Book Love: GONE CAMPING

TAMERA WILL WISSINGER

Tamera Will Wissinger was one of our first spotlight authors in 2014.

We featured her picture book This Old Band , and her DMC challenge was to write parody or tribute poems. (I reposted one yesterday: B.J. Lee's "The Passonate Stallion to His Mare.") In celebration of National Poetry Month and TLD's birthday, I invited Tamera to come back and answer a few questions about her latest verse novel.

GONE CAMPING
HMH Books for Young Readers
March 28, 2017
ISBN: 978-0544638730
Find at Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble,
or via Indiebound.org.

GONE CAMPING: A Novel in Verse is a companion to her award-winning GONE FISHING (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013). It's a delightful family story that picks up with Sam and Lucy, the same true-to-life siblings featured in the first book. While Gone Fishing was told largely from Sam's point of view (he didn't want his special fishing trip with his dad hijacked by his little sister), it's nice that Lucy shares equal billing in Gone Camping. Both kids are excited about the family camping trip, until Dad wakes up with a miserable cold! It's decided that he and Mom will stay home, while Sam and Lucy go with Grandpa instead. Uh-oh. Hesitant at first, Sam and Lucy settle into a different kind family adventure from the one they expected.








Like it's predecessor, elementary-aged kids are going to love Gone Camping for its humor and familiarity, its playful storytelling, and for Matthew Cordell's exuberant, often silly, line drawings which are more than capable of garnering giggles all by themselves. The supplemental back matter that describes the poetry "provisions"—techniques and forms—used in the writing of the book is a huge plus for both teachers and aspiring poets.



Hi Tamera! Welcome back to Today's Little Ditty!
What have you been up to since you were last here in 2014?

Wow, has it really been three years? Time leaps! Ha. In 2015 I welcomed a new poem in Janet Wong and Sylvia Vardell’s Poetry Friday Anthology for Celebrations. The poem I wrote is called "National Aviation Day" for the celebration of the same name on August 19: “On National Aviation Day we honor pilots, planes, and flight. We celebrate two brothers, Orville and Wilbur Wright…” I was also pleased to release the paperback of Gone Fishing that year. Then in 2016 my second picture book There Was an Old Lady who Gobbled a Skink arrived and last month Gone Camping: A Novel In Verse released. In between, I’ve been writing, reading, and visiting schools and conferences.

Tell us a little about your experience of writing GONE FISHING and GONE CAMPING as verse novels. Why did you choose to tell Sam and Lucy's adventures as a series of poems?

To be honest, I never considered telling the story any other way—Gone Fishing began to appear as a series of poems and I enjoyed that process, the characters, and the story (and poetry) so much that I wanted to try again with Gone Camping.


Was there anything noteworthy about your experience of writing a sequel? Did anything catch you by surprise?

The biggest aha for me was that despite having character, setting, and plotline clarity, sequel writing is trickier than beginning from scratch. For me it was striking a balance between familiarity of characters and freshness of story.


Please share a favorite selection from GONE CAMPING and tell us why it's meaningful to you.

Oh, I love how all the poems work together to tell a story, so choosing is tough. Just for Michelle, though, and for today only, I select SONG OF THE BEANIE WEENIE BARBECUE, only because of the connection to the other Will poet, Shakespeare, and because I love how Lucy really takes center stage in this one—in both text...

Text © 2017 Tamera Will Wissinger, from GONE CAMPING: A Novel in Verse,
used by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books for Young Readers.

and Matthew Cordell’s illustration.

Illustration © 2017 Matthew Cordell, from GONE CAMPING: A Novel in Verse,
used by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books for Young Readers.

What's coming up next for you?

I’m working on a verse novel for a little older middle grade reader that’s set in the Midwest, and I also have a short chapter book that’s currently captured my attention.

You've certainly captured our attention with all of your terrific books, Tamera! Thanks so much for stopping by today.

If you want to write a parody poem for our Ditty Potluck, I'd love to see it!  Or, if a parody poem is not to your liking, choose from any of the other 27 DMC challenges. Post your poem on our April 2017 padlet and be sure to indicate which challenge you are responding to.  All contributions will be included in a wrap-up celebration on Friday, April 28th. Individual poems shared this week were by George Heidenrich, Jessica Bigi, BJ Lee, and Jone Rush MacCulloch at Deo Writer.

Laura Purdie Salas was our debut spotlight author in May 2014, and last Wednesday I wrote about what she's been up to lately. Read about her new video course, Writer in Progress: 30 Days in the Life of a Children's Writer HERE.

