Banned books week crept up on me! I usually keep an eye on bookish "holidays" but with my busy schedule this one almost passed me by. ALMOST! Luckily I have some friends who help me remember these things.
I'm an introvert or an ambivert (a person whose personality has a balance of extrovert and introvert features) or I'm an introvert who learned to manage in an extroverted world. It all depends on the definition. Regardless of how it's categorized, I have introvert features that make marketing a book very difficult. And, yet, I have to do it. This weekend in fact I'll be inflicting my introvert awkwardness on a Facebook Takeover Event hosted by Saguaro Books, the publisher of my book, The Travelers. (If that's not a fantastic pitch to get you to come to the event, I don't know what is!)
The nerves in my stomach waved and dipped with the motion of the airplane. I was about to land in the Middle East and despite all my research the thought made me a little nervous...
Glowing crystal buildings that spike to the highest reaches of the sky. Tennis played in the clouds. Glass domed buildings submerged under shark-filled water. It sounds like a place that sprouted from a fiction writer's head. But it's no fantasy and I'm heading to this real-life wonderland.
There is very little "Renaissance" in a Renaissance Festival. A better description is Middle Ages meets Middle Earth with a lot more retail stores and a lot fewer boils and sores. That's not to say I don't love a good Renn Fest!
I wore a red shirt, khaki shorts and hoop earrings, tame for a girl who went through an extended suspenders phase and coveted her best friend's red, ruffled Spanish dancing dress. But this was 7th grade and I wanted to fit in...
If someone called me a "feminist" or a "bleeding heart liberal" or even a "libtard" my first response would be, "Well, thanks!" And then I'd say, "And nice to see you matured past the name-calling of 7th grade." (I wouldn't be able to help myself. I mean really, "libtard," come on.)
It started in early fall 2001, on September 8, just before the numbers 9-11 would become burned into US history. But on that sunny Saturday, tragedy had not yet struck and the bookish excitement of the very first National Book Festival swallowed up the Library of Congress and stretched out onto the National Mall.
It's Friday Five time again. Time to review my five favorite bookish articles or stories floating around in the last week or so. This week includes a sampling of stories both serious and fun, ranging from racism in books to book festival mania.
K.L. Kranes 