the countdown team

Light breakfast, quiet morning in New York City, and good thing. I am still digesting the wonder of meeting yesterday the folks who made Countdown possible.

I want you to meet them:

From left to right: Erin Black, David Levithan, Phil Falco, Els Rijper, and Joy Simpkins: Editorial, art and design, permissions, production. These are the folks who had my back -- and I mean that, quite sincerely -- as I sat in the pink chair all those hours and days and months and tried to deliver a book -- a project -- that held so many twists, so many turns, that none of us could have anticipated.

We couldn't have anticipated them because we were creating something brand new, a documentary novel. We didn't know how to do it. We just... did it. We grabbed hold and leaped. And now, Countdown is here.

I am proud and privileged to stand with this team and show off our new book.

Thank you, Scholastic, and a special shout out to this marvelous, talented, hard-working, creative, long-suffering (ha!) Countdown team.  I salute you!

I'm off to Princeton in ten minutes. Today is Bookazine's Kids Day event, and I am one of the speakers. Indie booksellers, here I come.

Tomorrow, signing at Books of Wonder in NYC at noon -- do come say hi, if you can!

this moment

This is where I am right now, operating on blind faith... and a good bit of honest hard work, by me and everyone at Scholastic. I'm in NYC now (this restaurant is just north of Chicago, in Evanston, Illinois, and where I had lunch yesterday), and I'm about to go to lunch with the Countdown team -- I hope my make-up doesn't start to run when I meet the folks who have meant so much to me and have held me up, like scaffolding, as we've toiled on Countdown.

The road can feel like careening from one thing to the next, and like there is not one minute to rest or restore... so yesterday, I stayed put instead of getting on a plane.  Jim and I stole a few hours away, and spent it with our friend Dan, who chauffered us around Chicago in his fabulous 1987 Oldsmobile Delta 88.

 Look at those jackets and hats! It's cold by the lake. Jim wanted to check out the dog park.

 The best part of the day was spending some time here:

After the buzz-buzz-go-go and hard work of a roudy and fabulous convention, which, as you know, is wonderful but can turn one inside-out, the slow unfolding of a day off-the-clock, and the unhurried pace of a place like this reminds me to be mindful, to savor each moment, in that moment. We sat here for a while, yesterday... and the tears came. And came. Silent, and slow, like  a release of all I had held on to, the past few days.

As we left, the monk who lives here gave us apples. "Go practice," he said to me. "Be happy."

I am stepping out the door of this hotel with a good bit of blind faith, luck, and hard work in my hand, stepping into my own good life, this minute. I am practicing. I am happy.

celebrating countdown

At IRA in Chicago:

John Mason, Director, Library & Educational Marketing at Scholastic. Big kiss, John.

Left, Robin Hoffman. Right, Andrea Davis Pinckney. Admiration all around.

Me 'n Robin again. Just 'cause. Love. That's Ashley Bryan behind us, and Jacky Harper (double love), one Scholastic Convention Goddess....

I finally got to meet Lizette Serrano, another Scholastic Convention Goddess... (more love, all around....)

Yesterday was like an action movie, as I sprinted from a reading to a signing, to a symposium I was part of, then dashed to a meeting, and on to dinner and good conversation.

In contrast, I'm having a Zen afternoon today, my last day in Chicago.  But Zen or ACTION~! -- it's all good.

Tomorrow in the wee hours, I fly to New York City. I'll have lunch with the Countdown team -- I'm so excited about this.  These are the Scholastic folks I feel I know intimately, after working with them the past two years on this book, but I have never met them (save my editor).

Then, a meet and greet at Scholastic's offices...  and a surprise, which I'll tell you about tomorrow.

We're celebrating!

coming into chicago

So we took the "L" from Midway to our hotel downtown. Intrepid us! Not only did we ride the "L", we then rode the #3 bus on Michigan Ave., to our destination. We got on going the wrong way. We got off. We got on going the right way.

Bus driver, as I stuck my ticket into the kiosk and it read "invalid":
 "You just rode this bus, going the other way!"
Me: "I know! We 're lost!"
Jim: "We can pay again, no problem."
Bus driver, shaking his head: "Just sit down and don't do it again!"

