STACKED

books

Getting Series-ous: How Blog Series Can Engage, Inspire, and Grow Your Audience

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I thought I’d share the Prezi Nova and I made for our presentation at the start of our presentation for anyone who wants to check it out or follow along. My caveat to this is that there’s not a whole lot of information on the Prezi. But I promise to write up a fuller report with our notes after Kid Lit Con this year so those who want to know more about putting together a blog series have the information available to them.

In the mean time, enjoy! You can navigate with the play button and your forward and backward arrow keys (that’s easier than trying to keep hit the play button): 

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Getting Series-ous: How Blog Series Can Engage, Inspire, and Grow Your Audience on Prezi

Blood Roses by Francesca Lia Block

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I’ve actually only ever read one other book by Francesca Lia Block – Pretty Dead, a slim vampire novel that was published in 2009. In anyone else’s hands, the story may well have been a generic vampire romance, but in Block’s, it was something else entirely.

Several reviews of Blood Roses, a collection of nine (very) short stories first published in 2008, call Block’s writing “prose poetry,” which I think is a good descriptor. The stories, which each take under five minutes to read, are loosely connected to each other and focus on teenage girls undergoing some sort of transformation – physical, sexual, magical. There’s a thread of fantasy that connects them all, sometimes dark, sometimes restorative, sometimes both. Block’s fantasy in these stories is a metaphor for adolescence and coming of age, and I loved nearly all of them.

In one story, a girl tells the reader that her boyfriend is an alien and explains how she knows. In another, a girl suddenly develops tattoos all over her body after becoming infatuated with a tattoo artist. In another, a girl meets a centaur and takes him home with her. Many of them are sexual in some way, and many involve other mature topics like drugs or family violence. While all of the stories are fantastical, Block doesn’t let her characters dwell on the fantasy aspects – the fantasy is simply a part of their world. (One review claimed that the characters may not all be quite sane, which is possible, I suppose, but it’s not how I prefer to think of it. It’s too literal an interpretation for me.)

Block’s use of language is always imaginative and always beautiful. She’s a fan of short, impactful sentences, unusual story structure, and interesting metaphors. The result is very moody, atmospheric writing you can get lost in. It can also result in some confusion as to what really happened, but that seems purposeful, and it doesn’t detract from the stories, which straddle the line between fantasy and reality anyway.

Due to the nature of Block’s writing, which is very different from most everything else, her books won’t be for everyone. Personally, I love them. She takes risks with language and trusts that her readers are mature enough to understand her. I often have a hard time with short stories, but these were a treat, and I think other readers interested in unusual, edgy fantasy writing will enjoy them too.

Book purchased.

Cover Doubles

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I ran across this double-take while browsing Goodreads the other day. On the left is Loose Girl, a memoir by Kerry Cohen chronicling her years as a promiscuous young woman – using sex as a stand-in for attention, love, and intimacy – and her ensuing recovery. On the right is Kirsty Eagar’s YA novel Raw Blue, a book about a surfer girl who experienced something terrible in college, dropped out, and must confront it a couple of years later.

While I have read neither, I’m struck by the parallels between the two books, represented by the girl on the covers. Both books seem to deal somewhat strongly in feelings of shame and regret, and the girl shows this – her downward look, her hair obscuring most of her face, her passive expression. I don’t think either of the two covers are particularly striking, but the girl does communicate a certain tone.

It also seems like the model’s shirt has been edited to be a little less revealing in the Eagar title, which is interesting to me.

Four cover changes to consider

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Ready for another round of book covers that have or will be changing their appearance when they move from hardcover to paperback? As usual, some of the changes are for the better and some leave quite a bit to be desired.

Meg Rosoff’s There is No Dog came out in hardcover — the one on the left — early this year. I’m pretty into this cover. It’s bright, and I like how the dog is made from the clouds themselves (which is pretty fitting given the book’s topic). The font for both the author’s name and the title are simple, and I think that the slight touches of color with red and white in them make them stand out just enough. The blurb on the front from Anthony Horowitz is simple and to the point. Rosoff doesn’t really need a huge blurb, given her acclaim as a YA author.

