INK Sisters Write

Dear Kim, I considered posting the text that I sent you this past weekend about Girls on Fire , but I thought better of exposing our readers to the amount of expletives used. Instead I will share a censored version: Robin Wasserman's masterpiece is a dark and twisty tale, too believable to be anything but young adult horror. Set in Battle Creek, Pennsylvania in 1991, a fitting town for Wasserman's many battles: high school reverence, best-of-friend manipulations, sexuality, and the battle to be just a girl in the world.  Kurt Cobain (not Gwen) plays the soundtrack to this novel. His songs hang like storm clouds around the girls-- all devastation, destruction, and angst.  Hannah Dexter seeks something more out of life . Then Hannah meets Lacey Champlain who is equal parts  seductress  and best friend. Lacey pulls Hannah (now Dex, per Lacey's order) into the fierce and violent fold of high school girlhood.   The story opens (and spoiler-ish...

Dear Kim, Thank you for sharing a bit about your new INKSpell publishing family . Those covers! Shoot. They are all awesome. I cannot wait to see your cover for Starr Fall. Speaking of covers. How about this one? Dumplin' . Yes, D  - fucking fabulous -  umplin! I love so much about this book, and its author, Julie Murphy that I may start to ramble a bit on this, the day of "J" in #AuthorApril. But, my dear Kim, I know that you appreciate a good ramble, so here I go... -Me devouring Dumplin circa September 2015, Cocoon Coffee House I was intrigued last spring when the buzz for Dumplin' started and was full on hooked by the time I saw this... Do you think I pre-ordered? Oh, you know I did. That Julie Murphy-- I am going to give her all the credit here, marketing teams be damned-- she knew how to run a pre-order campaign. I wore my Dumplin' pin with pride. (Secretly a bit jealous of the curvy lady it portrayed who was brave enough to w...

Friday night, I entered the Industry Party at the hotel. Dozens of agents, editors, and publishers ate cheese and drank wine in the SAME room as me. **major fangirl squee** Donna and I observed the Rock Stars of the Children's Book World, interact with each other, and guess what? They are regular people. They eat and drink like us. They have hopes and dreams like us. The only major difference between US and THEM? They possess the power to catapult us to the stars or smash us against a brick wall. So...okay, maybe they're more superhero, than rockstar, but you get the point. Post-Industry party, we met new SCBWI friends from New England and Kimberly Sabatini, at the bar. Kim is the author of Touching the Surface. ** fangirl squee *** And yes, I did squee in front of her--she's just a down to earth person who happens to have a YA novel published. (I know, awesome right?!?!) We met these new friends via Twi...