On Monday, I interviewed Grosset & Dunlap designer Mallory Grigg over on Shannon Messenger’s blog. Yesterday, Claire LeGrand hosted the illustrator reveal, which included original artwork by illustrator Genevieve Kote.

And today…oh, hey, today is the actual cover reveal. WOO!

Meet Holly:

I heart this cover. Seriously. If ten-year-old MiSchu saw this cover she’d have that book in her grubby little hands in a nanosecond. Holly is adorable, the detail on the instruments is incredible, and who doesn’t love a hand-lettered title?

But…BUT!…there’s more. Because that title? It will be covered in…

…wait for it…

YES. When one touches this series, one’s hands shall be SPARKLEFIED! Covered in the sparkly! It will be a SPARKLEPOCALYPSE.

Okay, I’m done now. So…whaddaya think?

About the series: I HEART BAND a fun, pacy younger middle-grade series about the thrills and spills, practices and performances, crushes and crises of middle school band geeks. (Books 1 & 2 launching January 9th, 2014)

At BookExpo America last week, I sat down to chat with Marissa Moss, author and illustrator of (among many other things) the Amelia’s Notebook series, about her new publishing venture. Creston Books will debut their first list of picture books this fall, and will expand to include middle grade books beginning next spring.

Marissa was inspired to start Creston Books out of the loss of Tricycle Press, a children’s imprint of Ten Speed, which was bought by Random House a few years ago. “They were a small publisher that took chances on weird, strange things,” said Marissa. “When I first tried to publish Amelia’s Notebook, I’d already been working with four or five different publishers, and I sent it around, but nobody knew what to do with it. It wasn’t a picture book, it wasn’t a novel – no one knew how to shelve it or categorize it, so they wouldn’t take it. But Tricycle didn’t know any better, so they published it, and it became by far my most successful series.”

“Tricycle’s numbers were good for a small house,” Marissa continued. “But for a big publisher like Random House, keeping them didn’t make economic sense. Big publishers have to make big numbers, so they closed Tricycle down. And for me, being from the Bay Area, it was just a huge moment of communal mourning, that this voice was gone, this advocate for idiosyncratic weirdness in children’s books.”

A word (or more) on the importance of small publishers

Amelia’s Notebook is a perfect example of why indie houses are so vital. Marissa still receives fanmail from women now in their twenties, telling her how big a part of their childhood Amelia was – but all too often, similar books are passed on my big publishers because they’re deemed too much of a risk.

“I can do this because I don’t have huge overheads,” Marissa explained. “Basically, all the money goes to the authors, the illustrators, the printing, and the promotion. And I’m hoping that means we can take chances on books that wouldn’t get published by New York. Not that New York is terrible – I have great relationships with my New York publishers and I love working with them, but they really can’t afford to take those risks, because they’re just too big. But I think those books, the ones that are a risk, often end up being the books that stick with kids the most. It’s a passion for me. I really want children’s books to survive.”

From author to publisher

To help get things rolling, Marissa launched a Kickstarter campaign for Creston Books last year. “Not only did I get a lot of financial support, I got a lot of emotional support and a huge amount of publicity,” Marissa said. “Publisher’s Weekly did an article on it, which generated a huge amount of promotion I would never have gotten otherwise. A lot of the Kickstarter money came from Silicon Valley people, which was interesting because these are venture capitalists doing something very…undigital. This is not new media. And I felt like that was a nice vote of confidence. They still want picture books!”

Creston Books is an author and illustrator driven house, largely due to Marissa’s extensive experience wearing both hats. As editor-in-chief, she’s excited about working with other talented authors and illustrators. “Being an editor is close to being an author because you’re constantly revising, revising, revising,” she said. “That’s not the tricky part. The tricky part is this. How to promote. It’s been very educational, and Publishers Group West has been a great help. Because I didn’t know the best way to get my books out there, or what format books needed to be in to go to print…things like that. It’s a steep learning curve.”

An ethical house

Creston Books is committed to being both socially and environmentally responsible, from printing on sustainably-sourced paper to focusing on the domestic market. “I’m printing at a press in Wisconsin, because to me it’s really important to encourage creativity and business here, domestically,” said Marissa. “I want to have an ethical business and feel good about it every step of the way. So I pay more per book, but I pay less per worry.”

