WriteFest books

It's been a couple years since Cyn and I hosted WriteFest, an invitation-only writers' workshop. Still, I'm very pleased that we are continuing to see manuscripts that were workshopped being published.

The first was Laura Ruby's Good Girls. Then, last year was Brian Yansky's Wonders of the World.

Forthcoming novels include Katie Davis's The Curse of Addy McMahon; Kathi Appelt's The Underneath, and Libba Bray's Going Bovine.

Great work, y'all!

SHIFT, by Jennifer Bradbury

SHIFT, by Jennifer Bradbury (Atheneum, May 2008). In SHIFT, first-time novelist Jennifer Bradbury presents a textured and moving portrait of a friendship and lives in transition.

The summer before they head off to college, Chris Collins and his best friend Win Coggans are on the adventure of a lifetime: a cross-country bicycle trip from their home in West Virginia to Seattle. But after two months in the saddle during which their friendship (and sometime rivalry) is tested to the breaking point, they separate. Chris ultimately makes it to the coast without Win and hops a bus back home.

Win, however, isn't there. And he still isn't back when Chris leaves for Georgia Tech.

Win's well-connected father suspects Chris has something to do with Win's disappearance...and then the FBI show up at Chris's dorm.

Making skillful use of flashbacks to tell the story, Bradbury does a terrific job of balancing details of the bicycle trek with development of the relationship between the friends (and their parents), and Chris's attempts to uncover/accept what really happened. Part road trip, part mystery, SHIFT is at all times compelling and thought-provoking.

THAW, by Monica M. Roe

THAW, by Monica M. Roe (Front Street, April 2008): In this finely-wrought first novel, Monica Roe presents the story of eighteen-year old Dane Rafferty: handsome, brilliant, and a gifted athlete, Dane is intolerant of failure and more than a little arrogant. In the midst of his senior year of high school, he's afflicted with Guillain-Barre Syndrome, a rare and debilitating disease which causes almost complete paralysis. In response, Dane's emotionally distant parents send him away from his home in upstate New York to a rehabilitation clinic in Florida. There, Dane encounters an oddball set of patients and therapists who alternately cajole, irritate, and profoundly affect him. Although seventy-five percent of patients with GBS make a full recovery, there are twenty-five percent who don't and Dane comes to realize he might just be in the latter category...

Told in a compelling first person voice (with flashbacks to his life prior to the illness), THAW artfully traces Dane's progression from self-centered and exquisitely arrogant to being aware of what his aloofness might be costing him (and others around him).

Best of all, throughout the novel -- even when he's at his worst -- Dane is portrayed as three-dimensional and real. In short, Roe engages the reader into Dane's character, situation, and growth in a resonant and affecting manner.

Vote early and often

Today is the last day of early voting for the March 4 Texas primary. For the Republicans, things are fairly calm and rather straightforward: you go to the polling place and, well, vote. Once.

If you're a Democrat, though, things are rather more tense and complicated -- you get to vote twice (and unlike Chicago, down here, it's legal!): For reasons that are not entirely clear to me, Texas Democratic delegates are assigned based on the primary ballot (where you vote normally once) and a caucus at something called a "precinct convention" held the same evening (where you do whatever it is people do at a caucus). The Austin Chronicle has more. So far as I know, though, it's still illegal for the dead to vote. Or caucus. Or whatever.

Anyway, here are the candidates' websites:

Democrat:

Hillary Clinton
Barack Obama

Republican:

Mike Huckabee
John McCain

The glamorous life...

of an author...Last weekend, Cyn and I did the final proof-reading of her forthcoming novel, Eternal. She blogs about it here. It's around 60,000 words and took around eight or nine hours to read (We traditionally do the read-aloud for all our manuscripts - it makes us read more slowly and helps us catch glitches in the rhythm of the language). The cats were generally intrigued. In the photo, you see (clockwise from top) Leo, Blizzard, and Sebastian.

The manuscript is terrific - I won't tell you about it, but will say it's smart, sexy, spiritual, and a little scary. I think Candlewick has scheduled it for Winter/Spring 2009.

