Monday, March 17, 2008

VISIT FROM PATRICK JONES...

I just had the pleasure of listening to Patrick Jones, author of THINGS CHANGE, NAILED, and CHASING TAIL LIGHTS, speak to a group of students at our public library. He was fantastic!

Patrick mentioned last fall that he would be visiting Michigan in March, and he agreed to come to our small, southeast Michigan community. At a population of only 2200, our venue is much smaller than most places he visits. The audience consisted of mostly high school students and a few 8th graders.

Most interesting to me was his description of how he arrived at the idea for each of his books. He gave examples of the thought processes used to create his characters and story-lines. Now I need to re-read his books to better understand what he discussed.

As a teacher, I appreciate that he involved the students and made them feel that he valued their opinions and concerns. I'm sure they will be talking about his visit for some time.

Thanks to Patrick for his willingness to share his time with a small town and its teens.

Patrick has two new books coming out in 2008. CHEATED will be released April 1, and another book is due out in October.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

How neat is that! :) I'll keep a lookout for those two books.

Happy Easter!