WRAD 2023 by the Number

Yesterday (Wednesday February 1st) was World Read Aloud Day, otherwise know as WRAD. This event was created by the non-profit LitWorld, and is sponsored by Scholastic (the creators of this awesome badge!). Here is a description from scholastic's website: 

"For 13 years, World Read Aloud Day has called attention to the importance of sharing stories by challenging participants to grab a book, find an audience, and read-aloud! The global effort, . . . is celebrated annually in over 173 countries and is all about bringing people together through the shared connection of reading aloud in all of our communities."

I have been participating in WRAD since 2016 (so for 8 years now!!), and I love doing it! It's so fun to meet young readers and share my love of reading with them. 

This year, my schedule was PACKED, and I thought it might be fun to give a rundown of numbers, stats, and basically, just do a little WRAD summary thread. I posted most of this on Twitter as a thread, but I'm adding a few things here.

My WRAD set-up

I hope you enjoy this inside look!

# of visits booked: 16
# of requests I couldn't accommodate and referred to others: 2
# of visits made: 13
# of states: 9 + 1 outside the US
# of visits cancelled for weather: 1

# of visits cancelled for time zone issues: 1
# of visits cancelled for unknown reasons: 1

Closest visit: Colorado
Furthest visit: Dominican Republic
State that cancelled for weather: Texas (!!!)

Grades I visited:*
Pre-K: 1
K: 7
1st: 5
2nd: 3
3rd: 1
4th: 1

*At some schools, I visited several grades at once, so the numbers won't match my number of visits

Books requested:

Help Wanted: Must Love Books: 4 times
Braver than Brave: 5 times*
The Recess Genius: 5 times

*I only read this one 4 times because of the weather cancellation

Book I am best at reading aloud: Help Wanted

Book I love reading aloud best: Braver than Brave (seriously, the ending blows kids minds, and I swear you can see it changing their world view just a little)

Book I can't wait to read more: The Recess Genius

Most Popular Question: How many books have you written?

Question I expected, but wasn't asked: How old are you?

A close second: Where do you get your ideas?

Favorite Question: What would you do if you weren't an author?

Best Question: So, in Braver than Brave, Wanda was brave, but the boy didn't think she was brave?

Quick pause to address that question. SO perceptive! This sweet girl almost whispered this question, and she was so brave to come up and ask it. We had a wonderful discussion about how sometimes when we're brave, others won't see how brave we are being. And that's okay, as long as we know inside ourselves that we were brave. It was a moment. The best kind of moments. The exact kind of moment that reminds me why I write the books I write. 💗

Okay, moving on:

Most unexpected questions (but I still loved them!):
-How do you make the shiny plastic covers?
-How do you make the words small & black?
-How do you put the pages together to make books?

(clearly I need to visit a book printer and learn all these things!)

# of illustration questions I was asked*: 5

-How do you draw without smudging the pictures?
-How do you decide what to draw on the covers? (2x)
-How do you decide what the characters look like?
-How did you create the art in Braver than Brave?

*Not including the questions about working with an illustrator

# of times kids thought I was less cool when they found out I didn't illustrate the books: 13 😅

(Okay, okay, that is just my perception, but it felt true, lol!)

# of others' books I shared: 15 (some multiple times) 

-9 PBs
-5 MGs

Questions I struggled most to answer:
-What is your favorite book that you wrote?
-What is your favorite book?

Things that helped w/WRAD visits:

-Using a Sign-up Genius to schedule visits
-Getting on @KateMessner's list
-Having work samples nearby to show
-Setting up my station the night before
-Using a slide presentation for book images
-Reading from a hard copy while kids view slides

Things I WISH I had done:

-Printed off a picture of my dog & family to show
-Asked teachers in advance to enable screen sharing
-Included a question on my sign-up about which book they wanted read & which state the school is in
-Recommended classes prepare questions in advance

-Requested that they don't mute the students as I read (The interaction always makes read-alouds better.)

And one last thought. 

I didn't mean to book so many visits. I failed to do the math when I set up my sign-up (lol!). And while I loved every visit, I only made it through 10 before my voice started giving out. Next year, I'll do fewer.

I just love visiting with students!

Happy World Read Aloud Day!! Keep Reading!

Fall Updates

This fall has been a busy, full fall, and I wanted to share some of the things I've been up to!

First, I've been working on Book 2 of my middle grade series. It has been fun to revisit my characters, and learn all the things they are struggling with, and celebrating. Creating a mystery based off a bit of  history has been a challenge, but delightful at the same time. I'm about 3/4ths of the way done with the first draft, and hope to finish it in the next couple of weeks. (Then comes the hard work of revising it into the story it can become!)

