Month: June 2008

Winning awards for The Most Hilarious Way To Begin A Monday comes a tale from 94-year-old Betty Jenkins’ girlhood.

A bra. A plane. A really, really embarrassing stop in South America.

Don’t miss Fuse #8’s strangely watchable explorations of LA (Retro Family Fun!) and Jen’s awed swag collecting (can’t fit the luggage in the trunk anymore because of books? No problemo!). As always, I wonder how publishers can afford to do this kind of thing!?

Happy, Happy Monday.

One of the nicest things that happened to me when I was home was totally and thoroughly unexpected. At the Model Bakery in St. Helena, I ran into a former college professor of mine. Actually, I’m not sure how to refer to her — I never took a class from her, but the English department at my college was small and homey, and we all knew each other. I was a department reader briefly, but generally worked solely for the ESL program, and the Department Chair in the time I was there. Anyway, I saw this woman, now in her late seventies, and thought, “Ooh, there’s Dr. Youngblood!” Only I couldn’t remember her last name in time to blurt out a greeting (and I just couldn’t bring myself to shriek ‘Barbara!’ at a woman almost fifty years my senior and a teacher), so I left it to that polite smile-and-nod thing you do when you see someone you almost know.

The friend for whom we were waiting arrived and we launched into conversation, but I kept my eye out for Dr. Youngblood, and when I saw her get up, I smiled again. My friend turned around and called her over — as the wife of one of my professors, she gets away with the ‘Barbara’ thing — and though this lovely woman had no idea who I really was, she said she, too, recognized me right off and asked what I’d been doing with my life.

Well, everyone at the table flourished their copy of my book. There wasn’t much I could do but laugh.

And then, that lovely person just whipped out her notebook and had us read the ISBN number from the back cover of the book to her. She wrote in perfect copperplate on onionskin paper my name, the book title, and a note to herself to order it from the Main Street bookstore. She then left, wishing us a good day.

Twenty minutes later, she was back with celebratory goodies from Woodhouse Chocolates. Napa Valley aficionados know you can drop several hundred dollars on teensy teensy tiny bags of chocolate covered in gold leaf at that store. Our little gifts weren’t nearly that much, but they weren’t cheap. (Lemon zest and peppercorns in your chocolate bar? But of course!) Obviously, the money isn’t remotely the point, nor what we ate. Rather, it was the gesture, and the well-wishing. I was just so touched that someone who barely knew me really, really, really wishes me well, and told me over and over that she was “so proud.”

Just remembering that will always be as good as the chocolates.

After a loooooong wait, Inanimate Alice is back!

(Okay, so you already knew that. Give me a break. I’ve been gone!)

And, if you don’t know what the buzz is all about, GO. Look. Read the earlier chapters. This is an interactive digital multimedia tale that’s just beyond way cool.

Via SF Signal, Terry Pratchett finally has made the jump to graphics. HarperCollins is producing The Color of Magic and The Light Fantastic in one gorgeous book, which is perfect. Pratchett, I think will gain a greater audience from this. But does anyone else think Twoflower looks just a tad like Harry Potter in those glasses!?

I have a lot of respect for the power of story — I believe unbelievable things happen when we actually listen to each other and hear words in what we believe are the silences of our own experiences. I believe that story can be even found solely in facts — that the story of the lost kid of Guantanamo will be told and retold, and someday — may it be soon — his life will change. Because I believe in the power of stories, I often turn to StoryCorps and listen and laugh — and cry, usually — at those ‘conversations of a lifetime’ which occur when the people there go into the booth in various cities, sit in front of the microphone, and begin to talk.

Dave Eggers is continuing the tradition with Underground America, part of an oral history series published by the San-Francisco-based Voice of Witness project. Eggers is interviewing undocumented workers, and the stories told begin to show us another world some of us might not have imagined. “The point of the series is to illuminate human rights abuses through oral history,” Eggers is quoted as saying in the Guardian. These voices aren’t often heard, and the undocumented workers aren’t all migrant laborers. I love the fact that the word ‘undocumented’ is challenged early in the book: the book’s editor, Orner, says in his introduction: “Of course they have documents: family photos, diplomas, driver’s licences, love letters, emails, credit card bills, tax forms, homework, children’s drawings.” None of us goes through the world ‘undocumented,’ but it may be that our documents don’t matter in some places.

You may not always love Dave Eggers or find his fiction embraceable, but these oral histories — one telling stories of exonerated prisoners, one made after Katrina, and this most recent one — are projects worth doing, and stories worth knowing. Well done, Mr. Eggers.

While I was away, the Forest went into leaf. Check out the June Edge of the Forest! And for more endorphines, check out ‘that guy Matt’ and his latest Happy Dance on Youtube.

Cheers!

And a happy cool, gray and wet summer day to you!