Hahahahaha. So we sat down, and, between the bus driver and kind people of Chicago, we found our way to the Sheraton, walking through NBC park, and past the Chicago Tribune building,

So we came in on the "L". We're having a wonderful time. Dinner last night with Scholastic, at the top of the John Hancock Building -- what a view! I wish I'd thought to bring my camera. Lisa Yee brought hers. I now have officially had my picture taken with Peepy! I hope it will be up on Lisa's blog soon.

I'm dashing to a reading at 11:20 and a signing at the Scholastic booth at 11:30... if you're here, come see me!

Love from Chicago --

bomb shelter books

I'm at the Atlanta airport, en route to Chicago for IRA, but I couldn't resist sharing this fabulous moment at Bound To Be Read Books in East Atlanta yesterday afternoon. Not only did I get to sign the first copy of Countdown -- that's a thrill in itself -- but a surprise awaited me -- read on.

Jef Blocker and Jeff McCord are doing a poem a day project for National Poetry Month at Bound To Be Read, and I was lucky enough to be asked to read a poem. But I knew I would be doing that -- that's not the surprise.

I chose "In Flanders Fields," written in 1917 by Col. John McCrae, a doctor who worked on the battlefields of WWI, partly because it is a poem in Countdown, and partly because I believe we can never hear this poem too many times.

For one thing, it's beautifully written. Its sentiments are deep and true. I chose the poem to include in Countdown because of a character in the book, Uncle Otts, who is a World War I vet, and who was mustard gassed in the trenches, not too far from Flanders Fields. Col. McCrae wrote the poem while sitting in the back of an ambulance on the day after a young friend had been killed in a bomb blast.

So I read "In Flanders Fields" and Jef taped me reading (will send y'all the link as soon as it's live), and then, as we talked about Countdown, Jeff said, "Where are those bomb shelter books?"

Well! Turns out, someone brought a box of books to Bound To Be Read a few years ago, and they are treasure. Just look at what one family chose to include in their 1962 bomb shelter (in Dunwoody, Georgia, no less), just in case they had to spend an extended amount of time there, during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

There's a book on engineering, a Mark Twain reader, a King James version of the Bible, books on how to fish and hunt (who knew what kind of world we would awake to, if the Russians sent those missiles into the U.S. from Cuba?), and there is also some science fiction, some inspiration, and even a bit of risque reading, eh?

You'll notice I included Countdown in the bunch -- how crazy-cool it is to be part of a 1962 Dunwoody, Georgia family's history, to place my new book (that takes place in 1962) into the pile of books one family decided they needed to take with them into the bomb shelter in 1962. In Countdown, Franny's Uncle Otts, our World War I vet, is determined to protect his family during the Cuban Missile Crisis. He wants to build a bomb shelter in their front yard. He gets started, and.... I don't want to spoil it... but just look at this history, right under my nose, at Bound To Be Read!

Which books would you have chosen? What a good question. And isn't THIS an interesting match-up, below! I also love how America's #1 bestseller at $6 is now 50 cents. Ah... the sixties.

Jef and Jeff put together a bomb shelter display with these books, in the store, a couple of years ago, before I knew them. I'm so glad I know them now. I first met Jef when he moderated a panel I spoke on at SIBA last September. Since then, we've confabbed several times about how bookstores and authors and readers can work together to form community. Bound To Be Read is dedicated to being Atlanta's best community bookstore, with a mix of new and previously read titles. I always find something I didn't even know I was looking for, at BTBR.

I also find Kona Kitty, sometimes asleep in the front window, as she was yesterday, with her paws wrapped around her... tennis shoe. When I did "In the Writer's Studio" at BTBR in January, Kona wandered into and out of camera range, checking everything out.

Nice bookstore. Great folks. Fabulous bomb-shelter story.  Good kitty.

