Wastepaper Prose

Tips for tackling BEA

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Wed, 22 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

Book Expo America is a week away, and we know a lot of you are headed to NYC to attend. We've thought back on past experience and each of us has come up with some last minute tips that could help if you prepare and have an enjoyable show.

Wear comfortable shoes.
Have a plan.
Be ready for that plan to fly out the window. (AKA Be flexible.)
Pack snacks.
Always bring back-up. (i.e. a friend or blog partner)

Pace yourself. BEA is a marathon, not a sprint. Do everything you can, but remember it's supposed to be a good time.
Keep your eyes and ears peeled. Look for signs listing signings or galley drops. Listen to people chatting next to you in line to learn what signings and books have them excited. You may find something to add to your list.
Be bold. Approach people working the booths and ask about a forthcoming title you're anxious to read. Better yet, ask them what upcoming book they adore. Who knows? They may just put a copy in your hands.
Stay hydrated. Bring a water bottle you can refill and drink up. It's easy to get caught up walking the floor or waiting in lines then suddenly realize you haven't had a beverage in hours.
Remember where you are and that you're representing yourself or your blog because other people will remember how you act. I won't belabor the point, but like the saying goes "you never get a second chance to make a first impression."

Acquire effective cab-hailing skills for easy travel. I cannot provide tips, as I have poor cab-hailing skills.
Pack comfy footwear in the event that #1 does not occur.
Have backup coffee vending locations for when the Javits Starbucks has a line of 900 people. You may not know my backup coffee location.
When someone takes the last copy of the book you want, suddenly stops in front of you, or bites you, remember this simple stress-reduction motto from Bad Boys 2: wooosaaah.
Have a great time. It's New York City and more books than you could ever hope to read.

Check out previous posts on BEA...

BEA on a Budget

BEA: The Low-Down

BEA: What the heck do I do now?

BEA: Packing 101

We'll see you at the Javits!

Author Insight: The Write Mood

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Tue, 21 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

Sometimes the simple act of writing becomes challenging. How do you make yourself write when you aren’t in the mood? Do you ever reward yourself at milestones?

"I find that the 'reward' system isn’t very effective for me. Like most writers and other addicts, I tend to give myself rewards whenever the hell I feel like it, making it pretty hard to fool myself into thinking I’ll only get that piece of chocolate after 10 pages. I mean, why not now, this very moment? Mmm. Thanks, Bill. Thanks for the piece of chocolate." - Bill Konigsberg, author of Openly Straight.

"My writing time is so limited, that when I have it, I just simply have to write. I'm not sure how, really. I just put my fingers on the keys and write very bad prose. Chocolate is helpful.:)" - Aprilynne Pike, author of Life After Theft and Earthbound.

"I’ve spent years forcing myself to burn the midnight oil and write and write and write, and I don’t think it’s actually been that productive. Recently, I’ve learned to be more in tune with my creativity. To listen to it. Be sensitive to it. Slow down. If it’s not happening, it’s better to step away from the desk. My biggest discoveries, the best fixes, have come to me when my brain is at rest." - Lex Hrabe , co-author of Quarantine: The Loners.

"I write 2,000 words a day, M-F when drafting. I don’t know how I make myself write when I don’t want to. I just do. It’s a job, and everyday people get up for work when they don’t want to. Writing is the same." - Victoria Scott, author of The Collector.

"I can’t say I have that problem. Revisions are challenging and can be brutal but at that point I usually have help (my editor) or good friends to help me. I reward myself by eating a lot while I am revising..eating a lot of junk food." - Nora Raleigh Baskin, author of Surfacing.

"I don’t believe in Writer’s Block, but Writer’s Procrastination is a whole other thing! I’m usually very good at self-motivating, and I love to write. But when writing changed from a passion to a fulltime job with deadlines, this brought challenges. The critical thing I find is not plugging in the broadband when I’m meant to be writing! I don’t generally use rewards at milestones...though there may be chocolate for that mid-afternoon slump." - Teri Terry, author of Slated.

"I used to be an awful procrastinator. But now that writing is my full-time job, I simply can’t afford to not be in the mood. What I do now is make myself accountable to my agent by having a daily turn-in goal five days a week. Knowing I have someone anticipating pages daily forces me to get off my butt and write. As for milestone rewards, definitely—I always celebrate when finishing a book!" - Jeff Sampson, author of Ravage.

"I make myself do sit-ups. Hahaha. Seriously. Once I've done a bazillion sit-ups, I'd much rather be in my writing chair than lying on my back, curling my abs." - A.B. Westrick, author of Brotherhood.

"I can't make myself write when I'm not in the mood, if I did, I would just end up deleting it because it would be awful. I just take a day off and read over what I have or read some books that I haven't gotten to yet, and try again the next day! I don't reward myself, but I seriously think I should now!" - Molly McAdams, author of Taking Chances.

"I think Steven Pressfield's fantastic book The War of Art addressed this question for me. It's your job. Other people don't get to skip work just because they don't feel like going, so neither do you. :) Plus, that feeling is often just a mixture of self-doubt and fear getting in your way. Can't let that stop you. And yep, I reward myself with small things (a hot chocolate, a new book, etc.) to help keep that motivation going." - Stacey Kade, author of The Ghost & the Goth and The Rules.

"During November’s NaNoWriMo, the weight of the target word count pushes me relentlessly. During the other 11 months of the year, I procrastinate until guilt drives me into a productive frenzy. I pre-reward myself with sweet milky coffee." - Liz Coley, author of Pretty Girl-13.

"I just write. I guess people aren't always in the mood to get up in the morning, get dressed and head into the office everyday, but they do it because that's their job. Writing is the same. I do tend to work on multiple projects at once, and one of the benefits of that is that if I don't feel in the mood for one project, I can switch over for a day or two to a different project. As for rewards, I always, always promise myself that I'm going to reward myself for milestones . . . and then I never do. :( I really should, though." - Kristin Halbrook, author of Nobody But Us.

"I like to go to coffee shops. It reminds me how many people out there still write for fun. And it also makes me focus. My best advice for writing when you aren’t in the mood- get a really good writing playlist that makes you want to disappear into whatever you’re working on for hours." - Robyn Schneider, author of The Begining of Everything.

Find out how the rest of the authors motivate themselves
when they aren't in the mood to write.

<< Previous

The Miseducation of Cameron Post by emily m. danforth

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Mon, 20 May 2013 05:00:00 +0000

Release Date: February 7, 2012
Publisher: Balzer + Bray
Age Group: Young Adult
Format: E-book
Source: Purchased
Pages: 354
Buy: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Google
Description: Goodreads
When Cameron Post's parents die suddenly in a car crash, her shocking first thought is relief. Relief they'll never know that, hours earlier, she had been kissing a girl.

But that relief doesn't last, and Cam is soon forced to move in with her conservative aunt Ruth and her well-intentioned but hopelessly old-fashioned grandmother. She knows that from this point on, her life will forever be different. Survival in Miles City, Montana, means blending in and leaving well enough alone (as her grandmother might say), and Cam becomes an expert at both.

Then Coley Taylor moves to town. Beautiful, pickup-driving Coley is a perfect cowgirl with the perfect boyfriend to match. She and Cam forge an unexpected and intense friendship--one that seems to leave room for something more to emerge. But just as that starts to seem like a real possibility, ultrareligious Aunt Ruth takes drastic action to "fix" her niece, bringing Cam face-to-face with the cost of denying her true self--even if she's not exactly sure who that is.

The first two parts of The Miseducation of Cameron Post didn’t do much for me. Saying that feels sort of strange because I enjoyed a lot of the details packed into both sections, like Cameron’s absolute certainty that her awkward ride home with Mr. Klauson was because she’d kissed Irene. That, somehow, he just knew, even though he couldn’t. It’s one of those nonsensical, world-revolves-around-me, very human thoughts that makes no sense, but we can never quite help but shake.

Danforth also has a knack for sliding into a paragraph-long aside or just tossing in that one extra detail, like calling something, “dried-hay itchy” instead of just “itchy,” that makes things pop to life. She uses these tricks to somehow make you believe in an entire childhood friendship between Cameron and Irene, even though Irene is around for all of about 30 pages. Despite my appreciation of Danforth’s style, the subject of the first two parts didn’t much connect with me. It felt very much like a typical coming-of-age novel, but with a gay main character. I can absolutely see why that would be useful for a teenager or young adult who’s struggling with the same stuff as Cameron; it just didn’t connect with me.

Like Cameron’s life, that all changed with Coley Taylor. More specifically, the aftermath of their night together. In the kitchen moments afterwards, when Coley’s brother arrives, the venom and fear in Coley’s actions is heartbreaking, but also completely believable. It only gets worse when she betrays Cameron and I could instantly relate with Cameron’s reactions: The part that wanted to tell everyone, the part that wanted to hate Coley, and the part that knew that she didn’t hate her even a little bit.

Sadly, Cameron, never gets that kind of closure, no matter how much I’d’ve liked to see an eventual confrontation. I suppose the lack of closure is a theme with Cameron’s partners, aside maybe from Lindsey, but that doesn’t make it sting any less. That said, it’s hard to fault Coley too much for being a scared teenager who caved to peer pressure and did what every authority figure in her life told her was right. She’s not a lesbian and never was (hell, even in bed, it was Cameron who did everything), but Cameron also gave her every chance to stop, no matter what Coley might think.

