VS Grenier ~ Award-Winning Author, Speaker & Podcaster

TC&TBC The Children's and Teens' Book Connection Author Spotlight: Babysitting SugarPaw by VS Grenier Read an Excerpt! Learn more about my book! Read Reviews! Follow the Babysitting SugarPaw virtual book tour! Tuesday, December 7 Guest blogging at Life in the First Draft Book reviewed at The Phantom Paragrapher Wednesday, December 8 Book reviewed at I Am A Reader, Not A Writer Book reviewed at Review from Here Thursday, December 9 Book reviewed and giveaway at A Cozy Reader’s Corner Reviews Friday, December 10 Author interviewed at The Hot Author Report Guest blogging at The Children’s and Teens’ Book Connection Monday, December 13 Guest blogging at Lori’s Reading Corner Tuesday, December 14 Book reviewed at Book Reviews by Molly Wednesday, December 15 Book reviewed at 4 the Love of Books Thursday, December 16 Book reviewed and giveaway at Candid, Clever & Cost-Effective Friday, December 17 Book reviewed Ohio Girl Talks   Learn more at http://

For Immediate Release J.D Holiday Guest Author on RRRadio-RFK: Stories for Children –December 6th   Come listen in at RRRadio’s newest show, RFK: Stories for Children as the hosts (VS Grenier, D.M. Cunningham and Tiffany Strelitz Haber) chat with J.D. Holiday about her newest book “The Great Snowball Escapade,” and what it has been like doing the World of Ink Author/Book Virtual Tour. J.D. Holiday will also be sharing writing tips, trials and tribulations of the writer’s life. The show will be live at 11am MST (10am PST, Noon Central and 1pm EST). You can tune in at the RRRadio’s site at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/rrradio or you can listen/call in at (646) 595-4478. In addition, Stories for Children Publishing will be touring J.D. Holiday’s book, “The Great Snowball Escapade,” all month long. You can find the World of Ink Author/Book Tour schedule at http://storiesforchildrenpublishing.com/J_D_Holiday_WorldofInkTour.aspx . Make sure to stop by and interact with both the h

J.D. Holiday is the author and illustrator of two children’s books: Janoose the Goose, picture book and a chapter book for six to eight year olds, THE GREAT SNOWBALL ESCAPADE. A chapbook of her short stories called, Trespasses was published in 1994 and she has had short stories printed in literary magazines and numerous articles about writing and publishing published.  She is a member of both The Society of Children’s Writers and Illustrators, (SCBWI) and Small Publishers of North America, (SPAN.)  J.D. Holiday lives in the Delaware Valley of Pennsylvania. VS : I want to thank you for being my guest here on The Writing Mama today. It is so exciting because you are my first World of Ink Tour Guest. It’s been a fun couple of days and the tour is only getting started. Okay, so I know your children are grown and out of the house, but I’m sure you’ve had to balance your writing life around them at one time or another. I know being a parent and writer can be hard and I find myself as

Join me and my children’s picture book,  Babysitting SugarPaw (Halo Publishing Int., July 2009), as we virtually tour the blogosphere in December on our first virtual book tour with Pump Up Your Book . About Babysitting SugarPaw A little bear named SugarPaw hopes to get rid of his babysitter, Bonnie Whiskers, by getting her into trouble after making changes to his rules chart. As this fun loving story unfolds, SugarPaw learns about honesty and friendship. This book will delight three-to-eight-year-old readers, especially those who like to create mischief. Read an Excerpt! Bonnie Whiskers never babysat for the Bears before. Hearing SugarPaw cry out, “Don’t go!” made her worry. She took a deep breath and knocked on the door. Here’s what reviewers are saying about Babysitting SugarPaw! “Children will love to read about the mischievous antics of SugarPaw, who doesn’t want to be babysat. Will Bonnie, a first-time babysitter, be able to keep SugarPaw out of mischief until h