Along with hosting this week's Poetry Friday roundup, Doraine Bennett is giving away five copies of HERE WE GO, by Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong. (I'm honored to have my poem "Look for the Helpers" in that book!) Visit her at Dori Reads to enter the drawing.

If you're looking for other ways to celebrate National Poetry Month, Jama Rattigan is your go-to for NPM festivites at Alphabet Soup.

DMC: "The Passionate Stallion to His Mare" by B.J. Lee

In July of 2014, Tamera Will Wissinger challenged us to write parody or tribute poems. Here's the fabulous poem B.J. Lee contributed, based on "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love" by Christopher Marlowe. You'll also find it in The Best of Today's Little Ditty: 2014-2015. Come back tomorrow to see what Tamera has been up to lately!


The Passionate Stallion to His Mare

Come live with me and be my mare
and we will every pleasure share.
I'll save my treats and give you all
the apples when they start to fall.

And we will graze in glorious grass,
and I'll not let a moment pass
when I am not as close to you
as I can be through chomp and chew.

We'll share the stable past Duck's pond,
and there we'll strengthen our deep bond.
I'll give you first dibs on the hay
and I will never say thee neigh.

So if this life seems good to you,
then bid your former life adieu.
And if you smell love in the air,
come live with me and be my mare.

© 2012 B.J. Lee. All rights reserved.


The DMC challenge for National Poetry Month is to contribute to our Ditty Potluck. Follow the guidelines for any one of the last 28 challenges, choosing from the following recipes:

Click HERE for an alphabetical list of all the DMC challenges.

Click HERE for an alphabetical list of all the Spotlight interviews.

Post your poem on our April 2017 padlet and be sure to indicate which challenge you are responding to.  All contributions will be included in a wrap-up celebration on Friday, April 28th, and one lucky participant, chosen randomly, will select from the following:

Option 1: A set of 8 copies of The Best of Today's Little Ditty: 2014-2015 to use with a classroom or extracurricular group.

Option 2: One copy of The Best of Today's Little Ditty, plus a $20 gift card to purchase a poetry book(s) of your choice.

Option 3: A $25 gift card if you already have all the copies of The Best of TLD you need.

Laura Purdie Salas: Writer in Progress

Instead of posting a ditty today, I'd like to share a terrific resource for children's writers—for aspiring writers who are trying to decide if this is the career for them, and for writers like myself who are a little further along in the journey, but still trying to navigate and explore the waters. It's an online course:

Writer in Progress: 30 Days in the Life of a Children's Writer

Laura, with her latest book from Millbrook Press.
Read a couple of nice reviews HERE and HERE.

with TLD's very first Spotlight author, Laura Purdie Salas.

I've learned a lot from Laura over the years, not only from her books (poetry, nonfiction, books for writers) and her mentoring service with Lisa Bullard, Mentors for Rent, but also through blog osmosis and social media, soaking in who she is and how she behaves as a writer. Laura is super creative, yes, but she's also sensible and practical—invaluable traits for those who want to manage a career, not just a hobby.

While there are many lovely and generous souls in the kidlitosphere, Laura stands out in that arena. She has the heart and manner of a caring teacher, making it her personal mission to share what she knows with children, and aspiring children's writers, too. Who wouldn't appreciate an honest and transparent "tell it like it is" article like her annual "How Much Money Does a Writer Make?"? There's more writerly advice where that came from—just follow the Mentors for Rent blog.

Writer in Progress takes that honest, straightforward approach to a whole new level. This 30-day course isn't some romanticized version of what it's like to be a children's writer. It's a collection of short daily journals—half written, half videotaped—detailing what one working writer (stress on working) does day in and day out for a one-month period.

"Asleep at the computer" by Kevin Severud

A steal at only $25, you're not paying for polish and perfection, you're paying to hear what it's really like to be a children's writer. You're not paying for hype or a step-by-step guide, you're paying to quietly peek over Laura's shoulder, to find out how she handles her time, writing projects, administrative tasks, and other activities.

Hers is not the only way children's writers manage their workload, of course (alas, we can't all be as organized as Laura is), but for many of us, this is a huge problem. Managing our time and priorities, I mean. If you're anything like me, finding out how others succeed at the juggling act is always helpful, if only to pick up a tip here or an idea there. But for the new writer? Priceless.

Another benefit for me, was that it gave me a peek at where I'm headed. I haven't yet attended a large conference like NCTE, ALA, or ILA. I haven't done many school visits either... at least not ones I've actually been paid for. But these things are on the not-so-distant horizon, and I'm chugga-chugging in that direction. I think I can. I think I can.

