The excellent moderate political blog Obsidian Wings recently posted the voter registration deadlines for every state, with links to each state's information. If you aren't yet registered to vote, please check it out, and change that fact about yourself. Whether you are a Democrat or a Republican, these next four years will be crucial in defining the direction of the country, so it's essential you take a stand in how they will go. Thank you.
Interns Wanted
It's that time of year again -- the movies get serious, the college students come back to the city, the stores put out their sweater collections, and I look for an intern. As I wrote at a similar time last year:
If you'll be in New York this fall, you're passionate about really great children's and YA books, and you have eight to ten hours to spare during the business week, you're welcome to apply for an internship with Arthur A. Levine Books. Our interns help us track, read, and respond to manuscripts; perform basic clerical tasks like opening the mail and making copies; and complete special projects based on personal interests and need. The position is unpaid, but if you're a college student, we will do whatever's necessary to see that you get college credit -- and there are always lots of free books around the office! Preference goes to college students and people interested in pursuing an editorial career in children's publishing, but anyone is welcome to apply. For more information, see our FAQ page here, and mention that you found this through my blog.
Also, on a completely unrelated note: New poll at right! It's "Survivor: Cheryl's Library." At least one must go . . . (and yes, Bullfrog, you can have THE GREAT BRIDGE).
If you'll be in New York this fall, you're passionate about really great children's and YA books, and you have eight to ten hours to spare during the business week, you're welcome to apply for an internship with Arthur A. Levine Books. Our interns help us track, read, and respond to manuscripts; perform basic clerical tasks like opening the mail and making copies; and complete special projects based on personal interests and need. The position is unpaid, but if you're a college student, we will do whatever's necessary to see that you get college credit -- and there are always lots of free books around the office! Preference goes to college students and people interested in pursuing an editorial career in children's publishing, but anyone is welcome to apply. For more information, see our FAQ page here, and mention that you found this through my blog.
Also, on a completely unrelated note: New poll at right! It's "Survivor: Cheryl's Library." At least one must go . . . (and yes, Bullfrog, you can have THE GREAT BRIDGE).
"Strange Things Are Afoot at the Circle K."
I would say "Ten points to the first person who identifies the movie quote," but that would be like shooting fish in a barrel. Taking candy from a baby. Finding malapropisms in a George W. Bush speech. If you can't do it -- sorry, dudes.
Anyway, the rationale for the quote is that it sums up the situation at my personal Circle K, as I will shortly be moving for the first time in eight years . . . leaving my beautiful little studio in Park Slope to move in with James in Prospect Heights. (Note that I'm sharing this for your information, not your commentary.) Eight years in one apartment is a lifetime in New York City terms, and I've stayed here so long because I've really loved this apartment , in which I've done a great deal of my growing up. But I am also turning 30 this next month, and while this by no means means I am actually grown up -- God forbid -- I feel ready to go on to a new phase of my life. So. Posting here will probably continue to be erratic as I pack up, move out, and settle in.
Indeed, the only thing I have started to pack thus far is -- surprise! -- books. I have six boxes thus far, with probably another four or five to go, and it's forcing all kinds of hard choices about how I see my life and my reading in years to come. Am I ever actually going to read Daniel Deronda? Traveling Mercies? Swann's Way? Will I ever finish The Great Bridge? Little, Big? I never reread the non-Harriet Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries -- do I need to keep all of them around? (I decided "no" on this one, though of course I am keeping all twenty Aubrey-Maturins, as I'm looking forward to a glorious year rereading those. Someday.) What about those books I inherited from my grandmother -- not the family-heirloom ones, just random books I know she liked? Am I obligated to keep them? I was holding on to certain children's and YA novels because I thought my own children might want them to read -- also someday -- but that "someday" is far enough off that I don't think I'll have the shelf space by then, because I just keep finding more novels I love. . . . In the end, it's also no surprise that the first items James and I have bought for our joint apartment are new bookshelves.
Anyway, again. Other notes:
Anyway, the rationale for the quote is that it sums up the situation at my personal Circle K, as I will shortly be moving for the first time in eight years . . . leaving my beautiful little studio in Park Slope to move in with James in Prospect Heights. (Note that I'm sharing this for your information, not your commentary.) Eight years in one apartment is a lifetime in New York City terms, and I've stayed here so long because I've really loved this apartment , in which I've done a great deal of my growing up. But I am also turning 30 this next month, and while this by no means means I am actually grown up -- God forbid -- I feel ready to go on to a new phase of my life. So. Posting here will probably continue to be erratic as I pack up, move out, and settle in.
Indeed, the only thing I have started to pack thus far is -- surprise! -- books. I have six boxes thus far, with probably another four or five to go, and it's forcing all kinds of hard choices about how I see my life and my reading in years to come. Am I ever actually going to read Daniel Deronda? Traveling Mercies? Swann's Way? Will I ever finish The Great Bridge? Little, Big? I never reread the non-Harriet Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries -- do I need to keep all of them around? (I decided "no" on this one, though of course I am keeping all twenty Aubrey-Maturins, as I'm looking forward to a glorious year rereading those. Someday.) What about those books I inherited from my grandmother -- not the family-heirloom ones, just random books I know she liked? Am I obligated to keep them? I was holding on to certain children's and YA novels because I thought my own children might want them to read -- also someday -- but that "someday" is far enough off that I don't think I'll have the shelf space by then, because I just keep finding more novels I love. . . . In the end, it's also no surprise that the first items James and I have bought for our joint apartment are new bookshelves.
Anyway, again. Other notes:
- I'm enjoying the Democratic convention thus far, though not the political chatter around it -- all we Democrats need to stop second-guessing ourselves and Barack and just start bringing the rain on McCain. (This means you, Maureen Dowd.) I'm really looking forward to Barack's speech tomorrow night.
- I'm going to Atlanta this weekend for the Literary Festival -- if you read this, do please say hello!
