Are You Writing Your Next Book?

This question has a two-step answer.

1) Yes. I am always writing.

2) Whether it will be a book is another matter. Only publishers can decide whether to turn manuscripts into books—unless authors self-publish.

The first statement is the only answer reading kids need to know. They should be spared from the complexity of roadblocks that authors meet.

I was asked that same question again at a book signing/speaking engagement last week. It was followed up with, “What is it about?”

When an author is blessed with tons of reading kids gathered under a covered court, she gets those questions—pushing her to write some more and do nothing else.

These kids at the Laguna BelAir Science School (LBASS) are encouraged to read. And during the school’s 20th anniversary celebration (Emerald Visions 20/20), they had a book fair.

Because their teachers have been using my books as teaching materials, I was invited to interact with the children by their librarian, “to have a meaningful and personal connection with you . . . you will serve as their role model in critical thinking and effective communication.”

At the school gate, a streamer greeted me. So did the guard.

 

From there, everything was effusive warmth, beginning with the principal, the vice principal, the teachers, and staff.

“A meaningful and personal connection” was grace I’d never have thought possible. As I walked into the covered court, the kids waved, jumped up and down, roared with “hellos” and other greetings with big smiles.

Before posing for the photo ops, they rewarded me with short zippy conversations and unabashed hugs—a court-ful of attention. “I feel like a rock star,” I teased Chino of OMFLit (my publisher).

During my talk, I knew it was impossible to have everyone’s young ears, but their incisive questions afterwards proved they listened well.

“Are you writing your next book?” “What’s it about?” Questions from the  thinking, insatiable readers of LBASS.

I wish I could tell them about those still unpublished stories. But the book they will eventually read may be totally different.

So between then and my next book, I pray that the children learn and live by the values woven into the stories already in their hands.