Secret Diary

this fun fact about girls? In 1985, at nineteen, Tania Aebi became the youngest person ever to sail alone around the world.

Explorers, p.125.

In five days the Daring Book for Girls will be in bookstores everywhere. In many large bookstores, it will be right up front, in a special display. Next Tuesday!

Meanwhile, we’re still busy writing blog posts everywhere, talking with reporters, and in all ways getting ready for the launch.

To come: a way to download the Daring Girls Anthem. The anthem’s music, lyrics and production are by Seattle filmmaker Brady Hall, and the anthem is sung by the glorious Taryn Webber. Taryn’s a  grown-up Daring Girl. When she was five, she knew she wanted to be a musician. She followed her passions, and voila, here she is, a vocalist, cellist and music teacher. To learn more about her, go to  http://tarynwebber.com.

I asked Brady for some backstory on the lyrics, and his first response was that he “just pulled them out of nowhere really quickly. ” I think that’s a good description of the creative process: sometimes you struggle over each word, and then when you least expect, the words turn out like magic. On further reflection, here’s what he had to say:

“When coming up with the lyrics I really wanted to express the spirit of the book which is that girls can have just as much fun, adventure and excitement in their lives as boys. Society always wants to pigeonhole little girls into playing with dolls and having tea parties but from my childhood experience and observing kids I know, girls are just as interested in mucking it up in the woods and running around as boys. So I really tried to make the song a reflection of that excitement and good hearted competition with boys for a fair share of excitement and thrills.”

Last night, in honor of a certain daring husband’s birthday, we went to our favorite Japanese restaurant. The kids love shrimp shumai, miso soup, and tofu, so they love going there for that stuff as much as their dad loves going there for sushi. But last night, my daring daughter not only ate her soup and shumai, she tried salmon teriyaki and tofu teriyaki, had two California rolls, and actually ate unagi — yep, that’s right, eel. After she was done, she said, “Well, that was pretty daring, right?”

Actually, according to The Daring Book For Girls, it is! In one of our lighter chapters, “The Daring Girls Guide to Danger” (which comes just after “Five Karate Moves” and just before “French Terms of Endearment, Expressions, and Other Items of Note”), we list a few ways a daring girl might test her mettle and expand her horizons. Coming in at number 7? “Try sushi or another exotic food.”

Maybe for Halloween she’ll tackle number 8: “Dye your hair purple.”

People are already quizzing us on what it means to be daring. Often they ask us to tell them the most daring things each of us has ever done. We’re more than happy to talk about navigating the wonderfully confusing streets of Istanbul (that would be Miriam) or jumping off the roof of her family’s house onto a trampoline (that would be Andi). Yet, while personal feats of daring are fun, and they make for great story-telling, but they are not quite the point.

That’s because daring is more than a single activity or event. Daring is an attitude toward life. Daring is about having dreams and following your dreams, about believing in your passions. To be daring is about seeking fun and adventure, not to mention the mysteries of life. It’s about finding your path, wherever it might be. It’s about having spunk, and about getting in the game.

Now that’s daring.

Just posted on YouTube, and soon to be on our page at Amazon.com, the video trailer for The Daring Book for Girls. We are totally in love with this video, and those 50-odd views listed beneath it on YouTube might just be ours, from watching again and again and again…. Enjoy!