Road trip!

We're packing up the family minivan and heading down to New York City tonight for my signing at Books of Wonder tomorrow. Then it's on to Connecticut for an event at R.J. Julia Booksellers Sunday afternoon. If you're in NYC or the Madison, Connecticut area, come say hi! Both events should be a lot of fun. Here are the details:

Saturday, March 31	12:00-2:00 pm, book signing and talk at Books of Wonder in New York City. "Batter Up!" baseball event with Diane deGroat & Shelley Rotner (author and illustrator of Homer) and Audrey Vernick & Steven Salerno (author and illustrator of Brothers at Bat).
Sunday, April 1	3:00 pm, book signing at R.J. JuliaBooksellers in Madison, CT, for There Goes Ted Williams: The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived

FYI- there happens to be an Ivy and Bean event at RJ Julia on Sunday at 2:00, just before my event. So if your kids are Ivy and Bean fans, come early and stay for both!

Sneak peek at my next book...

My next book, Helen's Big World: The Life of Helen Keller (written by the amazing Doreen Rappaport, illustrated by me, published by Disney-Hyperion) doesn't come out until October, but my editor gave me the go-ahead to post the cover image on my web site. So... here it is!

New Events Added in NYC and Connecticut!

My kids at Books of Wonder, 2009

I'm traveling around a lot this spring, promoting my new picture book, There Goes Ted Williams: The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived. I just added two exciting events for the weekend of March 31-April 1, at two excellent independent bookstores- Books of Wonder in Manhattan, and R.J. Julia Booksellers in Madison, CT. Here are the details:

March 31	12:00-2:00, book signing and talk at Books of Wonder in New York City. "Batter Up!" baseball event with Diane deGroat & Shelley Rotner (author and illustrator of Homer) and Audrey Vernick & Steven Salerno (author and illustrator of Brothers at Bat).
April 1	3:00-5:00 pm, book signing at R.J. Julia Booksellers in Madison, CT, for There Goes Ted Williams: The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived

If you happen to be in NYC or Connecticut that weekend, come say hi!

And since I haven't posted this in a while, here's the trailer for There Goes Ted Williams: The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived.

Report from Tucson: Books Are Not Dead!

During one of my sessions at the Tucson Festival of Books last weekend, someone asked the question that seems to come up in pretty much every Q & A session these days, about what's going to happen now that everything is switching over to ebooks.

My answer was something along the lines of, "Right now, we're at a book festival, and there are one hundred thousand people here..." I wasn't trying to go for the easy applause, but everyone clapped at that point (which, I admit, was nice).

But it's true.  Spending the weekend at a book festival attended by over 100,000 people, watching enthusiastic readers walking around with armloads of signed books, definitely made me feel pretty good about making books- especially picture books.

Now I'm back in my studio, working on my next picture book. Maybe some people will end up reading this on a kindle fire, or a nook, or who knows what the next thing will be. But as I work on it, I'm still looking at it as a physical work of art that people will hold in their hands.

Anyway... here are a few pictures from the Tucson Book Festival:

The University of Arizona. Not sure how much work I would have gotten done if I'd gone to college here!

The campus looked a bit different than the east coast schools I'm used to.

The Festival

My first event of the weekend was a book signing, and about 200 feet from where I was signing, there was, literally, A CIRCUS! I assumed nobody would come to my signing, but thankfully, plenty of people did.

The tablecloth at my first signing had 25 years worth of drawings and signatures from all the authors and illustrators who had signed there. Pretty amazing stuff. I particularly loved this one by the brilliant David Wiesner.

me signing

I drew this picture of Ted Williams on the tablecloth.

It's right next to one by pop-up master Robert Sabuda!

It got REALLY crowded!

I was part of a panel called "Bats, Balls, and Gloves: Great Sports Heroes" with my friends Phil Bildner and Kadir Nelson

Then I presented with Kadir Nelson and Doreen Rappaport, on a panel called "She Writes, We Draw: A Story of One Author and Two Illustrators". (For a sneak peek at my next book, look under Kadir's hands.)

reading There Goes Ted Williams at the Story Blanket

me doing a drawing demonstration at the Story Blanket

It was really a wonderful event. I met a bunch of people, and I got to hang out with some author and illustrator friends like Doreen Rappaport, Phil Bildner, Chris Van Dusen, and Kadir Nelson. I also got to meet so many authors and Illustrators I'd never met before, like Jack Gantos, Adam Rex, Mac Barnett, Maxwell Eaton III, Chris Gall, Jon Scieszka... what a fun weekend.


Now, back to work.

Tucson Festival of Books

I'm getting ready to head to Arizona this weekend for the Tucson Festival of Books. I've never been before, and it sounds like an amazing event. If you happen to be one of the 100,000 people they're expecting to attend (!!), and you'd like to come to one of my sessions, here's my schedule:

Saturday, March 10

10:30-11:15 am signing copies of There Goes Ted Williams: The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived at the Candlewick/Kids Center booth

 

1:00-2:00 pm "Bats, Balls and Gloves: Great Sports Heroes" panel discussion with Phil Bildner, Kadir Nelson, and me, followed by autograph session.

3:00-3:30 pm reading of There Goes Ted Williams: The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived in the "Storyblanket" area, followed by autograph session.

4:00-5:00 pm "She Writes, We Drew: A Story of Two Illustrators and One Author" panel discussion with Doreen Rappaort, Kadir Nelson, and me, followed by autograph session.

Sunday, March 11

10:15-11:00 am signing copies of There Goes Ted Williams: The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived at the Candlewick/Kids Center booth

Time to pack!

Fenway Memories: Jason Varitek, Literacy Champion

With Red Sox captain Jason Varitek announcing his retirement last week, I thought I'd post a few pictures of another one of my favorite Fenway memories, the time I got to meet Varitek before a game at Fenway when we were both involved with the Massachusetts Teachers Association's Red Sox Reading Game.

If you're not familiar with the MTA Red Sox Reading Game... kids in grades K-8 in Massachusetts can enter by reading nine books (one for each position on the baseball field), and they can win some great prizes, like autographed baseballs and tickets to a Red Sox game.

In 2005, the MTA promoted the Red Sox Reading Game with posters and bookmarks that featured Jason Varitek reading my book, Zachary's Ball. My role in the program basically involved me going to two Red Sox games for free (it's a tough job, but someone's gotta do it...). I did a book signing at Fenway as part of their kickoff event in April, where I got to meet Jason Varitek, who spoke for a few minutes about the importance of reading. Then I did another signing at a game at Fenway in August, on the night when all the kids who won tickets got to go to the game. Of course, I'm happy to be involved with any program that encourages reading and literacy... but the Red Sox tickets are a nice perk!

And here's some exciting news- this year, the MTA Red Sox Reading Game posters will feature Red Sox first baseman Adrian Gonzalez reading my new book, There Goes Ted Williams! I'm thrilled and honored to be involved with this excellent program again.

(If you missed it, I wrote a post a few months ago about the year Derek Lowe was the spokesman, called The Derek Lowe Poster Incident.)

Jason Varitek reading Zachary's Ball

A thank you gift I received from the nice folks at the Massachusetts Teachers Association- the copy of Zachary's Ball used in the photo shoot, signed on the cover by Jason Varitek! It says "To Matt, Jason Varitek, #33, 2004 World Champs!" So cool!

As a thank you gift to Jason Varitek, the Massachusetts Teachers Association presented him with a print of one of my illustrations from Zachary's Ball, during a pregame ceremony at Fenway.