Ani live and in person

I wrote an article about my reading history for School Library Journal called "How Reader Girl Got Her Groove Back." I got such a kick out of this--there was a little illustration, and I think it's supposed to be me. I think they hired an artist to make an image of me with a dragon! That's a first. I think I look pretty cute. Maybe I should wear more orange. (Illustration by Maura Condrick)

I promised a cool story about the cover model for the new goose girl paperback...but it fell through. There's a wonderful young actress who was a fan of the book from years ago. Her mother and I were in contact and she was going to pose for the cover. Unfortunately, the publishing and Hollywood are such different beasts, we couldn't find a contract that would work for both sides. Alas. Her name is Brie Larson and she is such a darling to have been willing, but I totally understand why it didn't work out for both sides. An actress needs some control of her image and how its used, and a publisher needs complete control of the image so they can reprint at will and promote the book.

A different model was used, a lovely young girl. Here's the new cover, which I think turned out really beautifully. This is not my mental image of Ani, though I don't know that we could ever find just the right model. I think the purpose of these new photo covers is not to replace the characters in our minds. They're not meant to appeal to those of us who already read the book, but to draw in a new audience who don't already have a mental image of the characters.

And you can see the three new books now side-by-side: