Saturday, September 13, 2008

State of Wilderness

I read a really cool book last night called State of Wilderness, written by Elysabeth Eldering and illustrated by Aidana WillowRaven. It's written for kids ages 9-12 years, but as an adult, I got a lot out of it. It's part of a series and there are going to be 50 books in the entire set. The books are really cool because they're based on characters who play a hand held geography game. You follow along as the game gives them clues about the state. The clues start off hard and get easier as they go along. By the end of the game, you have to guess what state the book is about. Even though the book is for kids, I really enjoyed it and learned a lot about the state it was about. I love trivia books, so this was right up my alley. In fact, one of the last books I bought was called Yellowstone Trivia with all sorts of fun facts about the park. Elysabeth's book is like that, but written as a story, making it fun for younger kids. If you and your kids love learning fun facts about the states, this is a great book. You can buy the book directly from the publisher by clicking here. I think the series would be an excellent choice for schools and homeschools. I'm looking forward to the second book.

9 comments:

  1. Thank you so much for those wonderful words. I'll keep you posted as to when the second one comes out. Hope your kids enjoy them as well. See you in the postings - E :)

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  2. Thanks for promoting State of Wilderness, Rena. It helps when readers share with others.

    One problem, the only link I saw "above" was for the Yellowstone trivia book. Did I miss something.

    Vivian

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  3. Hi Vivian -- the original link was where it said State of Wilderness. I added it a second place too, to avoid any confusion.

    Fun book! I'm planning on reading it to the boys eventually. I'd like to post something about it on the mailing system for our local homeschool group too, as I think a lot of homeschoolers would enjoy this sort of thing.

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  4. LOL -- no problem. It was right up there on the first line, so it's easy to overlook. I just sent the link to everyone in our local homeschool group too, since I think many homeschoolers would love the series too. I really enjoyed it!

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  5. Rena,

    Please all the promotion you can do would be great. State of Quarries is the second one and like I said before, it is almost finished - hoping after knocking out my work this weekend to get back on it and finished (have less than 10, but I'm thinking less than 7 or 5 clues to add into the story and some storyline around the clues). I'll keep you posted as to when everything is ready - E :)

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  6. Elysabeth -- No problem! As I learned more about your book, I was curious if it was something we, as homeschoolers could use. I definitely think that's the case. Nathan is 8, but reads very well and is getting into chapter books now. I know he could read this book on his own. I'm thinking I might read it to both boys sometime during the school year because I think it would be an awesome way for them to get to know the state. And I absolutely can't wait to see the one for Montana, so I'll be anxiously awaiting that one too!

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  7. I don't remember how far down Montana is. I've got my list and it is shifting slightly since I just got a big order (an email asking me for 10 copies, meeting tomorrow to do the exchange - books and money) and I have feeling that this is for teachers who will be using them in the school systems. So needless to say, I think to justify that, I need to move one state up and shift the rest down one. The first five are pretty set and if I have enough interest in a state from schools and homeschoolers, I defintely don't mind shifting states since I don't really have an "order" to them being written (meaning they are not being written in alphabetical order or admission to the union order or any other order that would be logical. What I did was email all the state travel and tourism departments explaining my series to them and the ones that sent me merchandise to go with the books were the order chosen to be written (in order of receiving merchandise) and then I had a list of fun facts in an email that my husband's stepmother had sent out and I sent that list minus the first eight that had sent items out to several of my friends and asked them to just pick four states off the list and then I gathered their choices and went by their first, second, third and fourth choices to put the states in the order to write them - so no logical order for them to appear).

    Anyway, I can't wait to get to back to writing my states and hopefully I can get ahead of the game here and have several states written by the end of the year and keep moving forward. No guarantee they will be published any sooner than the planned one every three months but we will just have to see. See you in the postings - E :)

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  8. Sounds like a great concept for a book.

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