- Kristin Cashore's Graceling is AWESOME AWESOME AWESOME. If you love Tamora Pierce, early Robin McKinley, Kate Constable, or Buffy the Vampire Slayer, you need to read this book. If you were disappointed in Breaking Dawn because it didn't force hard choices or you wanted Bella to be more of a feminist, you need to read this book. If you love a good romance and great fight scenes, you need to read this book. In general, you need to read this book. Galleys floating around now; out officially in October.
- The SQUIDs I didn't answer in July all went out yesterday, so if you sent a SQUID anytime since April, you should get a reply this week.
Two Poems about Peaches
(Best read with a juicy, delectable, gold-glowing farmer's-market peach in hand. Hat tip for both: The Writer's Almanac.)
From Blossoms
by Li-Young Lee
From blossoms comes
this brown paper bag of peaches
we bought from the boy
at the bend in the road where we turned toward
signs painted Peaches.
From laden boughs, from hands,
from sweet fellowship in the bins,
comes nectar at the roadside, succulent
peaches we devour, dusty skin and all,
comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat.
O, to take what we love inside,
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into
the round jubilance of peach.
There are days we live
as if death were nowhere
in the background; from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.
Peaches
by Peter Davison
A mouthful of language to swallow:
stretches of beach, sweet clinches,
breaches in walls, bleached branches;
britches hauled over haunches;
hunches leeches, wrenched teachers.
What English can do: ransack
the warmth that chuckles beneath
fuzzed surfaces, smooth velvet
richness, splashy juices.
I beseech you, peach,
clench me into the sweetness
of your reaches.
From Blossoms
by Li-Young Lee
From blossoms comes
this brown paper bag of peaches
we bought from the boy
at the bend in the road where we turned toward
signs painted Peaches.
From laden boughs, from hands,
from sweet fellowship in the bins,
comes nectar at the roadside, succulent
peaches we devour, dusty skin and all,
comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat.
O, to take what we love inside,
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into
the round jubilance of peach.
There are days we live
as if death were nowhere
in the background; from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.
Peaches
by Peter Davison
A mouthful of language to swallow:
stretches of beach, sweet clinches,
breaches in walls, bleached branches;
britches hauled over haunches;
hunches leeches, wrenched teachers.
What English can do: ransack
the warmth that chuckles beneath
fuzzed surfaces, smooth velvet
richness, splashy juices.
I beseech you, peach,
clench me into the sweetness
of your reaches.
My Terminus Speech + My Four Favorite Books on Writing
My Terminus speech is now online here: A Few Things Writers Can Learn from "Harry Potter"
Also, I was talking with someone at Terminus about good books on writing, and I realized these are my four all-time favorites:
Also, I was talking with someone at Terminus about good books on writing, and I realized these are my four all-time favorites:
- The Elements of Style by Strunk and White. This will teach you how to write a clean, strong sentence and paragraph, and once you master those building blocks, you can build essays, stories, arguments -- entire books.
- The Poetics by Aristotle. Over 2,300 years ago, Aristotle identified nearly all the essential elements of a compelling plot and recorded them here. I often run through the elements he identified when trying to figure out why a story's not working.
- Characters and Viewpoint by Orson Scott Card (part of the Writers' Digest Elements of Writing series). Much more recently, Card anatomized what makes a compelling character and how you as a writer can get the reader to connect with your characters, not to mention how you can manipulate the point of view for different effects. Brilliant.
- Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. Reading this book is like having a friend teach you how to write: She gives you advice, encouragement, reassurance, and lots and lots of laughs.
Three Thoughts
Pictures from my incredibly busy vacation! First Minnesota and Missouri, then Terminus. All parts of it were awesome, mostly thanks to the people. Friends and family: I adore you.
I have a cold now. It was going around the Leaky Cauldron staff, with whom I hung out, so I'm calling it my Leaky Coldron.
And goodness, this balance beam is a killer. (On TV, I should say.)
I have a cold now. It was going around the Leaky Cauldron staff, with whom I hung out, so I'm calling it my Leaky Coldron.
And goodness, this balance beam is a killer. (On TV, I should say.)
FAQ #Something: Do I have to finish the manuscript before I send you a query letter or the first two chapters?
I’ve gone both ways on this question in the past, but I thought about it a little more over the last week, and I’ve decided: Yes. Yes, you do. Because, as Maxwell Perkins said, "You can't know a book until you come to the end of it, and then all the rest must be modified to fit that"; and because what you want to send, and what I want to see, is your very best work—a draft you’ve completed, thought about, reread, tweaked, polished, perhaps had other people read, and in general taken to the point where you’ve done everything you can with it, and you’re ready for an editor’s (or agent's) opinion or advice. And no matter how assiduously you plan out your writing, I don’t think you can know what your very best work is until you’ve actually written it. So yes: Finish the manuscript first.
The Quote File: Abraham Joshua Heschel
I was introduced to the name and thought of Abraham Joshua Heschel through a passing mention in a Spring 2009 novel, Marcelo in the Real World by Francisco X. Stork. Most of the quotes below were taken from his Wikipedia page, but that doesn't make them any the less thought-provoking or worthy:
- "Wonder rather than doubt is the root of all knowledge."
- "A religious man is a person who holds God and man in one thought at one time, at all times, who suffers no harm done to others, whose greatest passion is compassion, whose greatest strength is love and defiance of despair."
- "Racism is man's gravest threat to man -- the maximum hatred for a minimum reason."
- "All it takes is one person… and another… and another… and another… to start a movement."
- "God is of no importance unless He is of utmost importance."
- "Just to be is a blessing. Just to live is holy."
- "Self-respect is the fruit of discipline; the sense of dignity grows with the ability to say no to oneself."
- "Life without commitment is not worth living."
- "In regard to cruelties committed in the name of a free society, some are guilty, while all are responsible."
- "When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people."
- "Indifference to the sublime wonder of living is the root of sin."
- "Truth is often gray, and deceit is full of splendor. One must hunger fiercely after Truth to be able to cherish it."
- "Remember that there is a meaning beyond absurdity. Be sure that every little deed counts, that every word has power. Never forget that you can still do your share to redeem the world in spite of all absurdities and frustrations and disappointments."
