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Category Archives: Poetry

Quirk and Quill 2014 Favorite Books

29 Monday Dec 2014

Posted by Sue LaNeve in Fiction, In Real Life, Poetry, The Writing Biz, The Writing Life, VCFA, We're Inspired, We're Reading

≈ 5 Comments

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Annemarie O'Brien, Brown Girl Dreaming, Candace Fleming, Carol Allen, Danielle Pignataro, E. Lockhart, Eliot Shrefer, Endangered, Evidence of Things Not Seen, I'LL GIVE YOU THE SUN, Jacqueline Woodson, Jandy Nelson, Linden McNeilly, Lindsey Lane, Romanov: Murder Rebellion & the Fall of Imperial Russia, Sue LaNeve, The One and Only Ivan, Varian Johnson, We Were Liars

So many books, so little time. How does one choose?

squirell acorns
We Kid-Lit writers read books the way voracious squirrels gather acorns, consuming the precious finds to feed our passions, spitting out the empty shells to guide and inspire our work. If you’re looking for a good book to read or give, here are favorites offered by my VCFA 2009 grad class–The Super Secret Society of Quirk and Quill, aka S3Q2.

Carol Allen

Brown Girl DreamingBROWN GIRL DREAMING by Jacqueline Woodson. I loved this memoir written in verse. Woodson is an award winning writer, and in this book,  she managed to trace not only her own development as a writer but her family’s participation in the Civil Rights Movement. The family, split among Ohio, South Carolina, and then Brooklyn, not only witnessed televised and personal experiences with the “Movement,” but they did so from an upbringing as Jevohah’s Witnesses.  Woodword’s poetic talent leaps off the page, and her references to the differences of Whites and Blacks in our nation’s history, while not in-depth, are powerful enough to take the reader right to the scene.

Danielle Pignatarro 

I'll give you the sunMy favorite book this year -not including any published from S3Q2- was I’LL GIVE YOU THE SUN by Jandy Nelson. It’s hard to pinpoint one thing that made it so amazing. The two different points of view, spanning years, created perfect tension that allowed things to be revealed at the perfect moments.  I tried to read it slowly, but it was impossible to do so. I had to know what was going to happen next.

 

Varian Johnson 

Brown Girl DreamingMy favorite book of the year was BROWN GIRL DREAMING by Jacqueline Woodson. The use of poetry and well-placed line breaks allowed me to contemplate and measure each verse. The memoir was powerful but never heavy-handed. It was rightly chosen for a National Book Award, and I expect it to take Newbery gold as well.

 

The Fourteenth GoldfishAnother favorite book is THE FOURTEENTH GOLDFISH by Jennifer Holm. The novel shows us a new take on the grandfather-grandchild relationship, but is never heavy-handed or didactic. Holm uses deceptively simple language to showcase very powerful moments for both Ellie and Melvin, her grandfather. While everyone doesn’t get what they want at the end of the novel, they all get exactly what they need.

 

Linden McNeilly

My top three were:

Brown Girl DreamingBROWN GIRL DREAMING, by Jacqueline Woodson:  I loved its close take on life, her use of essential details without bogging down or getting ham-handed, and overall core message of strength and family. I am not always drawn to novels or memoirs in verse, but she sold me with her use of spare, poetic language that was not cloying, singsongy or trite.

endangeredENDANGERED, by Eliot Shrefer: Vivid, excellent plotting, fantastic use of the political and personal to establish setting and tension, and authentic in its close look at life with the bonobos. I couldn’t put it down, and my husband, who reads almost no kidlit, felt the same way.

evidenceEVIDENCE OF THINGS NOT SEEN, by Lindsey Lane: What a book. She uses many alternate voices, and a changing time period to continually spiral around a tragic event that feels unknowable, yet affected a whole town. She is an absolute master at voice, and the way she was able to move the plot through changing narrative was very admirable.

 

Sue LaNeve

We were liars

I’ve just begun BROWN GIRL DREAMING, and already understand why it is such a favorite. But of the books I’ve completed, E. Lockhart’s WE WERE LIARS gets my vote for my favorite. Emily’s unique voice and opening lines sucked me in with an intense gravitational pull. Her development of setting, characters, and relationships begged me to slow my pace to savor her unique plotting. But her slow reveal of what my gut screamed would grow as dark and forceful as a black hole kept the pages turning, rapidly. The twist caught me so off guard, I shouted OH MY GOD, nearly giving my husband a coronary. This was delicious fictionone and only.