Which brings us to the third act, which is mostly an enjoyable exercise in irony, with the staff meaning the best without realizing how off base they are. Every lesson they try to teach Cameron to “cure” her just ends reaffirming her belief that her “condition” isn’t something that can be “fixed.” The staff of God’s Promise, much like every adult figure in her life other than her Grandma, do help Cameron, but not in the way they intended. It’s an almost-sad moment when Cameron realizes the reason behind Lydia’s inability to help her. The epiphany comes when Cameron realizes the reason Lydia has stupid little rules for everything: It prevents Lydia from ever having to confront something that makes he uncomfortable. She can’t possibly help Cameron because she will never even really try to understand Cameron’s struggle.

I absolutely love the final scene. There’s a sense of serenity that permeates the entire chapter that I don’t know how to describe. It’s this weird sort of ritual that culminates in a swim through a lake. Danforth manages to stack at least three layers of symbolism into this single act (freedom from God’s Promise, acceptance of herself, and making peace with her parents’ death) while managing to impart to the reader Cameron’s own calm. If nothing else, I’m glad I read the book just so I could experience the last 10 pages or so.

Release Days Round-Up: May 19-25

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Sun, 19 May 2013 16:00:00 +0000

New Releases

In Paperback

Ink by Amanda Sun

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Fri, 17 May 2013 14:00:00 +0000

Release Date: June 25, 2013
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Age Group: Young Adult
Format: E-galley
Source: Publisher
Series: Paper Gods #1
Pages: 377
Buy: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / IndieBound
Description: Goodreads
I looked down at the paper, still touching the tip of my shoe. I reached for it, flipping the page over to look.

Scrawls of ink outlined a drawing of a girl lying on a bench.

A sick feeling started to twist in my stomach, like motion sickness.

And then the girl in the drawing turned her head, and her inky eyes glared straight into mine.

On the heels of a family tragedy, the last thing Katie Greene wants to do is move halfway across the world. Stuck with her aunt in Shizuoka, Japan, Katie feels lost. Alone. She doesn’t know the language, she can barely hold a pair of chopsticks, and she can’t seem to get the hang of taking her shoes off whenever she enters a building.

Then there’s gorgeous but aloof Tomohiro, star of the school’s kendo team. How did he really get the scar on his arm? Katie isn’t prepared for the answer. But when she sees the things he draws start moving, there’s no denying the truth: Tomo has a connection to the ancient gods of Japan, and being near Katie is causing his abilities to spiral out of control. If the wrong people notice, they'll both be targets.

Katie never wanted to move to Japan—now she may not make it out of the country alive.

I’m coming down from one of the most epic book hangovers of my entire life, which means that I’ve been waiting for the proverbial other shoe (or, in this case, the other book) to drop. I knew that, even if it was an altogether entertaining book, if it didn’t obliterate my feels, it would seem much worse to me by comparison. Sadly, this is the case with Amanda Sun’s Ink, the first in the Paper Gods series. It had all the pieces of something I would enjoy, but somehow those pieces didn’t fall together.

In Ink, Katie Greene has left New York following her mother’s death to live with her aunt in Shizuoka, Japan. She doesn’t know the language, she’s unfamiliar with the culture, and she doesn’t know her aunt well enough to feel at home. One day at school, she witnesses a very, very bad break-up that sticks with her because a- the boy doing the breaking says terribly mean things but looks as though the words hurt him and b- pictures from the boy’s sketchbook fall into Katie’s line of sight, and those pictures move. She gets a ton of shade thrown her way by this mysterious and dangerous boy named Yuu Tomohiro about how pictures don’t move, but she refuses to back down. Her new friends tell her to back off, but she can’t help herself. She discovers Tomo’s secret—he’s part-god, a Kami whose drawings come to life with frightening results—and his drawings and the “ink” respond to her.

So here’s the thing—there’s a lot going on in Ink. At any point, it may be a supernatural romance, a thriller, or a fish-out-of-water tale. The problem was that I never felt these separate aspects coalesced like they should. The focus wouldn’t stay on one topic long enough for me to feel sated in what I’d read before it would leap to something else. By the end I felt things start to gel, the book was nearly over. I knew what I was supposed to feel—that was evident from what was happening on the page-- but I didn’t feel the characters had earned it. It’s a shame, because there are some really well-written, lovely descriptions of Japan that showed so much potential.

Then, there’s Katie and Tomo. First, there’s an unnecessary love triangle that felt more forced than anything. Secondly, I understood why Katie would be interested in following Tomo around after the break-up incident, but after finding out the tales of horror from his past and learning about the people he associates with (like, Yakuza gang members!), I wish she’d have taken more time to consider that he might actually be dangerous. She just wouldn’t let up. This doesn’t happen to me often, but I think this is one of those times when I am not Y enough to fully immerse myself in this YA. Katie kept making so many irresponsible choices with no regard for anyone around her, which shouldn’t make or break a character, but I didn’t feel bonded with Katie.

I could see how other people could really enjoy the Paper Gods series and its first novel Ink, but unfortunately, I don’t think it’s for me.

More Author Insight: Books with Influence

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Thu, 16 May 2013 14:30:00 +0000

What do you feel is the most widely influential book you’ve read in the last few years?

"Widely influential? I assume it's whichever book ending up being read by the greatest number of people, though I have no idea which one that would be. I read the Game of Throne books last spring, so probably those?" - Dan Wells, author of Fragments.

"In general? For all people? For me as a writer? As a person? Each one has a different answer, but I guess for me as a writer it would have to be Julie Halpern’s Into The Wild Nerd Yonder. Maybe an odd answer, but it was the book that gave me the courage to explore writing contemporary—something I’d been afraid to do beforehand— and writing contemporary has been one of the most rewarding things I’ve done as a writer." - Natalie Whipple, author of Transparent.

"Unfortunately, I read 50 Shades of Gray, which seems to be influencing people everywhere." - Page Morgan, author of The Beautiful and the Cursed.

"Some Girls Are by Courtney Summers. This is the book that comes up most when fellow YA writers tell me what influenced them, and I can see why. It’s a rare voice, raw and gutsy, and the authentic characters and the daring plot push the reader to new levels of awe and excitement and discomfort. If you’re a YA reader and haven’t read this book yet, you have a hole in your life that must be filled." - Nova Ren Suma, author of 17 & Gone.

"That’s a tough question, I’ve read a lot of great books in the past few years. The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness had quite an impact. There was something very original and brave about the way it was written and produced. That kind of innovation – done with real substance, with an honest story at its heart – is always inspiring. Ness did a similar thing with A Monster Calls which also surprised, impressed and affected me on many levels." - Dave Cousins, author of 15 Days Without a Head.

"I'm in love with Gothic horror right now. Ever since reading Frankenstein with my class, I've been crazy for atmosphere and melancholy." - Suzanne Young, author of The Program.

"Influential is hard - I am a completely compulsive reader, so I read for pure pleasure and because I can't stop myself. I read trash, high literature, classics, novels, memoirs, history, the backs of my credit cards if desperate. But I never read things only because they're good for me. One of my favorite books of the last year though was the Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England by Ian Mortimer. I can't get enough minute details about life in the past." - Emma Carlson Berne, author of Never You Let Go.

"I guess the easiest answers are to use the books that have redefined the YA-writing scene. The mega-hits have opened doors for publishers to take chances on so many novels that would have otherwise gone unpublished and unread. They’ve shaped the landscape the rest of us navigate, so they’re definitely the biggest influences. However, asking which book was the most moving or enduring would yield a completely different answer because those are often the quieter books that wouldn’t have been possible without the mega-hits." - Josin McQuein, author of Arclight.

"I can’t name one because I’ve read so many awesome books recently, but I can say that the most influential ones are those with strong, distinctive, jump-off-the-page voices. Unique, authentic voice gets me every time. The talent of some writers is inspiring. And disquieting." - Scott Blagden, author of Dear Life, You Suck.

"Personally so or culturally? Hunger Games really impacted me as a writer and reader when it firstcame out. I also recently read Mere Christianity by CS Lewis, which might not be new but is still relevant. His words are wise and highly quotable, whether you are Christian or not." - Lindsey Leavitt, author of Going Vintage.

"Lois Lowry's The Giver is the most thought-provoking and heart-stopping book I've read in many a year. Its simple language makes it accessible to a fourth grader, yet its ideas and sentiments are better suited to older kids and adults. I consider The Giver the most important children's book of my lifetime and one of the few written in the 20th/21st century that will live on as a classic forever." - Lois Ruby, author of Rebel Spirits.

Find out next week how the authors make themselves write
when they aren't in the mood.

<< Previous

Author Insight: Books with Influence

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Tue, 14 May 2013 14:30:00 +0000

What do you feel is the most widely influential book you’ve read in the last few years?

"Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan, the first young adult novel with an LGBTQ protagonist to make the New York Times Bestseller list. It has helped to greatly expand the audience for the types of books I write." - Bill Konigsberg, author of Openly Straight.

