Stacy Whitman's Grimoire » cats

And now part two of the cover reveal: Cat Girl’s Day Off

Stacy — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 15:45:10 +0000

Meeting authors, Kitty Saturday

Stacy — Sun, 14 Nov 2010 04:52:17 +0000

I haven’t had a chance yet to post about my time at the Ventura/Santa Barbara SCBWI conference over Halloween weekend. I had a great time—the organizers, including Lee & Low author Alexis O’Neill, the V/SB SCBWI RA, were extremely organized, and it was so nice to meet so many authors and illustrators who are either currently published and working on more books, or who are working toward publication. The other guests, Reuben Pfeffer (agent at East-West Literary Agency) and Andrea Welch (Beach Lane Books) were so nice to talk to. It was a lot to fit a lot into one day! But the organizers were able to do it because they kept everyone on track time-wise.

I had my camera with me, but didn’t take many shots. But one thing I did get a shot of was a milestone that any editor would count as a highlight: getting to meet one of my authors for the first time in person. This time it was Karen Sandler, whose book, Tankborn, will be out with Tu in fall 2011. (And I finally met her agent just this Thursday when we and my coworker Miriam met for hot chocolate at Burdick’s—it makes me happy that Burdick’s opened a New York shop just in time for me to move here. I was in love with their Boston shop when I was in graduate school.)

So here’s me and Karen in California on the day before Halloween:

And just for good measure, we haven’t had some good pictures of my cats around here recently, so here’s a whole buncha cute fluffies for ya.

And now for something completely different: cat yodeling

Stacy — Mon, 18 May 2009 19:04:23 +0000

From the engineers who brought you The Engineer’s Guide to Cats:

Tildrum wants you

Stacy — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 06:29:00 +0000

To tell me about your favorite children’s book/publishing related websites.
I so seldom actually look at my own front page that it took me until today to realize that not only did I have out of date links on the sidebar from since I’d left Mirrorstone, but that I’d never really updated them when I was still at Mirrorstone!
So I took off the links to specific series that aren’t being published anymore (though I couldn’t resist leaving Hallowmere up there) and need to add a link to the still on-going Dragon Codex books by R.D. Henham, a pen name for several authors including Rebecca Shelley, Ree Soesbee, Amie Rose Rotruck, and Clint Johnston. I love letting people know about books that I’ve worked on because I think you’ll love them.
I added some links for children’s publishing general information: everyone who is first learning about children’s publishing must get to know The Purple Crayon and the SCBWI.
As far as reviewers and authors, I realize how incomplete those lists are. Those are from about three years ago, with small additions made over the years. So, let’s do
a little game. What do you consider the most essential children’s book-related blog? We’ll have three categories: blogs that dish about publishing (no matter who runs it, whether author, librarian, magazine, or reviewer), blogs that review children’s books (any age range), and author blogs. If a newbie came to you and said, "Can you point me in the right direction?" what sites would you recommend to them?
The prize for this game is just the knowledge that you are the go-to guy or gal for this kind of information. Sorry, things are a bit tight here at the Grimoire mansion, and isn’t the glow of doing good better than any material possession anyway?

Dense cat

Stacy — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 06:10:00 +0000

My roommate apparently told another roommate that she thinks Tildrum is obese. Given that I’d just been noticing how much bigger Tildrum is than Mogget, this had me worried, because I had been thinking that perhaps Mogget wasn’t eating enough but that Tildrum—slight chunk that he is—was just normal. (Mogget, when you get him wet, is smaller than Tildrum, which is surprising given that Mogget is 6 months older. But since they’re both almost full-grown, I hope it’s just that Mogget comes from smaller-cat genes.)

Anyway, so I’ve been researching Manx cats tonight, trying to be sure that Tildrum is indeed just matching breed characteristics–his mother was definitely at least part Manx, a little calico sweetheart, and he was the only full-tailed kitten in the three I saw. One was a stumpy and one didn’t have a tail at all. In fact, I could have adopted his brother instead, who looked exactly like Mogget but with only a stumpy tail, but I figured that would be a little confusing.

(The picture is of Tildrum and his little family before I adopted him. His sister is on the right, the little calico—who had no tail. His brother is on the left, the little black one with a white patch. I’m almost positive that he had more white on him when I saw him in person, which might mean I’m thinking of a different kitten altogether, which might be the little ears in the back. But I think those belong to the mama cat–she seems bigger than anyone else. Tildrum is the little black spot with copper eyes in the center. It’s so hard photographing black cats. I rarely feel satisfied with anything I’ve taken of him lately.)

My discovery: Not only is Tildrum right on with Manx conformation—their longer hind legs and powerful jumping ability call for much more musclier, and therefore heavier, hindends—but I find out he totally would clean up in competition, if he had no tail. The breed requirements listed on that page are pretty much Tildrum to a T—minus the no-tail requirement. That especially includes the “surprisingly heavy when lifted.” He’s a dense little one.