House Favorites: Denzel

What's your favorite book?

That essential question, endlessly asked and answered, that often forms the basis for a person's assessment of your position as a reader. Are you a chick lit queen, a murder-mystery fanatic, perhaps a champion of comic books? Is your favorite amongst the loftier of classics, perhaps a Brontë, Poe or Melville? No favorite book is superior or truly representative of your personality, despite what some may have you believe, and so I find the most value not in asking what your favorite book is, but rather what it was. Who wrote the books that shaped you as a reader? From where did your love of your current favorite spring?

Now, it would not be fair for me to request this information without volunteering my own. And so I will now take you on a journey through time, starting with my first true favorite, Tikki Tikki Tembo.

 

Tikki Tikki Tembo (Age 4-7):

Tikki Tikki Tembo-no Sa Rembo-chari Bari Ruchi-pip Peri Pembo is a young chinese boy with a very long name. This name is nearly the death of him after he falls in a well and his younger brother Chang is forced to recite his full name repeatedly until he is blue in the face.

I loved this book like no other as a child. Having a middle named of 9 letters and a hyphenated last name, I had felt the sting of a name longer than anyone wants to say. It marks the first conscious empathy I can remember feeling. The illustrations also had a strong impact on my color preferences at the time, best measured in the number of blue, green and golden yellow crayons I burned through.

A Whole New World: My View from the Scarletta Office and a Little Poem

Greetings, fellow bibliophiles! As one of the newest additions to Scarletta Press I’d like to start at the beginning. I’ve only been working here a couple weeks and here are a few of my first impressions and thoughts about the office:

1. It is indoors. It is immensely preferable to being outdoors in Minnesota in October so we’re already on the right track.

2. The view is great. Whenever I look out the window I like to think about hopping into an airplane and pitching press kits overboard. If somebody went to the effort of parachuting books down to you from the ether you’d take a moment to read them. There’s room in the budget for tiny parachutes, right?

3. There is a fully-stocked craft room here. THERE IS A FULLY STOCKED CRAFT ROOM. If there is happiness in life does it not come from hot-gluing stuff to other stuff?

The Monster & Me Costume Contest!!!

Monster really does need a costume for Halloween! Can you help him out? Show off what your children are wearing this year by entering the online Monster & Me™ Costume Contest between Monday, October 28, and Friday, November 1.

Submit pictures of your kids’ Halloween costumes and be entered to win a Monster & Me™ book and t-shirt!

Overall Best Costume winner receives a book and a t-shirt

Special categories (Best group, Scariest, and Funniest) each win 1 t-shirt

AND all entrants receive a 30% discount to use for the book or the t-shirt on the Scarletta website

How to enter: Like the Monster & Me Facebook Fan Page & send a message to the page with your photo, name, email, twitter account (if applicable), and special category consideration (if applicable).

Entry rules:
1. Entrants must reside in the United States, including Alaska, Hawaii, and outlying territories.
2. Entries must be received between 9:00 AM Central Time, Monday, October 28, and 10:00 AM Central Time, Friday, November 1.
3.Winners will be selected at 12:00 PM Central Time Friday, November 1.

Why Scarletta is the Best, Why My Book Kicks Butt, and How I Became The Greatest Children's Book Author That Ever Lived!

Okay, so I may have used some superlative terms in titling this blog post, but that's what you get when you don't send your editor a title!

(OK, I didn't tell Paul I needed one, and I mostly wanted to make a title that was sure to grab your attention. In fact, barely any of the title is addressed in this delightful guest post from Mr. Czajak, but you're reading this and playing along so I think I've adequately done my job.)

To kick off the Monster Needs a Costume Blog Tour: A guest post by our very own beloved author of this fantastic book, Paul Czajak.  Thanks for reading! 

                                                                                                          -Josh

Meet Denzel!

Take a minute to meet our newest Marketing/PR intern: Denzel!

                                -Josh

For someone who spends so much of their time talking about himself, I'm surprisingly bad at this typed out introduction thing. Perhaps it's the fear that it will be forever immortalized online. But more so I imagine it's the enticement of the delete key, the ability to rephrase a hundred times until everything sounds perfect.

I should avoid the delete key, lest I transform myself into some sort of superman beyond reproach. 

Here goes.

My name is Denzel and I'm new here. Well, new enough. I've been in Minnesota long enough that the idea of being from anywhere else feels as weird as it is true. Minneapolis is my home, and that will remain forever true. I've always been a city kid, and the Central Library is as much my place of study as any university has ever been. I'm a book lover but my collection has not grown much in the past few years, instead books cycle in and out as they change hands from friend to friend and a copy of my favorite book has travelled further from home than I have. My love of books stems in part from my love of foreign lands, and of history.

Monster Needs a Blog Tour

Monster Needs a Blog Tour to embrace the autumn scene:

a fun and spooky journey that lasts through Halloween!

With reviews and books and interviews, and giveaways to win,

there's so much fun and happiness we'll have to jump right in!

That's right blogger buds! We're celebrating Paul Czajak and his new hit picture book Monster Needs  A Costume with a blog tour around the interwebs!  

Not familiar with the concept of a blog tour? Have no fear: nor was I until this afternoon.

For the next few weeks, we'll be linking to other blogs around the Internet to share new thoughts on the first book in the Monster & Me series 

Check back on Thursday, October 10th for a feature post from The Family That Reads Together! 

Then, on Monday the 14th: A guest post from Paul Czajak will be available right here on the Scarletta blog!

The 17th will see an interview with Colby Sharp and his classroom over ar Sharpreads.

With more dates to come, you'll want to leave a bookmark right here!

So, til Thursday, have a monstrously marvelous beginning to your Halloween season!