Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast

Approximately one year ago we started this little ‘ol blog about seven imps — no, wait . . . That’d be seven impossible things before breakfast, but since then, we have been abbreviated to the delightfully mischievous and roguish “7-Imp,” which we love.

The real story is that during July of last year the two of us had decided to do this blog thing and were writing reviews/composing posts. WordPress would not make the categories we chose for our reviews (“Adult Fiction,” “Intermediate,” “Picture Books,” etc.) appear until we assigned at least one post to each. So, last July we were composing a post for each category in order to have all our categories appear when we first showed up in our little corner of cyberspace. That would be why our first post is dated August 1st, but we were really giving birth to 7-Imp (ew) in July. Yup, here was 7-Imp’s first post ever — a review of Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love (whom Jules is still determined to interview one day, but she digresses). Ah, those were the days.

Plus, we’re celebrating the blogversary today anyway, ’cause 7/7/07 is more fitting for our somewhat numerological and rather sibilant blog . . .

We had these elaborate plans for our blogversary; primarily, we wanted to have this contest-for-illustrators in which we made a call for submissions for an image (think a logo, of sorts) fitting for our blog. We would then pick the most savagely creative and awesome one (not to replace Tenniel’s Alice image up there in our header, but just to tack on the right column of our blog’s template). We even talked about flat-out boldly asking some of our very favorite illustrators for a 7-Imp image to put forever-and-always on our blog’s template, but we decided not to. Jules, in particular, thought of how folks are always assuming that storytellers (and even performing arts sign language interpreters) are going to volunteer their talents and time when really they are supposed to get paid for what they studied and what they do, and . . . well, we didn’t want to seem as if we were doing the same for all of the obscenely talented illustrators out there who normally get paid for their work and talents and time (well, we were going to offer our undying love and adoration as payment, but still . . .).

So, we’re now, uh, doing nothing elaborate to celebrate! Just saying it’s our birthday and hoping you’ll party down in spirit with us. How about this, which is from Here’s a Little Poem: A Very First Book of Poetry, a most-excellent anthology of children’s poetry, which Jules recently raved about here:

(A traditional British street rhyme, which we assume is in the public domain — and Jules’ daughters are currently obsessed with this wonderfully irreverent little ditty and look for every. possible. opportunity. to sing it loudly) . . .

Woo hoo! Happy birthday to this here blawg!

Thanks to everyone for reading our blog over the past year and for letting us become a part of such a vibrant, smart, fun, and impressive community of folks who care about children’s lit (and, uh, the handful of adult novels we’ve reviewed. Do you even know that we set out to review books for all ages, but I swear, we’re 99% children’s lit here at 7-Imp, aren’t we?). Anyway, we put that statement in big, bold letters, ’cause we really and truly are grateful and want to be sure you see that . . . We are honored to be in your cyber-presence, especially since we thought we would mostly be talking to ourselves when we started this blog. How exciting and fun this year has been!

Here’s to talking about literature, to one-year blogversaries, to all of our readers and fellow bloggers, and to whatever this year may have in store for us . . .

{Quick Note That We Just Have to Add: Don’t miss tomorrow’s or next week’s 7 Kicks lists, ’cause we’re excited about our featured illustrators!} . . .

Just a quick note to say happy 4th of July to everyone and to direct you to this recent and wonderful Poetry Friday post at Liz Garton Scanlon’s LiveJournal. She shares a poem written by her good friend, poet and teacher
W. Joe Hoppe. Liz shares a poem (in its entirety) that he wrote in 1992, entitled “It’d be a Happy Ending.” And it’s not only a wonderful poem, but it’s fitting for the fourth. So, go experience it. It’ll be worth your time (and then you’ll understand why we titled this post the way we did).

His poem at Liz’s post might make you want to read his newest anthology of poetry, Galvanized (2006, Dalton Publishing). We know we want to. (And we just have to add that Liz — in her post about the poem — describes him as “remarkable for all sorts of reasons, including his lovin’ dad energy, his amazing full-back tattoo, his wise and talented wife, and his buddist-midwestern-hotrod-classics sensibility.” How great is that description?) . . .