Next, I've done some fun signing events with the brilliant author/illustrator Shawna Tenney. We've been at the Orem B&N, the Layton B&N, and we currently have two more events coming up. 

We'll be at the Provo Library, Read Local! Event on November 5th, 10 AM - 4 PM.  

And then the next week, we'll be at the Layton, UT B&N for Storytime on Saturday November 12th, 12-2 PM. Hope to see some of you there!

Shawna and I have also been doing some school visits together. It is so much fun talking about how Authors work versus how Illustrators work. Meeting kids, and getting them excited about books and reading is one of my very favorite things to do as an author. And it's even more fun to do it with a friend!

Then, if you can believe it's been so long . . . I revealed the cover for The Recess Genius: Open for Business. Stacy Ebert is a brilliant illustrator, and I'm so excited for the rest of you to read our book. It comes out on February, 7th, 2023! Here is the cover:

And, of course, as any good fall should include, I've been busy with my kids activities as well as helping them put together their dream Halloween costumes. What do you think?

What are your fall plans looking like?

Cover Reveal - A Bad Case of the Almosts

Things are starting to happen fast over here! Braver than Brave has been out in the world for three weeks now, and it got an "Editor's Pick" flag on Amazon, which is really exciting!

It's a little fuzzy, but feel free to head on over and see it live for yourself! And if you've read it and want to leave a review on Goodreads, or Amazon, or Barnes & Noble, I'd greatly appreciate it. 😁 

However, today I'm not on here to talk about Braver Than Brave (as much as I love doing that). Today, I'm on here to share the cover of my next book, A Bad Case of the Almosts!  It is set to release on January 1st of 2023, which is not all that far away.

Before I do, I wanted to share a little about how this book came to be. In January of 2020 (yep, just before everything hit), I was participating in a thing called Storystorm, a yearly event hosted by Tara Lazar. Storystorm is all about building your list of story ideas. During the month of January, Tara Lazar hosts a new author every day who shares an idea for a way to find story ideas. It's a super fun event with prizes, and such, so if you are a writer, you should join in next year. It's phenomenal!

So there I was, on the hunt for new ideas, and one of the blog posts had said that titles of other books can be good inspiration for a new story. If you look at just the title, imagine how you would write it, and then you can see if it's similar or not to the actual book that accompanies that title. You'd be surprised how often the two are not similar at all.

I saw the title "Almost Every Time." . . . or at least, that's how I read it. Long story short, that wasn't the title at all! My eyes had skipped down to the next line, and that combination of words really intrigued me. I thought, what if instead of "Almost Every Time," it was "Almost. Every Time!"

This character leapt to life. This character who got so close to achieving her wants and her goals, but then didn't get it. EVERY TIME!! That would be so frustrating! And honestly, I could kind of relate. Except not kind of. I could SUPER relate.

That's how I felt about my attempts to sell another picture book. I'd had multiple books go to multiple acquisitions meetings, and some amazingly wonderful rejections (yes, they really can be wonderful), but it felt like I couldn't quite get past that last step. It was "Almost" EVERY TIME.

This book took a bit more brainstorming, but when I dared show it to my critique groups, I was surprised at their enthusiasm. I guess they understood that feeling, too. And I was surprised at my agent's enthusiasm (you know, after some revision rounds). And I was surprised at how quickly my editor at Capstone was able to get it through acquisitions. Because she understood the feeling, too.

So without further ado, I share the cover of A Bad Case of the Almosts, featuring the beautiful artwork of Alexandra Colombo who really brought Abby, my main character who is a huge science enthusiast, to life. And if you like the cover, I can't wait for you to see what she did with the art inside!

A Bad Case of the Almosts is now available for preorder at Amazon and Barnes & Noble, as well as most places books are sold. You can also add it to your "Want To Read" list on Goodreads to be notified when it comes out.

And for all you book reviewers out there, an ARC (Advance Reader Copy - for those wondering) is also now available on NetGalley! 

Release Day for BRAVER THAN BRAVE!

It's Release day for BRAVER THAN BRAVE!! 

So funny thing. Picture books don't have acknowledgment pages, so I'm going to just go ahead and do it here. For a book to come out in the world, it takes so many people! I could not do it alone. No doubt I will miss someone, and I'm apologize in advance, but here goes . . .