Wish Me Luck with American Airlines.
And now I go away AGAIN for a grand Midwestern tour of Minnesota (hi Carleton friends!), Missouri (hi family!), and Chicago (hi Harry Potter fans!). I should be packing, but bah! Packing! Some fun things instead:
* New Yorkers: It's an allusion to Garth Brooks's song "Friends in Low Places." And if you'll pardon me, I'm now going to step on down to the Ohhhh-asis . . . after I finish packing.
- A Publishers Weekly article on my beloved Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit, including quotage from me. The anime of this book will be coming to [adult swim] at the end of August, and it looks awesome, so read the novel now if you want to be ready!
- The Tales of Beedle the Bard -- a new translation by Hermione Granger, with commentary by Albus Dumbledore and an introduction, notes, and illustrations by J. K. Rowling -- will be published December 4!
- Pictures of my trip to California.
- Pictures of an adventure right here at home.
- The trailer for Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, one of my favorite YA novels ever.
- The New York Carleton Club team will once again have a team for the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure. If you'd like to join, click here and search for "New York Carleton Club" (you don't have to be a Carl yourself); if you'd like to donate to my run, click here. Both very much appreciated!
- I will be appearing at the AJC Decatur Book Festival in Atlanta from August 29-31, including a workshop on writing children's books on Friday afternoon. Keep an eye on that website for more details.
- Is a woman who named her son "Weather'By Dot Com Chanel Fourcast" legally in the wrong? Yes.
- In honor of my return to the Midwest and in memory of my high school prom, where this* was a big hit:
* New Yorkers: It's an allusion to Garth Brooks's song "Friends in Low Places." And if you'll pardon me, I'm now going to step on down to the Ohhhh-asis . . . after I finish packing.
You Can Check Out Any Time You Like . . .
. . . and I did manage to leave California! (Insert guitar riff here.)
Some things I rode on my recent vacation, more or less in order:
N.B.: I saw it in IMAX, and if it's at all possible for you to see it in IMAX, I strongly recommend you expend the extra effort and money for the aerial shots of Gotham City and Hong Kong alone. Other reviews: Scott Foundas in L.A. Weekly; Todd Alcott; Reverse Shot, which disliked it.
And the Warner Bros. studio tour was great fun -- I saw the exterior of the orphanage from "Annie" (my favorite movie when I was six); looked in the windows of Luke's diner from "Gilmore Girls" and walked around the Star's Hollow town square; at a distance, caught a little bit of a taping of "Pushing Daisies" (the great spoiler I can reveal exclusively here: Anna Friel will wear a yellow dress and step out of a door in a future episode); sat on the couch from "Friends"; and, most excitingly for me, found an entire floor of Harry Potter memorabilia in the studio museum. A model Acromantula! The flying Ford Anglia! Hermione's Yule Ball gown! The Sorting Hat (or whoever was running it) mistakenly named me a Hufflepuff (I'm straight-up Ravenclaw, baby), but it correctly identified James as a long-lost Weasley cousin and assigned him to Gryffindor.
Finally, on the reading/work front, I finished Away, which I very much admired, and A Civil Contract by Georgette Heyer, a most unusual romance novel, and I'm about two-thirds of the way through Brideshead Revisited, which I don't especially like but seem compelled to go forward with (much the same way the protagonist relates to the Brideshead family, actually). And I wrote the illustration notes and a solid first draft of my Terminus speech, and bought two excellent pairs of Clarks sandals on sale. So, altogether, a successful vacation.
Some things I rode on my recent vacation, more or less in order:
- A JetBlue plane to Oakland
- A hotel shuttle van
- The BART train
- The Caltrain to San Jose
- A rental car
- A Southwest flight to Orange County
- Many private cars of James's family and friends
- A boogie board in the ocean off San Clemente -- the first time I've swum in the Pacific
- The L.A. Metrolink commuter train
- The L.A. Metro subway -- so much cleaner and better at station (and Internet) communication than our New York subway system
- Many L.A. Metro buses -- ditto
- The Getty Center tramway
- The L.A. Metro light rail
- A taxi
- A Warner Bros. tram for the studio tour
- A JetBlue plane to New York
- And the Airtrain and the A and F subway trains to JFK and back -- not clean or communicative, but mine and therefore home.
N.B.: I saw it in IMAX, and if it's at all possible for you to see it in IMAX, I strongly recommend you expend the extra effort and money for the aerial shots of Gotham City and Hong Kong alone. Other reviews: Scott Foundas in L.A. Weekly; Todd Alcott; Reverse Shot, which disliked it.
And the Warner Bros. studio tour was great fun -- I saw the exterior of the orphanage from "Annie" (my favorite movie when I was six); looked in the windows of Luke's diner from "Gilmore Girls" and walked around the Star's Hollow town square; at a distance, caught a little bit of a taping of "Pushing Daisies" (the great spoiler I can reveal exclusively here: Anna Friel will wear a yellow dress and step out of a door in a future episode); sat on the couch from "Friends"; and, most excitingly for me, found an entire floor of Harry Potter memorabilia in the studio museum. A model Acromantula! The flying Ford Anglia! Hermione's Yule Ball gown! The Sorting Hat (or whoever was running it) mistakenly named me a Hufflepuff (I'm straight-up Ravenclaw, baby), but it correctly identified James as a long-lost Weasley cousin and assigned him to Gryffindor.
Finally, on the reading/work front, I finished Away, which I very much admired, and A Civil Contract by Georgette Heyer, a most unusual romance novel, and I'm about two-thirds of the way through Brideshead Revisited, which I don't especially like but seem compelled to go forward with (much the same way the protagonist relates to the Brideshead family, actually). And I wrote the illustration notes and a solid first draft of my Terminus speech, and bought two excellent pairs of Clarks sandals on sale. So, altogether, a successful vacation.
Away for Vacay -- Hooray!
I am off tomorrow for a week's-plus vacation in California with James, seeing various friends and family members of his and hopefully catching up on sleep and relaxing. On the other hand, I'm also planning to write two speeches, a set of illustration notes, and notes on a manuscript while we travel -- no rest for the wicked or the terminally overcommitted.
