What's Up Wednesday

Dear Readers,

I have joined a Wednesday Meme!  What's up Wednesday!
 



http://www.jaime-morrow.com/
 

WHAT I'M READING:  I am not reading anything of my own personal choice this week, but I can tell you what my students are reading--The Great Gatsby.  Hmmm... If I just turn to a random page this is what I find:

There must have been moments even that afternoon when Daisy tumbled short of his dreams - not through her own fault but because of the colossal vitality of his illusion. It had gone beyond her, beyond everything. He had thrown himself into it with a creative passion.

Chapter 5, Nick speaking about Gatsby.

By the way, I am excited about starting my "Gatsby Twitter" project with my class! Details Soon!

WHAT I'M WRITING:  Well, I have been trying to finalize a blog post regarding the structuring of fiction--a basic "Pantsers" verses "Plotters" entry with examples of the "In-Betweens."  It is taking longer than I thought it would, and I will not have it ready until Friday. I suppose I am more of "Pantser." 

 

Now on to What I Am Trying To Write When I Have Real Time--A YA focused around a rising country singer name Carolina Rose Reyes.  I have chapter one complete!  As for chapter two, I need to get things going and continue on with the running theme of "good girls pick good politics"--since love interest number one is country music royalty and known by many as the "Son of Nashville," and love interest number two is truly involved in political politics.  Hopefully I can share some real progress next week.

WHAT INSPIRES ME RIGHT NOW:  Obviously, country music.  Especially Miranda Lambert's "Automatic" since at the core of my YA is the idea that music is not about politics, but rather about home.  Here are Miranda's lyrics from the final bridge section and stanza:

Let's put the windows down

Windows with the crank

Come on let's take a picture

The kind you gotta shake

Hey what ever happened to waiting your turn

Doing it all by hand, cause when everything is handed to you

It's only worth as much as the time put in

It all just seems so good the way we had it

Back before everything became automatic

Absolutely lovely writing.  :)

 WHAT ELSE I'VE BEEN UP TO:  Craziness!  Reasearch Paper Madness!  I teach 6 sections of college writing to high school students, and the semester is rolling fast to a frantic ending.  Kids are freaking out by having to write and submit a 6 to 8 page paper, and they have no concept that one day (when they really leave high school) that 6 pages is peanuts compared to the potential 20 page research paper they may one day write for some professor who expects nothing less than perfection. 


We are talking thesis, claims, warrants, refutaion, body sections, rhetorical strategies, and the dreaded MLA documentation.  Ugh.  Plus, this Saterday I am offering the final Advanced Placement review for the significantly difficult English Language AP exam on Friday, May 9th.  Thank God I simply have to teach and not actually test.  My testing days have been long over.  Yes, my students love me.  I hope.


Fictionally Yours Siempre,

Minerva

The Tearings Will Tear Your World Apart

Today's Thursday Trailer!

The Tearings by VC Repetto

Released by Evernight Teen, November 2013

 

 

The guy sitting at the next table coughed. It was an ugly, wet sound that made me look up from the exam sheet in front of me.

 

Fabulous. The last thing I needed was to get sick before the swim match.

 

He sniffed and wiped his nose with his stiff, already less-than-fresh sleeve, then lowered his hand back to his pencil and paper. Too bad for the person who'd have to pick that particular sheet up.

With this, Dear Readers, The Tearings begin.

Filled with 1950's black and white imagery that bring to mind the slightly creepy fascination of medical and scientific experimentation of a bygone era, the trailer will keep you bizarrely intrigued right up to that final moment--with a final seizing of  your own fascination. 

A human arm, sinewy with veins of virus poison jutting out and the entire almost monster-like arm turning red with infection--with plague.

I Am Legend, anybody?  The Walking Dead?  A new story of a new virus for all you world-going-down-plague-style loving readers and screen enthusiasts. 

 

P.S. Of interest to many of you may be the fact that VC Repetto enjoys submerging her brain in Victorian Gothic novels.  The Tearings is only her debut novel, and if she reads dark, Gothic-y material, then you can almost be certain she will emerge with her own work of "moldy lace and gas masks," two things she enjoys in Victorian Gothics.

 

Summary from Evernight Teen:

From the moment the black vans appear to take the sick away, Maya knows there is something wrong. She seems to be the only one to question the sudden disappearances at school and the masks everyone is forced to wear to keep from catching the new disease spreading through the entire United States.

Even when word of the new “healing centers” reaches the public, no one dares to ask what is happening. But when Maya catches the disease, the one they call The Tearings, and is taken to one of these centers along with her mother, the truth becomes all too clear. She is separated from her family and forced to work, becoming one of the more fortunate ones who is not sent to the testing wings.

