serving on the panel for the national book award in young peoples literature devoured months , and i also had three books come out in three countries between march and the end of the year : a novel , a death at the white camellia orphanage ( mercer , winner of the ferrol sams award for fiction ) ; next , a collection of poetry , the foliate head ( uk : stanza press ) ; and then the most unusual , an adventure tale in verse that combines epic conventions with novelistic modes , thaliad ( montreal : phoenicia publishing . )