… and what is the use of a book, thought Alice, without pictures or conversations?

Or, put another way, what is the point of a writer’s blog that doesn’t, on a reasonably regular basis, talk about writing? A writer's blog that doesn’t, once in a blue moon, brag?

Blessing’s Bead was named to  Booklist’s Top Ten First Novels for Youth 2010!

(There. I said it.)

But that’s not all:  the cover of Blessing’s Bead is the cover of the October issue of Booklist. 

I think I’ll have it framed. Does anyone have a copy they’d be willing to send?

But the coolest thing is this: Booklist’s facebook icon this month is, yes, you guessed it, BLESSING’S BEAD!!! I am not joking. Go friend Booklist and see for yourself.

There. I said it all. I’ll be quiet now. I won’t be self-serving next time, I promise.

Seriously, though, I don’t think that I’m the only writer who has a hard time with self-promotion. It just seems so…gauche. Like running up and down the street hollering Like me! Please like me! I mean, you spend years honing your craft, learning to open yourself to something higher, something over which you ultimately have no control.  And you devote countless unpaid hours—yes, years —to pouring your heart and soul onto the page in pursuit of something the name of which mostly alludes you. And after all that they want you to...what did you say?...go out and sell yourself?

Sorry, I think I have a call on the other line...

Actually, it was the cover of Blessing's Bead that attracted them, you know. It wasn't the writing.  It was my daughter--that's her picture on the cover. Her name is Susan, after my mother. Her Inupiaq name is Aaluk, the same name as one of the characters in the book. I talk about how that cover came about on Jacket Knack, an interesting blog that examines the art of and issues surrounding book covers. Go read it and then come back and talk to me about  book covers, book publicity, or the issues of race I raise there.

Or not.