All tagged Melissa Walker
Teaching the Classics: The Scarlet Letter
Note: This is the first in an ongoing series from Sandra, retired high school English teacher and current substitute teacher in the same subject area, discussing the classic novels she taught, their relevance to today's teens and pairings with contemporary fiction.
I taught high school literature for twenty-six years, many of the same books year after year. You’d think they would become ho-hum with a huge yawn after a few years.
No so.
There’s always something new and fresh that first-time readers bring to a text so it stands the test of time—meaning they relate to the characters and situations regardless of era or setting. Some books are simply universal. The Scarlet Letter, which I've written about previously, stands out for the fresh perspectives my students would bring to them each time I taught these books.
It’s all about making connections and drawing parallels.
I recall one student gingerly holding a copy of The Scarlet Letter between her thumb and index finger. The expression on her face was somewhere between horror and admiration as I shared that I had taught, and therefore read, this book every single year.
“What? You’ve actually read this at least twenty times? That’s that’s—I don’t know what is is,” my student said.
List-O-Rama: Let's Get Musical
This past week, I started and finished reading Jennifer Echols' July release, Dirty Little Secret (which is so, so good). I enjoyed so much about this book, but the stand-out element for me was the way music played such an important role in both the plot and in developing the characters.
I'm kind of a doofus when it comes to music: I play the ukulele poorly and was a flutist in marching band in high school until I quit band to protest the ill-fitting polyester pants. (That was super-effective.) Because of my musical doofusness, I really admire people for whom music is so ingrained in their lives. I realized that as a result of that, I tend to gravitate to novels featuring music or musical people. Sometimes, much like books featuring sports, the music is just window dressing, but when it's feels real, it's so very good.
Here are a twelve (!!!) of my recommendations for musically-infused novels you'll want to check out.
Adios to My Old Life & When the Stars Go Blue by Caridad Ferrer
Caridad Ferrer is one of my favorite authors you're probably not reading. Both Adios to My Old Life and When the Stars Go Blue are infused with passion for music and the arts in general. (Interestingly, both of these could easily be considered thematically as "new adult.") Adios to My Old Life is focuses on an American Idol-style singing competition, while Stars follows the structure of the opera Carmen and features an incredible touring marching band.
Links + Things: NPR examines publishing, all digital libraries, book clubs take over a casino and more!
Traditional publishing versus self publishing! A book club extravaganza! All digital libraries! Amazon coins! (Huh?)
All that plus cheap brain candy and some other bargain book goodness in this installment of Links + Things.
Why Traditional Publishing Is Really In A 'Golden Age' (NPR)
"What has changed in a really exciting way is the ways you can get people's attention. It used to be one book review at a time, a daily review, maybe you get into Time magazine. Now there's, with the Internet, this giant echo chamber. Anything good that happens, any genuine excitement that a book elicits can be amplified and repeated and streamed and forwarded and linked in a way that excitement spreads more quickly and universally than ever before. And what I'm seeing is that really wonderful books — the books that people get genuinely excited about because they change their lives, they give them new ideas — those books can travel faster, go further, sell more copies sooner than ever before. It's just energized the whole business in a thrilling way."
Self-Publishing Now The First Choice For Some Writers (NPR)
...traditional publishers are in the business of not publishing books but of selling books. And there's a big difference there. So they seek to acquire books and authors who they think have the greatest commercial potential. But the challenge here is they really don't know which books are going to go on to become bestsellers. Only readers know that.
Laura pointed me to this two-part series on NPR this week about self-publishing versus traditional publishing. The traditional publishing side is representing by the incoming CEO of Hachette while the Smashwords CEO makes the case for the supremacy of self-publishing. Both have an agenda, but it's interesting that both are so enthusiastic about the future of publishing and its potential. It's a nice contrast to the doom and gloom stories we hear so often.
Dear Googler: You Ask, CEFS Answers
The other day I was looking through the CEFS web statistics and was browsing my favorite section: search terms.
A fascinating trend I’ve noticed is that many Googlers put their searches in the form of a question, not dissimilar from Jeopardy! Since we get a lot of the same searches, I thought I’d answer a few of these common questions.
[Note: I’ve paraphrased a number of these searches that appear over and over again. But I swear, I’m not making any of this up.]
General Books/Recommendations
What should I read next?
Um… I don’t know. I just finished Wanderlove and adored it. Actually, I don’t even know what I’m reading next, to be honest. Maybe check out our CEFS favorites page?
