But first news about Boreas It’s been quiet on the Boreas front. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t anything going on here. There is! By now, paperback editions of three of the Boreas titles have been published. Hurray! Children still love the series and sales are steady. And maybe, just maybe… Boreas will make the jump to America like I did. That pleases me enormously. And now about The Memory Maker Meanwhile, I have been busy writing new books. This time in English. There is a wonderful middle grade out on submission: The Memory Maker in which Georgia “Izzy” Isherwood grapples with the loss of her mother. Her only real comfort is an old, worn t-shirt that still carries the familiar scent of her…
Mina Witteman – author | editor | teacher of creative writing
Posts from the “The Views” Category
What happens to a writer when there is a shelter-in-place edict that shrinks your physical world to proportions of times passé? Not much, I thought. I’ll be fine, I thought. I’m a writer and, by nature, a bit of a recluse. I mostly live in my head. Not that I don’t pay attention to the world around me. I do! A lot. But you won’t find me in the middle of the melee if I can help it. I feel most comfortable observing the world from the peace and quiet of my home. I prefer to take in life as it glides by: who moves where and how and, importantly, why? I look for connections and cross-connections, I analyze, I contemplate, I add perspective,…
Tagged: Berkeley, California, Children's Books, COVID-19, Drawing, Journal, Nature journaling, Shelter in place, Sketching, virus, writing
KINDERBOEKENWEEK WORKSHOP MET GROTE BROER! Tijdens de Kinderboekenweek (of daarvoor of daarna!) de wereldkaart van Boreas maken in de klas? Dat kan met Grote Broer Kunsteducatie! Superleuke workshop waar ook nog eens techniek bij aan te pas komt. Helemaal Boreas! “Met de hele klas maken de kinderen de wereldkaart van Boreas na. Het is niet zomaar een kaart, het is een interactieve kaart! De kinderen gebruiken verschillende technieken, zoals LED-lampjes, batterijen en pop-upsystemen. In groepjes werken ze aan de zeven delen. Aan het eind van de workshop worden alle zeven delen samengevoegd tot één uniek verhaal.”
This week was the start of a new chapter in my life. I recently obtained a visa for the US, a so-called artist’s visa that identifies me now as an alien with extraordinary abilities in writing children’s books. Needless to say I am super excited at this opportunity to spread my children’s books wings. But it’s also a life-changing leap into uncharted waters and I feel like the little ones in the picture below. Intimidated by the dark around them, you can see them think: are we going in or… I’m that little one at the end of the rudder. I made my choice and went in. These next years I will be exploring and navigating these, to me, uncharted waters. I’ll be enjoying Californian life, too. Let myself be lifted…
she walks into the sea to cleanse herself from the hurt that flooded her when he called her a whore with handfuls of brine she douses his vernacular, vile and full of harm, erases it from her mind barters the words for the soft-spoken sweetness he used to ensnare her heart and soul she’s not here to clear his conscience she’s not here to lift his guilt let him face the love he crushed with his thoughtless thirst she scours her body with sand and stone struggles to escape the hissing voice that tells her to let his words rip her to shreds and drown in the force of a surf that will steal her life
the sternum cracked from the inside alveoli plugged with broken stone sand cement water my brain taut with blood thoughts judgments incoherent rambling pushing to where I can’t go so I stay nameless invisible alone and die
Tagged: #amwriting, Mina Witteman, Revision, San Francisco, Sunshine, YA
a terminus spews travelers out into the city’s streets i jump a line and fly the five to where le nuit debout resides, encircled by black uzis from my camp four stories high i count the stairs and steps to anselm kiefer’s looming lines that suck me in and spin my brain through barren scenes of leaden books, burned and black, that dot a paint-encrusted field of snow paul celan recites his strophes the muse climbs up me silently i am alone and wonder if my words shall survive the summer
Tagged: #amwriting, Anselm Kiefer, Aschenblume, Ash Flower, le nuit debout, Paris, Paul Celan
Mina Witteman 