Exactly

When I was taking courses for my teaching program we talked about desktop publishing and all the cool projects you could do with kids. We would make books for fundraising purposes or simply because it's very esteem-building for a child to see her work properly formatted in a publication.

And then there's Exactly.

"The fifty-six children's tales in this anthology were written by students at Raoul Wallenberg Traditional High School in San Francisco. Each author crafted an original story or fable designed to provide entertainment and life lessons to the next generation. The stories have been vividly illustrated by professional artists - in full color ..."

Who is 826 Valencia and how did they come about? Find out here. OK sign me up. I know she's only four so that gives us a few years to prepare. In addition to San Francisco there are chapters in NYC, Los Angeles, Michigan, Seattle, and Chicago.

Speaking of San Francisco, two of my most favorite books are Daughter of Fortune and Portrait in Sepia by Isabel Allende. I saw a link over at Writing Time to a video of Allende speaking about writing, passion, stories and feminism. She's marvelous and funny- note the part about Sophia Loren, but she's also politically savvy and passionate about empowering women worldwide.