Megan McDonald

Biography
"Sometimes I think I am Judy Moody," says Megan McDonald, author of the award-winning Judy Moody books. "I'm certainly moody, like she is. Judy has a strong voice and always speaks up for herself. I like that." For Megan, being able to speak up for herself wasn't always easy.

The author grew up as the youngest of five sisters in a house full of books in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Her father, an ironworker, built bridges across the city and was known to his coworkers as "Little Johnny the Storyteller." Every evening at dinnertime, the McDonald family would gather around the kitchen table, talking and telling stories. But with four older sisters, Megan remembers barely being able to get a word in edgewise. "I'm told I began to stutter," she says. "That's when my mother gave me a notebook, so that I could write down everything I wanted to say!"

Megan has a B.A. in English from Oberlin College and a master's degree in Library Science from the University of Pittsburgh. Before Megan became a writer, she worked in museums, libraries, and bookstores. She has also made a living as a storyteller and a park ranger. Megan McDonald now lives with her husband in Sebastopol, California.

Honorarium
$1,400 per full-day visit within Sonoma County, California
$1,600 per full-day visit within the San Francisco Bay Area
$1,800 plus travel and expenses per full-day visit beyond the SF Bay Area

Program description
Megan is a born storyteller! Have you heard about the time her hermit crab escaped and was found…in her shoe? How about the time she accidentally hatched praying mantises in her sock drawer, à la Amanda Frankenstein from Insects Are My Life?

Megan will tell these and other funny stories to demonstrate how she gets ideas and how she transforms ideas into story. This glimpse into one writer's creative process includes a slide show featuring photos, newspaper clippings, illustrations, rough drafts, edits, sketches, storyboards, dummies, and even mistakes that take place when an idea is on its way to becoming a book.

Size and number of groups
Megan is available to visit schools (for full-day or half-day sessions) and conferences (keynote speeches and workshops). She also provides writing workshops for kids, students, adults, or any aspiring writers.

Programs for large audiences are 45 minutes, followed by a time for questions and answers. Smaller classroom visits and writing workshops can be arranged, depending on the needs of individual schools.

Number and length of presentations
A half-day visit is two assemblies; a full-day visit is three large-group presentations.

Equipment needs

• Slide projector and screen
• Room that can be darkened
• Microphone for large audiences
• Glass of water

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How to Order Books for a Visit
Order from this booklist 

Selected Titles

All the Stars in the Sky: The Santa Fe Trail Diary of Florrie Ryder Mack
(Scholastic Press, 2003)

Florrie and her Mama and little brother Jem are headed for a new life in New Mexico in 1848, until Mama falls ill and has to stay behind at Bent's Old Fort. Florrie and Jem must make their own way in a strange new place they now call home.

Ant and Honey Bee: What a Pair!
Illustrated by G. Brian Karas
(Candlewick Press, 2005)

Introducing Ant and Honey Bee, fast friends and stars of a delightful new picture book. Ant and Honey Bee make a perfect team in a costume for two for Cricket's big party — until it rains. Includes party ideas.

Baya, Baya, Lulla-by-a
Illustrated by Vera Rosenberry
(Simon & Schuster, 2003)

As the baya bird of India weaves its intricate nest of flowers and grasses, then lights it with fireflies, Mata weaves a traditional blanket and sings to her baby in this dramatic yet lulling lullaby of a book.

Beetle McGrady Eats Bugs!
Illustrated by Jane K. Manning
(Greenwillow Books, 2005)

The New York Times bestselling author of the Judy Moody series teams up with a New York Times bestselling artist for this funny, jazzy, and only occasionally disgusting school story about an ant and one truly memorable girl.

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The Bone Keeper
Illustrated by Brian Karas
(DK Publishing, 2000)

More meditation than story, more poem than prose, this book tells of the Bone Woman moving through the desert gathering bones.

The Bridge to Nowhere
(Orchard Books, 1993)

Laid off from his job building bridges two years ago, Hallie's father is like a stranger in the house. She misses the man she used to be able to talk to, the man who could make her laugh. She knows the stranger she and Crane saw up there on the bridge is him. And Hallie runs away.

• Judy Blume Contemporary Fiction Award

Is This a House for Hermit Crab?
Illustrated by S.D. Schindler
(Orchard Books, 1990)

Follow hermit crab as he scritch-scratches his way up the shore, trying on rocks, cans, and shells for size. Megan's first published work.

• A School Library Journal Best Book of the Year
• International Reading Association Children's Book Award

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Judy Moody
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2000)

Third grader Judy Moody is the only person in class to have a Venus flytrap as a favorite pet, a little brother named Stink, and a charter membership in the T.P. club. You don't know what the T.P. Club is? There's only one way to find out...

• An American Library Association Notable Children's Book
• A New York Public Library Best Children's Book
• First Annual Beverly Cleary Award Winner

Judy Moody & Stink: The Holly Joliday
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2007)

Judy Moody is making a list and checking it twice, but all her brother Stink wants this year is snow. It hasn’t snowed on Christmas in Virginia in more than a hundred years. Enter their new mailman, Jack Frost, who looks a lot like a jolly old elf, and who may have the answer, in this brand-new, full-color holiday adventure.

