What I’m Up To at Kirkus This Week
September 20th, 2013 by jules
“I really have no idea how the voices in my books come to me. I’m not sure any writer does. Walter Dean Myers once said that when he has to explain how he came up with the idea of a certain book, he mostly makes stuff up, because the whole thing is a mystery to him. It’s a mystery to me, too! And everyone does it differently.”
That’s Joyce Sidman, pictured here. We chatted yesterday morning at Kirkus about several things including taking risks, how a poet turns off the noisy world for a while (including loud social media-type places), and collaborating once again with illustrator Pamela Zagarenski. We also talked about her newest poetry collection, What the Heart Knows: Chants, Charms & Blessings (Houghton Mifflin, October 2013). That chat is here.
This morning, I ended up writing an ode of a sort to author/illustrator John Burningham, who is one of my all-time favorite illustrators. Candlewick has released a new(ish) book of his, and if that “ish” confuses you, well … you can read more here.
Until Sunday …
Photo used with permission of Joyce Sidman.
John Burningham! I read “The Shopping Basket” to my son, now 30, so many times when he was young, that I can still picture some of the great drawings, and taste the bag of crisps – we both loved it!