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Doing Our Part: Nominate Titles for YALSA’s Lists & Awards

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Remember last week I talked about angst and being regretful about not doing my part in nominating a title I loved for YALSA’s Best Fiction for Young Adults list?

Field nomination forms are now open, including the nomination form for BFYA.

I’m planning on spending the next day or two thinking about the titles that have stood out to me, published after September 1, 2011 and the ones I’ve started in on with 2012 copyright dates, and I’m planning on writing up the nominations. As I mentioned in my original post on this topic, field nominations need to meet the designated list or award’s guidelines, and those are all spelled out on the individual websites (accessible here and here). It’s crucial you do your research on the particular award or list before you nominate, to make sure your nomination is actually heard.

Other things to consider when you nominate: write out a well-reasoned, thoughtful, and purposeful reason why that particular book or media fits the list or award for which you’re nominating it. For BFYA, for example, explain why that particular book is one you think is about the BEST fiction for young adults, as well as how or why it should be considered on a list for librarians who use those lists to develop their collections and provide reader’s advisory. Reference appeal of the book, why or how it’s particularly well written, what makes it better than average. You don’t have to write a novel for your nomination, but you do have to nail key aspects of the book that make it good. So, for the title I’ve already nominated (because yes! I’ve already submitted a title), I emphasized pacing, effective use of subtle detail for character development, and how the writer’s ability to bend genres to tell an effective and powerful story makes it one that will stand out and resonate with readers.

In other words, really think through why you think a book is worthy and emphasize those key points in your nomination form. The better job you do, the easier the job is on the part of the committee. You want your nomination to be taken seriously, and you want the committee to read the book, as well as discuss it.

If you’re nominating a title that was published between September 2011 and December 31, 2011, make sure you check the previous year’s list to ensure you’re not nominating a title that has already been added to a list.

Remember that anyone can nominate titles for consideration, as long as they meet the criteria (and as long as you’re not the author, publisher, or editor of that particular title because yes, the committee will check). I hope you join me in spending time this year offering up thoughtful, well-reasoned nominations for the different award and list considerations.

Boy21 by Matthew Quick

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Finley loves playing basketball, and he’s pretty good at it because when he practices and plays, he is in it 100%. There’s no deviating from focus for him. He’s best friends with Erin, who, too, loves basketball. And though they aren’t officially “a couple,” they do like to kiss and spend time together and maybe it’s true that they’ll end up getting married down the road because they do care about each other that much. Except during basketball season, when Finley tells Erin they cannot be together because his focus can only be in that one place.

Things change though the day that Finley’s coach shows up at his door and tells him they need to talk. There’s going to be a new kid at school, Russell, and coach believes Finley should help her adjust to the new school. Russell — who prefers to be called Boy21 — was a top recruit for college basketball teams, but when his parents died tragically, his life was shaken. He’s been taken out of his home and sent to live with his grandparents in this neighborhood. Coach knows Finley would be the right person to help Boy21 adjust.

This isn’t a story about Boy21 adjusting to the new neighborhood, though. It’s a story about Finley learning what happened to himself.

Quick won my heart with his novel Sorta Like a Rockstar and it took only two chapters to realize I was going to be reduced to a mess by the end of Boy21, too. From the start, we get to know Finley and we realize he is a good kid. He’s honest, dedicated, and despite being treated terribly at school, he soldiers on with an optimism and determination that’s admirable. See, Finley is one of the few white kids at his school, and he’s earned nicknames because of this. Bellmont, his town, is home to the Irish mob, racial fights, drugs, and violence. As readers, we know this right away, and when we meet Finley, we see a kid defying his own situation. It’s the moment when his coach asks him to help support Boy21, who has been through tragedy personally, we start to see that things aren’t going to be any easier for Finley.

Boy21 is weird, at least in Finley’s opinion. He’s obsessed with the sky and he believes his parents will return to him in a space ship some day. He talks about the constellations as though they’re personal friends. But more than that, Boy21 doesn’t want to play basketball. No matter how hard Finley tries to coax him into it, knowing he’s a good player, he won’t do it.

Until the time he does.

