Project MG Mayhem: What the Mayhemmers are up to in 2017, compiled by Michael G-G

We're back from our short hiatus--and boy did the time fly by! I thought I'd bring you up to speed about what several Mayhemmers plan for our new year of 2017. Here we go:

Kell Andrews: In 2017 I want to finish writing and revising my current novel, which is the book of my heart. My goal next is to write something for my daughter. She has a hard time finding enough of the books she loves, so I want to write the book of her heart.

Caroline Starr Rose: February 7: Jasper and the Riddle of Riley's Mine publishes!!!!

Jim Hill: I'm teaching a workshop at NESCBWI called "So You Want to Write a Graphic Novel." April 21-23, 2017, Springfield, MA.

Mary Cronin: I'll be teaching two workshops at the New England SCBWI conference in April--
"World-Building: The Power of Setting for LGBTQ Characters" and "Writing about Characters with LGBTQ Parents."








(Looks like this will be a great conference to attend if you want to see Jim and Mary in action!)

Eden Unger Bowditch: I have MG/YA two books coming out in 2017:
May-The Strange Round Bird (Book 3 of The Young Inventors Guild)
October- Fun Things to Do With Dead Animals with my friend, Egyptologist Salima Ikram

Yamile Saied Mendez: My good news is that I'll be graduating from VCFA in January. I'll also be teaching a casual diversity class at the Storymakers conference in Utah in May. Storymakers is the largest writing conference in the state.

Michael Gettel-Gilmartin: Inspired by Caroline's recent post on The Artist's Way, I'm planning to work through the course once more. I was in an Artist's Way group way back in 1998. It'll be interesting to see how my inner artist responds to revisiting Julia Cameron's "spiritual path to higher creativity."





I hope you all have a magnificently creative and wonderfully fulfilling New Year. Thanks for reading and supporting Project Middle Grade Mayhem (now in our 7th year!!!)

Taking Your Writing Life Into Your Own Hands by Eden Unger Bowditch

Sometimes, it feels like we wait for others to guide our careers. We wait for our publishers to release our books, for our publicists to procure reviews; we wait for someone else to call someone else to get us into a bookstore that has never heard of us. Sometimes, however, we have untapped power we should consider and take our lives into our own hands.

When the first Young Inventors Guild book, The Atomic Weight of Secrets… was released, I was in the middle of a revolution, living in Cairo. I could do nothing until the following summer. I had ‘book release’ parties months after the book was released! It was a bit chaotic. I had sporadic events booked, sometimes in different parts of the US since I was only there during the summer. It was impossible. After we returned to Cairo in the fall, Bancroft Press, my kind and generous publisher, hired a publicist exclusively to book and take me on very short, intensely packed, book tours. I’d fly into NYC, take a train down to DC and meet my publicist. We’d visit twenty bookstores, shops, libraries, and schools. I’d have visiting author events booked and, in between, we’d visit a ton of bookshops and libraries as a collection of meet-and-greet events just to get the word out. I did three of these four-day adventures. It was exhausting but incredibly helpful. When the second YIG book, The Ravens of Solemano… came out last fall, there were bookstores waiting for the second book, who knew about the series because of our short visits.

Sharing with kids is always a pleasure

I learned that I could do this myself. Since I was in the US last year, I called libraries and bookshops, drove to places I had visited before and new places who were thrilled for the personal touch. I visited science museums and spoke to science and history teachers. I combined a family visit with a library visit in Chicago. I didn’t wait for someone else to do the work. I went out and made contact. When I return for the winter holiday this year, I am visiting two schools that have purchased YIG books, one for the entire 5^th and, the other, for the 7^th grade. Three libraries in Chicago have asked for author visits in the late spring when we come back for summer. As I work on the third book, I sometimes send notes to bookstore proprietors and librarians who have been kind. I hear back from them and they are always enthusiastic. Sometimes I hear back from their bookstore and librarian friends who are now enthusiastic, too.

So, my suggestion:

1. Make a list of who would be good to alert, considering the nature of your upcoming book. Be creative and consider museums and shops and conventions and fairs, in addition to libraries, schools, and bookstores.

Be prepared for bumps in the road.

