Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Even though they're not in the same room, I know they're there...

All three of my children are home sick today. I think only one is faking it. Even though I've banned them from using the computer so I can have free reign, it still changes the atmosphere around here and I find I don't work the same. My eldest has been off all week and I worry she has forgotten how to go to school. I will be re-training her in the subtle arts of school attendance as soon as she is well enough.

I am signed up to do author visits at a number of Auckland City public libraries for NZ book month in September. I am busy inside my head deciding how to approach these visits. Times like these I wish I had one or two more picture book titles out there as reading them all would fill up the time nicely. I certainly have written a couple I am very proud and fond of but they are unpublished and without pictures they don't have the same appeal to a bunch of littlies at your feet. These visits are not like author talks at schools where students might be expected to take an interest in the activity of actually writing stories. At the libraries the key theme will be a love of books. Still, I have a few weeks to come up with a game plan. Of course so much of this is still fairly new to me. Although I've done a few school visits, I have no teaching or library background but I have a few ideas about what I can do to get the children involved.

Today Kristin Nelson blogged about the benefits of Google Alerts and I have already signed myself up. I confess I do regularly google myself and have had some surprising and useful results, discovering new reviews, where my books are being touted online, and finding teaching resources associated with my work amongst other things. All good stuff. Sometimes it can be hard to see the new entries though and Google Alert will hopefully not only save me time and effort but improve my ability to keep tabs on what is happening to my work. Yay the internet.

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