When Finley realizes that Boy21’s performance means he might lose out on playing time, he’s understandably upset, but because he’s such a good kid, he also realizes this is an asset to the team. And being a team player, he’s surprisingly okay with it, too. It’s just when something terrible happens that things suddenly change, and Finley believes he’s made a mistake in funneling so much of himself into basketball.

Boy21 is the kind of book I have to stop talking plot at about this point because anything after this is spoiler. It’s a powerful look at race and rivalry from here on out, and not necessarily as you’d expect. As a reader, I’ve been so inside Finley’s head, I’ve grown to love and believe him as a character, and I have internalized what everyone’s said to him about being a good kid. He is a good kid. But the thing is, so much of that talk is in place because of what happened to him when he was younger. He’s living in a place where he really has no future, and it’s not at all by his own choice. When Finley has this ah ha moment, it’s painful not only for him but for everyone around him. Luckily, he’s paid his dues, and he has an amazing support network — including Boy21 and his off-beat star gazing obsession — to help.

Aside from impeccably drawn characters and a setting that’s going to test them all, this book features a thread through it that really hit me. One of the boys on the basketball team escapes from his life by reading, and others on the team bother him about it. During one of these teasing sessions, a book is torn from his hands, and it’s Harry Potter. The teasing becomes relentless, but it actually motivates Finley to read the book. The ways the story of Harry and Hogwarts weave into the plot were smart and savvy readers will appreciate them. It was the last reference to Harry Potter from Finley, though, that reduced me to a sobbing mess at the end of the book. It’s pitch perfect and captures the entire essence of Finley and why he’s such a damn good character.

Boy21 is a book that will appeal to fans of Quick’s first YA novel, as it will appeal to readers who
love a story about a good character in a rough environment. It’s a unique exploration of racial tensions, and it’ll hit home with readers who have ever felt like an outsider, regardless of their background. Quick is smart and subtle in offering us a white kid dealing with what so many could associate with urban problems and a black kid challenged with what has become almost a suburban stereotype. It’s an emotional read, and not one that’s necessarily easy, but it’s one that’ll leave a lasting impression. Much as I love a character I can hate, Quick offers me characters I can’t help but want to reach out to and tell them how good they are. No doubt this one will appeal to boys, too. The voices are authentic and relatable.

This book will be available for purchase March 1, but you can win a copy here starting tomorrow (when you’ll get to read one of my favorite Twitterviews to date!)

Review copy received from the publisher months ago. I put it off though because of how much I loved Sorta Like a Rockstar and didn’t know how it could be followed up. Well, this is how. Boy21 is available March 1 — put it on your radar now.

On ARCs, Ethics, & Speaking Up

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I’ve talked this week about how I use ARCs, and the reaction was about what I expected. Most librarians who come in contact with ARCs tend to do similar things. Over the last couple of days, though, the lid’s been lifted on how other people use their ARCs, too.

Before I go on, I’ve pulled up an example of what an ARC looks like, for those who might not be entirely familiar with them. The picture on the left is a good example of what an ARC from a publisher may look like. It’s usually paperback (though there are electronic ARCs too) and each of these ARCs comes with a disclaimer right on the cover — and on the back flap and usually inside, too — that these books are not for sale. That’s not to say they’re not to be shared, but that they’re not meant to be sold. There should be absolutely no monetary exchange with an ARC, either between the publisher and the reviewer, the reviewer and other reviews, or reviewers and, say, teens who may get a copy as a prize during a summer reading club.

Let me repeat: there is no monetary value in ARCs at all at any level. This means that the publisher makes no money off them (and in fact, they’re more costly to produce than a finished copy of a book). Authors make no money off them. Reviewers make no money off them. And they are not, not, not to be sold.

However, they are sold. Regularly.

Hop onto Ebay and do a search for ARC under the “Books” category (or just click here). These things are being sold left and right — some are books that aren’t available yet and they’re truly advanced copies of the book and sometimes, the books have been out and the ARCs are still being sold, often at some really discounted price or because they have a signature or any other number of reasons. It seems after big industry conventions or meetings like ALA or BEA, the number of books making their way onto Ebay increases and a lot of times, they’re books people are really looking forward to or that were perceived as hard-to-get ARCs at the convention. Just this week, I saw an ARC of Bitterblue up on Ebay for a cool $51 (you can pre-order the same book — one that’ll in fact be a finished, complete copy in hard cover and without error — for about $14 right now). That’s not to say that ARCs aren’t sold via Ebay and other similar sites all the time nor that they aren’t sometimes sold in indie bookstores, but the fact becomes more apparent and appalling following these events.

