Tomorrow's #kidlitchat is all about School Visits

For those of you who might be interested, I wanted to let you know that this week's #kidlitchat will be all about school visits. Got ideas or questions or stories to tell? Come join us!

#kidlitchat is held every Tuesday at 9 PM Eastern/6 PM Pacific on Twitter. For information about Twitter chats and joining in, I highly recommend Debbie Ridpath Ohi's article about chats for writers.

(Then, unrelated to chatting, I recommend congratulating her on her first picture book, I'm Bored, launching (and being reviewed in the New York Times by David Small!).)

 Hope to see you on Twitter on Tuesday!

A Kitchen Mystery - a cooking poem/a messy poem

A Kitchen Mystery
by
Greg Pincus

You’re asking who did this?
Well, Mom, I don’t know.
I don't even have a good guess.
Who'd leave the oven encrusted with goop
Or the counters in such a big mess?
I don't have a clue why there's flour in my hair
Or how frosting has turned my shirt plaid,
But really, I... what?
You demand that I guess?
Well, fine....
It must have been Dad.


This week's Poetry Friday Roundup is over at Random Noodling. Head on over and check it out!

And if you want to get all my poems emailed to you for freeee as they hit the blog, enter your email address in the box below then click subscribe!

The Homophoem - a New (to me) Form

Over at The Miss Rumphius Effect, today's poetry stretch comes courtesy of current Children's Poet Laureate J. Patrick Lewis... and it's a new-to-me form called the homophoem which uses, can you guess, homophones!

You can see some examples from Pat as well as poems in the comments (including mine, as well as from Douglas Florian and Kate Coombs (and is that Kenn Nesbitt, too?)) if you head on over.

Why knot leave won of you're own homophoems their ore hear?

Join Me in NYC for Kidlitcon 2012!

I'm excited to be going back to Kidlitcon after a two year absence. I hope some or ALL of you - yes, all!!!! - will be joining me for the fun. The conference itself is Saturday, September 29th in New York City. And , the conference is FREE. Yes, you read that right. You can register here.

Kidlitcon is an annual gathering of children's and YA bloggers... though it's open to ANYONE. It's a great place for authors and illustrators to learn about what book bloggers are thinking and doing... and vice versa. And if I were a publisher based in NYC, I'd send a lot of my staff to meet folks and listen and try to understand where value can be created in this space... and where it can't.

The schedule has been posted... and, lookie there! I'm speaking about avoiding the children's literature echo chamber. This is a bit ironic, as I'm flying across country to hang out with bloggers and authors and librarians in the children's literature world, of course, but I think it's a critical topic. Or put another way...

Those 100 million folks on Twitter? A huge number of them are potential allies, fans, supporters, word-spreaders, and book buyers. When we ignore this and only talk among ourselves, I think we miss out on a great opportunity.

Beyond that, there are fantastic talks and panels (some at the same time as me, even), and a keynote address from Maureen Johnson! Awesome stuff thanks to the conference organizers. And did I mention that all you have to do is register, cuz it's free?

Hope to see you there!

Video. Poetry. Song. It's all good.

I wanted to share a video a friend of mine put together, as I think it's poetic in the best sense of the word. The video features parents of kids with disabilities offering up what they might have told themselves on the day their child was diagnosed. Powerful stuff, I must say.




This week's Poetry Friday roundup is over at Sylvia Vardell's Poetry for Children. You'll find all sorts of goodies over there (including a book I'm thrilled to be a part of and which you'll see more about here soooooon!).

Newsworthy Poem Redirect!

I didn't realize that today was the conclusion of the Reinvention of the Toilet Fair (with a winner announced today). Here at GottaBook, I'm always ahead of the news trends, ya see...

So, I point you back to my poem The Evolution of the Toilet (A Brief History).

Will I have to rewrite it? Here's hoping!

It's That Time of Year Again! (With a Tweetup!)

I am not actually going to be an attendee at the now sold-out SCBWI Summer Conference here in LA, but as a local, I will be coming by and hanging out, at least a little. I'm not attending because I can't actually be there the whole time - a disappointment on multiple levels. Still, I'll get there... and I hope to see YOU!

