New website! Update your RSS feeds!

Hie thee over to www.disabilityinkidlit.com for a brand-new site!

New Year, New Pages, New Changes

The entire Disability in Kidlit team wishes you a spectacular 2015!

We thought it was time for an update as there have been some changes around here–and some other changes coming up. The most exciting of these changes is that we’ve received enough contributions that we’re doubling up on posts! Instead of only publishing new content on the first Friday of the month, we’ll be publishing on the first and third Friday. We’re so thrilled to share these great reviews and articles with you!

This posting schedule will continue for the first half of the year at least, after which we’ll reassess the situation.

Another change is that we’ve added some pages to the site:

• A shiny FAQ page with all sorts of information, including how you can help out the site (comment to show your appreciation! spread the word!), and how we can help you in turn (give suggestions! answer your questions!).
• A content page, offering an easy overview of what we’ve published to date.
• A book lists page, for easy access to the various ways to see what’s out there in terms of books with disabled characters. Of particular interest may be the book lists we’ve been posting on Tumblr semi-regularly.

Keep in mind that our Tumblr also has other content you won’t find here. We reblog all kinds of disability-related content, which is great for authors wanting to learn more about the disability community, ableism, and our daily life; we share Disability in Kidlit quotes; and we answer all kinds of questions from readers.

Finally, as you may have seen on our social media, we’re planning an autism-centric event for April. We have some great content lined up already, and remain on the hunt for more contributors. If you’re autistic and want to contribute a review or article, email us so we can discuss what works best!

(Of course, we’re always open to contributors with all kinds of other disabilities!)

All the best,

Corinne, Kayla and Kody

Discussion #7: Warning Flags and Turn-Offs

[Find the post you’re looking for here. Sorry–there was a date mix-up but we’d like to keep this link active.]

Kicking Off Our Anniversary Celebrations!

Hello friends!

It’s hard to believe, but it’s been a whole year since Disability in Kidlit was first launched. We’re so excited for this milestone and so grateful for all of your support. You’ve made it possible for us to continue sharing posts about disability in children’s literature. You’ve made this past year so worthwhile. We love discussing books and tropes and experiences with all of you.

And now, we want to pay you back for all of your support.

To celebrate our first anniversary, we have an epic calendar lined up, chockful of interviews, guest posts, discussion posts, and–best of all–giveaways! We have a ton of brand-new hardcovers, paperbacks, and even ARCs available, many of them signed.

Starting tomorrow, we’ll be running posts every Monday and Wednesday through the end of July. And on Fridays, we’re bringing back last year’s discussion posts with four brand-new questions for our contributors to weigh in on!

We hope you’ll join us for this month-long anniversary celebration–and thanks again for the wonderful year!

–Kody Keplinger, Corinne Duyvis, and Kayla Whaley

Tomorrow’s Twitter Chat

Hello, lovely people!

This is a reminder of tomorrow’s Twitter chat. Keep an eye on our account, @DisabilityinLit, to participate. We’ll be using the hashtag #DiKLchat and we’ll be kicking off at 3pm EST/noon PST.

We’re  hoping to make this chat of particular interest to authors–discussing experiences writing disabled characters and avoiding common pitfalls. Questions and experiences are more than welcome.

We hope to see you tomorrow!

Big Changes to DiKL

Hello everyone! Hope you all are having a lovely Friday thus far.

Today Corinne, Kayla, and I are announcing some news. Disability in Kidlit will be undergoing some changes, and we wanted to round them up and share them with you today.

Monthly Posts

Instead of posting once a week, Disability in Kidlit is altering its schedule. From now on, we’ll be posting new content on the first Friday of every month.  As writers, Corinne, Kayla, and I have schedules which fluctuate with each new project, and right now, we all need to be focusing on our writing. We’re still very devoted to DiKL, however, and we want to keep bringing you the best content we possibly can without us or our contributors feeling rushed. However . . .

We’re Still Seeking Submissions

So please don’t let this change stop you from submitting your post ideas if you’d like to contribute. In fact, we still actively need and welcome submissions! Remember, we’re looking from posts from people who identify as disabled, on topics that relate to their disability and children’s lit. Check out our submissions page for more detail. We’re particularly looking for more reviews. In addition, a couple of weeks ago we updated the page detailing what we’re looking for in terms of articles. Take a look, if you haven’t yet!

Tumblr

We will still be updating our Tumblr daily, so please check that out if you haven’t already. We post and reblog some great content on the subject of disability there.

And we have one piece of very exciting news . . .

Twitter Chat!

Corinne, Kayla, and I have been talking for a while now about running a Twitter chat to discuss disability and its relation to children’s literature. And we’ve finally nailed down a date! Please join us on Saturday, February 22nd at 3pm EST/noon PST using the hashtag #DiKLChat. We’ll post a reminder for this closer to time. Meanwhile, follow the Disability in Kidlit Twitter account for any updates.

Have a lovely weekend, everyone! We’ll see you on the first Friday of the month!

Holiday Hiatus

Hello everyone!

