Author Appreciation: Jerry Spinelli

I thought the best way to start this blog was with what I hope will become something of a series and will also give me a chance to re-visit some of my favorite authors.  I mean, if I had a blog back when I read Wringer the first time, I would have posted about it.  I didn’t then, but I do now, so I should remind myself what I would have tried to write in that first post.

So, my first “author appreciation” post will be some appreciation for Jerry Spinelli, the first children’s/YA author who grabbed me as an adult, the first author who made me say, You can write stuff like that for kids?! and opened my mind to this big wide, wonderful world where I now make my (happy) professional home.

Not just because of all that but because I also just finished his new book, the YA title Smiles to Go and I was reminded, yet again, just how good Jerry Spinelli is when he’s at his best and not retreading the Stargirl routine of how special it is to be different.  (Sorry, I don’t really like Stargirl or Loser.  IMO, Jerry Spinelli is at his best when he’s doing REGULAR kids with their own set of quirks and personality, not “special snowflakes of original-originality!”)

So, (shortly) I will start this off with not just an apprection of Spinelli but a review of the last book I read that knocked me over with it’s wonderfullness, Smiles to Go …

TBC

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