Clara Gillow Clark: The people I want to put in my books

I met Clara Gillow Clark about twenty years ago, when we both lived in the same rural Northeastern Pennsylvania community. One day we sat in the children’s room at the back of our local public library and Clara told me stories of her childhood. Although it was many years ago, I haven’t forgotten that conversation. Certain things stuck in my mind: she had attended a one-room schoolhouse; she was the seventh child in a family of seven, and she was writing a book inspired by her mother’s life. That book became Clara’s first published novel, Annie’s Choice, and since then she has written five other works of historical fiction for middle grade readers. We are so happy that Clara is our creativity blogger this week. She speaks here about her writing roots… —Anne

The youngest child in a family who came from "a long line of farmers and readers," Clara Gillow Clark began school in a one-room schoolhouse and-when she wasn't wanting to be an inventor, archaeologist, geologist, missionary, or solo violinist-grew increasingly drawn to writing. After marrying and having a son, she read a magazine article on children's author Judy Blume, who, like her, was a stay-at-home wife who sold her own crafts before starting her writing career. Inspired, Clara Gillow Clark began commuting to writing classes in New York City, while juggling jobs ranging from teacher's aide to store manager.
 
Her long efforts paid off. "Now I work at home,"she says, happily. When she's not writing--or reading, or teaching writing, or talking shop with other writers--she enjoys baking, gardening, and walking the dirt roads bordering her little red house, surrounded by her own meadows, woods, and lake. "Walking," she says, "is a love I learned from my father, who took his sprawling brood on nature walks and taught us to stop long enough to really see things."

Clara Gillow Clark: The people I want to put in my books

“To me no man is himself; he is the sum total of his past. . .”    William Faulkner

There are many reasons why I am a writer. I would say that the need to write came from the sudden death of my father when I was six and the upheaval of family and the ensuing poverty—not immediately, but certainly by my middle grade and high school years.  But I ALSO became a writer because of teachers.

First there was my mean 2nd grade teacher, Miss Lampart.  She wasn’t only mean, she was terrifying, somewhat like the teacher in Roald Dahl’s book Matilda. She wore spiky heels and lots of jangly bracelets; she had big red lips and long, red, very sharp fingernails, which she often dug into the cheeks of little second graders. At least she dug them into mine! Nearly every morning of second grade, when it was time for school, I’d tell my mother that I was sick and should stay home. Mostly, she made me go to school, but I got really good at play-acting illness and did stay home a lot.  One day, Miss Lampart made me stay in at recess to write a story or poem to go along with my drawing of a rabbit. My best friend stayed in with me and encouraged me, “Hurry up and write something! Recess will be over,” she told me.  I held my head and moaned, “I can’t think of anything to write,” I said.  “Just write something!” she told me. So faced with my first deadline, I wrote a poem because a story was too many words. The poem turned out to be my first published piece, thanks to Miss Lampart. She was still mean, but I wouldn’t have had that wonderful feeling of accomplishment without her.  So it was that ART got me into writing, and then it was MUSIC that taught me how to keep going.

I started playing the violin in fifth grade, and by sixth grade I thought I was getting pretty good. Not as good as Irene Wetzelberg the Concertmistress of the orchestra, but not bad. Then my music teacher taped me playing an etude from a Samual Applebaum book. I sounded like a screechy cat fight and wanted to end my failed career as a violinist.  My music teacher wouldn’t let me. Thank you, Mr. Pierce, because I did keep practicing and I did get better! I ended up becoming the Concertmistress in high school, but if I had quit I never would have known or believed that I could do that! I learned that playing an instrument is a process, much the same way that learning to write is a process.  You don’t start out writing publishable prose. At least I didn’t, but I knew that if I kept working at it I’d get better. If I’d quit the violin in sixth grade, I don’t think that I’d have become successful as a writer or have a book with my name on it. I am a writer because someone believed in my talent and wouldn’t let me quit. Believing in myself then was very very hard for me, but, now, fortunately, it’s only about every other day.

Later on there were others—my senior English teacher, Mrs. Chamberlin who submitted a poem of mine that was published, and Patricia Reilly Giff, who read an early attempt of mine and told me, “Oh, you are a writer!” Of course, I believed her and kept writing and writing and writing for ten more years before my first book contract came for Annie’s Choice.

