Council for Wisconsin Writers

Supporting Wisconsin writers from 1964 to 2022

Michael Kress-Russick

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Celebrate with Wisconsin Writers for Children

Wisconsinites who write for children recently  announced their good news for September on the Society for Children Writers and Illustrators’ Wisconsin chapter listserv.

Madison writer and author of Janis Joplin’s biography Rise Up Singing Ann Angel has a new book out. Adopted Like Me, My Book of  Adopted Heroes, debuted on Sept. 28. Ann blogged about how this book came about on the Children’s Literature Network. Here’s the link to her post: http://www.childrensliteraturenetwork.org/magazine/just-launched/2013/09/adopted-like-me/

Sandy Brehl’s debut book, Odin’s Promise, will be published by Crickhollow imprint, Crispin, early in 2014. Odin’s Promise is a middle grade (ages 8-12) historical fiction set in Norway in WWII.  You can read more about it at http://www.sandybrehl.com/.
Illustrator Michael Kress-Russick’s mural of an anamorphic rendering of a giant beanstalk is now on display at the Milwaukee Art Museum’s Kohl gallery for kids.
Pat Schmatz, author of Mrs. Estronsky and the UFO, Circle the Truth, Mousetraps and Blue Fish, has an essay in the anthology, Break These Rules, by writers of middle-grade and young-adult fare. Proceeds from book sales are to be donated to the Children’s Defense Fund.
Andrea Skyberg’s book Squircle won a Moonbeam Spirit Award
Emily Kokie will be participating in an event as part of the Wisconsin Book Festival. On Saturday, October 19, 2013, at 11:00 a.m., she and Nick Podehl, the narrator of the audiobook of her YA novel  Personal Effects, will be discussing about how to present difficult topics to teens, the various aspects of authorship, and how different voices make a book more interesting with a side-by-side reading from Personal Effects.
More about and for Wisconsin writers is at www.wiswriters.org

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News From the Children's Corner

Following are details about a Carthage College event, “Wisconsin Women Write for Children”,  from 6:30-8:30 p.m. on May 14 at the Women’s Club of Wisconsin

Wisconsin Women Write for Children Event

Come for desserts and coffee in a beautiful historic mansion. 

The Woman’s Club of Wisconsin is the setting for this presentation.
Writers include:  Carole Barrowman, Ann Bausum, Lois Ehlert, Janet Halfmann,
Barbara Joosse, JoAnn Early Macken, Lisa Moser
Where:
The Woman’s Club of Wisconsin
813 East Kilbourn Avenue
Milwaukee, WI 53202
(Free valet parking available)When:
Tuesday May 14th
Doors open at 6:00 pm
Program is from 6:30-8:30 pm

Registration:
Registration fee is $15, with $5 for students.
Registration

Registration is open. Walk-ins
are welcome at the event itself
Make checks payable to The Center for Children’s Literature

Mail to: Carthage College, 2001 Alford Park Drive, Kenosha, WI 53140

or pay at the event
Jstewig@carthage.edu          262-552-5480
Carthage College Center for Children’s Literature
*     *     *

The first of each month, members of Wisconsin’s chapter of the Society of Children’s Books Writers and Illustrators announce their good news of the previous  month, generally good reviews, honors and awards, and newly published work. Here in their own words is their news  from the month of April:

JoAnn Early Macken

In addition to the Wisconsin Women Write for Children event, I'll be
teaching picture book classes in both Milwaukee and Madison over the
next couple of months. Here are the details:

Writing a Children's Picture Book, 5 Thursday evenings starting May 9 at
UW-Milwaukee School of Continuing Education (downtown in the Grand
Avenue mall). Details and registration info are at
http://www4.uwm.edu/sce/course.cfm?id=24087

Children's Picture Books: Write and Submit Your Stories, Jun 17-21, 9:30
a.m.-12:30 p.m. each day at UW-Madison. More info is at
http://continuingstudies.wisc.edu/lsa/writing/wbtl/wbtl-sessions.htm

Ann Angel

There are also some interesting writing courses available this summer at Mount
Mary College that children's writers might find appealing. These include a
six-week Writing Healing Stories workshop, a course for fiction and nonfiction
writers called Pushing Boundaries which will be taught by Madison's Chris Mohar,
and a picture book workshop that is in-person on Wed evenings and includes an
online component. For more information, you can go directly to the website: http://www.mtmary.edu/summerschool.htm
or email me personally.

