Posts on books

Predictable Plots

Lisa — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 11:52:54 -0800

Susan at Wizards Wireless has a great post about authors who reuse characters and plot devices so consistently you can predict the plot before you open their next book. Susan breaks down the Harry Potter books, Amelia Bedelia, and L. M. Montgomery novels, and she invites readers to join in with their familiar favorites.

Lloyd Alexander is my personal love-to-hate author in this regard. When I was a kid, I totally loved his books, particularly the Prydain Chronicles and the Westmark trilogy (and I still do). But having read those series several times over and then moving onto his stand-alone novels, each time I open one of his books I'm overcome with déjà vu.

Sam Riddleburger blogged about this very issue last year after the publication of The Golden Dream of Carlo Chuchio and posed the question why did Lloyd Alexander essentially rewrite the same story again and again. There are some great comments on that post, and Jason Fisher responded at length on his own blog. If this matter has ever haunted you as it has me, check out both posts.

(I started to write out my own character/plot analysis, but it was so similar to Sam's I decided not to bother. That itself should be evidence of how consistent/repetitive Alexander was.)

That said, I believe Lloyd Alexander's books are well worth reading. The Prydain Chronicles (among them the Newbery Honor-winning The Black Cauldron and the Newbery Award-winning The High King) stand up as a top-notch high fantasy series, forty years after publication. The Westmark trilogy, as well as being a great adventure series, is fascinating for its treatment of governmental revolution. The Rope Trick has one of the strangest endings I've ever read in a children's book... which actually, I guess, depending on how you like your endings, may or may not be a strong selling point.

However, the Vesper Holly books—which I think of as Sherlock Holmes meets Indiana Jones but with a smart, brave young woman as the hero—are the only Alexander books I know that break the mold.

How about you? Head over to Wizards Wireless and share your thoughts. (I know some of my friends could probably write a Baby-Sitters Club synopsis in their sleep!)

Paperback Originals v. Hardcovers

Lisa — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 08:01:43 -0800

Editorial Ass discusses the pros and cons of publishing paperback originals as an alternative to hardcovers in these tough financial times. I found this article interesting from my different perspectives as librarian and prospective author.

From my public librarian standpoint, paperback originals are a mixed blessing. On the one hand, I like hardcovers because they are far sturdier than paperbacks and can handle much heavier circulation. On the other hand, unless a book is very popular or on a school reading list (this includes award-winners), a hardcover book is not likely to circulate heavily—like, enough to fall apart within a few years.

Therefore, in my opinion, it might as well reap the benefits of being a paperback: greater visibility/browsability on our paperback carousels, greater portability for patrons who don't like to lug heavy books, and greater affordability if we need additional or replacement copies. Paperbacks (I'm talking fiction) circulate more heavily than hardcovers, and circulation is the way libraries define a book's success.

The main caveat is that unless they're part of a very heavily promoted series or imprint (e.g., Aladdin MIX) that puts them on our radar, the books must be reviewed, and reviewed positively, in journals such as Kirkus, School Library Journal, Booklist, and VOYA for my library to order them. (Other libraries may treat paperback originals differently.)

From the perspective of a prospective author, I have mixed feelings as well. As EA notes, there's this nose-wrinkling in the industry that if a book was published as a paperback original, it's because your publishing house didn't take the book "seriously."

I have to admit, I've been guilty of nose-wrinkling myself—which was why I was so surprised that three of the first four YA books from Flux to garner starred reviews from major publications were—you guessed it—paperback originals: The Shape of Water, by Anne Spollen, Lament: The Faerie Queen's Deception, by Maggie Stiefvater, and The Way He Lived, by Emily Wing Smith. (Hopefully I've got that right... And the fourth, published in hardcover, was Everything You Want, by Barbara Shoup.) So, obviously there's no obvious correlation there between literary quality and binding.

And if a paperback's affordability makes it that much more likely for customers to buy my (hypothetical) book? Well, it's hard to say no to that. Sure, a hardcover looks good and feels good. But, having worked in a library for several years now, I've come to view both hardcovers and paperbacks as ephemeral objects. There's no other way to approach the fact that something like 98% of books go out of print within a few years. Knowing I'm unlikely to be one of those authors whose books are in print 20/50/100 years from original publication makes it seem to matter a little less.

