M.T. Anderson in Kansas City

For anyone in the Kansas City area interested in children’s books, M.T. Anderson, author of Feed, Thirsty and many other middle-grade and young adult novels, will be speaking about his book, The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing:

Monday, January 28th
7 p.m.
Plaza Branch
Kansas City Library
4801 Main Street
Kansas City, Missouri 64112

Octavian Nothing, set during the Revolutionary War, won the 2006 National Book Award for Young People’s Literature.

Reading Reptile, cosponsor of the event, will be selling Mr. Anderson’s books. The author will sign books purchased during the event.

This is event is free, but you must reserve a seat at kclibrary.org/rsvp/2008/mtanderson.

Sara Paretsky in Lawrence

In the spirit of being a recovering bad blogger, I’m posting twice today. Here’s an upcoming event for fans of mysteries, Kansas stories, or just plain good books:

Sara Paretsky
Talk and Book Signing
Tuesday, January 22
7:30 pm
Lawrence Arts Center
940 New Hampshire
Lawrence, Kansas

Lawrence native Sara Paretsky, creator of fictional Chicago private eye V. I. Warshawski, will talk about her writing career in this program, “Why I Write the Books I Do,” co-sponsored by the Hall Center for the Humanities, the Lawrence Public Library and The Raven Bookstore. The first 100 attendees will receive a free copy of Paretsky’s new book, Bleeding Kansas, a stand-alone mystery set in Douglas County. Paretsky will sign books following the talk. The event will be held at the Lawrence Arts Center, and is free and open to the public.

A Bad, Bad Blogger

I’m a bad, bad blogger. I haven’t posted anything to my blog since November. November! That was last year. I’m not sure anyone noticed, since I’m not entirely convinced anyone reads my blog anyway, but just in case, here is a list of my excuses:

1. I was busy doing writer events. (Which coud be a really good excuse, except that one of the reasons my blog exists in the first place is so that I can talk about my writer events.)
2. We had an ice storm and our power was out for almost a week. (This one is actually a good excuse, for anyone, really, but especially for me. Sadly, my life comes to a standstill without electricity. I’m a girl who likes her modern conveniences.)
3. Christmas blindsided me again. (I always swear it won’t happen this year, but it always does.)
4. After we slogged our way through the power outage and the holidays, I somehow got on a roll with my writing, and it’s going so well that I hate to stop and do anything else. (Believe it or not, this is true.)

Anyway, I’m getting my act together. I’ll post about my writer events from the past two months and also about events coming up in the near future. I can’t stand the guilt that comes from ignoring my blog.