Posts Tagged "Young ADult Reads"

Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl’s debut novel, Beautiful Creatures, is our Book of the Month during January. The authors took some time our of their busy schedules to answer some questions about their story and their beloved characters. Enjoy.

*Author photo credit: Alex Hoerner

What is it like co-authoring a book? Does this process ever get complicated or confusing at any stage?

Margie: You know, since this is our debut novel, we really don’t know any other way to do it. The most complicated part is definitely juggling our schedules so we can work. The easiest part is the writing. We’ve been friends longer than writing partners, so we can finish each other’s sentences – and that’s how we write, too.

Kami: We can fight like sisters, but it’s always about the mundane – the schedule – how cold our office is – why there is no ice for the Diet Coke. We’ve never disagreed about the story. And this year has been so overwhelming for us in so many ways, I can’t imagine going through it alone.

When you write, do you get together and write, or do you writing individually and then come together and edit?

Margie: We work separately. If we are in the same room, we’re still separated by my enormous earphones. Music vs. no music – we can’t write in the same airspace!

Kami: But we edit together, hashing out huge, color-coded whiteboards that plot all the character arcs, magic developments, and story beats. Our office is in Margie’s house, and it’s like the war room.

Was focalizing the story through Ethan’s POV a conscious decision, or did it just kind of happen?

Margie: We knew Lena was our mystery, and our supernatural. We wanted a strong female character with power, and we wanted to follow Ethan as he found his way into her story.

Kami: We also knew we were doing something less typical in YA, by allowing the reader to experience insecurity, first love, and fear through the eyes of a guy. To see what guys are thinking about girls, for once.We also fell in love with Ethan, the guy we never dated in high school…

As two female authors, was it difficult to write a romance-centered story from a male point of view?

Margie: Not really. We have six brothers between us. Also, there is so much already out there that is written from a teen girl’s perspective, it might have been harder to find our own voice if we hadn’t written from Ethan’s POV.

Kami: Sometimes it’s easier to write from a perspective that is definitely not your own. And Ethan is a great guy. He’s easy to write, because we love him so much.

Did you have prior knowledge/personal interest in magic and witchcraft, or was this something you had to research for Beautiful Creatures?

Margie: Just a lifetime of reading Diana Wynne Jones and high fantasy! I can’t imagine writing a book that didn’t have some sort of magic in it. Ever since I first read Susan Cooper’s The Dark Is Rising series in third grade, I have been living in a fantasy world. And yes, I can still recite the poem from the front of that book.

Kami: We are both huge fantasy readers, so magic and magical lore has always been swimming around in our minds. I don’t consider the magic in BC witchcraft, per say. But I have always been interested in the way religions from Africa and the West Indies influenced Southern culture. I’m so superstitious that I might as well be Amma.

When it comes to naming your characters, what kind of process do you go through?

Margie: We have raided our family genealogy for generations, to begin with… But we also do lots of research on the meaning of the names.

Kami: We used French-Creole names for Lena’s family, and traditional or more obscure Southern names for the folks in Gatlin.

A little birdy told us that Beautiful Creatures has just been optioned by Warner Bros and is set to be made into a film. Can you confirm or deny this?

Margie: Was the little birdy named Variety? ☺

Kami: Yes. We are so thrilled that Warner Brothers optioned the film for a supremely talented writer/director, Richard LaGravenese, and a hugely capable producer, Erwin Stoff.

How much input/control will the two of you have (if any at all)?

Margie: When Richard and Erwin came into the picture, we knew we could trust them. Their track records speak for themselves.

Kami: And we knew Warner Brothers would be the perfect home for Beautiful Creatures. Really, we couldn’t be happier. We’ll stick to writing and leave the rest to them.

What’s in your to-be-read list at the moment?

Margie: I am just finishing a draft of a work in progress, the newest middle grade book by my old friend, Pseudonymous Bosch. He’s the Roald Dahl of my generation, I adore him.

Kami: I am completely in love with the draft of Holly Black’s WHITE CAT, which I’m reading for the second time. Her new Curse Workers series is going to be huge! And I just finished her short story collection, POISON EATERS.