A special 10-year-old in my life led me to another honoree published a couple years ago, Katherine Applegate’s THE ONE AND ONLY IVAN. This particular boy prefers non-fiction but he inhaled this tale so consider it for your reluctant or avid reader. I was drawn to its core, the power of kindness.

Annemarie O’Brien

THE+FAMILY+ROMANOV (2)My two favorite books this year were BROWN GIRL DREAMING by Jacqueline Woodson and THE FAMILY ROMANOV: MURDER, REBELLION & THE FALL OF IMPERIAL RUSSIA by Candace Fleming. I’ll focus on the latter since the former is getting well deserved coverage. I’ve read numerous adult books about the fall of Imperial Russia and the Romanov family over the past twenty-five years. I can’t think of a book aimed at young adults that is as thorough and engaging as Fleming’s. Her book is so well researched and written even adults would enjoy it. Unlike most of the adult books out there, Fleming’s book is the only one that also brings the peasant point of view to life with true accounts inserted in each of the chapters. If you like non-fiction, THE FAMILY ROMANOV is a gem and a story you won’t be able to put down!

If you’ve reached this point in the post, you’ll likely agree that Jacqueline Woodson’s BROWN GIRL DREAMING deserves all of the honors it has already earned and will likely continue to receive. So even as we honor the work of all the authors listed above, this post is for you, Jacqueline Woodson. 

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Q and A with Greg Neri

07 Thursday Feb 2013

Posted by Sue LaNeve in Fiction, In Real Life, Interviews, Poetry, The Writing Biz, The Writing Life, We're Inspired

≈ 8 Comments

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Chess Rumble, Greg Neri, gut instincts, muse, Sue LaNeve, Surf Mules, trust your gut, Urban Cowboy, Yummi

Nearly ten years ago, Greg Neri welcomed me, a newbie writer, into his critique group. I’ve watched his career ascend like a missile. That success, his multi-cultural roots, plethora of talents, warm heart and slightly rebellious spirit bring an interesting angle to writing. 21779_10151185266762949_1795177605_n

Sue:  You’ve published four books, one a graphic novel, another in verse, and you’ve been the recipient of literally dozens of awards including Coretta Scott King honors, ALA Notables, YALSA Top Ten and the IRA Lee Bennett Hopkins Promising Poet Award. You’re a magnet for MG and YA readers, particularly boys, and your selection of subject matter has touched on rather gutsy subject matter.  How do you do it? 

Greg:  It all starts with the gut. The gut never lies as far as I’m concerned. We only get in trouble when we listen to our brain trying to justify another way out. So I’ve learned to follow my gut on stories. Your gut is like having your own personal version of The Force. Follow your gut, Luke.

If I have one so-called “talent”, I think it’s the ability to recognize a great story when I see it. And that’s all gut reaction. My books are inspired by real li8281988fe—unique places, unusual people, compelling events. If I listened to my head, I would have been scared off to pursue any of the subjects I wrote about. A middle grade story about a gangbanger who kills a teenage girl and gets assassinated by two other teenagers for becoming a liability? Yeah, right. But Yummy: the Last Days of a Southside Shorty ended up being my most popular and critically-acclaimed book.

8247486On every project I did and am doing, something unusual happened. I stumbled across a real life story so unknown and compelling that it had to be a book. I mean reality is truly stranger than fiction. Black urban cowboys in Philly? Whoa.

4534672Ex-cons saving young lives through chess? Heavy.

The disorganized crime world of5155656 surfing drug mules? Outrageous. But here’s the thing– nobody else was writing about these things.

So it felt like it fell on me to bring these worlds to life because other people needed to hear about these amazing stories too.

Sue: So why use fiction then to delve into these real worlds?

Greg: Fiction is just the way it comes out. I collect so many different and compelling stories within a world that I need to find a vehicle that will allow me to pick and choose from all those different moments to get at a deeper truth. I sometimes call myself a mash-up author. Just like DJs sample music and remix it into something original, I sample life and remix it into a new story.

Sue:  So how do you decide to take that leap of faith on a new story?

Greg:  Fortunately, the story decides for me. It feels like I have no choice—a story finds me, literally stops me in my tracks and won’t let go until I write about it—even if I am committed to something else. That is the only way out. But I can always tell if it’s the right choice: the writing comes easy. When it’s the wrong choice, its clearly an uphill battle.

Sue: What has been your riskiest decision?

