ROADTRIP WEDNESDAY (On Tuesday)

Welcome to the 130th Road Trip Wednesday! 

Art by ASummerTimeSadness

Road Trip Wednesday is a ‘Blog Carnival,’ where YA Highway's contributors post a weekly writing- or reading-related question that begs to be answered. In the comments, you can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic.

We'd love for you to participate! Just answer the prompt on your own blog and leave a link - or, if you prefer, you can include your answer in the comments.


This Week's Topic: What book brings back memories?

Hmmm, yeah - as normal I wasn't able to participate in the *actual* RTW over on YA Highway, but I really liked the blog topic so I thought that I would steal it (whilst giving appropriate credit, above!).

You see, books do bring back very strong memories for me. When I look back at my thirty years on planet earth, nearly everything is sort of... watermarked by the books I was reading at the time.

I'm sure some people would find that a bit odd - but I just think it's a sign of how incredibly important books have always been to me, and how much I've learned and grown due to the books I've read. I'm a different person because of the stories contained within me. Each and every one of them - whether I loved or loathed it - has made some kind of imprint inside me, channeling the waters of my emotions and creativity in different ways.

I can remember the book I read before bed the day that I found out about the Royal Literary Fund grant. The book I read on the bus-ride home when I lost my job. The book I shoved into my bag the night I was rushed to hospital. The book I had just finished reading when I got the call telling me my first book was going to be published. The books I got for Christmas the year my father had his first heart attack.

But when I initially saw this topic, the book that immediately sprung to mind wasn't from any of those traumatic or wonderful events. It was Mistress Masham's Repose, by T. H. White - an enchanting little book that tells the story of plucky, mistreated orphan Maria, and her adventures once she finds her way to the tiny, forgotten island of Mistress Masham's Repose (which sits at the centre of the ornamental lake on her family's vast, neglected estate) and meets the people who live there.

When I think about Mistress Masham's Repose, I remember a gloriously sunny, yet slightly frosty morning. I remember how the buttery rays of sunlight streamed through the leaded windows of The Highbridge Cafe in Lincoln, and gleamed off the polished wood of the tiny table where I sat all on my own. I had a cup of tea in one hand and the book in the other, and a plate of homemade scones with honey in front of me, gently steaming because they were fresh out of the oven.

The cafe was bustling around me. Customers, waiters and waitresses moved by. I was on the top floor of this lovely old building, and out of the window I could look down on the swans drifting along on the deep, glossy green of the river, and shoppers scurrying from store to store. I remember how, in the midst of all that noise and movement I felt utterly serene and peaceful. 

I had just turned nineteen and I had finally managed to conquer one of my major fears in life - travelling places on my own. 

Oh, I hadn't gone far! Only to my hometown train station and then on to this rather lovely market town just under two hours journey away. For most people it wouldn't have seemed like anything at all. But up until that point I'd always been terrified of going anywhere - especially new places - alone. I was especially fightened of trains. I used to be convinced that I'd accidentally go past my stop, or miss a connecting train, and inevitably get stranded somewhere miles from home with no idea what to do. This conviction was unshakeable and paralysing. 

In my new job as a civil servant I had recently been sent on a training course which required me to travel by train to a large city quite a long way from home, and I'd found the experience so scary (even with another trainee going along with me!) that I'd ended up having a stress nosebleed on the way there. That was the last straw, and I decided that I wasn't going to be ruled by this irrational fear anymore. 

Part of the problem came from my family. It was widely acknowledged that I was (whisper) terribly clever, you know. But I wasn't supposed to have any common sense at all. Everyone from my little brother to my great aunt believed that I was one of those dreamy creative types: scatty, flaky, and not to be trusted to look after myself. 

I knew that if I said I was going to hop on a train and go to a random destination somewhere (and there was no way around telling, because I lived at home, and they all expected to know what I was doing all the time) just to see if I could, my father would start ordering me to call him on my mobile phone periodically to assure him that I hadn't fallen off the platform or been kidnapped, and probably telling me that if I wanted to go somewhere he could always drive me. My mother would enlist my sister's help to remind me of all the times I'd gotten lost as a child and persuade me it would be better to wait for one of them to be free to go along too, just in case. My brother would laugh in my face and say 'Yeah, right'.

Which seems like an absolutely ludicrous amount of fuss to me now, looking back. But it was what happened *any time* that I tried to go anywhere or do anything by myself. 

My family were genuinely concerned. Their concern had a basis, because when I was younger I did quite often get lost, and even when I was at school I was always getting beaten up and tripped and injured. But unfortunately their concern made all my own insecurities worse. This terror of going anywhere by myself was basically (underneath all that ancient history) about the fact that I didn't trust myself. I expected to mess up as a matter of course - to forget vital details, get lost, or just plain freak out. I expected to trip, or get pushed, or possibly even attacked, wherever I went.

I had no faith in my own ability to cope with anything.

