Mundie Moms

Friday, April 22, 2011

Happy Good Friday, Happy Earth Day & Forum Closer

Happy Good Friday & Happy Earth Day!! To celebrate the Easter weekend and to spend time with our families, our forums will be closed starting tonight through early Monday morning. We'll still be blogging a little bit, but mostly we'll be running around trying to get last minute things done before the Easter bunny comes and our family get togethers.

We hope everyone has a wonderful holiday weekend and we look forward to chatting with you on our forums on Monday!

Teen Book Con Re-Cap & A Giveaway

Two weekends ago I had the chance to head to Houston to meet up with some wonderful friends and attend the Teen Book Con, sponsored by Blue Willow, the indie store there in town. If you haven't been to their store, you must go. It's a fabulous little store. Friday night was the highlight of the trip for me, I was able to meet up with some wonderful friends and over dinner we discussed everything from books, to writing and had a lot of great laughs. My wonderful Jen, whom I hadn't since in couple years flew out for the event, we had a lot of fun and I wish the weekend hadn't flown by so fast.

Deb Caletti was the key note speaker and WOW had an awesome speaker she is! Note only did it feel like she connected with everyone in the room as she spoke, both young and older, but it felt like all of us in the room related to her. Here's a few key notes from her speech:

-She says she didn't feel like she fit in anywhere (how many of us can relate to feeling like that as a teen), she needed books, they were her escape, comfort and place to hide & realized there were shelves full of characters and stories that helped her figure out herself & the world.
- Books were there for her, they were her friends at 3 am, they were information, the books she wrote saved her. -- -- - When I became a writer I found that place I belong

- What taught me to be a writer were the books I read
- A book is a possibility held in your hands!
- In talking about books she said- they make you think differently, they make you laugh and cry. It's the feel of satisfaction when you get to the end of a book. In talking about book lovers, she also mentioned how we love the smell of a book... she also said you can't have too many books, "the more books the better" we can horde....
-It's powerful to have this ability to control your life.


The Panels-


















Here there be Ghosts...and Werewolves and Everything else! panel (Andrea Cremer, Rachel Hawkins, Stacey Kade, Saundra Mitchell and Joy Preble)

On what inspired them to create their stories:

Rachel Hawkins- chose to write about demons because she wanted to explore the girl as the really dark scary creature

Saundra Mitchell- likes to write about the "what if" and what would actually happen in a normal town with a girl with extradionary things
Joy Preble- her books are grounded in magic and Russian lore- she thought baba yaga a fabulous witch to work with. What happens when you take an ordinary girl & pair her with this extraordinary circumstances
Stacy Kade- thought it would be fun
Andrea Cremer- loved playing in the woods near her home and she felt the wilderness was a fabulous place to be. She always wanted magical powers to turn into a wolf. She combined her love for the wildness and always wanting to be able to turn into a wolf and created her series. She said Cala is a wolf & warrior, and she wanted a simple transformation for her story. Her series isn't a werewolf story. The wolves are beautiful, but witches play a huge part and are more powerful than a wolf and that was the help Cala had needed.

The Lighter Side, with Bumps Along the Way Panel (Stephanie Perkins, Deb Caletti, Lindsey Leavitt and Kristen Tracy)

On writing and making time for other things:

Stephanie Perkins- she makes time to work (writing) and separates her writing time from personal time

Lindsey Leavitt- She gave wonderful advise. She said make time for other things in your life. You need to be happy. She makes time to write, but she's a mom before she's an author.
Kristen Tracy- she tries to have balance
Deb Caletti- A lot of work goes into balance & I reward myself with candy

A Walk On The Dark Side panel (Ellen Hopkins, Elizabeth Scott, Lauren Myracle, Gail Giles)
and of course my phone died as I entered their panel and wasn't able to take any notes. There were a lot of laughs during this panel and what I took away from this panel was the importance that each of the authors takes something from real life and gives their readers something to relate to. Their books are often the ones that give teens a voice they other wise wouldn't have had.


Authors- It was so much fun seeing authors I've met before and meeting ones I've admired for awhile now. Each of the authors are so much fun and it was such a wonderful day being able to chat with them and meet them. I look forward to seeing them all again. They are all fabulous!!































Lindsey Leavitt, Stephanie Perkins, Andrea Cremer (I'm holding her Armadillo Ben, whom you can meet here), Rachel Hawkins, Saundra Mitchell, Elizabeth Scott, and Shannon and I with Mary Lindsey, who's book Shattered Souls will be out in December.

Blogging Friends-




















This weekend was so much fun! I enjoyed getting to discuss books, listening to authors speak & meeting them, and being able to get together with friends and meet a lot of wonderful TX bloggers. I took a lot more pictures, but my iphone pics came out horrible... here's a few friends I enjoyed getting to chat with:
Yara (from Once Upon a Twilight), Girls In The Stacks, Jen (my fantastic room mate for the weekend) and Sab from YA Bliss.

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Giveaway Time!! I received an ARC of Meg Cabot's upcoming YA release, Abandoned. I already have a copy to review and I'd like to pass this one to someone else to enjoy. All you have to do is fill out this form below:

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