Catching up on my daily routine, I read the Jon Carroll’s recent article in the SF Chronicle and had to smile, albeit grimly. The first time I ever heard about the ‘Every Fifteen Minutes’ program, it freaked me right out. It’s one thing to have kids taken from the classroom all day by someone dressed as the Grim Reaper, as part of an awareness thing that hey, people die when alcohol and driving are involved. But to lie to kids and tell them in all seriousness that one of their own has gone? And then, a couple of hours later say the equivalent of “Psyche! Got you!” –? Is reprehensible. I would be a very, very angry parent if that happened to my kid. And I’d be one pissed off student if it had happened to me. Yet, people do this sort of thing every year. Justified trauma. As Mr. Carroll says, “Have we really forgotten our own teenage years? Grief and death and desperate unhappiness were not strangers to us then. Those dark feelings were fueled in part by a sense of powerlessness.” I think young adults already know that crap happens quickly, unexpectedly, daily. That the people you’re supposed to trust can play a role in that and fake you out — is something no one would want to hear.

Oy. Catching up with the Gloucester High School pregnancy story with Liz makes me cringe some more. People ask why I don’t have much interest in writing books for adults — you know, those ‘real’ books. This is why: people don’t respect young adults, take their lives and privacy issues for granted, and generally assume that this is okay. Hello: advocacy, please? Anyone?

Camille has ruined my life by teaching me to play Pollack. Thanks, BookMoot. With a TracBall, this is a wicked good time waster.

A friend noted, after reading my novel, that “you’ll have to deal with a father in fiction at some point.” Hah! I think that’ll have to be my fourth book, as books 1-3 are pretty kid/grandma/non-Dad oriented. However! Susan Taylor Brown is rounding up the Fathers in Literature for the June Carnival of Children’s Books, so head over to see who’s talking book-Dad dudes.

The Interview Maven is herself interviewed! No, I don’t mean Little Willow, although I noted her interview with Beth Kephart a while back. No, I mean, Miss Cynthia, who is interviewed at Shrinking Violets. Cynthia Leitich Smith seems to know everyone and talk books with anyone, and she’s got that Texas friendliness thing going for her, too. Cynthia says this of blogging: “I enjoy the blogs as a way of “pajama outreach”–you don’t have to put on dry-clean-only clothes and get in the car/plane to do it. But it’s a personal choice. If you feel burdened by the idea of blogging, then you don’t have to (and probably shouldn’t). Put the energy into something that feeds you instead.” This is an interesting interview, thanks Violets.

“Won’t You Be My Neighbor?” in the NY Times this past weekend made me cheer. What would it take to get to know your neighbors? Writers tend to live introverted, quiet lives, but this writer decided to make a change. Hat tip to mental_floss for the link.

…so are the days of my alleged “vacation.” ((Hat tip to Bogenfreud for the hourglass picture.)

*sigh*
I’ve already semi-whined that going Home is NOT going on Vacation, and my recent days have been filled with fun (and sometimes tedious) family obligations. Sunday we leave to make the twenty-three hour trek back to the UK, and it’s a little horrible to say that it will be a RELIEF to get back. For one thing, I’m pretty sure I gained twenty pounds, hitting the guacamole. (But oh — the sad lack in Scotland! That, and jack cheese and root beer have been things I’ve had to enjoy at least once to make sure I know I’m home!) For another thing, I’m beginning to miss my desk. I don’t know how rock star writers like Laurie Halse Anderson can do it — running around speaking to schools, doing book events, attending conferences and smiling — but I can’t even think straight lately, and I might do something truly odd if I don’t have some quiet time pretty soon. As it is, I’ve taken to hiding in my room and jotting things down on the back of envelopes. It’s writer desperation.

I have been doing teensy bookish things. I’ve met with book people at various independent bookstores (shout out to the nice people at Copperfield’s Sebastopol! Whoo!), I’ve been interviewed in an airport (which taught me that a writer really never does know the answer to the question, “why should we buy this book?” Um… because my Mom said it’s cute? So far that’s not convincing anyone.), I’ve had friends accost total strangers and show them my book — and have those strangers in turn stare at me… stare at the book… back and forth… (I kind of think that because I was going to get my hair done, and I looked like I’d been rolled down a hill in a log the strangers in question were amazed I could read and write, much less write a book…)

We never create in a vacuum… our creations go out and collide with other people’s viewpoints and expectations, and are seen in a way we could never foresee. It’s amazing how that works. A friend told me her daughter took my book to the beach, and considered it The Perfect Beach Read. This made me oddly happy.

Funny things you don’t find out from just reading the news — one of the American Girl books has been made into a film! I found that out by walking past a theater, and I’m sure you all already knew! However, NPR already has a review!

A few other things that stuck out to me in my blog perusing —

Tamora Pierce shows off the new cover for Bloodhound, the sequel to Terrier… nice.

Sara’s putting us all to shame by actually publicly listing her summer goals. Do I even have those?

Finally, Sarah Aronson gives some excellent advice to writers on how to take advice — some of us have a hard time hearing what people say about our work, and it IS hard to take and give criticism. A must-read for people in writing groups.

My time here in the U.S. is running out, and I’m feeling a mix of frantic, saddened, exhausted and relieved. This busy snippet of summer is soon going to give way to the cooler, slower life in the UK. We’ll be back up to our usual speed hopefully by next week. Hope these hot — or rainy — summer days find you doing well.

Cheers!