THE SUMMER OF MYSTERY - COMING VERY SOON!

The other day I was a judge in a poetry slam at a Middle School. A great experience, but the icing on the cake for me was when a seventh grade boy approached me afterwards to tell me how much he enjoyed my GP series and couldn't wait for the next book to come out. When I told him the next book was coming within the next month he started gyrating and jumping around like it was Christmas! Man Oh Man did that make my day, week and month. I cannot wait to hear from him after he has read the next book!

SO, I am TOTALLY excited to tell you about my new book coming within the next month! I think you will be too! Each chapter begins with a WANTED poster, featuring the main theme of the chapter, brilliantly rendered by my great friend and awesome illustrator David Schiedt!

Kids at the schools I visit always ask me what my favorite of all the books I have published are. I have to say THIS BOOK is my favorite for many reasons: Mystery, Summer, Buddies and THE MOST WANTED POSTERS are just a few of the reasons for me. I had as much fun writing this book as I think my readers will have reading it!

I finally wrote THE BOOK that I would have wanted to read badly as a boy!

SO. If you haven't read the first three in the series, it's time to catch up!

There is an awesome deal at my website right now - BUY 3 BOOKS - GET A 4th FOR FREE! www.justinmatott.com 

Simply add a note if you want the books signed and or personalized for the reader who will receive them.

With book four coming what could be a better way to go? Not just that, but I will make sure you get a 4th book signed by myself AND David Scheidt, the illustrator!

What a way to start your readers out for the summer. The new book is titled THE SUMMER OF MYSTERY - Book 4 in the GP series.

Here is a sample chapter (click on the image to make it larger). Mr. Lattimore was a villian in book three and he will make another appearance in book four as Gabe and his gang try to unravel the mystery behind him. Many other mysteries need to be solved and they are up to the task.

Under a full moon, around a fire where s'mores are being built Mr. Patchett will divulge many answers to the mysteries you've read about in the past. Revealing the back story to many of the mysteries surrounding the neighborhood, those mysteries that comprise the majority of questions I get from the readers of books 1-3.

 

Gabe is at it again...

Good day/night Blog Reader, I really appreciate the fact that you are here.  Book 5 (in my six book GB series) is well underway and for those of you familiar with Gabe you will know he and most of his crew are heading into Middle School! (queue the eerie music... BOM BOM BOM...)

 Having spent time working with middle schoolers lately, I have been mulling over some of the issues they deal with and Gabe is going to "represent".  I am interested to hear from anyone in middle school, teaching middle school or having vivid memories of middle school to hear what you think Gabe and his crew should encounter.  

 

I have the book outlined and about ten chapters written.  Much of their time is going to be spent at camp during the summer, but when back in school is what I am particularly interested in hearing about.

The awesomely talented David Schiedt is designing and illustrating the series and I would love for him to have some great challenges to bring Gabe and his adventures to life!    That's him ------->

A chapter from the next Gabriel Peters' book

What do you think of the following chapter? Would love some feedback...