I suspect you can find me in the hotel lobby a lot, but you most certainly can on Friday night from 8:30 to 9:30 for a #kidlitchat Tweetup. Yes, it's time for us all to meet in person (or see each other again). Hopefully, by doing this Friday night, folks will have a richer weekend cuz they'll know the, oh... 100+ others at the conference who have also come by #kidlitchat.

By that hour, I doubt many of us will still be tweeting, so just look for a chatting crowd or me or Bonnie Adamson and jump on in.

Oh, and for those Tweeting the Con or hoping to follow along at home... the Conference tag is #LA12SCBWI.

Hope to see you there, whenever I get there!

A Late Bird Giveaway for Poetry Friday...

It's Poetry Friday, and I'm still trying to catch up from days of no internet and everything in boxes... so rather than a new poem, I decided to give a copy of The Late Bird away over on Facebook. All you gotta do is "like" or comment on the post by 7 PM California time today, and you could win! Wheeee!

The Poetry Friday roundup is over at A Teaching Life today. Lots o' good stuff to check out, so I hope you do!

The Blogger Posts Unhappily

There's no mystery as to why I post unhappily today - Donald J. Sobol, author of the Encyclopedia Brown books has passed away.

I was not a huge, huge reader as a kid, but Leroy Brown, Sally Kimball and Bugs Meany were definitely a big part of what I did read. I still remember the solutions/clues to so many mysteries (the baby gurgled happily (and he wouldn't have if the bad guy truly had just driven his car, cuz then his hood would be hot); squirrels don't back down trees; a blind man wouldn't turn on the light to read a newspaper), and it's been decades since I've read them.

Since we just moved, I had packed up all my old books again. This time around, I purged a lot (all to happy homes, so no worries), but I didn't get rid of the Encyclopedia Brown books. And that's simply because the child read happily... and over and over and over again!

So thanks, Donald J. Sobol. I never knew you, but I am part of the legacy you left behind. And now, I look forward to Encyclopedia Brown and the Case of the Afterlife!

On The Move, and That's No Fib

I'm about to go silent here for a handful of days. Why? MOVING! And no internet at the new place for a spell! Mind you, I still can check in, but posting? No. (By the way, as a moving present, feel free to get The Late Bird back to number one on the Kindle children's poetry charts. Thank you :-). Nook purchases of The Late Bird are always encouraged, too.).

Moving, even though we're still in Los Angeles, is a big stressful thang. Lotta changes coming, but some things don't change. Such as what, Greg? How about...


the fib review! This is issue twelve that the fine folks at Muse-Pie Press have put together, and the contributing poets this time around once again demonstrate that constraints of form don't have to mean constraints on poetics. Great stuff, as always. I hope you'll check it out. It's great (and amazingly free) reading.

The Poetry Friday roundup is at the Opposite of Indifference today. Enjoy the reads! And I'll leave you with a non-poetic but very fitting fib of my own....

Pack.
Pack!
Pack! Pack!
Pack, pack, pack.
Pack. Pack, pack, pack. Pack!
Sweet. All done. What? Oh. Pack! Pack! Pack!

See y'all next week....

As Always... It's All About ME!!!!

OK, fine. It's actually about me and Katie Davis talking children's poetry, Fibs, social media, self-publishing e-books, and more on her podcast, Brain Burps About Books.

I hope you give a listen... and check out the library of Katie's other podcasts, too. Many, many fabulous guests not named Greg Pincus, I assure you!

What's that? What about a little more poetic me today? Well, sure!  Linda over at TeacherDance has posted a lovely review of the Late Bird! (And you can look in her April Archives and enjoy some of her own poetry, too, plus a poetrypalooza of posts). Thanks, Linda!

It's also Poetry Friday, with the roundup over at the Paper Tigers blog (a must-read blog for multicultural book info in the children's space, by the way). There, no doubt, it won't be all about me... but I'm sure it'll still be good :-)

That Bird... It Keeps Flapping!

It's been a busy month here, I must say, and I just today checked back in on my e-book, The Late Bird, to see what's up. And guess what? It's still selling! More specifically, it's selling on Kindle but not so much on Nook.

This answers the biggest question I had before I launched: if I don't talk about it, will anyone find it? I think I've tweeted about it once this month, done no blog touring in June and... well... nothing else. And no, it's not still #1 on the Kindle Children's Poetry charts, but it is still being found. This makes me happy.

