Awesome Quiltiness

I am on a quilt! Not sitting on a quilt, but in the quilt itself. And not literally me... though I am suddenly picturing a little quilt Sarah frolicking across an applique meadow beneath embroidered clouds. And then I'm chased by geometric triangles that want to chomp me up like Pac-Man, but I defend myself by brandishing the Magic Needle of...

And this is exactly why I outline when I write. Stay on target, Sarah.

Speaking of Pac-Man, why was the ghost Clyde changed to Sue in Ms. Pac-Man?

And speaking of quilts, I want to show you a photo of the quilt I'm in. First, though, a little background:

Last Saturday, I visited Northboro, Massachusetts -- my hometown and the setting of my debut novel, Into the Wild -- for the dedication of an Author/Illustrator Quilt to celebrate the Northborough Free Library's newly renovated Children's Room. Ten authors/illustrators are featured in squares on this quilt: Jan Brett, Marc Brown, Andrew Clements, Tomie dePaola, Sarah Beth Durst (hey, that's me!), Jack Gantos, Modricai Gerstein, Lois Lowry, Lane Smith, and Jane Yolen.

Here's my square (with images based on my novel Into the Wild):


And here's the whole quilt:


How cool is that?

This library is the place where I fell in love with books. Very cool to know that I have a presence there even though I now live in another state. Thanks, Northboro Library, for the lovely day, the lovely quilt, and the lovely memories!

Northborough Free Library Author/Illustrator Quilt

I love libraries in the way that a chocoholic loves a Godiva Easter bunny.

I blame my mother, who took me to the library so often that I was literally the poster child for Kid Obtaining First Library Card:


This photo was taken at the Northboro Library (or more accurately, the Northborough Free Library -- the town has become fancier since I left it, restoring the more formal "ugh" to its name and requiring all citizens to wear cravats).

This is the place where I discovered Diana Wynne Jones, Lloyd Alexander, Ruth Chew, and Tamora Pierce. I remember exactly where the shelves were that held all the Encyclopedia Brown books, and I remember sneaking into the grown-up section to find Watership Down. (I really did sneak. I assume I was afraid an adult would spot me, shout "Under Age Reader!", and a team from the Militant Branch of the ALA would rappel from the windows to capture me.)

This same library appears in chapter 7 of my debut novel, Into the Wild. Julie hides from Cinderella and Goldilocks here, and the Three Blind Mice live in the Children's Room. (The Children's Room actually did have hamsters. I don't think they talked, though. Perhaps after hours...)

Over the past couple years, the Northboro Library underwent major renovations. And now that it's all new and fancy, they've planned a lovely event where they will dedicate an author/illustrator quilt and hang it in the brand new Children's Room. The quilt was created by a group of talented local quilters who incorporated scenes from ten children's books along with quilt pieces signed by the authors or illustrators. I had the honor of contributing my signature when I was last at the library and am absolutely thrilled that a scene from Into the Wild has been included on the quilt.

The Author/Illustrator Quilt Dedication is this Saturday at the new Northboro Library. I'll be there, as will Andrew Clements, the author of Frindle as well as many other wonderful books. Here are the details if you'd like to join us:

Saturday, May 14, 2011 from 11am to 1pm
Author/Illustrator Quilt Dedication
Northborough Free Library
34 Main Street, Northborough, MA

Refreshments will be served (though I cannot promise any Godiva bunnies).

If you're in the area, I hope to see you there!

Polar Bears, Northboro, and Missouri

Thank you, everyone, for all your kind words about ICE and IVY! You guys rock.

As a thank-you, here's a new Random Arctic Fact: a male polar bear's neck is broader than his head. This means it's very tough to put radio collars on them -- collars slip off. So do necklaces, neckties, and cravats, which explains why you seldom see polar bears in fancy restaurants.

Another polar-bear-related tidbit: the mascot for my old elementary school (Lincoln Street School in Northboro, MA) is a polar bear. We didn't have a mascot while I was there. (We also didn't have plastic slides. We had a metal slide that heated to approximately 1,000 degrees in the sun. And we had a jungle gym composed of steel bars over concrete so that if you fell, you were guaranteed to seriously injure yourself.) Anyway, I love the new mascot. I think it's a sign.