GABRIEL PETERS AND THE SECRET DETECTIVE
BROTHERHOOD

Stories from the crawlspace clubhouse
Book 4 in the “GP” series



CHAPTER 6
THE GROSS-RIE STORE


It was the hottest day of summer so far. Mom said it would probably hit ninety-five degrees by noon and keep on climbing. It would have been a good day to just hang out at the lake where we could fish and jump in and out of the water and swim to the middle of the lake to cool off on the raft and later spend some time up in the tree house where the shade is good, but the guys and I had been planning our bike ride downtown for over a week and this time of year there weren’t any cool days, so we figured we would go ahead and tough it out.
We met down at Tunnel Number One and then took our bikes down the railroad tracks, bumping along in the middle on the railroad ties and talking about our plan if we saw a train coming. If we heard a train whistle coming from the south, fast action was required since we lived way out of town the train really picked up speed until it slowed for town.
Butch said, “Remember that time we were cruising the ties and that train came out of nowhere and was barreling down behind us?” We all started chiming in about what we each remembered most about it.
We were over Tunnel Number Three which is the tunnel that has the really, really steep trail leading up to the tracks and the only way off the track was pitching it down the hill. I pulled off the railroad tracks first, pointing my bike down the trail and rode my stingray down the thin, bumpy dirt trail along the tunnel and ended up riding it all the way down, hitting the jump at the bottom, getting great air and looking oh so cool and then cruising down in the grassy valley, making it look so easy and so did Butch, who was trailing right behind me. But Tony panicked halfway down the trail he pulled his front wheel up too high then tumbled down the hill with his bike bouncing along behind him, the bike barely missing him as it passed him and hurled itself bouncing off the side of the cliff and splashing down into the murky water and Tony was rolling along after it when he went sideways over the embankment falling about fifteen feet into the muddy water below landing almost right on top of his bike.
Butch and I were laughing so hard that it made Tony mad and he yanked his bike out of the water and pushed it home and didn’t talk to us for a couple days. But a few nights later we were all down at the streetlight and he showed up to play hide-n-seek like nothing had ever happened.
We swapped stories like that as we bumped along the tracks, laughing and practicing our spitting distances. It was the long way to where we were headed, but we were going the fun way. Then we pulled onto the road that ran along the railroad tracks through most of town.
We had ridden the ties one time through town and a police officer pulled up behind us with his lights on and everything. He made us all sit next to the tracks for a long time while he gave us a lecture about the dangers of being on the tracks and told us it was illegal to ride the ties in the middle of the tracks like that and if he ever saw us doing that again he would call our mothers. We all promised never to ride downtown on the tracks like that again, but we didn’t promise not to way out in the country where we were sure it wasn’t even illegal.
So we all got off of our bikes about halfway through town and put playing cards in our spokes. There was a part of downtown that was surrounded by tall buildings and when you rode through there with cards in your spokes it sounded like you were in a real life motorcycle gang. We got back on our bikes and rode alongside the railroad tracks on the road downtown.
“H-Hey since w-w-we are g-going to the grocery store, should w-we do a Gross-Rie d-dare off?” Andy asked excitedly.
“NO WAY LAMO! My mom is working today! You want free bakery stuff or not?” Tony barked.
Andy weaved his bike toward Tony’s like he was going to run him off the road, “G-Geez, don’t g-get your underwear in a kn-knot, I was j-just saying…”
“Guys! Cut it out!” I yelled over the loud sound of their shouting and the cards in my spokes that were echoing off the tall buildings along the tracks.
We talked about staging a grocery store dare-off soon when we were up in the tree house last, but never decided on when. We called it a GROSS-RIE STORE DARE OFF since the ideas we had were so disgusting.
The way it works is you would walk down the aisle and choose something the other guy had to eat AND he had to pay for it, but your turn was coming so you had to decide if you were going to be brutal which meant the next time you were in for it or if you just picked stuff that wasn’t so bad, but not what a normal person would choose. The rule of the game was that you had to eat every bite of the items chosen for you either until it was gone or until it made you puke.
Everyone put their name in a hat, and one by one the names were pulled out and the person holding your name would be choosing your lunch. Andy and I always prayed we would get each other because we were best friends and would go easy on each other. We knew what the other liked and we would make combinations that might sound gross to some people but we knew each other well enough to know it would be okay.
Like the time I made Andy eat beef jerky and marshmallows. He was supposed to smash them up together according to the game, but by the time he opened up his bags everyone was so focused on their own junk they didn’t even notice that he was eating them separately. That is the best part about being best friends, you know what your buddy likes most and Beef Jerky and Marshmallows were what Andy liked most. He picked fried chicken gizzards and wintergreen Certs for me. Butch started to complain because he also knew that I always got chicken gizzards when we went to Safeway, but eating them with Wintergreen Certs wasn’t something I did and the bad thing was Butch watched me like a hawk, so I had to mix them and it was pretty gross. But even so, Andy was doing me a favor by picking my favorites and then I didn’t feel like I had wasted my own money on junk I didn’t like.
Sometimes you would choose something that was yummy like a Snickers bar, but then the person that was going to eat it had to wrap it in sauerkraut or dip it in pickle juice or something like that. Other Gross-rie dare-offs were; a loaf of white Wonderbread soaked in the juice of canned red beets until it was so soggy you had to eat it with a spoon and that was after you ate all the cold, yucky beets or three bananas smashed up and mixed with all of the little packets of stuff you got back by the deli, which would include hot, red peppers, salt, pepper, ketchup, mustard, soy sauce, relish, hot sauce, sugar, creamer, salad dressing, mayonnaise and the worst thing ever made to eat by anyone; Miracle whip.
One time I had to eat a stale fruitcake that was in the bargain bin for fifty cents soaked in ketchup, yellow mustard and pickle relish, the inside part wasn’t so bad, but the stuff that got the bready part soggy almost made me hurl.
But, the worst backfire was the time Andy had to eat raw stomach soaked in hot sauce, the butcher called it ‘Tripe’. Andy isn’t one to chicken out. He has so many big brothers that nothing ever really phases him. Butch was really mad at him about something so he was the one who dared him to eat the Tripe with a whole bottle of hot sauce poured over it. Andy had taken about three bites and was plugging his nose to get it down when everything from the freshly eaten tripe to the morning’s breakfast came up and out. Everyone started to gag just looking at the mess on the ground.
As we were getting close to the Safeway we all agreed we for sure shouldn’t do the Gross-rie store dare-off because Tony’s mom was working and we didn’t want to spoil what was in store for us when we got there.
We headed for the Safeway store to get lunch. Tony’s mom worked in the bakery and if Tony gave her a heads up that we were all coming she always gave us the day-old Danish and junk. We didn’t care if it was a day old, a week old or a month old, a whole bag of Danish, donuts and long johns tasted good all the time.
We left our bikes propped up in the front of the store where the carts are kept and ran into the big store. We trotted back to the bakery first. When Tony’s mom saw me she said, “Well hello Gabriel, I see you still have at least one sweet tooth left!” The way she said tooth told me she was making some kind of comment about the time I had swiped her kid’s old, rotten pulled out teeth and I felt kind of sheepish.
“Yeah… I said I was sorry…” I muttered.
“Honey, I am just kidding with you.” Tony’s mom gave me a little hug.
“Mom, what’ve you got for us today?” Tony whispered, like it was some big secret that his mom gave us stale baked goods.
We talked to Tony’s mom for a little while and then she handed us two bags stuffed totally full of good stuff. She said, “You boys have to pay for these today, they aren’t free anymore.”
We walked about ten feet away from the bakery and I looked at Tony like he himself had betrayed us. “What gives with that? I didn’t bring that much money!”
“Yeah, what good is it to have a mom in the bakery if we don’t get free junk?” Butch snarled
“I d-don’t have t-t-too much m-money either!” Andy stammered.
“Cool it guys!” Tony snarled and pushed one of the bags in our faces. The price on the tag was fifteen cents.
Tony’s mom had come up behind us, “A penny a piece boys, a penny apiece.” She laughed and headed into the back of the bakery.
“That’s weird.” I said
“Mom told me it is okay to give away the day old stuff, but her manager needs her to do it that way because of inventory. She gave me fifty cents to cover it and these two bags are only thirty-two cents, so zip it you bunch of goons!”
“Goons? Who us?” I said sarcastically, “Goons are our brothers, not us, you big dork!”
“Who you calling dork?” Tony set the bags on a shelf and put me in a headlock and started to give me a wet willie.
“GROSS!” I pulled away from him, but my elbow caught a bunch of cans and they went tumbling to the ground making a huge racket.
