented at any of my March posts at Political Verses.

Check out this post to see the books of light verse that I’ll be giving away as prizes at Political Verses: Political Verses: National Poetry Month Prizes

Check out this post to see the children’s poetry books I’ll be giving away as prizes at Wild Rose Reader: Where Is the Wild Rose???

FYI
My poem Things to Do If You Are a Pencil is included in Falling Down the Page: A Book of List Poems that was edited by Georgia Heard.


Things to Do If You Are a Pencil


Be sharp.

Wear a slick yellow suit

and a pink top hat.

Tap your toes on the tabletop,

listen for the right rhythm,

then dance a poem

across the page.


Three of my poems were published in the April issue of Yareah Magazine. You can read about that in this Wild Rose Reader post: My Poems in Yareah Magazine. Here's a link to the magazine: Yareah. And here’s a link to the page with my three poems—Space Man, Winter Ballet, and Fairy for Hire.

********************

At Wild Rose Reader, I have an extensive post about mask poems. The post includes four of my original poems, mask poems written by my former students, and book recommendations.

At Political Verses, I’m featuring Poem at the End of the Twentieth Century by J. Patrick Lewis for this first Poetry Friday during National Poetry Month.

Amy Planchak Graves has the Poetry Friday Roundup at ayuddha.net.

POP! cover

Here's your first peek at the new cover. It's not done yet... but I hope to have it done by tonight. That's what I tell myself.

healthcare, taxes, and the finish line.

I'm working on a few things right now. One is the book. Oh, the book. I MUST get it done! I've actually been feeling okay these past few weeks so I know I should focus on it while I can... but there were/are some things in the way. The first is taxes. I finally finished but am not ready to pay the hefty bill. 5,000. Ouch. And I partially paid quarterly. Thank goodness I can write off my healthcare, etc.

Healthcare brings me to my second thought. The other night my sister called me to insist that I watch Frontline. The topic was the failing healthcare system. She said "it reminds me of you." And it is pretty much my situation. There are several people in the show who have a low paying job for the healthcare. That is my situation. I have a low paying part time job because without it I would have NO healthcare. No insurance company would take me with my pre-existing condition so I'm stuck for life ringing people up and saying "do you have the membership card?" Sigh. And of course this part time job means I can't work on the books--the things that actually pay the bills. The funny thing is (or not funny) that the only person who died on the show because of no healthcare was the young female with Lupus. My sister said "I didn't know they'd show that." Uh-huh. Even the guy who didn't have healthcare and had a heart attack survived! Oh well. This may end up in my little documentary.

At any rate, you can watch the whole frontline episide here:

The other thing I"m working on is my documentary. I've been carrying my camera around all week. I got a few awkward moments where some health care professionals questioned my use of the camera. "Is that so you can sue us?" I never filmed any of that, I just had it with me. You'll see when I finish the "film."

Lastly, I'm almost done with my bubble gum cover. I NEED to get this done! I'm also going for another "finish line." I signed up for the JPMorgan Chase Corporate Challenge. That means I need to train. This means I may hurt myself. Only time will tell.

meghan

still learning

So, I'm still learning how to edit video. I discover something new that I can do each time I try it. This little bit will be going into something larger--sort of a day in the life of an author... or rather me. Something like that.



I'm also currently covered in paint and shouldn't be typing. I'm trying to finish up the cover for my book about bubble gum. I hope to show something that looks kind of finished by the end of the day! I hope!

meghan

My Find Beauty Challenge Movie

So like Alvina in her post here, I made a little movie (with my friend Alexandre Ferron--who is also making my book trailer, he is the film-movie-smarty one) for the North of Beautiful: Find Beauty Challenge, inspired by the book North Of Beautiful.

For every video about beauty that fans upload, my friend and uber-talented author Justina Chen Headley will donate $10--up to $1,000--to help children in third-world countries born with cleft lips and palates. Now, that's beautiful!


www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8Ir1_R3By0

I'm always sad when people don't smile for photos because they "hate their smiles." I think that is contrary to reality-- in my opinion, people always look better when they smile because they look happy! And happiness is the greatest beautifier! So, our little movie is based on that. What do you think?

p.s.--if you like it, please rate it; I'd like to win that Ipod touch! ha ha

ps

Today is the official publication date for What Can You Do with an Old Red Shoe?. Hurray!! I am so excited to see it in bookstores at last. Check it out and let me know what you think!