Finally, speaking as both librarian and prospective author, if in these tough financial times we're faced with the choice of either severely cutting down the number of books published period or publishing many more trade books as paperback originals than as hardcovers, I prefer the latter. As a librarian, I prefer many voices to few. And as a prospective author, I'd like mine to be one of them.

(Via Cynsations.)

Fictional Parents with Interesting Jobs

Lisa — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 17:26:19 -0800

One of my favorite recent reads was Getting the Girl: A Guide to Private Investigation, Surveillance, and Cookery, by Susan Juby. Based on this one and Another Kind of Cowboy, I'm rather a fan of Juby's writing; it's elegant, she does great things with voice, and oh my lord is she funny. Getting the Girl, a sort of sociological teen mystery narrated by ninth grade shrimp and mack daddy Sherman Mack, has moments of brilliant hilarity and sweetness. Bookshelves of Doom has a nice review of it if you want to know more.

I'm bringing it up now, though, because of one wonderful little detail. Well, two. First, Sherman's mom makes her living as a bartender. Second, her hobby? Burlesque dancing.

"Wow," thought I while reading along, "have I ever read another book for young people in which a character's mother was a burlesque dancer?" And then I answered myself, "Verily, no. I know more burlesque dancers in real life than I do in literature." (The latter figure is still rather small, I should say.)

Anyway, that led me to consider the professions of parents throughout children's and teen fiction. Most of us work pretty run-of-the-mill jobs, so it makes sense that most fictional parents would, too. I tend to populate my own stories with parents who are real estate agents, factory workers, truck drivers, professors, bookkeepers—the kinds of jobs my friends' parents had when I was growing up. That means that when a character's mother is, for example, a bartender and burlesque dancer, I sit up and pay attention.

Some other parents in realistic children's/teen fiction with particularly interesting jobs (and it's telling, how difficult it was to come up with these):

Comfort Snowberger's parents in Each Little Bird That Sings, by Deborah Wiles, run a funeral parlor.
Meg's father in A True and Faithful Narrative, by Katherine Sturtevant, is a bookseller in Restoration England, which means that he also writes the books!
Mr. and Mrs. Murry in A Wrinkle and Time, etc., by Madeleine L'Engle are scientists dealing with the extraordinary: tesseracts, time travel, subcellular organisms! Then Calvin O'Keefe comes along studying the regenerative properties of starfish. Wow! Nothing boring there.
Katy's father in Beige, by Cecil Castellucci, is a punk rocker.
Vince's father in Son of the Mob, by Gordon Korman, is... well... you know.
Moose's father in Al Capone Does My Shirts, by Gennifer Choldenko, is an electrician at Alcatraz.
Dewey's father in The Green Glass Sea, by Ellen Klages, is a mathematician working on the "gadget" at Los Alamos.
Hugo's father in The Invention of Hugo Cabret, by Brian Selznick, is a clockmaker and inventor.

Can you think of any others?

Zorba Dances, Etc.

Lisa — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 15:31:52 -0800

Peter at Collecting Children's Books has a wonderful post about how various big-name children's authors reacted to the news of their first book sale (or, in some cases, big prize). He shares anecdotes from the careers of M. E. Kerr, E. L. Konigsburg, and Lloyd Alexander, to name just a few. Here's one of my favorites, on Jean Craighead George's reaction to winning the Newbery:

After putting down the phone, she "serenely opened a can of dog food and handed it to a guest who dropped in, put the book I had been reading in the refrigerator, and washed a batch of clean clothes."

Read the rest here. You'll be rewarded in chuckles.

Good, Old-Fashioned Censorship

Lisa — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 14:03:58 -0800

My blog is apparently all about sex, sex, sex today.

The New Rochelle (NY) School District has bowdlerized Girl, Interrupted, by Susanna Kaysen, which is being taught in an upper-level English class. Pages 64 through 70 were physically removed from each student's copy due to sexual content.

While Thomas Bowdler would surely approve, I do not. I hear these stories all the time but still can't quite believe they're real. I mean, the pages about contraception in our 7th grade health textbooks were glued together, but they were from the 70s. As a teacher quoted in the article says, you should "teach a book or not teach a book"! Ripping pages out is so... so... 21st century, apparently.

(Different question altogether: why, in the age of AIDS, was my 7th grade class using health textbooks from the 70s? Fortunately, they weren't our only source material. We also watched The Ryan White Story!)