Today I write historical fiction. I love to read history and to research, but what I really love are people.  Not just people living now, but people who were alive before I was born. I want to know what they wore, what they did from jobs to favorite pastimes, how their lives were like mine and how they differed.  I’ve been told that what I write isn’t really historical fiction because I don’t connect my stories to famous people or important historical events like war, for example. But what is more important than people in everyday life going about their business and creating the real fabric of our society? They are the people I want to capture, the people I want to put in my books. 

Mitali Perkins: Creating the Magic Carpet of Place

An Introduction by Anne Mazer: I first encountered Mitali Perkins through her book, Monsoon Summer, which immediately captured me with its warm, realistic voice, and compelling portrait of an Indian-American teen who spends an eye-opening summer in India. The book had everything – a romantic story, a quest for identity, and a “strong female character trying to bridge different cultures.” Her books tackle big subjects but are always down-to-earth, relatable, and irresistibly readable. Check out her blog, (and this fantastic introduction video below) for more of her thoughts on life and books between cultures. Here Mitali shares her thoughts on how to create the magic of place…

Mitali Perkins was born in India and immigrated to the States with her parents and two sisters when she was seven. Bengali- style, their names rhyme: Sonali means "gold,” Rupali means "silver,” and “Mitali” means “friendly.” Mitali had to live up to her name because her family moved so much — she’s lived in India, Ghana, Cameroon, England, New York, Mexico, California, Bangladesh, Thailand, and Massachusetts.

Mitali studied political science at Stanford University and Public Policy at U.C. Berkeley before deciding to try and change the world by writing stories for young readers. Now she’s settled in Newton, a town just outside of Boston, where she writes full-time. She’s the author of Secret Keeper and Monsoon Summer (both from Random House), The Not-So-Star-Spangled Life of Sunita Sen (Little Brown), the First Daughter books (Dutton), and Bamboo People and Rickshaw Girl, both from Charlesbridge. She tweets, facebooks and blogs at Mitali’s Fire Escape, where she strives to provide a safe place to think, chat, and read about life between cultures.

Mitali Perkins: Creating the Magic Carpet of Place  

I love the scene in Disney’s animated version of Aladdin when Aladdin holds out a hand to Jasmine, inviting her to leap on his magic carpet and discover a “whole new world.”  It reminds me that the best writing can also be a magic carpet, taking us to unfamiliar places—even when our physical bodies remain curled up on a sofa.  

I traveled to unfamiliar worlds a lot as a kid, living in six different places (Calcutta, London, Ghana, Cameroon, New York City, and Mexico City) before immigrating to California when I was in the seventh grade. That’s probably why I was drawn to writers who created a strong sense of place and made me feel at home there, like Elizabeth Enright (The Saturdays, The Four Story Mistake, Thimble Summer),  L.M. Montgomery (Anne of Green Gables, Emily of New Moon),  Maud Hart Lovelace (Betsy-Tacy), C.S. Lewis (The Chronicles of Narnia), and J.R.R. Tolkien (The Lord of the Rings).  Now that I write books myself, I try and transport my own readers to “whole new worlds” by following three guidelines. 

Use details about place to reveal more about people and plot.  

Every detail should reveal something about my characters and what they’re experiencing.  If a description doesn’t further plot or character, I try to cut it, no matter how beautiful or poetic it sounds. For example, Bamboo People, my novel from Charlesbridge coming July 1, 2010, is about Chiko, a Burmese boy who is forced to fight in the army. Early in the book, I describe Chiko’s first morning in the military training camp: 

They lead us out to the field, into a misty, gray dawn. Shivering in my thin clothes, I notice Tai beside me. He’s wearing only a longyi and a torn T-shirt, but he doesn’t even look cold. Instead, he pats his belly and tips his head in the direction of a tarp, under which a few soldiers cluster around a cooking fire. My own stomach rumbles in reply; the last meal I ate was lunch yesterday, with Mother.

Hopefully, even as my reader imagines himself in this place, he gleans a bit about the characters in the story—namely, that Chiko isn’t used to such harsh conditions, but Tai is, and that Tai has a sense of humor. I also hint at plot—Chiko’s forced inscription—by having my character recall lunch with his mother the day before.

Choose place to reflect a theme.   