(I will leave it to you to judge which category I fall into.)
Books I'm taking: Brideshead Revisited, because Emily in our office was shocked I have never read it and insists I must before the movie comes out; Away, by Amy Bloom, Arthur's favorite book of last year; and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, to inspire thinking for one of the speeches. I really wanted something light and vacationy . . . a Georgette Heyer, ideally . . . and wait! I think I have one of those at work! So I will pick that up tomorrow before I head out, and go to bed soon happy.
Also to help me with that same speech (for Terminus): Would you please vote in the poll about which of the HP books is your favorite, and, if you have a critical reason on why it's your favorite and not just a personal/sentimental one*, tell me (briefly) why it's your favorite in the comments? I have my guess about which one is going to come out on top, and I'm very interested to see if I'm right.
* Meaning that, say, you love Goblet of Fire because you think the action scenes are the most compelling there, and not just because you met your True Love while waiting in line for it at a midnight release party. That would be very sweet, but not quite so useful for my speech. :-)
Five jokes you can tell about Barack Obama.
Have you checked out Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog yet? It is FABULOUS. Part I is up for one week only, so grab it while you can.
Also, the High School Musical 3 trailer is out! Squee!
I might nod in here sometime in the next week, but in case I do not, have a lovely most of the rest of your July . . .
(I will leave it to you to judge which category I fall into.)
Books I'm taking: Brideshead Revisited, because Emily in our office was shocked I have never read it and insists I must before the movie comes out; Away, by Amy Bloom, Arthur's favorite book of last year; and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, to inspire thinking for one of the speeches. I really wanted something light and vacationy . . . a Georgette Heyer, ideally . . . and wait! I think I have one of those at work! So I will pick that up tomorrow before I head out, and go to bed soon happy.
Also to help me with that same speech (for Terminus): Would you please vote in the poll about which of the HP books is your favorite, and, if you have a critical reason on why it's your favorite and not just a personal/sentimental one*, tell me (briefly) why it's your favorite in the comments? I have my guess about which one is going to come out on top, and I'm very interested to see if I'm right.
* Meaning that, say, you love Goblet of Fire because you think the action scenes are the most compelling there, and not just because you met your True Love while waiting in line for it at a midnight release party. That would be very sweet, but not quite so useful for my speech. :-)
Five jokes you can tell about Barack Obama.
Have you checked out Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog yet? It is FABULOUS. Part I is up for one week only, so grab it while you can.
Also, the High School Musical 3 trailer is out! Squee!
I might nod in here sometime in the next week, but in case I do not, have a lovely most of the rest of your July . . .
Slothful Saturday Scoops
A lazy Saturday morning here, where I am still sitting in my pajamas in front of my box fan on my bed at 11 a.m. The sun is milky, the street is quiet, the day stretches before me, as langorous and unscheduled as a cat.
(I am not sure whether that's a good simile or not, but it's Saturday and I'm feeling lazy (too lazy to find another word so I'm not repeating myself, even). So what the hell.)
Next Kidlit Drinks Night! And it's a Very Special Swanky Summer Kidlit Drinks Night, on July 29 at 6:30 p.m. We're abandoning our downscale punk digs at Sweet & Vicious and heading uptown to someplace I've always wanted to visit -- the Library Hotel, at 299 Madison Ave. (at 41st St.), and its Bookmarks Lounge, which has an outdoor roof deck. See you all there!
Submissions News, Part I: Most of the June-to-mid-July SQUIDs went out yesterday. The remainder will follow this coming week.
Submissions News, Part II: I am closing to most unagented submissions for the next two and a half months -- through October 1, 2008 -- to give me time to try to really, truly, once-and-for-all clear out my backlog (the goal is to have this done by my 30th birthday in September, to start that fourth decade with a clean slate). Agented submissions are still very much welcome; or if I have requested a revision of a manuscript from you, or you were at the New Jersey SCBWI conference and have the sticker to prove it, you can still send submissions along as well. But no new unagented or unsolicited manuscripts until further notice, please.
A bit of advice: In this latest batch of SQUIDs, I noticed one sneaky Pete tried to circumvent the one-ms.-at-a-time rule by sending three different manuscripts in three different genres under three different names. The giveaways? The three names all shared common elements; the addresses were all along the same road in a rural part of a Midwestern state; the three manuscripts were dated within five days of one another; and all three query letters began in the exact same way: "Attention Ms. Klein: My manuscript [title] is a [number]-word [genre] about [subject]," in the same font.
Do not do this, people. It is not cool. We editors are not stupid; we notice these things, and they annoy us, and that hurts your chances of getting any of the three ms. through, as I don't want to work with someone who tries to trick me. Send me your one best ms. that seems most suited to me based on what else I edit, and wait your turn.
(My favorite Sneaky-Writer-Outwitted story: Back when I was Arthur's editorial assistant, we received a manuscript set among smugglers in Dorset, beautifully "written" by a woman who claimed to have been working on it for ages. But two things set my antennae humming: one, the "manuscript" was already formatted and typeset into book form, and two, the style and subject matter were distinctly old-fashioned -- still interesting, but not like most contemporary ms. we see, and not in a self-aware retro manner, either. So out of curiosity, I Googled the first sentence, and it took me straight to this page for Moonfleet, on the public-domain literature website Bibliomania.
Hmmm.
So I called the number given on the cover letter and the woman picked up. I identified myself and where I worked, and she said "Oh, hello" -- excitement rising in her voice at getting a call from a publisher.
"Yes, I was very intrigued by the manuscript that you submitted. You wrote this book?" I said.
"Yes, I've been working on it for years and years," she said.
So I told her what I had found online -- that the text of her book exactly matched the text of Moonfleet by J. Meade Falkner -- and she said very quickly, "I've never heard of that book or that author," and hung up.
And that was kind of fun, foiling a literary fake. But the practice of faking? Not cool, people. Not cool at all.)