The reason that I'm thinking about my elementary school now is that I was there on Tuesday. I also visited the Marion E. Zeh School in Northboro the same day. Zeh's mascot is a zebra, but I love them anyway because they put this on their sign:


That was so cool of them to do. Yes, I know they left off my "h"... But they tell me it was only because they ran out of h's for the sign, which is a pretty awesome excuse, so I totally forgive them, especially given the overall awesomeness of the sign!

I talked with the 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades at Lincoln Street and the 5th grade at Zeh, and I had such a wonderful day. All the students were fantastic. And really creative too. For my talk, I read a scene from OUT OF THE WILD and then did a writing workshop about a way to generate story ideas. They all came up with such awesome ideas. My personal favorite involved flying tacos.

And I have some other non-polar-bear-related news to share too: INTO THE WILD has been nominated for a 2009-2010 Truman Readers Award from the Missouri Association of School Librarians!! Huge thanks to GreenBeanTeenQueen for letting me know about this! I'm so excited, and am now feeling especially fond of Missouri, despite the state's distinct lack of polar bears...

Readercon, Northboro Library, and Fitchburg Trip Report

One Reason Why I'm Glad I'm a Writer

After arriving at my dad's house last Thursday night...

Me: "I have to wake up early tomorrow. Maybe I'll see you before you leave for work?"

Dad: "What time are you leaving?"

Me: "My talk is at 8:30 in Fitchburg. I think I'm going to leave by 7. What time do you leave for work?"

Dad: "5:30."

More Reasons Why I'm Glad I'm a Writer

This weekend, I had three book events:

AP Institute at Fitchburg State College

On Friday morning, I spoke with a class at an AP teacher training institute and had the chance to thank one of my high school English teachers (Ms. Tsang, who was teaching the class) for believing in me and encouraging me. How often do you get to say thanks to someone like that? I'm so pleased I was able to do this.

Northboro Free Library

On Friday afternoon, I talked about and read from Out of the Wild at the Northboro Free Library (my childhood library and the library that appears in chapter seven of Into the Wild). I think this was one of my absolute favorite book events. To understand why, check out this photo of the audience:

My Heroes

There are more people on the sides (maybe four or five more girls on either side) that I didn't manage to fit in the photo. But the cool thing isn't just the size of the audience on a random Friday afternoon. No, the cool thing is this:

None of these people are related to me.

Okay, one of them is a childhood friend who I haven't seen since fifth grade, but the rest... They came because they like my books. Or because the librarians bribed them to come so that I wouldn't feel unloved. Either way, I want to thank everyone who came. You made it a really special day for me. I hope that you use the bribe money to purchase something extra-nice for yourself. Like a chandelier composed entirely of gummy bears. (Seriously. It exists. How awesome is that?)

Readercon

Friday evening, I began my weekend as a program participant at Readercon. (Readercon is a Boston-area science fiction and fantasy convention with an emphasis on books -- in other words, it's not about costumes, LARPs, filking, or panels about Babylon 5, but it is about 2am discussions on the narrative function of werewolves.)

I did seven programming items (a reading, an autographing, a kaffeeklatsch, and three panels) and talked with precisely one bajillion people over the course of the weekend. I had a fantastic time.

One highlight was my kaffeeklatsch (a "meet-the-author" session, in which con-goers can sign up to chat for an hour with a particular author). People came! I was shocked. And they even laughed at my jokes, which is even more shocking since one thing I learned from school visits is that my sense of humor is precisely fourth grade. Again, I suspect the Northboro librarians of bribing people...

Another highlight was hanging out with the YA author brigade. Friday night, I was up to the wee hours with Holly Black, Theo Black, Cassandra Clare, Josh, and Sarah Rees Brennan discussing werewolves and other pressing issues. Saturday evening, I had a lovely time out to dinner with Sarah, who talks exactly like her hilarious blog and is super-awesome. And Saturday afternoon, after a YA panel, a group of us lingered in the panel room for about two hours talking about writing and books. Very cool and very fun.

The YA Brigade (Cassandra Clare, Nancy Werlin, Me, Holly Black, Sarah Rees Brennan)

From beginning to end, it was a great weekend. I met lots of really fun and friendly people (way too many to even try to list them all here) and hung out with lots of friends, both old and new.

Readercon, Northboro Library, and Fitchburg State

This Friday, July 18th, I'm heading up to Massachusetts for not one, not two, but THREE book events. Yes, three. This is a new record for me. Hmmm, perhaps I've overbooked myself ever so slightly...