Place can serve as a powerful metaphor for a theme resonating throughout your story. Secret Keeper (Delacorte, 2009) is set almost fully inside a joint-family house in Kolkata, India. Here’s the description of the place as seen by the protagonist for the first time: 

Asha stared up at the three-story house that still looked run-down since her visit four years before. A path wound through a long garden and led to a screen-in veranda. There were two narrow yards on either side, one with smoke rising form a garbage pile and laundry hanging on a line, the other squeezed between the Gupta house and the large newly painted house next door. Coconut and banana trees blocked the sunshine on every side except the front, the windows on the first floor were secured with bars, and the property was completely fenced in.  

Asha, faced with extremely limited choices, eventually finds a way out of a tight situation, so words like “narrow” “squeezed” “blocked” “secured” and “fenced” echo the theme of the novel. 

C. S. Lewis used the place-theme technique often in the Chronicles of Narnia. In The Horse and His Boy, Shasta is an orphan journeying to a land he will soon call home. What better place to put him than in a dark mist, walking through a narrow, dangerous mountain pass?  

The world became gray. Shasta had not realized how cold and wet the inside of a cloud would be; nor how dark. The gray turned to black with alarming speed … The road kept on getting to somewhere in the sense that it got to more and more trees, all dark and dripping, and to colder and colder air. And strange, icy winds kept blowing the mist past him though they never blew it away.

When a great Lion rescues Shasta, the setting reverberates with the change:  

The mist was turning from black to gray and from gray to white … Now, the whiteness around him because a shining whiteness ... He lifted his face and their eyes met. Then instantly the pale brightness of the mist and the fiery brightness of the Lion rolled themselves together into a swirling glory and gathered themselves up and disappeared. He was alone with the horse on a grassy hillside under a blue sky. And there were birds singing.

There’s no better way to learn how to create a sense of place than from reading experts like Lewis.

Rely on more than two senses when describing place.  

Despite Hollywood’s amazing computer-generated artistry, the written word has a big advantage when it comes to taking people to another place. If I’m journeying via film, I lose three senses — I can't smell or taste or touch the way my imagination enables me to when I'm reading.  

Case in point: the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. The movies enabled me to see and hear Middle Earth through the use of amazing sets and incredible sound. But they couldn’t accomplish what happened while reading the books, when I fingered the thick, green vines in Fangorn Forest, smelled the evil reek in the valley of Mordor, and tasted the hearty flavor of simmering mushrooms – thanks to the powerful combination of Tolkien's words and my imagination. Of course, every description of place doesn’t have to engage all five senses, but strive to do in your writing what a movie-maker couldn’t do when telling the same story. 

In my book Monsoon Summer, I take my readers with Jazz, the main character, into an Indian marketplace, and tried to engage four of the five senses (I’ll bold these attempts to make them easier to spot):  

I wandered through the stuffy alleys, shaking my head as vendors sang the praises of their wares, trying to lure me closer. There were piles of orange and yellow lentils in hanging baskets, narrow bottles of golden oil, copper pots in a range of sizes, and strings of blue rubber sandals. Naked lightbulbs hung from low ceilings, glowing on the faces of the men and women sitting cross-legged in the center of each narrow stall.

By the time I reached the enclosed fruit and vegetable market, sweat was pouring down my back. I sniffed the fresh ripe fruit and fingered piles of glossy zucchini, red tomatoes, green bell peppers, and purple onion.

Weave your own magic carpet 

Try this exercise. Choose a particular setting like the woods at night, a bustling school cafeteria, the elevator in a skyscraper, or a place of your own invention. Now introduce an angry, depressed, elated, scared, or thoughtful character into that place.  

Write a paragraph describing the place through that character’s eyes, using first person present tense (I stumble into the elevator and …) Here’s your mission: choose details to reveal insights about your character, use the place as a metaphor or symbol of the emotion he or she is feeling, and engage as many senses as you can, making sure you cover at least three.  

Once you’re done, get rid of your character, pick someone completely different, and rewrite the paragraph (i.e., if she was an angry biker chick in your first take, rewrite the description of place from the perspective of a cheerful old man).  

Read both paragraphs aloud to yourself or to a writing buddy. Even though you’re describing the same place, you probably chose strikingly different nouns, verbs, adverbs, and adjectives. 

In a writer’s careful hands, place becomes the third strand in a strong spin of plot, place, and people. Soon, your readers will be soaring to new worlds on the magic carpet of excellent writing.

✔Andrew Smith On RULE NUMBER ONE

We dare you to read the first chapter of any one of Andrew Smith’s YA novels—Ghost Medicine, In the Path of Falling Objects, or the upcoming The Marbury Lens—and stop reading after the first chapter. Try it. Go ahead. 

