Coming soon - Tania McCartney - Blog Tour

This coming Saturday, Tania McCartney will be dropping by as part of her blog tour to promote the release of her latest book, Riley and the Curious Koala and to discuss the pros and cons of self-publishing.

A bit about Tania ...

Tania McCartney is an author, editor, publisher, blogger, book reviewer and mango devourer who loves writing, celebrating and supporting children’s literature – and literacy. She is the author of the Riley series of travelogue picture books, as well as several published and self-published adult books.

Tania is an experienced magazine writer and editor, is the founder of Kids Book Review http://kids-book-review.blogspot.com and is a Senior Editor at Australian Women Online. She lives in Canberra with a husband, two kids and a mountain of books. For more about Tania visit her http://www.taniamccartney.com/ or check out these blogs during her tour.
Already this month she has visited:
Writing Out Loud Blog
AUTHOR INTERVIEW
The Book Chook
CRAFTING A BOOK USING PHOTOS
Handmade Canberra Blog
BOOK GIVEAWAY! Win Riley and the Curious Koala! Run!
 Dee Scribe
MARKETING A SELF-PUBLISHED BOOK
Reading Upside Down
A CURIOUS LIFE
Australian Women Online
HOW TO SELF-PUBLISH A CHILDREN’S SERIES AND REMAIN SANE
Little People Books
READING TO LITTLE ONES
Miss Helen Writes
TRAVEL, BOOKS AND CHILDREN
Soup Blog
STORY WRITING IDEAS
 Bernadette Kelly’s Blog
ILLUSTRATING THE RILEY SERIES
Posie Patchwork: The Blog
EXTENDING YOUR BRAND and BOOK GIVE AWAY!

And still to come:
Friday 19 November
Sally Murphy’s Writing for Children Blog
APPROACHING PUBLISHERS
Saturday 20 November
Sheryl Gwyther's Blog
FROM BEIJING TO CANBERRA
Kids Book Review
LIVE QUESTION TIME WITH TANIA!
Sunday 21 November
Sandy Fussell’s Stories are Light Blog
AN INTERVIEW WITH RILEY!
Kids Book Review
RILEY AND THE CURIOUS KOALA BOOK GIVEAWAYS!
Sunday 21 November, in the evening
Tania McCartney Blog
BOOK LAUNCH PARTY
Join Tania as she takes you through her book launch party, held at Dalton’s Bookstore in Canberra City. There will be photos, stories about the launch and lots of fun!

See you all on Saturday.

Teachers are Awesome

There is no doubt about it - there are a heck of a lot of seriously dedicated, awesome teachers out there.

Yesterday morning in Sydney was gorgeous. The type of Saturday when a walk in the park or along the beach seems like the perfect thing to do. Or perhaps a picnic or barbecue with friends.

But despite this glorious spring weather beckoning, 65+ teachers headed to Our Lady of Good Counsel School, Forestville to attend an ALEA North Sydney professional development event on Children's Literature. The ALEA North Sydney group hold these events on various topics relating to literacy teaching four times each year, and without fail they are always well attended.

I gave a talk on enticing reluctant readers and the Lightning Strikes series published by Walker Books and Dr Alyson Simpson explored reading and responding to children's literature, giving many practical classroom ideas for the attendees to try out.

There was such a buzz in the room - such wonderful enthusiasm for children's lit, for teaching, for improving literacy, and for finding the right book. I felt privileged to be involved.

Special thanks to the hard-working ALEA North Sydney committee, especially Wendy Bean, Kathy Ferrari and Helen Pearson.

There is a lot of talent out there ...

There are so many talented young writers out there. It never ceases to amaze me - truly. And last week when I was doing workshops with some amazingly clever and motivated young people at Brewongle - a NSW Department of Education Environmental Learning Centre and Bush Retreat - I was amazed yet again!

Holy guacamole, the kids were were amazing! They had talent by the bucket load.

What a classroom!

 This writers' camp is held each year and it is becoming a favourite event with me. Simon French, Susanne Gervay and James Roy were there also, charged with the happy duty of inspiring these fantastic kids.

Tough gig - but, hey, someone has to do it!



Get a Grip, Cooper Jones is Launched

I donned my party frock and party shoes. We sipped champagne and told jokes. We had a couple of speeches, a competition and lots of laughs, and I couldn’t have asked for a better way to celebrate the launch of Get a Grip, Cooper Jones.

Thanks so much to author, friend and SCBWI leader, Susanne Gervay for giving such a warm, generous and funny launch speech. You can read about it here.

Thanks also to Chris Cheng, SCBWI, the Hughenden Hotel, Claire Saxby, all who attended and shared the journey and joined in with the festivities. I had a blast. (And sold lots of books too! Yay!)

It was such a buzz  – I was grinning for days afterwards.

A review and a launch for Cooper

Here's a lovely review for Get a Grip, Cooper Jones at Chris Cheng's review blog. Thanks, Chris!

Now, drum roll please ...

Get a Grip, Cooper Jones is going to be officially launched by Susanne Gervay next Sunday (September 19) at the SCBWI conference, The Hughenden Hotel, 14 Queen St Woollahra NSW, 12.30 - 1.00 pm. Let me know if you would like to drop by and join the celebration.

Book Week Fun

Here are some pics from BOOK WEEK. Courtesy of the wonderful Jean Saxby, T/L at Galston Public. Thanks, Jean!

Firefighting fun!

My volunteer firefighters are pretty tired after putting out the fire at Lulu's Ice-creamery.

Teacher / Librarian, Jean Saxby and moi.
Look at the great FREAKY poster on the window.

Teacher's notes for Get a Grip Cooper Jones

Walker Books has created  a great set of comprehensive teachers' notes for Get a Grip, Cooper Jones. They can be downloaded from the Walker Books website. Thanks, Walker!