8:30am - Fitchburg State College

My high school English teacher, Ms. Tsang, is giving a course at an AP teacher training institute (teaching teachers to teach AP English) and invited me to be a guest speaker. Should be very cool.

2pm - Northboro Library (17 Lyman St, Northboro, MA)

I've been looking forward to this for a while. I'm doing a library visit in Northboro (my hometown and the setting for Into the Wild and Out of the Wild) at the library where I spent a large fraction of my childhood. I'm really, really excited about this event. The Northboro Library is where I learned to love books. It's where I discovered Lloyd Alexander and Tamora Pierce and David Eddings and Diane Duane and Diana Wynne Jones and... My mom used to take my brother and me there all the time, and we'd leave with this huge L.L. Bean bag full of books. (My mom eventually had to put limits on me, or I would have walked out with entire shelves straped to my back. And by "limits" I don't mean "you can take one." I mean, "Sarah, please try to limit yourself to twenty.")

And check this out. I've even got a picture of myself, at age four, signing up to get my first library card at the Northboro Library. A newspaper photographer happened to be there at the time, covering some sort of card registration drive at the library, and I happened to be absolutely adorable, so I got my picture in the paper! And my mom kept the article for the past thirty years! Take a look:

Hey, that's me!

Plus, this library also features prominently in Into the Wild -- an entire chapter takes place there! So, yeah, I'm kinda excited about this event. I'll be talking about, reading from, and signing copies of my books. And I'll probably tell a few embarrassing tales from my childhood. So, if you're in Northboro this Friday (7/18) at 2pm, come on by!

6pm (and the rest of the weekend) - Readercon

After Northboro, I'm hightailing it (I love that expression -- where does it come from?) over to the Marriott in Burlington, MA for Readercon. Readercon is a Boston-area fantasy and science fiction convention with an emphasis on literature. It's attended by lots of excellent authors and is always well-run and well-organized. I'm really thrilled with my schedule this year. My first event of the weekend is a reading from Out of the Wild at 6pm (thus completing my book triathalon). Here's my full schedule:

Sarah at Readercon 2008:

* Reading - Fri. July 18, 6pm - Sarah Beth Durst

* Autographing - Sat. July 19, 11am - Ellen Datlow, Sarah Beth Durst

* Panel - Sat. July 19, 1pm - Beth Bernobich, Suzy McKee Charnas, Michael J. Daley, Sarah Beth Durst, Walter H. Hunt, Ellen Kushner, Judith Moffett - "Are You Writing a Sequel?"

* Panel - Sat. July 19, 3pm - Judith Berman, Cassandra Clare, Michael J. Daley, Sarah Beth Durst, Charles Oberndorf, Nancy Werlin - "Gatekeepers to the World of Letters"

* Workshop - Sun. July 20, 10am - Kay Kenyon, Sarah Beth Durst, Walter H. Hunt, Elaine Isaak - "Stop Making Sense: Next Stage Dialog"

* Kaffeeklatsch - Sun July 20, 11am - Paolo Bacigalupi, Sarah Beth Durst

* Panel - Sun July 20, 1pm - Shira Daemon, Sarah Beth Durst, Scott Edelman, Louise Marley, Ann Tonsor Zeddies - "Finding Hamster Huey's Head: The Nature of the Childhood Favorite Story"

And after that, I collapse into a little puddle of tired (but happy) Sarah.

Melican Middle School (Plus Borders) Trip Report

After my visit to Algonquin High School, I spent two days visiting Melican Middle School in Northboro, MA. This involved another first for me -- signing not only books, but body parts too! Two palms, a half-dozen arms, and one forehead. No one ever asked me to sign a body part before. I felt like a rock star. Well, sorta...

I also felt unprepared -- I don't own an appropriate body-part-signing pen. My usual purple book-signing pen doesn't cut it. The ink doesn't stick. But permanent marker seems a bit... permanent. And with a signature, it's not like you can say, "It wasn't me." Does anyone have any suggestions? Is there a kind of pen that signs well on skin but won't annoy parents? Does the fact that I'm worrying about this make me a complete dork? Is this ever even going to be an issue again?

