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It is a great honor to have my work recognized this way.... Since my first book, THE WAY HOME, was published 20 years ago, I've felt like an outsider paddling upstream—with a needle and thimble in a stream of watercolors. Now I feel I'm floating down a stream of possibilities.

from her Amazon page

I say I am part of the "slow art movement."

Machines are no help, everything is done by hand.

Growing up crayons, were never enough... I'd spend hours creating scenes and clothing for my miniature dolls.

Writing the text of a picture book is deceptive. I mean, you look at the number of pages. 32. "I can write 32 pages!"
You look at the word count. Under 1,000. "I can crank out 1,000 words in one sitting!"
And you think, "how hard could it be?"

Well if you've tried it, you'll understand that crafting a great picture book text is like mastering the art of bonsai. Every word counts. Trim here. Shape there. Let the story grow and bloom and yet keep it tightly constrained while you revise and revise... and revise until there's magic shimmering in every word, in every page turn, in every emotion.

Rukhsana Khan wrote "Big Red Lollipop," and it's a beautifully written (and beautiful) picture book about culture clashes and wanting to fit in and sibling rivalry and ultimately, love.



Illustrated by Sophie Blackall, Rukhsana Khan's text for "Big Red Lollipop" won her the Golden Kite Award.

Here's Rukhsana accepting her award:



In her acceptance speech, she's telling us that she's been writing seriously for twenty-two years. And it took her ten years to write this. She's telling us that the first version of "Big Red Lollipop" showed up as an anecdote in her novel, "Dahling, If You Luv Me, Would You Please, Please Smile."

She's explaining the story behind the story - a moment from her childhood, where she wasn't the point of view character she later depicted in "Big Red Lollipop" - she was actually the younger sister who ate the lollipop!

And as an adult, she told this real life moment at a conference, and had to figure out, how do I make this a story? She uses it in workshops, and asks attendees to come up with different endings.

When you're writing a story, you can change what happens.

The ending in the book isn't what happened, but what should have.

She tried to make this story work in multiple formats over the years, (even as an easy reader), and then got the suggestion to re-write the story from her older sister's point of view - and it was the breakthrough she needed and wrote in 15 minutes - "this story took me ten years and fifteen minutes to write."

Rukhsana is a great storyteller, and it's a wonderful picturebook!

Jennifer Holm is the 2011 Golden Kite Award recipient for TURTLE in PARADISE.

Jennifer opens with, "I like to revise. It's kind of an occupational hazard, if you know what I mean." Then she thanks the entire room and tells us she has a lot of thank you notes to write.

She could hardly believe she had won this award.

Jennifer was sick when she learned she won and said, "That call was better than any chicken soup."

TURTLE IN PARADISE wasn't an easy book to write, she tells us.

"Don't give up. Stopping counting after you hit the 16th draft. Save frequently. Hire a babysitter so you have time to write," she told the room and then shared that this room of people is here for us (all of us). "We are your people."

Sarah Stern has designed the first ever Golden Kite poster. This poster will be sent to schools, libraries and bookstores all over the country to promote the latest winners of this prestigious award. This year's poster features the art of past GK Picture Book Illustration Award winner, John Parra.

These are going to be collector's items, so beautiful!

Thank you very much, I'm not as well spoken as the wonderful writers here today, that's why I chose art.

GRACIAS-THANKS by Pat Mora is a story about a boy raised in a multicultural family who goes through his day noticing the small (and sometimes not so small) things he is thankful for.

I would also like to say thank you.
Thank you to my parents, who always encouraged and supported me to become an artist.
It was the early memories of my dad drawing for me and my brother that inspired me to also be an artist.
My mom, a school teacher, read to us every day.
Thank you to my wife, Maria, for her love and support... for sharing her amazing insight and ideas as my personal art director and manager.
Thank you to Lee & Low, especially Louise May, my editor.
Thank you to all my art teachers and mentors. They showed me my dreams and provided me with tools on the path to becoming a real artist.
Thank you to my peers and all the great people at SCBWI.

With dreams and ambitions, the path of an artist is rarely easy. I'm infinitely grateful for all that I've received, thank you very much.

As Steve Mooser introduced this year's Golden Kite winner for non-fiction, he mentioned that if anyone saw Ashley Bryan at last night's poolside gala, they might not realize he just turned 87. But I was witness, and now you can be too.

Here is Ashley Bryan dancing with the lovely Sally Crock.

Jane Yolen author of children's books, fantasy, and science fiction, including Owl Moon, The Devil's Arithmetic, and How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight? has been added to our conference line-up as a special closing keynote speaker! Jane has been called the Hans Christian Andersen of America and the Aesop of the twentieth century.

Besides the SCBWI's own Golden Kite Award, her books and stories have won the Caldecott Medal, two Nebula Awards, two Christopher Medals, the World Fantasy Award, three Mythopoeic Fantasy Awards, the Jewish Book Award, the World Fantasy Association's Lifetime Achievement Award, and the Association of Jewish Libraries Award among many others.