~World of Ink Tour Schedule for J.D. Holiday~   December 1st  The Product Review Place http://productreviewplace.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?user=0lnk96wyqr6ya December 2nd Book Marketing Network http://thebookmarketingnetwork.com/profiles/blog/list?user=VSGrenier&xgs=1&xg_source=msg_share_url December 3rd The Writing Mama http://thewritingmama.blogspot.com December 4th VBT-Writers On The Move http://vbt-writersonthemove.blogspot.com/ December 5th Utah Children's Writer Blog http://utahchildrenswriters.blogspot.com/ December 6th RRRadio-Stories for Children with hosts: VS Grenier, D.M. Cunningham, Tiffany Strelitz Haber and Beth Navarro. Live Radio Interview at 11am MST (10am PST, Noon Central and 1pm EST) http://www.blogtalkradio.com/rrradio Call in number (646) 595-4478 December 7th KidsRead Blog http://kidsreads.wordpress.com/ December 8th Stories for Children Magazine FG Interview http://storiesforchildrenmagazine.org/pastfeaturedguests.asp

by Shery Ma Belle Arrieta-Russ (mailto:shery@writesparks.com) There are many ways you can generate ideas you can use for your stories, articles  and other creative pieces. Start with the three ways given below: 1. Put Your 5 Senses to Work A simple but effective way to generate fresh ideas from a single concept, idea or  object is to describe or illustrate it using the 5 senses -- sight, smell, touch,  taste, sound. For you to do: Generate 5 specific images or concrete examples (one example for  each sense) for the following: - vindication (what's the smell of vindication? how does it taste? how does it  sound? what does it look like? how does it feel?) - hesitation - celebration 2. Take Advantage of Your Conflicts Conflict is a part of life. It's also a source of creativity. You only need to  look at yourself and examine your experiences to come up with ideas based on  conflicts. For you to do: What's stopping you from doing something? Who is in the w

Kevin McNamee is a writer and poet living in Yonkers, NY.   He primarily writes for the children’s market.  He has several children’s picture books published including If I Could Be Anything , The Sister Exchange , Lightning Strikes and The Soggy Town of Hilltop .  These books are available at Guardian Angel Publishing , Amazon.com , Barnes and Noble or ask your local bookstore.  Look for other titles coming soon by Kevin including Lightning Strikes, What Is That Thing, My Brother, the Frog, and more. When Kevin isn’t writing, he spends his time playing hide and seek, at the insistence of his five year old daughter, and at his day job, at the insistence of his wife.  When time permits, Kevin also enjoys fossil hunting, home-brewing beer, and gardening.  He is currently engaged in an epic battle against roving gangs of crazed squirrels who are digging up everything in sight.  Kevin notes that the squirrels are winning. To find out more about Kevin, please visit his website at http:

Developing effective time management strategies is critical to anyone who wants to get the most out of their efforts to increase productivity. Generally speaking that would pretty much be everybody! Who out there does not feel the time crunch every day presents to us as our 'to do' list continues to grow without the benefit of additional time to manage it? It seems obvious that since time can not be 'fabricated out of thin air' we must therefore learn to better manage what we already got. Here are 3 time management techniques anyone can apply immediately to squeeze the most out of their efforts leading to an increase in personal productivity. Self-Imposed Deadlines By placing a time limit on your work this serves to increase the 'pressure' on you which 'encourages' more focus on your part. We all know that when the pressure is on we tend to concentrate more on the source of the pressure itself. With a higher level of concentration we are able to in

ATTENTION AUTHORS & ILLUSTRATORS: The SFC review team at Stories for Children Magazine and the Families Matter blog is very interested in reviewing your book. Our magazine site posts book reviews monthly and lists all reviewed books in our SFC Bookstore. We will also email you the book review for use with your book promotion and marketing. All books reviewed by the SFC review team at Stories for Children Magazine and Families Matter blog will be donated to a local children's library or charity so more children can enjoy your work. If you are interested in Stories for Children Magazine's Book Review/Donation program, please visit http://storiesforchildrenmagazine.org/BookReviews.aspx   for more information. Please put "BOOK REVIEW/DONATION PROGRAM" in the subject line when contacting one of our many SFC Reviewers. They will send you mailing instructions and requests for anything other information needed. This is a great way to get your books "out th

Katie Hines has been writing snippets here and there as long as she can remember. When in 8 th grade, she wrote a short story called, “Underworld.” Then, in high school, she wrote several poems that were published in an anthology. Marriage and raising two children contributed to putting away writing for a few years, but she came back to it while in her 40s. Since that time, she has been a contributing feature writer and columnist for a local newspaper, has written several features articles for another area newspaper, and wrote religious and humor articles for an online Catholic ezine. Since the release of “Guardian,” in January 2010, Hines is currently working on another fantasy novel as well as a couple of chapter books, and is extending “My Name is Bib” into a full young adult novel. VS: Katie, it is so great to have you here today to chat about your love of writing. Now you’ve been writing for a very long time. However, you didn’t get serious about your writing until you decid