"I think you can choose any of Harry Potter, Twilight, or Hunger Games as the most influential book to the industry, but the book that really had an influence on me personally was Janni Lee Simner's Bones of Faerie, from Winter 2009. Mostly because it was a faerie book that was exponentially better than mine. And since I've gotten the opportunity to meet and get to know Janni, she's a storyteller I really look up to and think about when I'm writing." - Aprilynne Pike, author of Life After Theft and Earthbound.

"I read The Big Sleep recently. I’d never read Chandler before, but I was blown away. His work is the touchstone for the boatloads of crime fiction and noir that followed him (and still to come), and somehow he reads more fresh, funny and stylish than any of his imitators. That’s good writing." - Lex Hrabe , co-author of Quarantine: The Loners.

"Bird By Bird by Anne Lammot. It teaches you so much about writing, and about life." - Victoria Scott, author of The Collector.

"Influential is hard - I am a completely compulsive reader, so I read for pure pleasure and because I can't stop myself. I read trash, high literature, classics, novels, memoirs, history, the backs of my credit cards if desperate. But I never read things only because they're good for me. One of my favorite books of the last year though was the Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England by Ian Mortimer. I can't get enough minute details about life in the past." - Nora Raleigh Baskin, author of Surfacing.

"I honestly can’t name a single book as being more influential than all others. I read widely, and everything I take in leaves little footprints behind." - Teri Terry, author of Slated.

"Probably The Hunger Games; if you’d said in the past decade, I’d have said Harry Potter and Twilight. These may seem obvious, but I remember when I started writing YA in the late ‘90s it was still this niche thing, with maybe two bookshelves shoved in the back corner of the children’s book section of bookstores. Now YA keeps getting bigger and bigger. It’s great in that more exposure means more readers and more sales. But I also worry that now the focus is so much on titles that could crossover to adult readers that books that might appeal mostly to younger audiences don’t get as much push from publishers." - Jeff Sampson, author of Ravage.

"I'd say the whole Harry Potter series because it woke people up. Reluctant readers became enthusiastic readers. All of a sudden, it wasn't just bookworms who loved to read. Reading became cool again." - A.B. Westrick, author of Brotherhood.

"I can't say any one book was the most influential, but Nicholas Sparks was the most influential author. He isn't afraid to write about things that people don't usually talk about. He writes what's real…and I love that." - Molly McAdams, author of Taking Chances.

"Oh, boy, people are going to hate me for this answer, but I think it's true for YA: Twilight. I think it marked the start of new growth in that area and it provided context for people trying to understand the market. (Every YA writer is now asked, 'Is your book like Twilight?') Plus, I think it demonstrated that YA was a viable product, something that could make money for publishers. Without it, I doubt there'd be nearly as many of us able to write and sell YA, so I'm grateful." - Stacey Kade, author of The Ghost & the Goth and The Rules.

"In terms of influencing me, Story by Robert McKee, a screenwriting guide, gave me the three-act structure and a powerful model for deepening conflict. In terms of influencing others, the books 50 Shades and Twilight were most influential on the market. Their success drove home to me the message that we authors are part of the entertainment industry, and that we compete for people’s free time against all other entertainments." - Liz Coley, author of Pretty Girl-13.

"If I had to choose the most widely influential of the last few years, I would probably choose The Hunger Games. That book has reached so many readers, on so many different media formats. It's brought new readers to YA in ways that some previous popular books weren't able to (mostly for gender reasons, which are wide and problematic). For me, personally, my favorite books--How I Live Now and Jellicoe Road--were the most influential. These books provide a writing standard for me to aspire to and illustrate the variety of style and content available in YA." - Kristin Halbrook, author of Nobody But Us.

"That is a very big question and I think I’m probably not going to have a right-sized answer, but Twilight. It was a book that became a cultural nuisance, and growing up in the Harry Potter generation, it was fascinating to watch that happen." - Robyn Schneider, author of The Begining of Everything.

Stop by Thursday to find out what the rest of the authors feel are

the most influential books of the last few years.

<< Previous

Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Mon, 13 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

Release Date: August 2, 2000
Publisher: Bantam Books
Age Group: Adult
Format: Paperback
Source: Purchased
Pages: 440
Buy: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / IndieBound
Description: Goodreads
In reality, Hiro Protagonist delivers pizza for Uncle Enzo’s CosoNostra Pizza Inc., but in the Metaverse he’s a warrior prince. Plunging headlong into the enigma of a new computer virus that’s striking down hackers everywhere, he races along the neon-lit streets on a search-and-destroy mission for the shadowy virtual villain threatening to bring about infocalypse. Snow Crash is a mind-altering romp through a future America so bizarre, so outrageous…you’ll recognize it immediately.

Welcome to a new, unscheduled, but almost-certainly recurring feature on Wastepaper Prose: What Wes Read Instead Of Reading What Wes Should Read! During April, instead of using my reading time to read the Miseducation of Cameron Post (I’m writing that review as soon as I’m done with this one! I promise!), I spent my time nerding out on comic books and books for computer nerds. Somewhere in that spree, I read Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash which a) was good and b) I thought readers of the blog might enjoy. So, without further ado...

I’m not even sure where to start with Snow Crash. It’s the sort of book where the main character’s name is Hiro Protagonist, all pizza delivery drivers have to get a four year degree at a pizza university, and there’s an entire language (Taxilingua) just for cab drivers. The most completely realized idea is the Metaverse, which is basically the Internet in full 3D. The idea might seem less crazy now, but Stephenson dreamed it up in the early 90s, before most people had even heard of The Web.

Stephenson’s description of the Metaverse is painstakingly detailed and covers everything from how people appear when they log in to what happens if their avatar is destroyed. The sheer amount of information Stephenson relays about the Metaverse displays his strongest talent: He can explain complex ideas very simply. I’ve previously read another of his books, Cryptonomicon, which contains even more difficult technical ideas than Snow Crash. In both novels, Stephenson manages to explain complicated ideas using a simple and humorous style. He makes you learn everything you need to know to fully follow the plot, but the building blocks are chosen so well and are delivered so humorously that you don’t even realize he’s teaching you something along the way. I’m fairly certain that he could write ten pages about paint drying and I would be entertained.

It’s a good thing that the world Stephenson creates is so much fun and that his writing style is so funny, because the actual execution of his plot leaves a bit to be desired. The grand strokes of the plot are excellent. The very first “computer drug” ever, Snow Crash, has hit the Metaverse streets. As it turns out, it’s more like a computer virus for a human brain and things only gets stranger from there. We’re talking a drug connected to Sumerian myth, the Tower of Babel, and an impending doomsday referred to as the Infopocalypse.

Considering the fantastic nature of the antagonist’s scheme and the mind-melting nature of the ideas Stephenson presents, the minutiae of the plot itself turns out to be disappointingly generic. While there are some awesome moments (I will never be able to hear the phrase, “Listen to reason,” without thinking about this book), I was surprised at how pedestrian the final act felt. I had similar misgivings after finishing Cryptonomicon, which makes me wonder if he’s not better at dreaming up grand ideas rather than he is at actually executing them.

None of the characters have much depth beyond “really good hacker” or “crazy Eskimo with nuke in his motorcycle that is wired to a dead man’s switch.” That said, when the bad guy’s one dimension includes “has a nuke in his motorcycle that is wired to a dead man’s switch,” it’s hard to complain. That particular fact leads to a hilarious moment where a bunch of cops helping the bad guy get away from a private security firm so the nuke doesn’t explode. Again: it’s that kind of book.

There are so many awesome ideas packed into this novel in terms of character quirks and intriguing plot threads, but the disparate parts never seem to quite congeal. Ideas that seemed like they were heading in mind bending directions never quite pay off. Some of those intriguing plot threads are just left dangling. The whole doesn’t do justice to the individual parts. In a way, this book is like a big budget action movie. It’s tons of fun and I’d absolutely recommend it to anyone looking for a fun read, but it just seems like Stephenson is capable of making something so much better.

Release Days Round-Up: May 12-18

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Sun, 12 May 2013 16:30:00 +0000

New Releases

In Paperback

Giveaway: The Program by Suzanne Young

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Fri, 10 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

The Program

by Suzanne Young

Release Date: April 30, 2013

Publisher: Simon Pulse

Sloane knows better than to cry in front of anyone. With suicide now an international epidemic, one outburst could land her in The Program, the only proven course of treatment. Sloane’s parents have already lost one child; Sloane knows they’ll do anything to keep her alive. She also knows that everyone who’s been through The Program returns as a blank slate. Because their depression is gone—but so are their memories.

Under constant surveillance at home and at school, Sloane puts on a brave face and keeps her feelings buried as deep as she can. The only person Sloane can be herself with is James. He’s promised to keep them both safe and out of treatment, and Sloane knows their love is strong enough to withstand anything. But despite the promises they made to each other, it’s getting harder to hide the truth. They are both growing weaker. Depression is setting in. And The Program is coming for them.

Thanks to Simon and Schuster for the opportunity host this giveaway. U.S. Only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

More Author Insight: Literary Lifestyles

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Thu, 09 May 2013 15:31:00 +0000

How has your life changed since you sold your first book and joined the publishing industry? Did you maintain life as you knew it or ditch the day job and become a full-time author?

