Enjoy this power point of photos from NCTE and ALAN.

and here is the list from Bonnie Kunzel from the ALAN session.

GENREBLENDING FOR NCTE/ALAN 2009

MYSTERIOUS FANTASY

Funke, Cornelia. The Thief Lord.

Fforde, Jasper. Thursday Next: The Eyre Affair. Lost in a Good Book. The Well of
Lost Plots. Something Rotten. First Among Sequels.
Nursery Crime: The Big Over Easy. The Fourth Bear.

Pierce, Tamora. Beka Cooper: Terrier: A Tortall Legend. Bloodhound.

Vande Velde, Vivian. Never Trust a Dead Man.

ROMANTIC FANTASY

Bunce, Elizabeth C. A Curse Dark As Gold.

Cashore, Kristin. Graceling. Prequel: Fire.

Marillier, Juliet. Wildwood Dancing.

Meyer, Stephenie. Twilight Saga: Twilight. New Moon. Eclipse. Breaking Dawn.
Klause, Annette Curtis. The Silver Kiss. Blood and Chocolate.

TIME TRAVEL ROMANCE

Cooney, Caroline B. The Time Travelers Quartet: Both Sides of Time. Out of Time. Prisoner of Time. For All Time.

Harrison, Mette Ivie. The Princess and the Hound. The Princess and the Bear.

Hubbard, Mandy. Prada & Prejudice.

Mangum, Lisa. The Hourglass Door.

DARK FANTASY

Gaiman, Neil. Coraline. The Graveyard Book.

Jinks, Catherine. The Reformed Vampire Support Group.

Marr, Melissa. Wicked Lovely. Ink Exchange. Fragile Eternity.

Werlin, Nancy. Impossible: A Novel.

Here is Mary Arnold's bibliography to go along with the Power Point posted earlier.

ALAN 2009

Many Formats Make Great Reading

Verse Novels

All the Broken Pieces. Ann E. Burg. Scholastic Press. 2009
Becoming Billie Holiday. Carole Boston Weatherford. Art by Floyd Cooper.
Wordsong. 2008
Amiri and Odette: a Love Story. Walter Dean Myers. Scholastic Press. 2009

Screenplay

Riot. Walter Dean Myers. Egmont USA. 2009

Epistolary

My Most Excellent Year. Steve Kluger. Dial Books. 2008
The Murder of Bindy MacKenzie. Jaclyn Moriarty. Arthur A. Levine Books. 2006

Short Stories/Novella

Pretty Monsters. Kelly Link. Decorations Shaun Tan. Viking. 2008
No Such Thing as the Real World. HarperTeen. 2009
Angry Management. Chris Crutcher. Greenwillow Books. 2009

Recordings

Thirteen Reasons Why. Jay Asher. Razorbill. 2007

Diaries/Journals/Blogs

Pieces of Georgia. Jen Bryant. Knopf. 2006
How My Private Personal Journal Became a Bestseller. Julia DeVillers.
Dutton Childrens Books. 2004
Click Here to Find Out How I Survived Seventh Grade. Denise Vega.
Little, Brown. 2005

Picture Books

Timbuktu. Paul Auster. Illustrations Julia Goschke. Penguin Young Readers
Group. 2002
Beowulf a Tale of Blood, Heat and Ashes. Retold by Nicky Raven. Illustrations
John Howe. Candlewick Press. 2007

It is a much smaller group today, but ALAN goes on with deep appreciation for all the goodies. More books today. Dozens more authors, too. First up is a new author panel with Francisco Stork, Eve Tal, Alan Zadoff, Sarah Ockler, and Maggie Stiefvater. Chair is Sarah Herz. Next will be breakout sessions. Hate to nbe leaving Philly but I will be so happy to get home to hubby, resident of the back bedroom, and Scout.

More will be in tweets (ProfessorNana).

So, my laptop died late yesterday afternoon, so I did not have the chance to talk about two things.

The Walden Award ceremony, chaired by Daria Plumb, was lovely. Jacqueline Woodson read from AFTER TUPAC AND D FOSTER. Then winner of the first ever Walden Award, Steve Kulger, spoke about his book: MY MOST EXCELLENT YEAR. If you have not read these books and the other three from the short list, please do so (GRACELING, GRAVEYARD BOOK, ME THE MISSING AND THE DEAD).


Then, it was off to dinner with the lovely and award winning Wendy Lamb (who won the Hipple Award; see earlier post). Joining us: Jim Blasingmae (incoming PreZ of ALAN), David Gill (outgoing past prez of ALAN, Jean Brown, and Marshall George). Dinner at Maggiano's was family style and we are indeed a family. Wonderful meal.

Electricity went out in the middle of the night but my phone alarm woke us in time to grab coffee and head down to Day Two. I will be tweeting from here (ProfessorNana).

Oh, and I got to see the handsome new college student, Baker Beers, a freshman at U Penn and son of Kylene, our now Past Prez of NCTE.