The ratio of established to debut authors on Creston’s list is about half and half, and Marissa is excited about finding more debut authors in the future. “It’s really important to me to include debut authors,” she said. “One of my authors sent me two manuscripts, and they were both just so heartwrenchingly beautiful, so poetic and touching, that I bought them both. And one is in the process of being illustrated by a debut illustrator. Normally, the paradigm is to pair seasoned authors with debut illustrators, and vice versa. But this debut illustrator…the work just fits. It’s a risk to pair two debuts together, but it’s one I’m willing to take for a gorgeous book.”

Interested in submitting?

While Creston Books is open to picture book and middle grade submissions, Marissa has a few words of advice before you click send.

“Do your homework,” she said. “Read children’s books, know what’s out there. If you’re sending me, for example, an alphabet book, then you’ve got a pretty high bar because you’ve got to beat Chicka Chicka Boom Boom. So know that there is that bar – know what you’re going to be compared to.”

“I also get a lot of picture book submissions from authors with no visual element,” Marissa added. “Think about giving your text to an illustrator and ask yourself, what are they going to do with it? Even if you’re not an illustrator, you need to be thinking visually. You should be thinking about your book like a movie, or in thumbnails – anything to help imagine the page turns. I get too many submissions that feature talking heads: mom talks, child talks, mom talks, child talks. That’s hard to make visually interesting. Also, I’m not interested in “message” books. Every book has a message, but it shouldn’t be message heavy. I want books that kids will love to read over and over and over again. No one-trick ponies – books with a good punchline, but once you know it, there’s no reason to read it again.”

Creston’s launch list features only picture books, but future lists will include middle grade novels. “I have an upcoming debut middle grade novel I’m very pleased with,” Marissa said. “I love the main character’s voice, it’s what hooked me right away. And with middle grade, the voice has got to be compelling. Give me a great voice, and we’ll work everything else out.”

Creston Books accepts both agented and unagented submissions. “There’s often a lot of gatekeepers in children’s publishing,” said Marissa. “A lot of people who have to read and approve the book to get it out there. But for me, it’s all about the kid. Kids take in books in a way adults don’t. We want our books to become a part of someone’s childhood.”

“If I keep telling myself I’ll do it one day, maybe that’ll work,” she joked this morning, pulling a few shots of espresso.

I shrugged. “Hey, positive thought is an important part of the process. You have to believe you’re going to do it, right?”

“True,” she said. “But sometimes I think that’s the problem.”

“What do you mean?”

She grinned. “When I was little, I had this sleepover party. One of the girls said that if one of us lay flat on the floor, and the rest of us put just two fingers underneath her, it was possible for us to lift her off the ground with just those fingers.”

“So one girl lay on the floor and the rest of us sat around her and slid our fingers between her and the floor,” she went on. “And we all just sat there, focusing, like she was going to magically levitate. The girl who told us about this in the first place starting laughing at us. ‘But you have to actually try to lift her!’ she said. ‘You still have to lift!'”

I’m a big believer in positive thought. Personally, I have a really hard time writing when my head is in a particularly negative place. And I really do feel like I have to believe I’m going to reach my goals if it’s going to happen. I’ll confess something here I’ve never told anyone – back in 2007 when I first decided I wanted to write fiction, I kept a little piece of paper that said I will be a published author in my pocket every single day. It was sort of a reaffirmation thing, a reminder that this wasn’t just something I wanted, it was something I was going to do.

And that’s all well and good, but this morning’s conversation with my barista made me realize something. That little piece of paper isn’t the reason I’m a published author. No, the reason is because I wrote a book. And another. And another. I queried agents, I went on submission, I went through years of rejection. I kept writing. I did the lifting.

Chances are pretty good you know someone who’s said this: “Oh, I always wanted to write a book.” There are tons of people out there who want to be authors, who maybe even feel confident that it will happen for them some day, because they’ve got an idea for a story and by golly, it’s a humdinger. But they’ll never sit down to write that story.

Positive thought is so important. But at some point, you still have to lift.

Middle school is far from a fairytale for adorkable misfit Lacey Unger-Ware. When Lacey ends up with popular girl Paige Harrington’s smart-mouthed fairy godmother, Katarina, trapped in her hair, life gets more magical-just not in a prince charming’ kind of way.