Dietmar Rabich

Here are just a few of the writing or writing-related tasks you'll see Laura work on:

    •    declining a speaking invitation
    •    preparing for a school visit
    •    revising a picture book
    •    checking on contract terms for a work-for-hire project
    •    pitching picture book ideas to an editor
    •    researching a nonfiction picture book project
    •    speaking at a conference for educators
    •    getting her first author's copy of her newest picture book
    •    struggling with wardrobe issues for a signing

I also appreciated the "universal truths" for children's writers she shares at the end.

If you're interested, I would encourage you to read Laura's own description of Writer in Progress HERE and also preview the first two sessions. You can explore her other online classes for writers HERE.

After that, maybe you want to try writing a water-themed cinquain (Laura's May 2014 challenge) for this month's Ditty Potluck!

Post your poem on our April 2017 padlet.

DMC: "Dictionary" by Jessica Bigi

In September 2016, Jane Yolen challenged us to write a poem that features reading or writing in the form of a septercet. It's a form she invented that has three-line stanzas (as many as you like), each line with seven syllables.


DICTIONARY

Rocket-shouter of Knowledge
Alphabet laces looping
Reading-coasters of learning

© 2017 Jessica Bigi. All rights reserved.


The DMC challenge for National Poetry Month is to contribute to our Ditty Potluck. Follow the guidelines for any one of the last 28 challenges, choosing from the following recipes:

Click HERE for an alphabetical list of all the DMC challenges.

Click HERE for an alphabetical list of all the Spotlight interviews.

Post your poem on our April 2017 padlet and be sure to indicate which challenge you are responding to.  All contributions will be included in a wrap-up celebration on Friday, April 28th, and one lucky participant, chosen randomly, will select from the following:

Option 1: A set of 8 copies of The Best of Today's Little Ditty: 2014-2015 to use with a classroom or extracurricular group.

Option 2: One copy of The Best of Today's Little Ditty, plus a $20 gift card to purchase a poetry book(s) of your choice.

Option 3: A $25 gift card if you already have all the copies of The Best of TLD you need.

DMC: "Twins" by George Heidenrich

For obvious reasons, Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong's challenge to create a poem video was not well-suited for the pages of The Best of Today's Little Ditty: 2014-2015. Despite being such a unique and interesting challenge, the combination of summer vacations and technical difficulties meant that it also didn't get a huge response. My dad was one of the few folks who did respond, overcoming many technological obstacles in order to do so. Three years later, I'm still not sure if he succeeded because of relentless determination or because of his love for me, but I'm proud and grateful nonetheless. In honor of his (80th!) birthday today, I'd like to share "TWINS" as our first daily ditty in April. I wonder if anyone else might contribute a poem video to our potluck this month?

 

TWINS

The sleeping dreamers and the dreaming sleepers
pass through the same portal into the gray twilight.
One is excited, the other, not.
Whether they find their destiny depends
not on their diligence, but upon their imagination.
Destiny is what you make of it: to one, a pleasure,
the other, a nightmare.
Attitudes matter.

© 2012 George Heidenrich. All rights reserved.

The DMC challenge for National Poetry Month is to contribute to our Ditty Potluck. Follow the guidelines for any one of the last 28 challenges, choosing from the following recipes:

Click HERE for an alphabetical list of all the DMC challenges.

Click HERE for an alphabetical list of all the Spotlight interviews.

Post your poem on our April 2017 padlet and be sure to indicate which challenge you are responding to.  All contributions will be included in a wrap-up celebration on Friday, April 28th, and one lucky participant, chosen randomly, will select from the following:

Option 1: A set of 8 copies of The Best of Today's Little Ditty: 2014-2015 to use with a classroom or extracurricular group.

Option 2: One copy of The Best of Today's Little Ditty, plus a $20 gift card to purchase a poetry book(s) of your choice.

Option 3: A $25 gift card if you already have all the copies of The Best of TLD you need.

Spotlight on Today's Little Ditty + DMC Challenge

THE DITTY OF THE MONTH CLUB

Whaaat? No spotlight interview?

Nope, not this month. But there's still plenty to celebrate around here, so don't go anywhere. (I'll have a DMC challenge for you in just a bit.)


Not only is it National Poetry Month, but on Monday . . .

Evan Long

Today's Little Ditty turns four years old!