Just in case, perhaps I should do some testing. When I started signing books, I bought about a dozen different purple pens and tested them out on a book that I didn't like very much. My pen of choice: the Pilot G-2. I could do the same with body pens. Just pick a body part I don't like to test them on. Like my chin. I'm not a fan of my chin, though perhaps that's not the best choice for signature experimentation...

I'd visited this school before (minus any body-part signatures). In October, I spoke with the sixth grade. This time, I came to talk to the seventh and eighth grades. I did ten presentations over the course of two days, and I had lunch in the cafeteria with the students in between talks. It's really a wonderful school filled with great students and teachers.

It's also the school that the main character in INTO THE WILD attends! Chapter three starts right outside at the bus pick-up area. Right here:

Julie's School

I think this is cool. During this visit, I talked with people who would be in Julie's classes, if she weren't, y'know, fictional and stuff.

I also discovered that the Curriculum Coordinator at Melican, Nancy Payne, taught GAIN (the Gifted and Talented program) at Lincoln Street Elementary School when I was a student there! I didn't make the connection during my last visit because when she was my teacher, I called her Mrs. Payne and now I call her Nancy. Totally different. (Yeah, I totally wouldn't qualify for the gifted program any more.) We reminisced about the time when we all dressed up as figures from famous paintings, and there was a fire drill and one of the fifth grade boys waltzed out of the school as Whistler's Mother, complete with black dress and high heels.

Me and Nancy Payne

In between the two days at Melican, I did a book signing at the Borders in Shrewsbury. I love this Borders. Everyone who works there has been so nice to me. And they give me hot chocolate. I really like hot chocolate. [Brief digression: Once, during a trip to Spain, my husband and I tried to order hot chocolate. Our Spanish is limited to what you learn on Sesame Street, but after a few funny looks, the waiter brought us two cups of very thick hot chocolate. We drank it. The next morning at breakfast, we were served churros with chocolate (donut-like sticks that you dip in chocolate), and we realized that what we'd thought was hot chocolate was actually the chocolate dip for the churros. Yes, we drank the dip. Again, not so "gifted" any more.]

Anyway, this was my very last book event for 2007! If you'd like to see any of my trip reports from other events, I've put links for each event on the Appearances page of my website. Hope you all are having a wonderful last few days of 2007!

Algonquin Regional High School - Trip Report

Happy Holidays everyone!!! The holidays have got me a bit behind on my blogging -- way too much time spent buying last-minute gifts at the mall!! -- but I wanted to tell you all about my great trip up to Massachusetts last week. So let's start with last Tuesday...

Last Tuesday, I visited Algonquin Regional High School in Northboro, Massachusetts. It was my very first high school visit, and I LOVED it. Except for the fact that high school starts really, really early. Here's a quick recap of my day:

5:30am - Alarm beeps. Attempt to shut off alarm. Knock Chapstick off table. Cannot live without Chapstick. Dive under bed to search for Chapstick which has rolled across the room and under the dresser. Flatten onto floor. Find Chapstick. Return to bed.

5:45am - Alarm beeps again. Look at window. It's dark. Also, the shade is down. The two things, while seemingly related, are not. It's actually dark outside, and the alarm is beeping. Shut off alarm. Drag self out of bed and into shower.

6:15am - Agonize over whether I should wear my black pants or my black pants. Decide on my black pants. (Yes, I obsess over minutiae when I'm nervous. Not to imply that pants are minutiae. On the contrary, clothing oneself is key to a successful book event.)

6:30am - Get in car. Notice thermometer in car says 6. Just 6. Think it's broken.

6:45am - Drive from Worcester to Northboro. Eat Christmas cookies for breakfast en route. Nutritious and delicious. Thermometer now says 0.

7:00am - Arrive at Algonquin. Unsure if queasiness is due to nerves or cookies. Am met by my fabulous host, Algonquin librarian Cheryl Lewis.

7:15am - Set up in library classroom. (Setting up involves propping two books up on stands, finding my notes, and checking to make sure I'm still wearing pants.)

7:30am - Give myself a pep talk: You can do this. You're smart enough, you're strong enough, and you've got enough gel in your hair.

7:35am - First presentation/workshop: Creating Characters. In the workshop part, we develop new motivations for Cinderella and Little Red Riding Hood. My personal favorite: Cinderella is petrified that the prince will step on her glass slipper as she dances. I think this is a completely reasonable fear. Her shoes are glass. This is not a sensible fashion choice. How do you dance in glass shoes? There's no support. No cushioning. Poor girl's feet must be a mess of blisters by the end of the night.