2. Send an email. Then make a call. Speaking to people makes a big difference. Let them know about the book (s) and find out policy about visiting authors and/or signings.

3. Map out places nearby, places receptive to your calls or places that might be great for a visit. A visit is great. Provide a complimentary copy and/or other items like posters or cards, things to be placed in the store to alert customers.

4. Follow through and stay in touch. Many authors are silent and only make contact through their agents or publishers.

5. Be sure to keep that list for the next book release. Even if someone else is promoting, your name will be on the minds of the book people who are now your friends.

TRILOGY…ONE…TWO…THREE: Thoughts on writing the third book by Eden Unger Bowditch

DISCLAIMER: This post contains subject matter that seems to flip back and forth. It reflects the ambivalence I feel as I pen the third book in a trilogy. It flops from thought to thought and back. Is it great? Is it sad? Is it happy? Is it fun? Is it hard? Is it…so many different things? What I can promise, it is honest.

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I am knee-deep in the third book of the Young Inventors Guild. 'Knee-deep' does not reveal the times when I am, in fact, in over my head, however. There are times when I am over my head. We all get attached to our characters and the worlds we create around them. By the third book, I sometimes feel overwhelmed by the final piece and all that it must contain.

(Wikimedia Commons)

While my publisher and I have discussed the idea of other Young Inventors Guild trilogies along different timelines, these specific characters during this particular time and place are contained in the three books. That means the mysteries are revealed and the story is given closure. It is exciting…and a bit sad. It’s like running to a finish line while loathing the end of the race. It is something you work so hard for, so relentlessly, so long. And, with one swift step or stroke of the pen or finger on the keyboard, it comes to a close.

So much goes into creating a world- heart, soul, love, madness. I find myself referring back to moments in the first two books to be sure I have it right and rediscovering things I’d almost forgotten about that story. The third book takes place in Cairo (good thing I came back!) and I find that I really do have to roam the streets, peruse the venues, explore the ancient markets to reestablish my own connection with a place that hasn’t changed much since my characters were there over a hundred years ago. I am lucky to have the opportunity to explore the very place that my characters will. But there is a sense of finality that goes along with the pleasure of exploring. It’s like a final walk-through, knowing you will close the door behind you and leave that house you built with your own hands, that home you love, forever.

(Gutenberg Image)

I know that, even if I continue and create new Young Inventors Guild books on their own timelines, it will be different. It will feel different, coming back to the first. Revisiting a place that was home is not going home again. That said, it is a wonderful thing to rediscover places where once we did dwell. With that in mind, those of us who have series that will come to a close, enjoy the time in that world, embrace it, and, as the adventure comes to a close, know that these books of ours become part of the world and people will get to enter the story and have a chance to be there. While we write, we are experiencing the adventure for the first time, too. The books then become their own destination. And we, too, can find our way back to visit them.

Holiday Gift Guide: Adventuresome Boy Books with Matthew MacNish

A couple of weeks ago, we here at Project Mayhem started discussing the possibility of having a holiday gift giving guide, with different categories of books or writing goodies. Since we are independent types who are about as herdable as cats, we decided to let everyone do their own thing. But keep an eye out this month for occasional gift guides!

With very little deliberation, I decided to write about Adventurous books for boys! Most of these books will feature boy protagonists, but some of them will have girls in the lead, and strong, brave, hilarious boy sidekicks. Regardless, they will all be full of adventure, whether in space, a magical fantasy realm, or even a mostly contemporary small town Iowa.

All of them are recommended for boys, primarily those age 8-12, who love a great adventure story.

You Can't Have My Planet, but Take My Brother, Please, by James Mihaley

Thirteen-year-old Giles is the last person anyone would expect to save the planet. he's not as charming as his little sister, and not as brainy as his goody-goody older brother. But when Giles witnesses an alien realtor showing Earth to possible new tenants, he knows he'd better do something. With the help of an alien "attorney" and the maddest scientist in middle-grade fiction, Giles just might save humans from eviction from Earth. Let's hope so. The alternatives are...not so hospitable.