Excerpts from some early reviews:

"Recycling becomes lots of fun in this sprightly activity book. . . what really makes this a a standout is Alter's adorable artwork featuring a coterie of animals at work and play."
--Booklist

"This is a great choice for environmental units and a valuable resource for parents interested in teaching their children about reuse at home."
--School Library Journal

Book Bash in review

Saturday's Book Bash was a lot of fun and a huge success, the place was packed! Lesson learned: partnering with a radio station for an event is super smart as they advertised the like crazy. Also, I am starting to see that events in smaller towns (as opposed to large metropolitan areas) seem to bring out more of a crowd, maybe because people's time isn't spread as thin with other events they could attend? Of course having great programming helps too, Jarrett (organizer of us book folks) and The River put on a great event and a good time was had by all. You can see more pictures on the radio station's web site, but here are some highlights...

The main room was filled with vendors of all kinds, including of course local independent book store The Odyssey:



There were art activities for kids all over the place, including this one that looks just like one of the art projects in Old Red Shoe (actually they were making May baskets):



Bands played all day on multiple stages, so of course there was lots of cute tiny kid dancing:



In between bands, us authors took the stage. I drew and read and talked about my new books:





After me came Timothy Basil Ering, who gave an amazing talk about how he gets his ideas, including an underwater video of catching lobsters at the Cape:



Jane Yolen took the stage next, and enthralled the audience with her reading of How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight? while she played a gorgeous animation of the art:



And to finish off the day Jarrett Krosoczka amped up the audience with his rock star reading of Punk Farm, the kids were in love:

Judging a book by the beginning

I read the Printz medal-winning book Jellicoe Road a few weeks ago. We don't review books on this blog, but my experience reading this book make me think twice about the way I review manuscripts, so I thought it was worth discussing. First of all, let me say that I absolutely loved the book. I thought it was profound, moving, intricately crafted, and layered. It made me sob, and those of you who know me, know that I'm a sucker for books that make me cry.

BUT, I spent the first 100 pages confused. I found it extremely hard to follow, with too many characters to keep track of. For some reason, I kept thinking it was a dystopian fantasy. It took me a while to realize that it was set in contemporary Australia! And then I spent the next 50-100 pages irritated by the main character. I know, right? Not exactly a glowing review. And yet I loved this book! The writing was beautiful, and I stuck with it, and I'm so glad that I did, because the second half was so fantastic, I forgave the issues I had with the beginning. And, in fact, I understood better the reason why the beginning was set up the way it was.

But I realized that if this had been submitted to me, I would have probably declined it, because when I review novels, I generally make up my mind in the first 30-50 pages. If I'm pretty sure it's a pass, I will skip to the end to see if it ends on a really powerful note, but it's hard to say in this case if skipping to the end would have changed my mind. In my first year or so as an editorial assistant, I actually read through every submission all the way through. Sure, I may have skimmed, but I had the time and interest to get to the end. But I came to realize that I rarely if ever changed my mind about a book after making up my mind in the beginning. I also started getting more novel submissions and was unable to read the entire manuscript and still keep up with the reading pile. (I should say that if I'm liking a book, I'll read the whole thing.)

So, what made me stick with the book in this case? The fact that it was a Printz winner was a reason--I knew that it must end powerfully for it to have won over a committee of librarians. Knowing that the author was well-respected played a role, too. Plus the fact that I was reading it for a book group and started it early enough to have time to finish it, of course!

I was talking about my experience with this book with an agent last week, telling her that because of the nature of the business, I might have a passed on a book that I ultimately loved, and she thought for a moment and said, "Well, I suppose that's where a good agent comes in." The agent can advise the editor to stick with a book, and if the editor trusts the agent, she will. It's true. There are certain agents I trust, and know that they would never send something unworthy. I give the submissions they send me a little more attention and patience than others sent by agents I don't know, don't know well, or know but don't generally trust their taste. Other readers at the book group said they stuck with it because colleagues had told them how amazing the book was, and they trusted their advice.

But I must say, ultimately, I think Jellicoe Road is the exception to the rule. There's a reason why so many conferences have first-page critiques--because it's so crucial to hook your reader from the very beginning. I won't be drastically changing the way I review submissions, but then again, I may be a little more patient with certain novels under very special circumstances.

*****

Just a reminder that tomorrow night I will be on a panel at the New School on getting published, along with Ben Tomek, marketing associate, Reader’s Digest Children’s Publishing; and Anna Olswanger, literary agent, Liza Dawson Associates. It's only $5 (free for students, faculty, and alumni), so if you're in the NY area, come on out! More info here.

*****

And finally, the winning name for my segments on the books I edit is...

Beyond the Book!

I wrote everyone's name who voted on a scrap of paper and drew one winner, and that lucky person is...Lindsey, who was the 5th commenter on this post. Congratulations! Email me at bluerosegirls@gmail.com and let me know which Little, Brown book you would like.

Thanks everyone for voting, and tune in next Monday for...
Beyond the Book: The Curious Garden.