That should totally have been how he recognized her: seeks out his bride based on blisters. Really, it doesn't make a lick of sense that he seeks out his future bride based on shoe size. Lots of people have the same shoe size -- hence the whole concept of a shoe size. Even if hers are really small, there should be some eight-year-olds running around with similarly petite feet... okay, I'm digressing.

9:05am - Second presentation/workshop: The Joy of Revising. For the workshop portion of this talk, I ask everyone to write the worst sentence they could possibly write, and then everyone votes on the worst and works on that one. Some of my favorites: "My cat is fat." "Frank do be cool." "The purple shirt is purple."

10:10am - Third presentation/workshop: also the Joy of Revising. See above.

In the question-and-answer portion of the talk, a student asks if I've never met a fairy. I haven't. (I did once receive a letter from the Tooth Fairy, though. She said she had brown curly hair like my mom, and I thought this was quite an extraordinary coincidence.)

Afterwards, learn that students in one of the prior classes have nicknamed me the Fairy Woman, which explains the student's question. I've never had a nickname before. I like it. Wish the title came with wings. I really want wings. I know what you're thinking: how will she ever find clothes that fit if she has wings? Well, if I had wings, I'd clearly be famous and asked to endorse many airlines and other flight-related products and therefore be able to afford designer wing-friendly clothing. Or else I'd be locked up in a research lab and dissected.

11:30am - Lunch with Cheryl Lewis. Turkey artichoke sandwiches and very fun conversation. Outside, it's now 25 and feels quite balmy. Plus the sun has risen. And I'm still wearing pants. Yay!

12:35pm - Fourth presentation/workshop: How-I-wrote Into the Wild plus a workshop on point-of-view, during which I retell Snow White (complete with my favorite ending: the evil queen dances to death in red-hot iron shoes at Snow White's wedding, and my major complaints: what's up with the prince liking the dead girl, and why is Snow White not brain-dead?). The students share some great retellings of the Snow White wedding scene.

2:00pm - Meet with the Algonquin Regional High School Book Club. All the members had read Into the Wild -- it was their December book. See, here's the lovely bulletin board with all their books, including Into the Wild:

Looky, looky, that's my booky!!!

Chat for an hour. So much fun! The time flies by. I could have talked with them for the rest of the day. They were awesome.

3:15pm - Stay late to talk to one of the book club members, who had questions about publishing. (Really, that is one of the primary reasons that I do school visits: to be able to tell kids who want to write, "I did it; you can too.")

So that was my day! I'll blog soon about the following two days, which involved school visits to Melican Middle School and a book signing at the Borders in Shrewsbury, MA.

Another Massachusetts Trip!

I'm heading up to Massachusetts again for more book fun! On Tuesday, I'll be visiting Algonquin Regional High School in Northboro, MA (the town where I grew up and where INTO THE WILD is set). On Wednesday and Thursday, I'll be returning to Melican Middle School in Northboro. (In October, I visited their sixth grade; this week, I'm visiting the seventh and eighth grades.)

I'll also be doing a bookstore signing while I'm there. On Wednesday, December 19th, I'll be signing copies of INTO THE WILD at the Borders in Shrewsbury, MA. (That's the one on Route 9.) Here are the key details:

Wednesday, December 19th from 3-5pm
Borders Shrewsbury - Signing
476 Boston Turnpike, Shrewsbury, MA

If you're in the area on Wednesday, please stop by and say hi!

Northboro School Visits (Part 5 of 5): Melican

On the fifth and final day of my Northboro Schools adventure, I went to Melican Middle School to speak with lots and lots of sixth graders. Here's a photo of me speaking. I don't know why I have my hand on my stomach. I think I'm reminding myself to stand up straight.

Can YOU rub your belly and give a presentation at the same time???

Aside from being awesome in its own right, this visit was super-awesome because this school is my main character Julie's middle school. In my book, Julie is a seventh grader at Northboro Middle School (which is what Melican was called in my day) and part of the book is set in this very school! I loved being able to tell the students that chapter three starts right here!