It’s questionable whether selling and buying ARCs is a legal issue, but that’s not what I want to delve into. I want to talk about ethics.

Selling and buying ARCs — when there is money exchanged — is unethical at any and every level.

Now that’s not to say doing an ARC trade or giveaway or donation is unethical. I don’t think it is. There are, in fact, ARC tours meant to help bloggers and librarians get their hands on ARCs to read and review, and the only requirements are time frames for reading and posting a review, as well as paying for shipping of the ARC to the next person in line. The problem emerges when ARCs show up with a price tag attached. When one person puts a price tag on a book that’s clearly an unfinished copy, that clearly has a note on it saying the item is not meant for sale, they’re practicing something that is unethical.

But the blame isn’t just on the person who sells the ARC. It’s also on the person who buys it, especially if it’s someone who knows better than that. It sort of sounds like a no duh moment, but the fact is, it happens, and it’s not as hidden as people think it is. Buying and selling of ARCs is much more common than we like to believe it is.

When someone purchases an ARC, rather than a finished copy of the book, they rob the book of a sale. The author and the publisher and the agent and the editor and everyone else involved in the production of a book sees nothing. The money spent on the ARC goes to the person unethically selling it, rather than to those who worked hard to put together the best finished version of that story.

Something that scares me a little bit about this practice, aside from the unethical nature of it and the fact it takes profit away from those who deserve it for their art, is how easy it is to track down those who are doing it. When I saw the Bitterblue ARC up on Ebay, I was also able to see other ARCs that particular seller had sold, as well as those people who’d purchased ARCs from that seller. One of those who purchased from the seller happened to be a book blogger, whose blog I was able to track down by their user name.  The ease of being able to do that is itself scary, but it’s scarier that the very people working toward promoting reading and books are participating in something they know is unethical.

Let me step back a second and return to a couple earlier points I’ve made here and in my post about how I use ARCs — though it’s not entirely easy to gauge the impact on actually selling copies, my giving the book to a kid doesn’t rob the book of a sale. It’s entirely possible the book is being sold in some way. More importantly, though, I’m not making a profit from giving the book away. No one loses money in this exchange, and there is only opportunity for it to be made (see: purchasing a finished copy for my library to lend).

When a blogger borrows an ARC from another blogger or participates in an ARC tour, they presumably review and build buzz for it. Again, impossible to gauge sales on this, but that’s sort of moot. The blogger isn’t profiting, though, in the exchange and sharing.

But when a blogger buys an ARC, they’re participating in an unethical exchange of cash for goods. They’re not helping spread the word. They’re taking away a potential sale. And when a blogger sells an ARC, they’re profiting from someone else’s work, too.

It sounds extremely hokey to say, but the fact is, books are exciting, and there are times when it feels impossible to wait to read something. When someone unethically lists such a coveted book on a site like Ebay, the temptation to purchase it — especially at what can sometimes be a really, really cheap price — may be huge. If the true goal of blogging, though, is to spread the word about books, to help promote those books worth promoting, to help sell books, the only way to be taken seriously is to behave ethically. That means not only holding off on purchasing an ARC unethically, selling an ARC unethically, and it means doing your part in reporting these things when you see them. It means holding fellow bloggers to a high standard of ethics, and it means calling them out when necessary. It’s a scary idea, to call someone out, but the fact is, people who do these things aren’t necessarily covering their tracks.

You can report these sales via Ebay, and you can forward on these sorts of links on to the marketing folks at relevant pubs.

I don’t have a whole lot more to talk about on the topic, other than to say the value in an ARC is the value in what it does for the book. An ARC and a book aren’t the same thing — the ARC precedes the book, and the ARC can help push sales of the book through early buzz. That’s why they exist and why bloggers have become part of the publicity machine. If you’re truly invested in helping promote books and reading, then you promote the purchase of the book, and you work toward halting the buying and selling of ARCs.