Happinesses of the Season: My new laptop battery (it sustains a charge for three hours rather than five minutes!); cute summer dresses and sandals; sangria; the Frames' Fitzcarraldo and The Cost; This Book Isn't Fat, It's Fabulous, by Nina Beck, which is indeed fabulous (and which, if you know the author, is exactly like spending a couple hours with her), and Paper Towns by John Green, which made me laugh out loud more than any book so far this year; Scharffen Berger chocolate.
(I am not sure whether that's a good simile or not, but it's Saturday and I'm feeling lazy (too lazy to find another word so I'm not repeating myself, even). So what the hell.)
Next Kidlit Drinks Night! And it's a Very Special Swanky Summer Kidlit Drinks Night, on July 29 at 6:30 p.m. We're abandoning our downscale punk digs at Sweet & Vicious and heading uptown to someplace I've always wanted to visit -- the Library Hotel, at 299 Madison Ave. (at 41st St.), and its Bookmarks Lounge, which has an outdoor roof deck. See you all there!
Submissions News, Part I: Most of the June-to-mid-July SQUIDs went out yesterday. The remainder will follow this coming week.
Submissions News, Part II: I am closing to most unagented submissions for the next two and a half months -- through October 1, 2008 -- to give me time to try to really, truly, once-and-for-all clear out my backlog (the goal is to have this done by my 30th birthday in September, to start that fourth decade with a clean slate). Agented submissions are still very much welcome; or if I have requested a revision of a manuscript from you, or you were at the New Jersey SCBWI conference and have the sticker to prove it, you can still send submissions along as well. But no new unagented or unsolicited manuscripts until further notice, please.
A bit of advice: In this latest batch of SQUIDs, I noticed one sneaky Pete tried to circumvent the one-ms.-at-a-time rule by sending three different manuscripts in three different genres under three different names. The giveaways? The three names all shared common elements; the addresses were all along the same road in a rural part of a Midwestern state; the three manuscripts were dated within five days of one another; and all three query letters began in the exact same way: "Attention Ms. Klein: My manuscript [title] is a [number]-word [genre] about [subject]," in the same font.
Do not do this, people. It is not cool. We editors are not stupid; we notice these things, and they annoy us, and that hurts your chances of getting any of the three ms. through, as I don't want to work with someone who tries to trick me. Send me your one best ms. that seems most suited to me based on what else I edit, and wait your turn.
(My favorite Sneaky-Writer-Outwitted story: Back when I was Arthur's editorial assistant, we received a manuscript set among smugglers in Dorset, beautifully "written" by a woman who claimed to have been working on it for ages. But two things set my antennae humming: one, the "manuscript" was already formatted and typeset into book form, and two, the style and subject matter were distinctly old-fashioned -- still interesting, but not like most contemporary ms. we see, and not in a self-aware retro manner, either. So out of curiosity, I Googled the first sentence, and it took me straight to this page for Moonfleet, on the public-domain literature website Bibliomania.
Hmmm.
So I called the number given on the cover letter and the woman picked up. I identified myself and where I worked, and she said "Oh, hello" -- excitement rising in her voice at getting a call from a publisher.
"Yes, I was very intrigued by the manuscript that you submitted. You wrote this book?" I said.
"Yes, I've been working on it for years and years," she said.
So I told her what I had found online -- that the text of her book exactly matched the text of Moonfleet by J. Meade Falkner -- and she said very quickly, "I've never heard of that book or that author," and hung up.
And that was kind of fun, foiling a literary fake. But the practice of faking? Not cool, people. Not cool at all.)
Happinesses of the Season: My new laptop battery (it sustains a charge for three hours rather than five minutes!); cute summer dresses and sandals; sangria; the Frames' Fitzcarraldo and The Cost; This Book Isn't Fat, It's Fabulous, by Nina Beck, which is indeed fabulous (and which, if you know the author, is exactly like spending a couple hours with her), and Paper Towns by John Green, which made me laugh out loud more than any book so far this year; Scharffen Berger chocolate.
The Arthur A. Levine Books Fall 2008 List
In alphabetical order by title:
CARLOS IS GONNA GET IT, by Kevin Emerson. Debut novel. I was the first reader on this manuscript, and from the very first time I turned over the final page, I thought, Wow -- this one's really something special. It's the story of Trina, one of the good kids at her inner-city Boston middle school, and Carlos, who is every nice but deeply troubled kid you've ever seen. Carlos always breaks up the class and gets everyone in trouble with his "Day Afters," and eventually Trina and her friends decide that they need to teach him a lesson. But then Trina is assigned to be Carlos's partner on a class project, and their work together shows her both his kindness and his genuine needs. Will Trina go along with her friends in their plan, or choose to stand with Carlos? The voice is spot-on, and the plot always makes me think of John Gardner's marvelous quote "Real suspense comes from moral dilemma and the courage to make and act upon choices," because it is loaded with that moral dilemma and the accompanying real suspense -- as unputdownable in its way as THE HUNGER GAMES. And Kevin taught in a Boston middle school very much like the one depicted here, so he knows whereof he writes. Keep an eye out for it.
CROSSING TO PARADISE, by Kevin Crossley-Holland. I worked on this one, so I will write more about it around publication time; and for now I'll just list some of the many wonderful things it is:
* A gorgeous account of a medieval pilgrimage to Jerusalem, including stops in London, Carcassonne, Venice, and the Holy City itself
* A terrific and atmospheric adventure
* A thoroughly Austenian moral education for Gatty, its main character
* The standalone companion book to Kevin's equally marvelous Arthur trilogy (The Seeing Stone; At the Crossing-Places; King of the Middle March)
* And as such, the conclusion and crescendo of Gatty's own story.
And the writing here -- the writing! Swoon -- as delicious and succulent as the Middle Eastern fruits that Gatty tastes for the first time. (N.B. This was the book about which I wrote this post.)