We’ll wait.

You can’t, can you? That’s because Andrew Smith is simply one of the most compelling, passionate voices in YA fiction today. His books take you on a challenging ride, never sparing you when it comes to difficult issues, but always delivering hope and wonder that echo long after the book is finished.

Be sure to also check out Andrew’s fantastic blog Ghost Medicine, which we adore.  But if you’ve never encountered Andrew Smith before, this inspiring post about a young writer’s group in Southern California will have you racing to read more.  

A teacher for 20 years, Andrew Smith published his first YA novel in 2008, GHOST MEDICINE, an ALA/YALSA "Best Books for Young Adults" 2009. This was followed by a second novel, IN THE PATH OF FALLING OBJECTS, which was also named a BBYA and received the Children's Literature Council's Distinguished Fiction Award for 2010. In November, 2010, his third, THE MARBURY LENS, a dark paranormal thriller will be released by Feiwel and Friends/Macmillan, to be followed by STICK in 2011. He lives in California with his wife, son, and daughter.

__________________________________________________

ANDREW SMITH ON RULE NUMBER ONE

At the beginning of the year, I started a young writers group to help high school students who wanted to enter a creative writing competition in Southern California. I had two purposes in volunteering to do this work: First, I wanted to try to get boys into the group, because boys at the high school level (and older) are so underrepresented when it comes to creative writing; and second, I hoped I could get the kids to experience a different process in their writing – where their effort wasn’t going to be held up to some standardized rubric and receive a letter grade; one where we would have a chance to work together, as a team (me and my writer), to try and get them to “discover” their best possible voice.

I believe that if you’re a writer, you never stop learning how to write. I remember things I learned from grade school to high school, and I had some pretty remarkable professors in college, too.

I even recall one editor I worked for at a newspaper who told me I overused commas.

Newspaper editors are cranky.

But in my entire life, I’ve probably learned more about writing from the person who’s edited all my books – the very talented Liz Szabla, editor-in-chief at Feiwel and Friends.

Book editors are different than newspaper editors. They don’t take things out, they help writers add things that need to be said. At least Liz never criticized my affinity for commas. And don’t even get me started on semicolons. I have quite a fondness for the beret-wearing comma.

Anyway, what I really wanted to do for these high schoolers was give them an opportunity to work with a writing coach in the same kind of way I work with Liz. Oh, and lots of boys wanted to do it, too, which was really cool.

I let them know at the outset that it was going to be tough, and that they were going to have to adapt to a different production process, because this type of writing can’t be laid out in a step-by-step recipe like all the years of linear, formulaic, expository essay writing that had been drilled into their heads.

Here’s how we did it: We started off by making a list of rules. Lots of teachers do stuff like that on the first day. It’s how they get kids to “own” their consequences. But our entire list of rules consisted of only One Rule.

Ready?

Rule Number One: There are no more rules.

We worked by asking questions. That’s how Liz does things with me. The kids submitted their work to me whenever they wanted to (no "due dates") and I would read it and write questions in pencil anywhere I could squeeze them in. Then, I’d hand the work back to the kids and wait for them to deal with (or ignore) my questions. There were no guarantees of how many rounds of penciled-in questions we’d go through, but I promised them all that everyone who finished and got to the point where they had something they believed was worth submitting to the contest – their best possible work – that I’d give them an ARC (Advance Reader’s Copy) of the novel I have coming out this November.

Keeping my promise resulted in my giving away every single ARC I owned. Yes, it’s true: I do not even own one copy of the book I wrote.

But, of course, I was happy to do it, and the kids wrote some amazing, mature, resonating stories.

I learned a few things by working with these terrific kids, too. First, it was refreshing to see that all my writers had to think about things and digest my questions for a few days before they could get back into their stories. I do the same thing whenever I get editorial feedback letters from Liz.

The other eye-opening moment came when I was helping a boy with a story he’d written (which I am happy to say ended up winning an award in the contest), and I suggested to him that he separate out a single sentence from one of his paragraphs and make it a standalone paragraph by itself. He told me he always thought “paragraphs” had to have at least five sentences in them.

I referred him back to Rule Number One.

The school year is nearly over, but I’m looking forward to starting up the group again in the fall. I know it’s going to be just that much better. 

