I’ve been blessed to work with fantastic illustrators and art directors on my novels from my very first one. THE BOY, THE BOAT, AND THE BEAST is my debut novel, but it was also the middle-grade debut of illustrator Justin Hernandez. The book also had a fantastic art director at Simon & Schuster, Laurent Linn,…
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When I got the idea for ARROW, it was this: A boy with one hand lived in a tree. I didn’t know why he lived in a tree or why he had a limb difference, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned in my career as an author, it’s to honor what my characters tell…
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When I’ve talked to readers and librarians about ARROW, I’ve been giving out little squares of seed paper. I encourage them to plant the paper squares with kids to grow beautiful wild flowers. One of the things I love about this is the way it builds a love of nature. It’s one thing to look…
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It takes a village to make a novel the best that it can be, and I had a fantastic village at Simon & Schuster and the Paula Wiseman Books imprint when I was working on ARROW. My editor, Sarah Jane Abbott, was indispensable, giving me suggestions that helped lift the characters and story to new…
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I’ve loved trees since I was a kid. Reading in their branches was one of my favorite things to do. When I was writing ARROW, I realized how much we use trees as metaphors for so many things in our lives, and that’s where the Tree of You activity was born. I did this at…
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Happy Book Birthday to ARROW! In this middle-grade novel, Arrow, a 12-year-old boy with a limb difference, has grown up as the only human in a lush, magical rainforest that’s closed off from the rest of the world. He was raised by the Guardian Tree, the protector of the forest, which uses the earth’s…
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I’ve got some really special blog posts coming up that I’m super excited about. With the release of my new novel ARROW, I’m interviewing a bunch of people who helped me make the book a reality and celebrate its release. First up is Andrew Smiley from the fantastic TreeFolks, and I’m giving away an ARC…
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It’s hard to believe, but THE BOY, THE BOAT, AND THE BEAST turned 2 a month ago! I was busy working on my next books and missed the actual birthday. When I came out of my revision cave, blinking in the sunlight, I realized, It’s Time For A Giveaway! Because, not only did my debut…
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