All tagged Trish Doller
Podcast #20: Diversifying the Shelves (Part 2) with Author Sarah Ockler & Blogger Racquel of The Book Barbies
We're super-thrilled to publish the second half of our discussion with author Sarah Ockler and Racquel, blogger from The Book Barbies, about diversifying our bookshelves, how writers can work to authentically represent people of color in their fiction and recommendations for books and authors that do this successfully. You can find the first half over here.
In this half, we get down to the nitty-gritty and recommend some novels that really, in our eyes, get it right, and why. It's important to emphasize that this is most definitely not a comprehensive conversation--if anything, it's framing questions and talking about our personal experiences. We hope to continue to explore this topic in future episodes. If you'd like to be involved in a future podcast discussion on this subject, get in touch and let's talk.
Podcast 18: Author Elizabeth Scott on Heartbeat, Writing Angry Girls, Reader Response & the Awesomeness of Courtney Summers
I could not be more excited to have one of my favorite authors, Elizabeth Scott, as a guest on our latest podcast episode!
Elizabeth's most recent novel is Heartbeat, which all three of us at CEFS have read and loved. It's a unique, emotionally intense, authentic examination of grief and anger that's unlike anything I've read. It's out tomorrow from Harlequin Teen and I really hope you'll check it out because it's one of my favorites of the year already. (While you're at it, you should read Miracle, which came out in 2012 and didn't get nearly the love and attention it deserved--here's my review.)
The Official 2013 Clear Eyes, Full Shelves List of Awesome
Each year, we here at Clear Eyes, Full Shelves put together a list of books that stood out to us over the last twelve months as particularly full of awesome. Last year's list had a whopping 24 titles.
Let's see if 2013 can match up, shall we?
The One Sarah Recommends to Anyone & Everyone:
Nowhere But Home by Liza Palmer
“The red light blinks. Welcoming me home. What’s the exact opposite of blaze of glory? I look around my dusty Subaru, cut-off jeans, and think: me. This. This is what the exact opposite of a blaze of glory looks like.”
One of the Year's Best: Where the Stars Still Shine by Trish Doller
“I can’t do this. I can’t sit here and pretend I’m a normal girl when my whole life has been so fucked up. Greg and Phoebe haven’t slept in the backseat of their car, or eaten all their meals from a vending machine because their mothers forgot to buy groceries. And the only monsters Tucker and Joe will ever have to contend with are the imaginary kind that are banished in the light. These people are so clean and I feel so—tainted.”
My copy of Trish Doller’s second novel, Where the Stars Still Shine, arrived last week and as I’m looking at it’s pretty, oh-so-shiny cover sitting on my desk, I’m still stuck when trying to talk about why it’s such a special book.
When I read Trish’s debut novel, Something Like Normal, I had to plug my Kindle in to finish the last ten percent or so because my battery was dead and it was 2:00 a.m. and I just couldn't fathom stopping.
The exact same thing—right down to the dead Kindle battery—happened when I read her second novel, Where the Stars Still Shine.
Like Something Like Normal, and perhaps even more so, Where the Stars Still Shine captures authentic emotion in a character-driven novel in a way that’s simply real.
The BFF Paradigm
“The myth of the BFF can be difficult to live up to. In film and television, we often see female friendships portrayed in a highly romanticised and unrealistic manner; uncomplicated and lasting forever despite the differences of the women involved. When women’s relationships are at the centre of the narrative – Sex and the City being the most obvious example – it seems that best friendship somehow transcends all else. ”
— The myth of the BFF and the end of female friendships (The Guardian)
Recently, I had the pleasure of engaging in a fabulous chat on Twitter with Trinity, Reynje and Laura prompted by Trinity's tweeting a link to the article quoted above. This piece was written by a contributor to Just Between Us, an anthology of writing by Australian authors on the topic of female friendships. The depiction of female friendships--and particularly the BBF (best friend forever) relationship--is one that I frequently find personally challenging in books, movies and television. Most of the time, those depictions aren't relavent to my own experiences, and in my discussion with Laura, Reynje and Trin, it sounds like I'm not alone.
Thinking back to elementary and high school, I remember the distinct feeling that there was something wrong with me that I didn't have a best friend. That's what we saw on Beverly Hills 90210 (the original show), right? Not to mention my mother and most of the adult women I knew still had the same best friends they'd had when they were twelve, so the inevitable questions from well-meaning adults would often head in that direction I name whatever casual friend was around the most at any given moment, but that overwhelming feeling of being defective because I didn't walk around with half of a friendship charm.
