“Clean” reads for multicultural YA girls

ETA 11/6/12: As with all my book lists, I’m putting this on Pinterest so I can more easily keep this list up-to-date. For a more recent version—including the books mentioned below and books published since 2010—see my Clean Reads for Teens board.     I have a friend who is the leader of a church … Read more

Updated multicultural SFF booklist

ETA 5/22/12: I’m keeping this book list up to date on Pinterest nowadays, linking each book to its Goodreads entry. It’s much easier to just pin a book than to keep this list up to date. For the running lists (broken down by age group and genre) and more, go here (sorry, the link was … Read more

Link roundup

Thanks for all the comments on my last post discussing writing African American characters (Is my character “black enough”?). The perspectives in the comments are great—just the kinds of things that people writing cross-culturally need to hear as they think about their characters. If you haven’t read the comments (and there are a few more … Read more

Is my character “black enough”

I recently got this question from a writer, who agreed that answering it on the blog would be useful: My hero is a fifteen-year-old African American boy [in a science fiction story]. A few of my alpha readers (not all) have said that he doesn’t sound “black enough.” I purposely made him an Air Force … Read more

Books for NYC Schools, School Library Month, and kimbap

Dropped in on the Books for NYC Schools event to see Scott Westerfeld and Justine Larbalestier read. But the trains were running late, so I missed their part of the reading, and forgot my copies of Leviathan and How to Ditch Your Fairy at work, so I pretty much listened to Bennet Madison and Cecily … Read more

Interviews, news, and Tu’s new submission guidelines

Link roundup from the coverage that Tu Books has been getting on the web, including interviews of me and coverage in Publisher’s Weekly: ETA: Opening New Doors (PW) Lee & Low Gets New Imprint Interview at The Enchanted Inkpot (also be sure to catch their discussion of diversity in fantasy, if you haven’t seen it … Read more

Updated LTUE schedule

I now have a couple panels on Friday, so if you don’t make it there today, there’s still Friday and Saturday. I’m not even going to format this–I have to run out the door to BYU. Thursday 1:00 PM – Defining Children’s Literature: What are a children’s book, a middle grade reader, a YA novel … Read more

My LTUE schedule

There’s a great little science fiction/fantasy convention (well, they call it a “symposium”) at BYU every year in February called Life, the Universe, and Everything. I’ve been going as a panelist for several years (I was an editor guest of honor a while back, too), and I highly recommend it for writers and fans who … Read more