THE GATE OF DAYS: The Book of Time II, by Guillaume Prevost, translated by William Rodarmor. The sequel to THE BOOK OF TIME (which is out in paperback now), and formerly known as THE SEVEN COINS, before we decided this title sounded cooler and reflected the book better. If the great plot question of the first book was "Where in Time is Sam's dad?", the great plot question of this book is "Why did Sam's dad go back in Time anyway? And does the thief now stalking Sam through the ages have anything to do with it?" You find out the answers to one of these questions by the end, and it's a doozy. Guillaume continues to work interesting twists on the familiar time-travel questions (e.g. "What if you meet your grandmother?"), and backs it up with impeccable historical detail and breakneck pacing. . . . Like Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson series, there's action in almost every chapter, and the excellent translation reads smoothly enough (I hope!) to grip even reluctant boy readers. More on this coming later too.
HER MOTHER'S FACE by Roddy Doyle, illustrated by Freya Blackwood. I couldn't track down a cover for this one today, alas, but I'll try to add it later. This is Roddy's first picture book, and our second book with the lovely, lovely Freya Blackwood and her lovely, lovely art, the first being HALF A WORLD AWAY. It's the story of a pretty Irish girl named Siobhan and her quest to rediscover her late mother's face -- funny, poignant, sweet, sad.
WAYS TO LIVE FOREVER by Sally Nicholls. Debut novel, the winner of the Waterstone's Children's Book Prize in the U.K. (where it was originally edited by our Scholastic UK colleague Marion Lloyd), and without a doubt the Book Most Likely to Make Arthur A. Levine Books Staff Weep, as I know we've all teared up over it when reviewing passes or proofs. Nine-year-old Sam has leukemia, and as the doctors approach the end of what they can do for him, he writes down his ambitions and Big Questions in a way that is always honest and true, often funny, and never mawkish. You can read a rave review from Mal Peet in The Guardian here.
Thank you for looking out for all of these books this fall!
CARLOS IS GONNA GET IT, by Kevin Emerson. Debut novel. I was the first reader on this manuscript, and from the very first time I turned over the final page, I thought, Wow -- this one's really something special. It's the story of Trina, one of the good kids at her inner-city Boston middle school, and Carlos, who is every nice but deeply troubled kid you've ever seen. Carlos always breaks up the class and gets everyone in trouble with his "Day Afters," and eventually Trina and her friends decide that they need to teach him a lesson. But then Trina is assigned to be Carlos's partner on a class project, and their work together shows her both his kindness and his genuine needs. Will Trina go along with her friends in their plan, or choose to stand with Carlos? The voice is spot-on, and the plot always makes me think of John Gardner's marvelous quote "Real suspense comes from moral dilemma and the courage to make and act upon choices," because it is loaded with that moral dilemma and the accompanying real suspense -- as unputdownable in its way as THE HUNGER GAMES. And Kevin taught in a Boston middle school very much like the one depicted here, so he knows whereof he writes. Keep an eye out for it.
CROSSING TO PARADISE, by Kevin Crossley-Holland. I worked on this one, so I will write more about it around publication time; and for now I'll just list some of the many wonderful things it is:* A gorgeous account of a medieval pilgrimage to Jerusalem, including stops in London, Carcassonne, Venice, and the Holy City itself
* A terrific and atmospheric adventure
* A thoroughly Austenian moral education for Gatty, its main character
* The standalone companion book to Kevin's equally marvelous Arthur trilogy (The Seeing Stone; At the Crossing-Places; King of the Middle March)
* And as such, the conclusion and crescendo of Gatty's own story.
And the writing here -- the writing! Swoon -- as delicious and succulent as the Middle Eastern fruits that Gatty tastes for the first time. (N.B. This was the book about which I wrote this post.)
THE GATE OF DAYS: The Book of Time II, by Guillaume Prevost, translated by William Rodarmor. The sequel to THE BOOK OF TIME (which is out in paperback now), and formerly known as THE SEVEN COINS, before we decided this title sounded cooler and reflected the book better. If the great plot question of the first book was "Where in Time is Sam's dad?", the great plot question of this book is "Why did Sam's dad go back in Time anyway? And does the thief now stalking Sam through the ages have anything to do with it?" You find out the answers to one of these questions by the end, and it's a doozy. Guillaume continues to work interesting twists on the familiar time-travel questions (e.g. "What if you meet your grandmother?"), and backs it up with impeccable historical detail and breakneck pacing. . . . Like Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson series, there's action in almost every chapter, and the excellent translation reads smoothly enough (I hope!) to grip even reluctant boy readers. More on this coming later too.HER MOTHER'S FACE by Roddy Doyle, illustrated by Freya Blackwood. I couldn't track down a cover for this one today, alas, but I'll try to add it later. This is Roddy's first picture book, and our second book with the lovely, lovely Freya Blackwood and her lovely, lovely art, the first being HALF A WORLD AWAY. It's the story of a pretty Irish girl named Siobhan and her quest to rediscover her late mother's face -- funny, poignant, sweet, sad.
WAYS TO LIVE FOREVER by Sally Nicholls. Debut novel, the winner of the Waterstone's Children's Book Prize in the U.K. (where it was originally edited by our Scholastic UK colleague Marion Lloyd), and without a doubt the Book Most Likely to Make Arthur A. Levine Books Staff Weep, as I know we've all teared up over it when reviewing passes or proofs. Nine-year-old Sam has leukemia, and as the doctors approach the end of what they can do for him, he writes down his ambitions and Big Questions in a way that is always honest and true, often funny, and never mawkish. You can read a rave review from Mal Peet in The Guardian here.
Thank you for looking out for all of these books this fall!
Those of You Who Love Goofy Animal Names or Pictures
Like those from my Natural History museum visit here: Don't miss this darling image of the translucent juvenile roundbelly cowfish.
All Good Things
- Jott, a phone/e-mail service that allows you to call a number, name a recipient, record a voice message, and then have that voice message delivered to the recipient as both a text message and e-mail, FREE. It's pretty amazing.
- Wall-E: What everyone else in the world has said.
- Hancock: Not a perfect movie by any means, but an altogether original take on the superhero mythos, with some laugh-out-loud funny moments and excellent performances. Worth seeing.