Over the loudspeaker the manager’s voice boomed, “BOYS IN AISLE TWELVE, KNOCK IT OFF! IF YOU WANT TO BE ALLOWED BACK IN THE STORE RETURN THE CANS TO THE SHELVES AND SETTLE DOWN!”
All the other shoppers turned and looked at us. I hope my face wasn’t as red as Tony’s. Just then Tony’s mom rounded the corner. “Just what do you two think you are doing?”
“Nothing!” we both said at the same time and then scrambled to return the cans of lima beans to the shelf.
“Do you want to get me fired?” Tony’s mom asked with her hands on her hips.
“NO…” we both said under our breath, kind of ashamed of ourselves.
The manager rounded the corner and looked at the cans still lying on the floor, “Two of these cans are dented now. I can’t sell them, so you boys will have to buy them.”
Tony’s mom disappeared before the fireworks began. “Uh sure…” Tony stammered. “How much?”
“One dollar a piece.” The manager snarled.
“A buck!” I just watched my can of Pringles disappear for some lousy dented lima beans and it wasn’t even my fault. If Tony hadn’t been trying to spit up my ear I never would have knocked them off the shelf.
“Those are pretty expensive for some lousy beans…” Tony muttered and then as he was setting the last can on the shelf he said, “Hey, this tag says they’re only twenty-nine cents! What gives with the buck?”
“Denting charge.” The manager chuckled.
“DENTING CHARGE?” we both said at the same time.
“Don’t worry about it, I am just kidding. I’ll put them on our half price bargain bin. Just clean up your mess and stop messing around inside the store!” He called over the top of the aisle toward the bakery, “Louise, you sure have a gullible boy here!”
We walked away from the aisle, grabbing our baked goods and Tony whispered, “What’s gullible mean Peters?”
“Means you are totally lame.” I answered and then hustled away from him to see what was cooking back in the lunch area. That was a close one. The last thing I would want to eat for lunch was a cold can of overpriced lima beans. After we picked out some stuff, we walked over to the freezer part, where the ice cream is kept and pushed our faces down onto the frost. “Mmmmmm, that feels great! It is so, so hot today!” I complained.
Murph, Butch and Andy had wisely distanced themselves from us and they were wandering around the store getting all of their favorites for our picnic lunch. Murph grabbed a hot plastic plate from the warmer with chicken gizzards and livers and a tall coke. “GonnatryyourfavoritetodayPeters!KindoflikeArmyrations…”
I rolled my eyes and got a can of Pringles and a big beef jerky stick and a red cream soda. “Uh, I don’t eat the livers.” I said nodding my head at his platter.
Murph was too proud or something to put it back and get just gizzards, “Yeahwellthat’smyfavoritepart!” he sneered, but I knew he had never tried one really. So we walked up to the front together, on side of my face felt like a frozen popsicle, numb like when the dentist put some kind of junk in my mouth so he could pull one of my baby teeth once.
Andy had the weirdest lunch I have ever seen: he got some snowballs; which are those nasty gloppy marshmallowy coconut covered chocolate things, a Mountain Dew, two packs of Slim Jims and a pink grapefruit. “Gotta k-k-keep my strength up. S-Starting K-K-Karate l-lessons next w-w-eek!”
“Yeah some Karate lessons huh? Just your big brother punching you around in the basement if you ask me.” Tony snarled.
“Shut up Tony!” I snarled, “Andy could whup your butt now, even without Karate.”
“Oh, I am so scared.” Tony gave Andy and me a dirty look then grabbed a small jar of peanut butter and a jar of jelly and a box of saltine crackers.
“You better get something to drink buddy! That is going to dry your mouth out!” I laughed.
Andy looked at the ground, “C-C-Can’t.”
“Why not?”
“I’m out of m-money.”
I pulled fifty cents out of my pocket and pushed it into his hand.
“Th-Thanks!” Andy went for the cold soda bin.
Butch came running up to the check out line, “I didn’t get anything yet! Wait up guys!”
“We’vebeenhereforhoursman,whathaveyoubeendoing?” Murph sneered.
“Reading the new Mad Magazine! What me worry?” Butch shrugged and had a dopey grin on his face like Alfred E. Newman.
“HURRY UP!” we all yelled.
So Butch ran around and came back with a big box of fudgesicles and a box of Otter Pops. “WhatareyougoingtodowithOtterPops?Theyhavetobefrozenyoudummy!” Murph laughed.
“Say’syouArmyDork!” Butch’s face got all red and he thumped Murph’s shoulder hard.
“Ow,yougavemeafrogbubble!” Murph screamed. The manager gave us a dirty look and we all shushed Murph.
I frowned, “But, seriously Butchie, you have to eat Otter Pops frozen!”
“No way, this is the best way to eat Otter Pops, it’s like super sweet Koolaid!” Butch insisted.
“What a dork!” Tony laughed. “Let’s go!” We went through the checkout and carried all of our loot to our bikes. When we left the air-conditioned store it felt like we had walked right into a sauna. My face tingled. It was so hot Butch’s Fudgesicles immediately began to melt and by the time he had chewed one down the rest were seeping out of the box. “Here guys, help me eat these. They ain’t gonna last! But you have to share your stuff with me then!”
Tony laughed, “Good thing you didn’t freeze those otter pops, wouldn’t have done any good.”
“See, I ain’t as dumb as you think!” Butch argued.
“You is if you says ain’t all the time.” I laughed.
“Nice grammar Peters.”
“Uh, that was intentional if you didn’t notice.” I laughed and shoved a Fudgesicle in my mouth.
We got on our bikes and started peddling toward the City Park. Murph was riding with one hand on the handlebar and with the other took one of the chicken livers out of the steaming package and stuffed it into his mouth. He got the worst look on his face, “YuckPetersyoulikethisnastystuff?” He threw one at Tony’s head.
“Watch it dummy!” Tony yowled.
“I told you I only like the gizzards, never livers, you weirdo!” I started to laugh. Murph pulled another liver out and threw at me. It whizzed right past my head. Then he threw one at a dog that was walking up the sidewalk. The dog sniffed it and wolfed it down and looked at us as we passed, hoping for another one. He started to trot after us and then just sat on the sidewalk under a shady tree. It was just too hot to run. The whole way down the street Murph was pelting us with livers.
“Try another one of the gizzards dummy! They might grow on you.” I weaved and yelled over the crackling of the cards in my spokes.
“NowayI’mnotputtinganotheroneofthosenastythinginmymouth!” Murphed yelled.
“Seriously, they are great! Don’t throw them too! I’ll eat them if you don’t want them! They don’t taste like the livers!” I yelled ducking a thrown one.
We wheeled our way down the side of one of the busiest streets in town, heading west to City Park. When we got near you could hear all the crazy kids on the other side of the lake that were cooling off in the big pool. You could smell the popcorn and cotton candy from the snack shack near the pool as we rounded the lake. “Man, that’s making me so hungry!” We have like ten thousand pounds of food and don’t forget our bakery bags!” I said as I dumped my bike in the grass and ran for the shaded picnic tables near the lake.
We were all so hot we sat right down by the lake, tore our shoes off and soaked our feet in the nasty, oily water. You could see all kinds of duck and goose poop floating and on the grass, but we didn’t care. We all stuffed our faces and the Pringles were making me so thirsty, I chugged down my whole bottle of red cream soda and then wished I would have paced myself. In a few minute I was going to be thirsty again.
We divided all the bakery stuff up evenly with a little bit of argument about who was going to get the two raspberry filled, I ended up with one, but gave half to Andy. I was getting stuffed and threw a piece of a long john at some geese that were hoping for a handout. All of a sudden they were honking and moving over each other to get closer to us. We all started throwing little chunks of baked goods onto the water and tried to throw it where it made them swim and fight for it. One of the geese rushed the shore and ran right up Butch’s leg. He started screaming and the goose got spooked and flapped his way back to the safety of the water. Almost as soon as we were down to the last crumbs from the bakery bags they started to swim away to see what other people sitting around the lake might have.
We spent the rest of the afternoon lying around in the sun. Going back and forth from the pool to the park where we had swinging and singing contests. You had to pick a dumb song and sing it in the rhythm of your swinging and the goal was to kick hard enough that you were swinging back and forth really fast so your song went faster and faster. The funniest one was Murph because he already talked so fast that when he sang he sang even faster and so off tune other people in the park were covering their ears and making comments about how he could make a dog cry with that voice.
Murph didn’t care, matter of fact it seemed to encourage him to sing even louder and even more off tune, “THEANTSGOMARCHINGONEBYONHURRAHHURRAHTHEANTSGOMARCHINGONEBYONEHURRAHHURRAHTHEANTSGOMARCHINGONEBYONETHELITTLEONESTOPSTOSUCKBUTCHESTHUMBANDBUTCHGOESCRYINGHOME!THEANTSGOMARCHINGTWOBYTWOHURRAHHURRAHTHEANTSGOMARCHINGTWOBYTWOHURRAHHURRAHTHEANTSGOMARCHINGTWOBYTWOTHELITTLEONESTOPSTOTAKEAPOORIGHTONTONY’SFOOT…”
“So mature Murph!” Tony scowled, but we were all laughing and you should have seen the look on some of the mom’s faces who were pushing their little kids around the merry-go-round. Some of them looked kind of mad. Some of them were laughing.
Then we saw Mrs. O’Malley, our school’s librarian heading right toward us. It was pretty weird to see a teacher or librarian out of the school building. Why would she be there? Didn’t she live at school? What did she want? I wondered. Then I remembered my overdue book charge that I never took care of before school was out and I took off running through the trees toward the lake.
All the guys followed me and I yelled, “We gotta get out of here!” before you knew it, we were pedaling noisily down the street toward the railroad tracks that would lead us back home.

