Category: Blog

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Behind the Bee Book: Part 3

tnPhoto courtesy of Ellen Harasimowicz

I knew early on that I would need to hire a photographer to work with me on THE HIVE DETECTIVES– this was a fresh story, and it needed fresh photographs–so I was crushed to find out that my friend Betty Jenewin, a photojournalist and one of the photographers behind the images in TRACKING TRASH, wasn’t available for the job. And I was leery when Betty told me that she knew another photographer, also a photojournalist, who might be available, not because I didn’t trust Betty’s judgment, but because I was setting out very soon for a research trip across the mid-Atlantic states. Whoever I hired would have to be game for traveling on short notice, bunking with me throughout the trip, and traipsing through commercial honey bee yards and research apiaries in search of images and stories. It seemed like a lot to ask.

And it would have been, for most people. But Ellen Harasimowicz is not most people. We met for the first time on March 25, and three weeks later we set off, the trunk of my car full-up with her camera equipment, my recording supplies, and two sparkly new bee suits. That’s how Ellen rolls. As soon as we hit Pennsylvania, the two of us taped our pant legs closed with duct tape, donned those bee suits, and marched into an apiary that was home to millions of honey bees; we visited a quarantined bee yard and sampled the honey left in its empty supers (realizing only afterward that whatever it was that scared off the bees might just be in the honey we ate!); and we volunteered to carry three boxes of honey bees from one bee lab to another … even before knowing for sure if our cargo of bees would be dead or alive (they were dead). It was a blast of a week, full of stories and insights and adventures. We returned to Massachusetts with great material for the book and, more importantly, a true friendship.

In nearly every review of THE HIVE DETECTIVES to date, special mention has been made of Ellen’s pictures. In case you missed them, here’s a sampling:

“Harasimowicz’s clear, beautifully reproduced photographs support and extend the text.” (Kirkus reviews)

“Fully illustrated with excellent color photos …” (Booklist, Starred review)

“… gloriously crisp photographs of bees and people at work out in the field and inside scientific laboratories.” (The Horn Book)

I am lucky to have found Ellen (thank you, thank you, thank you, Betty Jenewin!) and am grateful for her talent and flexibility. She and I have done some pretty amazing things since that first trek together: we’ve stung ourselves with honey bees, we’ve ridden horses to the top of a mountain in central Mexico to see colonies of monarch butterflies*; and we’ve lived on a Costa Rican butterfly farm with giant bats, garrulous howler monkeys, and poisonous snakes.** We’ve spent long hours considering photographs and book structures and new adventures. At this point we have more book ideas than we have time to make them, and I, for one, hope it is always this way.

Thank you for everything, Ellen. Here’s to all the books (and bookish adventures) ahead of us!

* Pictures from this trip will appear in our citizen science book, coming from Henry Holt in January 2011.

** And pictures from this trip are right now enticing an editor to sign the book we call SPECIAL DELIVERY. Or so we hope. Stay tuned!

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Behind the Bee Book: Part 2

Loree and Erica 2© Gerry Burns

That’s editor Erica Zappy and me at the 2007 Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards ceremony, where our first book, TRACKING TRASH, was given an Honor Book Award. It was a special night.

TRACKING TRASH was a literal first for both of us: it was the first book I ever wrote, and it was the first book Erica ever acquired on her own. There is nothing like creating a sixty-four page, ten thousand word book illustrated with seventy full-color images by more than twenty different photographers to bond a couple girls. We learned a lot, made a book we are both proud of, and established a great working relationship.

All of which made the creation of THE HIVE DETECTIVES an even more positive experience. This time we pulled together fifteen thousand words and nearly one hundred photographs, and we did it with none of the drama (no lost photographs! no crisis conversations from the top of a London double decker bus!) of our first trip round the bend.

Thank you for everything, Erica. I am looking forward to rolling up our sleeves and getting to work on book number three.

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Behind the Bee Book, Part 1

LindaMillerPhoto courtesy of David Miller

I have been planning this series of blog posts since May, when THE HIVE DETECTIVES was released. Somehow, though, the actual writing and posting has been put off as first one thing and then another (and another and another) stole my attention. As the calendar year winds to a close, I’ve decided to put extra effort into finally and publicly thanking the people who helped me bring this new book into the world.

