Page Created: 09/25/10. Last Updated: 10/27/10. Last Google Group Page Update: 01/24/08.
BRUCE COVILLE
Selected list of novels
The Foolish Giant
My Teacher Is an Alien
Sarah's Unicorn
Selected series
The A.I. Gang (3 books)
Magic Shop Books (5 books)
Moongobbler and Me (4 books)
My Teacher Is an Alien (4 books)
Nina Tanleven (3 books)
Rod Albright's Alien Adventures (4 books)
Shakespeare Retellings (6 books)
The Unicorn Chronicles (2 Books)
The author's official home page is: http://www.brucecoville.com/home.asp.
MEETING SUMMARY:
Meeting Date: September 14, 1991.
Meeting Site: Saddle River Valley Cultural Center, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey.
Official Attendance: 24.
Meeting Program: Talk by childrens' / young adult author.
Notes:
Meeting Memories:
Newsletter Account:
The following account is reprinted with permission from THE STARSHIP EXPRESS Copyright 1991 Philip J De Parto:
Bruce Coville, author of over thirty children's and young adult's books, was the featured speaker at the September 14, 1991 meeting of the Science Fiction Association of Bergen County. The meeting was held at the Cultural Center in Upper Saddle River, New Jersey.
Mr Coville is best known at the author of MY TEACHER IS AN ALIEN and three sequels (the third as yet unpublished) released through the Minstral imprint of Pocket Books. The series was based on an idea by packager Byron Preiss and has been a smash hit ever since the release of the first book in 1989.
The author is an experienced storyteller. He appears at about 60 schools each year. He told two stories--one about a clumsy, well-meaning giant, the other about a man who receives a special gift from an angel--as well as part of a story in progress, STAR BRAT.
Unlike a number of authors who dabble a bit in the young people's market, but who consider themselves as basically serious, adult writers, Mr Coville knew that he wanted to write for the young since grade school. He got his start when his girlfriend, later wife, Katherine, drew a picture and challenged Bruce to tell the story of this character. He did. The book became THE FOOLISH GIANT.
Mr Coville considers SARAH'S UNICORN to be his best book. Like THE FOOLISH GIANT, SARAH'S UNICORN is a picture book co-authored, and with illustrations, by Katherine. He finds these books relatively easy to write in first draft form, but has done as many as 50 re-writes to polish the material.
As usual, much of our guest's time was spent answering questions from the audience. One interesting bit of information came up during the drive to the meeting. Unlike many Y/A writers whose books appear first as hardcovers, Bruce Coville's yarns are published as inexpensive paperbacks. This means that he is usually able to bypass the screening process of librarians, teachers, and parents and appeal instead to his audience directly.
In other news, newcomers Richard Franke and Andrew Thorpe discovered us through Pat Nash's newspaper press releases. Phil Beraster is a friend of Beth Grout. Paul Dellechiaie, Roy Greenburg, and Chris Nash won doorprize books. Phil De Parto read a section from Ryder Stacy's DOOMSDAY WARRIOR # 19: AMERICA'S FINEST DEFENSE which features the La Barre Anti Gravity Drive invented by James and John La Barre of Westchester County. An upcoming raffle was announced. Judy and Charles (Gehm) were kind enough to drop Mr Coville off in Manhattan, thus allowing Philip De Parto to join Philip, Warren, Mary Ann, Paul, Dennis, Beth, Dennis, Kathleen, Joan, Joel and Chris at the Horizon Diner afterwards.