We hope your holiday season has been wonderful so far. Disability in Kidlit will be taking a brief two-week hiatus beginning today, but we’ll be back on January 10, 2014 with more excellent posts.

As always, if you’re interested in writing a post or a review, please see our submission guidelines. We’d love to hear from you!

Have a happy New Year! We’ll see you on the other side.

Corinne, Kayla, Kody

Welcome Back!

It’s September, which means we’re back!

While the August break was lovely (and so very refreshing), we could not be more thrilled to begin having regular content again. We’ll be posting weekly instead of daily, with new posts going up every Friday. As you’ve probably guessed, the first post will be up this Friday, September 6! Make sure you follow the blog itself for updates, as well as on Twitter and Tumblr.

We’ve got some great stuff coming up, but we’re still open to new and returning contributors! If you’re interested, make sure you check out our guidelines and then shoot us an email. We’d especially love to hear from POC and those interested in writing reviews.

Finally, Kayla did an interview about our re-launch over at London Crockett’s blog, which should tide you over until this party really gets started on Friday.

Thanks so much for your continued interest and passion and support. We really appreciate it, and we’re so excited to be back!

Corinne, Kayla, and Kody

See You In September!

Hi everyone!

Well, July has officially come to an end, and with it, the blog’s daily post schedule. Even though we’ve decided to continue Disability in Kidlit indefinitely, it still feels like we’re wrapping something up, like we’ve come to an end of sorts–and let me tell you, it feels fantastic. We’re so thrilled with how this event has gone. The types of posts we’ve featured, the reactions we’ve gotten, the places people have linked to the blog… We couldn’t be happier, and we wanted to thank all of you for following along this month.

Most of all, we want to thank the contributors who made all of this possible. Without their insight, thoughtfulness, criticism, enthusiasm, and occasional delightful snark, this event wouldn’t have been half as fantastic as it’s been. From the bottom of our hearts: THANK YOU.

So, now what?

First of all, this blog will go on hiatus. We’ll feature no new content during August, except perhaps for a housekeeping post or two. Our Tumblr and Twitter accounts will follow suit; we’ll still reblog and retweet, but it’s no longer a priority.

We’ll return in September, this time on a weekly schedule. New posts will go live each Friday. We’ll feature the same kind of content we have so far, with perhaps an extra feature or two that we’re still hashing out.

In the meantime, here’s what you can do:

* Consider contributing! We have a couple of people lined up already, but we’re still welcoming more. We’re open to contributors with all sorts of disabilities, and we welcome all sorts of posts and reviews (details in the link).

* We’d particularly like to put out a call for contributors of color and those belonging to other marginalized groups. We want to represent the full spectrum of disability, and that includes people who belong to various other minorities, and–should our contributors be interested in writing about this topic–a look at how these identities intersect with their disability.

* We’re also open to ideas/suggestions for topics from any of our readers.

* If you’ve joined us late, consider looking through our archives! You can use our tag system, or look at posts sorted by category, such as our discussion posts, our various reviews, and, of course, our articles.

* Take a look at our book list on Goodreads. We welcome suggestions and additional information, and we’d love you if you could spread the word.

* If you’re an author with a major publisher who’s written a prominent disabled character and you want to offer us a review copy, e-mail us! We’ll do our best to find a suitable reviewer.

Again, thank you so much for checking us out, and we hope to see you again in September!

All the best,

Corinne, Kayla, and Kody

Disability in Kidlit Lives On!

As you know, Disability in Kidlit was conceived as a one-month blog event, intended to be a resource for the kidlit community to learn more about disability and encourage more and accurate portrayals in MG/YA fiction. We’ve had an overwhelmingly positive response, and we want to thank everyone who has joined us this month. Because of this response and what we feel is a hunger for more content, we’re thrilled to announce:

Disability in Kidlit will live on!

We have decided to continue Disability in Kidlit as an ongoing blog rather than a one-time event. We will still feature the same types of content (articles about disability and reviews of MG/YA books), and we’re hoping to bring some exciting new content as well!

We have also created a Goodreads account which will allow us to do two things: 1) crosspost reviews that appear on the blog, and 2) provide a comprehensive, up-to-date list of MG/YA novels featuring characters with disabilities. We can’t vouch for these books–we haven’t read most of them ourselves–but we hope this will help connect readers with the books they want. You can find more info about our Goodreads account on our new Book List page, including the ways we’d love for you to help us curate our bookshelves.

This month couldn’t have happened without all the work from our contributors, and that will continue to be the case. We are actively seeking posts from both current and new contributors! If you’re interested in being a contributor, please see our brand-new, shiny guidelines.

We’ll be taking the month of August to prepare and will re-launch in September! Posts will appear weekly rather than daily to ensure a steady stream of posts and the moderators’ relative calm of mind. We couldn’t be more excited for the chance to continue. We’re so thrilled that you all share our passion and hope you’ll be back with us come September!

Thanks for everything!

Kody Keplinger, Corinne Duyvis, and our fabulous newest addition to the mod team, Kayla Whaley