And that concludes my Week of Awesomeness. I did a total of 20 presentations and talked with 600-700 students. I ate a chicken patty sandwich that tasted exactly the same as it did when I was in elementary school (not bad, actually -- I always kind of liked chicken patty sandwich days. Now shephard's pie is another story...). I visited the Agway rooster and drove past the former Dairy Hut (now Beezer's) and the White Cliffs Restaurant (all locations in INTO THE WILD). And I only cried a couple of times ... all very happy tears.

Thank you so much to all the students, teachers, librarians, PTO enrichment coordinators, principals, booksellers, and everyone else who made this fabulous week possible!

Northboro School Visits (Part 4 of 5): Proctor

On the Thursday, I visited Proctor School in Northboro. To my ultimate embarrassment, I got lost on the way. (I swear it didn't look like a dead end on the map!) Lost in my own hometown. Sheesh. Luckily, though, I tend to leave for places ridiculously early -- I'm the one who shows up at the airport three hours before the flight -- so I was perfectly on time.

Like Lincoln Street, Proctor had an awesome surprise for me. I set up for my presentation in the library, the third graders walk in with their teachers, and I turn around and see that one of their teachers went to elementary school with me!

Laurie McCabe and Me

It was very cool to have someone from my Northboro elementary school days right there in the audience. Kind of gave a full-circle sort of feel to the day. We last saw each other back in fifth grade, when I was first deciding that I wanted to be a writer.

Northboro School Visits (Part 3 of 5): Lincoln Street

Day three, I visited Lincoln Street School. This was my elementary school. And this was what I saw as I drove up to the school:

Most Awesome Sign Ever

I promptly burst into tears.

I sat in the parking lot for a few minutes, composing myself and reminiscing about the playground (we used to play jumprope over there and Electricity on the manhole covers over there, the girls used to chase the boys around that tree, my friend Gillian and I used to make little houses out of dandelions just over there...). Then I got out of the car and took pictures of the sign. I even figured out how to send a photo with my cell phone so that my husband could see the sign.

Inside, the school looked exactly the same as it did when I went there. Same walls, same floor, same everything, except that the curtain in the cafetorium stage is now blue instead of the very attractive 1970s brown print. I remembered that I was Mrs. Rabbit in our fifth grade play on that stage. I even remembered the lyrics to the Mrs. Rabbit song (which meant that pretty much the entire day, my brain was singing, "Oh, I am Mrs. Rabbit, and I say hello to you!")

I was in school here when I decided that I wanted to become a writer. I wrote my very first story in classroom number 1, Mr. Bostock's fifth grade class. He was the teacher who first encouraged me to write. He's directly responsible for who I am today.

And I got to thank him in person. He's retired now, but his daughter-in-law teaches fourth grade at Lincoln Street School, so he came in to her classroom when I was between presentations. Of course, I nearly cried. It was so phenomenally awesome to be able to say thank you to someone who had such a profound influence on my life.

Mr. Bostock and Me

I then went on to do two more presentations. It was so cool talking to the students there and thinking all the time, "I was you." (And then thinking: "Oh, I am Mrs. Rabbit, and I say hello to you...")

Northboro School Visits (Part 2 of 5): Peaslee

On day two of my Week of Awesomeness, I visited Peaslee School in Northboro. Here's a photo of me and the very awesome library teacher Nancy Kellner at the entrance to Peaslee:

Nancy and Me in Peaslee School

One of the highlights from this day was the book report frogs. "What are book report frogs?" you ask. Well, I'll show you:

Book Report Frog #1

Book Report Frog #2

When the students came back from summer vacation, one of the teachers had each student in her class choose one book they read over the summer and write a book report about it. They wrote them up on cut-out drawings of frogs on lilypads. Two (TWO!!!) students did their reports on INTO THE WILD. How awesome is that? I'm now suddenly much more fond of frogs than I ever was.

Not that I ever really disliked frogs. I'm wary of toads, though, due to the fact that I once stepped on one. Completely accidental, but I've always had this vague fear that someday his kindred will seek their revenge...

Anyway, Tuesday didn't end with the end of school. That evening, Nancy Kellner and I stopped by Innovations, the hair salon in the center of Northboro that was the model for Rapunzel's Hair Salon. Two of the same people work there, and they haven't aged a bit, which makes me suspicious that they really are fairy-tale characters in hiding...