"I quit as soon as my contracts got big enough to support my family, and it's awesome. Last summer we moved to Europe, planning to stay there for two years, just because I'm not tied to a desk job anywhere and we wanted to try something cool and adventurous." - Dan Wells, author of Fragments.

"Honestly? It hasn’t changed much. I still live in the same place, still take care of my kids, still squeak in work where I can. Oh, except I have three kids now instead of the two when I sold. Maybe it’ll change more after debut, but for now I’m happy just how it is." - Natalie Whipple, author of Transparent.

"I was a stay-at-home mom, so I didn’t have a day job to ditch—but I would have in a second had I been working full time somewhere!" - Page Morgan, author of The Beautiful and the Cursed.

"I stayed at work through the publication of my first book, Dani Noir. The day I quit my last day job in a long series of day jobs was when I was writing my second book, Imaginary Girls, under a swiftly approaching deadline. I left my last work cubicle in excitement, relief, and sheer panic. Sometimes, and this always happens during low writing moments, I fantasize about just setting up camp in my old cubicle and surprising my former manager so he’ll happen upon me when he comes in with his morning coffee. 'Hi, Mark! I’m back!'" - Nova Ren Suma, author of 17 & Gone.

"My life changed dramatically once I sold my first book. I became a full-time author a few months before it was published in the UK, mainly so I would have the time to write my second book and to do all the promotional events and school visits to support it. I’m very happy. It’s my dream job!" - Dave Cousins, author of 15 Days Without a Head.

"Writing didn't change my life in an extraordinary way, but I didn't really expect it to. I've made some wonderful friends, and grown as a writer through experience. I used to write full-time, but now I'm back to teaching high school. I like getting out of my pajamas every day." - Suzanne Young, author of The Program.

"Other than the diamond necklaces showered on me by my publisher and the hordes of rabid fans pounding on my door day and night, life has remained pretty much the same. Actually, I started out writing as my day job, in addition to teaching horseback writing. I wrote educational books for years, and I still do. I've been able to write as my day job ever since--eight years now." - Emma Carlson Berne, author of Never You Let Go.

"I’m a full time author, which is pretty much what I was even before it was a paying job. (I guess that makes me my own intern – Ha!) Nothing’s really changed; I don’t even make a point to tell people what I do for a living. There are too many preconceived notions about what an author actually does and how their lives go. Trying to combat that with facts can be exhausting." - Josin McQuein, author of Arclight.

"It hasn’t changed. I still work my day job, which is real estate. Obviously, I now have marketing and publicity responsibilities for the book, but that’s in addition to my daily work, not in lieu of it." - Scott Blagden, author of Dear Life, You Suck.

"When I began writing for publication, I was a full-time librarian getting nowhere in the publishing industry. I started popping babies (3 in 4 1/2 years), so I quit my day job and became a full-time mama. It was about 5 years later that my first book was published, and I was still doing the mother thing. I've been fortunate to have a husband who's been the major bread-winner so I could indulge my writing passion without worrying about sales figures. So, no, my life has not changed since I began being published all those many years ago. Nor have I gotten filty rich from my work!" - Lois Ruby, author of Rebel Spirits.

Stop by Tuesday to find out what the authors think are the most widely influential books to be published in recent years.

<< Previous

ARC Tour Sign-up: Indelible by Dawn Metcalf

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Wed, 08 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

ARC tours aren't a normal thing around here, but my excitement for this book runs so deeply that I had to share it with as many people as I could. As much as I want to, this dark and twisty ride is something I can't keep to myself. I'm partnering with Page Turners Blog to host a tour and kick-start the buzz for Dawn Metcalf's Indelible.

We're looking for 12 bloggers who'd like to get an early shot at reading this book and would be willing to share their thoughts in reviews on their sites. If you're interested just fill out the FORM below before 11:59 p.m. EST on May 16. The bloggers selected to participate will be notified on May 15 and books will begin to circulate shortly after that.

If you aren't familiar with Indelible yet, read the description below and a special note from Dawn enticing you to add Indelible to your TBR. Hurry and sign up! We can't wait for you to read this one.

A note from Dawn...

Dawn Metcalf

Hi! I'm Dawn Metcalf. Don't mind the hat, it's all part of the show. Come over here, I'd like to introduce you to someone. Several someones, in fact, but you can't see them yet. Hang on...stay still...okay? There. Better? Great! Now just smile and look pretty and try not to make any sudden moves.

Those two in front? They're the Scribes. What? Oh, yes, those really are their eyes. The guy over there with the scowl? That's Kurt. But he's not the one you have to watch out for. That would be Graus Claude, the Bailiwick of the Twixt. That's him in the back. Yes, it's real and yes, it's alive. Really. So's Kestrel over there... Well, of course you can't see her, she's wearing a camouflaged hood! And don't cross Brairhook, either. Or Hasp, for that matter. Or, um, any of them actually. They can be wonderful once you get to know them, but you have to understand the Folk aren't too keen on humans...especially those who can See them. Yes, well, okay so that is my fault. But *you* wanted to know!
Here. Take this. No, it's not a spell book. It's an arc of Indelible! You have a chance to be one of the first to read about Joy, Ink and the Twixt by following this tour as well as chances to receive Indelible swag.

Release Date: July 30, 2013
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Pre-Order: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / IndieBound

Some things are permanent.

Indelible.

And they cannot be changed back.

Joy Malone learns this the night she sees a stranger with all-black eyes across a crowded room—right before the mystery boy tries to cut out her eye. Instead, the wound accidentally marks her as property of Indelible Ink, and this dangerous mistake thrusts Joy into an incomprehensible world—a world of monsters at the window, glowing girls on the doorstep, and a life that will never be the same.

Now, Joy must pretend to be Ink’s chosen one—his helper, his love, his something for the foreseeable future...and failure to be convincing means a painful death for them both. Swept into a world of monsters, illusion, immortal honor and revenge, Joy discovers that sometimes, there are no mistakes.

Somewhere between reality and myth lies…

THE TWIXT

Blog Tour & Giveaway: Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong by Prudence Shen and Faith Erin Hicks

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Tue, 07 May 2013 16:00:00 +0000

Today, we are happy to welcome Prudence Shen, author of the graphic novel Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong (a collaboration with comic artist Faith Erin Hicks). It’s a thrilling, thoughtful, downright hilarious tale of a high school basketball star and his nerdy neighbor/best friend, one of whom gets unceremoniously dumped by the head cheerleader while the other is desperate to take his team to the robotic competition (I’ll let you figure out which is which). There are twists, turns, fights, chases, escapes, dirty dealings, new crushes, and possibly some robots beating the screws out of other robots. I asked Prudence to talk about the ramifications of the social hierarchy of so-called cliques within the educational institutions of early to mid adolescents.

Just kidding. She’s going to talk about robots.

Release Date: May 7, 2013
Publisher: First Second

You wouldn’t expect Nate and Charlie to be friends. Charlie’s the laid-back captain of the basketball team, and Nate is the neurotic, scheming president of the robotics club. But they are friends, however unlikely—until Nate declares war on the cheerleaders. At stake is funding that will either cover a robotics competition or new cheerleading uniforms—but not both.

It's only going to get worse: after both parties are stripped of their funding on grounds of abominable misbehavior, Nate enrolls the club's robot in a battlebot competition in a desperate bid for prize money. Bad sportsmanship? Sure. Chainsaws? Why not. Running away from home on Thanksgiving to illicitly enter a televised robot death match? Of course!

In Faith Erin Hicks' and Prudence Shen's world of high school class warfare and robot death matches, Nothing can possibly go wrong.

Research is the blessing and curse of every writer.

Prudence Shen

Most stories require some amount of research. In the case of Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong, my academic background in the liberal arts was wholly useless, and I spent a lot of time looking up whether or not high school students actually built the types of robots I was imagining. The closest I've ever been an engine of any kind was when I took a black and white photography class that was across the hall from the auto shop room. How do you build a battle bot? Is it horrifically expensive? Weirdly, I spent a solid week in 2008 trolling the internet for the biggest SUV manufactured in the U.S. It doesn't come up in the graphic novel, but the original prose had an entire tangent about how Charlie's "borrowed" car is big enough to have a table built into the back.

No matter how thorough, research isn't going to be able to guarantee you get everything exactly right. There's always going to be one smart-ass expert who delights in pointing out the big and little things you get wrong — usually long after you can do anything about it. But a thorough vetting can keep you from embarrassing yourself too badly, and even if you're not overly concerned with accuracy, I think it's always in the interest of the story for the plot to pass a basic smell test.

So with that in mind, I called up a browser window and started looking at information about battlebots.

Here's where the double-edged blade of research comes in:

While it can be enormously helpful, it can also be a distraction. Did I need to watch every video on YouTube that comes up when searching "greatest battlebot fights?" No. Did I do that anyway and then justify it at 4 a.m. because it was research? You bet your ass I did. And then I went onto the Home Depot website and priced a bunch of chainsaws. I have no doubt the CIA has flagged me under some suspected serial murderer file, where I'm guessing a lot of writers who have to Google stuff like "homemade poison??" and "how do you liquefy a body?" reside as well.

