Fib news: I gotta book deal!

I’m utterly, totally thrilled to say that yours truly has a two book deal with the wonderful folks at Arthur A. Levine Books (an imprint of Scholastic). Now, for those of you in the kid-lit world, you’ll understand when I say that I feel as if I won the lottery. And for those who don’t know of Arthur and his remarkable cohorts, the bottom line is that I’ll be working with people from whom I’ll learn an incredible amount and who will always make sure I deliver the best possible book I can deliver.

And what will that first book be, I hear you ask? Well, I can tell you that the working title is…

The 14 Fabulous Fibs of Gregory K.

Yes, there will be Fibs in it, but it won’t just be a book of Fib poetry. We’re talking story and character and all that good stuff. For more than that little tease, though, you’re gonna have to stick around to see how things develop. Or for updates, why not e-mail me and let me know you want to be on the Fib mailing list? Excellent.

This deal, I have to say, is a testament to the power of bloggers and the Net. Yes, the Levine Books folks knew me before Fibs, and I knew them thanks to SCBWI conferences and me submitting (and them liking but rejecting) my work. I believe we’d’ve worked together at some point, regardless of Fibs. HOWEVER, the wonderful Fibbing of friends, family and a few blogging pals set the stage for the remarkable Fibbery of the Slashdotters. From there, Fibs spread through the Net… and the buzz ended up getting me in the New York Times (a mere two weeks after the first Fib post!). After that, Arthur came to me with a brilliant pitch and voila… there’s a book with Fibs in the future.

I know the Times article and book deal would not have happened without the Net activity before it, so, I truly, truly thank all of you who Fibbed and linked and pointed others this way, be you bloggers, poets, mathematicians, teachers, MSNBC.com, CBS.com, Word Freaks, gamers, actuaries, musicians, librarians, knitters, or something else entirely. And I also hope some of you are inspired: watching a mention on Slashdot create the opportunity for a kids' book deal (with poetry!), you start to realize that thanks to the Net, almost anything is possible.