In Brief: November 11

Krosoczka Given Little d Literary Award

Author Jarrett J. Krosoczka recently visited Albany, N.Y., to receive the sixth annual Little d Literary Award, a program of 15-Love, which provides free tennis lessons, mentoring, and other activities for children in the Albany region. The Little d award is given to the writer of the year’s “most humorous” book, in honor of late bookseller Denise McCoy, who was also involved in the 15-Love organization. Past winners include Lois Lowry, Jeff Kinney, and Sara Pennypacker. Here, Krosoczka is seen with Susan Novotny of The Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza in Albany.

The Marion Bookworm in Marion, Ill., marked Ivy and Bean Day this past Saturday, with two science presentations held at the Illinois Centre Mall where the bookstore is located. The seventh book in the series from Annie Barrows and Sophie Blackall, Ivy and Bean: What’s the Big Idea? (Chronicle, Sept.), centers around the second-grade science fair. The Bookworm partnered with the Science Center of Southern Illinois for the event, which treated 100+ visitors to presentations about “Air and Energy,” including Alka-Seltzer cannons, a hovercraft, volcanoes, and slime. Click here for the store’s Flickr stream of photos from the event.

Author Judy Blundell, winner of a 2008 National Book Award for What I Saw and How I Lied, visited Minneapolis and Chicago last week, in the first two stops of a pre-pub tour for her March 2011 YA release, Strings Attached. In Minneapolis, she and two Scholastic representatives visited with local booksellers and librarians at the restaurant Sea Change, where Blundell (fifth from r.) discussed the business of books, including her excitement over receiving the NBA against some stiff competition and doing background research for her novels. After the holidays, Scholastic intends to resume Blundell’s pre-pub dinner party tour in the two months leading up to the publication of Strings Attached.

Author Scott Westerfeld spent the month of October promoting Behemoth (Simon Pulse, Oct.), the second book in his steampunk Leviathan trilogy. The tour took Westerfeld all across the U.S. with stops in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Comic-Con in NYC, Texas, Georgia, Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan, and Utah, among many other stops. At Jefferson Junior High School in Naperville, Ill., students constructed models of “Clanker” technology in Westerfeld’s alternate 1914—a “Tesla cannon” and, seen here, a “Walker” unit.

Last week, author Lauren Brown celebrated her new middle-grade series, The Doggy Divas, with a launch party at New York City pet boutique Trixie + Peanut. In the first book, Roxy’s Rules (Sourcebooks Jabberwocky, Oct.), the titular heroine starts a dog-walking business with two friends. Seen here, l. to r., are Brown, her fiancé Nathanael West-Rosenthal, and friends Steven Goldsmith and John Dias (plus one canine fan). Brown has written biographies of celebrities including Reese Witherspoon and Lindsay Lohan and written for CosmoGIRL, Us Weekly, and other publications. Click here to watch a video of the launch event.