I'm so proud to share this book with Eunji Jung who brought the story to life. Her illustrations are so perfectly perfect. I'm grateful to my editor, Christianne Jones who loved this story from the beginning, and who helped me make this story shine. Huge thanks to Nathan Gassman who designed the book, and to Jennifer Glidden who has done so much to market this book and get the word out. An all-around thank you to Capstone Editions for publishing it! My agent, Lauren Galit has always encouraged me in all my writing, and I owe so much to her.  

I'd be remiss not to thank the many people who read early versions and gave such helpful feedback. Patricia Bailey, Dee Romito, Annie Bailey, Melissa Richardson, Annette Pimentel, Angie Lucas, Laurel Neme, Robyn Buttars, and Shawna Tenney. I'd be lost without them! And I have to thank the 12x12 members who read a very early version. Thank you for the encouragement!

I'm enormously grateful to my extended family--both the Sumners and the Johnsons who have always supported me in my writing and cheered me on. I feel so lucky to have such amazing family on both sides. And of course, my children who not only cheer me on, but also inspire me with all the best ideas. They are my pride and joy!

I give my biggest thanks to Rick, husband extraordinaire who has always been my biggest cheerleader. He carries the weight for both of us when I sneak away to write, and he constantly looks for ways to give me more writing time. He inspires me and makes me Braver than Brave in all my writing endeavors. If not for him, I may never have sent off that first manuscript in my journey to publication.

Finally, I want to thank all my readers. Without you, there would be no point in what I do. THANK YOU!! I'm so grateful I get to be an author and share the stories that are tumbling around in my head with the world. I couldn't do that without you!

Thank you to everyone who has requested a copy of BRAVER THAN BRAVE or any of my books from their library, and to everyone who has ever left any of my books a review. It means so much to me!

If you want to get your own copy of BRAVER THAN BRAVE you can order it at any of the following links (or wherever books are sold):

The King's English     Bookshop.org         Amazon        Barnes & Noble 

26 Days of Facing the Chicken Exit: DAYS 25 - 26

Today is the final day of facing down the chicken exit! BRAVER THAN BRAVE comes out tomorrow. I have been waiting for this for so long and I can' believe it's almost here!  But in the meantime, I present Days 25-26 of 26 Days of Facing the Chicken Exit! I hope you enjoy!

DAY 25: ??? 

I left today open for all of you to share your own stories of facing down the chicken exit. I hope you've been inspired after reading so many great stories. I hope you've been thinking about the moments in your life when you've faced down your chicken exit . . . whether that means taking the exit, or doing THE THING. I hope you know that there are SO MANY WAYS TO BE BRAVE. You are Brave! And I hope you'll comment and share your own story. I would truly love to hear!

DAY 26: Back to Wanda

After reading so many stories of facing down the chicken exit, I bet you CAN'T WAIT to hear how Wanda faced hers. Of course I can't tell you how the book ends! That would violate all of my reading principles. But know that Wanda is BRAVE. In fact, she's BRAVER THAN BRAVE. If you want to know more, you can buy your own copy or request one at your local library (if they don't already have it). Thanks so much for coming along this journey of facing down your chicken exit! I hope you have recognized all the ways you are Brave in your own life!

I hope you enjoyed Days 25-26, and I hope you've enjoyed the whole series. I really wanted to highlight the idea that being brave looks different for everyone. Sometimes we are Brave by doing THE HARD THING, and sometimes walking away from it takes all the Brave. A huge thank you to everyone who shared their story. That took courage, too! I love you all!

And dearest readers, I would really love to hear your story of facing down your own chicken exit in the comments! 

If you want to learn more about Wanda's Chicken exit, you can pre-order (or is it plain old order now??!) a copy of BRAVER THAN BRAVE at any of the following links (or wherever books are sold):

The King's English     Bookshop.org         Amazon        Barnes & Noble 

If you've missed the previous Facing Down the Chicken Exit Posts, you can find them here:

DAY 1: The Legend of the Chicken Exit

DAYS 2-4

DAYS 5-7

DAYS 8-10

DAYS 11-14

DAYS 15-17

DAYS 18-20

DAYS 21-24

26 Days of Facing the Chicken Exit: DAYS 21 - 24

Today we're continuing with the countdown to the release of my upcoming picture book, BRAVER THAN BRAVE, illustrated by Eunji Jung, and published by Capstone Editions, a Capstone Imprint. I present Days 21-24 of 26 Days of Facing the Chicken Exit!

DAY 21: PB Character, Little One

A monarch caterpillar named Little One from HELLO, LITTLE ONE, exists in a lonely green world. It longs for a friend. One day an orange butterfly lands nearby and makes a connection. Although embarassed, Little One is brave and responds, making a new friend to end its loneliness. 