That's not to say I didn't have friends and a reasonably full social life. In high school, I had a group of friends--girls and boys--that I spent time with and had a lot of fun with. A few of those people I'm still in touch with. When I went to college, there were a couple of those high school friends who I thought may be that best friend forever that adults told me I should have, but distance (pre-email and Facebook and even texting--the horror!) made that challenging. Late in my sophomore year of college it hit me that one close high school friend with best friend forever potential had faded into my history, rather than being a part of my present. I was so very sad about that.
In college, I had a similar, loose circle of friends, but that group was largely comprised of couples--it wasn't the Sex and the City fantasy (this was when SATC was popular) full of shoe shopping, gossip-fueled brunches and hangovers. Aside from my now-husband, I'm only in touch with one of those people, though I have wonderful memories of my four years with that group. By that point, I'd pretty much come to terms with the reality that I simply was going to be the anomaly, that person who didn't have a best, lifelong female friend. (This was around the same time I realized that my real best friend forever was my now-husband.)
Now that I'm older (in my 30s), I realize that friendships change, grow and end, and that's part of the cycle of our social relationships as humans. Sometimes people come into our lives for a period of time, and there's value in appreciating those relationships while we have them. I know that I'll never fit in at a "Girls Night Out" (just as I always felt out of place and awkward at slumber parties at twelve), that my enjoyment of solitude and aversion to gossip and large groups will keep me from obtaining the sorts of female friendships depicted in popular culture.
Links + Things: Algonquin's Young Reader Imprint, The Fringe Book and a Year of Verse Novels
This week, I have a bunch of interesting news, ranging from an intriguing new young adult and middle grade imprint and a free download of one of my favorite light-hearted romance novels.
Links
Algonquin Launches YA/YR Imprint (Facebook)
Algonquin Young Readers, launching Fall 2013, is a new imprint of Algonquin Books dedicated to publishing works of the same literary merit and enduring qualities that are hallmarks of the Algonquin tradition.
Algonquin Books has released some interesting and well-performing fiction in the last few years (including the Water for Elephants), and this week they announced that they're launching an imprint focused on middle grade and young adult titles, Algonquin Young Readers. This is pretty intriguing, and it sounds like they're taking a literary approach to their acquisitions (they're posted on their Facebook page, linked above).
The one that piques my interest the most is Sara Farizan's If You Could Be Mine, which is about a lesbian teen in Iran, where being gay is punishable by death. (There's a preview up on Scribd.)
I'm excited to see where they go with this imprint, since I do think there's a market for more literary-minded books for young people.
List-O-Rama: Some of Our Favorite Male POV Contemporary YA
Gabrielle’s excellent post this week, “The Broken Boys of YA,” and subsequent huge Goodreads list inspired me to dedicate today’s post to highlighting some of our favorite young adult novels written from a male point-of-view.
These are all contemporaries, which is near and dear to us here, though there are some excellent paranormals and dystopians which Gabrielle’s Goodreads list highlights as well. It’s interesting, because I didn’t realize until now that many of my favorites are written by women. It’s funny, because many of the books I’ve had the biggest problems with have also been written by women. It seems like authors either knock this out of the park for me or absolutely fall flat. Funny… I would have thought there’d be more of a gender divide.
Freefall by Mindi Scott
“I just love that feeling when things are about to change. Like when you know that in a few seconds you’re going to do something and become someone else.”
I’m pretty sure that Laura and I are friends thanks to this book. Seth’s voice is one of my absolute favorites, it has a wonderful note of authenticity that makes Seth seem absolutely real. (I read Mindi’s new book last week and I literally squealed because Seth is mentioned and thought something along the lines of “I hope he’s doing well” before reminding myself that Seth is a fictional character.) Freefall has a very strong theme about actively choosing to make things change and it really resonated with both Laura and I. Seth Rocks.
{Laura’s Review | Amazon | Goodreads}
Something Like Normal by Trish Doller
He was the person all of us should be, but most of us aren’t. And if I could have taken his place to buy him a little more time in the world, I’d have done it. I’m sorry I couldn’t.
Trish Doller’s debut is still reigning as one of my absolute favorite books of 2012. A 19-year old Marine coping with PTSD, on leave back in his hometown, in his family home, Travis’ should be pretty unrelatable for a dorky girl like me, but his story is told with such emotional authenticity that ultimately I found extremely compelling and familiar.
How has half a year gone by already? Seriously, 2012… slow down!