In March 2013, there will be a new paperback edition of Roseoff’s title. I think the cover change is interesting. It’s still simplistic, and it’s still bright — even brighter than the hardcover edition. Like the hardcover, the only colors on the cover are red, white, yellow, blue, and black. Primaries with the black and white to contrast. What’s different though is that the last word in the title is in a different font and lives inside the image of the dog. I like the effect quite a bit, actually. But what is maybe most interesting to me in terms of the cover change is that the blurb is different now. Rather than Horowitz’s single word, the blurb is now from People Magazine and a whole two words. I’m not sure whether it’s the case or not, but this cover may be aimed more toward an adult audience than a teen audience. At least that’s the impression I get, given the blurb and the very simplistic look (and interesting to note, at least to me, is the Horowitz blurb almost reads down from YA for me — his books are middle grade in my library).

I think both of these covers are pretty good. If I were to pick one, I’d probably go paperback just because I like the yellow and blue contrast.

On the left is the hardcover rendition of William Richter’s thriller Dark Eyes, which came out earlier this year as well. It’s gotten a number of comparisons to Steig Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo though I haven’t read it and can’t confirm that (and I’m suspicious since I think that’s an easy label to toss on any thriller featuring a female character). The cover is pretty vanilla, and it reminds me of another similar book, though I can’t put my finger on which one because it’s so generic. I am not saying it’s problematic that it’s generic because I think that’s one of the appeal factors for the cover of a thriller like this one, but it doesn’t have much that makes it stand apart, either. One kind of weird thing to me is that the girl’s hands look really big for her body. She has a toughness about her in the way she’s situated, though it looks to me like she’s got something in her eye…other than her hair, that is.

The paperback, due out in February 2013, takes on an entirely different look, despite being just as generic as the hardcover is. It’s a bunch of tall buildings in a city! They’re all tinted in various shades of purple. There is a girl reflecting off the side of one of those buildings, and I think it’s the same girl from the hardcover (or pretty darn close to it). And then, there is that blurb. Can you read it? Do you see who it is from? Pittacus Lore blurbs this book! Pittacus Lore who is a product of the James Frey fiction factor (maybe, maybe not) thought pretty highly of Richter’s work to blurb it. Except this gets me wondering: what does it mean if an author who doesn’t really exist blurbs your book? Could you not get a real blurb? Is it a message about the value of blurbs (that there is none)? Or was this some sort of marketing point for the Pittacus Lore machine? And then I start wondering when I see that blurb if this book isn’t really what it claims to be. Is it a real author who wrote this? So really, the paperback cover here has lost my interest entirely because I’m way more fascinated by this blurb and what the implications of it are.

Neither of those covers quite do it for me, but hardcover might be a little stronger, despite lacking the crucial Pittacus Lore blurb.

It seems like a lot of times when covers go from hardcover to paperback, the change includes the addition of a person. But in the case of Jessica Brody’s My Life Undecided, the switchover goes from using a model to using an object. As far as the hardcover is concerned, it’s nothing mind-boggling. Actually, I’d say it fits the book pretty well. This is mostly lighthearted and the girl on the cover reminds me of the main character pretty well. The way the title and author’s name appear on the cover fits the look of Brody’s first book, The Karma Club.

The paperback is quite different from the hardcover, and I kind of dig it. I love how it’s a mouse, which is extremely fitting for the book itself (which is about a girl who gets all of her life advice via her blog). It’s cute and plays into the lightheartedness of the story itself. What I don’t care for is the curly style of the title font around some of the letters — it’s a small thing, but actually, I really dislike it and can’t stop looking at it.

There’s not really a better cover in this case since I think both play into the content of the book pretty well. It’s curious there was a change, though, especially since the new paperback takes away from the branded-look for Brody’s books that started with her first title. The paperback edition of My Life Undecided will be available November 13.

When this book first came out, the cover image killed me. In fact, it still kills me. Here’s the thing: the cover for The Second Base Club has immense boy appeal, doesn’t it? I mean, that’s a bra made to look like baseballs. However, no boy I know would ever check out a book with a bra on the cover, made to look like baseballs or not. I can pretty safely say the same thing about girls. I mean — putting a bra on the cover of a book just seems like a bad idea, unless it’s romance and aimed at adults, and even then, I can’t say it’s necessarily going to be what draws people to pick up the book. Think about what it looks like to read a book with that cover in public. Especially if you’re a boy. Also, that tag line is pretty terrible. Although it seems to get to the heart of it all.

The paperback edition of The Second Base Club — due out in February 2013 — eliminates the bra issue, but now it brings in a creeper guy. Seriously, the guy is reaching over the girl and she’s definitely not into it. But what scares me a little more is the expression on his face. Is it me or is his head over sized? It looks almost Photoshopped onto the body. As weird as the positioning and the modeling are with the male in this image, the cover itself is much more appealing than the original, and I think it maintains a lot of guy appeal. It sort of reminds me of the covers of the “Carter” series, actually, and I don’t think that is a bad thing. Of interest is the change in tag lines, too. What originally only read “we’re not talking about baseball here” becomes a little more clarified and a little less sexual by adding that the character’s goals aren’t only about baseball.

