Ready to write? Are you hungry for writing fun?

Hungry like the wolf? By the way, have you ever been so hungry you wolfed down your dinner?
(Woah ... hold on. In that first question I used wolf as a noun. In the second question I used wolf as a verb.)

Is that right? Can I do that? Sure I can.
Do you know why? I just did, and so can you.

Click "read more" to find out how to pump some animal instinct into your writing.  

Today, June 12, is Anne Frank's birthday. She was born on this day in 1929 and is world renown for her diary (Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl) which recounts her experiences during the Holocaust. In 1933, the Frank family fled to Amsterdam, where they hid from the Nazis until they were sent to a concentration camp. It was there in 1944 that Anne died from typhus.

I've been thinking about Anne Frank a lot lately, particularly while reading Markus Zusak's The Book Thief , a novel about the experiences of a 12-year old girl in Germany during the Holocaust. The main character of The Book Thief, Liesel, also turns to books and words to give her solace during the difficult times of war. The two books deserve to be on the same bookshelf and would make for a moving and fascinating side-by-side read.

I had forgotten this, but Anne actually received her diary from her parents on this day on her 13th birthday - June 12, 1942. Afterwards, she described the event to her diary "Kitty":

On Friday, June 12th, I woke up at six o'clock, and no wonder; it was my birthday.... Soon after seven I went to Mummy and Daddy and then to the sitting room to undo my presents. The first to greet me was you, possibly the nicest of all. ... I hope I shall be able to confide in you completely, as I have never been able to do in anyone before, and I hope that you will be a great support and comfort to me.

Anne's father was the only member of her family to survive the Holocaust. When he returned to Amsterdam, he found over 300 pages of his daughter's writing, including her diary about their two years in hiding.

Anne had deep aspirations to be a writer. During her time in hiding, she wrote many stories, fairy tales, and even the beginning of a novel. Click here for a close-up view of Anne's original writings which are part of the Anne Frank the Writer: An Unfinished Story online exhibition. I just spent some time on this website and I have to say, it's a fitting tribute to a courageous and awe-inspiring girl, human being, and writer.

- Short Story by Ishan Chatterjee, Grade 6

I'm Tom Bernstein. I'm twelve years old and live in Goresville. I have one sister. Her name is Mary. She's seventeen, and really crazy. My dad is a retired inventor and has constructed the first time machine in his company, Timeworks.

My mom died in a car accident when I was seven. She used to be an actress. She always went berserk when dad said his time traveler would be done in a year, and asked her if she would go on it with him. But it turned out I went with him instead.

I was eight, and playing in the park with my sister. I checked my silver pocket watch. (At the time it was my most prized possession. It used to belong to my great-great-grandfather, and was handed down the generations. To stop me from losing it, my dad told me that the person who didn't take responsibility for it would be cursed for the rest of his life. Thus I carried it wherever I went.)

"It's 2:13," I told my sister, "Dad's coming in seventeen minutes."

"I wish he'd come sooner," she responded drearily. Some time later dad pulled up, honking the horn.

"You look happy," droned my sister, gloomily observing the frown on his face.

"Be quiet, and help Tom pick up the balls you were playing with."

"What's the problem?" I asked as the car door clicked shut.

"Bad day at work. We were almost done, before someone realized that an internal wire was not hooked up properly. None of us have fingers that are small and nimble enough to connect the wire to the splitter. So we'll have to dissect the machine, and put it together again," Dad explained.

"I'll try to connect the wire and the splitter," I suggested, flexing my fingers.

"You will?"

"Sure." His face brightened, as we swerved in a sharp U-turn to go to Timeworks Headquarters.

CLICK THE WORMHOLE TO GO TO TIMEWORKS HEADQUARTERS!!!

Being a Rock Star is grueling.

Case in point: I recently interviewed an up-and-coming punk/pop band called the Plain White T's. Their touring schedule is intense. The group will play 200 shows before summer's over.

That means that every other day these guys are in a different town. The day in between each town is spent in a van (that frequently breaks down). AND every night before they get in the van, they scream their heads off on stage until midnight. And they do this ten months out of the year.

                     The Plain White T's on stage

It's the kind of lifestyle that should burn them out, but they just keep on going ...