Lauren Bradford, a 10-year-old student at Gulf Shores Elementary School, has won a $10,000 savings bond in the 10th annual HOAR Construction/Go Daddy.com Bowl Reading and Writing Program, thanks in part to an essay on A Yellow Watermelon by Ted Dunagan, published by NewSouth Books.

The Mobile Press-Register reports that Miss Bradford submitted a book report in the initial phase of the competition on A Yellow Watermelon after the author visited her school. She won an autographed copy by asking the so-called “Secret Question.” A seasoned presenter to school children, Mr. Dunagan always includes as part of his presentation an announcement to the students that whoever asks a question he has previously sealed in an envelope will win a free autographed copy of his first book.

Says Dunagan, “the secret question generates a lot of curiosity and a good bit of excitement among kids.” Winning the book in this way convinced Lisa Bradford that A Yellow Watermelon was a “lucky” book for her.

For the final competition resulting in the $10,000 prize, all the students read The Pig Man by Paul Zindel. In order to reach the final stage of the competition, Miss Bradford had to compete against some 10,000 students from the state of Alabama, so her essay on A Yellow Watermelon proved lucky indeed in moving her ahead to the finalist stage.

Ted Dunagan’s next book, Trouble on the Tombigbee, will be published by NewSouth Books mid-summer.

A Yellow Watermelon is available from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com or your favorite retail or online bookseller.

NewSouth Books is pleased to announce that Ted Dunagan’s novel A Yellow Watermelon has been named one of the 25 Books Every Young Georgian Should Read.

The Georgia Center for the Book compiled this inaugural list of titles for young readers; they have produced a list of 25 Books Every Georgian Should Read since 2002.

The names of the young adult titles were revealed at a private party on August 26 at the Parkers on Ponce restaurant in Decatur, Georgia. A public announcement to be followed by a book signing will take place Saturday, August 28 in Decatur’s Historic Square from 10:00 am to noon.

“The goal of the Georgia Center For The Book is most laudable,” said Dunagan, “and I’m honored that my work is part of their initial offering.”

William Starr, director of the Georgia Center for the Books, noted that “this new list was created to help recognize some of Georgia’s outstanding authors of books for young readers, and to serve as a way of connecting those writers with readers all over the state, and beyond. Ted Dunagan’s book A Yellow Watermelon is an obvious choice for the list because it carries a strong, compelling moral message and conveys it with a wonderful storyteller’s artistry.”

In the best Southern literary tradition, A Yellow Watermelon explores poverty and racial segregation through the eyes of an innocent boy. In rural south Alabama in 1948, whites picked on one side of the cotton field and blacks on the other. Where the fields meet, twelve-year-old Ted meets Poudlum, a black boy his own age, who teaches him how to endure the hard work while they bond and go on to integrate the field. The white boy and the black boy encounter danger and intrigue while executing a plan to save Poudlum’s family from a corrupt businessman, and discover a great, yet simple, secret of enlightenment.

A Yellow Watermelon has been compared to the works of Mark Twain and Harper Lee. Kirkus Reviews called it “a memorable, generous-hearted tale.” Ted Dunagan was named Georgia Author of the Year in the young adult category for Yellow Watermelon. NewSouth’s Junebug Books imprint recently published the sequel, Secret of the Satilfa.

Ted Dunagan has traveled across the South speaking to book lovers of all ages about the writing process and the themes of his novels. He says his visits to Southern schools and libraries will be even more meaningful now that he knows he’s speaking about a book which has been so strongly recommended for young readers.

A Yellow Watermelon and Secret of the Satilfa are available from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com or your favorite retail or online bookseller.

Ted Dunagan is no stranger to fan mail. But the students of Gatewood School surprised the author of A Yellow Watermelon, winner of the 2009 Georgia Author of the Year in the young adult category, with not five or ten but a whopping 70 letters of thanks for the presentation he recently gave at the school.

Ted read from his award-winning book and talked about the proces of becoming a published author. He shared stories of his own childhood in the rural South of the 1940s, episodes of which form the basis of his semi-autobiographical novels.

Ted Dunagan poses with students from Gatewood School

The school’s Gator Tales Newsletter enthused, “In an inspiring and candid discussion, he encouraged the students to overcome their adversities and live up to their potential. Mr. Dunagan’s advice to students who aspire to become writers was to read daily, to read all genres of books, and to set personal goals for themselves.”