Nancy and I then met Leigh King, the super-nice librarian from Lincoln Street School, for dinner at a restaurant near the Agway rooster. Agway is closed now and no one knows how long the rooster will be left to roost here so we took pictures:

Leigh, Me, and the Rooster

Nancy, Me, and the Rooster

Northboro School Visits (Part 1 of 5): Zeh

I am hereby dubbing last week my Week of Awesomeness. Last week, I drove up to Northboro, Massachusetts (my hometown and the setting for INTO THE WILD), for a week of school visits. I visited all four elementary schools plus the middle school in Northboro (one school per day). I gave a total of twenty presentations and met 600-700 kids. It was AWESOME.

My first stop was Zeh School, which used to be Oxford Academy when I lived in Northboro. I learned two important things on this first day:

1) The elementary schools in Northboro now have mascots. (Zeh is zebras, Peaslee is pandas, Lincoln Street is polar bears, and Proctor is penguins.) This makes them far cooler than they were when I went there because it opens up the door to some rich, eccentric alum someday donating an actual zebra, panda, polar bear, or penguin to be housed in the school, which would be AWESOME.

2) I love school visits. This was a somewhat shocking discovery for me, given that the mere thought of doing an announcement in assembly in high school would turn me into a quivering mass of jelly. But I think they're really fun. I love talking about writing and telling students why I think it's the most magical thing in the world. I love the looks of horror on the students' faces when I tell them I did 30 drafts of INTO THE WILD. And I love meeting kids and answering questions and signing books and... well, all of it.

Best moment at Zeh School was when I came into the library about ten minutes early for my presentation. A class was in there so I snuck into the back and sat quietly in a seat behind a pillar. A few seconds later, I see a face pop around the pillar and then pop back. Then another. And another, until about a dozen kids are all peeking out at me, whispering, "It's her! It's her!" Kind of made me feel like a rock star. Also made me feel like looking behind me to see who they were talking about.

Northboro (Part 7 of 7)

Last but not least on my photo-tour of locations from INTO THE WILD... Bancroft Tower! I don't want to give away any spoilers by saying how this appears in the book... but if you recall that this is a book about Rapunzel's daughter... and you're at all familiar with Rapunzel's fairy tale... and her famous high-rise accommodations... I think you'll figure it out... :)

Bancroft Tower (Isn't it just perfect?!)

Me, my Postcard, and the Tower

Bancroft Tower is actually in Worcester, the city near Julie's hometown of Northboro. When I was growing up, Forum Theater used to use it as the setting for Shakespeare-in-the-Park.

You've probably noticed that in many of the pictures on this photo-tour I'm holding up a postcard of the cover art for INTO THE WILD. The idea was to give this postcard a tour of all the sites from the book. While that may sound a bit odd, it was a lot of fun to do. It was also something of an homage to a similar kind of photo-tour that my husband and I did when we got engaged. We were in England at the time, so we visited all the tourist spots in London and took photos of my hand with the engagement ring held up in front of Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, Tower of London... Yeah, we're kind of cute. Or dorky. Or both.

I'll be posting soon about my week of school visits in Northboro. Thanks for joining me on this INTO THE WILD tour!

Northboro (Part 6 of 7)

Paris has its Eiffel Tower. St. Louis has its Arch. San Francisco has its Golden Gate Bridge. And Northboro (my hometown and the setting for INTO THE WILD) has...

... the Agway rooster!

The Agway Rooster

I'm not the only one who thinks the rooster is emblematic of Northboro. When the Boston Globe ran an article about me and the book last July, I offered them a whole bunch of photos. It was this picture of me in front of the Agway rooster that they decided to print with the article!

Rooster and Me

I'm told that Agway is closing soon, which makes me sad. Many of the locations in INTO THE WILD already only exist inside the book. The Dew Drop Inn closed when I was in elementary school. The local warehouse store, Spag's, is now no longer Spag's. The Dairy Hut is now called Beezers. But these places are still part of the Northboro that's in my heart, which is why I put them in the book.

Northboro (Part 5 of 7)

The photo-tour of sites from INTO THE WILD continues...

Here is the exact spot where Julie enters the Wild:


I'm not going to go into details here because I don't want to give any spoilers, but this is looking down West Street from the intersection of West and Crawford in Northboro, Massachusetts. Picture this as you read chapters nine and ten.

