Laurie Wallmark – Firsts – Book Giveaway

Winner of book give-away: Nancy Tandon

As the saying goes, every journey begins with a single step. If you haven’t done so already, it’s time to take your first step.

Laurie Wallmark

Laurie Wallmark shares with us some of her writing firsts:

The life as a writer is full of moments, both good and bad. And of course we always remember the “firsts.” I thought you might enjoy hearing about some of my firsts on the path to publication:

• MY FIRST ESSAY. When I was in first (another first!) grade, I overheard some of the older kids complaining about having to write a hundred-word essay. What’s the big deal, I thought to myself. I can do that. Easy. So I took out my pencil and lined paper and wrote my first essay:

The. Cat. Dog. Mom. Dad. Me. Go. Stop. And. But.

Ninety words later, I had my first essay. I think maybe it lacked a bit of characterization and narrative arc, but at least it was the correct word length.

• MY FIRST PUBLISHED POEM. I was very politically active in high school, and my writing reflected this. At the time, grape workers in California were on strike, so I wrote a poem about their struggle—in Spanish, no less—Viva la Huelga! (Long live the strike!). It was published in our school literary magazine. Full disclosure: I was one of the editors.

• MY FIRST WRITING PRIZE. The national SCBWI conference in New York often includes fun prizes for entries about a specific theme. One year, the challenge was to write the name of a possible Broadway show tune based on the life of a children’s book writer. I won $25 for my song with the title, “Seventy-six rejects in a single day.” With my winnings, I bought a craft book about writing for children.

Now I have another first—

• MY FIRST PUBLISHED PICTURE BOOK. Ada Byron Lovelace and the Thinking Machine.

Thought everyone would enjoy seeing some of April Chu’s gorgeous illustrations created for Laurie’s book. April was featured on Illustrator Saturday.Here’s the link.

ADA BYRON LOVELACE AND THE THINKING MACHINE (Creston Books, October 2015) is a picture-book biography of the world’s first computer programmer. Ada was born two hundred years ago, long before the invention of the modern electronic computer. At a time when girls and women had few options outside the home, Ada followed her dreams and studied mathematics. This book, by Laurie Wallmark and April Chu, tells the story of a remarkable woman and her work. Kirkus Reviews describes the book as a “splendidly inspiring introduction to an unjustly overlooked woman.” [starred review]

Join Laurie as she travels from blog to blog to introduce her debut picture book, Ada Byron Lovelace and the Thinking Machine. All stops are listed at: http://lauriewallmark.com/blogtour.php.

Ada Lovelace, the daughter of the famous romantic poet, Lord Byron, develops her creativity through science and math. When she meets Charles Babbage, the inventor of the first mechanical computer, Ada understands the machine better than anyone else and writes the world’s first computer program in order to demonstrate its capabilities.

Laurie is giving away to one lucky winner. All you have to do is leave a comment to get in the running. Reblog, or tweet, or talk about it on facebook with a link and you will get additional chances to win. Just let me know the other things you did to share the good news, so I can put in the right amount of tickets in my basket for you before drawing the winners.

Want to have some fun? Laurie is having a book launch party. I’m going, you should to if you don’t live so far away. Here’s the information.

October 25, 2015, 1:00-3:00
Frenchtown NJ
The Book Garden
Book launch-Ada Byron Lovelace and the Thinking Machine

Click here if you would like to look inside on Amazon.

Talk tomorrow,

Kathy