Ted savored his time with the “awesome” kids. Clearly the students also enjoyed the visit, as one of the letters reveals:

Dear Mr. D,

Thank you for coming to my school. It was real fun. I was thinking of the secret question but you did not call on me. Also, thank you for giving me your signature. Now you have mine.

Charlie Ruhl

A Yellow Watermelon is available from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com, or your favorite retail or online bookseller.

There are two things Georgia Author of the Year award-winner Ted Dunagan enjoys almost as much as writing. The first is presenting about his book, A Yellow Watermelon, to an interested audience, especially school children. The second is Southern cooking, especially when the menu includes corn bread and collard greens. He got a big helping of both on his recent visit to Savannah, Georgia, in connection with the Savannah Children’s Book Festival.

The Georgia Center for the Book invited Ted to participate as a special guest at the festival and to speak at area schools. Ted Dunagan recalled his trip with delight in a recent column for The Monticello News. Ted particularly enjoyed meeting with the students at Coastal Middle School, where some 200 youngsters had read his novel A Yellow Watermelon and were eager to hear from the author. Ted engaged his audience with a discussion about the writing process, his inspirations as a writer, the underlying history of his book, and what it was like to grow up in the rural south in the 1940s. A lively question-and-answer session followed.

At the festival, Ted held forth in the Georgia Center for the Book’s tent with two hour-long presentations. The best part, Ted wrote in his column, “was when several kids from the schools I visited showed up with their parents to get their signed copy of the book.” The perfect ending to a satisfying trip was a meal at Paula Deen’s The Lady and Sons restaurant. Ted looks forward to another enjoyable visit to Savannah next year.

A Yellow Watermelon is available from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com, or your favorite retail or online book seller.

Ted Dunagan received the Georgia Author of the Year award in the Young Adult category for his debut novel, A Yellow Watermelon, in a ceremony held June 13 at the KSU Center in Kennesaw, Georgia.

The Georgia Author of the Year Award is the oldest literary competition in the southeast. Submissions are evaluated for their narrative quality, creativity, enduring message and ability to evoke emotion. Katherine Mason, Assistant Professor of English Education at Kennesaw State University and lead judge of the Young Adult category said, “A Yellow Watermelon reveals the power of friendship and loyalty to overcome racial and economic prejudice in 1940s South Alabama. Told from twelve-year-old Ted Dillon’s point of view, the story is suspenseful and captivating, with authentic dialogue and engaging sentence variety.”

The Author of the Year award is sponsored by the Georgia Writers Association. See coverage of the winners at the association website. Ted’s hometown newpaper The Monticello News offers coverage as well.

A Yellow Watermelon is available from NewSouth Books, Amazon, or your favorite local or online book retailer.

Walk into Annell Gordon’s middle school reading classroom, and this is what you will probably hear: “I want a book that’s fun!” or “What can I read now?” According to Ms. Gordon, students are constantly on the prowl for good reading material. Ted Dunagan’s novel A Yellow Watermelon, recently added as a listing by Renaissance Learning as an Accelerated Reader book, will fit the bill for any avid young booklovers, she says.

Students at Wilson Hall Middle School in Grove Hill, Alabama have been involved with the Accelerated Reading Program since kindergarten. It is a program that makes success in reading easy. Students select books that match their reading levels, read them at their own pace, and then take a quiz developed by Accelerated Reader. The quiz serves as a motivational device when coupled with concrete incentives (taking the form of prizes) for younger readers and with reading grades for elementary and middle schoolers. These quizzes monitor and provide for teachers and students immediate feedback regarding reading performance and vocabulary growth.

“What a delicious option A Yellow Watermelon presents for book-hungry students! They will savor the adventure, mystery, and the lessons learned by Poudlum and Ted in a coming-of-age story that is set in their own back yards,” says Ms. Gordon.

Ted Dunagan writes about his book being accepted by Accelerated Reader, the sequel to A Yellow Watermelon to be published by NewSouth Books, his nomination as Georgia Author of the Year in the young adult category, and about a special moment of recognition by two students, in his weekly newspaper column. Read why Ted is “fixing to float all the way home” here.

A Yellow Watermelon is available from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com, or your favorite local or online book retailer.

Eighth grade students at Wilson Hall Middle School were asked if they preferred the young adult novel A Yellow Watermelon by Ted Dunagan, read by the class in October, or To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, which students recently finished reading. Many students chose A Yellow Watermelon, citing its simplicity and the fact that it is set in their own backyard. According to an article in The Clarke County Democrat, “Some liked Dunagan’s book because it was easier to read and it was about our own Clarke County.” Dunagan visited Wilson Hall School in October, when students read A Yellow Watermelon and heard from the author a personal account of growing up in Clarke County during the 1940s.