To celebrate, today we went with a friend to see Spiderwick. (Yes, we just saw it a week ago and will undoubtedly get it on DVD, but it's a movie that needs to be seen in the theater). Then we went out to Katz's for the Briggs' Brownie Boat.

Spiderwick!

Speaking of sprites...

Cyn and I just got back from seeing The Spiderwick Chronicles at the Alamo Drafthouse. We've been looking forward to the movie, based on the Spiderwick Chronicles books written by Holly Black and illustrated by Tony DiTerlizzi, for some time. (We've been fans for some time, and had the pleasure of meeting Holly at the National Book Festival last fall.).

The movie was amazing. The acting was superb (the casting was amazing), the story fantastic, the characters genuine, and the special effects terrific. It was poignant, scary, and just plain wonderful. It's been a while since I've enjoyed a movie this much.

If you like good translations of children's literature into film -- and if you ever want to see more -- go see this movie. You won't be disappointed. (Oh, and buy the books. But then, you've already done that, haven't you?)

Back to blogging...

Cyn has ended her holiday blogging hiatus. Cynsations is back on line with an interview with the Brown Bookshelf folks. Go over and take a look.

She's also got a post up on Spookycyn about our trip to Arizona last week. Many more pictures and details as she talks about Writing in the Desert.

Sprites!

Cyn and I just got back from Phoenix, where the American Intellectual Property Law Association was having its Mid-Winter Institute. (I was attending so as to fulfill my CLE requirement). The sessions were more interesting than I was expecting (really).

Venue for the event was the Arizona Biltmore Hotel, which was designed by a student of Frank Lloyd Wright. In addition, the hotel houses some of the remaining Midway Sprites (seen here), from the old Midway Gardens in Chicago. The place was extremely restful and an excellent choice for the Institute, as well as for a writer retreat. (Cynthia spent the days working on a couple of her new projects; she also took a glass artifact making class that was sponsored by AIPLA.).

Definitely one of our better hotel experiences.

Food was excellent; we ate at Wright's, the more formal place, twice: Highlights included buffalo sirloin and elk sirloin, as well as tuna tartare and potato soup. The Biltmore Grill, the more casual place, was also excellent, and had some menu overlap with Wright's.

Now back to work...

DINOSAURS

Dinosaurs: The Most Complete, Up-to-date Encyclopedia for Dinosaur Lovers of All Ages, by Dr. Thomas R. Holtz, Jr., and illustrated by Luis V. Rey (Random House 2007). This is a terrific book and, as the title suggests, both comprehensive and appropriate for ages middle grade and up. Particularly novel is the complete dinosaur genus list in the back.

Paleontologist Holtz provides excellent explanations of, and descriptions of, all of the dinosaur families. He also includes extensive discussions on the science of paleontology, cladistics, geology, etc. Illustrator Rey adds color and verve to the account, providing radical and eye-catching interpretations of dinosaur soft tissues and feathers, reminding us that we really have no idea what dinosaurs may have looked like in the flesh.

Definitely a must-read for dinosaur aficionados of all ages.

Dr. Holtz has a web page full of updates and supplemental material here.

REPOSSESSED

Repossessed, by A.M. Jenkins (HarperTeen 2007). Kiriel is a demon (err, "fallen angel"). Bored with the underworld, he hijacks the body of teen-ager Shaun just before he dies. Kiriel experiences physical existence for the first time as he takes over Shaun's life, and all that that entails. Not just taste and sight and smell and feel and sex, which are all terrific, but mortal relationships and interpersonal interactions. Once the novelty wears off, though, Kiriel realizes he wants to make the most of his current existence...to make a difference.

Told with a voice that captures Kiriel's sense of the novelty and wonder of Creation, Repossessed is at once fun and substantive, providing a unique and often funny perspective on mortality and teenage existence.

Comment: This is the only one of the Printz honorees I read last year. I could've sworn I'd blogged it, but apparently not (Fall was kind of hectic last year). Cyn has an interview with Jenkins here.