Via The Miss Rumphius Effect

Books by Their Covers

Lisa — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 11:32:08 -0800

L. at Jacket Whys invites readers to suggest their favorite children's and YA book covers of 2008. Jacket Whys generally focuses on middle grade and teen fiction, but I suppose there's no explicit limitation there.

Here are some of my favorite book covers of 2008. I should say that I haven't actually read any of these books yet, so the inside of the book isn't influencing my feeling about the outside. They're just books that catch my eye every time I see them on the shelf and make me want to pick them up without even having read the jacket flap or reviews.

Itch, by Kwasney (Holt) - Catchy title; bold, sketchy font; and 90-degree rotated text make me think this is going to be a quirky, light-hearted read.

River Song, by Belinda Hollyer (Holiday House) - Something about the girl's expression of quiet, happy confidence makes me want to know more about her. I'm also intrigued by the carvings beside her.

Highway Cats, by Janet Taylor Lisle (Philomel) - The back-and-forth silhouetted cats have so much energy, I expect an energetic animal adventure within.

Grow: A Novel in Verse, by Juanita Havill (Peachtree) - I love the painterly quality of this cover, so light, bright, and spare. I expect the verse within will follow suit.

Hummingbird, by Kimberly Greene Angle (FSG) - Watermelon = summer = good. I also like the way the stock image is softened by the fun typeface and bird silhouette.

Artichoke's Heart, by Suzanne Supplee (Dutton) - Is it wrong to like this one just because it makes my mouth water? I also like the potential symbolism of the empty candy wrapper at the "heart" of the cover.

Thumbelina: Tiny Runaway Bride, by Barbara Ensor (Schwartz & Wade) - The bold, bright colors and retro design capture me, and, once again, I love the sketchy cursive font.

One Small Step, by Philip Kerr (McElderry) - Among the title, the font, and the image, this cover gives me very clear clues as to what the book is about. But there's a surprise: a boy walking with chimps? Color me intrigued!

Over all, what I can gather from this exercise about my personal taste in cover art:

I like original art over photos.
I like silhouettes.
I like interesting fonts.
I like clean, bright covers.
I like food.

What do you think? Head over to Jacket Whys and speak your mind!

Talk of the Blogs

Lisa — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:57:39 -0800

I've latched onto a couple of interesting discussions taking place in the Kidlitosphere in the past 24 hours. Take a look...

Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect asks why we read. Her question is spurred by a profoundly irritating, borderline offensive review of Twilight in The Atlantic, "What Girls Want," by Caitlin Flanagan. The column is rife with gross generalizations and ignorance of teen literature, not to mention multi-directional sexism and heterosexism. Even if I weren't a person who hates being told what I think, what I feel, what I'm like, or who I am (does anyone?), I'd still want to remind Ms. Flanagan that one person's experiences do not a broad-sweeping phenomenon make.
Liz at A Chair, a Fireplace, and a Tea Cozy asks what personal area of expertise results in a "fail" moment when the book you're reading gets it wrong. For me, it's dog ownership and librarianship. And, I suppose local information. (I still haven't gotten over James Howe sending that giraffe to the nonexistent zoo in Kalamazoo!)

2008 Bad Sex in Fiction Award!

Lisa — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 14:22:00 -0800

The UK Guardian's Bad Sex in Fiction Award has been announced! This year's winner is a book called Shire Hell, by Rachel Johnson. John Updike was also awarded a lifetime achievement award.

You can read (and possibly cringe over) excerpts from some of the short-listed books online. I'd share some here, but, well, this is a family blog.

Bits & Bobs from the Blogs

Lisa — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 14:50:36 -0800

Here's a scattering/smattering of blog articles I've enjoyed this week:

Leila at Bookshelves of Doom interviews Kathleen Duey. Duey wrote Skin Hunger, the first in a pretty darn dark fantasy trilogy. I loved it, and it was short-listed for the National Book Award in 2007. The second volume, Sacred Scars is apparently off to the copyeditor, which means it will be on the shelves in only... wait... what's that? It won't be on shelves until Fall 2009? Evil, evil, evil snail's pace of publishing!
Molly at Bowen Press notes the similarities in the marketing of The Phantom of the Opera and Twilight. The similarities are so glaring, it's a wonder no one's pointed them out before.

