So they're making a movie based on the Goosebumps novels by R.L. Stine, coming out this October, and I'm super excited about it. I realize that if you're a teenager right now, there's a good chance you've never heard of Goosebumps. If you're sixteen years old today, then they were all written before you were even born. That's just crazy to me.

Goosebumps were YA before YA was a thing. People seem to think Harry Potter was the first series of Young Adult novels. Nope. YA literature has always been around, just in a different section of the library.

So because I'm feeling nostalgic, and I'm reminiscing about what I read when I was in school, I thought I would recommend some YA books from yester years that are still worth reading today. Enjoy!

When Kristan told me that YA Diversity Book Club had picked SIMON VS. THE HOMO SAPIENS AGENDA for this month, I was excited to have someone to gush with me over the story. You see, Simon inflates my heart. This book made me feel like I was in love. Love in all its awkwardness, agony and impossibility.

So when Kristan asked me if I wanted to post about Simon, I was like...let me think...YES! This is not because I need to add to the hype that surrounds the book. This is certainly something that fatigues our group. i.e. If something's getting loads of attention, it tends to influence our reading, and not normally in a good way.

I wanted to post about Simon because I felt him.

There are things in this book that aren't perfect. *shrugs her shoulders* You'll most likely guess Blue's identity (which is delicious). You'll probably dislike certain characters and then understand them a bit later on (just like real life). You might even forget all the minor characters that pale in comparison to Simon (his name's in the title, yo). And somehow that will all be okay because for the length of a book, you will BE Simon. And you'll nod along to his thoughts because you KNOW him. (Spoiler: I'm not gay). The world around him is quietened when Blue is in it. Things dim and brighten and crash and burn and rise just like a good story. But what everything comes down to is Simon. Clever, beautiful, funny Simon:

"...I'm tired of coming out. All I ever do is come out. I try not to change, but I keep changing, in all these tiny ways. I get a girlfriend. I have a beer. And every freaking time, I have to introduce myself to the universe all over again."

"'It's a Dementor robe over my clothes...'
'What's a Dementor?'
I mean, I can't even. 'Nora, you are no longer my sister.'" 

I think (hope) that you'll love him as much as I do.


For more on SIMON VS. THE HOMO SAPIENS AGENDA, be sure to check out all of our great features:

• Our group discussion at the Teen Lit Rocks
• Q&A with Becky Albertalli at Gone Pecan
• "Simon Says: The Audiobook Agenda" at the Reading Date

Next month we're reading UNDER A PAINTED SKY by Stacey Lee. Please feel free to join us by reading along! You can also visit the full archive of YADBC posts and #YADiversityBookClub tweets.

Link: http://www.buzzfeed.com/kayetoal/add-the-things-you-long-for#.jbw1ved28

A few highlights:

1. On "The Chosen One" stories

RR: Well, I think we all sort of want to be chosen. Because being chosen means having a purpose. Being chosen gives your life meaning and clarity.

KT: And it makes pain so much more bearable, in some ways, whereas a teenager struggling with depression may find it hard to figure out whether their pain and their life has meaning.

2. On beauty

I went almost 40 years without seeing anyone presented as beautiful unless they met a really narrow standard. I never saw fat women presented as beautiful. I think Tumblr, specifically, has actually healed my brain. It’s exposed me to so many types of beauty. And I realized that I have widened my own standards to include myself.

It has been said that the setting of a book is almost like another character. That is certainly true for many of my favorite novels, in which the setting evokes vivid images as well as intimate familiarity. It's like I am living the story along with the characters; I can see, hear and feel everything around me--the trickle of a stream, the soggy heat of a summer day, or the first burst of light as the sun rises. Reading a book by authors skilled at creating rich, organic environments is a treat for the senses and one of my favorite luxuries.

Below are five books that blew me away with their solid use of setting:

Link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brandi-megan-mantha/making-pretty-a-conversation-with-ya-author-corey-ann-haydu_b_7233898.html at Huff Post Books

A few highlights:

1. On the word "pretty"

Even though when I was a teenager I understood that it was great to be smart and talented and funny and brave, I was the most anxious about being pretty. I felt its importance really early on, and I took it on as a kind of goal. In some ways the word pretty is a little like the word love -- it only has the meaning we assign to it. There isn't a definitive pretty, but we act as if there is. I still feel the echoes of my concern with prettiness, it still feels like a large and important word to me, but in writing this book I hoped to dismantle it a bit -- for myself and for readers. I'd like to strip it of its importance, so that we can focus on all the other great things we can be. But for now, if I'm entirely honest, it's still a word that haunts me. 