What are your all time fave YA novels?

Margie: TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD by Harper Lee. In case you couldn’t tell…

Kami: Well, she took my favorite. After TKM, it would be THE OUTSIDERS by S.E. Hinton & FREAK THE MIGHTY by Rodman Philbrick.

Is it true that this series is set to be a five-book series?

Margie: We are just finishing our sequel now.

Kami: It comes out this same time next year. We are really excited about it!

Can you tell us anything about the next instalment?

Margie: Mortal danger. True love. Broken hearts.

Kami: Ethan and Lena are up against unbelievable odds. And there’s sweet tea.

You can keep up with Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl at www.BeautifulCreaturestheBook.com.

Join the BEAUTIFUL CREATURES US fansite at www.CasterGirls.com.

Visit Little, Brown’s Beautiful Creatures website at
www.SomeLovesAreCursed.com.

In case you’ve forgotten, we’ve been featuring Lili St Crow’s Betrayals as our Book of the Month in December. To close off the promo, Lili sat down and penned a review of Sarah Dessen’s Dreamland for your reading pleasure. Enjoy!

Dreamland by Sarah Dessen

The first Sarah Dessen book I ever read was Dreamland, and it is to Dessen I owe my reintroduction to the young adult genre. When I was of the age to be marketed to as a “young adult”, I found most of the offerings insipid to say the least, and downright patronizing at worst. I’m glad to say that the genre seems to have undergone something of a revolution in the last five to seven years, and Dessen holds a special place in my heart as the person who introduced me to a new breed of YA books.

Dreamland is about Caitlin O’Koren, a younger sister whose older sister Cass leaves home without a word on Caitlin’s birthday. The reason for her sister’s flight is beautifully shown but never spelled out: their mother’s almost frantic insistence on living her life through one of her children. Both O’Koren parents are flawed but not overly so, doing the best they can.

Caitlin, after living her entire life in Cass’s shadow, suddenly finds herself the focus of her mother’s ambitions. She’s now a stand-in instead of a postscript, and when she meets the appropriately dangerous-seeming Rogerson Briscoe, she makes the first of many abortive attempts at freedom. Unfortunately, Rogerson is a problem in and of himself. He has serious anger-management issues, a bad home life, and is exactly the wrong boyfriend for a vulnerable, uncertain girl.

Unfortunately, many real-life stories start out this way and end tragically.

When I was young enough to be a target audience for YA, the subject of teen dating violence—like so many other subjects—was taboo. I think what grabbed my attention most in Dreamland was Dessen’s unflinching but gentle look at the realities of such a situation. Rogerson is not a villain, he’s a messed-up kid. Caitlin is spoiled, yes, but she’s also loyal to her friends and trying to shoulder her family’s burden as well as she can. Caitlin’s mother is so devastated by her older daughter’s disappearance that her younger daughter becomes a figurehead to her, and Mr. O’Koren is uncomfortable with anything even relating to “girl talk” and prefers concrete action over emotional messes. All these things conspire to make an abyss Caitlin falls into, one she can’t extract herself from without help. She’s not completely a victim, and Rogerson is not completely evil.

I remember finishing Dreamland for the first time and feeling as if Dessen had reached into some of my most secret memories. The shame Caitlin feels, her need to “protect” Rogerson and cover things up, the pressure of her family’s loss, all these things felt familiar. It felt like someone was speaking the truth, and I do not remember the young adult books of my young adulthood ever giving me that frisson. Instead, I graduated early to the “adult” section of the library and didn’t look back—until Dessen.
Dreamland is not perfect. For one thing, the pacing is uneven and Caitlin’s therapy is not given nearly enough room. For another, all Dessen’s heroines start out (even if they haven’t always been) as upper-middle-class. Money is rarely an issue for the kids in her books, and it seems a shame that a writer of Dessen’s talents hasn’t explored that angle. Rogerson Biscoe screams “trouble” so loud, and Caitlin is such a sleepwalker, that occasionally the adult me wanted to shake both of them—as well as Caitlin’s mother. Still, the very strength of my emotional response tells me that these are well-crafted characters. If they weren’t, I wouldn’t have fallen so hard into the world of the book, nor would I reread it with my heart in my mouth each time.

