Writers, Wheat, and Giant Wagon

Crack o' dawn. Stumble into car. Drive away from our house in the woods. Waiting for coffee to kick in. We're off to see the wizard...wait, I am the wizard. Off to present at the Inland Empire SCBWI Regional Conference. The ferry smooths us over to Seattle in the distant mist.

You must cross the Cascade Mountains
to find the Inland Empire.

Then you must brave the corn people, the prairie dogs, and the rednecks before you arrive at the Inland Empire with its strange wonders. In an earlier post I told of the last time I was in the Inland Empire and was doing a book signing at Barnes and Noble in Spokane. A pig came up to me in the store and asked for my autograph. This is true. Word. Ipso Facto.

Wheat fields, silos and tractors...

Spokane is a lovely city cut in half by a powerful river, with beautiful turn-of-the-century buildings.

There's evidence that Gulliver used to hang out in this town. His journal was originally called Travels Into Several Remote Nations of the World.... so now you know. It's not called The Inland Empire for nothing.


I spoke to writers and illustrators about letting your picture book story swallow you whole, as in Shel Silverstein's poem, I'm Being Eaten by a Boa Constrictor.

Which reminds me, I once had python soup when I was in Singapore. It did not taste like chicken. It tasted stringy, like snake.

It was a great conference. Thanks so much to all the organizers and attendees. Among the highlights was meeting editor, Mary Kate Castellani of Walker Books for Young Readers. I was also happy to meet author, Judy Gregerson, and hubby, Scott.

I am still recovering from meeting Terry Trueman. He is a force to be reckoned with. He looked down at my Birkenstocks and said, " Yeah, well do your thing here, and then get out of town as quick as you can..." He drives like my life depended on it. He is, in fact, delightful. All things considered. Susi and I read his book, Stuck In Neutral, on our trip back home. Mind-blowingly good book. I'll do a separate post about it, later.


On the journey home from The Inland Empire we saw these scurvy pirates. They were no match for our newly restocked inspiration, and writerly resolve. With my illustrator's savoir faire I dispatched them handily to the bottom of Davey Jone's Junior High locker.