Honest review by a youngster, nice!

In my newest book, Gabe is up to his old tricks!

In an attempt to fool The Goon Squad, Gabe mixed up his journal, just in case they found the plans that were coming up to do a SUPER prank! If you have the book, check it out, Chapter 7 holds MUCH mystery and the way it is put together is simply GENIUS... ahem, uh, okay.... thanks for reading!

I'm coming to your school!

As a way of introducing myself to the schools I will visit next week, where we will be talking about bullying, anti-bullying techniques and what it feels like to be singled out by bullies, I made this video. It is not nice to judge someone you don't know based on their appearances and obviously when you see me, you know I know a little about that!

Last night... magic...

I did a talk for a group of kids, teachers and parents at a school I have visited numerous times not far from my house. It was a pleasant evening as I mingled in the library and then was eagerly greeted by a young girl who clutched her copy of Ol' Lady Grizelda, which I had signed for her five years ago, when she "was a little kid, in 3rd grade" and now she was in middle school and "still really liked the book". She insisted I update her copy with another note and signature and then informed me my signature had changed (aka, gotten sloppy) and said, "See you in another five years." after we talked about the fact that she wanted to be a teacher. I envisioned another five years which meant I could see her again when she was student teaching in a classroom. WOW, time does keep ticking... I imagined her copy of Ol' Lady Grizelda going from a bedroom bookshelf to a classroom bookshelf and smiled. Maybe I would work on my penmanship, so my third signing of it would show improvement?