I’ve read most, if not all, of Dessen’s other young adult books, and been entertained each time. Dreamland, however, remains something special. Every time I read it, it’s like the author—and Caitlin herself—are speaking directly to me. Which is a feeling to treasure, whether one is seventeen or seventy. Dessen opened up the new world of the young adult genre for me, and I’m glad to note that books for younger readers are not the clichéd swill that was the only thing on offer when I was significantly younger than I am now. Each time I see a new Dessen book, I feel a thrill and reach for my bank card.

And that, as a reader, is the highest compliment I can give.

“We went to the moon to have fun, but the moon turned out to completely suck.”

So says Titus, a teenager whose ability to read, write, and even think for himself has been almost completely obliterated by his “feed,” a transmitter implanted directly into his brain. Feeds are a crucial part of life for Titus and his friends. After all, how else would they know where to party on the moon, how to get bargains at Weatherbee & Crotch, or how to accessorize the mysterious lesions everyone’s been getting? But then Titus meets Violet, a girl who cares about what’s happening to the world and challenges everything Titus and his friends hold dear. A girl who decides to fight the feed.

When I first saw Feed mentioned in Maggie Stiefvater’s ‘Top Twelve Books of 2009’, I knew that I had to read this novel. (For those who don’t know, Maggie is the author of Shiver) What gripped me from the first page of this novel is the sense of grim reality. This isn’t a novel where everything is carefully scripted, it’s honest and raw. Dialogue and thought coming from a place that strikes me as real. Through every thought of Titus I got a sense of being completely in over my head, struggling to find meaning of events taking place. Which, I believe, is exactly the response author M. T. Anderson was looking for.

Feed opens with a group of friends on spring break who have decided to take off to the moon to find entertainment. But the moon isn’t exactly what they expected. They run into Violet, who for all appearances is as average and normal as the rest of them. Except for the fact she was home-schooled and needs to live a little. Yet everything doesn’t run smoothly on the moon. For Titus and his friends become the subjects of a hacker, resulting in their feeds being disconnected, leaving them shut off from the world. Imagine having the internet permanently accessible to you, then suddenly it’s gone. Yet this internet is the basis of everything. Communication, human contact. The world.

All too soon – or not soon enough depending on your point of view – the technicians of FeedTech have fixed the problem and Titus, Violet and their friends can continue on with their normal life as American consumers. However one member of this group doesn’t have it as easy as the rest. Even before the hack, Violet was about defying the feed. About not conforming to society. Testing the boundaries to see how far she can push. And her limit may have just arrived, for her feed hasn’t recovered the same as everyone else’s. Slowly, Violet is losing control of her most basic functions and without the money to fund repairs, Violet and Titus know that she only has a short amount of time to live.

With not enough time to do anything, Violet tries to do everything. Yet underneath it all there is still her belief in fighting the system. Her belief that there is something more out there than the average American. But can she communicate this to Titus in a way he can understand before it’s too late?

I’ve always measure novels in terms of how well I can get lost in the story. Feed is one that had me completely lost in the story. Anderson wove a story that was so compelling and so real. This isn’t a fantasy or alternate universe with different rules. It’s a grim look at a future possible reality. The ‘feeds’ which is the subject matter of a large portion of the novel is a highly advanced internet interface which is installed in your brain – it takes over everything from breathing and moving and completely removes the necessity of reading. It categories and records everything you do, building a profile of you used by American corporations. It is a place that we could very well be heading. A scary and controlling place. And through this, we have Violet who is fighting for a better world, a world where youth don’t live in ignorance of what is happening outside of their suburb, where youth remember the history of the past and what the world used to be like. It is Violet who made this novel all the more real, as she tries to break from society.

This is just one of those novels that needs to be read. At the core, one girls emotional and physical struggle to change the world, seen through the eyes of one that struggles and fails to break free of the constraints of society.

A warning to younger readers, frequent coarse language does occur.

Pages: 300

Publication date: 2004

Rating::

Oaths sworn…loyalties tested…forces collide.

