I found out yesterday that the publication date for Blackberry Banquet is August 2008 (not spring 2008, as noted earlier).
The good news is that Book Expo America will be in Los Angeles next year (May 29-June 1), so (hopefully) I’ll be there to sign advanced copies.
One of the reasons I started this blog was because in January I sold a picture book manuscript, The Blackberry Bush, to Sylvan Dell Publishing. I thought it would be interesting to journal, via a blog, what will happen AFTER I sell a story. So today I’m going to give an update of what’s happening with my manuscript (and I apologize for putting all of this in one post–I should have been doing this all along).
In March, Donna German (my terrific editor at SD), emailed me that they had chosen an illustrator for the book. Her name is Lisa Downey, the illustrator of Happy Birthday to Whooo? I’m quite excited about Lisa doing the illustrations, as her animal paintings are just lovely and should be a perfect match for the story.
In April, while reading the story aloud to a friend, I found a spot where my tongue caught in my mouth. I found this odd, considering that I always read my picture books mss aloud many times to check for flow and fluency. I put the ms away for a week or so, and read it aloud again, and once more my tongue tripped. I emailed Donna with a single word change and she made the change for me. Phew! Can’t have readers tripping over words now, can we?
Sometime around March, Donna had asked me for some possible titles with a bit more “umph” than The Blackberry Bush. With the brainstorming help of my fabulously creative critique group, I was able to give her quite a few choices, including my personal favorite, “Drinking the Blackberry Vine” (ha-ha, silly me had to throw that one Donna’s way, just for a laugh). Last week, I heard that the final title and pub-date have been determined. Drumroll, please……………
Blackberry Banquet! Spring 2008.
So, that’s where we stand, four months into the project. Lisa is busy working on the illustrations, we have a title and pub-date, and this summer I’m going to start laying some groundwork for setting up possible book signings in the Pacific Northwest (home to a kazillion blackberry bushes). This translates into going to bookstores, introducing myself to the owners and telling them about my upcoming book. Wish me luck!
That’s all folks! Stay tuned for more feasting to come…
My “word” (I put it in quotation marks to make it seem more ominous) was “continent” (quotation marks again, because just thinking about it in terms of the fourth grade makes it seem ominous). For some reason, I always switched the “i” and the “e.” Every week, for what seemed like decades. My teacher and parents were dumbfounded at how I could make the same mistake over and over. Then one day I finally spelled it correctly and received my gold star on the class spelling chart. My teacher’s face lit up and her blue eyes sparkled so much that I thought she might call the office and have the principal make an announcement to the entire school. My parents took me out for ice cream!
My writer friend’s word was “recipe” which she read as “re-sipe” (which makes perfect sense if you compare it to “recite”). My husband’s word was “poem” which he consistently spelled as “peom”. He still complains about how our language makes no sense.
And the irony I’ve found in this is that when my son was four years old and in his second year of Montessori school, he could easily spell “continent”. Thank goodness for Montessori education, as spelling never was a problem for him!
So, what’s YOUR word? Which “word” was your biggest obstacle with spelling tests?
Welcome to my blog (that word still makes me laugh). This has been a busy past two weeks. I can’t help but think of a greeting card I once saw that had a goofy dog standing on a cinnamon bun. He was yelling compliments to the recipient, and on the inside it said, “Don’t stop me. I’m on a roll!”
That’s how I feel now. Two weeks ago, I attended the Ventura/Santa Barbara SCBWI retreat on cyber-promotion. I came home exhilarated, my head spinning out of control with ideas. Then last week I received “the call.” The call that children’s writers and illustrators all dream of and anticipate. Donna German, editor at Sylvan Dell phoned me with the news that they wanted to buy my picture book manuscript, THE BLACKBERRY BUSH. My head was nearing tornado status!
Yesterday I received my contract in the mail, and to my surprise, a box of books. No, Sylvan Dell aren’t miracle workers; they were my collection of Mother Goose Rhymes from Picture Window Books, which were originally supposed to be out next fall. Now my head was officially in tornado mode! I posted my happy news on my SCBWI listserve because well, that’s what we writers do. We share in each other’s joys (and sorrows). We are uplifted every time “one of our own” makes a score. We are of such a community spirit that one might expect us to be found wearing orange robes and chanting at LAX. Amongst the congratulations, some of my writer friends and colleagues said, “Now this is something to blog about!” Yes, I listened. So, here I go. Like a tornado into the blogosphere!
I hope along the way, in my “not so daily” posts, I’ll have some insightful comments, provoke thought, and heck, if nothing else, give you a laugh or two.
Terry Pierce 
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