Katarina’s wings are too damaged to continue her fairy duties, and Lacey must take over as Paige’s fairy godmother. Distracted by her new responsibilities, Lacey’s in danger of losing her best friend, Sunny. Can Lacey get the hang of magic, make Paige’s dreams come true, and survive middle school?

In case you missed my review, let me sum it up for you: this books is A.D.O.R.A.B.L.E. Quirky, fun characters, lots of magic, and some seriously laugh-out-loud scenes. Barbara and James were nice enough to answer a few questions for KLN readers!

1. I love the concept of a girl forced to take over as fairy godmother for the snobbiest girl in her school! What first sparked the idea for The Glitter Trap?

We were working together on a screenplay, and one morning Barbara was driving over to James’ house and saw a teenaged driver almost run over an old woman in a crosswalk. (The old woman was fine, although much cursing was involved—and not from the teenaged driver.) Barbara told James the story and joked, “What if that old woman had been somebody’s fairy godmother?” So our book series started with those ten words.

2. So many scenes in this story had me tearing up laughing, like Katarina and the cat, or Lacey and Paige on the moped. Was there a particular scene that really had you cracking up as you wrote?

James always laughs at the scene where the mean cheerleaders are trying to figure out why their friend Paige, who’s under a magic spell, can’t talk: “Maybe she’s got a brain tumor. I saw this HBO movie where this girl stopped talking and started barking. By the end, her boyfriend had to howl like a dog to tell her he loved her. And then she died.” James is probably a bad person.

Barbara’s favorite funny moment is when the mildly delusional music teacher thinks he’s going to have to fill in as Prince Charming in the school play and shows up dressed in a tunic, tights and a wig: “Wow, that’s something you can’t un-see!”

3. It’s so cool that you write as a duo! I try really hard to be a plotter, but sometimes my stories get a little…unorganized. Can you tell us a little bit about your writing process and how you work together?

We write everything together. (We’re writing this together right now.) When our book sold to Disney-Hyperion, we told our editor that she was getting two people and one brain. We think she might have preferred one person and two brains, but that wasn’t an option.

Barbara comes over to James’s house five or six days a week to work. James types; there’s endless discussion. Luckily, we have very similar writing styles and senses of humor. We’re strong believers in outlining. (For us, there’s nothing more terrifying than not knowing what happens next.) But, as we go along, we’re also open to changing things when something fun comes along. For example, the moped scene you like wasn’t in the original outline, but was an addition to the story as we were trying to illustrate how Lacey convinces Paige that she is, indeed, her fairy godmother.

4. What’s your absolute favorite thing about writing for the middle grade reader?

That our characters are old enough to be articulate and funny, but young enough that they still have a sense of wonder about the world.

5. You both have experience writing screenplays. How has that translated over to writing a novel?

See above: outlining! We’re obsessed with story structure, which is definitely a key to screenplay writing. Also, we like to think we’re good with dialogue, but perhaps we’re just as delusional as Mr. Griffith the music teacher.

6. What was your path to publication like? Did you start by querying agents with your novel, or did you take another route?

We were lucky. We already had a film agent, and he was able to pass our book along to the head of the agency’s literary department. And, also luckily, the literary agent liked the book and was able to sell it. (Thanks Bayard! Thanks Joe! We owe you, big time.)

The next three questions are for 12-year-old James and Barbara!

1. What’s your dream job?

12-year-old James: I want to be either a scientist or a writer.

12-year-old Barbara: I want to be an actress, and would change my name to Babs if my brother Tom would just stop laughing.

2. If you could have any magic power, what would it be?

12-year-old James: Being able to fly would be really cool.

12-year-old Barbara: To make my brother stop laughing about the Babs thing.

3. Your fairy godmother shows up and asks you what you want the most. Go!

12-year-old James: World peace. And also to be able to get into R-rated movies.

12-year-old Barbara: Would it be too much to ask to look like Jane Seymour?

Thanks so much, James and Barbara!

The Glitter Trap is available for pre-order on IndieBound, Amazon, and Barnes & Noble.

Nickelodeon

Most writers feel a certain level of affection toward their characters. They are, in a sense, our babies. We’ve named them, given them their looks, and are prone to yell at them when they aren’t cooperating.

Sounds a lot like my child, or as I often refer to him on the internet, The Spawn.