Greg: To buy back a novel that had already sold to a major publisher because the sale went against my own gut reaction. It was a mistake and the toughest thing I had to do was to break free from that untenable situation (though it took a long time to realize it). There’s no one to blame, it just happens sometimes that things weren’t meant to be even if you really wanted it to work. But sticking it out longer would have ended my writing–I think I would have quit. But you can only learn from your mistakes—there’s nothing to learn from success (except that it might be nice to have).

Sue: Have you ever chucked a story because your gut told you to move in a different direction?

Greg: Yes, the novel I just finished came in the middle of a two year struggle on another book. The real incidents in the new story I came across were so powerful, my gut said I had to do it, even though technically, I was obliged to do the other. But it all works out in the end. Had I ignored the calling, I would have been twice as frustrated and had nothing to show for it. Now I will get 2 books out of it and renewed faith in my ability to write.

Other times, you chuck the idea you had for the execution of a book. All my stories started off as the wrong thing in the beginning and became something else in the end: free-verse became a novel, a picture book became a graphic novel, a short story became a free-verse novella. So I’ve had to chuck the initial idea I was trying to force on the story in order to accept the story as it wanted to be told.  I’ve come to learn that stories are like children: you might want them to become a doctor, but there’s no stopping them if they want to start a punk band instead.

Sue: Has your agent supported your decisions?

Greg:  I told my agent that at least he will never get bored with me. Seems every project I do breaks some rule, but he has always backed me. Especially when things get tough. A good agent in like having your own therapist to keep you going and a henchman to do your dirty work when it comes to that.

Sue:  Would you give us a peek at your next projects?

Greg:  Finished a free-verse picture book biography on the childhood of Johnny Cash, a book that took 10 years to happen. The project lay dormant for many years and then, I revived it on a whim because my gut told me it was too good to let it disappear forever. And with a few bold changes, it came to life again. That’s coming from Candlewick next year. Then I just finished the novel I referred to above which is going out to market as we speak. I am also finishing the writing on a new graphic novel called Grand Theft Horse about my cousin, a 60 year old Texas widow who stole a thoroughbred horse on Christmas Eve to save it from being raced to death. She became an outlaw—a cause célèbre, who learned the law165016_10151244081612949_200128039_n at the library at night in order to beat a high powered LA attorney bent on ruining her. Otherwise, I’m back on that epic book that I put aside, which is now smaller and simpler and not so damn important, but hopefully just a really great story.

To learn more about Greg, go to http://gregneri.com/.

Q&A with Author Holly Thompson

28 Monday Jan 2013

Posted by Annemarie O'Brien in Interviews, Poetry, The Writing Biz, The Writing Life, Writing Craft

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

Author Interview, Holly Thompson, Japan, Poetry, Verse

Orchards

AOB:       I just loved your novel, Orchards. It is one of the best books I read in 2012. How did you come up with the story idea?

Holly:  Thank you! Orchards was a story that began to develop as I was doing research at a mikan orange farm in Shizuoka, Japan, for an adult novel. Midway through my 18 months of assisting a mikan farm family and absorbing everything I could about mikan cultivation and Japanese agricultural village life, the farmer’s American-born niece came to visit. Seeing her there, a family member yet out of her element, inspired the character of Kana. The other element of the story, Ruth, was sadly inspired by the suicide death of the thirteen-year-old daughter of a friend. I never truly expected to write about it, but the idea of Kana’s summer in Japan, the mikan and apple orchards, the girls in New York all began to merge into a tale I felt needed to be told. I hope that Orchards raises questions for readers and starts discussions.

AOB:       In a few sentences could you give us a description of the plot?

Holly: Here is the jacket description:  After a classmate commits suicide, Kana Goldberg—a half-Japanese, half-Jewish American—wonders who is responsible. She and her cliquey friends said some thoughtless things to the girl. Hoping that Kana will reflect on her behavior, her parents pack her off to her mother’s ancestral home in Japan for the summer. There Kana spends hours under the hot sun tending to her family’s mikan orange groves. Kana’s mixed heritage makes it hard to fit in at first, especially under the critical eye of her traditional grandmother, who has never accepted Kana’s father. But as the summer unfolds, Kana gets to know her relatives, Japan, and village culture, and she begins to process the pain and guilt she feels about the tragedy back home. Then news about a friend sends her world spinning out of orbit all over again.
Holly Thompson’s dazzling novel in verse gives voice to the complex emotions of a girl whose anger, confusion, and regret transform into newfound compassion and a sense of purpose.