I’d like to start with my friend Linda Miller, who back in 2007, shortly after the publication of TRACKING TRASH, called to ask what I made of the honey bee crisis. To which I replied, “What honey bee crisis?”

And then, like some kind of eye-opening buzz magic, everywhere I turned were stories of honey bees and mysterious disappearances and concern for our food supply. I am not sure why the story hadn’t registered with me prior to that talk with Linda, but by the time the article she’d clipped from The Christian Science Monitor arrived in my mailbox, I was in too deep to turn back.

Within months I was registered for bee school at the annual conference of the Eastern Apiculture Society, where I met Dennis vanEngelsdorp. (He went on to star in the book.) I took more classes, joined a beekeeping club, infected photographer Ellen Harasimowicz with my honey bee mania, and began traveling the eastern seaboard to talk with bee wranglers and bee scientists involved in the CCD story. The journey from Linda’s question to a published book was a long and intense one, but I have not forgotten where it began: a conversation with a friend.

Linda still calls to ask interesting questions, and she sends handwritten notes by regular mail as well, usually tucking into the envelope a newspaper clipping or two. Not all of these lead to book projects, of course, but each and every one engages my mind. Which, come to think of it, is just the sort of thing Linda strives for: encouraging people to think.

Thank you, Linda, for asking the question that got me thinking about honey bees. Thank you for sending me notes and articles and ideas. And most of all, thank you for being my friend.

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What Do You Think?

With many thanks to my tech guys (the twelve-year-old Burns boys) and the photographers I have yet to credit in the video (we are working on this), here is my first-ever book trailer. It is a work in progress; I still have to figure out how to roll the photo credits, how to fix the text-heavy back end, and how to insert an image that is being prickly. While I work through those issues, though, I thought I’d post a draft here. If you have a moment to check it out, please do. And feel free to leave your feedback and comments below.

For the record, my tech guys are working on a trailer for THE HIVE DETECTIVES, too. I’m told that quality work like theirs cannot be rushed, and that there is no way to predict when the THD trailer will be ready. Suffice to say that someday the books page of my website will include trailers for each of my books. Someday.

 

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Wanna Be in a Children’s Book?

Seriously, who doesn’t?

Children’s author/illustrator and Worcester, Massachusetts native Jarrett Krosochka has launched his first annual Cyber-Monday online auction to benefit the Joe and Shirl Scholarship fund at the Worcester Art Museum … and one of the coolest items up for grabs is the chance to have your likeness drawn into one of his next LUNCH LADY books.

(Yowza!)

The Joe and Shirl Scholarship, created by Jarrett in honor of his grandparents, will fund art classes for needy children in unique familial situations. As a kid who grew up in just such a family, I think what Jarrett is doing totally rocks. And as a gal already worn out by seasonal consumer craziness, I’m thrilled to spread the word about this great cause.

Check out Jarrett’s video above, or click here for information on the Joe and Shirl Scholarship, the other items up for grabs, and how to get in on the action. Happy bidding!

 

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Madeline English School

On Wednesday I visited the town where I grew up—Everett, Massachusetts—and wound up on the site of a place I spent a bit of time as a kid: Babe Ruth Park. Do you know what I found there? A school. A very big, very new school. The Madeline English School, to be exact, which is one of four new K-8 schools now in Everett. And if that didn’t make me feel old, meeting the principal, Ms. Massa, who graduated more than half-a-decade after me, did. How can I be old enough that parks are now schools and whippersnappers are now principals? It’s all very unsettling.

Lucky for me, about a hundred chatty fifth graders met me in the library of the Maddy English, and they calmed me down. We spent a fine hour talking about bees and hives and beekeeping … and our hometown. We dispelled rumors, shared stories, and generally mused over the coolness of insects that are at once so important and so scary to us. I don’t know if their exuberance over honey bees had anything to do with our common roots, but it was a thrill for me to answer questions from kids who were so completely engaged and interested in the same things that engage and interest me … and who happen to be growing up in the same place I did.

At some point I asked an obvious question: who was Madeline English? The answer floored me. Madeline English was a national hero, a true baseball legend. And she grew up in Everett! How could a kid who grow up playing rec league softball in Everett—a girl who later played on the high school softball team—not know this? I was a third baseman, for crying out loud! (Okay, only for one season and only because we were desperate that year. But still.)

