Gordan Korman Takes Summer Challenge

Live webcast Friday kicks off new world record attempt

Author Gordan Korman joins Lisa Yee, R.L. Stine, and Christopher Paul Curtis Friday for a live webcast from Scholastic Headquarters in New York City. These prolific and award-winning children's authors will help kick off Scholastic's 2010 Summer Challenge: an attempt to break the 2009 record of more than 35 million minutes of summer reading!

Featuring a live reading game show with host Jon Scieszka, the webcast will begin at 1 p.m. Eastern Time. You can register at the Summer Challenge website.

Korman recently talked to this Scholastic Kid Reporter about one of his most recent books, Zoobreak. The author lives in Great Neck, New York, on Long Island with his wife and three children. He has written such favorite books as the Dive, Everest, and Island series, as well as non-series titles such as Pop, Schooled, and The Juvie Three.

He is also one of the authors of The 39 Clues series. His most recent, Book 8: The Emperor's Code, was released in April.

A third book in the series that begins with Swindled and Zoobreak, called Framed, will be released this fall.

In 2011, the first of a new series entitled Titanic, about kids who traveled on the infamous ship, will be released.

So how does Korman produce so many creative stories so quickly? He works at it with research, dedication, and one cardinal rule.

"I don't want the books to be predictable," Korman said. Which is why he gave, Ben, one of the characters in Zoobreak, narcolepsy. The disease causes Ben to fall asleep without warning.  

Korman is also funny.

"In Zoobreak, the humor is more based on animal behavior," Gordon Korman said. In the book, he draws on a variety of interesting facts about animals, from monkeys to pigs and bats to alligators. "I do a lot of research for my books."

Part of that research is talking with a friend of his who works as a zookeeper at Disney. She helped him to learn about the animals for Zoobreak.

You can learn more about Korman and the other authors by tuning in on Friday. You can also register for the Scholastic Summer Challenge and log in your summer reading minutes to help break the 2009 world record!

And be sure to check out Kid Reporter Susan Hepburn's review of Zoobreak!

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