ALA 2025

Had such a fantastic time at ALA!!! It was so great meeting so many amazing librarians and seeing so many wonderful publishing and author friends! Here are some of my photos from the weekend...

 

ALA Annual Conference 2025

Very excited to be attending the American Library Association Annual Conference in Philadelphia this weekend! I'll be signing ARCs of THE ENCHANTED GREENHOUSE!!! Will you be there? Here's where to find me!

YALSA's 2024 Quick Picks for Reluctant Young Adult Readers List

Thank you again, YALSA librarians! You've made my day twice now, two days in a row! After learning yesterday that my YA book, THE LAKE HOUSE, made YALSA's 2024 Best Fiction for Young Adults list, I found out today that it also made YALSA's 2024 Quick Picks for Reluctant Young Adult Readers list! I'm thrilled and so grateful.

https://www.ala.org/yalsa/2024-quick-picks-reluctant-young-adult-readers

YALSA's 2024 Best Fiction for Young Adults List

I just found out that my YA book, THE LAKE HOUSE, was selected for YALSA's 2024 Best Fiction for Young Adults list! Thanks so much, YALSA librarians!

https://www.ala.org/yalsa/2024-best-fiction-young-adults

ALA 2017 Schedule

Very excited for ALA this weekend!!! I'll be in Chicago at the American Library Association Annual Conference on both Saturday and Sunday.

On Sat 6/24:
1pm Signing JOURNEY ACROSS THE HIDDEN ISLANDS at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt booth #3111
2pm Signing THE RELUCTANT QUEEN at Hoopla (Midwest Tape) booth #4420

On Sun 6/25:
9am YA Author Coffee Klatch in Room S105
10:30am The 2017 Alex Award Panel in Room W179a, followed by signing THE QUEEN OF BLOOD
1:00pm "Science Fiction/Fantasy Adult Books with YA Appeal" Panel in Exhibit Hall on PopTop Stage, followed by signing THE RELUCTANT QUEEN
2:00pm Signing THE RELUCTANT QUEEN at HarperCollins booth #3611

Hope to see you there!

Newbery and Printz 2010

Snoopy dance of joy for Rebecca Stead and Libba Bray!!!

This morning, Rebecca Stead won the 2010 Newbery Award for her beautifully crafted novel WHEN YOU REACH ME, and Libba Bray won the 2010 Printz Award for her brilliantly hilarious novel GOING BOVINE.

I love it when nice things happen to nice people. Both Rebecca and Libba are awesome people in addition to being fantastic writers.

I first met Rebecca when we were both members of a debut-author group called the Class of 2k7. (Her excellent debut novel FIRST LIGHT came out the same year as my debut novel INTO THE WILD.) She's always been so friendly and sweet and gracious. I was so excited to hear she'd won the Newbery. Bet she was too!

Libba is simply hilarious, both on the page and in person. I've had the pleasure of hanging out with her at various teen author events in Manhattan, most recently at a Teen Author Reading Night where we both read from our books. While the rest of us read our scenes in the usual chronological order, Libba asked the audience to call out page numbers and read a selection of random pages from GOING BOVINE. It was the best reading I've ever heard. And of course, there's this.

So please join me in dancing for Rebecca and Libba, as well as all the other winners and honorees of today's American Library Association awards. See the full list here.

Sometimes the universe gets things right. Well done, ALA.

ALA Trip Report (part 3 of 3)

Monday

7am - Wake up rested. Yay! Sort through various loot from ALA (the American Library Association Annual Conference) and consolidate it in backpack. Very pleased to see all books fit in backpack. Then remember I haven't packed my toiletries. Or clothes.

7:05am - Re-pack.

8:30am - Check out of hotel. Go to hotel restaurant for breakfast. Discover bagel costs $4. Flee before ordering.

9am - Arrive at convention center. The lovely Penguinites let me stow my luggage at their booth -- if not for them, my arms would have fallen off. Not good for typing up blog posts. Or novels.

9:30am - Decide to take field trip... Okay, this part of the day was absolutely awesome. I go to the nearby Barnes & Noble... and they have Into the Wild! My first official non-local store sighting of Into the Wild in the wild (please excuse the pun). I'd heard reports but hadn't seen with my own eyes. But there... on the shelf... three lucious, lovely copies! Snoopy Dance of Joy!

INTO THE WILD in the wild

I sign all their stock, after which they put "autographed copy" stickers on them and arrange them face out.