2. On writing for teens vs. writing for adults

For now, I like writing from a teen perspective since I have some distance from that time in my life and the distance frees me up to write honestly and emotionally. But aside from that personal preference, I think the strategies and craft and emotional energy it takes to write a book remains the same. I am writing about teenagers, but mostly I'm writing about people. Teens are all reading adult novels in school, so there's no reason to write differently for them. The benefit of YA is that it is more squarely about things they might be experiencing and is taking their interior lives seriously. But in terms of craft or intent, I don't think there's a difference.

Three weeks ago, I had a visitor.

no idea what's happening in the back

All of We Heart YA used to live in Cincinnati, you see, and now we live in exotic places like Denver, London and...Norwood ;)

Let's pretend that we moved to these far-flung places just to make our holidays that much more interesting. London, for instance, has never been as magical as it was when exploring with Kristan.

can't get lost with a pink backpack

I had yet to visit Borough Market under the London Bridge and so glad that we did...

modeled by my own DNA

We went to Cambridge and found where DNA was discovered...
We went to my brother-in-law's farm traipsing about in the mud to feed Jack the horse and cuddle fox  hound puppies...

 

I wish I could say that we also did tons of writing and worked on our projects, but living and experiencing was the work we had to hand. And we did it well!

finally some proper English weather!

Have you been on any adventures lately?

The YA Diversity Book Club has been going strong for almost a year now. (Woohoo!) Recently we realized that all of our selections so far have been either contemporary or historical -- i.e., realistic fiction. Wanting to broaden our scope and examine diversity in other genres, we looked to Sabaa Tahir's much talked about debut, AN EMBER IN THE ASHES.

Here's a brief description of the story:

Laia is a slave. Elias is a soldier. Neither is free.

Under the Martial Empire, defiance is met with death. Those who do not vow their blood and bodies to the Emperor risk the execution of their loved ones and the destruction of all they hold dear.

When Laia’s brother is arrested for treason, Laia is forced to make a decision. In exchange for help from rebels who promise to rescue her brother, she will risk her life to spy for them from within the Empire’s greatest military academy.

There, Laia meets Elias, the school’s finest soldier -- and secretly, its most unwilling. Elias wants only to be free of the tyranny he’s being trained to enforce. He and Laia will soon realize that their destinies are intertwined -- and that their choices will change the fate of the Empire itself.

To be perfectly honest, after reading EMBER, I'm not sure that I would classify it as a diverse read. The world-building seems to draw from multiple sources -- most notably Ancient Rome, and a little from the Kashmir region -- but none of them comes through strongly enough for me to feel that I've learned more about a specific culture. That said, Tahir spun those influences into a wholly original setting and society, which is no small feat! And of course she is a diverse author -- a woman of color -- which I think is significant.

(Also, as Sandie pointed out in our group discussion, that still fits the We Need Diverse Books mission/criteria.)

Anyway, EMBER is a riveting and thoughtful read. For me, one of its strongest points was the dual POV structure. Sometimes two characters can sound too much alike, or the author will cover the same ground from both perspectives. But in EMBER, Elias is confident and wry, while Laia is fearful but determined, and each of their sections moved the story forward, adding information and building tension until the explosive (wink wink) end.

Interestingly, several other diverse books that we've read recently also featured dual POVs.

LIKE NO OTHER by Una LaMarche was YA Diversity Book Club's very first selection! A Romeo & Juliet story set in Brooklyn, between a Hasidic Jewish girl and a West Indian boy.

THE WALLED CITY by Ryan Graudin technically features three point of views. Two girls and one young man struggle to escape a rough-and-tumble neighborhood inspired by the real life area of Kowloon in Hong Kong.

LIES WE TELL OURSELVES by Robin Talley was another YADBC pick. Two teenage girls in Virginia grapple with their sexuality during the era of de-segregation.

THE STORYSPINNER by Becky Wallace is a Brazilian-flavored high fantasy novel. It actually rotates between several characters, but due to 3rd person narration it still feels focused on the two protagonists, Johanna the storyspinner and Rafael the young duke.

What other novels do you think use dual POVs really well? Or are there any coming out soon that you're excited about? We want to know!


For more on AN EMBER IN THE ASHES, be sure to check out all of our great features:

• Our group discussion at the Reading Date
• Q&A with Sabaa Tahir at Teen Lit Rocks
• Standalone or Series? at Gone Pecan

Next month we're reading SIMON VS. THE HOMO SAPIENS AGENDA by Becky Albertalli (which the Gay YA Book Club recently discussed on Twitter). Please feel free to join us by reading along! You can also visit the full archive of YADBC posts and #YADiversityBookClub tweets.

Our local indie bookseller, Joseph-Beth, has been on a roll! On March 31, they hosted yet another great YA panel, with Emery Lord, Kate Hattemer, David Arnold, and Courtney C. Stevens.

