Ellie McDoodle -- live and in person!

Charlie and I had the FABULOUS opportunity to meet Ellie McDoodle, Mo, Ben-Ben, Josh, Lucy, Mr. Brendall, and many other Ellie McDoodle characters yesterday when we popped in to surprise the performers during the Tech Week rehearsal for the stage play at Binda Performing Arts Center on Kellogg Community College's campus.
It was a thrill to see the characters alive on stage.
I'm so excited about the performance this Saturday.
If you're near Battle Creek, Michigan, come by and see it!
Two performances Saturday April 21, 4pm and 7pm.
Click here for all the official information for it or scroll down to the end of this post.
Thank you SO much to Miller College Children's Theater Project and Jenny Andrews for making this happen.
Thank you to the excellent script writer, Jack Wentworth.
Thank you to the fabulous What A Do Theatre and Zac Thompson for directing and managing the play.
And thank you to the performers and their families for making time in their busy schedules to take advantage of an opportunity to experience professional theater, with all its demands and rewards.

The best part of it all? The next Ellie McDoodle book, which I am writing right NOW, is about theater. This production is great inspiration and research!

Here are the performers for Ellie McDoodle: New Kid in School
Adapted for stage by Lakeview High School student Jack Wentworth
Directed by Zac Thompson.

Cast List

Ellie McDoodle...........Anna Harrel
Mom / Whittam...........Ghevon Sebastian
Dad / Brendall...........Anahita Suifollahi
Josh...........Derek Whitesell
Risa...........Kailen Roop
BenBen...........Kessy Cook
Travis...........Avery Beck
Lucy...........Kylie Ohrt
Mo...........Cassandra Galonsky
Marla...........Ariana Saifollahi
Zoe...........Tyree Jones
Sammy...........Kelea Gaskins
Joey...........Naomi Todd
Alex...........Taren Todd
Lisa...........Bailee Goff
Sarah...........Hannah Slayton



The performance will be held at the Binda Performing Arts Center on Kellogg Community College's campus on Saturday, April 21, 2012, at 4:00 and 7:00 p.m. Tickets may be purchased in advance by calling Jenny Andrews at (269) 967-1374 or at the door prior to each performance.  Adult tickets are $8.00; students K-12 $4.00; children 5 and under are free.

Cheezers! Ellie McDoodle has flair!

Here's a bit of Ellie McDoodle flair, available on Facebook:
Just search for Ellie McDoodle. Or scroll through the books category.
And -- there's more to come! (To me this is big-time excitement)

The pin shows Ellie drawing in her sketchjournal (direct from the cover of book 2) and has the word Cheezers! at her shoulder.
Cheezers is a purely-Ellie word. Nobody else uses it and you won't find it in the dictionary. It's a term of surprise, exasperation or dismay.

And what is flair? It's the goofy pins and ribbons the restaurant staff had to wear in the quirky movie, Office Space.
I can relate; I worked at Burger Chef when I was 16 and we sometimes had to wear flair, though it wasn't called that. There was a pin nametag and a pin for the Mariner, a fish dinner. And the hostess -- the plum position every girl wanted; it required no work, just smiles, and you didn't have to wear a hairnet -- got to wear a cool boating hat.
Working for Burger Chef was okay, but it convinced me I didn't want to go into food service as a career. I'm much happier creating kids' books.

Does life ever slow down?

Does life ever slow down? And would I want it to? No, and no, I guess.

(from an Attwood Elementary School Field Day 2008 sign; this year's theme was Ellie McDoodle! Last year's was Dr. Suess)

Ellie 2 is out! Ellie McDoodle: New Kid in School is on bookstore and library shelves right NOW. Buy it! Borrow it! Read it!

I think it's a better book than the first. The first reviews are in, and they agree. It's the best I could make it... which means there's plenty of room for improvement. ;)

The book launch party at Schuler Books in Eastwood Towne Center last weekend went FANTASTIC. We had more people than chairs -- I was truly heartened (and surprised -- expected about 3 people there, and even told Jim at Schulers to only set up 3 chairs. He laughed and set up 40). My friend Lori reports on the event here.