(Has anybody else ever typed "I swear I'm not a murderer I am just writing a story about murderers" into Google just so that whoever's logging this data has it on the record? No? Okay. Me neither.)

Moving on.

No matter how much more footage of gruesome motorized carnage there was available for research purposes, I was going to have to commit words to paper at some point. And while knowing those fights and the hardware helped enormously when constructing the story, after a while even I had had to admit I was using it to explain away uncertainty. I was writing a story about the kids who were building these bots, their adventures and teenage angst, not constructing a guidebook. Sometimes the danger of being experts in what we write is the temptation to turn a story into an academic exercise: I kept having to remind myself that nobody was reading Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong to learn how to put together a robot and to resist the urge to write it like they might.

It took a lot of undignified late nights trolling YouTube and producing zero paragraphs to reach this conclusion, but I got there eventually: research is essential and oftentimes fun, but it's all too easy to get bogged down. All of my stacks of notes didn't amount up to a plot or characters, and those were always going to be the engine moving a story forward.

In short: Oh my God, Pru. Stop bookmarking videos of robots bursting into flame and finish writing your stupid novel. This crazy-big SUV with a table in the back isn't going to steal itself.

And also, if I occasionally decided to type "I swear I'm not a crazed Bond villain planning on building a robot army I am just writing about robots" into my search engine, that was just taking a preventative measure. I've done my research about secret spy prisons, okay?

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Author Insight: Literary Lifestyles

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Tue, 07 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

How has your life changed since you sold your first book and joined the publishing industry? Did you maintain life as you knew it or ditch the day job and become a full-time author?

"I ditched my day job prematurely. I had just sold my second book (which, as it turns out, was later cancelled when my editor left the publishing house), I was going on tour, and I figured I couldn’t do it and a day job. Perhaps that was true, but a couple years later I was without work and without a book deal and had to go back to work. I am once again 'just a writer,' but I think this time it will likely stick as I have many more irons in the fire." - Bill Konigsberg, author of Openly Straight.

"I am a full-time author, but since I was a full-time mom before that, I haven't exactly quit my job.:) Honestly, my life hasn't changed much since I started writing. Before, I ran my household and took care of kids and plunked away at the keyboard whenever I got a chance. These days I still run my household and plunk away at the keyboard whenever I get a chance. I just get paid for it now." - Aprilynne Pike, author of Life After Theft and Earthbound.

"We’ve gotten busier. So far, between deadlines and the fact that Quarantine is a trilogy, there hasn’t been much time for a typical day job. Making the ends meet can be a challenge (and stressful), but somehow things work out." - Lex Hrabe , co-author of Quarantine: The Loners.

"I left my job before becoming a published author b/c the paper I was working for was folding. Life has definitely changed since becoming published. It’s different. It’s amazing." - Victoria Scott, author of The Collector.

"I actually got fired from my job right before I was first published and after running home crying I then secretly rejoiced in having more time to finish the book I was working on. But I still teach writing and hebrew school and I am still a mom and homemaker, so no my life remains the same." - Nora Raleigh Baskin, author of Surfacing.

"I’m a full time author! Hurrah! No day job, and I usually write half the day in bed in my fuzzy PJ’s. Though this can be embarrassing when people knock on the door. I also have to remind myself to occasionally get out of the house and interact with real people – I talk to myself and the characters in my head a worrying amount already." - Teri Terry, author of Slated.

"When my Deviants trilogy sold, I was lucky enough to be able to buck the day job and work as a writer full time. Mostly that just means I spend far more time at home than I used to, though I’ve vowed to start making my way to more writer shindigs soon!" - Jeff Sampson, author of Ravage.

"In spite of all the advice I received to the contrary, I ditched my day job and I now write full time. It's too early for me to know whether this decision will work out (financially), but in terms of satisfaction with life, I'm loving it! I write for 7-8 hours a day, then read for a few hours, then turn to social media, marketing, emails, etc. I love my life." - A.B. Westrick, author of Brotherhood.

"Oh man. It's been a crazy change. I never thought anyone would read my books and I was happy just writing at night when I got home from work. But I've since quit my job and I now write full-time. I love it and hope to stay doing this." - Molly McAdams, author of Taking Chances.

"I continued working as a copywriter for two years after my first book sold. Then my part-time, very flexible job was phased out, and I knew I had to make a choice. It was the scariest thing I've ever done, NOT looking for another job and writing full time. But it has been an amazing and wonderful (and occasionally terrifying) experience." - Stacey Kade, author of The Ghost & the Goth and The Rules.

"I was lucky enough to have been financially supported while the kids were growing and I was learning the craft. Two-thirds of my day job as a stay-home mom has now graduated high school and gone far away to college, but I still have to maintain life as I know it for my teenaged daughter and husband. I still cook from scratch (well) and clean my own house (poorly)." - Liz Coley, author of Pretty Girl-13.

"It hasn't changed that much. I still work outside of writing, though my schedule is ultimately flexible. I spend more daylight hours writing than before, but that has more to do with changing family dynamics than anything else. Ultimately, I'm living my dream. And it's amazing." - Kristin Halbrook, author of Nobody But Us.

"My life before and my life after are like two totally unrelated books written by different authors. It’s crazy how much has changed, in the best possible way." - Robyn Schneider, author of The Begining of Everything.

Come back Thursday to find if the rest of the authors'
lives changed since they got published.

<< Previous

Star Cursed by Jessica Spotswood

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Mon, 06 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

Release Date: June 18, 2013
Publisher: Putnam Juvenile
Age Group: Young Adult
Format: E-galley
Source: Edelweiss
Series: The Cahill Witch Chronicles #2
Pages: 462
Buy: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / IndieBound
Description: Goodreads
With the Brotherhood persecuting witches like never before, a divided Sisterhood desperately needs Cate to come into her Prophesied powers. And after Cate's friend Sachi is arrested for using magic, a war-thirsty Sister offers to help her find answers—if Cate is willing to endanger everyone she loves.

Cate doesn't want to be a weapon, and she doesn't want to involve her friends and Finn in the Sisterhood's schemes. But when Maura and Tess join the Sisterhood, Maura makes it clear that she'll do whatever it takes to lead the witches to victory. Even if it means sacrifices. Even if it means overthrowing Cate. Even if it means all-out war.

In the highly anticipated sequel to Born Wicked, the Cahill Witch Chronicles continue Cate, Maura and Tess's quest to find love, protect family, and explore their magic against all odds in an alternate history of New England.

Last year’s Born Wicked (see review) was one of my favorite surprises. I knew I wanted to like it based on the fact that it’s written by one of the most genuinely nice people in the business, Jessica Spotswood. However, historical fiction isn’t usually my bag, baby. As you saw from my review, though, Born Wicked is anything but traditional, and I reveled in the feminist themes, the world of witchcraft, and the adorable Finn Belastra. I’ve been dying for its sequel, Star Cursed, since the moment I closed the first book. It should come as no surprise that Star Cursed is a worthy follow-up with an even stronger story, more sisterly drama, and even more romantic delights.

The thing I love best about Star Cursed is that it has its own separate arc within the greater story. Trilogies are so prevalent in YA, and I read a ton of YA, so I’ve found that the dreaded Second Book Syndrome crops up so often. It’s one of my pet peeves, and it can turn me off to a series completely. There is nothing to worry about here. This is not a sluggish drag between a snappy beginning and a climactic finish. Honestly, by the end of the fourth chapter, I’d run through an entire book’s worth of emotions. Thankfully, you get some recovery time after that, but this doesn’t mean the story stops moving.

The alternate world in which Cate lives continues to spin on, and while she has a bit more freedom in the Sisterhood, she’s still just as feisty and stubborn as ever. We get an even closer look at Cate’s relationship with both of her sisters, and it isn’t always pretty. Cate still acts as a maternal figure for youngest Tess, though that becomes tougher and tougher the older Tess gets. Cate and Maura still butt heads like sisters do, but there is a decided shift in the reasoning behind the fights from the first book to this one. There were so many times I wanted to grab Maura’s shoulders and shake her and shout MAURA WHAT IS YOUR DAMAGE. She has so much anger and angst and honey, keep calm and have a cup of tea. Geezy peez.

I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Jess speak at a couple of signings (yay DC writer friends!), and she always finds a way to mention how much she loves writing the kissing scenes. Even if I didn’t already know that, it would be clearly evident after this. If you thought the feather scene from Born Wicked was something? Oh, you ain’t seen nothing yet. If possible, Finn becomes even more adorable. Of course, a happy, adorable couple means you should have your guard up. Le sigh.

If you loved Born Wicked, then you will adore Star Cursed. It’s a fabulous follow-up that carries on the greater story without sacrificing its own plot in the process. I anxiously await the chance to return to Cate’s world, though I am already not looking forward to saying good-bye.

Between These Lines by Jennifer Murgia (Blog Tour and giveaway)

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Sun, 05 May 2013 15:30:00 +0000

Release Date: April 1, 2013
Publisher: Playlist Fiction
Age Group: Young Adult
Format: E-book
Source: Blog Tour
Pages: 183
Buy: Amazon / Barnes & Noble
Description: Goodreads
I never told anyone how I felt about her. Not even Evie—not in so many words. And now, I’ll never get the chance to.

