Costume ideas for that book lover in you

Need some last minute costume ideas for Halloween (or any time, really)? In honor of their upcoming auditions for The Enchanted Bookshop, Encore Stage & Studio in Alexandria, VA offers some literary suggestions from their theatrical past.

Me? I'll be going as one of my favorite literary characters.

Reading for dollars (and much much more!)

Schools and theater companies across the country have gotten creative using The Enchanted Bookshop to encourage kids to read. And now our neighbor to the north is getting in on the act.

Eleanor Drury Children's Theatre of Thunder Bay, Ontario is launching a read-a-thon for students in this vibrant city on the shores of Lake Superior. From October 22 to November 16, participants are asked to log all books they read on this online form, and at the end of the contest, the most active readers will win up $50 cash (that'll buy a lot of books!) and four tickets to the show.

I'm especially glad that they're using this contest to shine a light on local authors. I used to be heavily involved with the Colorado children's book writer community and I know that a lot of those authors struggled to get the word out about their books, books that were just as compelling, entertaining and just plain fun as any title on the bestseller list.

The best part about this contest? Everybody wins. Even those who don't take home the big prize will discover books they wouldn't have known about otherwise. And that's worth more than any $50 check.

Good luck, everybody! And if you need some reading suggestions, check out these books favored by the actors in the show:

Show Me State Bookshop shows how it's done

I just came across this performance of The Enchanted Bookshop by South Valley Middle School in Liberty, MO. I've posted several recordings of this play over the last year, but I wanted to make a special mention of this one because the cast does an especially good job bringing out the humor in the script.

You've got to go big with these characters, and these kids do. The result? Some of the biggest laughs I've heard for this show.

Nice job, everybody!

The Enchanted Bookshop sings!

Growing up in the small town of Beaver Dam, Wisconsin, I didn't get much of a chance to see Broadway shows or national touring productions. But the town did have a movie theater, and three times a year, the manager closed the curtain over the screen, removed the first few rows of seats and built out the stage so that the local community theater could put on a show.

The community theater produced a ton of plays over the years, but it was the musicals I loved the most. Fiddler on the Roof. Mame. Camelot. They were all so big and full of life. And I remember thinking, even then, that those shows were better than anything I'd seen on that movie screen behind them.

Which is all just a roundabout way of telling you how excited I am that Pioneer Drama Service has decided to turn The Enchanted Bookshop into a musical.

I've always wanted to write a musical. There's just one small problem. I don't know the first thing about writing music.

But Stephen Murray does. He's the Massachusetts composer who Pioneer paired me up with. Stephen has decades of experience writing musicals, and his songs have a fun, bouncy quality that make them perfect for the school market. I can't wait to see what he comes up with for The Enchanted Bookshop.

No word yet on when the musical will be released, but Stephen is working on the score as we speak so I expect it'll come out in 2019, probably in time for the new school year. Of course, when it does come out, you'll hear it here first, so keep coming back!