"Tension escalates" - "Publishers Weekly" on "Brave Like My Brother"

Blurb about Brave Like My Brother in Publishers Weekly (6/13/16):

The structure of the book—namely, that most of the letters are from the older brother to the younger brother—was designed to challenge kids to read context clues and employ deductive reasoning to fill in blanks, and teachers are reporting that this is indeed what is happening. One reader noted that the "gaps that only help recreate the war correspondence feel."

Thank you!

Soundtrack to the Bill Finger film in my head

While researching and writing Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman beginning in the summer of 2006, I regularly did something else solitary: went running. Music is one of my top passions but I can't listen while writing, so running provides a triple win: the chance to listen to music; exercise, of course; and the chance to be in nature (which is not where I keep my computer and desk).

Several songs came to symbolize Bill Finger's story for me, and when they came on my iPod while I was running, I sometimes imagined them running along with the end credits of a feature film about Bill's life: 

  "Live in a Hiding Place" by Idlewild
(aptly, the video starts with a man typing)

 "Lousy Reputation" by We Are Scientists

"Try" by Billy Pilgrim (eventually used in the book trailer)

A movie that could happen…

"Historically accurate" - "School Library Journal" on "Brave Like My Brother"

Review of Brave Like My Brother from School Library Journal (5/1/16): 

 

Glimpses: 

 

• "historically accurate beyond the license the author takes, and acknowledges"
• "a gentler introduction to the genre for younger children" [NOTE: grades 2+]

The book takes a quieter approach in telling a WWII story, partly because of the epistolary format and partly because of the setting (it takes place in England, where there was no ground fighting). Because the story is told completely via letters (first person), I feel it brings readers closer to the action.

Thank you!

"A good option" - "Booklist" on "Brave Like My Brother"

Review of Brave Like My Brother from Booklist (4/16):

• "age-appropriate storytelling, making this a good choice for reluctant readers"
• "afterword notes the importance of soldiers' letters as historic documents providing wartime information that would otherwise be missing from political histories, and while these are fiction, they do indeed emulate the realism of a working-class soldier's thoughts and observations as well as accurately portraying what he might encounter during his service"
• "Nobleman always steers clear of melodrama. A good option"

Thank you!

The revelation of the dedication

My next book (due March 2017) is a comedy called The Chupacabra Ate the Candelabra.
 

hand lettering (and art—wait'll you see it) 

by Ana Aranda

I had the privilege of revealing my dedication to the dedicatee during an experience that had special meaning of its own.

I have two children. The younger is currently finishing second grade. At the elementary school he attends, kindergarten through second grade run a simple program called "Secret Reader" where every few weeks, a parent of one of the students in a class shows up unannounced to read to the kids. My wife and I participated for three years when our daughter went there, then began anew with our son.

Last week was our last time. Considering that made us emotional, imagine high school graduation (or even middle school graduation).

Usually I read picture books I love, but last week, I read a few I wrote. (Not that I don't love my own, but you know what I mean.) Only they aren't books yet—they're still manuscripts.

Except for one—the layout for the aforementioned chupacabra story. And after I read the story, I got to tell my son (with my wife and daughter present, not to mention his whole class) that the book is dedicated to him. That's a first. He smiled but (perhaps true to his age) didn't share his feeling about it with me. My wife claims he was proud.

This brings to mind a story from 2008, when my daughter was four and both my son and my book Boys of Steel: The Creators of Superman were less than a year old. A friend came over and saw the Boys of Steel dedication to my Girls of Steel (wife and daughter, natch). He asked why my son wasn't included.

My daughter chimed in: "Because he wasn't born yet when we made that book."

We.

Though in the sense that our children inspire us to work hard, she was absolutely right.

"Works well at the beginning" - "Kirkus" on "Brave Like My Brother"

Review of Brave Like My Brother from Kirkus Reviews (4/15/16):

Clarifications regarding the nonfiction:

• "blow-by-blow account": Early in the story, I establish that soldiers could not reveal precisely where they were or what they were doing strategically, and Joe does not. (In fact, for most of the story, as he notes, he does not know what he's doing.)
• "no evidence of censorship": I address military censorship throughout the story. This includes implying that there are gaps in the letter sequence because of it (as other reviewers have commented on). Also, as the war went on, censors sometimes relaxed their restrictions (or missed things).
• "defies credibility that Joe would easily recognize said tank": I never said it was easy! More to the point, I did not elaborate on how Joe knows, but that does not mean there weren't clues. (As in any letter, especially one written by a young soldier at war, some details are left out.) Given how meticulous military protocol is, it seems well within reason to assume the uninflated tank was labeled or marked in some way.
• "his minute recall is similarly unlikely": Joe is writing letters within days or even hours of the events occurring, so details would be fresh in mind.

Thank you!

"Keeps the suspense tight" - "Horn Book" on "Brave Like My Brother"

Review of Brave Like My Brother from Horn Book (May-June 2016):

Glimpses:

• "fascinating" (though this is referring to a fact/key plot point, not the book overall)
• "clear, breezy letters make this accessible to young independent readers"
• "history lovers will find a lot of new information here"
• "keeps the suspense tight"

Thank you!