When a class assignment brings quiet Chase Mitman and the stunning Evie Cunningham together, a mutual attraction ignites. There’s only one problem—Evie already has a boyfriend—one who practically OWNS Whitley Prep, and her.Knowing their relationship comes at a price, Chase’s life collides with Evie’s, and after entrusting her with a tragic secret, the last thing he’d ever expect is to learn she keeps a few of her own.An innocent prank turns ugly. An anonymous note changes everything. And lives at Whitley Prep will never be the same.

Talk about short, fast-paced, intense reads! In Between These Lines, Jennifer Murgia has built an engaging contemporary world and web of secrets that will suck readers in.

Between These Lines is the story of how Chase Mitman and Evie Cunningham finally wind up in close quarters and face their feelings for each other, but it's so much more complicated than two people with a crush. Both of them are haunted -- Chase by the past and Evie by her own fear of the present.

Evie's parents relationship is disintegrating before her eyes. She has a privileged, controlling boyfriend with a violent streak named Shane who'll do anything to keep her. Chase and Shane have their own past that resurfaces after being buried for years. And then there are the secrets... Whitley Prep is full of secrets and everyone in the story is connected, intertwined, and Murgia does a fabulous job on holding back details on exactly how everything seams up.

I think what I loved most about this novel is that you don't have to work for it while reading. It's beautifully plotted and unfurls like a carpet before you. All you have to do is follow along. It was a nice change from twisting fiction that you have to follow closely and sometimes wind up wondering what happened after 500 pages.

My only complaint is that I didn't ever truly relate to Evie. There were moments in which I felt connected to her, but she just felt a little too soft and distant. Chase, Shane, Tara (Evie's best friend) and even some of the secondary characters were very crisp and I could watch their actions play out in my mind.

Despite not relating to Evie very well, her encounters with Chase rang very true. Many of them were subtle and didn't coerce me as a reader to read something specific into their exchanges. The emotion or sentiment was just there.

I can tell you much more because you'll want to read the end on your own. Oh my, the end! Tension mounts, relationships come to a head and you'll be rushing to the end. Good thing it's an e-book, otherwise it could have easily ended up tear-stained and torn from the speed at which I was turning pages.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

More Author Insight: Creating Characters

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Thu, 02 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

When you conceptualize a character does personality or physicality come first or does a complete person instantly form?

"Personality never really surfaces in my characters until after I start writing them, which is why I do a lot of pre-writing. I know what a character's going to do long before I know how or even why." - Dan Wells, author of Fragments.

"For me, I usually get a character with 'a problem.' I learn about personality and appearance from there. So with Fiona from Transparent, I knew she was invisible and that her father made her steal. Everything else came after that." - Natalie Whipple, author of Transparent.

"Personality, definitely. I build their physical side based on that." - Page Morgan, author of The Beautiful and the Cursed.

"My characters are often modeled on people I’ve met in real life or seen somewhere, so personality and physicality are shaped by what I’ve observed and noticed and carried with me and distorted in my memory. Then fiction takes over and builds the disguise even thicker. You may never know I’m writing about you, but haha, I am!" - Nova Ren Suma, author of 17 & Gone.

"A bit of both I think, though personality is more important. Most of my story ideas start with a person in a situation. Often a character feels fully formed, though only glimpsed – like somebody walking past you in the street. I form an immediate impression of what the person is like, but may struggle to come up with details. Those come once I start writing and get to know the character properly." - Dave Cousins, author of 15 Days Without a Head.

"It usually starts with smart ass remark, or a conversation with another character. After that they start to take shape physically." - Suzanne Young, author of The Program.

"If only a character would instantly form. You can sign me up for that anytime. Usually, the first thing I try to get a sense of is what this person WANTS, more than anything. What is his or her greatest desire? Everything else follows that." - Emma Carlson Berne, author of Never You Let Go.

"The person comes through as a full entity, though their physical attributes are always less defined than their core personality." - Josin McQuein, author of Arclight.

"I do a very extensive character study before I start a story, which includes physical as well as psychological and emotional traits. I have a ten-page template that I fill out in excruciating detail about my character and his life. But even then, I’m only about halfway there. The rest of the pieces fall into place as I write the story." - Scott Blagden, author of Dear Life, You Suck.

"What? Some writers get complete people popping up on the page? Not fair.
The main character and important secondary characters almost always come with personality. I often don't focus on physicality until later drafts, unless it's something that defines personality." - Lindsey Leavitt, author of Going Vintage.

"I rarely think of the physical characteristics when the character develops. I prefer to trust readers to see the character through their own eyes. This drives editors nuts. So I've learned to go back, after the first draft is finished, and put in physical traits. This cockeyed method comes back to bite me, because I often have to change what that individual does, or is capable of doing, once I've got the physical clearly in mind." - Lois Ruby, author of Rebel Spirits.

Come back next Tuesday to learn whether the authors lives have
changed since they sold their books.

<< Previous

Author Insight: Creating Characters

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 16:00:00 +0000

When you conceptualize a character does personality or physicality come first or does a complete person instantly form?

"Usually a line of thought or dialogue comes first. I am extremely attuned to sound, so I tend to hear my characters before anything else, and then everything else falls into place. I hear their inner monologue typically, and that tells me something about their personality, which gets fleshed out, so to speak, over time. As for physicality, I really don’t focus on the physicality of my characters. I have no idea what Rafe from Openly Straight looks like. He looks like me at 17 sometimes. Other times, he looks like me only cuter. I’m sure no two people reading that book would choose the same actor as his likeness." - Bill Konigsberg, author of Openly Straight.

"It depends on the character. I have had characters spring into my head fully formed, and I have had to drag others out, characteristic by characteristic, kicking and screaming. There's no 'normal' for me on this one." - Aprilynne Pike, author of Life After Theft and Earthbound.

"The first thing that comes is an attitude, a point of view. Then, they begin to form physically. More pieces come into play as they’re needed. Sometimes, it takes the whole story before I know who that person really is. And then comes a rewrite." - Lex Hrabe , co-author of Quarantine: The Loners.

"Personality always comes first for me, then I have to ask myself what they look like." - Victoria Scott, author of The Collector.

"They always come together and I am usually using a real person or conglomeration of people in my mind so its easy although the personality can change or grow as I write and become less and less like the original 'real' model in order to fit the story. Story comes first." - Nora Raleigh Baskin, author of Surfacing.

"What characters are inside is by far the most important and interesting thing about them to me. I often have to remind myself to give them some physical features, but don’t like describing them completely. I’d rather readers form their own mind pictures from just a few clues." - Teri Terry, author of Slated.

"It all sort of happens at the same time, though I think personality might form first and then I consider what sort of physicality I want to give that type of person. I try to err on the side of bucking stereotypes, for instance I wouldn’t make a “nerd” character who is scrawny with coke bottle glasses or what have you." - Jeff Sampson, author of Ravage.

"Personality comes before physicality. I feel the character's emotions, irritations and desires, and at some point I scour magazines, looking for a face that will match the personality I've imagined. Once I find it, I'll post that face over my writing desk and revise previously written scenes, adding physical details." - A.B. Westrick, author of Brotherhood.

"Usually it's just them in their entirety from the beginning. BUT if anything changes it's their personality. I've never once changed the way someone looked, but I have changed personalities." - Molly McAdams, author of Taking Chances.

"Personality first, usually, then physicality quickly afterward." - Stacey Kade, author of The Ghost & the Goth and The Rules.

"The character approaches me through a fog. First emerges a general sense only of shape—how that character fits into the story in terms of role; then the face and voice become more distinct and I glimpse who I am dealing with; finally the hopes and fears, the quirks, the skills and the flaws all add color and definition as the more detailed personality reveals itself." - Liz Coley, author of Pretty Girl-13.

"Definitely personality: a voice, a sorrow, a plan. The physicality of the character tends to come later in the story and often I'll write many chapters not knowing what someone looks like, which is okay. Other times, I know quickly some of the physical characteristics of my character. But it's the personality that defines the character for me and looks are modeled around that." - Kristin Halbrook, author of Nobody But Us.

"For me, it’s like meeting a person. I take in as much of their looks and personality as I can when we’re first introduced, and I find out more the more time I spend with them." - Robyn Schneider, author of The Begining of Everything.

Find out Thursday what comes first when the rest of the authors create their characters.

<< Previous

Screen Free Week begins today!

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 16:01:00 +0000

Screen Free Week is here!

Yes, I realize the irony in announcing this on a blog but bear with me. In our jacked-in society it's getting infinitely more difficult every day to shut off the smart phone, TV, tablet, computer, etc and harken back to a simpler time.

You've heard those rumors about days when kids used to read for entertainment, write their own stories, create art or *gasp* go outside? Well they're true, and this week is your opportunity to try it on for size. Just unplug and be productive. (But finish reading the post first.)

During Screen Free Week Random House is encouraging everyone to UNPLUG & READ. Unplugging even for a short time can provide perspective on just how huge a role media plays in our lives.