Judy Moody: Around the World in 8 1/2 Days
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2006)

A brand-new friend and a big class project put Judy in an international mood in this comical new adventure.

Judy Moody Declares Independence
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2005)

When a visit to Boston spurs Judy's interest in Revolutionary War heroes and heroines, she's soon on a quest for more independence in this hilarious new episode of this popular series.

Judy Moody Gets Famous
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2001)

Not only did Jessica Finch win the Northern Virginia Spelling Bee and get her picture printed in the newspaper, she wears a tiara to class so that everybody knows she did. Judy is determined not to let Jessica outdo her.

• American Library Association Notable Children's Book
• A Children's Literature Choice List title
• An International Reading Association Children's Choices Award

The Judy Moody Mood Journal
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2003)

What is your mood today? Rare or roar? Goofy or snore? Give the Dial-a-Mood-Meter a spin to find out! Then write about it in a journal all your own. Here's a chance to tell YOUR story.

Judy Moody, M.D.: The Doctor is In!
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2004)

Judy gets a taste of her own medicine in this hilarious new episode which finds Judy demonstrating her desire to be a doctor when she grows up during Class 3T's show-and-tell day.

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Judy Moody Predicts the Future
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2003)

Judy Moody definitely has a mood for every occasion. And now she has a mood ring to prove it! The mood ring's Extra-Special Powers have put Judy in a predict-the-future mood, and her outrageous predictions have everyone wondering if Judy really is psychic.

Judy Moody Saves the World
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2002)

Judy Moody, lifetime collector of Band-Aids, has a new mission. Now, all she needs is one single creative, award-winning Crazy Strips idea.

• An International Reading Association Children's Choice Award Winner
• Chicago Public Library Best Books for Children

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Penguin and Little Blue
Illustrated by Katherine Tillotson
(Simon & Schuster, 2003)

Penguin and Little Blue put on shows at Water World until the day they findthemselves on an airplane, headed for Kansas. Will they ever make it back to the icebergs of home… and their fine-feathered friends of Antarctica?

Reptiles Are My Life
Illustrated by Paul Brett Johnson
(Orchard Books, 2001)

This sequel to Insects Are My Life brings together Amanda Frankenstein, the girl who loves insects, and a new best friend, Maggie, who's wild about reptiles. But when Emily Elligator arrives wearing her gecko shirt, look out!

Saving the Liberty Bell
Illustrated by Marsha Gray Carrington
(Atheneum Books, 2005)

Eleven-year-old John Jacob Mickley is in the city of Philadelphia in 1777, when the Great Bell rings out a warning from atop the State House that the Redcoats are coming. The British are eying the Great Bell as metal for a cannon, but John Jacob tells how the clever residents kept the bell safe.

Shadows in the Glasshouse
(Pleasant Company, 2000)

In 1621, 12-year-old Merry crosses the ocean from England to Jamestown by ship. Now she must work as an indentured servant to a glassmaker. In the glasshouse, she watches her 15-year-old friend, Angelo Lupo, work to find the formula for the thin, elegant glass called cristallo. But someone else watches as well.

Stink and the World's Worst Super-Stinky Sneakers
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2007)

While on a class trip to the Gross-Me-Out exhibit at the science museum, Stink Moody discovers that his very own nose has amazing sniffing abilities. Soon the junior olfactory wiz is engrossed in toilet water, corpse flowers, and all things smelly.

The Sisters Club
(Pleasant Company, 2003)

Three sisters—Stevie, Alex, and Joey—take turns telling what it's like to live in a family of nutty actors, how to survive Macaroni Disaster and escape being a Human Piñata, and when it's OK to kiss something (stuffed animals, school papers that get an A) and when it's not (praying mantises and boys who look like praying mantises!) No matter what, sisters are forever.

Stink: The Incredible Shrinking Kid
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2005)

In his first solo adventure, Judy Moody's younger "bother" stars in this funny, homespun saga that reflects the familiar voice of a kid who pictures himself with super powers to deal with the travails of everyday life.

Stink and the Incredible Super-Galactic Jawbreaker
Illustrated by Peter Reynolds
(Candlewick Press, 2006)

When Stink Moody buys a mammoth jawbreaker that doesn't break his jaw, he writes a letter of complaint to the manufacturer and receives a ten-pound box of jawbreakers. Stink soon becomes the proverbial kid in a candy store as his letter-writing campaign yields him heaps of free rewards.

When the Library Lights Go Out
Illustrated by Katherine Tillotson
(Atheneum Books, 2005)

Rabbit, Lion, and Hermit Crab inhabit a library puppet box. Once it closes, the library is theirs. The copy machine casts an eerie light, children's name tags hang like bits of the solar system, and magic abounds.

Forthcoming Titles

Daisy Jane, Best-Ever Flower Girl (Spring, 2007)

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