I think the paperback cover wins this one hands down, though I really dislike the male model and the way he’s definitely taking advantage of the girl who is so not into him. But oh it’s better than that bra cover.

Any opinions about which books have a better hardcover or paperback edition? Anything you love or dislike in any of these? What do you make of the Pittacus Lore blurb? I hope it’s clear I’m not getting over that one for a little while. 

Send Me A Sign by Tiffany Schmidt

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Cancer books don’t work for me. There’s an artificiality in the plot and there burden of the story falls upon the reader, rather than on the story teller: because we all have something we can associate with cancer in our own lives, we bring that to the novel. That emotional baggage then carries through the story. More than that, though, characters in the story become victims and heroes simultaneously, without any particular reason other than they’re faced with a horrific illness. The writing floats on the diagnoses rather than on character development or on a story arc beyond the cancer, and the emotional investment is inauthentic. It’s reader manipulation.

That’s not the case with Send Me A Sign, Tiffany Schmidt’s debut novel. In fact, this pushes against the books in the cancer genre that do that.

Mia has cancer — leukemia, in fact. But when she receives the diagnosis, she doesn’t want anyone to know. She hides it from her best girl friends, knowing that it would make her a victim/hero. Knowing it would mean that they would change how they treat her. It’s not just that she’s hiding it from them to protect herself, though; she does it because her mother pressures her to do so. It would shatter the illusion of perfect. Mia’s popular, well-liked, and admired. Cancer would change that. 

The thing is, Mia can’t hide her illness from everyone. After a night out at a party, on the drive home and after hearing one of those songs — a sign — Mia asks her best guy friend Gyver to pull the car over. And she tells him. Where she finally allows herself to feel something about it, to shed a few tears, Gyver is strong and steadfast. He wants to know the details and how they can get through this. Yes, they. He’s committed himself right there to fight with her to ensure she comes back stronger than she was before.

She checks into the hospital the following day for chemotherapy, but not before she covers all her bases with her friends. They all believe she’s going to a family member’s house for an extended vacation, though Gyver knows the truth.While building this story for her friends, it becomes clear that there is another guy in Mia’s life: Ryan. The athletic stud who all the girls would love to date but who has a less-than-stunning reputation for how he treats the ladies he dates. Mia’s not sure she’s ready for him, given this reputation. And given the cancer. It’s something she thinks about briefly but doesn’t put a whole lot of stock in, at least prior to her time in the hospital.

It’s a tough chapter to read as Mia’s body reacts to the treatment; at times, she’s lucid and thorough in reporting how she feels and what’s going on. Other times, there are very short blurbs of dialog and little else. Rather than give a blow-by-blow of the technical aspects of the chemo, we’re given the experience first-hand with Mia. We know when she’s feeling okay and when she’s feeling horrible. We’re getting it too. But what Schmidt excels in by writing the treatment this way is that it’s one chapter and it’s over. We aren’t subjected to any more or any less of the hospital experience than necessary. Once Mia is done with treatment, so are we. Because the thing is, this is a story about what happens outside of that.

Now that the chemo is over, Mia and Ryan become closer. As their relationship grows, Mia begins to understand the reputation Ryan had about being a bit of a player may not be true. That in fact, he’s invested in her and their relationship. But she’s not ready, particularly because she doesn’t want his sympathy due to her cancer. She’s gun shy and worried about him finding out the truth. Yet, he still wants her, still cares about her. And there’s also Gyver, her best friend. He is Mia’s rock through all of this, and not just because she has cancer and confided that in him. It’s because he’s always been her rock. He’s always been there for her through good and bad things. I wouldn’t say it took cancer for her to come to this realization — I think Mia’s a hell of a lot stronger of a character than that — but it was through her ability to confide such a huge thing in him where she realizes what he is to her.

