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Matthew Peterson
Website Links
Home Page
www.ParaWorlds.com
My Radio Show Page
www.TheAuthorHour.com
Interviews with the top fiction authors of our day (I'm the host)
Forum
www.ParaWorlds.net
MySpace
www.MySpace.com/pworlds
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Hello there! Hasn’t this been a crazy month? The attack on Libya, a huge earthquake and tsunami, and don’t forget the worst thing of all (at least for me): the ever-looming tax season. When we heard of Japan’s nuclear reactors having problems, my wife turned to me and said, "You have to be kidding! Out of all of the countries to be hit with a possible nuclear meltdown it would have to be the one country that has already suffered from the affects of nuclear radiation." Our thoughts and prayers go to everyone affected by this.
| School Visits and Settling Back into Life |
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Earlier this month I presented to the Glendale Landmark School, and the librarian there couldn’t thank me enough for talking to her kids. Evidently, I was the first author she knew of to ever visit the school. If my schedule permits, I’ll try to visit the other sixteen schools in the Glendale Elementary School District in the next year or two.
Not too long ago I was traveling all over the country for conventions, visiting schools, interviewing four popular authors a week, and trying to keep up with my own writing. Thankfully, after a string of bad luck, my life has calmed down considerably. I can actually go to sleep before midnight now... sometimes. Yeah! The bad thing of course is that I haven’t gotten much writing done lately. Half-a-dozen people asked me this week when my next book is coming out, so I need to get on the ball with that. |
| Google, Book Nominations, and Pink Slips |
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A LOT has happened this month in the publishing world, so I’ll name just a few of the big ones.
1. First off, Google lost its settlement to digitize books! Their plans were to digitize every published book known to man... without asking for permission. I’m not sure how they thought they could get away with doing this. The crux of the problem was that authors and publishers had to opt-out of the program instead of opt-in. I'm sure we'll see more of this in the future.
2. Tons and tons of book nominations! Here are a few of the recent lists:
A. Audio Publishers Association has announced the nominees for the 2001 Audie Awards. If you’re into audiobooks, you’ll want to check this out.
B. TOR came out with the results of their "Best SFF Novels of the Decade Readers Poll" and it’s pretty interesting. I’ve interviewed some of the authors in TOR’s "best of the decade data votes by author" article, including the top two authors: Brandon Sanderson and Terry Pratchett. Check out www.TheAuthorHour.com for those interviews.
C. Nebula Award Nominations Lots of science fiction/fantasy books and stories.
D. 2011 RITA and Golden Heart Finalists for those romance fans.
3. School districts around the country are hurting because of budget crunches. Here are two recent articles of note:
A. "Detroit Public Schools (DPS) district may face losing half its K-12 schools—and the impact on teachers and school librarians is likely to be extensive."
B. "The bloodletting continues. Scores of California media specialists received preliminary pink slips today, paving the way for several districts to be without librarians when the school year begins next fall." | |
| Lost in the Noodle Forest |
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On a personal note, my boys and I had a blast in the noodle forest at the local children’s science museum. The museum dangled hundreds of swim noodles for kids to "walk" through. What a great and fairly inexpensive idea! |
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Summer is just around the corner and I’m getting excited. Lake Powell is calling me! Hope you're doing great! Until next time.... |
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