The Reluctant Knight

Good Morning Readers & Writers,

As I embark on my summer vacation, I've asked my good friend, writer Doug Glener, to say something in my stead.  He's written a bang-up adventure, so I hope you'll give it a shot.

I'll turn it over to Doug:

I had an extraordinarily vivid dream one night: knights were sitting in front of heavenly pools, helping the earth-bound in distress. I woke up, the dream leaving a lasting impression on me. A few years passed, and in the background of my mind, I turned over the dream, believing it held the genesis to a story. 

The dream had something of a magnetic effect, pulling odd bits of history, my past, and other seemingly unrelated things to itself. A narrative began to form - I could literally see various scenes from the book. I just had to figure out how to get from point A to point B, and so forth. This process was an act of faith, believing that my subconscious would lead the way and fill in the missing bits of plot. That's exactly what happened, and the result was The Reluctant Knight.

Percival Adler always dreamed of going on a quest-until he stumbled into a real one. Now he's found himself entangled in an adventure with a Mongol warlord, an insane pharaoh, and the greatest samurai of 19th-century Japan. The cast of characters takes to Manhattan in search of a legendary relic that gives its wielder unimaginable power. Inside: lost civilizations, time-traveling warriors, suspicious parents, barbarous hordes, and one unforgettable ride.

Doug Glener did play far too many hours of Dungeons & Dragons while attending Paramus High School, but he did not step through a portal or meet Tesshu.

After completing high school, Doug went to Vassar College, where he had the privilege of taking classes with professor of English, Dean Mace, who was his writing mentor for manyyears. Then came a stint as a professional musician (Doug’s band appeared on Star Search). Once that had run its course, he picked up the pen and became a writer. He also picked upthe sword and earned a black belt in aikido.

Doug is the co-author of Wisdom’s Blossoms: Tales of the Saints of India (Shambhala, November 2002). He lives in Encinitas, California, and enjoys spending time with his family, biking, and meditating.

Inspiration

 

Two days ago my thirteen year old niece told me she was writing a book. She asked me to take a look at it, and of course I agreed. She’s writing it on one of those websites geared toward young writers like her. Miss Literati is a fun place for teens who love to read and want to write. So I went to read her story. I somehow skipped her profile, but today I read it and she mentioned me as one of her inspirations. I was touched, and so proud of her. She’s written five chapters of her vampire teenager story. Ahem, Stephanie Meyer is actually her biggest inspiration. I know this because a few weeks ago she held her breath after asking me, “Have you met Stephanie Meyer?” Sadly of course I to tell her that I hadn’t. She accepted the disappointment that I couldn’t provide an intro with grace.

I like to think I played a small part in her wonderful creativity and inspiration first; even though Stephanie Meyer has eclipsed Aunt Lynn. I bought her a beautiful poetry book when she was three. By age four her parents thought she could read. You see  they read it to her at bedtime every night for months (she insisted because she loved it so). Then she began reading along, or so they thought. Actually she had memorized the poems, all of them. As they turned each page she recognize the pictures and recited the appropriate poem. I called her Baby Einstein from then on. Now she wants to be a writer, lawyer and chef (she cooks very well). My books have adult content, so Jasmine is still too young to read any of them. Yet she told me at age eight, “I hope to follow in your footsteps”.

Reading and books changes lives. What we do as authors matters more than we know. So if you have the chance to talk to kids about books and writing, take it. You may plant seeds that give them big dreams. If you give to charities, choose a literacy program for adults and one that puts books into the hands of kids. I’ll bet each of us can cite at least one instance in which someone said, “You inspired me!” If you haven’t, don’t assume you haven’t because sometimes we plant seeds but never see the mighty oaks that result.

Here is one wonderful effort to put books in the hands of African children: Worldreader

Lynn
www.facebook.com/lynn.emery.author

Technorati Tags: writing,young writers,inspiration,authors,books,YA fiction

The Spoken Word

Oral tradition is a very important part of West African culture. Although their languages have had a written form for generations, one still finds that a lot of importance is placed on story telling and oral communications. You can see this in everyday conversations. People will seldom get straight to the point; a conversation must begin with a detailed greeting to set a friendly tone.

I cane face to face with the impact that oral story telling can have when I had the opportunity to speak to 325 children at an international school here in Accra. I sat with each class in the elementary section, read a story and then answered questions. The kindergarteners were my toughest audience. In the photo on the left, I am reading "Chee Chee in Paradise" to one of the kindergarten classes. The children paid rapt attention. As soon as the last word of my story had escaped my lips, a young lady piped up: "But what about Chee Chee's brother?" It was a great question and an indication that the story had touched and captured her. Their feedback was so useful, so humbling.

I firmly believe that the process of the reading had a significant impact on the way that the children saw the story and it made me feel very protective of my story. I wanted to pull the books off of Amazon and sell them one by one, only to parents who signed a contract to read the story with expression and drama. Don't worry, that madness has since subsided. I am ready once more to trust the words and the images to do the job for me.

Children's Book Signing

As a children's book author, I have a number of different issues to deal with than my compatriots who write for adults. Most of the issues are positive, for example, children are often more willing to suspend disbelief than adults. However, when it comes to marketing, life can get a little sticky.