Over at the Happy Accident. when I return from a blogging haitus in July, I'll have much more about the hows and whys of what's happened to date. But in the meantime... thanks to all who have bought or spread the word!

It Takes One to Know One - a whining poem/a complaining poem

It Takes One to Know One
by
Greg Pincus

Oh, my. Oh, my. How I hate when you whine.
You moan and complain although everything’s fine.
You’re simply a whiner. I find you a pain.
Please be more like me. See – I never complain.

It's summer vacation time here, so there's no whining, I tell you! It's also Poetry Friday, and Amy LudwigVanderwater has the roundup over at The Poem Farm.

And if you want to get all my new poems (and only the poems) emailed to you for freeee as they hit the blog, enter your email address in the box below then click subscribe!

Summer Reading Lists/Suggestions?

Ahhh, summer. Time when minutes, moments, and occasionally even hours pop up when it's time to read, read, read. So... who's got great suggestions for me? Or who can point me to great reading lists you've found online?

I'm curious... and the library and bookstores have been missing me lately!

My Friend Kim - a friendship poem/an androgynous poem

My Friend Kim
by
Greg Pincus

My best friend is androgynous.
Goes by the name of Kim.
Clothes and style are meaningless...
I'll always care for her.
Or him!


Sometimes I wonder "huh. What age is that poem for?" This is is one of these times....

The Poetry Friday roundup is up over at Carol's Corner. Go on by and a check it out.

And if you want to get all my new poems (and only the poems) emailed to you for freeee as they hit the blog, enter your email address in the box below then click subscribe!

Poetic Closure!

Back in March Madness, I had to write a poem using the word "pandemonium." I came up with The Poetry Games. But how did I get that word? Well, it was given to me by Mary Lee Hahn and her class of students.

Well, today I got to do a Skype visit with them! I read them The Poetry Games as well as some of the stanzas that fell by the wayside as I rewrote AND my earlier attempts at using pandemonium in a poem.

I even read some of my attempt to write a poem using only anagrams made from pandemonium. It was called A Mind Unpoem, and you can see right there why it never went much farther!

We talked poetry. They asked great questions. And then the whole class read me one of my poems from The Late Bird! It was fabulous.

So thanks, Ms. Hahn and all your students for the great time I had this afternoon. And yes... thanks for pandemonium, too!

Neil Gaiman - Make Good Art

I don't know if Commencement speeches have names, but if one were to name this speech by Neil Gaiman, I think "Make Good Art" would nail it. Writers, artists, musicians, and all leading a creative life will enjoy, I think...

Check out the Story Scrapbook

My friend and fellow author Tristan Bancks is offering up a great, free brainstorming app (for Mac and PC) called Story Scrapbook.

It's in beta, and I've been playing with it myself, even though it's designed for kids. Of course, I am a kid, just older, so it fits. Anyway, I love how it lets me combine video, audio, web finds, and text - it's like brainstorming without constraints. If you know a visual learner... I bet they'd love this. For that matter, I think a whole host of kids would find it liberating and fun, too.

So, watch the how-to video or download the quickstart file or just do what I did - download and play.  Good times!

I Don't Like Words (a poetry re-issue)

I DON’T LIKE WORDS
by
Greg Pincus

I don’t like words.
They don’t make sense.
Words make me upset and tense.
How due eye no witch whirred two ewes
Ore how too right thee won aye chews?
Wile sum mite think words are a bawl,
Eye dew knot care fore words at awl!


This is the first poem I ever got paid for (after blog posting, by the way)... and then it never got published! Sigh. I Don't Like Words is one of the 54 poems that's in my e-book, The Late Bird, by the way - available on Kindle, on Nook, and in other formats via Smashwords, too.

This week's Poetry Friday roundup is over at Katya Czaja's Write. Sketch. Repeat. Mosey on over and see all sorts of good stuff.

And if you want to get all my new poems (and only the poems) emailed to you for freeee as they hit the blog, enter your email address in the box below then click subscribe!