And just as with babies in real life, some of us struggle to let go. To put them on their own two feet and let them make mistakes. I don’t know about you, but there are some books out there that have characters so unbelievably, disgustingly perfect that I . . .well, I kind of hate them. Or at least, I never care enough to root for them because all their perfecty-ness is boring and obnoxious. Sure, a great, racing and winding plot from start to finish is fun, but if Chase the Great is incredibly giving (but not so much to look like a pushover), funny (but not so much to ever be considered a troublemaker), and naturally adorable (but not too much to compete with Gram’s cats) well . . .he sure doesn’t have a lot of places for his personality to develop, now does he?

I was a “good” kid. (I use quotation marks because my mother would argue with me on this.) But at school, I was a good kid. I didn’t bully, I did my work, I didn’t get in trouble. All in all, I had a reasonably normal albeit somewhat boring upbringing.

Except that one time I was kicked out of Girl Scouts.

Sounds bad, right?

It kind of was.

But I should say that I wasn’t technically kicked out so much as not asked back. As in, never got any further communications on events and the like. But I wasn’t alone! My best friend, forever to be known as my partner in crime, was also no longer included as well.

So what happened, you ask? Well, other than the fact we rarely did the work to receive badges (by rarely I mean never. If it wasn’t one we worked on during the actual meetings, we weren’t doing it.). Then during the annual camping trip, the BFF and I stayed up the entire night talking extremely loud even though our troop leader continuously told us “Lights out!”. When everyone woke the next morning, every single camping plot surrounding us–all full when we had arrived–had magically emptied of their patrons. Evidently the sweet old couples that had surrounded us the day before weren’t too keen on not getting a wink of sleep due to some chatterbox pre-teens.

Then came the big finale. We weren’t the nicest to a certain girl. Said girl happened to be the daughter of our troop leader. We teased a bit. Excluded her from our “secrets”. While we certainly could’ve been meaner, we weren’t anything close to nice.

It wasn’t my best moment. But it was one of a million little moments that pieced together my growing up.  And isn’t that what we’re trying to capture in a novel? A single snapshot of someone’s life when things aren’t perfect and might not turn out to be, but they learn. From their mistakes, they grow.

So next time you sit down to work on spit-shining up that new character, be sure to throw in some flaws. Some situations where they don’t react the way they should. Push those little babies out the door and toss ’em a box of band aids.

How to Set Tone and Mood in Your Scenes

by Janice Hardy, author of The Healing Wars Trilogy

The amazing thing about this post is that Janice breaks down in serious detail something that typically takes lots and lots and LOTS of writing practice to realize. It’s such a subtle thing – a tiny change in word choice or order that makes an enormous difference in the tone of your sentence. Bonus: try the writing challenge Janice poses at the end, and you could win a critique!

Voice: Defined

by Tracy Wymer, author of The Color of Bones

Voice (as it pertains to storytelling) is difficult to explain to anyone – and here, Tracy tells us how he explained it to a fourth grade class. Pretty darn impressive, especially considering what a subjective and almost ambiguous thing “voice” is.

The Most Useful Thing I’ve Learned (So Far) About Writing a Sequel

by Caroline Carlson, author of Magic Marks the Spot

If you’re writing a sequel, or thinking about writing a sequel, or have at some point in your life had the fleeting though “hmmm, one day I’d like to write a book and then write a sequel to it,” then go read this post immediately. Seriously, this isn’t your typical series advice. Caroline pinpoints something very specific – your main character’s emotional struggle – and offers an equally specific way for you to ensure that struggle is present in the sequel without  undoing the progress the character made in book one, and not just repeating the same struggle. Really really, go read it.

Elisabeth Dahl on Genie Wishes

by Cynthia Leitich Smith, author of Feral Nights

Great interview here with Elisabeth, author AND illustrator of the new middle grade book Genie Wishes (which looks so completely adorable that I think I’m going to have to buy it immediately).

Conquered

by Kate Carpenter

Click that link. Seriously. Just look.

Cover Reveal: The 14 Fibs of Gregory K.!

by Greg Pincus, author of (this feels so redundant) The 14 Fibs of Gregory K.

I LOVE cover reveals and I LOVE this cover! And once you’ve ogled it, you should head over to Goodreads and add this bad boy to your to-read list!

What’d I miss? Let me know if you caught any great middle grade posts this week!

As a children’s author myself, I’ve spent many a happy hour browsing for new titles on your shelves. I’m always thrilled when I find something new and exciting to read.

