Archive for Blood Mountain

GREAT NEWS: Four Books Coming in 2024!

 

Four new books? Well, ish.

I’ll explain.

 

COMING APRIL 23rd . . .

BLOOD MOUNTAIN

 

 

Not quite new, but . . . a new cover and new in paperback. Surely that counts for something. Grace and Carter and their dog, Sitka, struggle to survive in a mountain wilderness. Ages 9-up.

A Junior Library Guild Selection!

 

COMING JUNE 25th . . .

SCARY TALES: 3 SPOOKY STORIES IN 1

I’m thrilled about this 300-page collection, which brings together Nightmareland, One Eyed Doll and Swamp Monster in one heart-stopping, fast-paced collection. All for only $8.99. It is literally the deal of the century. Featuring the incredible art of Iacopo Bruno. Ages 8-up.

COMING SEPT. 10th . . .

SHAKEN (Hardcover)

For 7th-grader Kristy Barrett, soccer is life. It has always been at the center of Kristy’s world. Her friendships and self-worth, her dreams and daily activities, all revolve around the sport. Until she suffers from a serious concussion and has to set soccer aside. Kristy begins to experience stress, anxiety, and panic attacks which ultimately bring her to some questionable decisions . . . and the care of a therapist. Ages 10-up.

 

AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST . . .

 

COMING IN SEPTEMBER 24th . . .

TWO BIRDS . . . AND A MOOSE!

 

A Level 1 easy-reader featuring an aspirational moose! I’m so happy to have a new book out for the youngest readers. My first at this age level since Wake Me In Spring and Hiccups for Elephant. Ages 3-6.

 

So that’s that.  My year in books. 

 

I’m proud of the range here. A well-reviewed wilderness survival thriller . . . three popular “horror” tales for readers who can’t get enough of heart-pumping, scary stories . . . an ambitious hardcover about a 7th-grade athlete whose life spirals after suffering from post-concussion syndrome . . . and an irrepressible moose who only wants to go up, up, up!

 

It’s not too early to think about school visits in 2024-25!

 

COMING SOON: Blood Mountain in Paperback, April 23rd, 2024!

GOOD NEWS! I’m thrilled to share that Blood Mountain will soon be available in paperback. To me, that’s when books really get a shot at reaching a wide variety of readers.

Note: It’s an honor to be compared to Gary Paulsen. The man is legend. This book got compared to his bestselling Hatchet novel in three different reviews. I’d sign up for 1/10th of those sales.

Blood Mountain was a Junior Library Guild Selection.

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A QUICK RECAP OF THE REVIEWS . . .

“Preller combines brave characters with vivid descriptions of the perilous mountain, grasping readers’ emotions in the same way as Gary Paulsen’s Hatchet series.” — Booklist.

“A fast-paced, action-packed story that is filled with intense moments and well-researched outdoor information . . . Preller nails it.”

The Reading Junky

“Fans of Gary Paulsen’s books will likely be hooked from page one.” — Publishers Weekly.

“A thrilling purchase for middle grade collections, perfect for fans of adventure novels by Jean Craighead George, Peg Kehret, and Gary Paulsen.” — School Library Journal

James Preller Reads from BLOOD MOUNTAIN: When Carter Climbs a Tree

Happy News Comes in the Mail: Two Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Awards!

It’s a pretty terrific day when an author opens the mail to receive not one but *two* Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Awards. In this case, for BLOOD MOUNTAIN and UPSTANDER. Check out ’em out if you get the chance. Thank you, my gifted-kind-patient-and-insightful editor Liz Szabla at Feiwel & Friends/Macmillan. I’m lucky to have you on my side.

 

       

 

These books are both available only in hardcover, and I don’t think they’ve found their audience yet, but I hope they do.

I guess that’s up to you. 

And it is all — all of it — thanks to you, the readers, the lovers of the arts, the people who believe and the folks who support.

Thanks. 

       

 

Gary Paulsen & Me: An Appreciation

“I owe everything I am 
and everything I will ever be
to books.”
— Gary Paulsen

Gary Paulsen passed in October, 2021, and I wanted to hang back and wait a bit before bringing up my very slight connection to the great writer. I didn’t know the man, we’ve never met. And unlike others, I’ve only read a few of his books, all as an adult.

My 2019 novel, Blood Mountain, was compared in three separate reviews to Paulsen’s Hatchet. No reviewer suggested that my book was as good as Hatchet, and certainly not as important (arriving, as it did, 30-plus years later). But they noted that I was working the same vein as Paulsen’s masterwork. Writing in that tradition of wilderness survival and, as is the nature of such an endeavor, within the tradition of wilderness respect and appreciation.

Both books are, in their way, love stories.

The quotes on Blood Mountain:

“Fans of Gary Paulsen’s books will likely be hooked from page one.” — Publishers Weekly.

“Preller combines brave characters with vivid descriptions of the perilous mountain, grasping readers’ emotions in the same way as Gary Paulsen’s Hatchet series.” — Booklist.

“A thrilling purchase for middle grade collections, perfect for fans of adventure novels by Jean Craighead George, Peg Kehret, and Gary Paulsen.” — School Library Journal

What I admire most about Paulsen is his engagement with the natural world. He was an outdoorsman, comfortable and expertly capable in the wild. I don’t have 1/10th of his skills and knowledge. But in my own way, I try to see things, appreciate and name the trees, the birds, the world around me. That’s what he offered us, more than anything: his own innate sense of wonder and respect.

There’s a deceptively simple line by Roger Tory Peterson, the artist and writer known for the famous Peterson Guides. He said, “The more you look, the more you see.”

I believe Gary Paulsen was telling us the very same thing. And his message became, for me, all the more relevant as we drifted further and further from the real world into cyber-whatever. And as the natural world became more endangered — witness the great species die-off — and as we all became more entangled in our phones and apps and the algorithms of social media, I find myself holding closer to the message of writers like Gary Paulsen, Bill McKibben, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Gary Snyder, Thich Nhat Hanh, Peter Wohlleben, Jane Goodall, Robert Macfarlane, and many more.

Paulsen said to us, in effect: Go outside. Look, see, love every blessed living thing.

I’m honored to enjoy the slightest, most gossamer connection to such a compassionate writer.

Here’s a very short excerpt from Blood Mountain:

Grace spends much of that day gathering anything that will soften her bed. She works doggedly, with purpose. Grace saws at the branches of a hemlock, scraping her knuckles, covering her hands with sap and dirt. Hauls the boughs up, which is not easy with her injuries. She spreads the curved branches with the ends stuck in the dirt, so there’s a slight hump in the middle. Then she adds a mattress of moss and soft boughs.

By the end, she is exhausted. Her entire body throbs.

She lies down, breathes in the piney air, satisfied. And for that brief moment, Grace doesn’t feel lost anymore. 

Blood Mountain is a Junior Library Guild Selection.