Rebecca M. Douglass, Author

  Title: Weedflower Author:   Cynthia Kadohata Publisher: Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2006 Source: Library Publisher's Summary: Twelve-year-old Sumiko feels her life has been made up of two parts: before Pearl Harbor and after it. The good part and the bad part. Raised on a flower farm in California, Sumiko is used to being the only Japanese girl in her class. Even when the other kids tease her, she always has had her flowers and family to go home to. That all changes after the horrific events of Pearl Harbor. Other Americans start to suspect that all Japanese people are spies for the emperor, even if, like Sumiko, they were born in the United States! As suspicions grow, Sumiko and her family find themselves being shipped to an internment camp in one of the hottest deserts in the United States. The vivid color of her previous life is gone forever, and now dust storms regularly choke the sky and seep into every crack of the military barrack that is her new "h...

This week Chuck Wendig challenged us to write a story in which insomnia plays some role . I picked on poor Xavier Xanthum again, and went just 3 words over the 1000-word limit. Sleep Xavier Xanthum, Space Explorer, was regretting having landed on his latest discovery. Granted, it was what he did. And the planet looked good; money in the bank if it checked out. Larry’s scans had shown no particular hazards or dangerous life-forms. Larry didn’t make many mistakes. Xavier was pretty sure, looking at the five-legged beast with very large teeth, that he’d made one this time. The creature looked dangerous, and Xavier didn’t want to stick around to find out if he was right. The trouble was, he was too far from the landing pod to retreat. Xavier couldn’t even begin to imagine how a five-legged creature could keep track of its feet, let alone run, but he was pretty sure the mind behind those teeth knew the answer. There was only one place to go, and Xavier went. The planet had a lot of plant li...

This month the IWSG has a prompt (maybe we do every month? I can be so slow to pick up on these things). That's convenient, because I didn't know what to write about this time, except to fret some more because I'm not actually writing this summer. So far, I'm mostly traveling. Which is totally cool, except...my book! It's not happening! Okay, so the prompt is   What's the best thing someone has ever said about your writing? It looks so easy. It would be easy just to say it's , "When's the next book coming?" and that's even fairly true. I mean, especially the first time a reader indicated how eager she was for the next book it was a total thrill. And basically every time someone leaves a comment on my blog (especially on the flash fiction) telling me that they loved the story I just posted, I pretty much do a happy dance. But maybe the best thing anyone has ever said was about my first published book, The Ninja Librarian . The president of...

Just for fun...a little excerpt from the 4th of July in Skunk Corners, as the author is very busy just now and is already late with this post :D  It's a little long, being a whole chapter from The Ninja Librarian , but it's good reading for this holiday! THE NINJA LIBRARIAN AND THE GLORIOUS FOURTH, PART II I have seldom enjoyed a meal as much as I did that Independence Day picnic.  I sat with Tommy and Peggy, and it would be hard to say which of us ate the most.  I’d never have believed kids their size could stow away that much food, though some of it may have ended up in pockets for later.   Across from us, the Ninja Librarian ate with a restraint I could scarcely imagine.  Either they teach an awful sort of self-denial wherever he learned to be what he is, or he’s a far better cook than I am. Or maybe not all those widows had given up.   I was distracted from the thought by the appearance of another dish of potato salad.  By the time we’d taken care ...

Today's post is late, and not entirely up to snuff, because I have been traveling and had limited opportunities to work on it. I'll try to do better in future! Title: When You Reach Me Author: Rebecca Stead Publisher:  Wendy Lamb Books, 2009, 199 pages Source: Library digital resources Publisher's Summary: By sixth grade, Miranda and her best friend, Sal, know how to navigate their New York City neighborhood. They know where it’s safe to go, like the local grocery store, and they know whom to avoid, like the crazy guy on the corner. But things start to unravel. Sal gets punched by a new kid for what seems like no reason, and he shuts Miranda out of his life. The apartment key that Miranda’s mom keeps hidden for emergencies is stolen. And then Miranda finds a mysterious note scrawled on a tiny slip of paper: I am coming to save your friend’s life, and my own. I must ask two favors. First, you must write me a letter. The notes keep coming, and Miranda slowly realizes ...

Title: Paperboy Author: Vince Vawter; read by Lincoln Hoppe Publisher: Random House/Listening Library, 2013. 240 pages in hardcover. Source: Library (digital resources) Publisher's Summary: An 11-year-old boy living in Memphis in 1959 throws the meanest fastball in town, but talking is a whole different ball game. He can barely say a word without stuttering, not even his own name. So when he takes over his best friend's paper route for the month of July, he knows he'll be forced to communicate with the different customers, including a housewife who drinks too much and a retired merchant marine who seems to know just about everything. My Review: Paperboy is a good story, though at times it feels like it's taking on too much--coming of age and stuttering might be enough without the segregation issues. But that's the life the lead character gets (and, I gather from the Author's Note at the end, the life the author got), and the story doesn't try to reso...

  I recently ( thanks, Jemima Pett! ) stumbled on the Flashback Friday blog hop run by Michael G D'Agostino , and couldn't help thinking it would be a great help during the summer when I'm often on the road--or the trail--and can't post in the usual way. This is one of those weeks, plus Chuck didn't give us a prompt this week, so I've crawled around in the archives and hauled up and old story. A little dusting off, and here we go. From 11/31/2013: The Cat Did It Now, I’m not saying the cat was plotting to kill me.  But. It started with football practice.  I’m not really supposed to be there anyway, since no one thinks a girl should play football.  Mom says nobody should play football, and she was only letting me play as long as it was flag football.  That gave me one more year.  After that, the only options were to convince her I could play tackle ball or quit.  Maybe I could find a rugby team.  Bet Mom would love that! But at practice last week,...