Lee Wind (The Children's Book Podcast #423)
QUEER AS A FIVE-DOLLAR BILL
Lee Wind is the author of QUEER AS A FIVE-DOLLAR BILL, a novel for teens about a boy named Wyatt, some little known research about our 16th president, and a social media post that goes viral. In this conversation Lee talks about his Kickstarter campaign for the book, a decision he made after the publisher that previously acquired his manuscript dropped the book just a few months prior to production. You're going to love hearing Lee tell that story. It was a total surprise to me. Lee also talks openly about being a gay teen who became a gay adult and struggled throughout much of his teens and twenties to be authentic to himself and, more importantly, to love himself.
ABOUT THE BOOK:
Wyatt is 15, and nobody in his homophobic small town of Lincolnville, Oregon knows that he’s gay. Not even his best friend (and accidental girlfriend) Mackenzie. Then he discovers a secret from actual history: that Abraham Lincoln was in love with another guy! Since everyone loves Lincoln, Wyatt’s sure that if the world knew about it, they would treat gay people differently, and it would solve everything about his life. So Wyatt outs Lincoln online, triggering a media firestorm that threatens to destroy everything he cares about—and he has to pretend more than ever that he’s straight. …Only then he meets openly gay Martin, who may be just the guy Wyatt’s been hoping to find.
SHOW NOTES:
Queer as a Five-Dollar Bill - Empower LGBTQ & Allied Teens Kickstarter Campaign
Camp Brave Trails home page
Models of Pride home page
QUEER AS A FIVE-DOLLAR BILL serialized on Lee's blog
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life 1st Edition by Anne Lamott
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Lee is the head of SCBWI Team Blog and the official blogger for SCBWI (at http://scbwi.blogspot.com). His personal blog, “I’m Here. I’m Queer. What the Hell do I Read?” covers LGBTQ Teen Books, Culture and Politics, and has had over 2.4 million visits from GLBTQ Teens and their allies. It’s a Children’s Book Council “Great Diversity Blog” and is linked from the American Library Association’s Rainbow Books List.
And visit Lee Wind online at http://www.leewind.org/.
A MESSAGE FOR YOUR STUDENTS:
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