Bullied by the guards to the point of death, she meets David Summers, the enigmatic young Captain who appears to loathe his position of power in the camp and who seems as drawn to Maya as she is to him.

When Maya suddenly becomes the disease’s only survivor, she must put her trust on David to find a way to escape the camp and get the truth, and the cure coursing through her veins, out to the world.

14+ for Violence and Adult Situations


Novel Excerpt from Evernight Teen:

 

My throat was raw, throbbing, and dry.

 

Panic rose immediately.

 

I was sick. I’d caught it.

 

I dug my nails into my hands and tried to get a hold of my galloping fear. Maybe I’d just slept with my mouth open during the night. That could be it, right? It didn’t need to be the worst thing imaginable. Except, I knew it was.

 

In seconds I was bolting up out of bed and running to the mirror hanging from my closet door. It hurt to open my mouth. Patches of red and fuzzy white had spread across my tongue and palates, making me wince when I touched them.

 

Sudden tears made my vision waver. Whatever this super-flu was, I had it.

 

I brushed my tears away with violence. There was no time for that right now. I had to think. My first instinct was to run into Mom’s room and tell her, but I made myself stand still for a few seconds more. Once she knew, she’d call the ambulances; there’d be no stopping her. They’d take us away to the health centers, so this might be the last few minutes I had to face this without needles poking at me.

 

As much as I tried to convince myself that allowing the ambulances to take me to the centers was a good thing, I couldn’t stop my stomach from clenching at the thought of riding in those black monsters that patrolled the streets. I wanted to stay home.

 

On impulse, I grabbed my cell off my night table and pressed one of the speed dial buttons.

Derek picked up on the fourth ring. “Maya?”

 

“Hi.”

 

“Is everything okay?”

 

I hesitated. This was it. Once I told someone, there’d be no stopping this. “I woke up with a sore throat.”

Author Website and Blog 

Book Page-Evernight Teen

VC Repetto on Twitter

VC Repetto on Goodreads

VC Repetto on Facebook

Caught in the Act of Obsession

 

 

#TBT:  The Original Post (keep reading after for my new 2014 thoughts!)

Caught in the Act by Peter Moore

 

 

YA Fiction Meets the PG-13 Version of Fatal Attraction.

That is basically what you see in Peter Moore's novel, Caught in the Act, when Ethan Lederer, a good kid with a good reputation, falls for the new girl dressed in black.

As Ethan puts it, he was doomed from the minute he first laid eyes on Lydia Krane, and it doesn’t take long for him to be captivated by her Carebears t-shirts, Goth clothing, and black dyed hair.

But more than that, Lydia understands him in a way no one else does, or so he thinks. She is also the only person who knows his whole smart guy status is a façade built on parental expectations, late night cramming, and cheating when necessary.

And then things start getting weird.

I don’t want to spoil all the bizarre, psychotic complications in the plot, but let’s just say the whole tattoo thing in the story ranks pretty high on the crazy scale.

 

You know, the story really grabs you from the start, and you find yourself rooting for Ethan and Lydia as they have all these meaningful encounters in the early chapters.

Then, the author hits you with all this drama, and I don’t just mean figuratively, as both Lydia and Ethan take the lead roles in a modern day interpretation of Macbeth in the annual school play.

By the end everything unravels for Ethan as he finally faces up to some of his choices and decisions, but not without a heavy cost.

Caught in the Act is not a psychological thriller, but it has enough twists and beyond nutty behavior to keep you turning the pages. Lydia leaves her imprint on Ethan and makes you think twice about breaking up with your current gal or guy just for somebody you think you really know. Enjoy the new YA Macbeth!

Looking Back and Forward, 2014

Dear Readers,

Published about a decade ago in 2005, Caught in the Act is a well-written YA with a load of intensity and an extremely intriguing storyline.  Probably a YA you missed. 

Peter Moore has served as a high school counselor, so you know he might have seen some crazy stuff.   You all have probably seen crazy stuff or done some crazy stuff yourself, like passing by a boy's house about 25 times in one week.  Well, that was back in the 1990s.  Do "stalkish" girls still do this?  Or do they just hound the guy on Twitter?

If you never read this YA, the purchase price is just a little over $4.00 on Amazon.  Seriously, how can you go wrong especially when the book features the first person narration of a teenage boy with a crazy girlfriend?  Also, I know I have ready plenty of YA where the guy is obsessed with the girl and not the other way around such as with Stay by Deb Caletti or Stolen by Lucy Christopher.

Then there is the whole Macbeth thing--the dark obsession of Macbeth mirroring the dark obsession in the relationship between Ethan and Lydia.

Just read these two gorgeous lines at the start of chapter 1:

"It was a cool day in October when Lydia Krane walked into our sophomore honors chem class. I was doomed from the minute I set eyes on her."