Good, old Everett: full of memories, smart students, new schools, old friends, and even a few surprises. I’m glad I grew up there, and I’m glad I had a chance to go back for this visit. I made a stop at the Parlin Memorial Library, too, and I will tell you a bit about that amazingness soon. Stay tuned. In the meantime …

** Excited waves to Ms. Lyons’ third graders at the Webster School: it was fun to meet all of you! I thought you would get a kick out of that photo up there at the top of this page. Can you find Ms. Lyons and me in it?**

 

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Brookwood School

For three days last week, I got to be part of the incredibly energetic learning community at Brookwood School in Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts … and I am still glowing. I shared writing adventures with first and second graders, buzzed about bees with saavy sixth graders, talked books with excited teaching interns, and celebrated sustainability with the more than six-hundred folks from northeastern Massachusetts who turned out in force for Brookwood’s fourth annual Sustainability Fair.

Six hundred! That’s a lot of green people.

I brought home some nifty treats to share with my family, like organic peach salsa chopped to perfecton by Brookwood second graders, recycled bookmarks crafted by pre-K students (photo above), composting tips, green cleaning tips, farming ideas and inspiration to keep me thinking and living green for a good, long time. I even found a few minutes to stroll the beach and collect seaweed for my garden. (The garlic bed is now drenched in Atlantic seaweed and very, very happy.)

Congratulations, Brookwood School, on a job well done, and thank you for letting me join in the fun!

 

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On Conversations

© Loree Griffin Burns

A couple weeks ago, Sara Pennypacker visited our local library. Being mother to one of Clementine’s best friends (or so she says), organizer of a Mother & Daughter Book Group that has read lots of Clementine adventures, and also a fan of Ms. Pennypacker and Ms. Frazee (writer and illustrator, respectively, of the Clementine books), I went. And something Sara said resonated with me deeply. She told us that the reason she likes to visit schools and libraries is simple: conversation.

Yes. That’s it exactly.

We writers toil and tinker until we’ve got down on paper a story that we think will have meaning for someone. We think what we’ve written is important, and so we send our words out into the world hoping the readers who need them most will find them. Once the book is gone, though, there is not a lot we can do to be sure that happens. We try to spread the word, of course, but so much is out of our hands. In order to avoid the agony of waiting and wondering—and also to keep food on the table—we get busy on the next book.

Eventually, we hear from reviewers. If their criticisms are kind, their whisper of a reply feels good. Sometimes we hear from readers by letter or email, and this also feels good, especially when there is an opportunity to respond. But for me, neither reviews nor letters compare to eye contact with a reader, to an actual exchange of looks and expressions and thoughts and ideas. That sort of loveliness happens only in person, and mostly in a school or library or bookstore setting.

For me, sadly, these events are few and far between. But listening to readers, hearing their responses to my work, knowing—finally!—their thoughts on what I did right, what I did wrong, and what I should do next, is always a humbling experience. I am able to respond, to ask about their thoughts and ideas … and in the asking begins a true, honest-to-goodness conversation. These moments change me in ways that are as profound as they are unexpected.

That Sara Pennypacker is one smart cookie.

All of this is on my mind, of course, because I’ve just returned from two days of school and library visiting in Athol, Massachusetts. The conversations I had there were organic chocolate chip cookies for my writing soul, I tell you …

I met a boy who I think is going to be this world’s next champion of honey bees, a beekeeper with verve and smarts.

I chatted with a girl whose books we will likely all know one day, and she bravely shared with me the opening of her newest short story. It was fabulous … and composed, she told me with a frankness that knocked my breath away, during my presentation. (“When I realized you were going to talk about bees and not writing,” she told me, “I had to tune out. This story had to be written!”)

I sparred with a thoughtful man who is as worried as I am about agricultural chemicals. We are on the same team, he and I, but we use different playbooks, and he reminded me that even in disagreement, conversation is worthy and important.

Many thanks to all the fine folks I met in Athol this week; I am so glad we had time to talk.

A postscript on the illustration: this is an old photo of a special conversation between one of my children and the author of his then-favorite book IBIS: A TRUE WHALE STORY, John Himmelman.

A postscript on my postscript: Yes, I forgot to bring my camera to Athol!