CRIBS: FRIDGE TIME

Here's the "see inside the fridge" part. If you haven't seen Cribs then you probably won't understand why I did this. Oh well. P.S-- the other film isn't edited. That whole end part will be cut out-aka pants and part of judge judy.



Also, if you're wondering why I'm doing this... well... not really sure. It started with my "see inside the studio" video, and then I guess I felt the need to expand... oh yes, into something ENORMOUS! I really do think that the home environment is very important to the self-employed individual, mostly because if you have a home "office" and "studio" then you're there A LOT. And, well, I thought I'd document it. Making a mock CRIBS is a good way to do it. I'm also going to show some of my favorite books and that sort of thing, so it'll all be tied in soon enough.

Stay tuned!

Meghan
p.s - yes, I'm obviously feeling better because the OCD tendencies are coming back like the plague. Fingers crossed.

CRIBS: PART 2

It's entirely possible that I've lost my mind on this one....

A job that's GOOD for my writing!

I've ALWAYS written; sometimes when I had a full-time job, sometimes when I had a part-time job, and, since 2001, when I had no job. I've freelanced (8 work for hire books, lots of adult editing/ghostwriting). I've had little jobs, too. Some of you may have seen my post about the job I had a few months ago where I sat at a table, dressed in dark glasses and trenchcoat, and responded:
"The eagle flies at dawn" when groups of game particpants approached and whispered their password.

I had imagined this scene taking place in a bar, where my outfit would blend in or it would be so dark that no one would see me, but my post was the closest thing my town has to a hippy hangout, and one that was flooded with sunlight. But it was fun and I got paid $100 for two hours! Work like that doesn't come often, though.

As all freelancers know, it's an anxiety-filled life, never to know when you're going to have work and when you're not, when you're going to be able to pay your rent and when you're going to be late..... SOME pressure is good, but this kind of anxiety puts a kind of pressure on writing that is the opposite of helpful.

The ideal situation for me -- a writer without an independent income or partner to pick up the slack -- is, I think, a part-time job. I wrote letters and sent out my resume for months, applying for full-time jobs when I realized that the part-time ones barely existed. The only company to respond had what sounded like a dream job: writing children's stories for a Web site as a paying, steady job. As a friend said:
"It sounded too good to be true and it was."

But, he didn't make that comment until after I'd wasted a lot of time (my own and the BRGs'!) trying to pick out an outfit, going into NY for the interview, and starting a sample project for the company. I stopped the latter when they told me how little they were going to pay me.

After that fiasco (and there were others -- that was just the proverbial straw), I added up all the time I'd spent on my job search, and decided that it had been time wasted.

At this point, one of the BRGs suggested that I become a nanny. At first, I thought that was ridiculous, but she persisted (you love kids, it would be great for your writing -- with the right family), and the more I thought about the idea, the better I liked it. I've done it before and loved it; in fact, it was while I was a nanny before that I made my first real sale (a short story to REDBOOK).

So to test the nanny idea, I've been babysitting for the last two weeks -- I get to spend my working time playing with kids -- yesterday the kids (I was only babysitting for one but two others joined in the expedition) and I visited a local farm and later walked to a river where we made boats..... The thing that surprised me most about is how many kids there are out there who spend their free time doing stuff like this (something that is not reflected much in YA books or even many books for tweens) as well as playing video games.

The kids I've been meeting lead more old-fashioned lives than the media would have us believe. True, everyone I've been babysitting for attends a good private school, and this is the country, not the city -- but still. There are kids whose parents don't allow them to go online, who don't watch much television (half an hour a day during school was the rule most of the parents had), and who are in sixth grade and not even close to dating.

This is really encouraging to me! Babysitting has also removed a lot of financial pressure and (as my fellow BRG predicted) is giving me ideas for stories, too.

Magnetic Poetry

Cloudscome of A Wrung Sponge did a post about Magnetic Poetry last Friday. She wrote: "The trick in magnetic poetry is that you have to pull words from a limited pallet. It becomes somewhat stream of consciousness... or even nonsensical. But for some reason that amuses me and I think it enables me to play with alternate layers of meaning."

She also encouraged blog readers to create poems using the online Magnetic Poetry Kit—saying: "Go ahead, give it a go. If you write some (G rated) magnetic poems come back here and share them in the comments. I'd love to see how you do."

Later, she posted the poems we composed. Here’s the poem I created using words included in the “Artist” Magnetic Kit:

POET (A Magnetic Poem)
By Elaine Magliaro

I
observe
compose
experiment
sculpt water
paint colors
create metaphors
fashion fiery impressions
chisel rhythm & symbol
capture imagination
passion
ink beauty

Click here to view my poem as it appears on the Magnetic Poetry site.
You can also read Cloudscome’s post and the other “magnetic poems” that were created here.