Jacob Wonderbar and the Cosmic Space Kapow, by Nathan Bransford

Jacob Wonderbar is used to detentions, but when a spaceship crashes near his house, he finds himself in a whole new level of trouble. After swapping a corn dog for the ship, he and his two best friends, Sarah Daisy and Dexter, take off on a madcap adventure. They accidentally cause an epic explosion, get kidnapped by a space pirate, and are marooned on planets like Numonia and Paisley, where the air smells like burp breath and revenge-hungry substitute teachers rule. And that's only the beginning . . . It turns out that there's an entire colony of space humans, and Jacob's long-lost father just might be one of them.

The first book in debut author Nathan Bransford's hilarious space adventure series has dynamite friendships, peculiar planets, and nonstop action. You'll never look at the stars the same way!

The Mostly True Story of Jack, by Kelly Barnhill

When Jack is sent to Hazelwood, Iowa, to live with his strange aunt and uncle, he expects a summer of boredom. Little does he know that the people of Hazelwood have been waiting for him for quite a long time.

When he arrives, three astonishing things happen: First, he makes friends -- not imaginary friends but actual friends. Second, he is beaten up by the town bully; the bullies at home always ignored him. Third, the richest man in town begins to plot Jack's imminent, and hopefully painful, demise. It's up to Jack to figure out why suddenly everyone cares so much about him. Back home he was practically, well, invisible.

The Mostly True Story of Jack is an eerie tale of magic, friendship, and sacrifice. It's about things broken and things put back together. Above all, it's about finding a place to belong.

Nightshade City (Nightshade Chronicles Book One), by Hilary Wagner

Deep beneath Trillium City, a modern metropolis, lies the Catacombs, a kingdom of rats of extraordinary intelligence and ability. The once peaceful and democratic colony has become a harsh dictatorship ruled by the High Minister Kildeer and his henchman, Billycan, who runs the Kill Army and collects weekly Stipend from the terrified subjects. The two of them rule with iron fists. With most of the adult rats wiped out in Killdeer's Bloody Coup and the subsequent great flood, orphaned young male rats are forced into the army and the females into servitude or worse. But change is coming. . . .

Two orphan brothers, Vincent and Victor Nightshade, sons of a hero killed in the Bloody Coup, manage to escape from the Kill Army and meet up with Juniper Belancourt, leader of a rebel group seeking to overthrow their oppressors and restore peace and democracy in a new city. The brothers are quickly caught up in Juniper's cause: "We survive by cover of night. We live in the shadows, waiting for our redemption! Our name must symbolize our burning spirit. . . . Tonight and forever, we are Nightshade City!"

Juniper's plans are complicated by many factors. His lovely young niece Clover has been picked by Killdeer to be his next Chosen One, so the rebels and their allies the Earthworms must work fast to save her. Can the rebels locate their enemies' War Room? Can Juniper's former love, now holding a position in Killdeer's Ministry, be trusted? Will the rebels be able to execute their plans without the aid of a young Topsider (human)? And how will Vincent and Victor fare in battle will they honor their father's legacy of courage?

The Kindling (Middle School Magic Book One), by Braden Bell

All thirteen-year-old Connor Dell wants to do is pass pre-algebra, play lacrosse, and possibly kiss Melanie Stephens, but when a run-in with the school bully ignites strange powers inside him, Connor's normal teenage life goes up in flames. Now he'll need his new powers to defeat the Darkness that's coming for him. Fast-paced and original, this book's guaranteed to keep you guessing!

Storybound (Storybound Series Book One), by Marissa Burt

In the land of Story, children go to school to learn to be characters: a perfect Hero, a trusty Sidekick, even the most dastardly Villain. They take classes on Outdoor Experiential Questing and Backstory, while adults search for full-time character work in stories written just for them.

In our world, twelve-year-old Una Fairchild has always felt invisible. But all that changes when she stumbles upon a mysterious book buried deep in the basement of her school library, opens the cover, and suddenly finds herself transported to the magical land of Story.

But Story is not a perfect fairy tale. Una’s new friend Peter warns her about the grave danger she could face if anyone discovers her true identity. The devious Tale Keeper watches her every move. And there are whispers of a deadly secret that seems to revolve around Una herself....

With the timeless appeal of books like A Wrinkle in Time and the breathtaking action of Inkheart, Storybound has all the makings of a new classic. Brimming with fantastical creatures, magical adventure, and heart-stopping twists, Storybound will leave readers wishing they too could jump through the pages into this enchanting fairy-tale world.