What made Send Me A Sign work for me and stand apart from the crowd of cancer lit is that it never once felt like a cancer story, and that’s due in part to the fact Mia chooses to hide it. Even if it feels like it’s for selfish reasons and an effort to protect her reputation, the truth is, Mia doesn’t feel human anymore. She’s so far removed from herself, from her body, and from the experience all together, that she refuses to think about what this all means for her on a grander scale. There’s a real loss of control in her life and in her choices. Where it could be easy to dislike her because she’s lying so much and because, well, she’s at times simply hard to handle, it’s not the cancer that manipulates the reader into finding her sympathetic. It’s the fact she’s gained our trust because we are in on the secret. We know the inner world of Mia more than anyone. We know how complicated it is and how little she finds herself caring for and loving herself. This came to a head for me during a conversation Mia has with her father, something I’m still thinking about months after reading the book. He says to her quite simply: “Sick or not, you’re a person to be respected.” In this moment, she has a wake up call. She realizes how much value she has as a person, a whole person, and not just as an unfortunate victim of circumstances. As a victim of cancer.  

While I shy away from the love triangle story line, that’s not what I saw here. Instead, Schmidt develops a great metaphor between the relationships Mia has with these two boys and her relationship to her own body as it fights leukemia. Gyver, the steady constant in her life, is the thing that’s always been there. That’s her determination and strength and strong-will. Ryan, the new thing, is the experience of dealing with cancer and navigating something different. He himself isn’t a cancer; far from it. But he and the cancer share the qualities of being new challenges to face. There’s one scene in the book where this metaphor sings, and it involves Mia’s cat. Although I felt a tiny bit manipulated by it (I think anyone with this sort of experience would feel that way), it ultimately drives home the powerful friendship between Mia and Gyver. They’re rock solid, even if sometimes Mia doesn’t feel that way. Schmidt nailed romantic tension throughout the story in a way that worked for me, even though I’m not a romantic. It was reminiscent of Jenny Han’s “Summer” series, the way the main character has complete agency but still wants to satisfy her heart and both of her choices have their positive aspects and their negative aspects. There is no perfect person in Schmidt’s story, which is precisely why this works.

Another side of Mia I haven’t touched on yet but I think a lot of readers will dig: there’s a weaving of superstition throughout. Mia believes in these signs, believes that if she listens to the right song at the right moment, she needs to act a certain way. That if she does things in a certain order, it will give her control. This, of course, all relates right back to the notion of control and illusion of control. But more than that, Schmidt’s use of this character trait ties into what may be the biggest take away of this story — what it means to choose. Mia has to make so many choices, and none of them are easy. She has to consider who she lets in and who she doesn’t let in. What she is to herself and what she is to others. Whether or not she’s strong enough to go this alone or whether she needs support. Following those signs is a choice Mia makes. It’s never about a right choice or a wrong choice; it’s about choice, period.

There were a couple of minor issues I had with the story. The first is that I felt that Mia’s friends were forgettable and interchangeable. They don’t play a huge role in the story, and that’s because Mia chooses that as her way of handling them. It makes sense they aren’t fully-developed, and it makes sense I found them annoying when they were around. My other quibble was that I wish I had known Mia a little more prior to the diagnosis. I didn’t wish to know what led to her seeking out a doctor for feeling ill; rather, I wish I had gotten to know her on an emotional and relationship-interaction level a little more. For me, that would have made the already-strong character arc even stronger. If anything, it’s a sign of how much I cared about Mia and how much I wanted to know her even more.  

Send Me A Sign isn’t a book about a girl who becomes wiser, more insightful, more worldly, or more well-loved because she’s tackling cancer. It’s a book about a girl who figures out what it means to respect herself and understand the fact she has a choice in how she lives her own life. Mia’s a teen girl dealing with teen girl problems — boys, friends, family — and it so happens that leukemia throws her for a loop when she thinks she has those things under control. Because that’s how it works. In no way would I consider Tiffany Schmidt’s book a “cancer book.” I have no doubt Mia would feel the same way.

Hand Schmidt’s debut to fans of Jenny Han, particularly for the romantic elements, the strong and determined lead female character, and for the great writing (because the writing in Send Me A Sign — even though I haven’t spent a long time talking about it — is one of the book’s strengths). I think this book will appeal to fans of Sarah Dessen, as well as Siobhan Vivian.

Oh, and if you’re curious: Mia makes the right choice at the end of the book. I never flip to the end to find these things out, but I was so invested in the story I needed to know. The conclusion was beyond satisfying to my heart. I guess that’s a spoiler, isn’t it? Mia doesn’t die. She doesn’t need to to get us to pay attention though.

She’s a hell of a lot more interesting than that.

Review copy received from the publisher. Send Me A Sign will be available October 2. You will hear more about this book from the author here later on this year. Also, Tiffany is donating $1 to cancer charities for each copy of her book pre-ordered through the end of the month. You can read about why and order through her website.