Soon we gathered in the music room where I told some stories, primarily stories upon which my books are based. As I explained the GP series and where the ideas came from I talked about how my main character Gabriel Peters (GP) begins in book one, Go Ask Mom, with some "strikes" against him, mostly physical, which draws attention and wrath from some school bullies and as a result Gabe is bullied and must find some solutions.

As I told the story I became quite aware of a young man sitting in a wheel chair listening intently to me talking about physical "shortcomings" that were causing Gabe some problems and wondered what he was thinking. He was holding a copy of Go Ask Mom so I knew he was very aware of the conflict in the book. He nodded in recognition as I told stories about Gabe's narcoleptic cat, his mean big brother who Gabe chased out of their shared bedroom one night with nothing more than a lot of imagination and a good, scary story and other adventures.

At the end of my talk it was question time and then it was time to go back to the library, to the book fair, to sign some books. My friend on wheels chimed in as did his mother, but more one on one as the others filed out to go back to the library. He, a really good-natured boy and a social ease recounted parts of the book he really liked. Mom and son both told me how reading Go Ask Mom together had brought them a lot of good times, where mom could recount her neighborhood adventures and how similar they were to Gabe's. My young friend told me how he had used the idea Gabe used to do something different to catch a bully of guard, using his words "like Gabe" to baffle. He simply said "sparkly wheels", because his wheelchair has a cool lighting gizmo, kind of like those tricked out cars that light the undercarriage at night and the bully didn't know how to react. He continued to just say that simple phrase whenever the bully would approach and it seemed to properly keep him off guard because soon it appeared as thought he bully wanted to befriend instead of be mean.

Later in the library, as they had me sign a copy of the sequel, The World According to Gabe, mom told me more stories about how they had connected to Gabe and she thanked me numerous times for writing the book. It seemed at that moment as if the reason for writing that book had been to help a young man in a wheelchair learn how to make the world work a little better and I felt a sense of pride nothing else could have brought. When my young friend wheeled up eagerly holding several toys (does every kid in the world think the book fair is a toy fair?) he was delighted to see mom had already had me sign the second book for him.

As he clutched the book close, he wheeled away, but over his shoulder he said, "I can't wait to see what happens next." I thought he was going to burst when I told him The Gabriel Book of World Records was coming out next week. I imagined mom and son cracking open his new prize at bedtime in just an hour or so and the "new" adventures of Gabe once again filling his bedroom.

As I drove home in the dark, with probably the last of summer evening warmth flowing over me, I was filled with a sense that I was really doing what I was put here to do: Writing stories, telling stories, living stories.

You never know when something you share with the rest of the world is going to make a difference. So, what story do you have that could be shared that would change someone in a small or big way?

A Progression of cover treatments... The Gabriel Book of World Records!

I personally have always enjoyed a good back story. Almost as much as the story itself. I have read many author biographies to glean their inspirations and to see their processes. Thus, I thought some of you might be interested in seeing this.

For my upcoming book, the new series illustrator/designer (the magnificent David Schiedt) was kind enough to ask my opinion of what the cover should "say". Having worked with Mr. Schiedt before on our collaborated picture book, Drinking Fountain Joe, I knew David painstakingly sketches and sketches and sketches until he finds the character he wants. I trust him and when he sends me really, really rough sketches I try hard to envision the end "product". No matter how hard I try, I never see it as good as he does it! This challenge for Mr. Schiedt was particularly difficult because he had never illustrated a chapter book before and he was taking the series over mid-stream. He wanted it to have his own individual stamp and look nothing like the previously illustrated works of Gabe. That is what I wanted too. It was time to introduce Gabe to the world in a newly minted way. Gabe himself was taking over the reigns. The books would be from his perspective not only in the writing style, but illustrations "taken from his sketchbooks".

I thought of a cover where Gabe is central and six to eight items from the action within were surrounding him in bubbles. Mr. Schiedt gave it a try and although it was 100% better than anything I could have done, it wasn't quite right. Fortunately for me Mr. Schiedt is a very nice and patient man.

He drew some sketches and some cover treatments that neither of us were totally wild about, then we asked the opinion of some kids and teachers and librarians who are familiar with the character Gabriel Peter and his stories in the previous two books and they weren't wild about them either. DEADLINES and COMMITMENTS looming, what were we to do?

Back to the drawing board (while I was crazily editing my work too and wanting to make this the very best book possible.The cover below was sent to me after a discussion about the element of action and trying to get into the famous Guinness World Book of Records.

I liked it a lot, but after a conversation Mr. Scheidt was still not totally satisfied that it conveyed Gabe correctly in the scene.

Then he sent this one. I was in love with the cover and the idea.

After deliberation about incorporating action and something that indicates what is within the covers of the book we came upon this idea. The main idea was to capture attention, particularly by the reluctant chapter book reader. What would do it? What is popular and stays true to the series?

SO many questions. My answers were, comics, sketchy drawing style and TONS OF ACTION! What do you think of how the cover looks now?

PLEASE CLICK ON COVER TO SEE THE ENTIRE THING! THANKS!

Gabe rides again!

The Gabriel Book of World Records is on its way! First signing, Tattered Cover... stay tuned!