The Atomic Weight of Secrets or the Arrival of the Mysterious Men in Black (The Young Inventors Guild Book One), by Eden Unger Bowditch

In 1903, five truly brilliant young inventors, the children of the world’s most important scientists, went about their lives and their work as they always had.

But all that changed the day the men in black arrived.

They arrived to take twelve-year-old Jasper Modest and his six-year-old sister, Lucy—he with his remarkable creations and she with her perfect memory—from their London, England home to a place across the ocean they’d never seen before.

They arrived to take nine-year-old Wallace Banneker, last in a long line of Africa-descended scientists, from his chemistry, his father, and his New York home to a life he’d never imagined.

Twelve-year-old Noah Canto-Sagas, already missing his world-famous and beloved mother, was taken from Toronto, Canada, carrying only his clothes, his violin, and his remarkable mind.

And thirteen-year-old Faye Vigyanveta, the genius daughter of India’s wealthiest and most accomplished scientists, was removed by force from her life of luxury.

From all across the world, they’ve been taken to mysterious Sole Manner Farm, and a beautiful but isolated schoolhouse in Dayton, Ohio, without a word from their parents as to why. Not even the wonderful schoolteacher they find there, Miss Brett, can explain it. She can give them love and care, but she can’t give them answers.

Things only get stranger from there. What is the book with no pages Jasper and Lucy find in their mother’s underwear drawer, and why do the men in black want it so badly?

How is it all the children have been taught the same bizarre poem—and yet no other rhymes or stories their entire lives?

And why haven’t their parents tried to contact them?

Whatever the reasons, to brash, impetuous Faye, the situation is clear: They and their parents have been kidnapped by these terrible men in black, and the only way they’re going to escape and rescue their parents is by completing the invention they didn’t even know they were all working on—an invention that will change the world forever.

But what if the men in black aren’t trying to harm the children? What if they’re trying to protect them?

And if they’re trying to protect them—from what?

An amazing story about the wonders of science and the still greater wonders of friendship, The Atomic Weight of Secrets or the Arrival of the Mysterious Men in Black, the first book of the Young Inventors Guild trilogy, is a truly original novel. Young readers will forever treasure Eden Unger Bowditch’s funny, inventive, poignant, and wonderfully fun fiction debut.

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That's it for today! Please feel free to share your own recommendations in the comments.

THE READER, THE AUTHOR, AND THE LIVING TEXT, eden unger bowditch

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My MA thesis was on ambiguity in literary texts. I proposed that ambiguity(and I do not mean obscurity and lack of clarity, simply the capacity for being understood in more than one way) is at the heart of literature. Unlike any other form of writing (weather reports, legal briefs, reportage, etc) it is actually necessary to a literary text, something we want. Without an open avenue for the reader within the text, there is no way for the reader to find a personal place in it. I asked two questions: Does a text have meaning without a reader? Is a text changed by the readers who read it? If we can accept that, without reading it, a text is only an object without a reader, then we can say that a reader changes the text by reading it. If a reader is what gives it meaning, then the reader has affected the text. Think of books you have read and how they change when you reread them. Think of stories you have written and how they change when you reread them.

People make a distinction between author and reader. As authors, we know that as we put words on a page, they come forth and we direct them, but often are directed by them. We interpret what we write and then, when we reread, we may change our minds. Can we really say were we wrong before and right now? Or do we, as readers of our own words, see something different when we revisit our own words?

It is easy to think about rereading and reinterpreting other works, but as writers, we must consider that we, too, come back to our own texts as readers and find new meaning. With every experience, we change. It makes sense to see how we, with those experiences, see new things when we reread.

Ambiguity allows for texts to live throughout history, be reread as we grow older, and loved by different generations. For me, I rarely feel that someone else’s interpretation of my work, if coming from a careful reading, is wrong. If I write something poorly or if someone misreads a name or a section of a chapter and goes off in a wrong direction, that is one thing. But someone breathing new ideas and life into a story, mine or others’, makes for a new and exciting journey through that story. The reader heads into the world of the story with different eyes, each time. That is the magic of reading. That is what makes the reader and the author (the initial reader) part of the living text.