Archive for July 25, 2017

Notoriously Tough Critic Raves about New “Jigsaw Jones” Book

She’s 91 years old.

She’s tough as nails.

Mom’s motto: “Getting old is not for sissies.”

And she loved my new book, The Case from Outer Space, coming August 8th.

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Maybe I’ve been writing for the wrong demographic all along. Why write for young people at all? Picture books for preschoolers? Novels for tweens? YA?

Forget all that. I’m going after the untapped nonagenarian market!

Thanks, Mom.

Can I Just Read Now?

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Check Out These 5 Jigsaw Jones Books . . . Coming August 8th!

Look what came in the mail yesterday . . .

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I’m happy to announce that on August 8th these five Jigsaw Jones books will be available in stores for the first time in years. Published by Feiwel & Friends at Macmillan.

Leading off, The Case from Outer Space: A brand-new, never-before-published story for a new generation of young readers. Librarians please note that it’s also available in hardcover, a first for Jigsaw.

Plus these four classroom classics that have been previously unavailable, newly revised and updated:

 

The Case of the Glow-in-the-Dark Ghost

The Case of the Mummy Mystery

The Case of the Bicycle Bandit

The Case of the Smelly Sneaker

 

Coming in November . . .

 

The Case of the Million-Dollar Mystery

The Case of the Disappearing Dinosaur

The Case of the Best Pet Ever

The Case of the Buried Treasure

Lastly, older readers (grades 4-7) might be excited about my upcoming hardcover book due out in October, a zombie-goes-to-middle-school story titled Better Off Undead (Macmillan, 275 pages, October 2017). Talk about misfits. Adrian Lazarus is the ultimate outsider. But slowly Adrian makes a small but fascinating group of friends: the bee-obsessed Zander Donnelly; the seventh-grade sleuth, Talal Mirwani; and the mysterious Gia Demeter, who just might be able to see into the future. After they discover that someone has been spying on Adrian with a birdlike drone, the mystery deepens. The clues led Adrian to two powerful corporate mogals . . . and a thrilling conclusion.

 

Housekeeping: Summer Hours, Book News, and So It Goes

Believe it or not, I’ve been keeping up with this blog for more than 9 years. The world has moved on to Instagram and Twitter and Podcasts, and yet I remain, still comfortable with this outdated form at a time when fewer and fewer people seem to want to read much of anything, especially blogs.

We’re in deep summer now, when readership of my blog hits an annual lull. Things are going to be quiet here for the next 6-8 weeks, and will pick up again when schools get back into session. Heaven knows that Staples is already gearing up new commercials urging us to get out and purchase our school supplies. Do you not have your notebooks yet? New crayons? Kleenex boxes?

But let’s resist that for now and just quietly work on our tans. Shall we?

In terms of news, Booklist offered up a review of the new Jigsaw Jones book, The Case from Outer Space, coming out this August. It’s so tepid I don’t know why they bothered. Oh well. I did get a kick out of this line:

“The story rambles a bit in a completely amiable manner . . . .”

Guilty as charged!

 

Up in the treehouse with Danika, Mila, Jigsaw, and Joey. Illustration by R.W. Alley from THE CASE FROM OUTER SPACE.

Illustration by R.W. Alley from THE CASE FROM OUTER SPACE.

Here’s the full review, which did nothing to cheer my soul:

Junior detectives Jigsaw Jones and his friend Mila take on a new case after two classmates discover space- alien-related clues in their neighbor’s Little Free Library. When their teacher starts dropping hints about a “special visitor from far, far away,” the stage is set for the big reveal at the book’s end. The story rambles a bit in a completely amiable manner, but this isn’t the sort of mystery that readers are expected to solve by examining the clues and deducing the improbable but inevitable solution. Fortunately, it is the sort of mystery that will please Jigsaw Jones fans, who know they can count on the series for likable characters and a bit of a challenge here and there. For example, when Mila passes an encoded note to Jigsaw, he explains the substitution cipher she used, and then lets readers decode it on their own. With short sentences, bits of humor, and engaging illustrations, the latest early chapter book in Preller’s long-running Jigsaw Jones Mystery series has plenty of appeal for young independent readers.

— Carolyn Phelan
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I am taking a break from my “5 Questions” interview series. Will likely continue come September. It’s hard to keep the energy up when there’s so little positive feedback. Writing into the void.
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Have a great 4th of July, everyone. This deeply troubled country was built upon a wonderful and worthwhile experiment of sound values. There is so much in our past of which we can be proud. There’s such a long way still to go, and it feels like we’ve lost our way. Let’s celebrate the America we dream of, the country we aspire to become. Light a sparkler for science, for the environment, for education, for justice, for tolerance, for decency, for love.
 
I still believe.
 
Happy 4th!