AOB:       Verse novels have always intrigued me. Can you share your writing process with us? What tips would you give writers on how best to approach writing a verse novel? What are your favorite YA verse novels?

Holly:  I think each verse novelist approaches a verse novel in a unique way. Many “verse novels” are actually what I would call “novels in poems.” My approach is to write each chapter as a longish poem, with each page a sort of sub-poem. I’m very conscious of page turns. This means that while each page may not contain a true stand-alone poem, within that chapter it should serve as a sort of sub-poem, a unit larger than a stanza but smaller than the chapter. This is the approach I’ve used for Orchards and The Language Inside and another verse novel I just completed.

LanguageInsideCover

I look forward to further experimenting with this and other methods.  As for other verse novels and novels in poems that I love, to name just a few of many: Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha Lai, Because I Am Furniture by Thalia Chaltas, and works by Ellen Hopkins, Sonya Sones and Helen Frost. My advice for verse novelists is to read poetry, read verse novels, write poetry, go to poetry readings, hear poetry. Then ask yourself if the voice and the content of your story are truly suited to the pared down, condensed nature of verse. Verse novels require blending story with poetry, and not all stories are necessarily suited to the form.

AOB:       I’m fascinated with the writing life you have created for yourself in Japan. How did you end up in Japan teaching writing? What courses do you teach and for whom? What kind of advice would you give someone (me!) interested in following a similar path?

Holly:  I met my husband-to-be when I was twenty and he was recently back from a year and a half living and studying in Kyoto and keen to return. I was studying biology and just discovering my love for writing short fiction—Japan was so not on my agenda! But we came to an agreement that after graduating I’d teach science for two years and then we’d move to Japan, and that’s exactly what we did. We lived and taught in public high schools in Kanagawa for three years, and while there I became serious about writing. We moved back to the US so I could attend the Creative Writing Program at New York University. It wasn’t until 1998 that we had the chance to move to Japan again—with our two small children; soon after that I began teaching at Yokohama City University. Creative writing is not typically offered at Japanese universities, so I’ve been lucky to be able to teach courses in poetry writing and fiction writing, as well as literature and other courses.

AOB:       What does a typical writing day look like for you?

Holly:  There is no typical day! Some days are new writing days, some are more for editing, some days I work on long fiction for part of the day then turn to poetry, or vice versa. Sometimes I’ll spend a day immersed in short fiction. A writing day always includes a run or a hike—physical movement. I’m lucky to live in Kamakura where I have some amazing scenery and cultural history to draw me outside my study and generate new ideas. There are lots of Kamakura-related posts and photos on my hatbooks blog so you can get an idea of my writing environment.

CIMG8842 kyoto

AOB:       How does living in Japan influence your writing?

Holly:  Living in Japan and raising our kids here; travel back and forth to the US; meeting students and writers all around Asia; insider/outsider issues—all of this has fueled my writing. I tend to think that writers and artists can always benefit by going outside our comfort zones, by finding new ways of seeing. Speaking and hearing Japanese daily inevitably influences my English, my sentences, my sense of rhythm and pacing, and where I find the need for breathing space and pause in my verse and prose.

CIMG8129 yukata

AOB:       What kinds of challenges did you have launching Orchards from overseas? How did you overcome them?

Holly:  Well, there aren’t many grand launch opportunities here, so you have to create them for yourself. I speak at international schools–perfect settings to celebrate a book launch. SCBWI Tokyo and other Japan writing groups offer opportunities for speakers to read and present and get a book known. I’ll be in Korea for the U.S. launch date of The Language Inside so will celebrate with international school students there, and will follow that with a launch event in Singapore at the Asian Festival of Children’s Content. Whenever I’m in the U.S., I try to fit in as many school visits and readings as I can. And of course there is social media.

The other tough challenge for me personally during the spring 2011 launch of Orchards was the March 11, 2011 earthquake in Japan. Inevitably my attention was drawn away from Orchards to the disaster and its impact on northern Japan. I volunteered for tsunami cleanup work, and soon after began compiling the anthology Tomo: Friendship Through Fiction—An Anthology of Japan Teen Stories to benefit teens in the quake-affected areas. Sometimes life throws us truly unexpected events.

11 TomoCover2

AOB:       Your next novel, The Language Inside is also written in verse. What is it about? How did the story idea come to you?

