Spring 2010 Flying Starts

Spotlighting four novelists and one illustrator who had their debuts this spring

Q & A with Patricia MacLachlan

Patricia MacLachlan is the Newbery Award winning author of Sarah, Plain and Tall and more than 20 other acclaimed books. She spoke with Bookshelf about her new novel, Word After Word After Word, which is based on her own experience speaking in schools.

Q & A with Treat Williams

Treat Williams, an accomplished actor who has clinched Golden Globe and Emmy nominations for his work in the theater, television, and film over three decades, steps into a new spotlight with his first book, Air Show (Disney-Hyperion). In this large-format volume, illustrated by Robert Neubecker, two siblings fly with their pilot father to an air show, where they view planes of various design and vintage.

BookExpo America 2010: Big Children's Books of the Show

The BEA convention may have been shorter than in years past, but there was no shortage of major titles at the show last week. “It’s been a good show, bigger than I thought it would be,” said Mary Albi of Egmont USA, while Robert Kempe of Seven Footer Press called it “BEA on steroids,” due to the compressed two-day schedule.

Q & A with Christoph Niemann

German-born author/illustrator Christoph Niemann moved with his family from New York City to Berlin two years ago, but his two new books both focus on the Big Apple,but his two new books both focus on the Big Apple and are drawn from a blog Neimann produces for the New York Times.

Amy Krouse Rosenthal: Putting All Her Books Under a Yellow Umbrella

What a year Amy Krouse Rosenthal had in 2009. First, with four children's books published that spring, Rosenthal got the coveted invite to be a breakfast speaker at BookExpo America; then, on Mother's Day, the New York Times printed a glowing review of all four of her new titles, Duck! Rabbit! and Little Oink (Chronicle), Spoon (Hyperion), and Yes Day! (HarperCollins); and she hit the New York Times list for Duck! Rabbit! May 24—staying on for weeks and re-emerging later in the summer.

Q & A with Rachel Vail

She's written picture books, middle-grade fiction, and young adult novels, but Rachel Vail breaks new ground as an author in her latest novel, Justin Case. Aimed at readers ages 7-9 and written as the journal of a third-grade worrywart, the book will be published by Feiwel and Friends.

Q & A with Louis Sachar

In his first novel since Small Steps, the 2006 sequel to his Newbery-winning Holes, Louis Sachar focuses on a subject rarely explored in fiction for teens: the game of bridge. The Cardturner centers on 17-year-old Alton, who spends a summer accompanying his blind great-uncle Trapp to his bridge club, where the boy acts as the bridge whiz's "cardturner" and finds himself drawn into the game, the mystery surrounding his relative, and a new love interest. Delacorte will release the novel with a 250,000-copy first printing.

Q & A with Deborah Wiles

Deborah Wiles, author of the Aurora County trilogy, is using the term "documentary novel" to describe her latest release, Countdown, a work of historical fiction set in 1960s Maryland.

Q & A with Megan Whalen Turner

A Conspiracy of Kings is Megan Whalen Turner's fourth book in the series that began with The Thief, a 1997 Newbery Honor winner. Bookshelf caught up with Turner in California, where her husband's job has taken the family for a sabbatical year.

The Future Is on the Line...

Author Sarah Mlynowski writes about how a tweet promoting her new book has taken on a life of its own.

Gimme a Call is about a high school senior who accidentally drops her cell phone in a fountain. When she fishes it out, she discovers the only call she can make is to herself—as a high school freshman, at age 14. Since Gimme a Call comes out next week, I thought it would be fun to ask a few fellow YA authors what they would tell their high school selves if, say, they had magic cells of their own. So on Monday I tweeted "Ever wonder what YA authors would tell their high school selves? (If they had magic cell phones that could call the past?) #gimmeacall." What started as a question to fellow authors has spread to their followers and their followers' followers. Click through to read some of my favorite responses.

Q & A with David Pogue

David Pogue is the personal technology columnist for the New York Times, and is a tech contributor to both CBS News and CNBC. He has authored a number of technology books, including the Missing Manual series of computer guides. Pogue has just written his first children's novel, for middle-grade readers, and he spoke with Bookshelf about it.

Q & A with Kathryn Erskine

Kathryn Erskine's second novel, Mockingbird, sprang from the intersection of two life-changing events—a daughter diagnosed with Asperger's, and the April 2007 shootings at Virginia Tech near Erskine's home in Charlottesville, Va.

Q: Your daughter, Fiona, has Asperger's Syndrome. When did you decide you wanted to write a novel about a character with that condition?

A: I had been jotting down notes, mulling over the idea of a main character who had Asperger's almost as an exercise—trying to see the world through her eyes, but I didn't have a compelling plot.

Rick Riordan's Big Year

With two new trilogies launching this year, Percy Jackson author Rick Riordan stands likely to boost his already (ahem) Olympian output—and sales. Disney-Hyperion will release one million copies of The Red Pyramid, first in his Kane Chronicles series inspired by ancient Egyptian magic. An as-yet-unnamed Percy Jackson spin-off will follow, which will combine familiar characters with some new half-human, half-Greek-god kids.

Until now, Riordan has stuck to one book a year. "I've set myself a challenge of putting out two books a year so the readers don't have to wait longer than a year for either series," said Riordan. "That's a pretty big jump for me."

Q&A with Deb Caletti

Deb Caletti knows she was "meant to be holed up in my room wearing my pjs and talking to my imaginary friends." And, even though becoming a young adult author wasn't part of her original plan, her complex stories about distressed families and complicated romances have certainly connected with teen readers—and critics. Her book Honey, Baby, Sweetheart was named a finalist for a National Book Award in 2004. Here, Caletti talks with Bookshelf about what it's like to write after winning such an honor, the inspiration behind her newest novel, The Six Rules of Maybe, and the actual rules she chooses to live by.