Speaking of Twilight, Carlie at Librarilly Blonde calls Stephenie Meyer on her assertion that "no one was supposed to read these but me." I'm with Carlie. Writing itself is generally a highly personal endeavor, but once you start querying agents and editors, you're assuming (or, at the very least, hoping) other people will want to read your book, too. Maybe Meyer didn't expect the books to be such a blockbuster, but considering her mega-advances? I have to imagine she got a clue pretty early on.
At the Carolrhoda blog, Andrew Karre discusses the importance of "naughty bits" in books for children and teens to make them appealingly subversive... or subversively appealing... whichever.
Hosted by Cynsations, Gail Langer Karwoski gives children's authors and illustrators the ABCs of School Visits. This article is going in my file for that magical, miracle, maybe day I can call myself a published children's author.

The Day I Became an Autodidact

Lisa — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:49:50 -0800

Since Carey turned me on to The Teenage Liberation Handbook: How to Quit School and Get a Real Life and Education, by Grace Llewellyn, I've adopted a pretty critical stance toward formal education. (Actually, my husband would probably tell you this is a vast understatement.) Subbing in the Chicago Public Schools for six months and dealing with inane school assignments at the library for three years have not improved my opinion.*

I was very successful in school, and school did benefit me in certain ways, but I cannot say that it was a very happy experience over all or that I think my time couldn't have been spent more productively elsewhere. My real life as a teen was outside of school: Girl Scouts, art classes, camping and camp counseling, church choir, church youth group, GLBTQ youth group. Going to the theatre with my parents, riding bikes and hanging out in the woods with my friends, writing stories in my notebooks, baby-sitting, riding my bike to the library, sketching in the park, learning to cook.

I realize I was very lucky. I grew up in an area where there were lots of outside-of-school opportunities and you didn't need a car to get everywhere. I had smart, supportive parents. And I'm a pretty driven person who does well with self-directed learning and self-discipline. In other words, while unschooling may not be the right thing for every kid in every situation, I think I would have been an ideal candidate.

I think most smart adults become autodidacts once they get their diplomas—taking up a new musical instrument or developing their skill on an old one, learning a new art or craft, studying a foreign language, traveling the world, writing books, making films, reading about everything under the sun. It stretches the definition of autodidactism, but I think taking community center classes should count, too, because they're voluntary and you do most of the work independently. No one is grading you. It's all up to your own interest and self-discipline.

Don't you ever wonder what you could have done if you'd had all those hours you spent in classroom drudgery to pursue your interests? I didn't need formal schooling to become a librarian, writer, or web designer. I might even have found my path sooner without school in the way.

Anyway, enough kvetching about my misspent youth. (It's all grist for the mill, after all.) The other day Collecting Children's Books mentioned a book called The Day I Became an Autodidact and the Advice, Adventures, and Acrimonies That Befell Me Thereafter, by Kendall Hailey. It's the memoir of a teen girl who left formal schooling in high school and pursued autodidactism. Clearly I needed to read it.

I started it today and am already in love. The narrative voice is charmingly old-fashioned (though it was published in 1988), and there's so much humor to it. I've wished it wasn't a library book so I could go through with a highlighter. There are so many gems. Some snippets that have stuck out to me already...

Upon receiving a summer reading list:

I read (rarely skimming) everything school tells me to from the middle of September to the middle of June, but the summer is mine. And being told what to read during summer suddenly made me realize that I don't really like being told what to read during the fall, winter, and spring either. (foreword)

Upon reading about the life of Tolstoy:

It turns out that to be a great literary genius, not only do you not have to go to college, you don't even have to be very good at educating yourself. I always like to begin a new phase of life on a comforting note. (p. 4-5)

Upon finishing Anna Karenina:

His novel has aroused in me many doubts about how we can hope to do good things. I dreamed last night that the only way I wouldn't feel guilty spending my life being a writer would be to cure cancer first—and even then I would still feel a little guilty. (p. 5)

On sleep:

I hate sleep and I hate how much time I spend doing it, but, quite frankly, I think it is the only thing that keeps human beings from going mad: the illusion that life is not one continuous stream, but the more manageable concept of days. A day, contemplated in its entirety, is hard enough to deal with. A life, contemplated in its entirety, is an impossible concept. (p. 10)

I could go on, but you get the picture. I look forward to reading more!

*No offense intended to the teachers out there. I know you do the best you can with what you've got for curriculum, NCLB standards, etc. And there are tons of families out there that could never pull off unschooling, and those kids need you! But is school everything it could/should be? I don't think so.