Tag: meaningful

Reading with Open Eyes

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As part of TLT’s Why YA series, author John Corey Whaley talks about why what YA fiction means to him. One of my favorite parts:

“But one thing we all have is the memory of being a teenager.  We remember how it felt, how awesome it was sometimes and how much it sucked other times.  We remember discovering things for ourselves and making mistakes we knew better than to make in the first place.  We all share so few things, but being a teenager and knowing what it means to be one is a damn important one…They’re just waiting to grow up and become more bruised and cynical by the ways of the world.  I write YA because teenagers read with open eyes and, you know what? Maybe more adults should do the same.”

High five, John Corey Whaley. I’m sure I’ve said this before, but I think YA could easily be classified as coming-of-age novels. So many great works of literature–To Kill a Mockingbird, Catcher in the Rye, A Separate Piece, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, etc.–are about first encounters with the larger, complicated world and having to come to terms with oneself. As a teen, so much is new and imbued with importance. Why wouldn’t someone one to write about those experiences?

Books That Change Your Life

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At Maybe Genius, S.E. Sinkhorn shares her thoughts on one book that changed her life: The Giver by Lois Lowry. She says:

“Sometimes books come into your life that you don’t just enjoy. They don’t flit before you and then disappear again. The Giver is a book that changed what I wanted from fiction. It changed my outlook on life. It changed me. It seeded a love of dystopia and imperfection and melancholy in my heart. It stole my breath when I realized that the characters of this book had been robbed of color. Their lives had been sterilized. Passion had died. And Jonah fought to win it back.

Books like this are why I write. They’re why I demand so much of the books I love. This is everything I want to create someday. I’m not there yet, but… maybe one day.”

I felt the same way about The Giver when I first read it. When I started, I thought “Wow, this community is so great. Everyone has a place and everyone shares things.” Then, as the truth is slowly revealed, I felt that I had moved into another level of reading and understanding. Even though I’d read fantastic books before that, The Giver was the first book that really made me think about what it meant to live in a world with pain and joy and beauty and suffering. It’s the first book that made me consider what it means to be human.

This is what books can do–particular books for young readers. This is why we need books as stunning asThe Giver.

What books have touched you or changed your life?

You’re Gonna Make It After All

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Love this post by  Justine Larbalestier about when you know you’ve made it as a writer. Lots of hilarious items included like:

“. . . I get my very first fan letter. Someone read and enjoyed my book enough to write to me! Best. Day. Ever.

. . . the fan letters I get make me cry because they are so moving.

. . . the fan letters I get make me cry because they are so illiterate.”

Make sure to read through the whole list, because it’s awesome and a good reminder that being a writer isn’t about being on tour or having an agent or getting a Nobel Prize. It’s about writing.

(Couldn’t resist including Mary Tyler Moore in this one.)

Making Your Details Work

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Love this post over at Kidlit.com about characterizing details. Mary encourages writers to focus on details that actually say something about their characters’ personalities, not just stuff that kind of describes them. (Fun quiz included!) She writes:

“When you’re dealing with character, and especially at the beginning of your book–whether novel or picture book!–make sure you are choosing details and actions that do double duty and flesh out character on a more emotional level for your reader.”

Obviously this is essential for main characters, but I think it’s also something to remember for minor characters as well. It’s easy to describe your main character’s best friend as being tall and funny, but if you talk about how she breaks into showtunes in the cafeteria or how he can make even the stern Latin teacher crack a smile, it can go a long way into developing the world of your novel. Also, it gives readers a better reason as to how your main character interacts with the world around them. You don’t need to go into a ton of detail, but showing instances like these are a great way to build your minor characters and, by extension, your main character.

You Are a Writer

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When people ask what I do, I usually tell them about my day job, not my writing, even though I think of writing as my chosen career. Like the writing is less real because it doesn’t give me health benefits. So I like Kristine Carlson Asselin’s post about owning yourself as a writer. She talks about the hesitation to identify as a writer, and how we should stand up for our writing. She says:

“I AM A WRITER. And if you write, YOU ARE A WRITER. Not you want to be a writer. Not you hope to be a writer. If you write, YOU ARE A WRITER.”

Amen to that! I might need to start practicing this affirmation. Do you find it hard to identify as a writer?

Forever Austen

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If you’re a fan of Shannon Hale, you probably know that Midnight in Austenland, her follow-up to adult novel Austenland, was recently released. Over at figment, Hale talks about what Jane Austen meant to her at various points in her life. On different readings, Pride and Prejudice could be a love story, social commentary, or a comic novel. Hale says:

“Many people ask me, why do you think Jane Austen is so enduring? Simple answer: she writes books people want to reread. Books mean different things to different people at different times.”

I entirely agree. A lot of people dismiss Austen as old-fashioned chick lit, but her writing is sharp and funny and she understands very grounded social concerns. Going to a ball isn’t just a fun night out; it means the possibility of meeting someone halfway decent so you’re not left homeless at age twenty. She writes about real family drama and social power struggles. I’d wager that more people can relate to that than they can to the subjects of many other classic novels. And I think this is another reason that Austen can appeal so much to the YA audience.

Make sure to check out Hale’s full post. And if you want more, she and other YA authors–Elizabeth Eulberg and E. Lockhart–are talking about Jane Austen’s continued popularity on Monday, February 13. How cool is that?

Fifty Years of the Finches

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To Kill a Mockingbird is one of my favorite books and movies. It’s rare that both the original novel and the film adaptation work so well, but each version is fantastic. The movie is celebrating its 50th anniversary–hurray! In honor of the occasion, Movieline has interviewed Mary Badham, who played Scout, and Cecilia Peck, daughter of Gregory Peck. About why To Kill a Mockingbird is so necessary, Badham says:

“To me, the root of all evil is ignorance, and this book speaks directly to the importance of getting an education because ignorance breeds things like bigotry and racism, and all that hatred. We’re still dealing with that, right here in the United States, if we’re talking about Muslims or Mexicans or immigrants, you know, it’s a major deal right now. So we’re still grappling with these issues. It’s just that people have changed their clothes, that’s all. This is not a 1930s black-and-white issue, this is here and now, today.”

Another great example of why literature and film matters, especially if it confronts an uncomfortable subject. Make sure to check out the rest of the interview through the link.

Religion in Wrinkles

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Austin Allen looks at how Madeleine L’Engle combines fantasy and religion in her potentially most famous work, A Wrinkle in Time:

“I think she’s being careful, ducking accusations of parochialism, and leaving everything up to the reader’s interpretation. But I also think the variety of her idols suggests a restless imagination, one that was more confined than inspired by doctrinaire Christianity. Her impulse toward sermonizing wrestles with her impulse toward a vision that is—like her extraterrestrials and shimmering presences—unclassifiable.”

This is one reason that I like L’Engle’s work in general. She acknowledges a greater purpose in the general and, even as she tends toward the Christian, suggests that whatever the universe is, it’s beyond our current power of comprehension. But that doesn’t mean we should strive to reach out toward it.