A dash of M.S.G. (Macho Sino Girl)
March 29, 2009
- When I worked with Paula Wiseman at Harcourt Brace nearly a decade ago, I was surprised by her comment, which I paraphrase: "Your style is different from anyone else's."Then I heard it again today in a review in a Scholastic's online tool for teachers:I think frogs must just be boastful creatures because Foo is on a roll, bragging to his friends Mao-Mao and Sue-Lin. But he gets his ...
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March 21, 2009
- Gina and Ryoma Collia-Suzuki live in England and I, in California. We met in Redroom and have visited our homes through photographs. I've seen their beloved porcelain foo dogs and other treasures, placed just so. I've even met their eight sister rats (alas, now down to four). I've flown over their beaches, quarries and river via Google Earth. I got to see their old yew tree (the wood ...
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March 14, 2009
- Hear Belle Yang read Foo Frog in this Book Trailer on Youtube-ribbitBook signing at Hauk Fine Arts in Pacific Grove on April 11th, 11 AM to 2 PM. I bet if I talk tadpoles, your imagination will take you rushing back to your own experiences with anthropomorphic amphibians. If you've never caught a tadpole, I feel immensely sorry for you.When I was getting my blood test yesterday, I told nurse ...
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March 6, 2009
- I have to do it all over again. Kill my great grandfather. A friend tells me I am the reincarnation of Yang Junchen, who died in the middle of the great famine, unleashed by the Great Leap Forward. I came into the world in 1960 on the Island of Taiwan, where food was scanty, but I did not go hungry.I am working on the final chapter of "Forget Sorrow: An Ancestral Tale." My ...
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February 9, 2009
- Tomorrow, February 10th, is the official launch date of “Foo the Flying Frog of Washtub Pond.” With my previous picture books, I was happy on the pub date but not excited the way I am about "Foo." I like all my books and the characters I’ve created, but I am especially fond of Foo Frog, Sue-Lin Salamandar and Mao-Mao Mudpuppy. These three amphibians gave me a laugh out loud ...
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February 5, 2009
- When I was emerging from my illness and started to walk with my dad in the canyon behind our house, my dad whacked to smithereens a beautiful, layered patch of mushrooms growing at the base of a dead pine. I was so mad, I called him names. (He was contrite, but he said, he didn want Mom to slip on them.) At that moment, I decided I'd take up the mushroom identification and ordered my field ...
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February 3, 2009
- I did it. I accomplished what I suggested Jessica Barksdale do. I deleted the people I do not know, or barely know, from Facebook. Now I have sixty-odd people I do enjoy, old friends, new friends I find sympatico, classmates I've not seen in over 30 years, or writers whose words I've come to love through Redroom. I think I might now begin to enjoy Facebook on a limited basis.I must ...
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February 3, 2009
- Moments ago, I received below forwarded message from Terri Debono, the film maker of the PBS documentary, "My Name is Belle." Contrary to what people think, the filmmakers do not get paid for the broadcasts. They are asked to pay $30,000 to have the films promoted on PBS stations. Our budget was small, but we were very lucky to have strong support from Gayle Loeber, director of ...
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January 29, 2009
- As in prose writing, sequential art of the comic book, you can sail into the doldrums when there is not enough information or you haven't found the best way to tell the story visually.I was asked to reprise my father's journey on foot out of China in 1949, so that the rest of "Forget Sorrow: An Ancestral Tale" could be addressed: what happened to his family after the Communist ...
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January 16, 2009
- My Norton editor gave me a one and-a-half month extension on my graphic novel, so what do I do on a gorgeous day like today? I went hunting for mushrooms. I am now writing to crow that I've been officially inducted into the ranks of a mushroom hunter, because I've eaten what I've found.I had been studying them, but not ingesting. My friends, Judie Marks and June Cornea, have been mushroom ...
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