Childhood friends

Being an adopted person, I am always interested in those reunion stories where after many years of wondering and puzzling over the issues of adoption there is a coming together and I have had one myself. I know both my maternal and paternal origins. I have actually written a book, well a manuscript, about the journey and hope someday to go back through it enough editorially to get someone interested in it. Anyway, I just saw a story about how Facebook caused the reunion of a family after they had gone through various ways to try to find one another. Facebook has created some reunions for me as well and strangely enough I have been reunited with not one, not two, not three, but four of my boyhood friends named MIKE. The reunion with one particular Mike is the focus of this blog, but more than that, it is about going back in time and remembering those building blocks and people that contributed unknowingly to what one would eventually become. The point of my blog is to encourage you to think about reconnecting with someone that you are not sure how you disconnected with in the first place. Sometimes friends are for a moment in our lives and sometimes they are for the duration. Sometimes they are both.

I have always been accused of being the nostalgic one in my family. I'm not ashamed of it. I use it to write, so there... it is handy. This blog is a bit nostalgic.

Do you have someone in the past who periodically comes up because of a memory, a dream, a scent of simply just pops into your mind now and again and you wonder what they may be doing, why you lost touch or why at 3:00 A.M. are you thinking of something so long ago, so seemingly irrelevant to today's business? (Or do you simply wonder if I might have made that last sentence just a bit longer?) Just such a person over time popped in and out of my consciousness for no apparent reason. (I cannot believe I spelled consciousness right the first try!) A person who owns "real estate" in the deep inner reaches of my brain.

When I was a boy I developed a wonderful relationship with another kid in my sixth grade class. My most vivid memory of my early school days was on the very last day of sixth grade when Mike and I walked from our school to his house. It was a very hot day and Mike and I couldn't have been more excited to be out of school! We stopped at this wide ditch near Mike's house to wade and cool off in the shade of a giant cottonwood tree as the chocolate milk colored water flowed through our sleepy little college town. I remember pulling my shoes and socks off and hurling them down into the water as a way of saying, SUMMER is here! Let it begin! The time of being a little kid is over! It was my personal right of passage from school to summer, but more importantly it was a letting go of childhood and from elementary school to enter the big world of Junior High, the BIG TIME! I also remember wading in that ditch later when mom came to pick me up and demanded that I fetch my shoes from the deep. I just don't remember if I ever found them... Some things you just block out.

One of the things I liked and remember most about Mike is that when I got him laughing, which I did a lot, he smiled with his entire face. His eyes turned up as much as his mouth when he smiled and laughed. I've always enjoyed seeing someone's entire face get involved when I am being Mr. Funnyguy! Mike and I rode the ski bus together every weekend and cruised the slopes until the very last possible run every time and then we would tuck and cruise all the way past the lodge and down into the parking lot where inevitably we were the last to load our skiis under the bus and head for home.

When the weather was good we rode our bikes everywhere. We were "best friends", we had each other's backs. We were two mismatched peas in a pod and mostly we both had really cool long hippie hair that flowed behind us as we tooled with summer abandon through the town and country. We spent almost every day together that summer, meeting at one another's house to go on another fun adventure and share another carefree hot summer day.

I remember thinking Mike was one of the coolest dudes I had ever met. Mike was a gentle giant of a kid. He was easily my size and then again half. He had a sweet and gentle nature, yet he was tough, played football and wrestled with the best of them. He was my favorite bike and ski buddy and the dude could carry on a good conversation and challenge me in some of the grossest eating contests. I remember once he came to my house and we endeavored to try EVERYTHING in the kitchen. We did fine until we hit mom's spice rack and the dog food bag.

We had many sleepovers and mom let us stay up late into the night watching Creature Features then we'd sleep out in my backyard tent and gaze up at the stars and talk about aliens, girls (sometimes those conversations seemed identical back they) and wondered where life would take us. I thought then that Mike and I would be best friends for life. I simply couldn't imagine a better friend anywhere or anyone! At the heart of it, I always respected and liked Mike a lot. I always cherished that summer we had after sixth grade when Mike and Eddie and I would move like a herd from one to another's house and got into a little mischief together. Mostly it was my first band of brothers outside of my small country neighborhood and they meant the world to me.

Then we went to different Junior Highs and by the time we ended up in the same High School we were sadly kind of strangers. I would see Mike in the hall and we always nodded and acknowledged the bond we once had, but peers, circumstances and changing interests took us in different directions.

In my series (Go Ask Mom) Gabe, my protagonist has a very best friend named Andy. I have been asked if I ever had such a friend. Andy is a very cool kid. Andy in many ways embodies the Mike I knew when I was Gabe's age. So there you have it. Authors take what they know and knew and sometimes unknowingly import that into people and places that inhabit the world of fiction, at least this one does.

Now, many, many years after that sixth to seventh grade summer I am pleased that Facebook brought Mike back into my life because of the preparation for our high school reunion. Over the year or so that I have had a Facebook account Mike has sent me some very thoughtful messages, especially when my Dad died. His mom is a friend of mine on Facebook as well as his sisters. For years I wondered about them and what they were all doing and I am so pleased at how wonderfully life has turned out for a family that once accepted me as just another one of the kids underfoot.

The first time Mike and I talked prior to the reunion for about an hour on the phone he told me that his mom saw me on a national television show years ago promoting my first book. I think he said she was "proud that weird kid you used to hang around with turned out so well... WHEW!" Actually some of the nicest comment I have received on Facebook have been from Mike's mom, congratulating me on my career and family ( I think she is a bit surprised, ha ha). The world is so small.

Mike and I still share the passion we once had for biking, but now we both mountain bike. Perhaps some day Mike and I will bike together again. Though from the looks of his blog, I might not be able to keep up with him anymore (his blog is mostly about his mountain bike team, the races he competes in and some other pretty groovy stuff).