Thanks, guys.

watching the socks spin

The tiny Mississippi town I spent my childhood summers in was so small there was nothing to do but sit in the laundromat and watch the socks spin. I'm not sure Camp Springs, Maryland -- the setting for Countdown -- was any more bustling than that in the early sixties, when I lived there. But Decatur, Georgia bustles right along, and probably has many laundromats. This is the one we chose today.

 Jim did his laundry here for twenty years. I did it for him once, after his dad died, in 2003. It brought back memories of the years I spent in laundromats, entertaining small children through the wash, rinse and spin, and toting the wet clothes home in a sheet so I could dry them on the line -- sunshine was free.

Today Jim and I are married and have a washer and dryer at home, but neither is working right now because of some construction work we've got going in the basement (yes, we're under construction again!) so we tootled back to the old laundromat stand by. It monsoon rained all day long, so we felt a little Robinson Crusoe-like (okay, *I* felt a little R.C.-like), braving the elements to Get Things Done.

Medlock Coin Laundry (bring a LOT of coins) is a bit like the Sunshine Laundry in The Aurora County All-Stars. They'll do your laundry for you, and you can pick it up later, or you can do it yourself. We did it ourselves. We got soaked dashing from the car to the laundromat, and the clothes got another good rinsing as we ran from the laundry to the car. Sheesh.

But now I am ready for Chicago and New York City. Even if you don't see me, you've seen a chunk of my wardrobe. Also, while I'm at it, I think I need one of those wheely cart things. I think we all need one. Very handy.

Sunshine Laundry -
Send us your sheets!
Under new management!
We can't be beat!

Time for sleeping. There's nuthin' like sleeping long and deep when the clothes are clean, the night has come, and the rain thrums hard on the roof, washing the whole sweet earth.

looking up

That's what I'm doin' as I head into the last week of April. I'll be home late on May 1. If you're coming to IRA in Chicago, I'm signing Countdown at the Scholastic booth (#1225) on Tuesday, April 27 at 11:30am -- come say hey!

I'm also signing Saturday, May 1 at Books of Wonder in NYC at noon. May 1 is the official release day for Countdown -- if you're in NYC on May 1, I hope you'll come out and celebrate with me!!  

A new book and a new decade deserve a new website design. Allison Adams has worked wonders with deborahwiles.com -- see for yourself.  I'm still working on copy, but the design is all there, and how I love it. We're continuing it here on the blog, so come on over and take a look and tell us what you think.

 

 I seem to have a thing for chickens. Must be Ruby Lavender's influence. At any rate, I promise, no live chickens at signing events... but I may have to bring along my collection of 45s....

up all night

You know the friends that you sat up all night talking to, gossiping with, and telling all your secrets to when you were a kid? The friends who listened with rapt attention until you fell asleep mid-sentence? The friends who laughed -- and cried -- in all the right places when you told your stories, and whose storytelling was so superb, you felt lucky to be in their presence and amazed to be entrusted with their stories?

I have friends like that. Saturday night, here in Frederick, Maryland, I sat up with some of those friends until 3am, reconnecting and catching up, and picking up where we'd left off on my last visit. Then, I slept like a baby for a few hours, in the bedroom set aside for me. On Sunday morning I savored a long, luxurious shower. I didn't even count the carbs in the fresh garlic rolls and hot coffee.

Saturday night was almost like a slumber party, like being a kid again, like having so few cares or responsibilities, that the world could slip away for some purloined hours. How rare.As the old clock on the wall tick-tocked, three of us held court in a well-loved kitchen with warm light, homemade soup, and shared history. What a gift.

Every book I write is about friendship, its joys and perils. Ruby and Melba Jane (and Dove, of course) in Love, Ruby Lavender. Comfort and Declaration, in Each Little Bird that Sings. Cleebo and House in The Aurora County All-Stars. Joe and John Henry in Freedom Summer.

And now, Franny and Margie, in Countdown.

As you read it, keep in mind: There is nothing like a true friend, to remember you to yourself.

under the b

Many years ago, I wrote a picture book story called "Under the B" about a little girl and her great-great aunt, and how much they loved to play Bingo. When I am back in Atlanta, I'm going to dig it out and brush it off, and look at it critically again, because there is nothing much I like more for an evening's entertainment than playing ridiculous, hilarious Bingo with old friends in the little town I lived in for 25 years, Urbana, Maryland. That's where I was last night.