For what it’s worth, bloggers who practice the unethical buying and selling of ARCs are harming, rather than helping, everything that bloggers are working toward doing. They’re tarnishing the image of the role a blogger can play in sales and in promotion and in buzz. They’re also stealing from those who work to produce the content, narrowing, rather than expanding, the experiences the book world can bring.

Anyone curious to learn more about ARCs and the role they play, please take the time to read through Liz Burns’s posts here, here, and here.

Catch & Release by Blythe Woolston

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Polly had her life planned out. She had been dating Bridger for a long time, and she was eager to marry him when they finished high school. She’d go to college, get a good job, then she’d settle into having kids. Sounds pretty cut and dry, but it was a life she was happy to prepare for. It was safe and it made her comfortable.

Of course, there’s a wrench in the plan, and that wrench went by the name of MRSA — the flesh-eating infection which somehow, Polly came in contact with. As did many other people in her community. A few people died. But Polly was lucky because she was able to live and she walked away with just a disfigured face.

While being treated for MRSA, Polly meets Odd, one of the football players from her school. She didn’t know him before they ended up in the same facility being treated for the same infection. But now that they’ve had some time to bond, they’ve grown close. Two people from opposite sides of high school, together, because they’re both now trying to figure out where they fit into the world which has turned them both into physical outcasts.

Catch & Release is one part story of survival and one part road trip, sprinkled with a healthy dose of science, an unlikely friendship, and fishing. Woolston’s sophomore release, following on the heels of her Morris Award winning The Freak Observer proves she’s one to keep an eye on in the young adult world.

Polly and Odd are a strange pair, but they need one another to survive. Sure, they weathered MRSA and came out on the other side with scars to prove they’ve made it, but the truth is, their real survival story begins where their hospital stay ends. Everything either of them knew about their lives and everything they planned for changed. Bridger and Polly broke up — even though Bridger claimed he wouldn’t do something like that to Polly, he did — and Odd’s got no chance of being back on the football team. Except, for Odd, it’s much less about the football team and more about the fact his family is falling apart, and he desperately wants to keep them together as best he can. His grandmother’s become more and more mentally unstable, and Odd isn’t comfortable with how his parents have brushed her life off as more or less done and gone. When MRSA enters the picture for both Polly and Odd, it’s not only representative of dealing with disease; it’s about dealing with the fact something out of human control can ravage everything. It causes both not only physical changes that turn them into disfigured outcasts, but it also causes them larger life changes.

Polly and Odd are life’s cast offs now, and they don’t shy away from expressing that they feel this way. That’s part of why they decide to take a trip together. The other part of why they decide to take this trip to Portland is because that’s where Bridger’s gone. Polly wants desperately to know why he left her, and Odd, who is protective of Polly, wants to have a talk with him too (probably not a talk with nice words). They set off, and along the way, they really connect not only with one another, but with nature. Woolston weaves a smart metaphor within the story about fishing. Polly loves to fish, but she’s of the “catch and release” mindset, while Odd believes in catching and taking. Even though we already know how different the two of them are, this metaphor plays big into the final ending of the story and it plays big into how both Polly and Odd come to understand themselves in their post-MRSA lives. Not only that, though, fishing reminds Polly and Odd of who they are on the outside, too: none of the fish they’re after are the pretty ones.

Woolston’s story is strong, but the writing itself stands out. It’s literary and not afraid to be so. Woolston’s got a knack for offering what feel like disparate pieces of story and tangents that, when read initially, don’t make much sense. As the story progresses, each of these moments comes together into something bigger and maybe even more bizarre. But the beauty is this bizarre quality makes sense; it may make even more sense than books which come together smoothly and flawlessly. I don’t want to say the writing is ugly, because it’s not, but there’s something unique and disturbing in the writing that just works. There is a lot of science in this book, not to be confused with science fiction. One of the things I loved about the writing is I feel I not only got a great story, but I learned something (maybe even too much) about the world. Woolston sinks nature into the plot, and she offers moments of scientific wonder that we get to experience right along with the characters. It’s a short book, and it reads a bit jarring, but it couldn’t be any other way. The challenge becomes a pay off. The writing captures and reflects Polly and Odd’s experiences — these aren’t the smart kids nor the pretty kids. These are real kids, and their dialog, their experiences, and their conclusions are honest and ring true to who they are.