At the end of it all, it is friends and family that make this a richer world to travel through. I will always be glad about the place my friend Mike holds in my memories and thank him for being such a great friend back in the day when I really, really needed a buddy I could hang with and depend on. Mike was one of my mom's very favorites of my friends and my mom had very good taste!

If you had a friend like this that you have wondered about over the years, reach out and find them. It really is pretty easy now with this wonderful world of web. If you find a person of great character and when they laugh you basically still hear that kid you hung out with, you will be a richer person for it! And if you don't and there is no happily ever after, at least your curiosity will be sated. Thanks Mike for being my buddy back in the day and now! By the way Dude, you STILL smile with your entire face!

Images that inspire a writer...?

When we worry about the fact that our young reader is obsessed with reading silly books and comics and "non literature", some of us must remember what it was like when the reading world was new and there was so much interesting and weird...

I would sit in my back yard or up in my tree house and obsess over comic books for hours and hours when I was a boy. There is a large box of my old comic books and Mad Magazines in my basement that I have been pouring over. When I look at these old ads it brings back memories of the mystery and the fantasy of actually having the exotic animals shown on the pages.

I ordered virtually everything in those magazines, the most disappointing the X-Ray glasses.

As I am molding the characters for the Go Ask Mom series I am able to go back in time and become a boy again for short periods, WHAT FUN!

Gabe is obsessing about some of the items you see in these pictures and I think you will like what comes from it in book 3. The Gabriel Book Of World Records will be out sometime within the next months.... Stay tuned and read whatever grabs YOUR fancy and let your imagination run wild!

The sequel is a good summer read, so the spring is for the first book...

First came Go Ask Mom - Stories from the upper bunk, then The World According to Gabe - Stories from the lower bunk.

I have finished the third book in the series, titled: The Gabriel World Book of Records - Stories from the tree house and am presently working on fourth.

This is a planned six book series. Happy Reading!

Offer to my readers

I am very excited to have the new book out and have had great response by the pre-readers!

The World According to Gabe is OUT and if you liked the adventures in Go Ask Mom, I think you will LOVE them in this book.

If you would like to get an autographed copy, please go to my website (www.justinmatott.com) and order it now ($21).

If you are a book club and want to get the kiddoes started on Go Ask Mom, please indicate so
and I will make your book club an offer you can't refuse: For instance: a book club orders 10 copies of The World According to Gabe, you will receive 10 copies of Go Ask Mom at 50% off or something creative like that (you tell me what works best for your club). Also, the first book club (in the Denver metro area) to order in this fashion can contact me to come and meet the book club to discuss the books and I will share a sneak peak of the third book in the series: The Gabriel World Book of Records, which is finished and shipped off to the editor!

I will be posting more excerpts from the book here on my blog, so stay tuned!

Do you have an idea for my upcoming book?

Hello there, I am writing a chapter for the fourth book in the GO ASK MOM series and I am looking for your ideas. I am writing a chapter titled THE GROSS-ERIE STORE, in which the band of boys have a dare-off, in which they choose combinations of foods to have their buddy's eat. An example: A Snickers bar marinated in pickle juice or wrapped in saurkraut.

I am looking for YOUR gross food combination ideas. If you have a good idea, either comment here by clicking the comment link or send your idea to me at justin@justinmatott.com

I hope you are in the middle of a really good book right now, I am in the middle of a really funny book write now...

THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GABE

THE BOOK IS COMING VERY SOON (March 15 is the estimate) and can now be preordered from my website (justin@justinmatott.com)! I am very excited about what is happening in the new book and am busy trying to get the next four in the series out in the near future!

If you liked Go Ask Mom - Stories From the Upper Bunk, you are going to love this book!

Scroll down to read the prologue for the new book and see some of the illustrations.

Also, the third book is titled The Gabriel World Book of Records- Stories from the Tree House, in which Gabe and his buddies will try to set a record to get into the famous Guinness World Book. I am really done, but editing and if you have a really good idea of a record they could try, let me know at justin@justinmatott.com as soon as possible.

RIght now, their biggest eneavor is 'The World's Largest Spit Pool'.

YUCK! YECH! COOL!

Sample chapter in THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GABE

I haven't been blogging much in the past few weeks because of a looming deadline on the GO ASK MOM series. Books two (and three) are written completely, book two is completely designed and illustrated and I am happy to announce that Gabriel Peters and his friends have been very busy and the new book is scheduled to be out by mid-March! I thought you might enjoy a sneak preview:

PROLOGUE

In the last week of summer, Mom and Dad walked out of my room with the saddest looks on their faces. I could tell they felt almost as bad as I did.

My brother Carl stood in my doorway with a look of astonishment on his face, having overheard our conversation. He then just shook his head and crept back to his room.

“WHAT??” I screamed after my departing folks. “WHAT? NO WAY! I cannot repeat fourth grade! I cannot, I cannot! You promised that I was going to change schools!” THIS ISN'T FAIR AT ALL!

I then screamed into my pillow at the top of my lungs. It was bad enough to think about being a repeater and all the kids who would make fun of me, but the worse part was that I was going to have to repeat classes with Sister Mary Claire. Mom had talked to me about repeating fourth grade at Pioneer Ridge Elementary School instead, the same public school everyone else in Skyview, our neighborhood, goes to, and that was bad enough, but now it was the worst news ever, repeating in my old school AND in the same class with the same dumb old teacher! That was simply more than I could take. Even though Mom had explained over and over that I would graduate from High School several years younger than all of the other kids and then it would really matter to me, I didn't care. IT JUST ISN'T FAIR AT ALL!