Also, Nancy at Journey Woman had some great poetry choices for the holiday for her most recent Poetry Friday entry. We particularly loved this:

America makes prodigious mistakes, America has colossal faults, but one thing cannot be denied: America is always on the move. She may be going to Hell, of course, but at least she isn’t standing still.

That would be E.E. Cummings for you on this July 4th. Go read the rest of Nancy’s poetry choices, including “I Hear America Singing” by Uncle Walt (pictured here). Happy 4th to all . . .

Don’t miss the final Summer Blog Blast Tour interview today: Justina Chen Headley over at Finding Wonderland. Go here to read this great interview.

Whew. We can’t believe it’s the last day. What a blast (pun intended) it’s been!

And, in case you missed all the action, go here to this great list of authors interviewed in the SBBT (organized by author) at HipWriterMama’s site. Thanks, Vivian! Oh, and Little Willow has a wrap-up here, too — a full SBBT schedule with all the links. Excellent.

We were honored to be a part of this. Thanks to the SBBT mama, Colleen Mondor, for coordinating this entire thing (here’s her “moment for reflection” about the entire venture).

We at 7-Imp are taking an SBBT interview break today. However, we’ll bring to you an interview with Mitali Perkins tomorrow and an interview with Holly Black on Friday. We encourage you to check out the SBBT interviews at other blogs today; Wednesday’s schedule is below.

Wow, everyone, are you keeping up with all the great interviews this week at all these amazing blogs? Good stuff.

Schedule for Wednesday, June 20

• Mitali Perkins at Hip Writer Mama
• Svetlana Chmakova at Finding Wonderland
• Dana Reinhardt at Interactive Reader
• Laura Ruby at A Chair, A Fireplace & A Tea Cozy
• Holly Black at Shaken & Stirred
• Hilary McKay at Bookshelves of Doom
• Kirsten Miller at Miss Erin
• Julie Ann Peters at A Fuse #8 Production
• Carolyn Mackler at The YA YA YAs
• Jordan Sonnenblick at Writing and Ruminating

{Update: Colleen has posted the grand, master schedule for the Summer Blog Blast Tour over at Chasing Ray today. Go see!} . . .

Hello everyone! Just in case you haven’t heard, the amazing dynamo Colleen Mondor of Chasing Ray has organized the first ever Summer Blog Blast Tour, and it starts this Sunday!

The SBBT is a week-long barrage of interviews with YA authors on a massive scale: over 15 blogs, over 25 authors, for a total of over 50 interviews. Colleen will be posting the entire schedule on her blog, but we wanted to give you a heads-up on who we have the honor of interviewing here at 7-Imp:

Monday, June 18: Brent Hartinger
Tuesday, June 19: Sonya Hartnett (exclusive, as those journalists say)
Thursday, June 21: Mitali Perkins
Friday, June 22: Holly Black

We hope you’ll stop by and hear what these excellent authors had to say, and we look forward to reading the other 40-odd interviews in the tour. We also want to thank Colleen for coming up with such an amazing idea, recruiting bloggers, contacting authors and their agents/publishers, coming up with the timetable, and making sure we all worked together. At this point, we would follow Colleen into battle and trust her with our lives. Or, at the very least, eisha wishes she could pay Colleen to help her move.

Jules here. Quick post that is not a book review (or blogger interview or author interview or Poetry Friday or a 7-Kicks list — hmmm, I guess we need to stop saying we stick to book reviews only here at 7-Imp!). Incidentally, I feel like it’s been a while since I’ve done a proper review myself, but what with Eisha’s heroic 48-Hour Book Challenge efforts and the two of us getting ready for next week’s Summer Blog Blast Tour (more on that later), whew, we’re busy. I should have two children’s poetry anthology reviews for this Poetry Friday.

Anyway, back to what I was saying . . .

Here’s the thing: I have no clue as to how many middle Tennessee readers we have. I do know, amazingly enough, that we have readers all over the country — the world, for that matter — and we have publishers and agents and authors and illustrators reading our blog. It’s a bit odd that I know that for a fact, yet I’m not sure how many readers we have here in Tennessee (or even the South), where one-half of 7-Imp (Yours Truly) lives.