Available for purchase at Amazon.com

Sooooo... it occurred to me that I never had a proper launch party for The Best of Today's Little Ditty: 2014-2015.


Yes, the book was released five months ago.


Yes, it's time to start thinking about the next volume. (Drop me a line if you want to be on my new Ditty Committee.)


Fine. Maybe I'm just in the mood for cupcakes. Do you have a problem with that?

Andy Li

I'll need quite a few. More than 150 poets have contributed to 28 DMC challenges over the past three years, plus classrooms, plus blog readers who haven't submitted poems yet (but hopefully will one day). You're all invited.

Pardon me for a moment while I crunch some numbers . . .

Holy ditty, Batman! More than 850 poems have been contributed so far!

Now excuse me while I conduct some cupcake research— dark chocolate with toasted coconut, mmmmm....  What's your favorite flavor?  It's on me.


Speaking of flavors . . .

I've noticed there are basically two flavors of DMC challenges:

1. There's the "here's a word or subject—go!" challenge, like David Harrison's "ditty" challenge or Amy Ludwig VanDerwater's "small as a chickadee" challenge.

2. There's the "try this (new) poetry form" challenge, like Joyce Sidman's deeper wisdom poems or Margarita Engle's tanka challenge.

Occasionally we get a challenge that combines the two, like Laura Purdie Salas's water-inspired cinquains or Bob Raczka's monster-inspired haiku. Or who could forget Penny Parker Klostermann's "dragon's feast" challenge (a progressive poem comprised of couplets)? What a wild ride that was! That one might need a category all to itself.


Which kind of challenge do you like best?

It's a little hard to gauge which challenge was most popular since TLD's readership has grown over time, but in terms of numbers of contributors and numbers of poems, Jane's Yolen's septercet challenge comes out on top with 46 participants and 54 poems. Other buzzworthy challenges include Nikki Grimes's free verse/wordplay challenge, Douglas Florian's poems about nothing, J. Patrick Lewis's zeno challenge, and last month's ode poem challenge from Helen Frost.

Ready for this month's DMC challenge?

Here it is: 

Write a poem following the guidelines of any one of the past 28 challenges.

That's right, we're celebrating National Poetry Month and TLD's birthday with a Ditty Potluck!

The table is set. YOU decide what dittilicious delicacy you'd like to share with the rest of us, choosing from the following recipes:

Sebastian Dooris

Click HERE for an alphabetical list of all the DMC challenges.

Click HERE for an alphabetical list of all the Spotlight interviews.


Please note: When you post your poem on the April 2017 padlet, be sure to indicate which challenge you're responding to.

This month I'll be sharing daily ditties from the padlet, of course, but I'll also be featuring a few from The Best of TLD: 2014-2015, and touching base with a couple of Spotlight authors from 2014-2015 to see what they're up to lately.



You didn't think I'd forget some kind of extra incentive, did you?

Of course not.


At the end of the month, one participant (chosen randomly) will get their just desserts:

Option 1: A set of 8 copies of The Best of Today's Little Ditty: 2014-2015 to use with a classroom or extracurricular group.

Option 2: One copy of The Best of Today's Little Ditty, plus a $20 gift card to purchase a poetry book(s) of your choice.

Option 3: A $25 gift card if you already have all the copies of The Best of TLD you need.

Ready? It's BYOD time! 

(Bring Your Own Ditty)

From "Eating Poetry" by Mark Strand, Academy of American Poets

HOW TO PARTICIPATE:

Post your poem on our April 2017 padlet. (Be sure to mention which challenge you are responding to.) Stop by any time during the month to add your work or to check out what others are contributing.

By posting on the padlet, you are granting me permission to share your poem on Today's Little Ditty.  Some poems will be featured as daily ditties, though authors may not be given advanced notice. Subscribe to the blog if you'd like to keep tabs. You can do that in the sidebar to the right where it says "Follow TLD by Email." As always, all of the poems will be included in a wrap-up celebration on the last Friday of the month—April 28th for our current challenge.

TEACHERS, it's great when students get involved! Ditty of the Month Club challenges are wonderful opportunities to learn about working poets and authors while having fun with poetry prompts. Thank you for spreading the word! For children under 13, please read my COPPA compliance statement in the sidebar to the right.

FIRST-TIMERS (those who have never contributed to a ditty challenge before), in addition to posting your work on the padlet, please send your name and email address to TodaysLittleDitty (at) gmail (dot) com. That way I'll be able to contact you for possible inclusion in future Best of Today's Little Ditty anthologies.