Thank you, Andrew! For a chance to win a copy of Spilling Ink, please leave a comment below. We'd LOVE to hear from you! Two winners will be chosen at random. Good luck! xo Anne & Ellen

★DREAM WITH NAN MARINO★

This week we are delighted to host Nan Marino, author of My Uncle Neil Armstrong and Other Lies Muscle Man McGinty Told Me. The book, Nan’s first, has received rave reviews. Betsy Bird of the Fuse Eight blog called it “an amazing debut and a remarkable novel.” Booklist, giving it a starred review, said, “It’s rare to have a story told with sympathy from the viewpoint of a bully.” I have to confess that I haven’t yet read it (it’s at the top of my “books I am dying to read” list), but I know Nan through her wonderful blog. When I read her posts, I always feel as if I’m talking to a kindred spirit. That’s how I feel about this blog piece, about dreams and creativity.  Like Nan, I’ve always been fascinated by dreams and their relationship to creativity. I’ve kept dream diaries and have gotten inspiration from my dreams. Here Nan offers great practical advice on how to start tapping into the power of your dreams. -Anne 

Nan Marino is the author of Neil Armstrong is My Uncle and Other Lies Muscle Man McGinty Told Me (Roaring Brook Press, 2009). She’s also a librarian who lives at the Jersey shore with her husband and their very large dog. When she’s not writing middle grade stories or working in the library, she’s hanging out in bookstores, eating chocolate or daydreaming near the Barnegat Bay.

Keep Dreaming by Nan Marino

Writers have dreams. And I don’t mean the one where you’re sitting on a Caribbean beach eating guacamole, drinking margaritas, furiously typing heartwarming, funny, critically-acclaimed, award-winning best sellers that after reading it for the first time, your agent, editor and Steven Spielberg exclaim in unison, “I laughed. I cried. It was better than CATS.” I’m talking about the dreams where you go to sleep with a problem (a plot hole, a character snag, a w.i.p. that’s going nowhere) and you wake up filled up with solutions.   

Creative types have been harnessing the power of their dreams for ages. Teenager Mary Shelley claimed she got the idea for Frankenstein after a night’s sleep in the Swiss chalet of Lord Bryon. Paul McCartney woke up one night with a song in his head. He called it “Scrambled Eggs” but later changed the title to “Yesterday.” Salvador Dali was so anxious to tap into his dreams that he slept holding a spoon that would crash to the floor the moment he fell asleep. Robert Lewis Stevenson, Wordsworth, Charlotte Bronte, Sting, Coleridge, Paul Klee, Beethoven, Thomas Edison, Mozart, and Billy Joel all credit their dreams for helping their creative endeavors. 

Most dreams come from our REM stage of sleep. Researchers say we enter this stage between two to five times a night. During REM our muscle activity is quiet, but our brains are as active as when we’re awake. Why we dream is still a subject of debate, but studies show that dreaming helps us to be more creative. According to an article in Psychology Today, dreams “help us find new patterns and create combinations that break through well-worn ruts.” 

But how do we dip into treasure trove of creative ideas that comes from our dreams?  There’s no one set method, but here’s a list of suggestions I’ve collected over the years for helping to remember dreams: 

Make your sleeping space a tranquil haven. Have a regular time for going to sleep. 

Catch yourself dreaming. Some people suggest setting your alarm twenty minutes earlier. The theory is that REM stage of sleep occurs just before you awake. If you wake up during a dream, they’re easier to remember. That’s why Salvador Dali used the spoon dropping method.  

Tell yourself the night before that you’re going to remember your dreams.  Say it over and over again while you fall asleep.  

Don’t wake up to noise. Resist the urge to turn on the TV or radio.  Allow yourself to stay with your own thoughts.  Be patient. See what you remember. 

Some researchers suggest putting a note nearby that asks “What did I dream?” I have a sign near my bed that says “remember your dreams” so I see it as soon as I wake up, but a tiny note near the coffee maker would do the trick too.  

Keep a pen and paper nearby to write down your dreams.  No matter how much you tell yourself that you can’t possibly forget that absolutely brilliant thought by morning, you could lose it. Sometimes even the entire experience of waking up in the middle of the night might be lost to you until perhaps the next day when after five cups of coffee you’re in a meeting speaking to a group when you suddenly stop mid-sentence because you remembered you woke up the night before but nothing else.   

