Fiction author Robin Brande talks about writing, reading, and other vital matters

I should be sleeping right now because I barely have in the past 48 hours, but I’m too wired because I had such a great time at the Michigan Library Association Spring Institute last night! Hurray! I was up there because they had chosen Evolution, Me & Other Freaks of Nature as their Thumbs Up award-winner for best young adult novel of last year. HUGE honor for me and the book, and I’m supremely grateful!

But what I really loved about the event was getting to meet yet another collection of funny, smart, dedicated, and highly-entertaining librarians. I’ve had a real run of that lately, from the ones in Dallas to the ones in Rochester, and now Michigan.

And I also got to meet the Mitten Award winner for her book A Crooked Kind of Perfect, Linda Urban (who I had to keep reminding myself was named Linda Urban and not Linda Mitten, because when I first read her name and the name of the award I got all confused. More lack of sleep, I’m sure). Linda is a lovely, warm, FUNNY woman, and it’s really a benefit of my writing life these days to meet more and more cool, witty writers out there. I don’t take that for granted–I know these are the perks.

So Linda gave a great speech, very touching and funny, then I gave my speech, and then it was time for Librarian Karaoke.

I wasn’t sure what to expect. I sure didn’t expect what I got. Those librarians are AWESOME. One of them–I wish I knew her name–has been a sincere fan of rap since its early days, and she did one of my favorite (okay, maybe my only favorite) rap songs, this one by Flo Rida called “Low,” which is part of that incredible last dance sequence in Step Up 2. (“Shawty had them Apple Bottom Jeans, boots with the fur (with the fur), everybody on the dance floor lookin at her . . .”)

Someone else did this excellent rendition of Prince’s “When Doves Cry,” the key being committing to the moves (and she did). There were duets, ballads, show tunes, 70s classic rock, group sing-a-longs–the whole bit. And because those librarians are so fun, they were able to coax the waiter into singing, “You Lift Me Up” (that Josh Grobin hit), which made many of us get all teary because he did it SO beautifully, and when I complimented him later he told me he was a music performance major, working as a waiter. Of course. You gotta start that combo early.

It’s hard to adequately describe the fun of hanging out with those women and men last night, but suffice to say I wasn’t sorry I missed Lost on account of it all. Nor was I sorry that I didn’t get to bed until well after midnight, even though I had to wake up at 5:00 to catch my plane. So worth it.

And last but not least, I want to give a major shout-out to the lovely Elizabeth whom we all know as a commenter on this blog. She made good on her promise to bring me homemade vegan chocolate zucchini bread, which I ate as my dessert last night, my midnight snack in the room, my breakfast this morning at the airport, my lunch on the plane, and finally my afternoon snack sitting up in my own little bed. Sweet heaven. Thank you, Elizabeth, for sustaining me on my long journey home. Plus that bread was DIVINE. Which is why it is all gone.

Thank you again to the librarians on the Thumbs Up committee who chose my book out of hundreds of others. I am really, really grateful for that. And thank you for all the kind things you said about it last night!

Special thanks also to Karrie Waarala for her committee organizing and author wrangling. Good luck in your MFA program!

xxoo
Robin

Technorati Tags: Authors, Librarians, Linda Urban, Michigan Library Association, Michigan Library Association Spring Institute, Publishing, Writers, Writing

Posted on Thursday, April 16th, 2009 at 4:09 pm under Writing . Subscribe to responses: RSS 2.0 Comment Feed. Tagged: Authors, Librarians, Linda Urban, Michigan Library Association, Michigan Library Association Spring Institute, Publishing, Writers, Writing. Comment, or trackback.