Don't miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to hear the wisdom and wit of a legendary voice in the world of literature for young readers!

Click here to register. Early registration ends January 4th!

Thanks to Cynthia Leitich Smith for posting the following info WITH LINKS:

Golden Kite Award Winners:

Picture Book Text: Pierre in Love by Sara Pennypacker, illustrated by Petra Mathers (Orchard).

Picture Book Illustration: Little Night by Yuyi Morales (Roaring Brook)(illustrator interview).
Note: Yuyi also illustrated Harvesting Hope: The Story of Cesar Chavez.

Golden Kite Honor Recipients:
Picture Book Text: The End by David LaRochelle, illustrated by Richard Egielski (Arthur A. Levine Books)(author interview).
Note: David won the 2005 Sid Fleischman Humor Award for Absolutely Positively Not.

Picture Book Illustration: Who Put the B in Ballyhoo? by Carlyn Beccia (Houghton Mifflin)(author-illustrator interview)
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Cover illustration by Petra Mathers

Angelo has another thought-provoking post at his blog, this time on the Filippino Consul General's argument against the boycott of Herman's Bakery. Shut-UpPinoys


Here's my own take on the matter.

The background
Herman's Bakery is the business run by a family corporation, headed by Juan Tenorio Guerrero, a/k/a Juan Pan. Other Juan Pan businesses include Western Union and MITA travel.

Juan T. Guerrero (Juan Pan) has been president of the Chamber of Commerce, head honcho of the Red Cross, a former Congressman in the CNMI Legislature, Executive of the year, and an otherwise well-recognized and respected community leader in CNMI and Guam. Herman'sHistory

But he's taken a stance against federalization , and opposed the wage hike as well. In fact he said these would be a disaster for the CNMI. PanPredictsDisaster


The call to action
For his opposition to the rights of workers, especially the alien workers, and his opposition to possible improvement in the CNMI through federalization, now there is a call for action against his businesses. A boycott. A boycott of Herman's Bakery products (which are available retail, but also used at KFC and other places), his Western Union business, MITA and any other Juan Pan business.

The call is being sent around by text messaging. (Love technology!) And it's making some waves, getting a little press coverage and prompting a call to Juan Pan himself, while he was in D.C. talking about how the CNMI doesn't need U.S. takeover of immigration and labor.


Juan Pan's response
Juan Pan, when learning of the call for the boycott, tried to paint himself as only a messenger. He said that he is just delivering the message of the Chamber of Commerce because he is its president. And that he has a right to express his own opinions, too. Don'tShootTheMessenger

What? This is a ridiculous response.

Juan Pan fully supports the Chamber's position against federalization. He's been a mover and shaker in the CNMI's effort to stop federalization, speaking out on it, predicting disaster, joining in the meetings. If he had serious qualms about the Chamber's latest position, he could have argued against it at some point. He could have begged off being the "messenger" and let someone else deliver the Chamber's position. His decision to be the one to testify is evidence of his commitment to the opposition to federalization.

And then there's the Chamber's position against grand-fathering in long-term residents. They want to say that all the years people have lived in the CNMI as alien workers doesn't count. That everybody starts over, starts on the date of the new law, assuming one is passed.

And this position, against grandfathering in our long-time resident aliens, is just nasty. Immoral. Cowardice.


the RP Consul General's mistake
The RP Consul General urged everyone to ignore the boycott because it would hurt the workers employed by Juan Pan. It's a "pressure tactic" and that makes it blackmail. And so it would be wrong.

But if you employ that logic, it would mean we could never protest anything. The Boston Tea Party (which is one of the most outrageous acts of vandalism and theft to ever be perpetrated in the name of a cause) would be reduced to nothing more than a crime, not an eloquent demand for freedom. The Emancipation Proclamation and the entire Civil War, fighting against slavery, would be wrong because slave-owners would react, and those poor slaves would have no homes, no place to work, nothing--but freedom. The Resistance against Hitler would be wrong, because trying to undermine his power and pressure him into not torturing and killing Jews would be-well, blackmail. And the German law could be used against your family and other innocents.

Obviously, the RP Consul General's argument is baloney.

Boycott--it's not wrong, it's a right.
There is nothing wrong with concerted effort to boycott. It's a tactic that recognizes how economic endeavors are intertwined with the political. And when you can't make direct progress on the political front, you need to refocus on the economic. There have been some successful boycotts. BoycottPepsiforBurma , TheMontgomeryBusBoycott , and the original boycott, aimed at landreform in Ireland.

So, if you support federalization, the wage hike, and recognition of aliens' long-term residence in the CNMI as a basis for rights, then boycott the Juan Pan businesses.

As for me, I support those things. I'm not a big fan of the U.S. and its handling of immigration at all, but I've come to the conclusion that the CNMI can't make things better on its own because our leaders are all like Juan Pan--getting rich from cheap foreign labor, and thus forgetting the higher moral values in support of equality and liberty, living wages for all and an end to poverty, justice and universal brotherhood that they had instilled by their faith, by their community, and just by living.