It’s been only months since Eragon first uttered “brisingr”, an ancient-language term for fire. Since then, he’s not only learned to create magic with words – he’s been challenged to his very core. Following the colossal battle against the Empire’s warriors on the Burning Plains, Eragon and his dragon, Saphira, have narrowly escaped with their lives. Still, there is more adventure at hand for the Rider and his dragon, as Eragon finds himself bound by a tangle of promises he may not be able to keep.

When unrest claims the rebels and danger strikes from every corner, Eragon must make choices – choices that will take him across the Empire and beyond, choices that may lead to unimagined sacrifice.

Eragon is the greatest hope to rid the land of tyranny. Can this once simple farm boy unite the rebel forces and defeat the king?

Murtagh is defeated – for now. But not after revealing the information the rocks Eragon to his core and changes everything he knew and thought was right in his life. Struggling with the true identify of his mother and rejecting that of his father, Eragon is trying to find where he truly belongs. After having his entire being affected by the Ageti Blodhren ceremony of the elves, Eragon is starting to feel the binds of the oaths that he has made – oaths to each race and the individual people of Alagaesia.

First, is the oath to his cousin Roran. Roran’s betrothed is being held hostage by the Ra’zac – servants of Galbatorix, they spread fear in their opponents making them a deadly enemy in battle. And for this battle, it is impossible for Eragon and Saphira to be together. For it is in the caves of the Ra’za, caves too small for Saphira to fit through. Eragon and Roran are on their own. And when further complications arise, Eragon is making the first of his decisions that will affect the entire Empire.

Then there is the oath to Elva, the blessed-yet-cursed child that Eragon has promised to help. Yet when it comes to the ancient language, nothing is a simple as it seems. The more Eragon learns, the more he beings to realise how hard it is to remove the cures he placed on Elva. One wrong pronunciation and it could become a lot worse.

Then there is the problem of his un-finished education and the promise to return to Ellesmera to complete this. Yet can Eragon really afford the time to travel across the Empire when the Varden need him now more than ever?

For it is Ellesmera that holds the key to the next stage of the battle against Galbatorix. For Ellesmera holds the only elf with the knowledge on how to forge a Rider’s sword. A sword Eragon is in need of after Za’roc was taken from him by Murtagh on the plains. For only a Rider’s sword can face another of its kind and only a Rider’s sword can withstand the pressure of magic. Yet this seemingly simple process is complicated further by more oaths and promises, some that Eragon himself doesn’t yet know the cost of.

As Eragon, Saphira, Arya and the Varden hurdle closer to the battle that will decide the fate of the world, each side begins to face the costs of what has be promised.

In Brisingr, I feel Paolini has outdone himself. This is by far the best of the series. The characters all come leaps and bounds, with the multiple viewpoints woven simultaneously into a smooth plot that gives you an understanding of each and every race that make up Alagaesia. One of the biggest things I noticed in Brisingr was the development of the characters and the relationship between these characters. You could see just how much each character was standing for and just how much they would lose if they failed.

Personally, I’m a sucker for romance in any for, and the continuing developments between Eragon and Arya had me happy in this novel. There still isn’t a relationship between these two, yet the strength and development of the friendship that Paolini developed between Eragon and Arya was so believable and strong, that it had me smiling at many stages in this novel. Not to mention the ending that had me tear up at one stage, due to the pure and raw emotion in the scene.

Once again, I would recommend Brisingr to any lover of epic adventure fantasy novels, and with one instalment left to go, I will be looking forward to the release date for the last novel in the Inheritance Cycle as much as the next reader.

Pages: 763

Publication Date: 2008

Rating::

Melissa Marr, author of the popular Wicked Lovely series, is spreading a little Christmas cheer on her blogs right now and has posted a couple of chapters from Radiant Shadows, the fourth novel in the Wicked Lovely series.

Click here if you want to take a look.

Radiant Shadows is scheduled for release in 2010.

Note: Some people would rather wait for the book’s release. If you do chose to read the chapters, please refrain from making comments about the plot or characters which may spoil other readers.

We are discussing Radiant Shadows over on our forum, though, and if you decide to read the chapters and want to talk about them somewhere, click here to to join the conversation.