"Entertainment Weekly" RIP covers

Between the 1989 launch of Entertainment Weekly and its 2019 switch to a monthly, the magazine ran only 19 "in memoriam" covers. Stats: 

• 15 men, 4 women
• 9 singers, 7 actors, 3 comedians
• 15 white people, 4 Black
• 11 black and white images, 8 color
• year with most covers (four): 2016

The covers:

 Kurt Cobain, 1994

 Chris Farley, 1997

Frank Sinatra, 1998

George Harrison, 2001

Katharine Hepburn, 2003

Marlon Brando, 2004

Johnny Carson, 2005

Heath Ledger, 2008

Paul Newman, 2008

Michael Jackson, 2009 **

Patrick Swayze, 2009

Whitney Houston, 2012

Philip Seymour Hoffman, 2014

Robin Williams, 2014

David Bowie, 2016

Prince, 2016

George Michael, 2016

  Carrie Fisher, 2016

Aretha Franklin, 2018

** EW produced four covers for Michael Jackson's death; the other three:

I did not count covers about deceased notables that were not tributes published the week after their deaths:

Standalone tribute magazines (surely an incomplete list as these are harder to track):

Jerry Garcia 1995

Leonard Nimoy, 2015

Stan Lee 2018

Luke Perry 2019

Chadwick Boseman 2020

Am I missing any?

2/9/22 addendum: It was announced today that Entertainment Weekly is ceasing print publication; the last issue will be April 2022. I have been a subscriber since its second year, 1990. Looks like I have to add the magazine itself to this RIP post...

Jim Steranko tweets

Only four known people interviewed Bill Finger: Jerry Bails in 1965, Tom Fagan in 1965, Jim Steranko circa 1969 or 1970 (for his History of Comics), and Robert Porfirio in 1972. (Bill was also quoted in a 1965 New Yorker piece.)

Bails spread word of what he learned in his interview via a two-page piece he distributed via mail to his personal network. Fagan also wrote an article that was not formally published, but others did see it. Fewer (perhaps almost nobody) knew of Porfirio's interview till much later. Given that some of Steranko's interview was incorporated in a book, it reached the widest audience of the bunch.

During my research for Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman, I was fortunate to communicate with three of the four men, all of whom were helpful. The other one is the only one still alive—Jim Steranko.

So you can imagine how honored I was to see this:

• Bails died in 2006—mere months after I interviewed him (and, sadly, six years before the book would come out). Without Jerry Bails, we might not know about Bill Finger.
• Fagan died in 2008. The article he wrote based on his interview with Bill ("Bill Finger—Man Behind a Legend") was "lost" but resurfaced in 2009.
• Porfirio died in 2014. His 28-minute interview was recorded on audio and was also "lost," rediscovered in 2008. It is transcribed in Tom Andrae's Creators of the Superheroes.

Pawcatuck Middle School, CT

On 5/11/16, I spoke and ran writing workshops at this lovely school, where a four-color, five-alarm welcome awaited me.

A highlight: a student came up to tell me she's begun an autobiography she plans to continue writing throughout her life. Clever and ambitious—plus will work wonders for accuracy, since she'll be documenting moments soon—instead of the usual many years—after they happened. It's like Boyhood on paper.

Thank you, Betty Pacelle, for hosting me with such kindness, and thank you to the Westerly Sun for covering my writing workshops.

I was born in a small town, and I spoke in a small town

On 5/5-6/16, I was in Indiana for the first time, speaking at five schools (one in Amo, one in Monrovia, and three in New Palestine) and a library (Monrovia) that invited me at the last minute and drew a nice crowd.

The welcomes were warm, the books were signed, and the wish to return was immediate.

As I drove around I wondered if I was passing the childhood homes of John Mellencamp (who was born in a small town) or David Letterman. (I checked later; I was not.)

But I did have a brush with celebrity. Unless, of course, this is a different Adam West…

I, too, was born in a small town, out Connecticut way.

Dunning Elementary, Framingham, MA

On 4/26/16, I made my first trip in several years to the state where I colleged, Massachusetts. Huge props to teacher Michael Pearson for taking on the task of organizing an author visit, something he'd not done before.

The kids were a lot of fun in both the assemblies and the writing workshops. Thank you also to Mike's colleagues, who supported him in bringing in an author that some had not heard of. Under any circumstance it takes conviction to champion an author visit but especially a) when you have never heard the author present and b) when your school doesn't regularly host authors.

Hope for more funning at Dunning before long.

Newbery 2017 - prediction 1

...an expression that may seem sly to some and shy to others...

A day in Houston

On 4/12/16, I spoke at three lively schools in Houston:

• Hogg Middle School
• Alexander Hamilton Middle School
• North Shore Senior High

All three put me in big auditoriums, my favorite kind of space to speak in. (You know what they say about Texas...)

At Hogg, the student who had written and planned to deliver the introduction for my talk was out, so another student bravely stepped up...and aced it. It's hard enough introducing someone considerably older than you...even harder when you have not met that person before. Kudos to Josiah. And to Mary Chance, who took a chance on me, with enthusiasm. And to Emily Guyre, a Hogg mom who has worked hard for the students of her community and who took notes during my talk...on her hand...in true middle school fashion.

At Hamilton, thanks to superfan and super educator Anthony White, Batman himself stood guard.

At North Shore (so big I drove around the entire building and still could not figure out where the entrance was), Jeff Derrickson impressed me. He'd never organized an author visit before, and complicating things, he chose to hold the event at night...meaning he'd have to attract an audience rather than force students to attend during the school day. And he got 125 people to show up. He said he was hoping for more; I told him he should be proud: he drew a bigger turnout than some more experienced, more urban venues.

They offered superhero cookies and kryptonite punch:

But you had to be dressed for it:

I especially loved these posters encircling the grand lobby of this sprawling school:

Parading passion in this place of pride (the school entrance) seems like a heckuva motivator. It turns students into stars.

I believe all three of these schools are home to a comic book club. I can't imagine having such an opportunity when I was in middle school.

Thank you yet again to Anthony, Jeff, and Mary for inviting me spend a bit of time with your engaged communities. Hope to be back again soon.