Introducing OCULUM ECHO, coming October 2022

 

What happens to Miranda1, Mannfred, Cranker, Grannie and the other children of OCULUM now they're outside their domed world?

Robots, freedom, war and FatRats. And ECHO.

I'm SO happy to reveal the cover for my next book, OCULUM ECHO! It's book 2 in The Children of Oculum series.

PRE-ORDER NOW. 

Coming from DCB Young Readers in October 2022, it's the sequel to OCULUM (2018), my middle-grade dystopia, which also features pandemic and climate change. 

In OCULUM ECHO, the story of the children of OCULUM continues. There is still pandemic and the planet is slowly recovering from climate collapse, but now there is also war with the UnRuly. (I was sadly prescient on this one, I'll be writing more about that in upcoming posts, just know that the story offers hope, glimmers anyway.) 

BUT ... there is also a voice from the past. There is also ECHO.

More to come soon, but for now I'm just really excited to reveal the cover of my next book! Thanks to my publisher DCB and to cover artist Emily Weedon, for the great new book cover.

OCULUM was nominated for the OLA Silver Birch Award and the SYRCA Diamond Willow Award and is optioned for a television production.

More about OCULUM on this blog.

Launch, Hamilton SuperCrawl AND a Giveaway for Quinn and the Quiet, Quiet

It's a BUSY week ahead with a book launch, an author reading AND a book giveaway on 49th Shelf!

The lastest book in the Weird Stories Gone Wrong series, Quinn and the Quiet, Quiet, is hitting stores September 21, and I hope you'll join me at an event, or enter to win 1 of 2 sets of the books in the series.

BOOK LAUNCH
Saturday, September 14, 2019, 1-4 pm
Indigo Yonge & Eglinton

AUTHOR TALK: OLD GODS AND ROBOTS
Sunday, September 15, 2019, 1-2 pm
Hamilton SuperCrawl, Author's Tent

49th SHELF GIVEAWAY:
Enter to win 1 of 2 sets of all 6 books in the series, including Quinn and the Quiet, Quiet! Contest ends Sept. 27/19.


More about Weird Stories Gone Wrong on this Blog
BOOK TRAILER for Quinn and the Quiet, Quiet

OCULUM makes the 2019 Forest Kid Summer Reading List!

What are your kids reading this summer?

I couldn't be happier to announce that my middle-grade dystopia, OCULUM, has been selected by young readers on the Forest Kid Summer Reading Committee, a first for me!

OCULUM is in the Red Maple category with some terrific books by Canadian writers like Susin Nielsin, Kevin Sands, Wendy Orr, Gordon Korman and more.

Here's the list: Forest Kids Committee 2019

The OLA Forest of Reading says: "This is what your readers should read over the summer - as chosen by the readers themselves!"

YES to that! Keep reading everyone, and read Canadian. Thanks to my publisher, DCB Young Readers, for letting me tell this near future environmental dystopia (with robots)! 

Borrow OCULUM from Toronto Public Library 
(or check your own hometown library)

Purchase a copy online AMAZON INDIGO 

Check out the FREE Teacher's Guide
More about OCULUM on this blog.
Publisher's Page

MORE fabulous kid's art for OCULUM

J's Granola Bar from OCULUM

"E created a set of bookmarks that depict important scenes from the story.  Part of J’s project was that he created a granola bar based on the story - the details he included are so creative!  R created a poster. If you look closely it includes an amazing amount of details. He split the paper in half and one half is related to things inside Oculum dome, the other half is related to things on the outside in Oculum City.  Personally, I loved the book!!  Thanks for introducing it to us!"- Grade 5 Teacher, Ontario

E's awesome bookmarks

I love this time of year, I get wonderful letters and creative projects from students across the country. Last week I received these wonderful pictures of projects grade 5 students did for OCULUM, my environmental dystopia. SO good, and SO creative, thanks guys!
Keep reading everyone.

R's poster: the amazing detail inside and outside OCULUM.
I love the "W1 Here," the man William 1 made of garbage from the Olden Begones. Amazingly creative.

