Book Club

The idea of a book club isn’t anything new, but the idea of an online book club that enables the readers to have personal contact with the author of the book each month and throughout the year is different. That is exactly what Fellowship of Fantasy has done with their Facebook Book Club.

Each month, club members nominate a theme for the next month and nominate ten books that are then voted on by the club members. An electronic version of the chosen book is made available for free to all members throughout the month. All of the nominated books are featured throughout the month with giveaways and prizes. Part way through the month a spoiler thread appears and readers can share their thoughts and feelings and discuss the book to their hearts’ content. The best part is the author gets to interact and answer any questions you have!

This month’s featured book was Fabled by Kara Jaynes. At the beginning of the month, Kara let us know that books two and three were on sale for 99 cents. So, when I picked up Fabled, I also grabbed the the other two books. I am so happy I did, because book 1 ends in a bit of a cliff-hanger. I’ll be featuring the series in a future blog post of recommended reads for back to school.

Go to Book Club

Fan Art Contest

Do you love to draw, paint, write, sing, quilt, or sculpt? If so, then you’re the one we’re looking for. Fellowship of Fantasy is sponsoring a fan art contest for any Indie fantasy books. Any of the Dragon Courage series will count as will any of the books listed in my recommended book lists. Enteries are open right now until August 21st. Voting will be held on Fellowship of Fantasy’s Facebook page based on likes during the month of September. For ease of voting, there are three divisions: ages 16+, 11-15, and 10 and under. Want more information or have something to submit? Check out Fellowship of Fantasy’s Fan Art page.

Go to Fan Art Page

Hope to see you in the book club and to see your artistic renderings in the fan art contest. Have questions? Feel free to ask.

Choose a Book with Appeal

When choosing a book, consider the age of the child and the attention span. I’ve read to two-year-olds. However, I chose a book that had lots of pictures and things the child could look at. When reading to my own kids, I picked out books they either recommended to me or gave them an option of several interesting ones and then let them decide.

What will appeal? Good question. For younger children, I’d suggest picture books with vibrant colors. For very young ones, the Dr. Seuss books are great for that. Another good author is Jan Brett. Her books combine great story-lines with amazing drawings. Unique books also are good. Joseph Had a Little Overcoat is one such book. It has cut outs to create the drawings. For older kids, you’ll want good stories. Think of the ones that you enjoyed growing up. Blend some of the classics with some modern day stories. A good resource for a list of books to read at different ages is Honey for a Child’s Soul.

Stretch Your Child

A pet peeve of mine is when people talk down to kids. When they do this, it’s as if they’re saying the child is not of importance. I say, believe in your child. Stretch your child’s imagination, vocabulary, and attention span. Test different styles of books to read to your child. Just because it’s not in his or her age range, may not mean it isn’t perfect for the two of you to sit down and read. Often people think that children can’t understand large vocabulary. I disagree. Lemony Snicket used big words in his A Series of Unfortunate Events. Each book centered around one word that sometimes I didn’t even know what it meant. He would explain it at the beginning and then move on and continue to use it throughout the book. When I wrote the Dragon Courage series, I read it to my children who were eight, eleven and twelve at the time. The nine-year-old sat through all of them eating them up and asking for more. The other two came and went, but still have favorite characters from the stories. The series is rated at middle grade, but I didn’t talk down to them. Even when my editor pointed out words, I thought through them and often decided to keep them and let kids look them up or ask an adult what it means.

Be Active

One of my now twenty-two=year-old’s favorite bed-time stories when he was about two was the Berenstein Bears In the Dark. It wasn’t because of the story itself but because how we read it to him. We moved him around with the bears, and at the end when sister bear bends over the edge of the bunk bed and yells “boo” to brother bear, we’d reenact it every time.

With little ones, I’ve watched my mom point out the items in the pictures. She’ll ask, “Where’s the bird? Do you see the bird?” then wait until the child points with her. I’ve also used my finger to point to the words. Soon, the little ones are using their finger to follow along as well. This is not only keeping them involved, but it helps them with reading readiness which their kindergarten teacher will thank you for.

Be Creative

Change your voice around as you read. Be the different characters. Have fun with it. Kids love it when you have fun with them.

Audio books can be great at this. If you sit down and listen to an audio book with your child, you can have memories of a book read aloud that you both experienced together as hearers. From 2012-14, I had a fifty minute commute to work. I took my middle son along as he attended school where I taught. We’d use that fifty minutes one way to listen to audio books. We traveled through the worlds of Peter Pan and the Starcatchers, The Beyonders, and many more. We participated together in the unwinding of the plot and character development. We’d discuss what we thought would happen, how we’d have written it if we were the authors, and sometimes even real life values based on what we were hearing.

