Robert F. Sibert Honoree Colleen Paeff starts every book with a sense of wonder for her subject. Whether exploring the intersection of pollution and infrastructure, as in THE GREAT STINK: HOW JOSEPH BAZALGETTE SOLVED LONDON’S POOP POLLUTION PROBLEM (2021), or delving into the science of synchronous fireflies, as in the forthcoming FIREFLY SONG: LYNN FRIERSON FAUST AND THE GREAT SMOKY MOUNTAIN DISCOVERY (2025), Colleen aims to provide readers with equal doses of information and awe. Learn more about her books and her author presentations for young readers at www.colleenpaeff.com.
In celebration of the third anniversary of her award-winning book, The Great Stink: How Joseph Bazalgette Solved London's Poop Pollution Problem, Colleen is offering picture book critiques to anyone who buys two copies of her book from her local indie bookstore (until they sell all their stock). "Look for details in my next newsletter!" Subscribe via her website below:
Wow, what a treasure trove of info in this session as well as Colleen's handout! Though the focus of this session was nonfiction research, I can't help but think that many of these tools would be super-useful for illustrators (especially reference material) and fiction writers as well.
For each tool, she explained why and how she uses it in her research process, with plenty of how-to screenshots and examples. I definitely plan to watch the replay of this session so I can pause at certain sections, take notes, try things out, etc. Here are some she discussed:
The Library ExtensionFree library catalog search tool that automatically shows if a book you're viewing on Amazon and other retail sites is available at your local library. Over 5,000 libraries are supported!
Scan Text into Notes Free. Uses OCR technology (Optical Character Recognition) to turn written text from an analog source into searchable, editable text.
Kindle AppFree. Using Readwise with the Kindle sends highlights to your preferred note-taking app (Colleen uses Obsidian). Colleen then breaks up these highlights into separate notes and adds tags to help keep her research organized.
ReadwiseCost: USD $129/year. Readwise enables you to create highlights fro a wide variety of online sources and store them in your note-taking app.
Otter.aiCost: Free (with limitations); USD $30/month; $100/year. Voice to text transcription tool that uses AI to quickly transcribe lectures, dictation, audio files, and meetings (virtual or face-to-face).
ReaderCost: A Readwise subscription. A "read later" app like Pocket or Instapaper.
ObsidianCost: Free or USD $4/month to sync across devices. Bare bones but powerful note-taking app that lets users connect ideas from a variety of sources and allows you to organize them, creating links and tags. (Note from Debbie: I love Obsidian, too! I use it for my picture book project notes as well as other book projects.)
After telling us about even more methods and tools and knowledge management rabbit holes to check out, Colleen reminds us that there is no ONE right method, and each creator needs to find what works for them. In the end, none of these tools are necessary to write a book.
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