Cathy C. Hall Writes

I came across this AMAZING deal the other day from Writer’s Digest. And now you have just a couple more days to act on it, so don’t waste another minute. Go HERE and check out these SEVEN writing books that are absolutely FREE.

That’s right, friends. They’re part of a free NaNoWriMo ebooks deal. And don’t tell me that you don’t have an e-reader, ’cause you can download a FREE Kindle for your PC. Yes, you can. Then you can download any or all of these FREE books. Yes, you can!

Then, after saving ALL that money, you can zip over to the Light Up the Library Auction and bid on something special. There are a ton of categories, and one especially for you, writers.

Now, I love libraries and I love how this auction will benefit the Musana Children’s Home Library in Uganda. So check out what Jean Reidy‘s been up to, and take a look at her book, Light Up the Night, then light up a child’s life with your bid.

For Picture Book Writing Month, I thought it would be fun to ask some of the picture book writers in my own little corner of the world (or in SCBWI/ Southern Breeze, to put it another way) how they came up with the idea for their published picture books. And so here’s Nancy Raines Day on how she came up with the idea for her scary (but adorable) On A Windy Night:

One windy October night in 2001, I heard a newscast about how the terrorists might be planning to attack a mall on Halloween. Thinking about how we humans, with our wild imaginations, can scare ourselves sillier than anyone else can, I stepped outside to clear my head.

Listening to the wind rustling through the dried cornstalks in my husband’s garden as I swam in our backyard pool, I wondered–as I sometimes do about sounds–how would you spell that? I decided on cracklety-clack. Poetry often comes to me when I’m doing something rhythmic, like swimming, walking, or rocking. The refrain popped into my head:

Cracklety-clack, bones in a sack.

They could be yours–if you look back.

Then I got the first stanza:

On a windy night, on a winding road,

A boy walked home with a heavy load.

That much was a gift. But then I had to figure out, who was the boy? What was he carrying? What was the story? It took years to come together–after I had my own lost-in-the-woods-at-night experience!

Oh, Nancy, I SO want to hear about that lost-in-the-woods-at-night experience! And I so love how just a sound, a sound, was the start of On a Windy Night. Thanks so much for the inspiration! And P.S. you’ll find more good stuff where that came from over at Nancy’s place (or her website, to put it another way).