Magnetic Poetry Site
You can create your own magnetic poem in five different categories:

• Artist
  
• Genius
  
• Office


• Poet


• Romance

You can submit your poems for posting at the Magnetic Poetry site. Categories of poems include: Love, Friends, Daily Life, Pets, Nature, Spiritual, Existential, Absurd, and Other.

My poem is posted in the “Other” category. You’ll see me listed under Elaine M., MA, USA, 3/22/09.

Click here to find the page with links to the poems submitted in all categories.

NOTE: If you compose a poem using one of the magnetic kits, leave it in the comments. I’ll post all the poems I receive next Friday.

********************

At Political Verses, I have another original poem entitled Rush and the Pussy-Cat. It’s a Limbaughyme that’s a parody of Edward Lear's The Owl and the Pussy-Cat.

At Wild Rose Reader, I have Things to Do If You Are a Pencil, an original poem that’s included in Falling Down the Page: A Book of List Poems, a new anthology edited by Georgia Heard.

Julie Larios has the Poetry Friday Roundup at The Drift Record.

CRIBS: PART ONE FINISHED

Okay, I added more to it. Each day it'll get a little more finished. The real project will be cleaning my apartment so that I can film it!



Stay tuned for me watching TV and some commercials thrown in for good humor. Sham Wow! anyone?

Book Bash on Saturday

Just a reminder to folks in western Massachusetts looking for a fun event to bring their family to this Saturday, come join me at The River's Family Music Meltdown & Book Bash! I'll be doing a brief presentation at 11:40 am about how I made What Can You Do with an Old Red Shoe?, then signing books afterwards. I am honored to join Jarrett Krosoczka (who co-organized the festival), Jane Yolen, and Timothy Basil Ering, who are also presenting. There will be great food, local vendors, storytelling, lots of bands performing, and activities like hula hooping and trapeze!

Saturday, March 28, 10 am - 4pm
JFK Middle School
Free!

MTV CRIBS, MEGHAN STYLE

This is part of part one. I've got a long way to go!


p.s - the picture quality is way better on my website:
http://www.meghan-mccarthy.com/cribs_part1.html

Stay tuned for the first part. See inside the lovely studio! And maybe the refrigerator!

table of Menus

I am still traveling in Texas visiting schools daily, which while fun, is admittedly exhausting. But not without highlights! For example, a table full of red origami cranes (just like Menu in Lissy's Friends) from a first grade class:



Even so, I must confess that I am a bit drained, which is why this post will be a bit truncated. But besides the cranes I wanted to share these other tidbits:

1. There was a lovely blog post at Xiaoning's Blog about the anniversary of The Ugly Vegetables. That's better than a card!

2. I was forwarded this link. It's my first review of my new novel (out June) Where the Mountain Meets the Moon! And it's a good one (phew!). Terry Hong of the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Program calls it "...definitely a glowing, loving, memorable read." THANKS!

3. I have figured out how to get my blog on my Amazon Connects profile. At least I think I have. If I haven't, don't tell me until after I have had a good night's sleep.

Virginia Festival of the Book

I am just settling back into Boston after a lovely in week in Charlottesville (my hometown) at the Virginia Festival of the Book. It wasn't quite as warm as other years, I didn't get to wear flip-flops like last year, but we did hit 70 on Wednesday! And I got to see some flowers in bloom before returning to the arctic north. Here is a little preview of spring for those of you weathering March in New England:







I was especially pleased to see these, clearly someone had an advance copy of What Can You Do with an Old Red Shoe?:



The festival itself went great! I visited three head start programs, two elementary schools and met the most delightful librarians. On Saturday I threw an event open to the public at an art center with my mom, a local art teacher. The response was overwhelming- families began arriving half an hour before we planned to start, and quickly filled the room! As most authors will attest, its pretty challenging to draw people out to book signings these days, so I was really quite thrilled to see such a crowd. I was lucky enough to have my dad the photographer there taking pictures, he got this great shot of the room during my talk:



I began by comparing my very first book to my most recent, then went about explaining all the steps in between:



I finished by drawing some of the characters in RED SHOE:



Then invited kids to come color them in, which was a big hit:



After the talk kids rushed our recycling craft table, grown-ups had a peek at the original art for the book and I busily signed books and chatted with folks. All in all a great day! Its going to be a lovely spring.

Kindle 2 on Jon Stewart

I recently posted this on my blog... thought the BRG readers might be interested too! Jon Stewart interviewed Jeff Bezos last week, the founder of Amazon, about the new Kindle. Hilarious. I love how Jon clearly thinks that books are better.

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

Jeff Bezos

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Economic Crisis

funny bookseller video

I stumbled upon this. Okay, almost all of this stuff has happened to me too! Good lord people are stupid.