Monday Miscellany, a.k.a I Don't Have a New Review

I guess it's time I admitted it to you all--there are times when I'm not actually reading YA books. Surprise! Over the past few weeks I read a couple of grown-up books instead: The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead (which won last year's National Book Award) and No Time Like the Present by Jack Kornfield, which was helpful for anxiety and stress and the like. I highly recommend it if you have any interest in mindfulness as a therapeutic practice. I wouldn't say I'm any GOOD at mindfulness, at meditation, or at stress relief as a general rule, but I think I'm better off having read the book. And, as a special bonus, both of these books were available in my library's ebook app!

I did run across a couple of items of interest, though, which I thought I would share. First, the program for this year's Kidlitosphere Conference in Hershey, PA has been finalized, with a ton of fantastic authors and presenters including keynote Rachel Renee Russell, author of Dork Diaries, Jordan Sonnenblick, Tracey Baptiste, Laura Atkins, and many many more.

Second, in the process of desperately googling ways to make my novel notes more coherent, I found a really cool resource for writers who use Evernote (I don't, but after this I'm thinking about it!). In honor of last year's NaNoWriMo, the Evernote blog did a post about several writer-oriented templates, from character worksheets to plotting outlines. They look really fun to play around with for those who a) use Evernote and b) like to fiddle with their notes and stuff.

As per usual for me these days, I don't think NaNoWriMo is in my future this year, due to work-related circumstances, but I am starting a new project...which is also good news!