Writing Surprises (or Boy or Girl Voice?)

Tip of the Day:
Check out the Diversity in YA Reading Challenge! You could win a ton of new books by spreading the word.

I'm working on my YA WIP that involves two different aspects for me: 1) alternating first person povs; and 2) a boy main character.

And guess what? My crit group loves the boy's voice a lot more than the girl's. Woah. I did not think that would be the outcome.

What that means is that I need to really work on the girl's voice and go through her chapters carefully and make her as fun to read as her brother.

Can I do it?

The challenge is on.

What has surprised you about your writing?
Deena, Miss Subbing for Pubbing

The anti 9-to-5 movement

Tip of the Day: if one of your guilty pleasures is the Real Housewives of New Jersey, you have to check out Jay Mohr's blog entries. Too funny!

One of the articles that popped up in my Yahoo news feed the other day was about people making a living with multiple part-time jobs. The NY times article was a fascinating read for a number of reasons. Not only have I made my living with multiple part-time jobs on numerous occasions, but I have to admit that I almost prefer to work that way. And it appears I'm not alone, because the article touches on the growing trend for Gen Y'ers to prefer sampling with multiple careers.

Both of my parents have been in the same field (if not the same job) for pretty much my entire life. While I on the other hand have a resume that could rival Mr. Ryan Seacrest himself in variety and quantity. And I have to admit, I wouldn't want it any other way. All of my work experience has pushed me to think outside the box and be in a state of constant learning.

I think part of the reason I'm drawn to writing so much is not only is it an outlet for creativity, but it gives me something to work for professionally outside of my current career.

Maybe it is being born into (or at least relating with) a generation that's in constant contact via email, cell phone, Facebook, Twitter, and the like. But as a result of all this communication and motion, I get bored easily. Very easily. As a result I'm constantly looking to the future for new ways to get fulfillment in work and artistically.

Writing has been one of those ways.

And as the article suggests this can be both good and bad. Because it's easy to get distracted when things are hard and then it's almost a given you want to move onto the next job or activity.

But if you want anything great to happen, you have to rein yourself in and keep plugging away!

--Emily, Miss Habitual Job Seeker

Happy Graduation!

Tip of the Day: I have absolutely no tips to share with you on how to stop your kids from turning into slugs over the summer. Let me know if you have tips for me!

This weekend was high school graduation weekend in my area. There were parties on almost every street. Congratulations! Is it me, or do these events seem much less dramatic and rowdy than they did when I graduated? The drama must be very well hidden.

Here is what I learned from being a writer about what happens after graduation:

1- Keeping a journal is probably a good thing, but don't be surprised if you want to burn it someday.

2- Take some college classes in something you like. My parents really pushed me to be a business major and were disappointed when I majored in English. They thought I'd never make a living. But I've had some interesting jobs, and even jobs that paid pretty well. It's better to get through school learning about what you love than to drop out.

3- Read this summer a lot. Because whether you're going on to college or not, life tends to get very hectic in the fall.

4- If you're living at home, you're going to hate living at home. If you're living away from home, you're going to hate that, too. Be patient with yourself. If necessary, journal and burn.

5- Try something you've never tried before. I'm still telling myself that. We don't know what we can do until we try, and every time we try something new, we learn.

6- I don't know what the end goal is, but you'll probably get the kind of life you work for.

Happy Graduation seniors and parents of seniors! Enjoy your summer!

-- Kate, Miss Perfecting the Pages

Fun Friday: Guest Post from YA Author JENNIFER HUBBARD

Today's guest post comes from an author who has been reading Author2Author since the very beginning! So cool! Welcome Jenn!

***

About a month ago, I faced the fact that my TBR (to-be-read) book pile, if unchecked, stood a good chance of taking over the house. (I assume the only reason it hasn’t already is that the prospect of ruling two middle-class adults and one self-important cat isn’t particularly compelling, as coups and takeovers go.) I couldn’t shake the thought that there’s a certain silliness to buying more books when I have dozens of perfectly good unread books at home. (Readers everywhere will understand, though, that you have to be in the right mood to read a book, and sometimes that means putting off the TBR pile another day.) Also, I like to subscribe to literary magazines, but ever since I sold my first book, issues of these journals have been piling up unread.

As an inveterate list-maker, I decided that making a list would help me put a dent in the TBR pile. Nothing thrills a compulsive list-maker like crossing off items on a list, or getting to add to a list of accomplishments! I decided to do both: to make a list of all newly-read books and magazines that were already in the house as of April 17, 2011; and to list all books purchased since then, and record whether I’ve read them or not.

I know you are all waiting breathlessly for my stats, so here they are for the first month: Since starting this project, I’ve read three novels that I already owned; seven issues of the literary journal OneStory; and one issue of the literary magazine Tin House (likewise). I have also purchased ten new books, of which I’ve read six. That’s a net decrease in the amount of unread material in the house! I’ve also reread some books, as I always do, but they don’t count toward this list.

I’m not sure how I’ll handle library books—I don’t have any checked out at the moment. *ponders* The nice thing is that, read or unread, library books don’t hang around the house for long, joining the TBR pile in whatever act of rebellion it’s plotting.

How do you manage your TBR pile—or do you manage it?