A Yellow Watermelon is available from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com, or your favorite local or online book retailer.

Ted Dunagan continues his successful book tour across the South, with engagements taking him to South Carolina, southern Alabama, and throughout Georgia. Ted speaks at schools and libraries about his highly praised debut novel A Yellow Watermelon and about the writing process.

Darlington School Dean of Students Ken Wempe of Rome, Georgia, notes: “In discussing his book A Yellow Watermelon, Ted Dunagan brings with him all the flavor and juice–as well as a few seeds of wisdom–that you would expect from an authentic Southern writer. Dunagan, in a direct, twangy drawl, offers his experiences on the craft of writing, the process of publishing, and even reveals some of the secrets from his semi-autobiographical novel. Both A Yellow Watermelon and Mr. Dunagan himself are treats worth celebrating.”

Darlington School made A Yellow Watermelon required reading for their students, as have a number of schools across the region. The Grove Hill, Alabama, Arts Council designated the book as Clarke County’s “community read” for fall 2008.

A Yellow Watermelon, is available from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com, or your favorite local and online book retailers.

NewSouth Books’ Junebug Books imprint recently published two new titles by Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) members: In the Company of Owls by Peter Huggins, and Space by Roger Reid. These books join Reid’s 2005 title Longleaf and A Yellow Watermelon by Ted Dunagan as the latest works by Southern SCBWI chapter Southern Breeze authors to be released from NewSouth.

In the Company of Owls tells an exciting story of courage and the triumph of family loyalty in the face of danger. After Aaron Cash and his father discover their neighbor Morgan Blackburn’s illegal still, Blackburn resorts to increasingly violent acts to force the Cash family to sell their land. Aaron must ultimately use his wits–and his BB gun–to defend his family, an act that leaves both Aaron and the reader to consider its many implications. Of In the Company of Owls, poet Tony Crunk writes, “[Aaron’s] story, and Huggins’s graceful telling of it, sneak up as quietly as a spring shower, but startle as fiercely as a copperhead strike.”

In Space, fourteen-year-old Jason is recruited by his cantankerous friend Stephen to help find which of a group of gathered scientists killed Stephen’s father. Adding to the suspense is a mysterious Man in a Red Flannel Shirt who keeps appearing wherever Jason happens to be. In the climactic scene, Jason uses his scientific knowledge to escape a pursuing gunman in the woods surrounding the real-life Conrad Swanson Observatory. Graham Salisbury says of Space, “Another Roger Reid winner for young mystery lovers. Space is packed with fascinating science, action, compelling story questions, and an ending that rockets off the page. Loved it!”

Southern Breeze named author Ted Dunagan’s A Yellow Watermelon, published earlier this year, a “Soaring Success.” In the best Southern literary tradition, A Yellow Watermelon explores poverty and racial segregation through the eyes of an innocent boy; Ted Dillon wanders through the cotton fields, streams, churches, whiskey stills and his own heart and mind as he struggles with the hypocrisy and wonders of his small world, amid the lingering effects of the Great Depression. Yet with beguiling prose and an ear for the way people speak, the author brings to life a story so engaging and heartfelt that it will resonate with young and old. Kirkus Reviews calls A Yellow Watermelon “a memorable, generous-hearted tale.”

NewSouth Books is a general trade publisher based in Montgomery, Alabama, with a growing list of fine literary fiction–for adults and young adults–and non-fiction.

NewSouth author Ted Dunagan enjoyed a visit with students from Darlington Middle School for the school’s second annual author visit day on August 22. Students read Ted’s debut novel A Yellow Watermelon for their required summer reading. Set in 1948, the young adult novel A Yellow Watermelon explores poverty and racial segregation through the eyes of two young boys, one black and one white, who bond while working in the cotton fields and go on to free their town from a corrupt businessman.

Ted discussed the themes of his book with the students and talked about the writing process. After his presentation, Ted and the students enjoyed watermelon and moon pies, foods featured in the book.

“We selected A Yellow Watermelon because it is a new book by a new author,” said Ken Wempe, dean of students and English teacher. “Published this year, this coming-of-age story is both compelling and wonderfully written in a simple, subtle style. Dunagan used his novel as a jumping off point to discuss its themes and the writing process.”

A Yellow Watermelon is available for order from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com or your favorite local or online book retailer.