- Reprise: Or if you'd rather take in foreign-language cinema, which definitely needs your support more than those Hollywood blockbusters do, check out this rambunctious Norwegian film following two young men submitting their first novels for publication. One gets published instantly; one doesn't; and its vision of friendship, love, the literary life, and being artistic and serious in your twenties unfolds with wonderful truth and verve.
- Lyle Lovett live: He is touring, with his Large Band and a full gospel choir, and he is genius.
- Harry and the Potters: They are also touring, with the Unlimited Enthusiasm Expo, and they are also genius -- where else will you see Albus Dumbledore rapping about his love for tenpin bowling? The only sad moment of this concert for me was when tour partner band Uncle Monsterface launched into an unorthodox cover of "Like a Prayer," and I realized none of my fellow concertgoers were singing along to the lyrics because they were too young to know them. Kids today just don't appreciate the classics. (Though glory, that video has not aged well.)
- Sagamore Hill: Being history dorks, this weekend James and I took the Long Island Railroad out to Oyster Bay to visit Theodore Roosevelt's family home, which has been almost perfectly preserved as it was when he lived there. Every room was filled with interesting memorabilia (especially animal heads or skins), decorations, and especially books: Apparently at one point TR read three books a day! I came away with even more respect for his energy and courage, and I recommend his house to New Yorkers for a grand day out.
- Word Challenge on Facebook.
- Ice cream.
Also for Fellow Joss Whedon, Neil Patrick Harris, and/or Musical Fans
If you haven't heard about "Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog," check out this bit of awesomeness:
Teaser from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog on Vimeo.
More details here.
Teaser from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog on Vimeo.
More details here.
The Annual Frivolous Foot Photo, and Excellent Revision Advice
I got a pretty pedicure this morning, so here is my annual Frivolous Foot Photo:
Yay! (Previous Photos: 2005-I; 2005-II; 2006. Just in case anyone thought this blog was, you know, serious.)
(Though this post does demonstrate the power of the capital letter, for if I called this a "frivolous Foot Photo," I would be calling the photo frivolous; whereas by calling it a "Frivolous Foot Photo," I am calling my feet frivolous. A hugely important distinction, as you can tell, though I have to admit "frivolous Frivolous Foot Photo" would be most accurate.)
But in totally non-frivolous news: If you're a novelist, I command you to read this article by Anita Nolan (PDF, linked at "The End Is Only the Beginning") on self-editing a revision. It is the best list of practical writing and rewriting tips I have seen in a very long time, or possibly ever. (With, of course, the caveat at the end of the article, that you should know what works for you in your writing process and voice and follow those first.) I've already taken things from it to use in my own editing. Seriously, seriously, seriously, check it out.
Finally, new poll, just for my own curiosity. Thank you for voting!
Yay! (Previous Photos: 2005-I; 2005-II; 2006. Just in case anyone thought this blog was, you know, serious.)(Though this post does demonstrate the power of the capital letter, for if I called this a "frivolous Foot Photo," I would be calling the photo frivolous; whereas by calling it a "Frivolous Foot Photo," I am calling my feet frivolous. A hugely important distinction, as you can tell, though I have to admit "frivolous Frivolous Foot Photo" would be most accurate.)
But in totally non-frivolous news: If you're a novelist, I command you to read this article by Anita Nolan (PDF, linked at "The End Is Only the Beginning") on self-editing a revision. It is the best list of practical writing and rewriting tips I have seen in a very long time, or possibly ever. (With, of course, the caveat at the end of the article, that you should know what works for you in your writing process and voice and follow those first.) I've already taken things from it to use in my own editing. Seriously, seriously, seriously, check it out.
Finally, new poll, just for my own curiosity. Thank you for voting!
Interview with Editor Janet Silver
Poets and Writers has a really wonderful interview up with Janet Silver, the former Houghton Mifflin adult publisher who edited Jhumpa Lahiri's The Interpreter of Maladies and Jonathan Safran Foer's Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Three excerpts that resonated for me:
- "There are a couple of things I see in first fiction that always tell me something is not for me. The first is usually in fiction by young women. There will be a young female protagonist with a vaguely artistic temperament who goes to New York to do something. At some point, usually about page ten, she looks in the mirror and describes herself. And you see this device in many wonderful novels—this is the way the author's going to let the reader know what the narrator or main character looks like—but now you just see it too much. So I usually get to that on page ten and say, "Not interested."" [Cheryl says, Ha!]
- Tell me about a particularly memorable editing experience. "Peter Ho Davies comes to mind. The greatest thing for an editor is when you read a manuscript, you give some comments, and then the author goes off and does something completely different from what you expected, but it's brilliant and wonderful. With some of Peter's stories, especially that one I was just describing, I gave him some comments, and the story came back about three times as long. So there was this kind of ebullient response from him—a kind of magnanimous sense of possibility."
- Tell writers one thing about agents that they don't know but should. "That they can ask a lot of questions; that they should ask a lot of questions. I think that writers, especially first-time writers, sometimes feel as though, "Well, whatever the agent says. Of course the agent knows best." But in the same way that I think authors should be having conversations and asking a lot of questions of editors, they should ask potential agents, "Okay, whom do you represent? Which houses do you work with? Which editors do you like? How do you go about deciding where you're going to send something?" I'm just astonished again and again when I talk to writers at writing programs that they don't know they can ask those questions."
