Did You Know?

When Jack Canfield talks about perseverance, he speaks from experience. His best-selling Chicken Soup for the Soul series was rejected by over 144 publishers before going on to sell over 100 million copies.

Neil Gaiman's spooky book wins Newbery

Oh, the horror! Neil Gaiman has received the top prize for children's literature: The John Newbery Medal.

"I am so wonderfully befuddled," the best-selling author said Monday after winning the 88th annual Newbery for "The Graveyard Book," a spooky, but (he says) family friendly story about a boy raised by a vampire, a werewolf and a witch.

"I never really thought of myself as a Newbery winner. It's such a very establishment kind of award, in the right kind of way, with the world of librarians pointing at the book saying, `This is worthy of the ages.' And I'm so very used to working in, and enjoying working in, essentially the gutter."

Gaiman, known for his "Sandman" comic-book series, had worked on the "Graveyard Book" off and on for more than 20 years, an understandable delay for the author of more than 20 books and the winner of prizes for science fiction, fantasy and horror.

He says "The Graveyard Book" was inspired in part by "The Jungle Book," Rudyard Kipling's classic about a boy raised by animals. Gaiman's book opens with a baby boy escaping an assassin who kills his parents and older sister. The boy totters to a decrepit cemetery, where he's adopted by ghosts, christened Nobody Owens (Bod for short) and given the Freedom of the Graveyard.

On Gaiman's blog, he writes that "The Graveyard Book" is not a children's book. It's "a book for pretty much for all ages, although I'm not sure how far down that actually starts. I think I would have loved it when I was eight, but I don't think that all eight-year olds were like me."

Quote of the Day for the Writer

"If you're a singer, you lose your voice. A baseball player loses his arm. A writer gets more knowledge, and if he's good, the older he gets, the better he writes."

--Mickey Spillane

Singer Leona Lewis Signs Deal for Autobiography

LONDON (Reuters) – Leona Lewis, who won British talent TV show The X Factor in 2006 and topped charts around the world with her debut album "Spirit," has signed a deal to pen her autobiography with publishing house Hodder & Stoughton.

The book, which will include more than 100 new photographs, will hit the shelves in October, shortly before the scheduled release of Lewis' second album, the publisher said on Monday.
"The last two years have been an unbelievable experience for me," said the 23-year-old Londoner, who debuted at No.1 in the key U.S. album chart last year, the first British woman to achieve the feat.

"Spirit" has sold an estimated five million copies around the world since its release in 2007.

Hodder & Stoughton, which did not disclose the financial details of the deal, said photographs for the autobiography would be taken by Dean Freeman, who also worked on the publisher's collaboration with soccer star David Beckham.

"This will be the first time Leona tells her story of how the X-Factor launched her from waitressing in Pizza Hut in Hackney to stardom on both sides of the Atlantic," said Hodder editor Fenella Bates.

"It is a real-life fairytale and every girl's dream."

02/08/09 6:16 am Sun

Did You Know?

Do you know the motivating power that bestselling novelist, Sandra Brown, used to become a writer? That power was being fired from her job in television. Her husband told her that she can now use the time to do what she has always wanted to do--write! To bad for the television station. I guess they too can't keep their talent. : )

01/08/2009 Thurs 8:31 am

Quote of the Day for the Writer

“I just have to tell anybody out there who feels like they’re a nobody, listen, if they tell you that you have no talent that it’s never gonna happen for you that you’re just some loud, crude, pushy little nothing in a tight dress and too much make-up. Just tell them ‘Hey! Just look at Jacqueline Susann!’"

-- Jacqueline Susann during her book party for her best selling book, Valley of the Dolls

Dec 27, 2008 4:42am Sat

The Gift of Hope

Here is a story by bestselling Christian author Max Lucado that was forwarded to me by a co-worker awhile back.

The aspiring young author was in need of hope. More than one person had told him to give up. “Getting published is impossible,” one mentor said. “Unless you are national celebrity, publishers won’t talk to you.” Another warned, “Writing takes too much time. Besides, you don’t want all your thoughts on paper.”

Initially he listened. He agreed that writing was a waste of effort and turned his attention to other projects. But somehow the pen and pad were bourbon and Coke to the wordaholic. He’d rather write than read. So he wrote. How many nights did hr pass on that couch in the corner of the apartment reshuffling his deck of verbs and nouns? And how many hours did his wife sit with him? He wordsmithing. She cross-stitching. Finally a manuscript was finished. Crude and laden with mistakes but finished.

She gave him the shove. “Send it out. What’s the harm?”

So out it went. Mailed to fifteen different publishers. While the couple waited, he wrote. While he wrote, she stitched. Neither expecting much, both hoping everything. Responses began to fill the mailbox. “I’m sorry, but wee don’t accept unsolicited manuscripts.” “We must return your work. Best of luck.” “ Our catalog doesn’t have room for unpublished authors.”

I still have those letters. Somewhere in a file. Finding them would take some time. Finding Denalyn’s cross-stitch, however, would take none. To see it, all I do is lift my eyes from this monitor and look on the wall. “Of all those arts in which the wise excel, nature’s chief masterpiece is writing well.”

She gave I to me about the time the fifteenth letter arrived. A publisher had said yes. That letter is also framed. Which of the two is more meaningful? The gift from my wife or the letter from the publisher? The gift, hands down. For in giving the gift, Denalyn gave hope.

Love does that. Love extends an olive leaf to the loved one and says, “I have hope in you.”

Love is just as quick to say, “I have hope for you.”

You can say those words. You are a flood survivor. By God’s grace you have found your way to dry land. You know what it’s like to see the waters subside. And since you do, since you passed through a flood and lived to tell about it, you are qualified to give hope to someone else.

December 25, 2008 2:34 AM