Holly: The Language Inside (Delacorte/Random House, May 2013) blends elements of Japan, Cambodia and Massachusetts. Here is the description:

Emma Karas was raised in Japan; it’s the country she calls home. But when her mother is diagnosed with breast cancer, Emma’s family moves to a town outside Lowell, Massachusetts to stay with her grandmother while her mom undergoes treatment. Emma feels out of place in the United States, begins to have migraines, and longs to be back in Japan. At her grandmother’s urging, she volunteers in a long-term care center to help Zena, a patient with locked-in syndrome, write down her poems. There, Emma meets Samnang, another volunteer, who assists elderly Cambodian refugees. Weekly visits to the care center, Zena’s poems, dance, and noodle soup bring Emma and Samnang closer, until Emma must make a painful choice: stay in Massachusetts, or return early to Japan. The Language Inside is a verse novel rich in language both spoken and unspoken and poetry that crosses boundaries to create a story layered with love, loss, movement and words.

***

When I was a student in the NYU Creative Writing Program I was a volunteer in the Goldwater Hospital writing workshops and had the opportunity to assist Julia Tavalaro, a brainstem stroke victim, who looked up to indicate yes—volunteers used a letter board and she looked up to spell words letter by letter and create poems. I was daunted and amazed by her determination and spirit, and years later began thinking about a teen character volunteering in such a situation. I wanted to set it in or near the city of Lowell, Massachusetts, a city of immigrants, and this led me to my Cambodian-American character Samnang.

CIMG6562 Camodia village

AOB:       Is there anything quirky you’d like to share with our readers about yourself, your life in Japan, or your writing process?

Holly: When my schedule is balanced and I’m running nearly every day, my writing is at its best. When I’m away from the running, my writing suffers. Sometimes ideas come one after another during my runs and as soon as I return home I have to sit down at the computer and write feverishly so I don’t lose the ideas. Other times during my run, my brain turns over all the intrusive daily life stuff so that when I’m back at my desk I’m able to focus better on my writing. I don’t run far or fast, but my runs are a productive, vital part of my writing life.

A list of awards for Orchards:

2012 APALA Asian/​Pacific American Award for Literature

A YALSA 2012 Best Fiction for Young Adults title

A Bank Street 2012 Best Children’s Books of the Year title

SCBWI 2012 Crystal Kite Winner

A 2011 Librarians’ Choice: Poetry title

For more information, go to www.hatbooks.com  and http://hatbooks.blogspot.com

CIMG4338

Thank you so much for joining us at Quirk and Quill, Holly. I can’t wait to read your other books!!

Who Are the Quills?

  • Annemarie O'Brien
    • Preparing for an Author School Visit
    • An Author Interview with Stacy Nyikos: WAGGERS
    • Book Give-Away Contest: WRITING NEW ADULT FICTION by Deborah Halverson
    • 10 HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE VCFA AMR July 2014
    • Who Loves a Garden Loves a Greenhouse Too: Quote from William Cowper
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    • The Fourth Annual S3Q2 & Friends Retreat
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    • Author vs. Writer Smackdown
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    • Then and Now
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    • My Love-Hate Relationship With NaNoWriMo
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    • Why You Should Travel Now More Than Ever, Especially with Kids
    • Telling the Story
    • Lipstick
    • Interview with Linda Pratt of Wernick & Pratt Agency
    • INTERVIEW: Varian Johnson on Being a Writer and a Dad
  • lindenmcneilly
    • The Resolution of Resolutions
    • Fear & Killing the Muse
    • Chat with Larissa Theule, Author of Fat & Bones
    • Want versus Want
    • So Many Books, So Little Space
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    • Writing: Whose Process?
    • A Ramble
    • CAN YOU TEACH IT?
    • Artisanal Publishing
    • An Interview with Susie Morgenstern
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    • Breaking (It) Down
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    • Something To Say
    • News From the Hill
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  • Quirk and Quill
    • November Reading Report
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  • Sue LaNeve
    • Quirk and Quill 2014 Favorite Books
    • The Writing Process – Author Blog Tour
    • “I Love You Baby, Can I Have Some More?”
    • Looking for a Good Book?
    • Life From Both Sides
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    • WIP: Blog Hop // Steve Bramucci
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    • Just Because You Can’t See It, Doesn’t Mean It Isn’t There
    • A Classroom Visit Featuring Gayle Forman
    • Unremembrance
    • New York, New York!
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  • Varian Johnson
    • Speech, Speech!
    • Where we’ve been and where we’re going
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