It is not easy to arise and get down to a meeting at 8 am when the previous evening went late (thanks Victoria for the lovely dinner with Sara Zarr, Sarah Ockler). But I am sitting here and have already heard 4 authors in an hour. Greg Maguire opened the workshop followed by David Klass, Todd Strasser, Adrian Fogelin, Sarah Dessen, and Deb Caletti (oh, that's 6 authors but some have not spoken yet on this panel).

Gave away most of my box of books to three teachers sitting behind me. I took one look and knew they were early career. They teach HS in Connecticut and were thrilled to get more books to take back to the students. I think I can add the few I kept to my luggage and still be within my weight limits.

Pet Peeve:

Several authors have gone WAY over their time limits. Not naming names here, but how arrogant! Will post more later. You can follow me on Twitter for more updates. Thunderchikin is also tweeting as is LizB and a few others. Hashtag is #ALAN2009.

Crutcher was terrific (not surprising in the least). Now panel with Chris Carlton Brown (HOPPERGRASS) and E Lockhart (Frankie, BOY Book, Treasure Map, etc.). Before lunch, Matt de la Pena, Maureen Johnson, Patricia McCormick, and Ben Saenz. SQUEE!!!!

Next year, we are in Orlando. Make plans now to come to ALAN.

Is it Wendy Glenn or Daria? Only her close friends know for sure. Here is Daria Plumb, current chair of the Walden Award Committee, posing as Wendy Glenn, past chair. Photo is from ALAN Breakfast yesterday morning. Despite the early hour, all 600 people enjoyed Laurie Halse Anderson's passioned speech and the acceptance speeches of Naomi Shihab Nye and Wendy Lamb, the ALAN Award and HIPPLE Award winners respectively. You can follow my tweets from the breakfast with #ALAN2009 hashtag.

After I spoke at the ALAN Workshop, a man approached me and told me he thought I would be the right person to read his book. I took a copy and promised to read it as soon as I could. So, I took some time this morning after cleaning out my closet and doing some of the laundry to read NOTHING PINK (Front Street, November 2008) by Mark Hardy. Vincent is the son of a preacher. It is a difficult position for him as he cannot bring himself to confess his sins in front of the congregation. The main reason is that Vincent is unsure his homosexuality is a sin to begin with. How could the God he has read about and heard his father preach about his entire life want Vincent to be something he is not? And then there is Robert, a young man who comes to Vincent and reveals his own homosexuality. Vincent is certain of his feelings; he is even more certain that these feelings are not sinful.

What I admired about this book was the structure. Each chapter is a scene, one that does not flow directly into the next chapter and scene. Tine passes. Things change. Vincent becomes more assured. His love for Robert deepens. He stands up to his parents, especially his mother. While not quite episodic, the structure mirrors the way life seems sometimes: disconnected moments that tell our stories. Thanks, Mark, for handing me the book. Thanks for sharing the story of Vincent and Robert with me and with YA readers.

We had a lovely brunch for Thanksgiving. It became a tradition for my family because I am always way too tired after NCTE and ALAN to even think of shopping let alone cooking. Then, to counteract a nap, we headed to the movies to see TWILIGHT. Painful, that was. The residents of the back room loved it, of course. The grown ups had even more heartburn after viewing a movie that failed to live up to the hype or to the book.

Finally finished BREAKING DAWN in audio as well, rounding out my vampire weekend. I had read the other books; this was the first one I opted for in audio format. Perhaps I would have liked it more in text? Not sure. I did think it went on a tad too long. I did not need all the details of the pregnancy at all. I enjoyed the complication of having a child who is not totally human or vampire and thought Bella's coming into her own powers exciting plot points. In audio, I thought the narrator who did Bella's portions missed some opportunities to make it a more interesting listening experience. Jacob's narration had better pacing and voicing. I think perhaps I have my own voices in my head from reading the first three books and Bella's sounded different inside my head. It is something I have been noodling about for my next VOYA column, too.

Back to some reading. I hope to find time the next couple of days to attack the stack from ALAN. Great workshop, Thunderchikin!

I was so tired last night and failed to post about Day 1 of the ALAN workshop. So, let me begin with the opening session this morning. Laurie Halse Anderson (yes, that one, our own LJer) is up on the podium now reading a poem to celebrate the 10th anniversary of SPEAK. They have been set up outside the conference room taping people talking about SPEAK and how it has affected them and the readers they know. She is rocking the joint.

Now, about yesterday. After I got to give the keynote, Tobin Anderson delivered the most intelligent, incredible, riveting speech ever. I am so happy that it will be published in the ALAN Review so I have a chance to read it and think at the same time. Jinny Wolff spoke eloquently about innovation, something she knows a great deal about, of course. Panels with Rene Saldana, Walter Mayes, Lauren Myracle, Matt de la Pena, Catherine Murdock, Rick Riordan, Gail Giles, Ann Dee Ellis, and Nancy Werlin were integrated with speeches by John Green (made of awesome) and Joan Bauer (passion personified) and finally David Lubar who spoke rapid fire with tons of jokes (surprised???).

So, back to listening to Laurie. More after I recover from this wonderful trip.

Here is a photo of Scout enjoying a FedEx box.