Making Connections

Telling a story – writing a story – is about connecting with a reader. And the storytelling in and of itself is about connections of many kinds. Connections between characters, connections between themes, connections between the beginning, the middle and the end....

Revision

In the process of revision, I discover things. – Rita Dove In my capacity as an editor, I cannot count the number of times I’ve expected an author or illustrator to revise their work. The expectation for revision comes with every manuscript draft and with every batch...

Seeing Through History

Why are the people in charge of our society right now so afraid of history? And in being so afraid, have become dismissive of the importance of history as a continuum of events in succession leading from the past to the present and into the future. To my mind, the...

Letting Go

Growing up in Manhattan, you don’t necessarily do things the way most people do. You don’t, for instance, learn how to drive by the time you’re 16. But you do learn how to trick-or-treat in apartment buildings and how to travel an intricate subway system. You don’t...