It's TAKE IT FROM THE TOP month! 🎭

A few kinda-sorta-fun facts from your exhausted author friend.

I posted on Instagram the other day that I felt like burnt toast, and I wasn’t lying.

I’m weary in heart and spirit. I finally got the first draft of my next novel for adults turned in (yay!), and I basically took to bed like a Victorian woman with “hysteria”. I pampered myself with TV¹, read a lot of books, and ate entire bags of jalapeño chips. This lasted approximately a day and a half before the rest of my real-world responsibilities called out to me. These are the moments when I get snarly about childless New York Times bestsellers with housekeepers, and I constantly need to remind myself that the barriers in my life improve my creativity. I’m a better writer because I’m a mother. I’m a better writer because I have less time. I’m a better writer because I have real-world concerns, from elections to broken dishwashers to difficult family relationships to snot-nosed children who can’t quite reach the tissues. I truly believe these things; I just frequently need the reminder.

I’m excited to turn the corner into November—my second book of the year is coming out, and I really am over the moon excited to share this story with you.

Usually, I have lots of launch events planned for my books. This time around I don’t. It isn’t because I don’t want to celebrate or because I don’t think Take it From the Top is worth the fanfare. It really is because I’m bone-tired. The kind of tired that just isn’t fit for large group events besides ones I’ve already committed to. Perhaps I’ll do events for it in the spring, or events for my two (!!!) books coming out next year. But for this one, I’m happy to have a simpler release. My big launch day plans involve taking myself to breakfast and not cleaning my kitchen after dinner before I become a deer widow the rest of the week (Wisconsin—IYKYK.)

Take It From the Top is, at its heart, about the joy of friendship in all of its chaos and complexity. My friends have been rock stop me over these past few years, and to feel so seen, loved, and understood is a gift I don't take for granted. I think a lot of the preteen and teen years are about learning what friendship is. What do we owe each other? How do we disagree? How do we understand one another’s perspectives, and how do we care for one another when our needs might be at complete odds? I need you to see me. Will you? Do you? These are the questions 13-year-olds might have a difficult time articulating but are certainly feeling.

Time is running out to preorder Take It From the Top, out 11/19—it would mean so much to me if you gave Eowyn + Jules’ story a chance. If you’re a library reader instead, no worries—I am, too! (I love how the receipts tell you how much money you’ve saved over the year. It kind of makes me feel like I should take a very outlandish trip somewhere.) Give your library a ring + ask if they’d be willing to stock Take It From the Top. Most libraries take patron requests!

The book was also included in the Children’s Book Council’s Hot off the Press November Reading List.

Five kinda-sorta-fun facts about Take It From the Top:

• The main character’s name is Eowyn, after one of my all-time favorite literary characters. Eowyn is a brave, bold, brash woman in Lord of the Rings who feels stifled by her gender role but ends up embracing the beauty of the balance in who she is and what she was made for².

• I grew up performing in musicals and have always wanted to write a novel about children’s theater. Much of my childhood was shaped by reading books with a flashlight backstage, rubbing blush onto my cheeks, and turning down slumber party invitations due to my show schedule.

• I wrote almost the entire story at Roots Cafe and Coffee Bar in Oconomowoc, WI.

• When I started writing the book, I had no idea that its release would coincide with the release of the Wicked movie. It really was a happy accident. I was brainstorming which musicals I knew well that featured two female leads, and the threads between the two stories align so beautifully. I told my husband that what I really want to do to celebrate this book is go see Wicked in theaters, and for him to find the babysitter and buy the tickets—ha.

• This was by far the most difficult writing experience I’ve ever had, which leads to one of the proudest feelings I’ve ever felt leading up to a book’s publication. I did it. I made this for you. 📚

Set at a camp over the course of six summers, this novel dives into the falling-out of two girls from different backgrounds who thought they'd be friends forever. Claire Swinarski, Edgar Award nominee of the ALA Notable What Happened to Rachel Riley?, tackles privilege, perspective, and the power of friendship in this page-turning puzzle that readers will devour.

Eowyn Becker has waited all year to attend her sixth summer at Lamplighter Lake Summer Camp. Here, she’s not in the shadow of her Broadway-star older brother; she’s a stellar performer in her own right. Here, the pain of her mom’s death can’t reach her, and she gets to reunite with her best friend, Jules Marrigan—the only person in the world who understands her.

But when she gets to camp, everything seems wrong. The best-friend reunion Eowyn had been dreaming of doesn’t go as planned. Jules will barely even look at Eowyn, let alone talk to her, and Eowyn has no idea why.

Well, maybe she does…

There are two sides to every story, and if you want to understand this one, you’ll need to hear both. Told in a series of alternating chapters that dip back to past summers, the girls’ story will soon reveal how Eowyn and Jules went from being best friends to fierce foils. Can they mend ways before the curtains close on what was supposed to be the best summer of their lives?

Will you be at the Wisconsin Library Association Conference?

I will—to accept an award, whee! But I’ll also be speaking. If you’ll be there, come see me talk about hope in middle grade fiction at 4:00 on Thursday, November 7 in Grand Ballroom F.

And lastly, a book I’ve loved lately for…

Kids: We’ve had a really great month of picture book read alouds. I always love Brambly Hedge this time of year, but we’ve also been reaching for Fletcher and the Falling Leaves by Julia Rawlinson. It’s a very sweet book about a fox who’s learning about the changing seasons. Three Pebbles and a Song by Eileen Spinelli is delightful, too. My husband accuses me of always favoring picture books that star mice³—and he’s 100% correct.

Middle graders: My son and I read Wonder by RJ Palacio together. I’ve read this story of a boy with a facial difference’s integration into a regular school many times, but it really is—pardon the pun—a wonder. Such a great conversation starter about disabilities, looking for the lonely person, courage, and kindness.

Adults: The Haunting of Moscow House by Oleysa Gilmore was fantastic. I’m a sucker for Russian historical fiction, and it had the perfect amount of spookiness. Two sisters, a haunted ancestral home, a mysterious ghost—10/10 autumn vibes.

Thanks for reading along!

-Claire-

1. Under the Banner of Heaven on Hulu—yikes. Terrifying. I watched it in three days. I also really need to discuss that disappointing Only Murders in the Building finale.

2. These facts are inspired by the fantastic Laurie Morrison, btw!

3. Ironic, because I am DEATHLY AFRAID of rodents. We had mice at our old house and I started sobbing when I saw one, racing upstairs and blocking off the basement with a barrier as if the thing could open the door. We literally hired a service to set the traps and deal with it because we were too scared (me) and grossed out (my husband), and then the same service came quarterly to check for mice. That is my level of insanity. I am who I am.