Friday, July 24, 2015

Bublishing is Fun!

Terri at BQB Publishing (which will be releasing A Buss from Lafayette in April, 2016) suggested I sign up at Bublish.com.  She recommended it as a way of giving background information (called "author insights") on Buss.  Since the copy-edited version of Buss is not quite available yet, I decided to post my previous historical novel for young readers, The Riddle of Penncroft Farm, on Bublish, in order to learn how to use the site. I've been having a wonderful time re-reading Riddle and remembering how and why I came to write certain bits of it (or the whole thing, actually).

The Riddle of Penncroft Farm was published in 1989 by Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich.  It has won numerous awards and honors, has remained in print for 26 years, and has sold something like 130,000 copies. Soon after its publication, the International Reading Association chose it to be a Teachers' Choice Selection, for cross-curricular use in schools.  As a result, my story is read in classrooms all across the United States. (To learn more about Riddle, click here: Riddle Info.)



I am delighted to be able to answer some of the questions that I think some of these 130,000 "old" readers or any "new" readers might have about the story.

For example:

What is a riddle and why did I use it in the book (and in the title)?
Where did the original idea for the story come from?
What major plot change did I make after an expert in children's literature read my first draft?


And those are just some of the questions I answered in the first few hours after I opened my Bublish account!

To read my answers, and all those I will be writing soon, please visit My Bublish Page!

Regards,

Dorothea