But, I’m going to post this anyway for any middle Tennessee readers we may have (and I’m going to email this post to every person I know in middle Tennessee!). And even if you don’t live here, this is an issue that repeats itself all over the country and affects librarians and library-lovers everywhere, so you may want to read anyway.

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We’ve been tagged again, and we’d hate to ignore it, especially since it was the kickin’ Anne at Book Buds who tagged us.

This one is a bit more challenging: Share 10-15 professional goals for the summer. Hmmm . . . okay, here goes:

Do I have to be serious here? Ah, okay . . . This might be challenging, as I’m taking a temporary break from librarianship (and sign language interpreting, for that matter), but I do work from home, and, hell, this blog is like a full-time job (but I do not say that bitterly) . . .

• First and foremost, Eisha and I have a freelance writing gig with The Poetry Foundation about which we are very excited. What an honor to write for the children’s section of their site. And if they like us, we’d love to do more. We’re looking forward to starting this summer writing assignment . . . we’ll share the link once it’s done.
• My buddy and pal, Shannon, and I are working on a YA poetry anthology, a project that began for me back in grad school. I haven’t given this project the focus it deserves and hope to do better, uh, starting now-ish. Good news is that I’ll actually see him this week (he lives about 200 miles away), and we can really talk about it all nitty-gritty, nuts-and-bolts, face-to-face.

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Time: Monday, 12:35 a.m.

Books Finished: 5. Read Defect by Will Weaver this afternoon, and Grand & Humble by Brent Hartinger this evening.

Pages Read: 1213

Time Spent Actually Reading: 15.25 hours.

Time Spent Blogging About It: 2 hours.

Unicorn Sightings: none.

Pathetic. I thought I would rock at this. I mean, seriously, sitting around reading is pretty much how I spend every weekend. Why was it so hard this time? Here’s what I think: because reading is what I usually do to procrastinate whatever I should be doing but don’t really want to, like cleaning or packing or whatever. When reading becomes the thing I’m supposed to be doing, my whole equilibrium is thrown. Good to know for next year.

But hey, I read some good books. Wanna hear about them?

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Time: Sunday, 12:45 p.m. 36.75 hours in, 11.25 to go.

Books Finished: 3. Finished Magic’s Child in the wee hours, and then read The Egypt Game by Zilpha Keatley Snyder between 8:30 and 10:45 a.m..

Pages Read: 802 (page count adjusted to reflect that I’d already read the first 27 pages of The Egypt Game at work the other day).

Time Spent Actually Reading: 11.25 hours.

Today is hard. I thought the weather was supposed to be all gloomy and wet all weekend, but no. It’s sunny. 70 degrees. Birds are all, like, chirping and stuff. Probably butterflies, too, doing their little fluttery thing. Flowers. Bees, wiggle-dancing about where the good pollen is. Maybe rainbows. Hell, maybe unicorns and leprechauns and shit, how would I know? I haven’t left the apartment in almost 24 hours.

I think I have to take my next book outside if I’m going to carry on. Semper Fi, ya’ll.

Time: Sunday, 12:25 a.m. 24.5 hours in, 23.5 to go.

Books Finished: 1.75. I’m on page 222 of Magic’s Child by Justine Larbalestier.

Pages Read: 545

Time Spent Actually Reading: 8 hours.

Fielded long phone calls from mother and sister. Read solidly through early evening, then fell victim to an accidental nap. Probably due to overly-fatigued eyeballs. Had an interesting dream, in which I helped Roger Sutton repaint an apartment that had been trashed by squatters while we listened to Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Want To Have Fun.” I am sure this means something.

Have decided Little Willow isn’t human. Some kind of supernatural reading mutant. Further evidence: she can eat corn after oral surgery. Am now focusing competitive energies on Leila at Bookshelves of Doom. She’s hardcore, but not as scary. Also, her sister sounds like mine.

At some point, I seem to have turned into the nerdy Bridget Jones. If I start recording calorie counts, please intervene.