An alternative to a professional audio book is a self-made one. When my family moved to Ecuador for eleven months, we took the three-month-old granddaughter, and two-and-a-half-year-old grandson from my parents. They made the best of it by recording tapes of grandma reading to the grandkids. Later, when we returned, a friend we met in Ecuador sent a tape to our son of her reading his favorite books. She added a fun twist. She got books she knew he had and could follow along with. So, as she read and would get to the bottom of the page, she’d say “ding, ding, turn the page”. After that, no matter who read to him, we had to use, “ding, ding, turn the page”.  In today’s technology of recorders, it would be even easier to do this.

This all sounds nice and easy. It is. The hardest part is getting up and going to your local library and picking out a book. You can do it. Maybe try one of these already mentioned, or pick up one of your favorites from growing up. Here’s a list of my favorite books you can choose from. So, go out there and start reading to your child.

About the book: Misadventures of Princess Sydney: Have Parentals, Will Travel is the second book in the Princess Sydney series. Readers call Minich’s writing, “fun-filled,” “insightful and creative,” and “heartwearming.”  If you are between the ages of 8-12, a dog lover, or a kid at heart, this book is for you! You can find Chris’s books on Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Blurb: “You’ll have a great time,” said the Parentals. But Princess Sydney knows better! America’s favorite crafty cockapoo reluctantly embarks on summer vacation, along with her bumbling brother, Buddy. She expected chaos, but she she never expected to lose her cool when the trip takes an unplanned turn. Silly boy dogs, leftover pizza, and fair maidens are just a few of the bumps along their travels that will keep readers laughing and in love in this second book in the Princess Sydney series. As Sydney would tell you, “Why wouldn’t it?”

About the author: Chris Minich is a writer living in Snoqualmie Washington. He enjoys spending time with his wife and their two precocious dogs, Sydney and Buddy. Chris is also a die-hard Seattle Seahawks fan. You can find out more about Chris and the Princess Sydney series on his website, on twitter, @cockapoosyd, Instagram, or Pinterest.

The kids have grown up learning to sit and listen to adult conversations, and as they grew, they became part of that conversation. I used to read to them after dinner. We have met various characters who have become part of our family culture. I started out with biographies, and then moved on to stories the kids wanted to share with the family. The last book we read was D J MacHale’s Pendragon series. We only made it to book 9, and it took several years due to various interruptions. The reading gave way to conversations with the kids about their day or joking around. Some of my favorite memories right now are centered around our dinner table and laughing with my children.

Our dinner table was a place to teach our kids’ friends how to interact with a family. Many of their friends had never sat down at a table except maybe at Christmas or Thanksgiving. They learned how to ask for food to be passed and how to ask to be excused from the table.

It was around the dinner table that our kids learned how to interact with adults–not just parents. We have entertained missionaries from around the world: Japan, Brazil, New Zealand, Ethiopia, and more. Besides the missionaries who visited from church, we have had numerous visitors. These aren’t just our friends that we know and love. Our visitors are travelers along Highway 101. We have enjoyed getting to know people from Seattle, Colorado, Eugene, New Hampshire, Boston, New York, England, France, Bolivia, Spain, Germany, Palestine and countless more. Many are college age students who are hiking or biking their way across a part of the United States. We have sat and chatted about politics, their impressions of the US, and anything that came to mind. After dinner we have jammed adding a violin and drums to our guest’s saxophone. We enjoyed target practice once. Numerous times, we entertained our visitors with fire dancing, but only once did our guest join the show.

Our kids have also enjoyed game nights around the table. When they were little, we had game day on Sunday afternoons. We played Star Wars role playing. As they grew older, we moved on to Scrabble, Uno, and Munchkin. The group of friends have changed, but the table has stayed the same. We sit down talk with one another across the table, having fun and enjoying each others’ company.

Was it easy to keep up this tradition of the dining room table? No. We struggled. There were some weeks where we didn’t sit down often at the table, but we made it a priority. In so doing, we have created memories and taught our children the value of face to face communication. One hard and fast rule has always been, “No electronic devices at the table.” The only exception was if we were reading a book online such as The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy,or if we have some quiet classical music playing while we eat. The kids tried to push this rule only a couple of times. They never got far.

As a parent, I believe this one tradition has been very valuable. We got to know our kids. We were able to feel the pulse of their world. When friends would come over, we got to know them as well.  Our table with young children resembled Duskya and Cerulean’s in Dragon’s Heir:

The meal contained light banter and the general commotion of any meal with two little children.

Once we had teenagers, it reflected Duskya and Cerulean’s table in Dragon’s Cure:

The evening meal followed with much talking and friendly banter. The clean up continued in the same vein.

Both of these scenes although summed up with just a sentence or two reflect the many memories around our dining room table with our children. So, if you have the opportunity to create a family tradition, I would suggest reinstating the family dining room table. Use it for more than just a fancy tablecloth (although my kids learned how to deal with a fancy meal as well at our table). Let your table become a place of laughter, stories, and memories.