Hidden venom

I get Real Simple's Daily Thought in my email every morning. This morning's thought was:

"The more hidden the venom, the more dangerous it is." ~ Marguerite De Valois

It made me think of villains. Some who come specifically to mind... Marquise de Merteuil in Dangerous Liaisons, Cousin Bette in the book of the same name by Balzac, and even Caroline Bingley in Pride & Prejudice (in her treatment of Jane) is a creature with hidden venom.

Villains who appear honorable on the surface are far more frightening than villains who are unquestionably evil (like Voldemort!)

Which do you prefer? The outright evil villain or the inner venomous one? Which one frightens you more? Which is easier to hate?

A Fate Worse Than Death

One day I'll quit talking about DOCTOR WHO. Today is not that day.

I'd forgotten that not all victories are about saving the universe. --Rory 

One of the main characters mentioned this in the latest episode, and it really struck a chord with me. It got me thinking about the things I find most memorable in books.

And it's not the big battle at the end. It's not slaying the dragon, or throwing the ring in Mordor, or defeating Voldemort.

It's the small things.

I felt more triumph, as a reader, when the father and son share a Coke in Cormac McCarthy's THE ROAD, than at any other moment in the book. Such a small detail--a small victory--but a meaningful one.  Harry's confession of love for Ginny--an action that terrified him--made me cheer more than his triumph over Voldemort. When Tris jumped onto the train for the first time, my heart was racing more than when she started the revolution in DIVERGENT.

I'm not sure why the little battles are sometimes so much more important to me than the big ones. Perhaps it's because I've got a fairly certain idea that the hero will win the big fight--but it's never for sure he'll win all the little ones. Or perhaps it has more to do with the fact that I will face the little battles myself much more than the big ones. I've felt the fear of confessing love, the desire to have something rare, the decision to do something stupid and dangerous just because I could. Maybe it's the little battles that remind me of me.

It's Great To Be Back!

Dude, so it turns out that organizing and attending WriteOnCon, starting back to school, and editing a 90,000 word book won't kill you.

It will, however, make you feel a bit absent from the blogosphere. While I've been off doing other stuff, I've had guest posters here on the League (and weren't they awesome??), but now I'm back!

So tell me. What did I miss? What's new in the science fiction and dystopian world? What are you reading or watching that I need to catch up on? (I did just finish the first and only season of Firefly. FAB! I even liked the movie, Serenity.)

Too Many Closets

In this week’s Genreville, authors Rachel Manija Brown and Sherwood Smith shared something very disturbing.  In a nutshell, these co-authors of a yet unpublished dystopia YA novel were offered representation for this novel—on the condition that they drop or make straight a gay character.   The post stirred up some mighty interesting discussion about how / if gatekeepers (agents, editors, etc.) may be straightening and whitening YA fiction.   (Go read their post. I09 also covered it. I love their title: "Top literary agent says it's not okay to be gay after the Apocalypse.")

By weird serendipity, I watched the Celluloid Closet this week. (It’s one of Current’s 50 Documentaries to See Before You Die).  And guess what it’s about.  Gatekeepers—this time in Hollywood—preventing open and honest depictions of gay and lesbian characters.

Here’s a clip:


One of my favorite parts of the doc is when Gore Vidal (screenwriter of Ben Hur and many other films) explains how Ben Hur was shot as a love story between Ben Hur and Masala.  The director and Steven Boyd (who played Masala) were in on it, but they didn’t tell Charlton Heston. ;)


Anyway, the important point many of the interviewees—such as Susie Bright, Armistead Maupin, and Harvey Fierstein—made is that everyone looks for themselves in movies.  When you don’t see yourself reflected on the screen—or what you are is made out to be evil or less than human—you feel invisible or even that something is wrong with you. 

The same holds true for fiction—YA fiction, in particular.  If teens don't see themselves reflected in the worlds we create, what are they going to think about themselves? What are straight white kids going to think about people unlike them?  Just like Hollywood, the publishing industry influences how straight kids think about gay ones, and how gay ones think about themselves.

I should add that my experience with my editor and agent has been just the opposite of Brown and Smith's.  One of the main characters in Memento Nora is gay, and no one ever mentioned it let alone suggested that I change her in any way.


What do you guys think? Is there a YA Fiction Closet?

New addition: Agent Joanna Stampfel-Volpe refutes Brown and Smith's claims. Thanks, Charity for the link.

Win a Signed Copy of Marianna Baer's FROST!

Hi Everyone! I'd like you all to meet Marianna Baer, author of Frost. She was nice enough to stop by to answer some questions and giveaway a signed copy of her novel! 

 

Hi Marianna! First off tell us a little about the book.

Frost is the story of two 17-year old girls -- Leena Thomas and Celeste Lazar -- who are roommates in a potentially haunted dorm at a New England boarding school. I say "potentially," because the girls are definitely haunted, but I'm not going to tell you whether it's by the house itself, or by their own internal demons. It's a creepy, psychological, modern Gothic novel. 

 

Since you are now officially a ghost expert with the publication of this book give us the low down. Real or not? Have a good ghost story of your own you can share with us?

 

Unfortunately, I myself have never lived in a haunted house. But I've heard enough stories from credible sources that I do believe houses can contain certain energies, left by past (and passed) residents. All of my personal experiences with the paranormal have involved ESP, that sort of thing. For example, one time I had a dream that my roommate's friend (someone I'd never met, but had heard about) was in the hospital and we went to visit her. There was absolutely no reason I should have dreamt about this girl I'd never met, so I told my roommate about the dream in a, "Isn't this strange?" context. About an hour or two later my roommate got a phone call: her friend had been hit by a car and was in the hospital. I'm sure some people would say this was a random coincidence, but I don't think so. And I've had too many other experiences that make me think there are lots of things going on around us and in our brains that we don't understand.
 