As usual, I live-tweeted from the event, and I have collected those tweets here with some additional photos and tweets from other people in attendance. Below that, I also have a few more notes -- both funny and insightful -- from the authors. Enjoy!


And here's what couldn't quite be captured in 140 characters...

ON THE WRITING PROCESS

Kate hates drafting. Because it's like, "Good day's work? No! Bad day's work!" So she tries to do the first draft pretty fast -- like two months. (Plus that way, if she were to die suddenly, no one would ever get the chance to see it.) She relishes revision.

Emery revises as she goes. She especially hones the first third of the story, meaning that it takes much longer than the rest of her book. When she's stuck, she likes to go to concerts.

David wrote his first book as the stay-at-home dad of newborn. So basically: Whenever, wherever he could.

Courtney says, "Every book is a different beast." She actually threw away about 20,000 pages to get to the book that is now THE LIES ABOUT TRUTH. "I don't think that makes me a bad writer. I think turning in that first book would have made me a bad writer."

QUESTION FROM EMERY (who moderated the panel): What writer would you trade brains with? You could see their work-in-progress, and they could see yours.

Emery: Melina Marchetta
David: A.S. King
Kate: Richard Russo
Courtney: Markus Zusak and Neil Gaiman

QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: People always talk about the challenges and frustrations of writing. What about the joys?

David wrote a lot of his story to his son. (So obviously that was very meaningful and rewarding for him.)

Emery writes to a point of catharsis. She writes to give herself a happy place.

Kate loves the feeling of getting the prose just right.

Courtney thinks the bad stuff actually doesn't have to do with writing and actually is just about personal insecurity. She anchors herself to moments that no one can take away. Like getting a message from someone about why her book mattered to them. Changing someone's life through art that you made.

MISCELLANY

"No one will ever think it's autobiographical," Kate joked about writing her debut novel from a boy's POV. She also added, "Or maybe that's because it's about a heroic gerbil..."

David and Courtney are writing a Middle Grade book together via email, just for fun. It's structured as letters between two kids, one at summer camp, the other back at home.

Kate finds that she's always talking about books. For example: She once chatted with her sister about Harry Potter for 4 hours straight. "That's what humans do; we talk in stories."

Somewhat related: Kate's little sister listened exclusively to Harry Potter audiobooks from age 2-6. She ended up with a British accent!

Link: "One Thing Leads to Another: An Interview with Laura Ruby" at YALSA's The Hub

A few highlights:

1. On being angry and getting perspective

I should have been humiliated by it all—by the drama at my school, by the forced psych evaluation, by the refusal of all these idiot adults to believe I’d written what I’d written, to believe me. Except I wasn’t humiliated, I was furious. And not furious in a self-conscious or inchoate way, not furious just for the sake of it. I was purely, righteously angry. I thought, here I am telling the truth and I’m being punished for it.

But after this happened, it was much harder to be angry at stupid little things, much harder to be humiliated by the need to ask a question. Some of the debilitating self-consciousness began to fall away.

Once, I was whining to my dear friend Anne Ursu about feeling incapable of writing a particular story, feeling like I wasn’t talented enough to do it. And she told me that it was good I felt that way, that you should always be working at the very limits of your abilities. What’s the point, she said, of writing a book you already know how to write?

But I think this advice applies to almost everything. It’s just a more elegant and specific way of saying, “Try. Just try.”

Every once in a while, we'll be discussing a book we all enjoyed. Ingrid, who will have just finished reading it, will say "Oh, I need to own this book." And then Kristan will offer Ingrid her copy, saying that she'll never read it again anyway. Kristan's always running out of space to store books, so she's constantly in the process of bringing in new books and giving away old ones.

For me, saying I'll never read a book again and actually giving it away means I probably didn't enjoy it very much. When I like a book, I automatically plan to reread it, without even thinking about it. I may not ever actually get around to it... but the plan is there in the back of my mind. I guess I just always want to have the possibility of experiencing the story again.

I also find that I'm constantly returning to the last great book that really transported me, wishing to find the same magic it had the first time around, until I find the next book that captures me. It's always bittersweet rereading a book that you've lost yourself in before, because your first experience with it is something you can't have again. If only you could bottle that feeling.

The other reason I return to books is to scour them for inspiration. Every time I read a story again, I learn more about it and how it was put together. I know Sarah does the same thing. Every time she comes to a standstill in her writing, she rereads one of the books that gave her the idea in the first place. She uses it to recalibrate.

I feel like you could learn a lot about me by the books I've reread in the past year. The books I've reread lately are:

• The Daughter of Smoke and Bone trilogy
• The How to Train Your Dragon series
• Shadow and Bone
• Alice in Wonderland
• Pegasus

Do you reread books? What have you been rereading lately?