And the winners are...

I had so much fun this week. Thanks to everyone who joined in the contest and who promised to howl at the full moon (you kept your promise, right?).  I'm glad the moon finally came out that night here in NJ.  It was touch and go for a while. The photo above is the moon over NYC taken by my amazing editor, Nancy Mercado.  She arroooed too!

 If you haven't seen this post from the fabulous Mike Jung, here he is, howling at the moon.  (I'm so touched that he thought to make this video. It's wonderful. Please go take a look). I only know Mike virtually but he is a fun, friendly guy.  Follow him on twitter. Friend him on Facebook. He'll make you laugh. (I'm telling you this because I believe it, but also because I'm going to have to give Mike some bad news soon...some very bad news).

So here's how we chose. I indulged my occasional Luddite tendencies and did this in a very low tech way. I printed out the blog post comments, cut and folded each comment till it was the same size, put them all into a box, shook the box (a lot), and then let my librarian friends pick the winners.

The librarians picked two names, one for each of the big prizes (one name was quite a surprise and we had a conversation about that too... but more about that later). 
After they were done, the librarians wanted to pick some more:
Librarian 1: What kind of a celebration is it if only two people win?
Librarian 2: Do you have anything else you can give away?
Me: Um, I suppose I have an extra hard cover book & a CD audio & an MP3 CD version.
Librarian 2: And didn't you get some soft cover books from when your book was part of the Scholastic Book Club?  
Librarian 1: And wouldn't it be fun to throw in a Slinky?

Who am I to argue with a group of librarians? (btw, what do you call a group of librarians? A shelf? A catalog? Is there a name for a bunch of librarians? okay.. I digress..)

Here are the winners:

SCBWI One Year's Membership:  Serenissima

Hard Cover Book:  Stephanie J Blake
CD Audio version:  salarsen
MP3 CD:   Thea Miller Ryan
Scholastic Paperback Version:  Suzanne
Scholastic Paperback Version:  Dana
Scholastic Paperback Version:  kcharman
Scholastic Paperback Version:  Deb
Scholastic Paperback Version:  Rosa
Slinky: Llehn

Did you notice I didn't mention the Neil Armstrong is My Uncle and Other Lies Muscle Man McGinty Told Me Gift Package yet?
The winner is: 
 Susanjsteward   
( Mike, take a deep breath here. To fill everyone in, it seems that Susanjsteward and Mike Jung have a friendly competition going on. It is friendly, right? There was a little tough talk on the blog and on twitter. And frankly with all the entries, I'm surprised at this too. Mike, if you look at this in the right context, it's kind of humorous. Of all the people who could have won, it went to your arch rival. That's kind of funny. Right?)

I can't change what the librarians picked (and I wouldn't want to because of course I'm happy for Susan -- as I am for all of the winners). 
 I did mention the rivalry to the librarians. And with all due respect to Susan, when a person risks getting mugged to create a moon howling video, you have to feel a little bad that his major competitor won. They thought I should send a hard cover book to Mike Jung for his extreme support in the birthday bash contest. After all, it's the first video for Neil Armstrong is My Uncle... Are you seeing a pattern here? Librarians like to give away free things. But who am I to argue with the librarians?

To all the winners, congratulations. Please send me your contact info. My email is on the right.

The Party's Over: and How I Learned to Howl at the Moon.

I never howled at the moon before. Not really.  
Oh sure, to celebrate my book's release, I tried my best to channel my main character (or her best friend) and I went outside and I arroooed.  It was hardly what you'd expect. At their best, they were the quiet, respectable, "arrooos" of a person who is way too worried about what the neighbors would think.
I was there the day my librarian friends did a podcast.  While they were able to celebrate my book by howling in a spirited, carefree way, I sat there, watching. When they arroooed, I mouthed the word.  I can't help it. There are still too many times when I'm shy and quiet.
But last night, I had the contest.  And so many people promised to howl at the moon. My editor tweeted about it.  Blueboarder, Vijaya Bodach, blogged about it. Heck, Mike Jung promised to take a video,
There was a rainstorm. They're not fun events here. My dog, Chi, barks at every single flash of lightning.  There's nothing more stressful than watching your German Shepherd-sized dog freak out at a storm.  But it ended, and even though I couldn't see the moon, I went outside..and I arroooed.  A tiny whimpy arrooo.
At least I could say I did it.
I went inside, wondering why that was the best I could muster. It's not even like I have neighbors around. I live on a street filled with summer cottages. While this weekend, the summer people will come out in droves, last night the only people around was my eighty-year-old neighbor (and she would be totally cool about this).
I waited.
I checked twitter.
I tried to read.
I went outside one last time.
The sky was brighter, especially this one spot. I couldn't see anything because of the house next door. So I ran upstairs and looked out the window.
The moon was framed with clouds.
After the storm, it was wonderful to see. Perfect. Peaceful. Reassuring. I love the moon.
I howled. 
It was loud.
And the next time, it was louder.
They sounded so real my dog ran up the stairs and stood by my side.
So for the first time in my life, I arroooed.
Thanks to everyone who joined me.

My librarian friends will be randomly picking the contest winners today.  I'll post the results tonight.

Having some problems with the computer tonight. Will post in the morning. Sorry for the delay.

Arrooo!

There's something empowering about crawling out on the garage roof and howling at the moon. Or maybe it's the word "Arrooo!" Since my book's been published, I've received "arrooo's" in text messages, emails, phone calls, cards, notes, etc. The word seems to take on many meanings, like "hello" "miss you" "cheer up" "congratulations" "don't forget the guacamole"...well..you get the idea.

We talked about it during the recording of the Ocean County Library's podcast on The 40th Anniversary of the First Manned Moon Landing. We were sitting in a room in the Bishop building, formerly the Toms River library. Even though the shelves are now empty, the building has that quintessential old-fashioned library feel. If you've seen the movie "The Amityville Horror", you know what the place looks like. The library scene was filmed there. (By the way, the Hollywood producers did not think the librarians who worked in that building looked enough like librarians to be in the film, so they hired extras from a local retirement community to play the parts.)

After we did the podcast, we celebrated with an Arrooo! Here's what we sounded like.
No need to wait for a full moon if you want to give it a try.