Last Saturday I held a book signing for my latest book, Trapped in Dunston's Cave. Now, I have never planned a book signing for an adult book, but I can imagine my plans would circle around a staid location (a bookstore, a cafe, or something similar), wine and cheese for snacks and a quiet reading of the book followed (hopefully) by an orderly line of people waiting to sign and purchase a copy.

When I think of a children's book signing, the first few lines of Ogden Nash's poem Children's Party comes to mind:

May I join you in the doghouse, Rover?
I wish to retire till the party's over.
Since three o'clock I've done my best
To entertain each tiny guest.
My conscience now I've left behind me,
And if they want me, let them find me.

Parents and children arrived at the location I had chosen, the Nubuke Foundation here in Ghana which supports the Arts and does a lot of work with children and literacy. The children started colouring on the sheets that I provided to entertain them until we got started. This went well with one, two or three little ones, but once we got past four and five, the quiet, organised scene began to unravel as they decided to explore the garden.

It took us some time to round them all up. When we finally got them all seated in the right place at the same time, one child who had been sitting quietly for a while piped up,
"Can I go back to my colouring now?"

I told the children an interactive story and then got them to create a story of their own, line by line, one child at a time. They chose to create a story about a dinosaur which ate the narrator's sister. There was a lot of laughter before we were able to engender some sympathy for the sister and the story turned in a direction that led to her rescue.

After this, the children were released to colour some more and to make bookmarks that they could use as they read their books. They ran in the expansive garden, ate cup cakes and by all accounts had a great time.

I was exhausted at the end, but fully satisfied. I did not sell many books, however, I felt that the children had a very enjoyable experience that could help them to associate reading with fun.

Great Responsibility

In my first post at Novel Spaces, as a guest blogger, I wrote about the responsibility that I feel as a writer of children's books to produce books that positively impact my young readers.

I have recently been wondering about publishers' responsibility to not only provide books that will sell, but books that will have a positive impact on the reader's lives. In the Caribbean, children's books tend to mean text books. Most mass distributed novels are literature books, scholarly works well suited for classroom discussions of alliteration and other such techniques.

Publishers print these books because parents will definitely buy them if they are a part of the school curriculum, regardless of the price. Regular children's novels are much harder to sell. So, the supply is driven almost solely by the demand.

I hope that one day we can see a major publisher in the Caribbean market that takes the leap and creates demand by regularly publishing fun, enjoyable novels that encourage our children to pick up a Caribbean based book just for the enjoyment .... the idea just might sell.

Is it just an unrealistic pipe dream? What do you think?

See you again soon, I will write again on October 28.

Reading and Writing

I think that one of the best things I ever did as a mom was to teach each of my children to read at a young age. Now, don’t get me wrong: they weren’t little one- or two-year-old phenoms running around reading encyclopedias at one or two years old. But by Kindergarten, they’d passed basic phonics and sight words and were on to simple sentences. And, as I’ve mentioned in a blog before, they all love to read. I can’t tell you how happy that makes me.

So, it’s only fitting that I’d be just as disturbed by the rampant illiteracy plaguing our communities. (Visit this site for a few interesting statistics: Interesting literacy statistics)

A few years ago, the nonprofit I was working with (you know, the day job), started an early childhood initiative. It was in those early strategic meetings that I learned stats like children who are behind in school at third grade almost never catch up. That in our modern cutting-edge-obsessed culture, there are those who can’t complete a job application – in store or online – because they’re rudimentary reading skills are too poor.

And, let’s face it. I don’t care how kids shorthand text messages or bastardize the words on their social networking pages. They need to know how to spell those words “for real” if they expect to survive in tomorrow’s brave new world. Apparently they disagree, though. My son showed me one of his Facebook friends’ latest fan page, something to the effect of, “I hate it when you text to somebody old and they make you spell out the whole word.”

Sigh.

Reading has to be more than an “I told you so” or “Because it’s good for you” admonition on our part. As grownups, specifically writers, I think we owe it to those who can’t (or simply won’t) read, to educate and inspire. From a purely selfish perspective, we may be fueling our own fan base at some point.

So, the moral of my blog is a suggestion at best. Latch on to a kid and teach him/her to read. Prepare them for a life filled with word problems, subtitles and great novels. Or find an adult who feels utterly lost, but with enough conviction to know that they need to do better. Support their steps by getting them past the reading levels they’ve yet to conquer.

Detroit Public Schools has launched a reading initiative inviting community members to mentor students. There are myriad literacy organizations desperate for eager volunteers to spend a few hours of week doing what they love – reading, and letting someone else in on the fun. Or find a way to help improve the issue through a method of your own – blogging, hosting an event, lobbying your elected officials, etc.

Here are a couple of starting links. For more, head to your favorite search engine and try words like literacy, tutor, volunteer followed by your city. The people you help will remember you (even if you’re a fuzzy subconscious blur), but more importantly – despite the hurdles you might have to surmount – you’ll feel fuzzy, too. Warm and fuzzy.

Stefanie

www.stefanieworth.com

Romance Writers of America and Literacy

Volunteer Match

National Literacy Coalition

All About Adolescent Literacy

Children’s activities for International Literacy Day (Sept. 8, 2010) from Crayola

International Reading Association