You don’t have to wait till night to dream. You can dream during naptime. Leonardo DaVinci and Thomas Edison were frequent nappers. 

According to my Great Aunt Lil, a glass of warm milk before bedtime helps too. 

So the next time you’re in a rut or stuck on that w.i.p, get some zzzzs.  

And have good dreams.

Thank you, Nan! For a chance to win a copy of Spilling Ink, please leave a comment below. We'd LOVE to hear from you! Two winners will be chosen at random. Good luck! xo Anne & Ellen

Gary Allen VanRiper: the power of practice

Whenever I visit classrooms, I always ask the students about their favorite books. It’s not just professional curiosity; I’m actually looking for books to read. When I moved to the North Country a few years ago, the title on every student’s lips was The Adirondack Kids series. After reading the first book in the series I understood why.  The series is both suspenseful and fun and appeals equally to boys and girls. Imagine my delight when I found myself at a book signing with the series’ authors Gary and Justin VanRiper! The father-son team are true dynamos, writing prolifically while frequently travelling across New York State to meet their legions of fans.

The VanRipers are celebrating the 10th anniversary of the series with the release of The Adirondack Kids#10 - The Final Daze of Summer, as well as a summer book tour. Let’s celebrate with Gary’s inspiring piece on the power of  practice. —Ellen

Gary Allen VanRiper: the power of  practice

I love reading how other writers work. That is just one reason why this blog is such a great idea and worth visiting often! 

And since you are here, I would say there is a good chance you are seriously considering, or already are, Spilling some serious Ink!  

One of the writers I have learned a lot from is the late Madeleine L’Engle, author of so many wonderful and powerful books including the Newbery award-winning A Wrinkle in Time.

Listen to what Ms. L’Engle said about Creative Writing: 

“Nobody can teach creative writing – run like mad from anybody who thinks he can…” 

Wait! There’s more! 

“BUT one can teach practices, like finger exercises on the piano; one can share the tools of the trade, and what one has gleaned from great writers.” * 

That makes a lot of sense, doesn’t it? 

Great writing does not come ‘poof!” It is from good coaches we learn the basics –  the fundamentals. From those in action, we learn what is possible and are inspired. And then it is for us to prepare for participation through practice, practice, practice. 

Think about a great basketball player. You watch the athlete fly and spin through the air and sink the basket with amazing speed and accuracy and creativity. 

But here is what you didn’t see. 

The time spent sitting at the feet of great coaches and studying the best in the game. And then the countless hours of practicing the basics of the game – honing his or her skills and experimenting with possibilities.  

A great figure skater. A great pianist. A great writer.  

Anything done well takes time and dedication and listening to good coaches and then it is lots and lots of practice. 

Not really romantic is it? It is hard work. But the payoff is so worth it! 

There are those occasional voices heard from the crowd: 

 “Your story really touched me.” “My son wasn’t into reading, until he read your book!” “Something you wrote changed my life.” 

So, are you serious about being a writer?  

Then dive in and commit to the long haul. 

Listen to your coaches –  your teachers – and learn the fundamentals.  

Listen to and study the greats in action. Some of my favorites? Beverly Cleary. Mark Twain. Annie Dillard.  

And then spill some ink! All the time! And a lot of it!  
 

*from Madeleine L’Engle: Herself Reflections on a Writing Life. Compiled by Carole F. Chase, Shaw Books, ©2001, page 183

Gary Allen VanRiper has been writing for most of his adult life. For seven years he published a community newspaper, winning awards in journalism and photojournalism before writing award-winning books for children with his son, Justin, and becoming a senior pastor with the Wesleyan Church.

He and his wife, Carol, (who draws the interior illustrations for the series) are also therapeutic foster parents and were recently appointed foreign correspondents for Global Partners, the missionary arm of the Wesleyan denomination. Gary also hosts Adirondack Journal for the weekly television show, Mohawk Valley Living. There are now 10 titles in The Adirondack Kids® series with some 100,000 copies sold. Both Gary and his son, Justin, speak regularly at schools and at conferences inspiring young people to read and write. The VanRipers reside in Camden, New York and have a camp on Fourth Lake in the Adirondacks which has been in Carol’s family for over 100 years.  

Thank you, Gary! For a chance to win a copy of Spilling Ink, please leave a comment below. We'd LOVE to hear from you! Two winners will be chosen at random on July 18th, 2010. Good luck! xo Anne & Ellen