I thought I’d use this Sunday’s List-O-Rama to round up some of my most memorable reads thus far in 2012—and I am going to bug Laura, Renegade and Sandra to do the same. (We’ll see if they cooperate, the CEFS contributors are not known for their blind acquiescence.)
Published in 2012
YA Novels
Bittersweet by Sarah Ockler - This is definitely my favorite Sarah Ockler; I definitely connected with dynamics of growing up in a small down. {Review | Amazon | Goodreads}
The Fault in Our Stars by John Green - This book has been rather divisive, but I loved it—and I really affected by the TFiOS tour stop I attended. {Review | Amazon | Goodreads}
Something Like Normal by Trish Doller - SLN is a book I’ve been recommending left and right to people—especially those who are afraid of reading YA. It strikes a perfect note of authenticity. {Review | Amazon | Goodreads}
Our latest book matchmaker victim participant is Kate, who loves good young adult fiction. This is one of the most fun book matchmaker posts we’ve done, since Kate’s tastes appear to be very similar to Laura’s and mine. She’s looking for YA novels that have either historical or contemporary settings and have some depth.
The biggest challenge was finding books to recommend that Kate hadn’t read yet!
Kate’s Responses
Adult, YA or Both: YA
Genres: Contemporary, Historical, Romance
Narrative Style & POV: First Person, Multiple POV, Present Tense, Past Tense, Male POV, Main Character or Narrator, Female POV, Main Character or Narrator
Swoon Factor: 4
Gross Out Factor: 1
Fluff Factor: 3
Smut Factor: 3
Likes: “Favorites include: The Summer books by Jenny Han, Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys, Nicholas Sparks. But I also books with deep themes, such as dealing with death, etc. I’m really up for anything. Just not a huge fantasy fan!”
Dislikes: Vampires, made-up creatures, really improbable plotlines :)
The Results
All the Broken Pieces by Ann E. Burg
This is a novel in verse recommended by Laura that deals with several big issues and has a semi-historical setting (the 1970s—which I can’t really comprehend as “historic,” but oh well). This is an emotional book in which the author makes every word count.
{Early Review} Something Like Normal by Trish Doller
But what has been done can’t be undone. My best friend is dead and I’m never going to be the same Travis Stephenson.
Trish Doller’s remarkable debut, Something Like Normal, is one of those rare books that I recommend to nearly everyone. It’s an important, timely novel—one that’s lingered with me in the months since I read it.
Well before SLN was published (it’s out on June 19), I found myself on seemingly every social media site insisting the everyone—absolutely everyone—read this novel about 19 year-old Marine Travis Stephenson, who’s home on leave in Florida following a tour-of-duty in Afghanistan where his best friend, Charlie, dies before his eyes. Suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (a fact kept hidden from the Marines, as that would torpedo his military career), Travis finds himself feeling like and outsider in his own home and hometown.
As we head toward the beach I notice the differences in the landscape of the city. New businesses that weren’t there last year. Old businesses that are gone. It’s like a whole chunk of time has just … disappeared. The songs on the radio are different. The faces on the celebrity tabloids at the airport newsstand were people I didn’t recognize. There’s even a new American fucking Idol.
Contemporary Young Adult fiction is a sub-genre near and dear to my heart.
I think it goes all the way back to my 13-year old self’s undying love for Judy Blume’s incredible novel, Tiger Eyes (Goodreads, Amazon). (Seriously, it is her absolute best, despite that it’s not nearly as widely read as Forever et al.) So, I watch Kirkus reviews, Goodreads lists and blog posts like a hawk for buzz about my favorite contemporary YA authors and new and new-to-me authors and then tap my fingers while waiting, waiting, waiting for these new releases. The following are five contemporary YAs that I’m eagerly anticipating.
In Honor by Jessi Kirby
Sarah Ockler raved about this book on Twitter, and since Sarah is amazing, I immediate but it on my “omigod I must read ASAP” list. Then, I discovered that one of the characters was inspired by Tim Riggins. After picking myself up off the floor, this rocketed into another level. (A note: I love Tim Riggins, but I will maintain forever and always that Coach Eric Taylor/Kyle Chandler is hotter than Tim Riggins/Taylor Kitsch. I dare you to try to change my mind.) In Honor takes place in the aftermath of the main character’s brother’s death in Iraq and the subsequent road trip (sa-woon—I looooove road trip novels) she takes with her brother’s best friend. It’s got to be awesome, right?
Simon & Schuster, May 2012
{Preorder In Honor as an ebook or hardcover.}
{Add on Goodreads.}