Screen Free Week is the annual celebration from the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood (CCFC) that encourages turning off screens and turning on life. CCFC’s Screen Free Week is a creative response to growing public health concerns about the unprecedented time children spend with entertainment screen media—television, computers, video games, and smart phones. Studies show that Preschoolers spend as much as 4.1 to 4.6 hours per day using screen media. Including multi-tasking, children 8 to 18 spend 7.5 hours per day with screens. Unplugging for one week provides an opportunity to reset media habits, establishing a healthy, sustainable tradition of media consumption in households and schools.

Inspired by Dan Yaccarino’s Doug Unplugged (On sale February 12, 2013) about a robot who discovers that the real world trumps the virtual, we are launching Random House Unplugs: A Screen Free Week promotion. We are committed to supporting teachers, librarians, booksellers and parents in their efforts to encourage children to UNPLUG & READ during Screen Free Week from April 29 – May 5.

manicpixiedreamgirl by Tom Leveen

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 16:00:00 +0000

Release Date: April 23, 2013
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Age Group: Young Adult
Format: ARC
Source: Publisher
Pages: 256
Buy: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / IndieBound
Description: Goodreads
Sometimes the most dramatic scenes in a high school theater club are the ones that happen between the actors and crew off stage.

Seventeen-year-old Tyler Darcy's dream of being a writer is starting to feel very real now that he's sold his first short story to a literary journal. He should be celebrating its publication with his two best friends who've always had his back, but on this night, a steady stream of texts from his girlfriend Sidney keep intruding. So do the memories of his dream girl, Becky, who's been on his mind a little too much since the first day of high school. Before the night is over, Ty might just find the nerve to stop all the obsessing and finally take action.

This is my first Tom Leveen novel and I am head over heels for his writing. You can bet after reading this slim but superb novel about a young man chasing a vision of what he wants instead of appreciating what he has that I will be adding Leveen's other novels to my shelf.

Manicpixiedreamgirl opens on Tyler Darcy and and his friends Rob and Justin celebrating after Tyler sells a short story to a literary magazine. The story, featuring his long-time crush whom he knows nothing about, brings three years of pining for a Rebecca Webb or really the idea of a Rebecca to a head. Tyler's forced to decide whether its time to act or time to move on.

I can't say enough about this book. It's 256 pages of real people with real emotions, actions and reactions that is nothing short of absolutely compelling.

Every character is unique and steps outside of some of the stereotypical teenage characters you see in fiction. For example, Tyler's friend Rob is constantly evolving, changing his look and trying new things but never trying to become someone else. Vignettes that showcase this evolution are a testament to the teenage search for self that everyone goes through in high school.

Voice is the thing that gripped me most about manicpixiedreamgirl. Tyler tells his story as it happened. For the most part it's his unembellished, true account of what happened down to his self-doubt and reflection on his actions or lack thereof. His honest review of his past during a single day of his present is what made this novel so difficult to put down.

Tyler's girlfriend Sydney and his best friends, Rob and Justin, don't understand his obsession with Rebecca. Rob and Justin wonder why Tyler put her on a pedestal and why after all this time he hasn't given up the dream, especially when he has a great girl like Sydney right in front of him.

Sydney, a smart go-getter of a girl, is convinced Tyler will leave his obsession behind one day and realize what he has. All he needs is time and she's willing to be patient, but reading Tyler's recently published story makes it apparent that one day might be further away than Sydney thinks.

If you're looking for a fantastic read that nixes the melodrama of high school and overblown archetypes associated with it then your search ends with manicpixiedreamgirl. Simultaneously quick-witted and achingly real, Leveen's latest work is not to be missed.

The Kissing Booth Giveaway

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 16:00:00 +0000

Thanks so much to Random House for offering me a copy of Beth Reekles debut novel to giveaway. I'm in the midst of reading this right now and it's super cute and extremely enjoyable. The main character and her best guy friend have the same type of easy going relationship one of my guy friends and I did in high school, right down to the biting jokes and level of physical comfort with each other. And well, let's just say the romance is intense...

Trust me, you don't want to miss The Kissing Booth!

The Kissing Booth
by Beth Reekles

Release Date: May 14, 2013 Publisher: EmberPre-order: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / IndieBoound

A cool, sexy romance novel written by seventeen-year-old British sensation Beth Reekles.

Meet Rochelle “Elle” Evans: pretty, popular—and never been kissed. Meet Noah Flynn: badass, volatile—and a total player.

When Elle decides to run a kissing booth at her school's Spring Carnival, she locks lips with Noah and her life is turned upside down. Her head says to keep away, but her heart wants to draw closer. This romance seems far from a fairy tale.

Is Elle headed for heartbreak or will she get her happily ever after?

a Rafflecopter giveaway

More Author Insight: Peculiar Recaps

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 06:00:00 +0000

NOTE: My apologies that this post is a day late. I didn't catch that it hadn't posted until late Thursday evening. We will be back on schedule starting Tuesday.

What is the weirdest way someone (possibly you) has recapped your book?

"From San Diego Comic Con: 'Partials is like Battlestar Galactica meets The Stand, starring Hermione as a medical genius.'" - Dan Wells, author of Fragments.

"I think I heard it described as 'The Sopranos, but with a teen girl and superpowers' once." - Natalie Whipple, author of Transparent.

"Well, I just read somewhere that I was the 'force behind Lauren Kate’s Fallen series.' I WISH!! Sadly, not true." - Page Morgan, author of The Beautiful and the Cursed.

"My books are kind of weird to begin with, so when I find a recap of one that makes it sound straightforward and ordinary… well, it freaks me out. One time, one of my books was called “chick-lit.” I was horrified but mostly amused." - Nova Ren Suma, author of 17 & Gone.

"'A cockroach can live for days without a head … but it always dies in the end.' That was one of my early – and awful – taglines for 15 Days Without a Head!" - Dave Cousins, author of 15 Days Without a Head.

"I got an AMAZING review in all GIFs for The Program that cracked me up. I think all reviews should come with pictures." - Suzanne Young, author of The Program.

"The recaps I've read have been pretty spot-on--maybe I need to offer my four year-old son a chance to recap the book. He usually has a pretty unique way of phrasing things." - Emma Carlson Berne, author of Never You Let Go.

"I don’t think any of the recaps have been particularly weird, though I did have to look up a couple of novels people have compared it to. The coolest comparison was definitely having someone say it reminded them of 'Aliens for YA.'" - Josin McQuein, author of Arclight.

"I haven’t heard any weird summaries from readers or reviewers yet, but since the book initially started out much more plot-driven, I once referred to an early draft as 'a Hardy Boys mystery with booze and profanity.'" - Scott Blagden, author of Dear Life, You Suck.

"Sean Griswold's Head: About some guys head, but the inside, not the outside, and actually about a girl trying to get into his head, but not really about him at all because there is family stuff. BUY IT NOW!" - Lindsey Leavitt, author of Going Vintage.

"An eighth grader recently emailed me that she'd finished my new book, Rebel Spirits, and she cried for an hour afterwards. Was this good news, or bad? I couldn't tell whether she'd cried because it disappointed her, or because it ended wrong, or because she hated the book, or something else I was missing entirely. My writer friends assure me that it is, indeed, good news because this reader was moved to respond emotionally. I like that explanation." - Lois Ruby, author of Rebel Spirits.

Find out Tuesday how the authors conceptualize their characters!

<< Previous

Dare You To by Katie McGarry

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 15:00:00 +0000

Release Date: May 28, 2013
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Age Group: Young Adult
Format: E-galley
Source: NetGalley
Series: Pushing the Limits #2
Pages: 462
Buy: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / IndieBound
Description: Goodreads
Ryan lowers his lips to my ear. "Dance with me, Beth."

"No." I whisper the reply. I hate him and I hate myself for wanting him to touch me again....

"I dare you..."

If anyone knew the truth about Beth Risk's home life, they'd send her mother to jail and seventeen-year-old Beth who knows where. So she protects her mom at all costs. Until the day her uncle swoops in and forces Beth to choose between her mom's freedom and her own happiness. That's how Beth finds herself living with an aunt who doesn't want her and going to a school that doesn't understand her. At all. Except for the one guy who shouldn't get her, but does....

Ryan Stone is the town golden boy, a popular baseball star jock-with secrets he can't tell anyone. Not even the friends he shares everything with, including the constant dares to do crazy things. The craziest? Asking out the Skater girl who couldn't be less interested in him.

But what begins as a dare becomes an intense attraction neither Ryan nor Beth expected. Suddenly, the boy with the flawless image risks his dreams-and his life-for the girl he loves, and the girl who won't let anyone get too close is daring herself to want it all....

Dare You To is one of those books I’ve been all grabby-hands about since the moment I finished its companion novel Pushing the Limits last year. Katie McGarry’s debut gave me a couple to root for in Noah and Echo, but I knew I’d love to hear Beth’s story. Turns out, not only do I love Beth even more than I did before, but I think Ms. McGarry has added herself to my “Insta-buy List” from this day forward.