For kids, RedOak writers summer writing camp is again offering the camp on Mount
Mary's campus. For more information on that camp, please go to http://www.mtmary.edu/camps.htm
Pat Zietlow Miller
I've sold two picture books. One, The Quickest Kid in Clarksville, sold to Chronicle Books. It's fiction, but it's inspired by Olympic sprinter Wilma Rudolph. The other, tentatively titled Roads, sold to Little, Brown. It's a lyrical look at the roads we take in life -- both literal and metaphorical.

Dori Chaconas
I've been fortunate enough to be offered a contract from Viking for a tenth book in the easy-reader series, Cork and Fuzz.

Emily Kokie

Personal Effects is a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award (the winner
will be announced in June). As part of the celebration leading up to the
award presentation, on May 22 I will be doing a reading in Chicago with 8
other finalists. Details:
http://www.windycitymediagroup.com/lgbt/Lambda-Literary-Awards-finalist-reading-May-22/42576.html
Miranda Paul
My second picture book went to auction, and my agent and I have accepted an
offer from Neal Porter at Neal Porter Books! Roaring Brook and Neal Porter
Books have produced some of my very favorite picture books, and this is a
significant honor for me. I'm also proud of the fact that it's a rhyming
book, and non-fiction!

Kate Heling
Debbie (Hembrook) and I are pleased to announce that our picture book CLOTHESLINE CLUES TO JOBS PEOPLE DO (Charlesbridge) was named to the 2013 Best Children's Books of the Year list by the Children's Book Committee. We've also recently received word that this book will be coming out in paperback in Spring, 2014.
And even more exciting........we've been offered a contract for CLOTHESLINE
CLUES TO SPORTS PEOPLE PLAY, publication date of August, 2015.  We
anticipate that the new CLOTHESLINE CLUES book will have the same
illustrator, Andy Davies from the UK.

Janet Halfmann

Eggs 1, 2, 3: Who Will the Babies Be? (Blue Apple Books) won the Lupine Picture Book Honor Award from the Maine Library Association. The award recognizes an outstanding contribution to children's literature of Maine.

Plus, Little Skink's Tail is on the Just Read, Florida! 2013 Summer Recommended
Reading List for K-3.

Becky Wojahn

My news is that MALCOLM AT MIDNIGHT won a 2013 Friends of American Writers
Literary Award (http://www.fawchicago.org/)

Kashmira Sheth

I have a book signing coming up for Tiger in My Soup and I hope some of you
can make it. It is on the 14th of May at 7:00 PM at Barnes and Noble west (in Madison).
Michael Kress-Russick

Cricket has asked me to generate four illustrations for a piece of historical fiction to be run in their 75th anniversary issue (Sept).

Please check back after the CWW Awards Banquet next Saturday, May 11. I hope to be able to post some pictures from it on this blog.  Meantime, please visit the CWW website at www.wiswriters.org.



 




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New Leaf


In the wake of getting a little sidetracked during the holidays, my New Year’s resolution for this blog is to post Wisconsin writers’ info when I learn about it, rather than wait until I have more time (never happens) or until I have more than one item (why?). So here are a few items.


First from members of the Society of Childrens Book Writers and Illustrators Wisconsin chapter comes their “first of the month (and in this case, first of the year) good news” which gets posted on the WISCBWI listserv, tada, the first of each month.


Ann Bausum (whose Freedom Riders: John Lewis and Jim Zwerg on the Front Lines of the Civil Rights Movement I am just now reading) is a Cybils Children and Young Adults Bloggers Literary Awards finalist in the nonfiction teens & tweens category for Unraveling Freedom: The Battle for Democracy on the Home Front During World War I. Ann, an American history author for young people, has seven other books in this genre to her credit.


Janet Halfmann‘s third book from Sylvan Dell Publishing, Home in the Cave, will be out next month and is to be reviewed in the spring issue of ForeWord magazine. Janet’s two other Sylban Dell books, Fur and Feathers and Little Skink’s Tail are among the more than 30 books Janet has published.


Michael Kress-Russick is set to illustrate a historical fiction piece due to be published in the May issue of Cricket magazine.


In the adult ranks, New York Times bestselling author Patrick Rothfuss, whose The Name of the Wind and The Wise Man’s Fear are the first two books in a trilogy, is one of several authors to be featured at the April 11-18 Fox Cities Book Festival.


Featured speakers at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee’s March 9-11 Spring Writers Festival include Wausau native Margot Peters, whose book Lorine Niedecker: a Poet’s Life (namesake of the CWW’s Lorine Niedecker Poetry Award) was published in September.