The Quote File: Truth
There are only two mistakes one can make on the road to truth, not beginning and not finishing. -- Buddha
. . . when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. -- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Education is not merely a means for earning a living or an instrument for the acquisition of wealth. It is an initiation into a life of spirit, a training of the human soul in the pursuit of truth and the practice of virtue. -- Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit
There are few human beings who receive the truth, complete and staggering, by instant illumination. Most of them acquire it fragment by fragment, on a small scale, by successive developments, cellularly, like a laborious mosaic. -- Anais Nin
We taste and feel and see the truth. We do not reason ourselves into it. -— William Butler Yeats
You must accept the truth from whatever source it comes. -- Moses ben Maimon
Like many of the people I had read about, I set out on a long journey to find truth and beauty. As usual, the road led straight back to the beginning: home, country roads, the sun setting through the woods. –- Joyce Sutphen
A fact is not a truth until you love it. –- John Keats
Defending the truth is not something one does out of a sense of duty or to allay guilt complexes, but is a reward in itself. -- Simone de Beauvoir
Love truth, but pardon error. -– Voltaire
It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry. -- Thomas Paine
Everyone wishes to have truth on his side, but not everyone wishes to be on the side of truth. -- Richard Whately
Truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it. -- Flannery O'Connor
The high-minded man must care more for the truth than for what people think. -- Aristotle
How dreadful knowledge of the truth can be when there's no help in the truth. -- Sophocles
It does not require many words to speak the truth. -- Chief Joseph
Truth may be stretched but cannot be broken. It always gets above falsehood as oil does above water. -- Miguel de Cervantes
Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it. -- Andre Gide
The folly of mistaking a paradox for a discovery, a metaphor for a proof, a torrent of verbiage for a spring of capital truths, and oneself for an oracle, is inborn in us. -- Paul Valery
All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident. -- Arthur Schopenhauer
One owes respect to the living. To the dead, one owes only the truth. -- Voltaire
What is laid down, ordered, factual is never enough to embrace the whole truth: life always spills over the rim of every cup. -– Boris Pasternak
. . . when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. -- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Education is not merely a means for earning a living or an instrument for the acquisition of wealth. It is an initiation into a life of spirit, a training of the human soul in the pursuit of truth and the practice of virtue. -- Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit
There are few human beings who receive the truth, complete and staggering, by instant illumination. Most of them acquire it fragment by fragment, on a small scale, by successive developments, cellularly, like a laborious mosaic. -- Anais Nin
We taste and feel and see the truth. We do not reason ourselves into it. -— William Butler Yeats
You must accept the truth from whatever source it comes. -- Moses ben Maimon
Like many of the people I had read about, I set out on a long journey to find truth and beauty. As usual, the road led straight back to the beginning: home, country roads, the sun setting through the woods. –- Joyce Sutphen
A fact is not a truth until you love it. –- John Keats
Defending the truth is not something one does out of a sense of duty or to allay guilt complexes, but is a reward in itself. -- Simone de Beauvoir
Love truth, but pardon error. -– Voltaire
It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry. -- Thomas Paine
Everyone wishes to have truth on his side, but not everyone wishes to be on the side of truth. -- Richard Whately
Truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it. -- Flannery O'Connor
The high-minded man must care more for the truth than for what people think. -- Aristotle
How dreadful knowledge of the truth can be when there's no help in the truth. -- Sophocles
It does not require many words to speak the truth. -- Chief Joseph
Truth may be stretched but cannot be broken. It always gets above falsehood as oil does above water. -- Miguel de Cervantes
Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it. -- Andre Gide
The folly of mistaking a paradox for a discovery, a metaphor for a proof, a torrent of verbiage for a spring of capital truths, and oneself for an oracle, is inborn in us. -- Paul Valery
All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident. -- Arthur Schopenhauer
One owes respect to the living. To the dead, one owes only the truth. -- Voltaire
What is laid down, ordered, factual is never enough to embrace the whole truth: life always spills over the rim of every cup. -– Boris Pasternak
More New York City Coolness
Since you were interested in New York City activities . . .
James and I rode bikes down to the Brooklyn shore for his birthday recently. Here I am with the Verrazano-Narrows bridge (the one for which I crashed the Marathon).
On that same jaunt, we randomly found a Norwegian festival in a Bay Ridge park. Here James poses with a Viking ship.
Self-portrait in a multilayered mirror, taken at the Olafur Eliasson exhibit at P.S. 1 last Saturday. I highly recommend both that exhibit and its MoMA half for beauty, simplicity, and elegance. It's closing soon, so go! Go!
Finally, Angela Gheorghiu performs in Prospect Park in Brooklyn last night as part of the Metropolitan Opera's "Met in the Parks" program. It was a gorgeous evening, 75 and sunny, and New Yorkers covered the south end of the Long Meadow to picnic and see Ms. Gheorghiu, her husband Roberto Alagna, and the Met Orchestra and Chorus perform selections from The Pearl Fishers, La Traviata, Il Trovatore, Nabucco, and others. After a ten-song program, the couple did, I think, eight encores, which was a bit much -- but as they included "Nessun dorma" from Turandot (surely one of the most beautiful pieces of music ever) and "O Sole Mio" from Trovatore (yes? they also turned it around and sang "It's Now or Never" by Elvis, which, I had never realized, uses the "Sole Mio" melody), I cannot complain.
Hooray for New York!
James and I rode bikes down to the Brooklyn shore for his birthday recently. Here I am with the Verrazano-Narrows bridge (the one for which I crashed the Marathon).
On that same jaunt, we randomly found a Norwegian festival in a Bay Ridge park. Here James poses with a Viking ship.
Self-portrait in a multilayered mirror, taken at the Olafur Eliasson exhibit at P.S. 1 last Saturday. I highly recommend both that exhibit and its MoMA half for beauty, simplicity, and elegance. It's closing soon, so go! Go!
Finally, Angela Gheorghiu performs in Prospect Park in Brooklyn last night as part of the Metropolitan Opera's "Met in the Parks" program. It was a gorgeous evening, 75 and sunny, and New Yorkers covered the south end of the Long Meadow to picnic and see Ms. Gheorghiu, her husband Roberto Alagna, and the Met Orchestra and Chorus perform selections from The Pearl Fishers, La Traviata, Il Trovatore, Nabucco, and others. After a ten-song program, the couple did, I think, eight encores, which was a bit much -- but as they included "Nessun dorma" from Turandot (surely one of the most beautiful pieces of music ever) and "O Sole Mio" from Trovatore (yes? they also turned it around and sang "It's Now or Never" by Elvis, which, I had never realized, uses the "Sole Mio" melody), I cannot complain.Hooray for New York!