~by Zeena M. Pliska, art by Fiona Halliday

DAY 22: Mr. Janet Sumner Johnson 

"I don’t like water sports. I know a lot of people love swimming or boating or whatnot. I don’t really. I think it goes back to almost drowning as a child or something. Now, I have worked on it because others have said I was silly for being afraid of water; but you know except for cruises and calm lake kayaking I still don’t like water or water sports. What inspires me to be braver in many aspects of my life is when I rock climb regularly. I have never been very good at it but I have certainly felt braver in many areas of my life when I struggled against that infuriating over hang or when I actually could complete the climb as planned. It was all about besting myself. Strange rock climbing over water skiing!"

DAY 23: Janet Sumner Johnson (Me!), author of BRAVER THAN BRAVE

"One morning, when I was 6, my brothers and their friends built a bike ramp to jump off while waiting for the bus. I was new at riding my bike, and the jump was too big and scary for me. I sadly made my way home while they stayed and jumped. Not long after that, one of my brothers came home with bloody hands and cuts on his face. The ramp had collapsed when he tried to jump it. Suddenly I was glad I’d taken the chicken exit! Sometimes the chicken exit is the best choice, even if you don’t realize it at the time."

DAY 24: Jessie Oliveros, author of THE REMEMBER BALLOONS 

"When I learned how to drive as a teenager, I refused to drive through the heart of the city. I couldn’t handle the lane changes and traffic! So for years I took the “chicken exit” by taking the highways around the city and that worked out great! Then years later I went home to help a family member in the hospital and had to see and hear and do hard things. The first night I left the hospital, I could have gone around the city like usual. But what I had done that day was so hard that suddenly driving through the city didn’t seem so scary anymore. So I did! And I was okay and I’ve done it many times since. Sometimes we can take the chicken exit until we are ready not to!"

I hope you enjoyed Days 21-24! If you want to learn more about Wanda's Chicken exit, you can pre-order a copy of BRAVER THAN BRAVE at any of the following links (or wherever books are sold):

The King's English     Bookshop.org         Amazon        Barnes & Noble 

If you've missed the previous Facing Down the Chicken Exit Posts, you can find them here:

DAY 1: The Legend of the Chicken Exit

DAYS 2-4

DAYS 5-7

DAYS 8-10

DAYS 11-14

DAYS 15-17

DAYS 18-20

26 Days of Facing the Chicken Exit: DAYS 18 - 20

Today we're continuing with the countdown to the release of my upcoming picture book, BRAVER THAN BRAVE, illustrated by Eunji Jung, and published by Capstone Editions, a Capstone Imprint. I present Days 18-20 of 26 Days of Facing the Chicken Exit!

DAY 18: Angie Lucas, author of MY BIG, DUMB, INVISIBLE DRAGON 

"I rode the roller coaster of infertility for 12 long years. After three consecutive losses, I gathered every remaining ounce of courage to try ONE more time. And that's how I got my wonderful son, Wyatt, who just turned 5."

DAY 19: PB Character, Morah

In MERMAIDS DON'T WEAR FLOATIES, Morah faces a chicken exit when she elects to learn to swim instead of keeping her floaties on.

~by Rachelle Jones Smith (@writerachelle), art by Jairalin Repalbor

DAY 20: Gabi Snyder, author of COUNT ON US! 

"As a young adult I went skiing for the first time with friends who were seasoned skiers. They said they could teach me to ski and we got in line for an intermediate slope. I could barely stand in the skis. The idea of starting with an intermediate slope terrified me. Even the chairlift terrified me! So another friend and I happily took the chicken exit and spent the afternoon taking lessons on the bunny hill. The chicken exit was definitely the right choice!"

I hope you enjoyed Days 18-20! Now, I want to give a huge thanks to everyone who entered the giveaways on Twitter and Instagram. Today I'm announcing the winners!!

First up, we have the winner of the Twitter giveaway:

Mrs_Alexa_Terry (That.Tall.Teacher)

Congratulations!

And next we have the winner of the Instagram giveaway: 

Ryann Jones (ryann_jones117)

Congratulations to you, too!! I hope you both enjoy the book and swag! And if you didn't win, you can pre-order your own copy at any of the following links (or wherever books are sold):

The King's English     Bookshop.org         Amazon        Barnes & Noble 

If you've missed the previous Facing Down the Chicken Exit Posts, you can find them here:

DAY 1: The Legend of the Chicken Exit

DAYS 2-4

DAYS 5-7

DAYS 8-10

DAYS 11-14

DAYS 15-17