***

Jennifer R. Hubbard writes contemporary YA stories, including The Secret Year (Viking, 2010), “Confessions and Chocolate Brains” (a short story in the 2011 anthology Truth & Dare), and the upcoming Try Not to Breathe (Viking, 2012). She blogs at http://JenniferRHubbard.blogspot.com

Anthology Cover

Tip of the Day: Check out this great post about why we should be reading contemporary YA novels over at stackedbooks.org and then browse through the rest of the week of great posts on contemporary YA.

Remember a couple of weeks ago when I was talking about writing a short story? Well, I'm still working on it but it's going better (Yay!). And we just got the BEAUTIFUL cover so now I'm even more excited to finish and make it great. Isn't it cool?

The list of authors includes: Cyn Balog, Lauren Bjorkman, Leigh Brescia, Jennifer Brown, Kirstin Cronn-Mills, Janet Gurtler, Teri Hall, Cheryl Renee Herbsman, Stacey Jay, Heidi R. Kling, C. Lee McKenzie, Saundra Mitchell, Jenny Moss, Jackson Pearce, Shani Petroff, Carrie Ryan, Sydney Salter, Kurtis Scaletta, Jon Skovron, Kristina Springer, Rhonda Stapleton, Charity Tahmaseb, Jessica Verday, J.A. Yang, and Lara Zielin.

This will be an eBook only (available via Amazon, B&N, and Smashwords)--the tentative release date is October 2011.

Kristina, Miss Author in Action

Tip of the Day: At least watch Step 1 on "How do I Plot a Novel." Then, if you have time, watch the next 27 (I'm not done yet!).

In honor of my latest WIP that I'm excited about, I'm posting a teaser. Enjoy!

The Forgotten Night

Chapter 1
Leo

My body ached like it had been crushed under an entire football team. Except I hadn’t played ball in three years. Screw anything that could break my fingers and stop me from playing my Gibson.

Speaking of that, I slowly flexed my fingers. Thank god they bent without trouble.

Wait, why would there be trouble?

I popped my eyes open. I was in my car.

Why?

A pounding head, nausea, and dizziness joined my body aches. The rising sun’s rays cut like razors in my eyes. “Jesus,” I muttered.

A moan came from beside me. My sister, Jenny. “You OK?” I grunted.

“Where are we?” she asked, her voice rough.

I felt my head for gaping wounds. My fingers slicked up with sweat but no blood.

“Leo? What happened?”

As if I had a clue.

“You crashed, didn’t you?” Jenny clutched her head and cringed. “I can’t believe it. Why do you have to drive like such a maniac?”

“I didn’t crash.” My own voice hurt my head. I reached to the back seat and groped around for my water bottle, then drank. I didn’t remember crashing, but didn’t remember not crashing. From the crooked position of the car, I had run into a shallow ditch. Dammit.

“Do you remember what happened or don’t you?” Jenny demanded, her voice rising. Not that I blamed her. Inside I felt the same panic.

“Leo!”

“I’ll figure it out,” I said, a better answer than admitting that my thoughts from last night were as blank as a corrupted hard drive. I rolled out of the car. The motion made me gag but nothing came up. I leaned onto the cool, dewy hood and scoped out the scene.

The road was empty, the sky was still. I sucked in some fresh air and recognized the two-lane country road that we took to and from Dad’s. Route 522 in Pennsylvania. To the west, long field grasses lined the way until the elevation soared into the tree-covered Appalachian Mountains.

Jenny’s door creaked open. “Did we hit a deer? Or take down a tree or something?” she asked from her seat.

The overgrown grasses buzzed with insects but that was it. Jenny and I were alone. I circled the car in measured steps looking for any sign of damage, trying to keep my posture tall so Jenny wouldn’t know how bad the spinning was in my head and gut.

###

Clean up on Page 10

Tip of the Day: finally tried out the Overdrive app on my iPhone today, so I can get books easily from my library. Love it!

This week has been filled with cleaning, cleaning, sprucing up, and more cleaning. I definitely come from the group of people that believe messy environments are the sign of a creative mind, and choose to clean for only one of two reasons:

1.) When you have to flip through 100 papers to find the one you need. (Or you know...you have to start hand washing dishes because there's no clean bowls left to put your Lucky Charms in.)
2.) Or when someone is coming to visit.

This week's reason for The Great Clean centers on No. 2. Not only do we have company coming this weekend, but we also have hundreds of people that will be traipsing in our house for a Historic Home and Garden Tour. And since they have to fork over $10 to see all the homes and gardens on the tour, I felt I owed it to them to at least dust.

But I will have to say that I have found myself on multiple occasions this week just stuffing random papers into drawers, throwing things into closests, and taking more and more items down into the basement to sit out of view.

And after doing all this, I'm just now realizing that it's going to take me twice as long to put it all back to it's rightful place when the home tour is over. And if I'd just taken the extra time upfront to do the proper cleaning then I probably won't be wanting to bang my head against the door when I have to clean again in a few days.

I'm guilty of doing this with my writing as well. Sometimes I'm lazy and want to shortcut my revisions or I think "oh this simple solution will still work. It might not be the best, but it will be ten times faster and easier."

And you know what...in the end it's not worth it. Because it almost always needs redone.

If only I'd listened to my mother when I was younger and learned the proper way to clean, maybe both my house and my current work in progress wouldn't be such a mess.

Oh well...it's a good thing Creative Minds are born from chaos...

Hmmm....maybe my coffee table/trunk really would make a better laundry basket in the basement?

--Emily

* Note: this is not my office. To prove it you can find the picture posted on this site and track down the real owner of this office. But I will say at least the papers seem to be in neat piles! That's points in my book.