These folks raised me. We were so happy to see one another again last night!

I was 25 years old when I moved to Urbana, and 50 when I left. During those 25 years, I attended Wesley Chapel United Methodist Church with these folks, worked at umpteen firehall suppers in this very room, played Bingo outside under the stars every July during the Firemen's Carnival (I've written about this here), and raised my family in a very small, very quiet, very rural town. I loved every single minute of it. Today I live in a bustling city, Atlanta. Not so rural. Not so quiet. And I love it, too. But I love to come back home to Urbana and Frederick County, Maryland.

When I wrote "Under the B," I was trying to capture the feeling of doing simple things together with great love, with people you adore. And... that is what I did last night.

I sent "Under the B" to several publishers, back in the '90s, when I wrote it. Every one of them rejected it. I'm sure, when I read it again, I'll see why. I remember that it was a "slice of life" story -- a "quiet" story... too quiet. So let me see what I can do with that quiet story, when I'm home again. "Let go of your memories, and tell me a story." That's what Liz Van Doren at Harcourt told me, over and over again, as I was writing Love, Ruby Lavender, our first book together.

So I need a story. Surely, within that story, I can capture the sense of community, the preciousness of friendship, the utter loveliness of coming home... I hope I can. And even if I can't... I have come home. And it is good.

one day home

On my one day home this week:

-- I ate comfort food: a huge plate full of scrambled eggs with spinach, and some romaine with blue cheese dressing.

-- Jim and I signed our wills at the attorney's office. We've been married for almost three years; it's time. I think this marriage thing is gonna take.  :>

-- Sent in my estimated first-quarter taxes and paid bills.

-- Took a long soak in a deep tub.

-- Caught up with family... big changes afoot here, all good. Had dinner out with my daughter.

-- Watered the garden and breathed long and deep all the while.

 -- and other stuff.

Jim and Hannah taped me reading "In Flanders Fields" for National Poetry Month, and for Bound To Be Read Books in East Atlanta Village. It's coming your way, Jef, as soon as Jim figures out how to send the file. I wasn't wearing makeup. I hope it's not too scary. I don't know if I remembered to smile.

Still - thanks for the opportunity. "In Flanders Fields" appears in Countdown, so I took a chance to promote the book AND National Poetry Month (AND Bound To Be Read -- check them out!)

And now I am in the air again... literally. I'm trying GoGo Inflight on my Airtran flight to Washington, D.C., where I'll visit with family, attend the Children's Book Guild Nonfiction Award event (and you can, too -- here's how!), and work in schools early next week, before heading home again.

I'm so looking forward to meeting Sy Montgomery on Saturday (the Guild's Nonfiction Award winner!). Talk about STORIES. I've interviewed Sy, and this woman is an extraordinary storyteller -- if you are near the D.C. area on Saturday, you must try to make time to come to the National Geographic Auditorium at 1600 M Street, NW, 2:00pm, to hear Sy speak, and to hang out with the members of the Children's Book Guild of Washington, D.C. I'm a member, and I'll be there with bells on.

Landing!  Here we go...

lamoni, iowa

Since I chronicled what I left behind yesterday, I want to show you what I came to. I never would have known about Lamoni, Iowa, if I hadn't been hired to come and talk with teachers, work with students, and attend Graceland University's Young Writer's Conference.

I worked in two schools today with third through fifth graders, ate lunch at the Sale Barn, went to an Amish farm to buy candles and preserves, and took a walk with my camera. Didn't write. Decided that this experience was too rich to pass up -- can you just imagine the stories here? I know many of them already. What a privilege.

Dinner now, with teachers at Graceland. Tomorrow is the conference. Nothing but story, story, story. And then I'll be on my way home, my life enriched for having met the folks in Lamoni, and having been invited to share my story as well. 

Amazing how that works. It's everywhere. Story.