J. Patrick Lewis - Edgar Allan Poe's Pie

I am always excited when J. Patrick Lewis, currently the Children's Poet Laureate, stops by here at GottaBook. Pat's a word wizard whose seemingly unending creativity is both entertaining AND inspiring for me. And this time, I'm talking to him about a book that delights me more than usual: Edgar Allan Poe's Pie: Math Puzzlers in Classic Poems (illustrated wonderfully by Michael Slack).

In short, he takes classic poems, parodies them, and adds math. Here's an example so you know what I'm raving about:

Edward Lear’s Elephant with Hot Dog
Inspired by “THERE WAS AN OLD MAN WITH A BEARD” by Edward Lear

 
“When an elephant sat down to order
A half of a third of a quarter
Of an eighty-foot bun
And a frankfurter, son,
Was it longer than three feet, or shorter?”

Be still Greg's geeky heart! (And yes, the answers are in the book. But here, you have to do the math!). Now, on with the chat....

It was nice of you to write a book specifically for me - a mashup of math, poetry, and parody. How did you know that this was what I would've flipped out for as a kid (and still do as an adult)? Or... well... do you think there are other kids who would like it, too????

I can only hope other kids like yourself will cotton to a math/poetry salmagundi. It worked once for me with a collection of math riddles, Arithmetickle, which is still in print after a decade.

When you visit classes/schools and get to these poems, what reaction do you get from the kids? Do they want to hear the original poems? Do they yell out answers?

The short answer is, Yes, they do yell out the answers, at least to some of them, but I have come to realize, after a number of tries, that some work and some don't. As always, I write, and wrote this book, for myself. And many of these poets/poems in EAPoe's Pie are simply unknown or passe to 4th-5th graders. That shouldn't detract from the math element in them, but I won't lie and tell you that they were shouting, "John Ciardi!" "Eleanor Farjeon!"

How did you pick the poems you chose to re-work? Was it based on you seeing how to make them fit with math or was it based more on poems you love or something else entirely?

Truth be told, I chose the poets first, then looked for their most well-known poems that might make grist for the math parody mill. Harcourt accepted almost all of the choices I made, so there was some feeling of vindication.

Did you ever create poems with math that you decided was too complex for this collection?

Sadly, yes, and a few of them might still reside in the book. It's extremely challenging to write math poems all of equal difficulty—far easier in fact to write straightforward math problems. And occasionally, I get/got so carried away that I forget/forgot my (young) audience.

Any plans to do this with other topics besides math?

How many I think he should do.

Well, I love the parody form, which I see in no way as an attempt to outdo the original. For me, a parody is an act of homage, even if you re-do a serious poem with a nonsensical "reply."

In 2037 or thereabouts (kidding), I have a book of parodies about all sorts of subjects coming out with Wordsong/Boyds Mills Press entitled Shadow Poems: Parrot-ies. At least that's the title I hope they agree to keep.

You've already had wonderful books out this year. What's next for you?

If you promise not to hold me to the exact dates—publishers are always changing lists—I'll mention these poetry books:

• Take Two! A Celebration of Twins (with Jane Yolen), Candlewick, Spring 2012.
• Last Laughs: Animal Epitaphs (with Jane Yolen), Charlesbridge, Spring 2012.
• The National Geographic Book of Animal Poems, Sept. 2012—200 poems (my first anthology).
• If You Were a Chocolate Mustache: (156) Poems, Wordsong/Boyds Mills Press, 2012-2013?
• When Thunder Comes: Poems for the Civil Rights Leaders, Chronicle Books, 2013. 
• Everything Is a Poem: Selected Best Poems of JPL, Creative Editions, 2013.
• Poemobiles: Imaginary Car Poems (with Douglas Florian), Schwartz & Wade, Spring 2013.
• World Rat Day: Poems About Holidays You Have Never Heard Of, Candlewick, 2013.

There was more in our email exchanges, but I decided to end with this list of delectable titles we have to look forward to (or in the case of some, like Take Two!, have already enjoyed).

I'm not sure how Pat found the time to chat with me, but I'm grateful that he did! He also had time to stop by No Water River to chat and read some poetry... and to answer five questions with Sylvia Vardell, too - another post worth reading!

And can I just say once again... if you like math, poetry, inspired wordplay or any combination of those three (or if you do the math to see how many combos exist!), you should go out and by J. Patrick Lewis's Edgar Allan Poe's Pie.  Period. The end!