Ellie and Er-ick play tug-o-war on a sign at the Attwood Field Day

I'm working on a few other book projects right now. When my wonderful-beautiful-brilliant (honestly, she is all that) editor says those magic words, "What do you have for the next Ellie book?" I'll be ready. In the meantime, I'm working on a book for older kids and a book for younger kids.

I've done a zillion sketches this summer, but haven't scanned many in because I've been too busy with other obligations.
Here are two sketches from my cousin's Ordination as a Priest, in May.

It was a fascinating ceremony, held in downtown Detroit at a lovely cathedral. Here's Father Charles, no longer Chuck:

Our car is in the shop, the first loaner car died (same problem as our car, ironically), and now the second loaner car is dead. I'm distressed; I missed a crit group meeting this morning and will probably miss my friend's birthday party this afternoon.

Crying doesn't help, so I'm writing (working on a book about a kid in NYC).

And, when I need a break, I pull pranks on my kid.

I'm laughing at the moment, because she just walked into my studio dressed like me! And talking like me! And it's hysterical.

Got time on your hands because your car isn't working?

Read this: Debbie Diesen's blog

Her book just went into a second printing -- and it's only been out a couple months.

And read this: Ann Finkelstein's blog.

And this one: Lori Van Hoesen's blog.

And check out this site: http://runamokink.com/ That's April.

These are all brilliant writers in my crit group. (Tim, Amy and Kay don't have blogs yet)

I love them so much I put their pictures in my second Ellie book. Page 7.

Mostly done

This is Ellie, from book 2, embarrassed and trying to melt into the floor.Suddenly my time is my own, again.
I've been working nonstop since September on the second Ellie book, first some marketing stuff with the publisher and then the revised art and writing for it.

All during November I worked all day and all night on the book. I stayed up til 2, 3, 4 in the morning. Sometimes til after 6am. Sometimes I went to bed at 3 and had to get up at 7:30 to get my daughter to school. It was a grueling schedule, definitely.
I missed some very important events. I don't even want to list them because if I think about it too much I'll be too sad and will question my priorities.
Basically I put my life on hold, for the book.
Nobody asked me to.
Nobody forced it on me.
I have a weird sense of focus when it comes to books.
Whether reading them or creating them, I enter the world of the characters and it's nearly impossible to come back out before the job is done.

With Harry, Hermione and Ron, my teenage self became the fourth buddy, the one not mentioned in the book by the author. I hung out with Hermione in the girls' dorm. I had a crush on both Ron and Harry, and wondered whose side Snape was on. In that big cataclysmic fight scene I was there, helping our guys to triumph over evil.

It's the same way with my Ellie McDoodle books. I become part of the book, both observer and creator, an unwritten and unmentioned character who goes on every adventure, shares in every secret and sometimes wishes my real life was so exciting.
(Actually, my real life is plenty exciting, but a lot of that is due to the books!)

All through November I lived the Ellie book.
I sent the last package of art and text to arrive on my editor's desk on the last day of the month.
There will still be little revisions, and the first package of the first 44 pages has some very rough art in it, so there are about 11 illustrations that I know will need redrawing.
But the bulk of it is done.
Book 2 is written.

I think you'll enjoy it. I laughed a few times, out loud, while writing it.
I felt Ellie's angst and I understood her pain in certain scenes.
I think the reader will, also.
Ellie McDoodle: New Kid in School won't be on bookshelves until the end of June. In this book, Ellie starts at a new school in a new city without any friends.
Like me, Ellie has trouble sleeping before the big event.

Here's a sneak peek at page 66:

Now, I can't wait for the whole thing to be printed into a galley and then published as a real book.
I think it's a good one!
But there's plenty of things to do before the book comes out.
Like answer all this email.
I have 958 messages accumulated, which need responses. Very few of them need only filing or deleting.
If you've written me and you've waited patiently for two months for a response, know that you've got plenty of company, and I might be responding soon...