It was still an eventful week.

Monday was the Oregon Book Awards. You’d think it would be less nerve-wracking to present an award than to be in contention for one — and okay, it was, actually — but it was not a stress-free occasion by any means. You want to do right by the folks in the category you’re presenting; enunciate their names and titles properly, then read the selection from the winning book with feeling but not, like, you know, totally over-the-top. I might initially have erred on the side of excessive seriousness.

AT FIRST I WAS LIKE

BUT THEN I WAS LIKE

Super congratulations to winner Emily Whitman whom I am hugging in the photo above, and also to fabulous finalists Jen Violi, Lisa Schroeder, April Henry, and Heather Vogel Frederick.

(Tuesday featured a series of events that were not documented photographically, nor do I intend to describe them here, but they were also not stress-free.)

Wednesday was VERSELANDIA, the first ever all-Portland Public high schools poetry slam, and although I was initially all deer-in-the-headlights about having to give actual numerical scores, Olympics-style, I was very honored to be a judge along with Eirean Bradley, DLUX THE LIGHT, Leanne Grabel, and Turiya Autry. Here we are applauding the amazingly talented poets:

And here are the five winners, from left to right: Micah Fletcher, Madison; Lauren Steele, Jefferson; Desiree DuBois, Jefferson; Alex Dang, Cleveland; Gus Coats, Wilson.

I would add links for all of them too, but so far I have only tracked down one of their Tumblrs, and maybe that already makes me a little bit of a creeper.

Thursday was Comics Underground, the documentation of which I will leave to the esteemed Christian Lipski. But here I am watching the action onstage while Steve grins  at photographer Paul Guinan:

We had a swell time.

But man. By Friday, it had already been a very long week and while it was extremely excellent in terms of literature appreciation, it was not so conducive to the production of same. So I elected to miss Stumptown in favor of holing up and increasing my wordcount. I am sorry not to have been there, but glad for the words that resulted.

But tomorrow, Friday 4/20, if you come to Bridge City Comics between 6 and 9 pm, you will see:

Jen Van Meter

Erica McGillivray

Rachel Edidin

and also me, celebrating the release of Chicks Dig Comics!

* I am compelled to tell you that Google Ads in its wisdom, when I was searching for the publisher’s page so I could link it, displayed a t-shirt reading “Chicks Dig Cartoonists.” Which, yes, certainly, sometimes. But chicks also are cartoonists, which, again, the point.

• Remember how I have a story, “Fair Trade,” with art by the fabulous and now Eisner Award-nominated Dylan Meconis in Welcome to Bordertown? Now you can acquire a fetching and affordable paperback edition!

• Remember how I have an essay, “Nineteen Panels About Me and Comics,” in Chicks Dig Comics? The book is OUT NOW! And there will be an EVENT on April 20th at Bridge City Comics featuring several of the contributors. You should come! I will write my name in your copy, and perhaps draw something, although, warning, I cannot actually draw.
• Excited to be a presenter on April 23rd of this year’s Oregon Book Award in young adult literature. Also conflicted, because I know and like all the finalists! Relieved to be a presenter and not a judge.
• But I am going to be a judge — and I’m equally excited — for the all-Portland Public Schools Verselandia poetry slam, April 25th at the Mission Theater. Totally intend to defer to the judges who are poets themselves, however. Extra cool: this will be the very first Verselandia. Read about how it came to be.

• At 6 p.m. tonight, I’ll be at the Cedar Hills location of Powell’s for the Smart Chicks Kick It Tour 2.0. Why? Kelley Armstrong, Melissa Marr, Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Ally Condie, Beth Revis, Margaret Stohl, and Sara Zarr, that’s why.

• Next weekend, I’ll be at Wordstock. On Sunday at 2 PM, I’ll moderate a panel about contemporary YA fiction with Lisa Schroeder, Lindsay Leavitt, and John Corey Whaley. When not empaneled I plan to generally lurk around.

• And in a few short weeks, on Monday, October 17th, I’ll be at Multnomah County Library’s tenth annual Teen Author Lecture with Matt de la Peña. It is FREE. You’ll be there too, right?

