2012 Children / Teens Participants

Listed in alphabetical order

Tony Abbott

On the Edge of Our Seats: Why Kids Love Suspense – Saturday 10:30 AM

Tony Abbott has published over ninety books for readers 6 to 14, including the long-running series The Secrets of Droon, and the novels Kringle, Firegirl, The Postcard (2008 Edgar Award winner), and Lunch-Box Dream, which appeared in 2011. New series include Goofballs and Underworlds, both for readers age 7 and up. Tony also teaches in the MFA Creative Writing program at Lesley University in Cambridge Massachusetts. His website is www.tonyabbottbooks.com, and he writes the literary blog www.FridayBookReport.com.

Elise Broach

On the Edge of Our Seats: Why Kids Love Suspense – Saturday 10:30 AM

Elise Broach is the author of 12 books for children, ranging from board books to young adult novels. Her picture book When Dinosaurs Came with Everything won the E.B. White Read Aloud Award, and her middle-grade mystery Masterpiece was a New York Times Bestseller. The first book in her new mystery trilogy, Missing on Superstition Mountain, was recently selected as an Amazon 2011 Best Books of the Year. Elise lives with her family in Connecticut.

Corinne Demas

Time to Face the Change – Saturday 3:00 PM

Corinne Demas is the award-winning author of twenty-eight books for children and adults, including two short story collections, four novels, a memoir, Eleven Stories High: Growing up in Stuyvesant Town, 1948—1968, and a collection of poetry, The Donkeys Postpone Gratification. Her most recent books include her new novel, The Writing Circle, and her new Young Adult novel, Everything I Was.  Her children’s books include The Littlest Matryoshka,  Saying Goodbye to Lulu, The Disappearing Island, Always in Trouble, and Pirates Go to School. She is a Professor of English at Mount Holyoke College and a Fiction Editor of The Massachusetts Review.
Her website is www.corinnedemas.com

Susan Kapuscinski Gaylord

Homes for Poems Bookmaking Workshop – Saturday 9:30 AM

Newburyport resident Susan Kapuscinski Gaylord has an international reputation for sharing the art and craft of making simple handmade books through her website:
www.makingbooks.com and blog: www.susangaylord.com. Her own artists books have been featured in magazines (Urthona: Buddhism and the Arts, Somerset Studio, Fiberarts, Letter Arts Review) and books (500 Handmade Books, Cover to Cover, The Art of the Handmade Book, Handmade Books And Cards) and exhibited around the US and abroad.

Jeff Kinney

Comics, Diaries and the Triumph of the Wimpy Kid – Saturday 1:00 PM

Jeff Kinney is an online game developer and designer, and the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. There are more than 45 million copies in print. Jeff was named one of Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World. He spent his childhood in the Washington, D.C., area and moved to New England in 1995. Jeff lives in southern Massachusetts with his wife and their two sons.

Brian Meehl

Weird is the New Cool: How Quirky Characters Make Us Care – Saturday 2:00 PM

Brian Meehl, ex-Muppeteer and 3-time Emmy winner for writing children’s television, is thrilled to be immersed in his first great love: books. He has written four novels for young readers: Out of Patience, Suck It Up (it’s sequel, Suck It Up and Dieto be released this August) and You Don’t Know About Me. This last one was just garnered a Blue Ribbon from the Bulletin for the Center of Children’s Books. Meehl has two beautiful daughters and is married to the documentary filmmaker, Cindy Meehl.

For the full menu on Meehl, check out his author website, www.brianmeehl.com

Matthew Quick

Weird is the New Cool: How Quirky Characters Make Us Care – Saturday 2:00 PM

Matthew Quick (aka Q) is the author of The Silver Linings Playbook (Sarah Crichton Books / Farrar, Straus & Giroux) and two young adult novels, Sorta Like a Rock Star and Boy21 (both Little, Brown & Co.). His work received the 2009 PEN/Hemingway Award Honorable Mention; was named an Amelia Elizabeth Walden Book Award for Young Adult Fiction Finalist; won the Michigan Library Association’s Thumbs Up! Award; made the YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults 2011 list; has been translated into Italian, Spanish, Chinese, and Russian; and was selected by Amanda Ross for The TV Book Club in the UK. The Weinstein Company and David O. Russell are making The Silver Linings Playbook movie, starring Robert De Niro, Bradley Cooper, and Jennifer Lawrence. Matthew lives in central Massachusetts with his wife, novelist Alicia Bessette. www.matthewquickwriter.com

Barbara Walsh

Remembering Sammy – Saturday 10:30 AM

Barbara Walsh is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who has worked for newspapers and magazines in Florida, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire and Ireland. Her book, Sammy in the Sky, is illustrated by painter Jamie Wyeth; it was inspired by her family’s first dog, Sam, a loyal and loving hound who died in 2004. She is also the author of August Gale: A Father and Daughter’s Journey into the Storm, an adult biography and memoir. Barbara lives in Maine with her family and their coonhound Jack, a rescue dog from Tennessee. Her website is http://barbarawalsh.net/