INTO THE WILD tamed by my pen

Call husband and dance along DC sidewalks.

11am - Back at the conference... meet the lovely people at ALSC and YALSA, who dub me honorary member and give me ribbons to attach to my name badge.

11:15am - Visit the sweet and awesome people at the Mirrorstone booth, who dub me honorary member and give me more ribbons and also teach me the super-secret Mirrorstone hand signal.

Stacy Whitman, Me, Tiffany Trent, Nina Hess, and Shelly Mazzanoble

I heart the Mirrorstone posse. They're all so cool. And their books rock too. (Just read Shelly Mazzanoble's Confessions of a Part-Time Sorceress -- HILARIOUS. Once you read it, you'll want to move to Seattle purely so you can play D&D with Shelly and her friends.)

Noon-ish - Lunch with the wonderful Tiffany Trent.

2pm - More talking and chatting, including with Bruce Coville and Sue Streeter from Full Cast Audio. I also meet and totally gush like a fangirl at Jean Craighead George, who graciously pretends not to notice I'm making a fool of myself.

3pm - More hanging out with Simone and Shannon, who I wish lived in New York so I could see them more often.

4pm - Say good-bye to the Mirrorstone posse and the Penguin folk and head home after one final photo:


(In case you missed the beginning of this trip report, here are links to part 1 and part 2 of my ALA adventure.)

ALA Trip Report (part 2 of 3)

Sunday

6:30am - Wake early to attend the YA Authors Breakfast at ALA, the American Library Association Annual Conference. (Note: I hadn't actually signed up for the breakfast. I'd been so busy prepping for the pub date of Into the Wild that I didn't spend much time planning for the ALA Conference. But how many people would really be getting up so early on a Sunday anyway?)

7:30am - Arrive at convention center. Ask about breakfast. Get blank look.

7:32am - Ask someone else. Am told it's at the Renaissance Hotel. Trot over to hotel.

7:40am - Find breakfast location. It's sold out. It's been sold out for months. Feel like an idiot. The main conference doesn't start until 9! I could have slept two more hours!

7:42am - Decide to take Julie for a walk. Say, "Julie, how would you like to see the White House?" Get odd looks since Julie is the fictional main character of Into the Wild, and I'm talking to a book. Keep walking anyway.

7:55am - Blocks in DC are long.

8:05am - Really long.

8:10am - I'm hungry. Why is there nothing to eat in DC?

8:15am - McDonald's so doesn't count.

8:20am - Ooh, my first famous thing! Civil War Monument. Julie wants to pose.

Julie at the foot of the Civil War Monument

8:25am - The Washington Monument is really far away. White House isn't all that close either. Still hungry. Bet they have food in the White House.

Julie and the Washington Monument

Julie and I in front of some house with a big lawn

8:27am - Lose interest in the whole tourist thing and walk back to Convention Center.

9:15am - Enter ALA. Visit the lovely people in the Penguin booth, including everyone from the prior night plus Stefanie Daehler, Lara Phan, Ben Schrank, and Doug Whiteman.

10-ish - Wander and chat with various people. Score one of the coveted Harry Potter 7 tote bags from Scholastic. I intend to use it at my Eight Cousins event on July 20 (in which I'll be doing a reading/signing for Into the Wild right in the middle of their Harry Potter festivities!).

11-ish - Catch up with very cool author (and fellow Class of 2k7 member) Laura Bowers and very cool uber-blogger and librarian Liz Burns.

12:30pm - John Scalzi reads my blog! Since he's the King of Blogs, this kinda blows my mind. He's also really, really sweet. I had lunch with him, Ann and Jeff VanderMeer (also really, really nice), and Steven Erikson, who told us about the time he (accidentally) peed on a bear.

2-ish - More wandering and chatting...

3pm - Wander and chat with the fantabulous duo of Holly Black and Theo Black.

4pm - Find Shannon Greenland and Simone Elkeles signing books for an enormous line at the YALSA booth. (YALSA is the Young Adult division of the American Library Association.)

Simone, Me, and Shannon

5pm - Take taxi to Westin with Shannon, Simone, and Thais (Shannon's friend from college) to a WWE-sponsored YALSA cocktail party. (Yes, that's right, World Wrestling Entertainment sponsored the YALSA cocktail party as part of their literacy outreach program!)

5:15pm - Discover there are multiple Westins in DC.

5:30pm - Take taxi to another Westin with Shannon, Simone...

