The Home Stretch and What's Next

The National Book Awards Longlists have been announced!



This signals a slowdown in the crazy that has been the past few months for me. Plenty of other things have been happening, but I hardly looked up from my stack of reading to pay much notice.  Now, with the bulk of the work done (I'll be hashing out the short list with my fellow judges very soon!), I can take a moment to share some nice things.

First of all, I'd like to say thank you to the fine folks that chose ORLEANS as a:

2016 Louisiana Young Readers Choice Nominee

2015 Magnolia Book Awards Nominee (which I might have mentioned already.. the mind, these days, really!)

ORLEANS was written for the people down South, my own mother included.  I'm happy to know my love letter has reached them!

I've also learned Flygirl is a 2014 ALA Popular Paperback Selection in the category of Conflicted: Life During Wartime.  It's sad to think there's a special category for this, but I am honored to be a part of the literary conversation.

I've also got a few events coming up:

Sun, 10/12/14, 2:00 pm – Teen Read Week:  Meet the Author

Central Library, 630 W. Fifth St., Los Angeles, CA 90071

Celebrate Teen Read Week by meeting great teen authors, enjoying snacks, and entering to win free books! Author appearances by Cam Baity and Benny Zelkowicz (The First Book of Ore: The Foundry's Edge), Cherry Chevapravatdumrong (Open Mic: Riffs on Life Between Cultures in Ten Voices), Simmone Howell (Girl Defective), Jessica Love (Push Girl), Kathryn Rose (Camelot Burning), and Sherri L Smith (Orleans).

Thurs., 10/23/14, 8:00 pm – Book’d In Burbank

Theatre Banshee, 3435 W. Magnolia, Burbank, CA 91505

Join the season finale of Book’d in Burbank with a selection of Mystery, YA, Horror, Romance and Humor readings from by Steph Cha (Beware, Beware), Sherri L. Smith (Orleans), Devan Sagliani (Zombie Attack:  Army of the Dead), Zoe Archer (Wicked Temptation), Melissa Cutler (Risky Business) and Diane Haithman (Dark Lady of Hollywood).  Tickets available through Eventbrite or at the door.  General admission:  $10.

Fri. 10/31 – Sun. 11/2/14 – Comikaze Expo – Details TBA

Wed., 11/18/14 – National Book Awards, NYC

If you are in the LA area, I hope you'll swing by and say hello.  If you're in New York, maybe I'll run into you at the Strand Bookstore.  When I was an undergrad at NYU, they claimed to have 8 miles of books.  It's gone up to 18 in the intervening years.  I think I could run a marathon in book miles.  (I think I already have!  Here's a great article on judging the National Book Awards).