Here's a link to the FREE TEACHER'S GUIDE for Oculum, courtesy of my publisher Dancing Cat Books

A Diamond Willow Award Nomination for OCULUM!

CCBC Best Books Selection
& Willow Awards stickers!

So honoured to announce that OCULUM 
has been nominated for an SYRCA 
Diamond Willow award, 2019-2020!

Thank you to the SYRCA! 

Here is the list of finalists:
DIAMOND WILLOW 2019-2020

The Diamond Willow was the first nomination I ever received, for my first book, The Gargoyle in My Yard, which is this month celebrating its 10th year in publication.

Kind of a nice circularity to that.

Really looking forward to sharing the book with the students, teachers and librarians of Saskatchewan! See you all soon!

More about OCULUM on this blog.

Introducing the Weird Stories Gone Wrong 6 BOOK SERIES!

HERE THEY ARE! All six covers in the award-winning Weird Stories Gone Wrong series, and what a beautiful job series illustrator Shawna Daigle has done. I'm so lucky!

There are currently five titles available in the series:

Blackwells and the Briny Deep (2018)
Alex and The Other (2018)
Carter and the Curious Maze (2016)
Myles and the Monster Outside (2015)
Jake and the Giant Hand (2014)

And now I'm SO HAPPY to introduce Quinn and the Quiet, Quiet, which comes out from Dundurn Press next fall, September, 2019. It's a resistance dystopia, a little unusual for middle grade readers, but the whole series has been pretty unusual.

The series has covered plenty of weird stories for kids since its start: screaming mermaids on an enchanted island, an evil twin, time-travel at the CNE, a paranormal road-trip and a monster outside the car, and a giant's hand buried in a farmer's field.

More to come about Quinn and the Quiet, Quiet (September, 2019) in the months ahead, but for now, just look at that glorious set of covers!

More about Weird Stories Gone Wrong on this Blog

OCULUM at OLA Super Conference on Jan. 31!

OCULUM, Dancing Cat Books, 2018

Hey Librarian and teacher friends! I'll be signing OCULUM, my new middle-grade dystopia from DCB (formerly Dancing Cat Books), at the Ontario Library Association Super Conference this month.

When: Thursday, January 31/2019
Time: 2:40 pm
Where: OLASC, OBP Pavilion

MORE INFO: OLASC Author Signing Schedule

I hope you'll drop by, say hello, and grab a copy of the dystopia for younger readers that Quill & Quire calls "folksy and whimsical" (and other nice things). See you there!

All Posts about OCULUM on this Blog.

CCBC Best Books for Kids and Teens Fall 2018, OCULUM makes the list!

Every spring and fall, the Canadian Children's Book Centre puts out their list of the 

Best Books for Kids and Teens.

So pleased that OCULUM made the list in the latest issue, Fall 2018! Thanks guys! 

I love the tags: Dystopia, Science Fiction, Adventure, Environment, Robots, Survival, Secrets. 

They could have added one more: Shakespeare 

The main characters in OCULUM are Miranda1 and Mann (remember The Tempest), and the main book that the children living in the domed world of OCULUM read is the WillBook, which is a collection of Shakespeare's plays and poems. 

Thanks to wonderful author Kate Blair for the picture (I still don't have my copy yet, due to a postal strike here in Canada).

Enjoy the full fall catalogue online at CCBC

Get a copy of OCULUM now

Quill & Quire Review

FREE Teacher's Guide

OCULUM gets a CYBILS longlist nom!

Well that's a very nice surprise! My middle-grade dystopia, OCULUM, received a long-listing for the CYBILS awards in the Elementary Speculative Fiction category.

Thank you!

The list is long (hence the name), over 100 books, and although it's largely a U.S. award, there are Canadians on the list with me, notably Kenneth Oppel, Kevin Sylvester, Rachelle Delaney and Wendy Orr (sorry if I missed anyone).

Full List: CYBILS Elementary Speculative Fiction/18

Thank you to my publisher, Dancing Cat Books, for the chance to tell this near-future dystopia that ponders a question for older middle-graders (ages 10-13): what will matter most as humanity rebuilds itself after the fall?