I’m less thrilled when I pull a book off your shelf only to find that it is actually an Advanced Reader Copy.

I’m sure you know that since ARCs aren’t purchased, but rather provided by the publisher, the publisher and author make no money on sales of ARCs. They are meant to be shared for reviews and publicity, not exchanged as a “used book” between customers and bookstores that may have otherwise purchased an actual copy of the book, thereby helping the author earn her fair share. Most ARCs come with a “Not For Sale” sticker on the cover or just inside the cover.

One of my favorite bookstores in Seattle had a fantastic solution to their abundance of advance copies. Once a year, they would stack all of their ARCs on a display table. For each regular book a customer purchased, they were allowed to select one ARC from the table, free of charge. The “buy one get one free” promotion brought in lots of customers, more sales were generated, and no authors lost money due to ARCs being sold as opposed to books.

I hope you’ll consider this option, because for the author, every sale counts!

Thanks for your time,

(feature image credit)

The blurb

Middle school is far from a fairytale for adorkable misfit Lacey Unger-Ware. When Lacey ends up with popular girl Paige Harrington’s smart-mouthed fairy godmother, Katarina, trapped in her hair, life gets more magical–just not in a ‘prince charming’ kind of way.

Katarina’s wings are too damaged to continue her fairy duties, and Lacey must take over as Paige’s fairy godmother. Distracted by her new responsibilities, Lacey’s in danger of losing her best friend, Sunny. Can Lacey get the hang of magic, make Paige’s dreams come true, and survive middle school? (~Goodreads)

The authors

Barbara and James have worked together ever since they sold a feature film script about a very, very, bad cat, “Fluffy,” to Disney’s Hollywood Pictures. Their romantic comedy film script, “Deliver Us From Eva,” was produced by Focus Features. “Oh My Godmother: the Glitter Trap,” is their first book. (~website)

The review

I knew from the blurb that this book would be funny – her name is Lacey Unger-Ware?! – but I didn’t expect to laugh out loud as much as I did while reading about Lacey’s adventures. After accidentally trapping a fairy godmother named Katarina in her hair, Lacey has to fill her magical shoes and make sure snobby Paige Harrington’s dream of starring in the school musical comes true…even though Paige’s singing voice leaves something to be desired. And if Lacey fails, well then none of her dreams – like her dream of working with animals at the zoo – will ever come true.

Unsurprisingly, Lacey has a little bit of a hard time mastering magic, with hysterical results. We’re talking vertical rides in a moped, a great pickle calamity, some ticked off bunnies, and a whole lotta pigeon poop. And glitter. Pigeon poop and glitter feature prominently.

Katarina is a hoot, Lacey’s best friend Sunny is adorable, and Paige is much more than a stuck-up cheerleader. But Lacey is totally the star of this story, with an honest, hilarious voice tween girls are going to adore. I’m looking forward to more sparkly fun in this series!

It’s Okay to Take a Break From Writing (Or Blogging)

by Janice Hardy, author of The Healing Wars Trilogy

And you know that’s true coming from Janice, who is probably the most consistent and fantastic middle grade blogger ever. I particularly love this: “everyone else is so busy trying to do it all, that most of them won’t even notice if you’re slacking a bit.” So true! We writers are really good at pressuring ourselves – we need to learn to let go sometimes.

Religion in Middle Grade Fiction

by Dee Garretson, author of Wildfire

I love what Dee says in this post about why it’s so important that kids (and adults!) read books where the characters have different faiths, beliefs, and lives in general. How do you handle religion in your writing?

Hands-free Books are Coming

by Nathan Bransford, author of Jacob Wonderbar and the Interstellar Time Warp

Oh, Google. You kill me. I’m really torn, because these glasses look really slick but take us one step closer to that Wall-E world we seem to be destined for.

Query Letter Quick Tips

by Lehua Parker, author of One Boy, No Water

Lehua offers some seriously down-to-earth query advice in this post. The first tip is a fantastic one, on learning to “speak the language” of agents (and the publishing industry in general).

3 Reasons I Finish Reading a “Bad” Book

by Anna Staniszewski, author of the My Epic Fairy Tale Fail

I’m totally with Anna on this one, but perhaps most of all on number three. As I blogged about earlier this week, I’m a sucker for a mystery.

What’d I miss? Let me know if you caught any great middle grade posts this week!