What are the main themes in [book name]?
Kid, you’ve got to read the book. I’m not doing your homework for you.
Where can I download [book name] for free?
- Try your library, if there’s one in your area. Some publishers participate in ebook lending.
- If you’re a Kindle owner with Amazon Prime, you can also access the Kindle Owners’ Library in which you can access one book for free each month; many of these are self-published books, but there are a number of traditional publishers participating as well.
- Check Books on the Knob for daily deals, including freebies.
- If you live in a community with a library (not everyone has one, sadly), you can also check out print books for free—the one in my neighborhood actually holds back new releases each week for people who come into the library (Lucky Day Books), so it’s worth actually going in the library too.
- Some ebooks are lendable. If one you want read is, see if a friend will virtually lend you a book for your Kindle or Nook.
- Whatever you do, please don’t pirate books.
What are some books with lots of sex?
That’s probably a question better answered by Rebeca, whose knowledge on that subject is more broad than mine (I’m trying to get her to review the zombie apocalypse polyamorous novel she just read). But, maybe try Victoria Dahl? Her books are a little much for me, but with that said, they don’t have the yucky gender dynamics that can be very problematic. (Yes, this is a very, very common search term.)
What are some books with lots of action/violence?
I’m kind of a wimp when it comes to this subject, but check out our recommendations for my friend Matt in our Book Matchmaker feature.
I want to read an urban fantasy series with a strong female lead.
Check out these ideas!
List-O-Rama: A Bunch of CEFS Reader-Suggested Backlist YAs
We had such fantastic suggestions last weekend for backlist young adult novels that I had to spotlight them all into a list this week.
Thank you all for making to to-read list so enormous!
Small Steps by Louis Sachar (2006)
I may have ruined my life, but at least I got to eat some really good Chinese food.
Our friend Gabrielle Prendergast (whose book, Audacious, is one of our very much anticipated 2013 verse novels) suggested Louis Sachar’s follow up to Holes. I’m shocked I haven’t read either Holes or Small Steps because they really sound like something I’d like. All of the reviews say that you don’t need to read the first book to enjoy this one about a teen recently released from juvenile detention who’s trying to turn his life around in Austin, Texas.
Gabrielle also suggested anything by Barry Lyga (I know she’s a huge advocate for Boy Toy in particular), Pete Hautman and I am the Messenger by Markus Zuzak.
List-O-Rama: 3 Backlist YA Novels You May Have Missed
And by “backlist,” I mean books published prior to the explosion in popularity of YA in the last few years. These are a few of my go-to books when I make recommendations to folks who fell in love with young adult fiction and plowed through most of the popular titles.
These are all contemporaries, natch. And bonus: they’re generally way cheaper than new releases, so it’s easier to feed your book addiction.
Adios to My Old Life by Caridad Ferrer
MTV Books 2006
I adored Caridad (aka “Barb”) Ferrer’s 2010 novel, When the Stars Go Blue (which is inexplicably omitted from lists of “New Adult” titles, by the way), so I immediately bought both of her previous novels. (I’ve actually held off on reading It’s Not About the Accent because then I will have no other books of hers to read—please tell me I’m not the only one who does this.) Frankly, I’m surprised Adios to My Old Life wasn’t more popular when it was released, since it was published during the height of the American Idol craze, when everyone was talking about Idol around the watercooler. Adios follow Alegria, a talented 16 year old from Miami who’s competing in Oye Mi Canto, a reality show searching for the next Latin pop star. This is a fast-paced novel that I read in one sitting.
Review: Lovestruck Summer by Melissa Walker
“I know what I like,” I say. “It’s a certain type of music and I’m just not into stuff like bluegrass and banjos.”
“Music is music, Priscilla,” says Russ. “If you love music, you give it all a listen. You see what there is to learn in every song you hear. You take chances on shows. That’s part of it.”
I’ve been just dying for a great summer-themed read, so a couple of weeks ago I blew though five or six books I hoped would fit the bill. Among those books was Melissa Walker’s 2009 novel, Lovestruck Summer, which was exactly what I was hoping to find and earned itself a spot as a summer read I’ll definitely revisit.
Don’t let the cutesy cover fool you. Lovestruck Summer has quite a bit of meat to it with excellent, believable character development—as well as some very smart humor—and most definitely fits into the spectrum of older-YA/”new adult” that’s becoming so popular right now.
