Road Trip Wednesday: in which Elissa starts to feel like a stalker...

Once again, I'm going to take a stab at the YA Highway's Road Trip Wednesday theme (see, I can't comply with too much structure, so if something is supposed to happen weekly, you can pretty much guarantee I will do it once every few months...), which is BEST BOOK OF JUNE!

Well.  It just so happens that this totally coincides with a post I've been wanting to write, but I felt like it might make me seem like a crazy person.  No, not really a crazy person, but just that kind of fan who crosses the line between being...YAY I HAVE A FAN! to OMG THIS PERSON IS OBSESSED WITH ME.

And I'm  not.  Obsessed.  But I really admire the writing of Australian YA writer Simmone Howell, and this month I reread her second YA novel, Everything Beautiful and then read her debut, Notes from the Teenage Underground, and let me tell you, they are both so wonderful I wish I had written them myself.

So I gave my students an assignment for their fourth quarter book report, and one of the options was to send an email or letter to the author of the book they read and just, you know, tell them about what they thought.  Fan mail.  And then I thought I might as well do the same, and I wrote this gushing email all about how the book Everything Beautiful had, you know, changed my life.  And then I followed her blog.  And followed her on twitter.  And gushed a little more on Absolute Write.  And that doesn't even count all the students I passed the book to, or all the ones I plan to pass it to in the fall.  So yeah.  I'm not obsessed.  They're just really good books.  Here are my librarything.com reviews, and you should all read them both!

First, her debut (even though I read it second):

I read Howell's second book first, but this was still a great follow-up!  An original story, awesome pop culture references from art and film and feminism--exactly the type of book I would have loved as a teen!  On top of that, the dialogue is interesting, the characters quirky and yet layered, and the themes in the book are carefully and thoughtfully drawn.  I especially  like the exploration of the "three girl movie" structure, and Gem's reflections on the power struggles found in a triangle.  I can't wait to read Simmone Howell's next book!




And then her second book (the one that got me hooked):

This book is exactly the kind of book I aspire to write.  A memorable main character, a snappy voice, a quiet lyricism that makes me want to copy whole paragraphs out and share them with people, and a clear and captivating plot, too.  I like the way there is emotion but no sentimentality, and there is "edginess" without making it seem like edginess was the only goal in writing the book.  I would like to immediately go out and buy the debut from this author, except I may want to reread Everything Beautiful first.

I'm no-ot whi-in-ing!

So there's this terrific collaborative effort of young adult writers and bloggers--YA Highway--who do these Wednesday road trip topics, and I always read them but I'm never really sure if I should jump in and join because I'm really more of a lurker than a joiner...

...but this week on twitter literary agent Colleen Lindsay started asking people to have a no-whining-week (#nww for the hashtag proficient) and to say some nice things about publishing, and well, the publishing industry may have its flaws, but it still produces hundreds of thousands of MY FAVORITE THINGS ON EARTH, so I thought I could come up with some positive things to say. 

(See?  Monkey is full of smiles when standing next to my stacks of books--those of course being my favorite things on earth.)

So, positive thing number one about the publishing industry:  GOOD BOOKS.  Oh, I know there are all kinds of things to complain about--I've whined about some of those very things  myself--but in the interest of not whining, I will say that there are still lots of good books selling.  And I love reading them.

Positive thing number two about the publishing industry is the WONDERFUL WRITERS.  I have the awesome privilege of being friends in real and internet life with so many writers at all stages of this profession, and they are amazingly awesome, one and all.  They are my favorite people, and the fact is, without them, I don't know if I could do it.  The support of my writer friends is worth so much, I can't even begin to express it.  And really, when it comes to me whining, they bear the brunt of my angst, and they never fail to help me see the positive side.

So speaking of positive things, I just got off the phone this afternoon with my agent (and I still can't quite get used to the way that sounds), and when I hung up, I felt so excited and energized about my book.  This may seem strange, since what she was calling about was essentially a rejection, but in the process of talking over plans for edits and eventually subbing to editors, I came away with a SENSE OF POSSIBILITY--and that's what I think is most positive about this industry, the fact that really, I know plenty of people who sat down, put their fingers to the keys, did their research, didn't give up, and they wrote books, found agents, got book deals, managed publicity, made mistakes, received fan mail, and who knows?  Maybe they even changed lives. In any case, they're still writing, and they're still dreaming, and the possibilities are still endless.

The publishing industry is in flux, and it is flawed, and I'm certain that I'm not finished whining about it.  But there's also a lot to love.