Beth Risk is the definition of someone who makes you work for it. The girl has had a hard, gypsy-style life of moving and hiding and taking care of her mother. Her dad left them both long ago, for something that Beth claims was her fault, and she’s been the one to take care of them ever since her dad’s brother Scott abandoned them to become a Yankee (like the baseball team, not the Doodle Dandy). Ryan Stone is a golden boy of Groveton—he’s a baseball star, his dad’s well-known and well-respected, and his older brother helped his high school football team win many a game. However, he’s got his own family troubles hidden beneath the layers. He and his buddies are in a constant Dare War, which is how Our Boy meets Our Girl in a Louisville Taco Bell. The rest, as they say, is a compelling, heart-meltingly romantic tale of redemption, wall-busting, and love with a capital L (for “Lawd, this book is h-o-t”).

I really, truly adored Beth in Pushing the Limits. It was so clear that she had a big heart and that she needed someone to love her the way she deserved to be loved, but she wouldn’t and couldn’t tear down those walls of hers. I spent so much of Dare You To with a deep crease between my eyebrows and a lump in my throat. Dear, sweet Beth. I wish I could hug her and tell her it’s not her fault. I wish she had had a true childhood without any of the harshness that she saw. I felt for her in a deeper way than I previously did for Noah and Echo. This isn’t to say that I didn’t care about them, but there’s just something about Beth that gets under your skin and demands your attention. I blew through this in one sitting, and I could’ve read 450 more pages easily.

And Ryan. A jock with depth. One of my favorite aspects of this novel was its turn on the tradition of bad boy/good girl into bad girl/good boy. That’s something I don’t see often enough, and it’s done so well here. Ryan and his buddies are boys in all the boyiest ways, which you know I love to bits. Have I said that I love well-written male POVs before? Oh, only about a gazillion times? Well, all right then.

Honestly, I have been in such a reading rut lately. Nothing has been able to bust me out of it. I’m so happy to say that Beth and Ryan may have been just what I needed, so thank you Dare You To for being the book I needed. The only problem? Now I have to wait for Isaiah’s story! Dang it, McGarry!

Author Insight: Peculiar Recaps

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 04:00:00 +0000

What is the weirdest way someone (possibly you) has recapped your book?

"It was the first sentence of my first-ever review of my first novel, Out of the Pocket, by Kirkus. 'In this unusual hybrid that juxtaposes hard-hitting, play-by-play football action with scenes of psychological soul-searching…' I remember reading it and thinking: Was that weird? Am I weird? It didn’t seem weird to me… Luckily, in four-plus years since then, not a single person or reviewer has said to me that they thought it was weird that a book about a football player being outed against his will would include both football and soul searching." - Bill Konigsberg, author of Openly Straight.

"Brandon Sanderson christened my faeries in Wings, 'Veggie-Faeries.'" - Aprilynne Pike, author of Life After Theft and Earthbound.

"I can’t think of any weird ones. We were lucky that we stumbled across an idea that was pretty easy to pitch: a high school gets quarantined, and after a year inside, the social cliques devolve into gangs that battle each other at bi- monthly military food drops. I’ve noticed that there’s always someone that gets distracted by the virus that prompted the quarantine. I understand why certain readers might place expectations on that, but for us, it was always just a starting point, a device to justify the world we wanted to create inside our high school." - Lex Hrabe , co-author of Quarantine: The Loners.

"The Collector– Sexy jerk, meet likable nerd." - Victoria Scott, author of The Collector.

"Not sure I have an answer for that...hmm." - Nora Raleigh Baskin, author of Surfacing.

"Weirdest way Slated has been recapped? Can’t think of anything I’d classify as weird, exactly. I’ve had things that have surprised me, though. Like talking with a friend about the world in Slated and finding that we had very different ideas about aspects of it. At first I worried this meant I hadn’t described it enough, but after I thought about it, decided I was happy with this. I personally don’t like it when books don’t leave you any room to imagine. I love that gap, where readers have to make jumps of imagination." - Teri Terry, author of Slated.

"Someone once reviewed Vesper and claimed it was a clear Twilight rip-off and that I was trying to ride that wave. The plots are literally nothing alike—there isn’t even a romance, let alone a love triangle. So I found that kind of bizarre!" - Jeff Sampson, author of Ravage.

"The comment that most surprised me came from an editor who thought my book would be read as an apology or justification for the Ku Klux Klan. I had thought my book would make Klan members angry, and this person suggested the opposite." - A.B. Westrick, author of Brotherhood.

"'Hot guys. Drinking. Fighting. Lying…made me cry. Go read it.' (yeah...that one wasn't from me)" - Molly McAdams, author of Taking Chances.

"In describing The Ghost and the Goth, I usually tell people that I killed the Homecoming Queen. With a bus. It's not a spoiler or anything, as Alona is the ghost in the book, but it does seem to catch some attention!" - Stacey Kade, author of The Ghost & the Goth and The Rules.

"I suppose that having the book categorized by my publisher as a psychological mystery is a little weird, because I never intended to set it up as a mystery with subtle clues and a whodunnit kind of feeling. That’s led to some reviewers scoffing that they weren’t mystified, which speaks to the problem of buttonholing genres. By contrast, here’s a review characterization I cherish: “If this doesn't receive the rave reviews it deserves I'll eat my copy!”" - Liz Coley, author of Pretty Girl-13.

"I have yet to run into the weirdest way. There have been summaries that I don't necessarily agree with, but they aren't weird, and I reserve the right on behalf of readers to summarize how they see fit. But if anyone says it reminds them of the Muppets or something, well, that would be weird. And also awesome." - Kristin Halbrook, author of Nobody But Us.

"A sales rep told me that the marketing director at Harper has been referring to my book as “If JD Salinger and Candice Bushnell got together to rewrite Dead Poets Society,” which I think is pretty great." - Robyn Schneider, author of The Begining of Everything.

Come back Thursday to learn the weirdest way the rest of the
authors' books have been recapped.

<< Previous

Things I Can't Forget by Miranda Kenneally

noreply@blogger.com (S.F. Robertson) — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 04:00:00 +0000

Release Date: March 1, 2013
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Age Group: Young Adult
Format: E-book
Source: Purchased
Series: Hundred Oaks #3
Pages: 320
Buy: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / IndieBound
Description: Goodreads
Kate has always been the good girl. Too good, according to some people at school—although they have no idea the guilty secret she carries. But this summer, everything is different…

This summer she’s a counselor at Cumberland Creek summer camp, and she wants to put the past behind her. This summer Matt is back as a counselor too. He’s the first guy she ever kissed, and he’s gone from a geeky songwriter who loved The Hardy Boys to a buff lifeguard who loves to flirt--with her.

Kate used to think the world was black and white, right and wrong. Turns out, life isn’t that easy…

It took approximately 17 pages for me to put down Miranda Kenneally’s third book Things I Can’t Forget and take to the Twitter to rave about it. Miranda just gets me. She writes about girls and situations that I can relate to so easily without having to relate to it completely. It’s like she somehow met Teenage Jessica and wrote about her, only her versions are more interesting and the girls play sports instead of the clarinet.

This time, our Hundred Oaks High protagonist is Kate Kelly. She’s an exceedingly strict and devout Christian, and she’s a member of the Forrest Sanctuary Church (previously seen in last year’s StealingParker). However, when her best friend Emily asks for her help to get an abortion, Kate begins to fall apart with guilt and shame. She sinned when she took her friend to the clinic that day, and she really needs Emily to pray with her and ask forgiveness for what they did, the thing she can’t forget. Hopefully, you can see why that’s a bit problematic. Their strained relationship forces Kate to be a counselor on her own at Cumberland Creek Camp, where her fellow counselors and campers show her that not everything in life is so clear cut.

My girl Miranda writes some fabulously flawed and compelling female characters. Jordan, Parker, and Kate are nothing alike, except for the fact that they are incredibly real. It’s been a challenge for me to write this review (though I clearly enjoyed the novel), because Kate’s story hit me in a very personal and true way. Kate is a difficult character to love. She says so many things that smack of self-righteous judgment, and yet, every time I felt close to disliking her, I heard her words in my own teenage voice. Granted, I was younger than Kate when I was at my most self-righteous, but it sure sounded like the ghost of Jessica Past. I read this book with the perfect vision of hindsight, and I found myself wishing that I could hop in the TARDIS (with Ten and Rose, obviously) and put this in Teenage Jessica’s hands.

The most important aspect of Kate’s personality, to me, is that she actually and actively listens to those around her, and she truly puts thought into her decisions. She isn’t just going along with the crowd to fit in. Kate chose a hard path for herself, and it’s beyond commendable to see her stick to her guns, especially in the face of a grade A hottie like Matt. Oh me oh my. Miniature Poodle Matt Brown. Teenage Jessica would’ve loved him too, with his guitar playing and no-shoe-wearing and easygoing awesomeness. Miranda knows how to bring the hotties too, which you’ll already know if you’ve read her other two books. Speaking of, all your favorite Hundred Oaks characters come out to play. Who wouldn’t love more time with Parker and Corndog?

Things I Can’t Forget is sweet and painful, honest and thoughtful, hilarious and heart-breaking. I know I’ll recommend this book again and again. It’s the perfect read for Jessicas Past, Present, and Future.