Quinn (who’s real name is Priscilla, but no one had better call her that) has just graduated from high school in North Carolina when, on a whim, she calls her favorite record label at 3:00 a.m and asks for a summer internship. To her surprise, the label agrees, which means she’ll be spending the summer in America’s live music capital, Austin, Texas.
Quinn finds herself living with her super sorority girl cousin, Penny, a UT student who has a bedroom and wardrobe for her dog, and whose next-door neighbors include Russ, a 21 year-old cowboy/frat boy combo (think Matt Saracen if he drove Tim Riggins’ truck) who loves country music and annoys the hell out of Quinn. She often “escapes under her headphones” because these people are so different, and Quinn doesn’t know how to cope with the Bachelor marathons and pop-country that are the soundtrack of her cousin’s apartment.
I tug on Penny’s arm. “I hate country music,” I whisper through clenched teeth.
“What?” she asks, clapping her hands to the beat and hardly turning around. “I hate country music!” I shout, way too loudly. The back half of the restaurant turns to scowl at me.
Book Matchmaker: Sarah (not our Sarah) Seeks Good Coming of Age Stories
Sarah (not our Sarah) is looking for some novels that tell a good coming of age tale.
This is one of our favorite themes, though we were a bit stumped on finding some that are also ’50s, ’60s or ’70s period novels. But it sure was hard to choose just a few to recommend! Sarah filled out our extremely scientific Book Matchmaker Questionnaire and here are her responses:
YA or Adult: Surprise Me
Genres: Contemporary, Historical, Romance
POV/Narrative Style: First Person, Third Person, Multiple POV, Present Tense, Past Tense, Male POV, Main Character or Narrator, Female POV, Main Character or Narrator
Turn-ons/Likes: Easy by Tammara Webber, Summer Sisters by Judy Blume, The Romantics by Galt Nierderhoffer.
Coming of Age is a favorite theme. Also period novels set in the 1950’s, 60’s and 70’s.”
Turnoffs/Dislikes: None that I can think of…
Swoon Factor: 5
Gross Out Factor: 2
Smut Factor: 5
Fluff Factor: 3
The Results
Marcelo in the Real World by Francisco X. Stork
My brain is like a water faucet that I can turn on or off. Only now there is no off and the water of thoughts just flows.
Rebeca aka Renegade suggests Francisco X. Stork’s (what a cool name!) YA novel about a 17-year old boy with a mild Autism-like condition who spends his first summer in the “real world” outside his specialized school. There’s a strong theme of self-discovery and the point-of-view is distinctive.
Review: Small Town Sinners by Melissa Walker
I have recently been reading through a number of young adult novels recommended to me by Sarah dealing with challenging, contemporary issues.
Among these have been Sara Zarr’s incredible Story of a Girl, Siobhan Vivian’s brilliant The List and Small Town Sinners, Melissa Walker’s difficult, yet sensitive 2011 release about a small town evangelical community.
Each of these has been quite moving in very different ways, and each has been equally memorable, addressing issues and making me think without being “problem novels.” I love seeing this level of innovation of depth from today’s YA writers.
I grew up in a small town, taught in a small town and currently live in one. There are many wonderful aspects of this experience and just as many not-so-great ones. Small towns are sometimes tempting to stereotype but also defy classification. Melissa Walker skillfully captures the complexity of a small town, walking a line in which she peels back the layers of small town life and the influence of strong Evangelical fervor.
Small Town Sinners is told from the point-of-view of Lacey Anne Byer, the daughter of the children’s pastor for the House of Enlightenment, her town’s evangelical church, who says,
I’m just trying to figure out what truth really is for me.
{List-O-Rama} My Sucker List
I know everyone’s got them—those elements of books that you just can’t say no to. For instance, Laura just can’t say no to body switching plots. I call this my “Sucker List.”
Sometimes my Sucker List works out and leads me to beloved reads, a lot of the time… not so much. Here are five elements guaranteed to seduce me every single time, for better or worse.
#1 Capers
I love caper flicks. Love. Them. (I own the DVD of The Italian Job.) And, I keep hoping I can find books that translate the awesomeness of my beloved caper movies into the pages of a fantastic novel. I am yet to find this between the pages of a book. But, I keep on trying and I keep getting disappointing. The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks is just about the only one that’s worked for me. (Related: Wouldn’t Frankie make a kick-ass movie?)