A writer who can write these first two lines is a writer I want to read anytime.  And, Peter Moore--don't forget this name--will soon have his most recent novel released this coming May, V is for Villian.

Summary from Amazon:  V is for Villian

Brad Baron is used to looking lame compared to his older brother, Blake. Though Brad's basically a genius, Blake is a superhero in the elite Justice Force. And Brad doesn't measure up at his high school, either, where powers like super-strength and flying are the norm. So when Brad makes friends who are more into political action than weight lifting, he's happy to join a new crew-especially since it means spending more time with Layla, a girl who may or may not have a totally illegal, totally secret super-power. And with her help, Brad begins to hone a dangerous new power of his own.

But when they're pulled into a web of nefarious criminals, high-stakes battles, and startling family secrets, Brad must choose which side he's on. And once he does, there's no turning back.



P.S. And now an obsessive love song from the fantastic Miranda Lambert... This is basically Lydia's theme song for the rest of her life.

"I cut my bangs with some rusty kitchen scissors
I screamed his name ‘til the neighbors called the cops."

Talk about obsession!  Please watch this video--it is a seriously fantastic creation!






Fictionally Yours Siempre,

Minerva

Liberty Belle

 

Back to MG!

Cover Reveal!

Liberty Belle by Emily Ungar
 

Release Date: August 12, 2014

Summary from Anaiah Press:
 

On the same day she turns twelve years old, Savannah moves away from everything she’s known in sweet, sunny Georgia to preppy Washington D.C. Not only will she miss her best friends Katie and Tessa, but Savannah will start a new school where schoolmates love to brag—about their clothes, their parents’ governmental connections, and even who has the "in" with the school authorities.
 

Unhappy and lonely, Savannah decides that if she can’t make life better, she can at least make it sound that way.

Soon she is living in the childhood home of George Washington, riding in the limo of the vice president’s daughter, and even moving into the former Luxembourg embassy.

 

All is well until she learns that her true friends from Georgia are coming for a visit. Now Savannah must create the life she’s been talking about in her letters—and fast! Will Savannah find herself or lose her friends?

 a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

Author Bio:

Emily Ungar is a graduate of Indiana University, where she majored in journalism. After living in seven different U.S. states between grade school and college graduation, she now lives in Indianapolis, Indiana, with her husband and very curious twin toddlers. When she isn’t chasing after her twin boys, Emily loves to curl up in a chaise lounge with a book in one hand and a lemon cupcake in the other. Emily loves connecting with her readers, so she welcomes you to say hi on her blog at emilyungar.com.

 

Website: Emily Ungar

Twitter: @emilyungar

Pinterest: Emily Ungar

Goodreads: Liberty Belle 

 

Facebook: Author Emily Ungar

 

Publisher:  Anaiah Press

 

 

 

Dear Readers,

Although I usually focus on YA and the occasional adult fiction, today I am part of a cover release promotion for an upcoming MG release, Liberty Belle.

 

This is one I would definitely be promoting to my daughter is she was still in 5th or even 6th grade.  The cover reminds me of one of those American Girl dolls that my daughter, sadly, received a little too late at the end of her 5th grade year. 

 

By the end of 6th grade the doll and the accessories were placed simply on display. 

 

What I am trying to say is that Liberty Belle is straight up middle grade fiction and any girl between the ages of 3rd through 6th grade would love to read this.  And what I really love about Liberty Belle is that the novel is a perfect transition book since the plot is moving towards the issues that our young girls begin facing as they grow older, but at the same time Liberty Belle does not contain any of the edgy elements of mainstream, full-out YA. 

The storyline in Liberty Belle is one many young girls will find relatable to their lives--fitting in and trying to keep up appearances.  We all know that feeling out of place can come at any moment and in any place.  It does not require moving to an entirely new state. 

 

This happens to many young people at the start of a brand new school year, and it especially happens when entering middle school.  My daughter had her first taste of "not fitting in" pre-teenage reality at the beginning of 6th grade.  Also, I remember that when I was in 6th grade that was the year I was going to make things seem better for myself even though this wasn't true. 

 

Being untruthful starts with being untruthful with yourself.  And are we ever really truthful with ourselves?  Then there is the aspect of not being truthful to others in our lives. 

No one wants to be singled out in middle school for being different--we all want to fit in.  If I were Savannah I might have lied to my friends at home as well.  I would not want them to know the girls up here in preppy D.C. were a different breed I could not completely connect with immediately.

P.S.  This is for my lovely Celeste, soon to be a high school freshman, but always in my heart that little gal' who didn't know people can hear someone humming a tune while finishing classwork.  Really, she revealed this to me about a year ago.  That she would hear humming and stop to listen and try and figure out who it was.  It turns out she was humming.

 

 

Fictionally Yours Siempre,

 

Minerva