BLOGGERS, thank you for publishing your poems on your own blogs– I love that!  Please let me know about it, so I can share your post! Also remember to include your poem (or a direct link to your post) on the padlet in order to be included in the wrap-up celebration and end-of-month giveaway.

Clare K

Now have a cupcake. They're going fast.

Many thanks to everyone who contributed an ode poem to last month's ditty challenge! (Tabatha Yeatt's "Ode to a Tablecloth" came in fairly late in the day, but is definitely worth going back to the wrap-up presentation to have a read.) Without doubt, it was an exercise that reaped marvelous results!

Random.org has determined that a personalized copy of When My Sister Started Kissing by Helen Frost will go to:

BRIDGET MAGEE

Congratulations, Bridget!

Irene Latham is awash with poetry this month. Her poem-a-day project ARTSPEAK! Portraits reveals the voice within 30 different artistic works. In addition, she organizes the annual Kidlitophere Progressive Poem. (Day 4 was posted here earlier this week.) Join Irene for Day 7, along with this week's Poetry Friday roundup, at Live Your Poem.

If you're looking for other creative ways to celebrate National Poetry Month, Jama Rattigan is your go-to for NPM festivites at Alphabet Soup.

Day 4 of the 2017 Kidlitosphere Progressive Poem

One of my favorite National Poetry Month activities is Irene Latham's annual Progressive Poem.  It's exciting, spontaneous, fun, and because it's a community writing experience, it takes on a life of its own. From April 1-30, a poem travels from blog to blog, each host adding a new line daily. The results are always richly layered, with a piece of every poet who takes part and the collected anticipation of everyone who has been following its journey.

This is the fourth year I've participated in the Progressive Poem. (You can read previous years' poems HERE.) I've contributed lines at the end and in the middle, so it's a treat to be near the beginning where I can help set the poem's direction. That said, it didn't occur to me when I signed up for Day 4 that I would need to make an important decision. It's my choice whether or not to establish a traditional pattern of rhyming quatrains. Our goal this year is a children's poem and many children's poems do take on that structure, but personally, I prefer when the progressive poem does not. Not all participating poets are comfortable with rhyme so why take on the extra constraint? Besides, judging by these first three lines, we don't need it.

I'm fidget, friction, ragged edges— 
I sprout stories that frazzle-dazzle,
stories of castles, of fires that crackle

Making use of alliteration, assonance, consonance and slant rhyme, this poem has plenty of interest and kid-appeal already! Of course things might change later on, but for now, why box ourselves in unnecessarily? Plus, I think the lack of a predictable rhyme scheme reflects the agitation of our speaker.

My objectives for line 4 were to keep up the playful language, continue channeling the speaker's restless energy into imagination, and reinforce the story themes introduced in line 3.

I'm fidget, friction, ragged edges—
I sprout stories that frazzle-dazzle,
stories of castles, of fires that crackle,
with dragonwords that smoke and sizzle.

Visit Diane Mayr tomorrow to see where she takes the poem next!


April

1 Heidi at my juicy little universe
2 Tabatha at The Opposite of Indifference
3 Doraine at Dori Reads
4 Michelle at Today's Little Ditty
5 Diane at Random Noodling
6 Kat at Kat's Whiskers
7 Irene at Live Your Poem
8 Mary Lee at A Year of Reading
9 Linda at TeacherDance
10 Penny at blog-a- penny-and- her-jots
11 Ramona at Pleasures from the Page
12 Janet F. at Live Your Poem
13 Margaret at Reflections on the Teche
14 Jan at Bookseedstudio
15 Brenda at Friendly Fairy Tales
16 Joy at Poetry for Kids Joy
17 Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect
18 Buffy at Buffy's Blog
19 Pat at Writer on a Horse
20 BJ at Blue Window
21 Donna at Mainely Write
22 Jone at Jone Ruch MacCulloch
23 Ruth at There's No Such Thing as a Godforsaken Town
24 Amy at The Poem Farm
25 Robyn at Life on the Deckle Edge
26 Renee at No Water River
27 Matt at Radio, Rhythm and Rhyme
28 Michelle at Michelle Kogan
29 Charles at Poetry Time
30 Laura Purdie Salas at Writing the World for Kids

If you're looking for other creative ways to celebrate National Poetry Month, Jama Rattigan is your go-to for NPM festivites at Alphabet Soup.

Today is the final day to leave a comment for your chance to win Helen Frost's new verse novel, When My Sister Started Kissing (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2017). Click here to do so, then come back this Friday to see if you've won!