Colorado Teen Literature Conference

Last Saturday was the Colorado Teen Literature Conference in Denver, CO. Attending were 300 teachers, librarians and teens. I'm always surprised at just how many teenagers actually come to this conference. Get up early on a Saturday to discuss literature with your teachers and librarians, what? I'm not sure that I would have been such a diligent student when I was that young. But each year, I rediscover just how many teens love contemporary YA lit enough to venture forth on a Saturday despite the threat of blizzard to discuss the year's newest teen titles, to perform their original poetry and to hear their favorite teen authors speak.

This year authors David Lubar and Jordan Sonnenblick were the keynote speakers and appropriately, this year's theme was humor. Jordan spoke about his first book, Drums, Girls and Dangerous Pie, which he described as a funny book about pediatric cancer. It is intriguing to realize just how much of the author's real life is put into their books. David Lubar's Weenies short stories are some of my favorite short fiction. The characters almost always meet some sort of sticky end whether it is disappearing forever under a pile of leaves or discovering that you no longer have a working buttocks. Lubar discussed how he invents his topics, how he is constantly wondering, "what if?" and writing it down. Both authors were humorous and engaging and kept the students' attention through 45 minutes of speaking on stage, which is quite a feat.

My favorite part of the day, however, was the Teen Connection Panel. The panel is comprised of 6-10 teens who have spent the last several months reading everything by the featured authors and composing questions for them. Each of these teens have mentors who make sure that this exercise does not result in questions of the "what is your favorite color" variety. Instead, these students must think critically about these books and must develop questions that make the authors explain their writing, their thoughts behind their writing and defend their writing styles and choices. Before the end of this panel both authors were exclaiming, "this is the best interview I've ever had." "Keep these questions coming!" "We don't want this to end!" Having a teen from my library and a member of my youth advisory council on this panel, I was shining with pride each time she asked the authors a question.

For now, I am honored to have been a part of the CTLC planning committee and I cannot wait to begin planning next year's conference featuring Terry Trueman and Ellen Hopkins. And now I have way too many books to read.

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