Northboro (Part 4 of 7)

Continuing our photo-tour of Northboro... In chapter seven, Julie runs into this library:

Northboro Public Library

... and ducks behind the book return box inside this entryway:

Side Entrance to Library

I went to this library constantly when I was growing up. I have clear memories of discovering Trixie Belden in this library. And Ruth Chew. And Lloyd Alexander. And the book that I took out most often of all: Alanna by Tamora Pierce. My friend Gillian loaned me that book in fifth grade (not-so-coincidentally, the same year that I decided that I wanted to be a writer). I remember being very nervous to have a book that was checked out to someone else. If I failed to return it... disaster!

There's harsh punishment if you are at fault for not returning a friend's book. First, the library gargoyles (all libraries have them, even if they're not visible) taunt you. Next, the Cat in the Hat trashes your house, and all the rabbits from Watership Down eat your entire yard...

Anyway, I used to take out so many books from this library that my mom had to institute a rule simply to keep her back from breaking: I could only take out as many books as I could carry. So I got really good at stretching out my arms and fitting a zillion books between my outstretched fingertips and my chin.

They recently started a major renovation project for the Northboro Public Library, so it is currently under construction. In a year or two, it will look totally different from how both Julie and I remember it. But it will still house Lloyd Alexander, Tamora Pierce, Ruth Chew... and now Sarah Beth Durst!!! OMG, that's such a cool thought. There could be some kid in Northboro taking my book out of that very library that I went to and maybe thinking to him/herself, "I want to be a writer too..."

Northboro (Part 3 of 7)

Today's Northboro photo features the gas station that Julie sees on TV in chapter 5 and in person in chapter 6 of INTO THE WILD...

Gas Station (pre-Wild)

"Premium unleaded was now next to an oak tree instead of a window squeegee dispenser. Vines were twisted around the pump nozzles. Moss covered the credit card displays. Julie leaned closer to the TV. Was that moss spreading? The TV focused on the pavement. Green (oddly vibrant for October) advanced across the blacktop like an army of worms. Tendrils snaked forward, and the asphalt cracked. Thicker vines shot into the cracks, widening the splits. The street crumbled."

Northboro (Part 2 of 7)

As I said in the prior entry, I'm going to be in Northboro, MA, visiting schools all week. I'm really, really, really excited about this. Northboro is the town I grew up in. It's the place where I started writing. And it's my main character's hometown too.

Julie Marchen lives on West Street. Her friend Gillian lives around the corner on Crawford Street (also coincidentally, in the same house that I grew up in). They eat extra-cheesy pizza from the Northboro House of Pizza and drink cherry Slush Puppies from Lowe's Meat Market. They buy school supplies and toothpaste at the CVS next to Julie's mom's hair salon, they see the Agway rooster every day, and they attend Melican Middle School...

Today's photo from Northboro is Julie's school (featured in chapter three of INTO THE WILD):

Julie's School

I'll be visiting Melican on Friday.

When I lived in Northboro, it was actually just called the Northboro Middle School. "Melican" is a new addition to the name. You may also note that the town is spelled "Northborough" on the sign. Northborough was always the official name of the town, but we always dropped the "ugh." Not sure when the "ugh" came back into fashion. Guess today's Northboro(ugh) residents are much classier than we were. :)

Northboro (Part 1 of 7)

I'm in Northboro!!!

I know what you're thinking: Why the three exclamation points? (Or perhaps you're thinking: When is the next season of Project Runway? Should I buy new socks? If mice could talk, what would they say?) The three exclamation points are due to the fact that I grew up in Northboro, MA. I lived there from birth until college. By some crazy coincidence, it's also the town that is transformed into a fairy-tale kingdom in INTO THE WILD. I have five back-to-back school visits in Northboro this week:

Monday 10/22: Zeh School
Tuesday 10/23: Peaslee School
Wednesday 10/24: Lincoln Street School (my old elementary school!)
Thursday 10/25: Proctor School
Friday 10/26: Melican Middle School

So in honor of these school visits, I thought I'd do a series of blog posts with photos of locales featured in INTO THE WILD. First up: Rapunzel's Hair Salon! This is the salon owned by Julie's mother. I got my hair cut at this place for twenty years.

Rapunzel's Hair Salon

Yes, in the real world, it's called Innovations, but that's just because in the real world, Rapunzel is a bit sneakier about how she uses her name. :)