New Page on Author and Illustrator Source

We are still in the thick of summer, but educators may already be trying to schedule events for the coming academic year.

With that in mind, I would call to your attention Author and Illustrator Source, an extensive listing of (you guessed it) published authors and illustrators who make school visits and presentations, with contact information, rates and types of presentations offered. Presenters are listed both alphabetically and geographically, with biographical paragraphs and information on their titles. Areas represented include picture books, chapter books, non-fiction, poetry and virtually every type of children's and young adult literature you can imagine.

My page, which you can find here, lists my rates and possible presentation formats. I am in the unusual position of being able to offer programs for both children and adults, and I hope to do so at book festivals as well as school visits in the months ahead.

Anarchy in the Pre-K!

The headline's a bit of an exaggeration, but some of you will enjoy the reference.

More literally, yesterday was my first school visit in support of The Best Mariachi in the World/El Mejor Mariachi del Mundo. Brooksfield School in McLean, Virginia, a Montessori school for pre-K to third grade students, hosted me for most of the morning.

We read and shared the bilingual and Spanish-language versions of the book, and students heard several tracks from a two-disc collection by Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitlán that my wife Paula Van Lare bought for me in time for the appearance. The upper-level students danced for a few minutes, and both groups had some fun with show and tell and Spanish vocabulary.

Pictures and further details are forthcoming and, to paraphrase the title of a recent film, there will be sombreros.