My first fourth-grade year had been a nightmare in many ways. At least my eye patch was coming off before school began and my leg was a lot better that it used to be. But how could they promise me that I was going to get out of St. Joseph's and then go back on their word?

As I said, Mom and Dad had tried to explain that there were real reasons that I was going to stay at St. Joe's. Maybe their reasons made sense to them, but I was the one who had to stay. Since I didn't want to hear their reasons, I didn't really listen to them; after all, they had promised me that I would be going to Pioneer Ridge Elementary School and now it wasn't going to happen.

I wanted to run away from home.

My friends went to the normal school, the public school with the big yellow bus that squeaked loudly in the early morning as it rounded the corner and headed up Venus Avenue toward my house to pick the kids up at the bus stop. I always wanted to ride that bus with the other kids, including my big brother, but instead I rode in the carpool of misfits, us kids who for a bunch of reasons didn't fit into the normal scheme of things and didn't go to the same school as all of the other kids in the neighborhood.

My carpool had these twin sisters with poodle-puff blond hair and breath that always smelled like raspberry Kool-Aid, and a boy named Ike who never talked to anyone in the car but stared out his window, singing to himself and ignoring everyone else in the car. Sometimes this other boy named Bhasin with really dark skin who came from India rode with us when his mom couldn't take him to St. Joe's because she had to take care of his sick sister. I always felt sorry for that kid, because he never got any attention on account of his sister. He seemed really sad. Then there was of course me, the clown of the car as Mrs. Abernathy called me, but everyone knew I went to the Catholic school because I was smart and needed a challenge.

It seemed to me like just going to the school and surviving the day was the real challenge!

The moms took turns driving us back and forth downtown to the school. I didn't like it when the little Indian kid's mom drove because she had this rickety old brown station wagon that barely made it every time (we broke down on the side of the road two times already in the first month of my fourth-grade year), and she smoked like a train.

Whenever I hear that saying, “…smokes like a train,” it always makes me think of The Little Engine That Could and how if he smoked he couldn't have gotten up that hill because he would be all out of breath and really blue in the face. Come to think of it, he was blue in the face, and blue all over for that matter.

I was always doing stuff like that, daydreaming and thinking about stuff in a weird way. My dad just said it was because I live in my head, in my imagination, and that it is a good thing. Everyone else just seems to think I am strange.

As I said before, I wanted to ride the big yellow school bus with the other kids from my neighborhood. It got so bad that one day I just hopped on the bus after my brother got on. It was kind of sad, because my mom got really scared and called the police when I wasn't around to get in the carpool. I hid under a seat all the way to the public school, that I only got to go to when my brother's class had a play or the annual school carnival.

My mom and dad told me that they had imagined all kinds of crazy stuff happening to me while I was missing. It was like I was one of those kids on the posters who show up every so often in the post office or on the side of a milk carton: HAVE YOU SEEN ME?

Geez, I wasn't ever really missing! My brother was only three feet away from me the whole time, but no one saw me get on the bus because the bus driver was on the tetherball court flirting with the weird divorced lady who had no kids at the school, but was always standing out there near the bus stop in a fancy dress and tons of makeup. I guess she liked the bus driver or something.

When all of the kids went to their classes I wandered into the library and started reading one of The Happy Hollisters mystery books. The librarian finally saw me sitting on the floor in the back and then took me to the office, where my mom was called.

I was sent home in the janitor's car. He told me all kinds of funny stories about pranks he pulled on other people when he was a boy. He had gone to a Catholic school too, and had some funny stories about it.

When I got home my mom hugged me so hard that I thought my brain was going to pop out. She then drove me over to St. Joe's and walked me into my fourth grade class. That's kind of embarrassing in a way, but it made me feel kind of special, too.

When I got home later that day, the kids at the bus stop were talking about my stunt.

Well, all of this to say that going to the Catholic school in a uniform every day, when almost all of the other kids in my neighborhood are in the yellow school bus in their jeans and t-shirts, has singled me out. When we all play hide-n-seek or some other game and they started talk about stuff that happened at their school, I always feel left out. I like the summers best, because no one goes to school, and after just a few weeks they all stop talking about stuff at school and we are all the same for a little while.

One thing I did this past year, that my brother said was sissy, was to keep a diary. I liked it. I liked having an imaginary friend who heard all of my stories, shared all of my inner secrets. Something about writing it all down for me was like getting it all out. Like throwing up when you feel really lousy. My diary was a place to go throw it all up. I have a lot to throw up too, because for a little kid, I have already been through a ton of rough stuff.

So, the bottom line is there is nothing I can do about repeating fourth grade again. Besides, if I don't I will barely be a teenager when I graduate from high school because I skipped both second and third grades, no lie, and that will make me even more of a misfit than I am now. So, like it or not, as my big brother Carl and his friends will say over and over, “Gabriel Peters is going to fourth grade AGAIN! GABRIEL PETERS IS A REPEATER!” This year is going to be a waste! I already learned everything there was to know in fourth grade last year. I thought they said I was so smart. Maybe they had it all wrong?

Now I only have a few more weeks of freedom left to do all the things kids like to do before I am back in the Batwoman's torture chamber. I just cannot believe I am going to have to repeat Sister Mary Claire. Trust me, repeating any grade is bad enough without having to repeat her! DANG! DANG! DANG!

So, the stuff you are about to read is from my diaries. I like telling stories, and keeping the diaries helps me to remember details. Stories about your life and junk always seem to be better when you tell them later, after it has happened and having some of the nitty-gritty details makes a story so much better! I really only want to tell you about the summertime, because summertime is the best time of the whole year, but some interesting things happened in my second fourth grade year that made me look forward to the next summer even more, so here goes….