Since you're the only person I've ever met who actually went to boarding school you're also an official expert on that now. It sounds so cool. What was that experience like and how did it  feed into the writing of Frost?

I absolutely loved it. Not that I didn't have my share of emotional trauma, but I had wonderful friends and (truly) incredible teachers, and immensely enjoyed the whole living-in-a-dorm thing. Most years I lived in medium-sized dorms, but my senior year I lived with several of my closest friends in the real Frost House, a quirky little Victorian house on the edge of campus. There was a faculty member with an apartment in the house, but she was pretty hands off, so it felt like we were living on our own most of the time. Once I started writing YA, I knew that I wanted to write about girls in a similar situation. It provides such natural tension, the fact that you don't go home from school at night. If things aren't going well, there's no escape. If things are going well, it's the most fun ever.
 

So you're a grad from Vermont College's writing program. Can you tell us a little about the experience. Any particular words or wisdom or key lessons you learned while you were there?

How long do you have, Jeff? :) Seriously, when I start talking about VCFA I can get a bit long-winded.  For those who don't know, it's a low-residency program, which means that I went to the campus in VT five times over two years, for 10-day residencies with the other students and faculty. The rest of the time, I was working from home with an advisor. I'd send monthly "packets" of critical and creative writing, and would get feedback in letter form and sometimes over the phone.

The experience was life-changing. Finding myself in a community of people who were as passionate about children's literature as I was was incredible. The residencies were intense -- non-stop lectures, readings, workshops, dance parties... And the faculty -- which includes many award-winning authors, like Rita Williams-Garcia, Kathi Appelt, and Martine Leavitt -- are so generous and supportive.  My graduating class of sixteen included wonderful writers such as Carol Lynch Williams (The Chosen One), Jandy Nelson (The Sky is Everywhere), and Trent Reedy (Words in the Dust).

I think one of the major skills I acquired was how to read like a writer. How to evaluate what about a book is pulling me in or pushing me out of the narrative. And how to read my own work in a similar way.

Holy crap! Barack Obama bought your book! What was it like for you when you saw that?

My reaction was total denial (I still don't believe it actually happened. Literally.) combined with, "Who cares if it actually happened??! My name is in an article about PRESIDENT OBAMA!!! My. Name. With. Obama's. Name. Together! As long as we both shall live!!!!!!!!" And I smiled a lot.
 

What's next for you? Is there a new book on the horizon we can look forward to?

I'm working on a new YA novel, unrelated to Frost, called Immaculate. It's about a 15-year old girl in Brooklyn who is pregnant, but says she's a virgin. It will be published by Balzer+Bray, as well, so I'm fortunate to be working with my editor Kristin Daly Rens again. Yay!

 

Lastly, can you tell us five things readers might not know about you?

1. I’m terrible with wheels. I haven’t driven a car for years, but when I did, I endangered everyone in a three-mile radius. When I try to ride a bike, my life flashes before my eyes. And don’t even ask what happened the one time I rode an ATV!
2. I’m a sucker for beautiful clothes. One of my favorite museums in NYC is the gallery at the Fashion Institute of Technology.
3. Despite being somewhat shy, I have no problem taking over the dance floor if the right music is playing.
4. Since childhood, many of my friends have called me Mair, meaning they also sometimes call me the extremely mature sounding “Mair Baer.” (Rhymes with Care Bear.)
5. I own a broken skateboard made of fried pork skin. I’ll let you wonder why.

Thanks for coming by Marianna!

 

To enter a drawing for a signed copy of Marianna's FROST, just leave us a comment below! If you have a good ghost story, share that too!

Cleverbot - Who'd a thunk?

Ummm... okay - this is quite interesting.

http://www.cleverbot.com/

And, yes, you can have an actual conversation with Cleverbot. Not that all of it will make sense - and if you're not an adult, be sure to get parental permission and don't be surprised at what Cleverbot says. But... yeah... talking to a bot... not as cool as C3PO, but it's a step in that direction, right?

What do you think? Are you ready to spend conversation time with a robot? Do you find it odd, or slightly disturbing? Or super-cool?

Sci Fi: A New Golden Age

Sorry for the delay in posting this--I thought I'd scheduled it, but apparently goofed!

I recently read an article by author Sherwood Smith entitled "The Problem of Kids and Sci Fi." You should totally read it if you've not--she mentions a really neat sci fi book that I'm going to check out. But she also says that:

Fantasy was by far the biggest genre among those who were eager readers. When I’d prompt about why they didn’t read sf, I’d get the wrinkled nose, and it’s boring or it’s too hard.
Some digging led me to the conclusion that the old formula—the joy of a garage chemistry lab, or building a space ship in the back yard—had totally lost its appeal. That book is about kids doing science homework. Who cares?

Her point was the old school sci fi typically involved a group of teens who were actively pursuing science, and that led them to adventure. That formula is certainly rarer--when was the last time you read about a group of teens whose science project led to the plot of a sci fi novel? The only one that comes to mind for me is Bruce Coville's My Teacher is an Alien series--and that is both on the older side and a MG novel, not YA.

Sherwood Smith posits that YA sci fi is more often distinguished by romance--these days, you can't seem to have YA without at least a hint of romance, no matter what the subgenre. And--sadly--she had a valid point here. It is more typical than not that YA must involve some sort of romantic undertones at the very least.

But I don't think it's the romance that distinguishes YA sci fi these days. Instead, I think it's a shift in genre.

In adult sci fi--and in YA sci fi of the old days--science was the driving force of the plot. But in modern YA, science is a part of the setting, with some other element--romance, mystery, adventure--being the driving force of the plot.

What are some new YA sci fi titles that you're looking forward to? Do they use science as a setting or a driving force of the plot?