This amazing independent bookseller filled their store with twelve YA authors. They enlisted numerous zealously attentive teen volunteers to check in with us regularly to make sure we had everything we needed. The staff had read our books in advance. There was music by some of the authors, by a band fronted by a local librarian, by local kid and teen musicians. There were refreshments.

And did I mention we were on not one, but two marquees?

The readers came in droves. They bought books, yes. Some of them asked us about writing. Some of them told us what our books meant to them. Some of them read back covers, flipped through, looked up with shy smiles.

We smiled back.

Here’s all of us in front of the Granada marquee. (Names not in l-r order.) Me, Jesse Freels, Stephanie Bodeen, Kenny Knight, Rosanne Parry, Dave Anderson, R.A. McDonald, Inara Scott, Conrad Wesselhoeft, Anne Osterlund, Sherrida Woodley, and Neil Wolfson representing much-missed L.K. Madigan.

But as amazing as the day had been already, it got even better.

Some of us went out to the juvenile detention section of NORCOR. No photos from this part, obviously. We started with a panel discussion in front of the whole class, then broke into smaller groups.

Rosanne Parry and I were with three girls. I won’t tell you the stories they shared with us. I’ll tell you some authors they love.  Ellen Hopkins. Stephen King. Dean Koontz. They like drug books, to see characters struggling with addiction. They were smart and curious and funny, two of them starting to think about what they might do with their lives, the third not able, yet, to envision a future not dominated by the same issues that brought her inside. “But that’s kind of what I think can be great about books,” I said, trying not to be heavy-handed about it, but wanting to make the point — “It’s just, when you read, you can see more possibilities, right?”

She smiled.

As promised, here are my slides:

As I said during the presentation, the bullet points about each title I highlighted during the trend snapshot piece are absolutely not intended to cover all aspects of a book, simply the trend(s) it represents.

Questions, comments, passionate disagreement — all welcome!

2. I recorded another Rules for Hearts podcast! (Link is directly to the mp3.) See, people, when you bug me via the Formspring, it works! Because anonymous Internet questions are the new peer pressure. Or maybe they are actually the old peer pressure.

3. Saturday morning, May 22nd, 9 AM, on the Portland State University campus in the Smith Memorial Student Union on the third floor. I am going to talk about YA Trends. AND Audience. Not just trends, not just audience. BOTH. As part of the Ooligan Press Write to Publish conference. I will remind you about this again, I bet.

• The new What A Girl Wants post is up! (And I am blushing because Colleen says very kind things about my work in the introduction.) We wrote about the books we wished we’d read when we were sixteen.

• Portlanders! On Saturday, 5/22 I’ll be giving a talk at the Ooligan Press-sponsored Write to Publish conference on “YA Trends And Audience.” It’s at 9 AM, which is counter to the trend of when I like to wake up on the weekend, so I will make sure to be especially caffeinated! Y’all come!

You may have noticed, it is almost time for the Stumptown Comics Fest?

In mere hours, I’ll be headed over to Things From Another World for the party in celebration of Steve Lieber & Jeff Parker’s graphic novel UNDERGROUND, a crackerjack entrant in the crowded category of spelunking thrillers.

On Friday, I’m going to Drink & Draw Like A Lady, at the ever-swell Secret Society Lounge. I have every reason to suspect that my collaborator on the forthcoming Bad Houses graphic novel, Ms. Carla Speed McNeil, will also be among the ladies present.

And Saturday afternoon at 2 pm, I’ll be moderating a panel:

Comics for Young Readers Comics and graphic novels for kids, teens, and tweens are quickly gaining popularity among readers. Join creators Hope Larson (Chiggers, Mercury), Raina Telgemeier (Smile, Baby-sitters Club), and Alexis Fajardo (Kid Beowulf) for a discussion on their work, their audience, and their influences. All ages welcome!

Other Things Are Also Happening. I will tell you about them…soon.

Emily Whitman, author of Radiant Darkness, MJ Beaufrand, author of The River, Anne Osterlund, author of Academy Seven, and yours truly will converge upon A Children’s Place Bookstore on Saturday, 4/10, at 1 pm. We’ll all read briefly and then answer questions about writing.

But because, you know, I already posted that, here also is a picture of the cat:

(Why yes, he is inside a box that once contained copies of A Working Writer’s Daily Planner. Yay for Small Beer Press!)