6pm - Talk with many marvelous librarians plus the fabulous Diana Peterfreund. Also meet WWE wrestler Chris "Harvard."

7:30pm - Go out for yummy sushi with Shannon, Simone, and Thais. Laugh a lot. (They are all fantastically cool and nice. I adore them.)

10pm - Sleep.

(Tune in tomorrow to read about my final day at ALA... or click here to read part 1 if you missed it.)

Books of Wonder and ALA Trip Report (part 1 of 3)

Saturday

6am - Wake from dream in which I am on a Huck Finn-like raft in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean and I have a stack of copies of Into the Wild that I'm supposed to sign or else the sharks with laser beams strapped to them will shoot me but I don't have a pen so I'm trying to distill the seawater so that I can sign with salt...

6:05am - Pack more pens.


11am - Arrive one hour early for reading/signing at Books of Wonder (Manhattan's best children's bookstore). Admire my book on the front bookshelf. Check to make sure I still have my pens.


11:30am - Eat cupcake with author Staton Rabin, who is very nice plus has a cool hat. Wonder when cupcake-only stores became popular. Why not eclair stores? Or carrot-cake stores?

11:55am - Notice that I will be signing books in the same room as signed first editions of Wizard of Oz, Harry Potter, and the Fellowship of the Ring. Hyperventilate a little. Then notice that the wonderful Books of Wonder staff has provided the authors with extra pens. Feel better.

Noon-ish - All four authors (JT Petty, Ellen Potter, Staton Rabin, and me) talk and/or read, then answer questions. We use a handheld microphone. I am tempted to sing Copa Cabana. I manage to resist, but it's a close call.


12:45pm - Sign books! I have a line!!! And there are even actual kids in it! (Special thanks to Julie Kaplan, the awesome teacher who told many students in Corona about me and to the students who came; special thanks to Leslie Margolis who is so sweet that she bought a copy of Into the Wild even though she's already read it; and special thanks to Penelope who heard me read the same scene twice before but came anyway because she's awesome.)


2pm - Sign the special Books of Wonder notebook. (This is a tradition - every author who has an event at Books of Wonder signs one of these notebooks. Prior notebooks hold signatures from Lloyd Alexander, JK Rowling, Tamora Pierce, etc.) I wish I could draw a picture, but the only thing I know how to draw is a somewhat deranged cartoon bunny. That doesn't seem so appropriate so I stick with just my name.

2:15pm - Arrive at Penn Station, ready to hop on the 3pm train to Washington DC for the ALA (American Library Association) Annual Conference. I'd paid the extra bucks to be on the Acela Express, due to arrive at 5:50pm, so that I can make the Penguin Young Readers Cocktail Party, which starts at 6pm. (Saturday night of ALA, many publishers throw cocktail parties. This will be my very first publisher cocktail party -- at least the first one where I have an actual official invitation and am not crashing -- and I'm determined not to miss it.)

2:20pm - Train is delayed 20 min.

2:55pm - Train is delayed 30 min.

3:05pm - Get on the Regional (slow) train instead.

6:30pm - Arrive in DC and go straight to cocktail party at the Fairmont Hotel.

6:45pm - Someone asks me, "Where's your yellow rose? All the Penguin authors have yellow roses." Feel sad and rose-less.

6:46pm - Steal a spare rose off a grand piano. Feel better.

6:50pm - John Green comes over and congratulates me on the recent release of my book. Gives me his yellow rose as a congratulations present. Now I have two roses. Feel twice as cool.

7-ish - Talk to many librarians, writers, and Penguin folk. No actual penguins are present. Pity. But I did see Judy Blume (from a distance).

8pm - Adjourn to outside patio with several awesome Penguin people (Leila Sales, Rachel Henry, Kathryn Hurley, Alan Walker, Dominique, and Kiwani, who I'm sure spells his name totally differently than I just did, many apologies) and two awesome authors (Simone Elkeles and Shannon Greenland).

10pm - Check into my hotel.

10:30pm - Go to next party in yet another hotel. Walk in to find virtually every YA author I've ever met (plus some I met for the first time, including Marcus Zusak, Debby Garfinkle, Sara Zarr, and Sarah Aronson). Also got to meet Mirrorstone editor Stacy Whitman, who is just as sweet as I thought she'd be.

12:30am - Return to my hotel. Put the yellow roses by my bed so that I'll have rose-scented dreams, rather than shark-filled ones. Sleep.

(Tune in tomorrow for more of Sarah's adventures at ALA...)