My favorite part of this book was one of the most subtle. There’s a subplot about the idea of life and conception, and about how things coming to be is itself a scientific marvel. This ties into a story about antelope and about Polly and her existence. She wasn’t born of her parents traditionally, but rather, she was artificially conceived. Woolston is clever in delivering what ends up being one of the most profound moments in the entire story (to both the reader and the characters).

Catch & Release is a story about how life throws curve balls, and there are a million ways to handle them. It’s not a quick paced story, despite the length, nor is it one that’s necessarily easy to read. It’s a challenge, with a pay off that’s entirely worth it. Polly and Odd will stick with readers long after finishing the book. Hand this book off to fans of books that are a little bit different, to fans of stories that incorporate science right into the plot line, and to those who love fully-fleshed characters (though I make no promises on how literal that is for either Polly nor Odd). This story will resonate with anyone who has ever felt like an outcast. Without doubt, Woolston is one of the freshest and most startling voices in young adult fiction today with appeal not only to teens, but to adults as well.

Review copy received from the publisher. Catch & Release is available tomorrow (Feb 1).

Librarians, Bloggers, & The Lines Between

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Before diving into the heavy stuff, a glimpse at the books I picked up at ALA. I used “picked up” loosely because I’ve become a big believer in talking with publicists at conventions. I love hearing what their favorites are and why (because it’s not always the book getting the big publisher push and often it can lead you to a real gem). But yes — this pile is everything I picked up at Midwinter. It fit into my carry on luggage.

Over the last few conventions, I’ve posted the titles of books I’ve picked up, their release dates, and a link to GoodReads for more details. I’m not going to stray from that, but it’ll wait a couple of days. I’ve been told by librarians, teachers, and readers how nice it is to know about what’s coming out from the different publishers, so they have it on their radar. I like doing it because it helps keep me organized too.

Something that’s come up is blogger behavior at industry conventions like ALA and BEA. In fact, I’ve talked about it before, been cited about it before. Whenever this conversation comes up, I have to take a step back. The anxiety gets overwhelming. There seems to be some sort of belief there are only black and whites and not shades of gray everywhere. That there are, say, bloggers and there are librarians.

I tread a fine, fine line. I’m a librarian and I’m a blogger. I do both and I love doing both. I don’t think they’re necessarily different identities nor ones I need to keep separate. And in fact, the more I have become involved in blogging, the more I see them as things that cannot be separated. Being a librarian has made me a better blogger because it’s given me deep perspective on the idea of audience and readership. The more I’ve blogged, the better I’ve become as a librarian because I’ve forced myself to read well and read with the idea of audience.

These things just aren’t separate for me.

When I go to a conference where there is an exhibit hall, where there will be publicists and opportunities to pick up ARCs, of course I go in with a wish list of some sort. There are books I’m excited about personally and I’d love to get a crack at. Books I’d love to read and fall in love with so I can talk about how much I love the book and why I love the book. Books that in my job as a librarian I’d love to bring back to my teens because they’re excited to read them. 

But I don’t go into the exhibits with expectations of anything, either as a blogger nor as a librarian nor as a reader nor as a person who has red hair. It’s an experience, and it’s one best enjoyed by interacting, be it with publicists, colleagues, strangers. When I’m able to take home a book that is on my wish list, it’s a plus. When I don’t, it’s not a minus. It just is! I’ll still be able to purchase the book or borrow it from the library when it publishes a few months down the road.

I’ve never walked away from a convention thinking I didn’t get enough. Because the thing is, I don’t expect to get anything. Being a librarian and/or a blogger doesn’t entitle me to anything. Being a librarian and/or a blogger, though, does come with a set of expectations. A set of standards.

But this is something I’ve talked about before.

No matter what your title is, no matter what your goal is in attending an industry convention, the only expectation there is is for classy, professional, courteous, kind behavior. It means being thoughtful and considerate. It means behaving in a way that would make whatever you’re representing proud to call you a part of that organization (if it’s your blog, then it’s your blog; if it’s your library, then it’s your library; if you’re there representing yourself, well then that’s a pretty big role to make proud, too).

