News From the Author

Incredible opportunities in YA and Adult Fiction for Teens is the topic on Sunday Sept 18, opening day of the annual book festival FALL for the BOOK in Northern V irginia. Our host is the bookstore ONE MORE PAGE, 2200 N. Westmoreland Street #101, Arlington, VA. The panel includes the spectrum of hot topics: coming of age, teenage angst, paranormal, and teen romance.  The bookstore invitation included the quip in deference to Catcher, Caught: “Hello there, Holden Caulfield.”

After the YA panel, catch a bite to eat, and swing over to George Mason University to hear best selling author Mary Karr receive her award. The festival website :  http://www.fallforthebook.org/events/calendar.php   CHECK OUT ALL THE FABULOUS AUTHORS and EVENTS for the week ending with STEPHEN KING on Friday night. Most events are free, but not King.

Tomorrow I will be swooning with excitement. I start at the opening ceremony, hear Hawes Spencer announce this year’s fiction contest winners (with a friend in the list), the young writers’ letters to their favorite authors, and then on to panels and readings. Major Pettigrew author is in town, and Kathleen Stockett is speaking during my panel at Northridge with Blue Ridge Writers’ new projects (post-Anthology). Thursday EBook best seller Caroline Leavitt and I share the stage with two other writers and moderator/writer whiz Rachel Unfeker from Writer House at the New Dominion Bookshop at noon. I’m going to hear new poets and novelists who write about novelists and my old friend Marc Leepson and Rick Britton. I’m going to have a Downtown Grill dinner with the Heathsville Books Alive friends. I’m going to greet writers at the OMNI at the VWC table and the Writer House table. I’m going to buy books and talk books and lug them around close to my heart. HOORAH.

Staff wriiter Mary Ann Yin posted her interview of me about Catcher, Caught on the anniversary of Salinger’s death, Jan. 27. Two weeks earlier the review appeared. Here’s the link to the interview.

http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/sarah-collins-honenberger-on-j-d-salinger_b22030

A lifetime body of work, pitched in Southern nuance, and his analysis of Southern literature and writers. Price earned his place in American writing.

Despite the grotesque pulpy heart on the front cover, Blythe Woolston’s first novel grinds into your heart whether you want it to or not. Loa’s lost her little sister Asta with a crippling disability and then her best friend gets hit by a truck. Already on the fringe, Loa connects with a teacher and two boys in her quiet, self-effacing way and finds that she has a place in the universe after all. For a first book, it’s a work of art that even makes outspoken Blythe Woolston smile in spite of herself. Well-deserved award and worth reading.

Kathy Erskine’s YA novel Mockingbird introduces us to Caitlin, a young girl with Asperger’s Syndrome, whose brother has been killed in a school shooting. Grieving, but also struggling with her place at school and with friends, Caitlin’s challenges are heart-rending. Erskine’s light touch resonates beyond the everyday. Teenagers, like my own Daniel Landon in Catcher, Caught, want to understand a world that looks crazy at first glance. Erskine posted her interview of me on her blog. Read more about the year Daniel battles leukemia at: http://tinyurl.com/2drl2tt

Good news (and boy do I need it with the cancer diagnosis and chemo starting today): CATCHER, CAUGHT moved up from quarterfinals (500 out of 5000) to semi-finals (100) on April 15. Read the excerpt and reviews at :

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001UG3A64

If you can leave a comment, the judges will be reading those and considering as they make their decision to end up with 3 finalists for Seattle ceremony third week in May.

My most recently completed manuscript, CATCHER, CAUGHT, has been selected as one of 500 quarterfinalists in over 5000 entries for the AMAZON BREAKTHROUGH NOVEL CONTEST.The novel about a 16 year old boy with leukemia is set in Essex County, VA. In the midst of his illness, Daniel considers Holden Caulfield from Catcher in the Rye his confidant and friend, working through his issues in a similar way and ending up in NYC as Holden did in this coming-of-age story.
Here’s the link to my excerpt, a free download in the Amazon shorts department. All of the excerpts from the quarterfinals are posted. And if you want to read the pitch from each author, click on ‘see more editorial reviews’ on each entry’s page. Comments will be helpful to authors, and judges will read, though they are not making their decision based on the comments of Amazon reviewers.

Here’s my link: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001UG3A64

Hit control and click, it will take you right there for the download if you have an Amazon account. If not, you need to open one to be able to read the entries. Looking forward to reading your comments.

A Prayer for the Dying by Stewart O’Nan

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
A powerful little book along the lines of The Road, but set back in history, a diptheria epidemic in the mid-West. First person, almost conversational to himself as the events unfold. Understated, resonates with graphic images and emotions.

View all my reviews.