Will it be love? Food? Friendship? Shakespeare? Peaches? Or will it be kindness, community and storytelling? Or something else?

A few readers have described the book as "Cormac McCarthy's The Road for kids", which is interesting. (It's not nearly as disturbing though, honest.)

My favourite character in the book has to be Grannie, who holds fast against poverty, starvation, neglect, and fosters dozens of children at her homestead in the wilderness. She seemed like an important character that we see too rarely in children's books: a brave older woman, holding the world together. I'm pretty happy to see her in print!

For more, here is the publisher's page: OCULUM
Free Teacher's Guide
All posts about OCULUM on THIS BLOG

OCULUM is at Word on the Street 2018!

I'm signing my new middle grade dystopia, OCULUM, at Word on the Street 2018 in Toronto!  It'll be a great day for book-lovers, rain or shine, with lots of fantastic writers, publishers, and books, books, books. Hope you'll come find me and say hi!

When: Sunday, September 23/2018
Event: Word on the Street, Toronto
Where: Cormorant/Dancing Cat Books,
 Booth #236
Author Signing Time: 3-4 pm



Here's the schedule for the full day of signings at Cormorant/Dancing Cat Books, with more great authors
AND a special WOTS promotion, drop by and say hi!

Happy U.S. Book Birthday to OCULUM, love, death and peaches

Oculum, cover by Emma Dolan

"May the sun shine, may the sweet rain fall and the fruit trees blossom once again." Then she mumbles under her breath, "What I wouldn't give for a peach."
--Oculum, Dancing Cat Books, Sept/2018

Those words are spoken by Grannie, the older woman who manages to keep all the boys in her village fed and clothed after the fall of civilization, in my new middle grade dystopia, Oculum.

Peaches, along with all the other fruit bearing trees, are long gone due to an environmental disaster 70 years (or so) earlier. Of course, there ARE peaches in the story, but they are just for the lucky few living in the domed world of Oculum.

The cover of the book shows Mother of Miranda1, a robot mother, holding out a peach.

It's peach season in Ontario right now. My daughter and her boyfriend brought me a carton of fresh Niagara peaches for my birthday dinner this week. We devoured them, they're delicious, sweet and perfect. And they're also a perfect symbol of what we stand to lose in this world if we completely tank the planet.

As I ate a peach this morning, I tried to imagine a world without them. Then realized I didn't want to.

There are other things missing in Oculum. Inside the dome, there is no talk of love and no one has ever died or grieved for a loved one, because all the children are under the age of 13, and their "adults" are all robots. But the children grow up ... and love blooms anyway.

Just like peaches.

And death is unavoidable, inside the domed world and out.

Does Grannie get her peach? Give Oculum a read, and find out!

Happy U.S. book birthday to Oculum, which is available in the U.S. tomorrow, September 1/2018. Buy a copy now: OCULUM

Quill & Quire loved it, here is their review: OCULUM

Also Highly Recommended by CM Magazine, Oculum Review

Goodreads Reviews

More about OCULUM on THIS BLOG

OCULUM, coming Spring 2018!

COMING SPRING 2018 from
Dancing Cat Books | PRE-ORDER NOW

Introducing OCULUM, my new middle-grade dystopia, coming from Dancing Cat Books, April 2018. 
Here's the back cover copy:

“William, you cannot go out that door. You have no idea what’s out there. If there IS anything out there!”

So says Miranda1 to William1 in their perfect, domed world of Oculum. They are the oldest children of the one thousand chosen, raised by robot Mothers, taught to read, write and tend the fruit trees, but in a closed world without love or freedom.

Then one day, William1 finds a hidden door. What awaits Outside?

A destroyed ancient city of rubble, where orphaned children like Mann and Cranker live rough with only Grannie to feed and protect them. It’s a world without beauty or fruit trees, plagued with death and hunger.

But change is coming, if only Miranda1 and William1 can find the way out of Oculum …"

New author photo! No one LIKES taking author photos,
I don't think, but this one is OK. 

Oculum is available SPRING 2018 
For Media and Preview Copy Contact 
ORDER a copy now