I’m not of the belief that we should close off cool experiences like ALA from non-industry members if it’s not necessary. But I am of the belief that there should never be bullying, there should never be swarming, there should never be name calling or teasing or stealing or rule breaking. Treating one another with respect is the only expectation, and that goes for not only attendees, but for attendees toward publicists, publishers, the industry as a whole.

I like to think of the book world as a type of eco-system. We all grow and thrive when we allow one another to do so. This means feeding and keeping one another in check. It means being respectful and thoughtful every step of the way. When you’re contributing the good, you get the good back. When you’re not, you’re only harming your environment.

Stepping back from this a second now, since I really cannot say anything more on that particular subject without sounding like a broken record, I thought I’d talk a little bit about what picking up ARCs means for me. Since I tread that slippery line of blogger and librarian, it means a couple of things.

As a blogger, I like to think my role in the ARC process is one of reading, blogging, and helping build buzz. I like to think, too, that by being a librarian, I reach a certain audience of readers who have a budget behind them — they actually purchase some of the books I talk about, either for themselves or their organization. And if they don’t have the funds, I like to think I’m able to offer to readers books they can talk about with readers in their lives. Either way, my role as a blogger is spreading the word.

Did you know for a lot of teenagers, owning a book is something they will never get to do?

Did you know for a lot of teenagers, the ARC a librarian brings them from a conference may be the only book they actually, truly own?

This was something I never thought about, never knew, until I actually worked with teenagers. Until I had teenagers tell me they’d bring the book right back to me because they didn’t want to lose something that belonged to me (an adult). Telling those kids they could keep that book illuminated something inside them. Disbelief. Shock.

Excitement.

I can’t even tell you what it feels like to hand a teenager a book you picked up for them at a convention. It’s what makes me LOVE being a librarian. Putting that book into their hands. Knowing it will change a life, even if it’s in a small, small way.

Moreover, many of the ARCs end up as prizes for various programs at the library, including the summer reading club. Most libraries — especially smaller ones — don’t have prize budgets. They don’t have money to give teens books to keep. After working on the Cybils and attending a couple of conventions, I can amass a lot of ARCs (and finished copies). For what it’s worth, I pay for shipping on everything I bring home from a convention. Sometimes upwards of $50, $100, often for books I’m not necessarily keen on myself but that I know will mean a lot to a reader at the library. No, I don’t get reimbursed.

But I get to bring books to the library in stacks this tall to give away to teenagers. Books they’ll get to peruse and pick from and keep. Books that will mean the world to them because it’s something they get to own. I reiterate — for many of these teens, this is the only time they may actually get to own a book.

The other thing I do with ARCs as a librarian is this:

I cannot possibly read everything being published for teens, so I often go directly to the teens and ask them to write up book reviews for me. In exchange, they get to keep the book (if they want) or they can trade with another teen (which they often do). My teen above writes excellent reviews which I use to promote the books when they’ve been purchased, and they help me decide whether it’s a book worth reading so I can book talk it. And often, I can book talk the book based on the teen’s review alone. I get feedback on what the book reminded the teen of (I can’t possibly know what all of their experiences are in their world and in their age, and this feedback is priceless to me as a librarian and, as you’d guess, a blogger, too!).

Let me say, I’ve never felt guilt about picking up an ARC I could put in the hands of a teen.

If you’ve ever wondered why we don’t do a lot of giveaways here at STACKED, this is just one of the reasons. Most ARCs never stick around long enough to give away. I’d rather spend my own money to buy a finished copy of a book I read in ARC form for someone else (and that is why if you’ve entered and won a giveaway here, the book often comes straight from Amazon or Book Depository).

All of this is to say one thing and one thing only, really: let’s be courteous, please. We are all part of the same eco-system, even if our end goals differ. Whether you’re a blogger whose goal is to build your readership and build buzz around books or whether your goal as a librarian is to pick up books for your own reading/collection development planning/prizes. What you pick up, what you take, what you demand. You can pollute or you can recycle. Either way, it reflects back upon not just you, but the environment as a whole.

I like a world that keeps spinning.