This Is My Secret: The Blog and Website of Writer Kristin Cashore

Jacqueline Woodson, divinely wonderful writer and winner of the National Book Award for Young People's Literature for Brown Girl Dreaming, has responded to Daniel Handler's watermelon joke in the New York Times. Here's a link to her piece, called "The Pain of the Watermelon Joke." It's in the printed paper today, too. (Thanks, Sarah, for all these links!)

Occasionally, when I'm not feeling picky about what I want to listen to, I'll open up my songlist, choose a place to start, and listen alphabetically. It can create some interesting sorting results, especially when you get to a word that frequently starts song titles (like "Close/r," "Don't," "Long," "Love," and "You," for example...). Just now, I've somehow ended up in the middle of all the "All" songs. The links below take you to the songs on youtube (though I haven't watched all the videos). Happy Thanksgiving and enjoy the music :o). (And by the way, this is an open invitation for any friends who read my blog to tell me about any "All" songs they're appalled not to find in my library.)

All About That Bass -- Meghan Trainor
All Along the Watchtower (by Bob Dylan, but this is the Bear McCreary Battlestar Galactica version)
All Four Seasons -- Sting
All I Need -- Radiohead
All I Really Want -- A…

I'm getting a lot out of the discussion in the comments of Roger Sutton's blog post in response to Daniel Handler's racist watermelon joke at the National Book Award ceremony last week.  I haven't read every comment yet, but there's a lot here, a lot of people making astute observations and criticisms and explaining muddy things with great clarity. For example, I like the way some commenters are eviscerating Roger's criticisms of poet Nikky Finney's response to Handler's comments. (That link is to only one of the comments on this topic -- keep reading.)

Also, this seems like a good segue to reminding people that the We Need Diverse Books campaign is still going strong. Help the organization reach its stretch goals!

Okay, I should never have said that thing about how the next thing I blog is going to be the girl superhero post. All it's doing is preventing me from blogging anything at all. When in fact, I have some mighty complaints, like, for example, why in the name of all that is reasonable is the fabulous Jeremy Jordan not going to be starring in Finding Neverland now that it's moving to Broadway? Jeremy Jordan was SO SO SO SO wonderful as J.M. Barrie in that show. He has so much talent and charisma, his voice is beautiful, he is beautiful. AARGHHH! Thank goodness I had the chance to see him originating the role at the A.R.T. this summer/fall.


Also, big cats like boxes, too; baby elephants have, like, no control over their legs whatsoever; and there are some really great moments in this video of (domestic) cats freaking out. Oh my goodness, the kitten and the lizard.

Also, a conversation with a writer friend recently about the distinction between young adult and middle grade books led…

The next thing I do on this blog will be my post about superhero girls and women, so help me God.  I just looked it up and I've been promising to do that since July! Eeek! But for now, here's a little bit of autumn in New England for those of you who don't get to see this kind of thing.

We Need Diverse Books from Undercurrent on Vimeo.

Everybody, please go check out the We Need Diverse Books fund-raising campaign. Lots of good information over there about WNDB, which is dedicated to advocating and supporting non-majority narratives in children's literature. If you can, contribute; if you can't, consider passing on the news to someone else. Some of the prizes for contributing are pretty nifty: for writers, "Bypass the Query Queue" -- one pass to jump to the front line of an agent's inbox for a PB, MG, or YA manuscript. Another one for writers: an agent critique (MG and YA). For art lovers: original art by Cindy Pon, and let me tell you, I would be jumping on that. Go check it out!

I love Elizabeth Minkel's article in the New Statesman, "Read whatever the hell you want: why we need a new way of talking about young adult literature." It soothes my heartsore parts that are so tired of the condescension. Thank you, Elizabeth Minkel. Also, thanks for making me laugh when you said, "(I saw the piece somewhat misleadingly shared with the burning question, “What would Henry James think of YA?” and for the love of God, if there is a single person whose opinion on YA I care less about…)" HA HA HA HEE hoo, seriously, yes.

Also, I could listen to Ryan Keberle on trombone, Michael Rodriguez on trumpet, Jorge Roeder on bass, Eric Doob on drums and Camila Meza's vocals performing Sufjan Stevens' "Sister" over and over and over again. Check out these gorgeous lyrics and press play. "Sister" takes up the first 5:25 or so of the video. (You can download the mp3 for free here; click on "download audio".) (And if you c…