Nathan Lane emceed Fridays morning's Children's Book and Author breakfast. As the co-author with Devlin Elliott of Naughty Mabel, illustrated by Dan Krall (S&S Books for Young Readers), Lane filled his remarks with analogies to entertainers (and got a bit bawdy at times). Mabel is the name of his own pet cat. "Mabel does it her way, just like Sinatra!" he explained. A quick study, he compared a picture book to a "mini–one-act play" with scene changes, costume changes and the like.
 |
|
| Nathan Lane, Oliver Jeffers, Rainbow Rowell and James Patterson | |
Oliver Jeffers (The Day the Crayons Came Home, Philomel/Penguin), born in Northern Ireland, spoke of his parents' "mixed marriage," a Catholic to a Protestant. "After the referendum last week, mixed marriage means a man and a woman," he said, exclaiming about how happy he and his fellow Irish citizens were to have passed it. He explained the roots of some of his tales: his grandparents have 23 grandchildren and "called us all Huey," the seeds for his Huey series. Lost and Found was inspired by the true story of a school trip during which a boy climbed into the penguin pen and took one with him; he kept it in a tub overnight until it could be returned the next day. Jeffers also described, as a nine-year-old alter boy, accidentally setting the altar on fire. Luckily, holy water put it out.
James Patterson (the Treasure Hunters, and House of Robots series; Little, Brown Books for Young readers) grew up poor in upstate New York, and his first novel was rejected more than 30 times. Yet today he's in a position to have donated more than $1 million to bookstores with a children's books section, and $1.5 million to libraries. Patterson announced at BEA the launch of a new imprint, Jimmy Books at Little, Brown Books for Young Readers. His motto: "We want everyone who finishes a Jimmy Book to say, 'Give me another book.' " Patterson said his truck driver grandfather gave him great advice: "Remember, when you go over the mountain in the morning, you've gotta be singing." Now, he does.
Rainbow Rowell (author of Carry On, St. Martin's Griffin) left the audience howling. As a child, her thoughts about writing were, "No one gets to do that." She wanted to be a librarian and "tell people what to read." She graduated with a degree in journalism because "you can write and have health insurance." She described writing for the Omaha World Herald fresh out of college. "You all have Beauty Queens," she said, but in the Midwest, "We have Pork Queens." She covered a Western Iowa Pork Queen who was vegetarian and failed to see the irony of her title: "I feel good about pork," said the Queen, "I just don't eat it." Rowell also told attendees about a giant popcorn ball in Sag County, and the use of dynamite to destroy it. It quietly broke in two. "Humiliation for Sag County," Rowell said. "I made sure the people of Omaha knew about it." When Nathan Lane returned to the podium, he told Rowell, "You should be on cable." He added, "And thank you for clearing up what Pork Queens are. Where I come from, they have a whole other meaning." --Jennifer M. Brown