Life is a roller coaster! Personal post

NOTE: This post is political and personal.  It is not about books, or storytelling, or crafts.   It IS about change and my thoughts on all the change that is going on right now in the Untied States.

A week and a half ago, a young man sat with a Bible study group for an hour and then killed nine of the members.  He chose this group on purpose.  He had a plan.  Suddenly, the hatred, obstinacy, and irrational craziness that many Americans subscribed to since an African American became president was exposed for what it was.  Racism.  Bigotry.  Cruelty.  Evil.  Fear.

Since then:
1. The Confederate flag has been demonized - rightly so.  It should never have been flown on public land after the Civil War. (Private rights are another thing.)  It's just a piece of cloth, but it's significance in the war against equality is now clear.

2.  The Supreme Court has outlawed housing discrimination - again - upholding broad discrimination claims.

3.  The Supreme Court made marriage among all people - same sex, two sexes - a law in 50 states.  This means people everywhere in the United States have the right to not be lonely anymore regardless of whom they love.

4. The Affordable Health Care Act survived and was approved, I guess, by the Supreme Court.  Health Care for everyone!

5. Our president delivered the speech of his lifetime when he delivered the eulogy for Clementa Pinckney - a speech that showed his intelligence, his confidence, his empathy, and his faith.

People were shocked into their senses again.  Politicians had to admit that their party loyalty just might be counterproductive, if not downright anti-American.

The battle to be a better country is not over.  Hate crimes are still being committed. Guns are too readily available.  The Equal Rights Act needs to come to fruition.  But, my dwindling hope has rebounded.  There are good people here - on both sides of the aisle.

Toon! Toon! TOON!

Bless you, TOON Books, for the lovely box of new graphic novels!  You publish some of the best highly illustrated kids' lit out there.

Written and Drawn by Henrietta, a TOON Book by LINIERS, is my favorite of this bunch.  "A box of colored pencils is as close as you can get to owning a piece of the rainbow", Henrietta tells her cat, Fellini.  Henrietta sits down to write and draw the amazing story of "The Monster with Three Heads and Two Hats."  We see Henrietta's drawings and we see her reactions to her own imagination and the whole thing is fun and funny and delightful. 

Flop to the Top!, a TOON book by Eleanor Davis & Drew Weing.  Wanda is a Superstar and she knows it.  When she goes online and posts a picture with her floppy dog, Wilbur, the Internet goes crazy.  Wilbur is a HUGE hit.  Wanda is not happy for his fame.  Young readers will get a kick out of attention hog Wanda's disappointment and of Wilbur's response to fame and fortune.  The ending is super cool, too.

Check back soon for reviews of my other TOON swag.

GoFundMe

This graphic is the property of the Lehigh Valley Storytelling guild and was designed by Kutztown University students.

The Lehigh Valley Storytelling Guild does a lot with kids.  We have a Children's Series of performances.  This past year one of our members planned a Teen Story Jam.  And we host the Pennsylvania Youth Storytelling Showcase.  What we don't have yet is a group of young members.

So, some other storytellers and I are starting the Young Tellers Guild of the Lehigh Valley.  It's not as easy as it sounds.  We need meeting places.  And resources.  And time and travel.  And coaching supplies.  And most of all, we need kids.

I have started a GoFundMe campaign to raise funds to provide resources, to find meeting spaces, to encourage libraries and schools to hosts meetings and to pay travel expenses for storytellers who work with these groups.

Please support these efforts to share the oldest form of entertainment, education and enrichment with the newest tellers.

www.gofundme.com/ytglv

Thanks.

Glass bird

In The Girl with the Glass Bird, we meet Edie Wilson just as her awful cousins have caught the pet goldfish Edie brought with her to Folly Farm.  What they do to the goldfish and to Edie is gross and cruel.  But like many stereotypical upper class British parents, Edie's aunt writes it all off as "Boys will be boys".

Meanwhile, Edie's older cousin, Charles has been handed an assignment by one of his biggest clients and oldest friends.  Charles has to plant a girl in the client's daughter's boarding school to find out if the client's daughter IS being tormented as she claims she is.  Well, well, well, how convenient!  When he decides to drop in on Folly Farm, who should he find but an 11-year-old  girl whose aunt could care less what happens to her - as long as Edie is "safe", that is.

And Edie enters the world of Knight's Haddon.  No cell phones, no TV, very little computer usage -  the school is exactly as it was when Edie's mother went there.  From the start, Edie knows that Anastasia, her charge, is being manipulated.  But are the students behind the pranks or are the adults to blame?

Princesses and bullies, spies and secrets, The Girl with the Glass Bird by Esme Kerr mixes all these things together to produce a page turner.  Is Anastasia crazy or is someone just trying to make her seem that way?  Who can Edie trust when her grandmother warns her away from everyone?  Little events build to a grand crisis.  And Edie may not be able to move fast enough. 

Gregory K.

Your book trailer for the day!

Thanks, Greg, for a fun book!

I am Incorrigible!

 

Dear Maryrose Wood,
    I finished The Unmapped Sea, early Monday morning and I have just one or two little questions for you.

1.  WHAT!!!!????

2.  Are you kidding me?  Please, say you are kidding me!

Oh and this one.

3.  How could you do this to your loyal readers?

Sorry.  I do have another question.  It's actually the most important question.

4.  When is the next book coming out?  I hope it will arrive next week, because I can handle this sense of fraughtitude for maybe a week.  But not much longer than that.  Then I explode and start telling people what happened.  Or not.

The Incorrigible children and Miss Lumley accompany Sir Frederick and Lady Constance and the Ashton household to the beach at Brighton - in January.  The doctor ordered it.  But this works to Miss Lumley's advantage because the only person who has any clue as to the nature of the Ashton family curse lives in Brighton.  Coincidence?  I think not.  Time is running out.  Lady Constance will bring forth generation #5 of cursed Ashton's in May.  The curse must be dispelled before the baby arrives or..... (falls into a Lady Constance-ish swoon!!!)

Alexander, Beowulf and Casseiopeia meet the Babushnikov children.  Isn't that sweet?  (Simper and smile.)  They go skating and share dinners together and visit a most unusual Museum and it's like a walk in the sunshine... A very cold, argument-wracked walk in the winter blustery sunshine - with clouds.

And that is really all I can tell you.  Don't ask.  If you need to know more you can read the book yourself.  I am returning my copy to the Bethlehem Area Public Library this weekend.