You're a reasonably clever, averagely competent young woman, I said to myself sternly. You can do whatever you set your mind to. You are going to get over this.

I waited until my parents went on holiday - leaving me alone in the house for a week. Frankly, they were scared to even do that, and left me a list of instructions as long as my arm, just in case. But I found that week of solitude invigorating. On the Friday, which I'd booked as annual leave from work, I gathered up my courage, went to the train station, picked a destination, and went. 

And nothing bad happened. In fact, once I'd gotten over shakily checking that I was on the right train for the twentieth time, it was *fun*.

I got to Lincoln, and spent a wonderful day wandering around the place by myself, basking in the sun, climbing the hill, poking into the shops, eating a solitary lunch - during which I read my book - and then I successfully got myself home again. 

That day taught me two very important things:

One: I could look after myself as well as anyone.

Two: I valued my own company and enjoyed doing things by myself.

The confidence and self reliance that developed from those realisations changed me. It didn't happen all at once, but within a few years I had gone from being the kind of person who got stress nosebleeds (and possibly hyperventilated) when she had to get on a train to go to a training course, to the kind of person who loved exploring new places and meeting new people, and who jumped at the chance to go travelling, especially alone. Eventually it sank in, not just for my family, but for me, that I wasn't helpless, flaky or lacking in common sense anymore. I probably never had been. Resourcefulness, focus and common sense have no reason to manifest if you never go looking for them,

So when I think about Mistress Masham's Repose, I think about strong, determined Maria and how she changed her life. I think about that seemingly insignificant day which was the start of this amazing journey of exploration, not just of the world, but of myself. I think about realising that the picture other people have of you, even the people who love you most, isn't necessarily the whole one. How sometimes what other people tell you about yourself is actually about them, not you at all. And I think about sunlight and scones, and swans on the river. But most especially I think about long, solitary train journeys where I watch the countryside slide away and scribble in my notebook and smile.

ROADTRIP WEDNESDAY

Road Trip Wednesday is a ‘Blog Carnival,’ where YA Highway's contributors post a weekly writing- or reading-related question that begs to be answered. In the comments, you can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic.

We'd love for you to participate! Just answer the prompt on your own blog and leave a link - or, if you prefer, you can include your answer in the comments.

This Week's Topic

Pick two of your favorite YA characters and write a dialogue between them.

Well, you know what? I'm going to pick two of my own characters here (even though I don't think that was the purpose of the thing) because as soon as I read this the most funny, ridiculous pairing popped into my head. And that pairing is Akira, the fabulous fairy godmother from Shadows on the Moon, and Arian, the tortured, gruffly-wuffly lieutenant from the upcoming FrostFire.

(Bear in mind that I'm taking a few liberties with them here, just to allow them to exist in the same space)

BEGIN SCENE

Akira: Oh, hello! I didn't see you there - who are you?

Arian: (Stares, blushes, looks away) *Mutter mumble*

Akira: I beg your pardon, I didn't quite...

Arian: (Blushes harder) *MUTTER mumble growl mumble*

Akira: My apologies, perhaps there is something wrong with my hearing this morning. Could you repeat yourself for me one more time?

Arian: NEVER MIND!

Akira: (Jumps a little) Goodness me. Is there something wrong, young man? Because I can assure you that no matter how handsome you are, in this country that is not what passes for good manners. (Starts to turn away)

Arian: (Blinks) Handsome?

Akira: Oh, that got your attention? How typical. (Turns away again)

Arian: Wait!

Akira: (Sighs) Yes?

Arian: *Mutter mutter mutter*

Akira: (Sighs louder) Oh, will you please just come out with it? I'm starting to get the worrying sensation that I might be going deaf, and I'm not nearly old enough for that.

Arian: I think you're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen.

Both: Awkward pause.

Akira: Oh.

Arian: (Blushes brighter than a thousand suns)

Akira: Well, that's...that...ahem...very nice of you...ahem. But I think maybe...(Steps a little closer, leans in) *Whisper whisper whisper*

Arian: Oh? Oh! Um...well, I don't mind if you don't. 

Akira: What? Really? 

Arian: Well, just between you and me, there's this guy I was trying to get over, and then this girl...I'm open minded, you know? What's always mattered to me is - um - what's inside. And there's something about you...

Akira: (Stares, open-mouthed)

Arian: (Shifts uncomfortably)

Akira: All right. Come with me. You and I are going to get better acquainted. (Grabs his arm)

Arian (Allows himself to be dragged, a tiny smile on his face)

END SCENE

And there you are folks! That's what it looks like when an author writes fanfic for their own books - and ships a couple no one else probably ever thought of :)

THE DARK SIDE OF #YASAVES

Hi everyone - I hope you're having a nice Monday so far. I've been in two minds as to whether I should write this post for a few days, but after some encouragement from Twitter pals I've finally decided to go ahead and talk one more time about the issues brought up by the Wall Street Journal's article 'Darkness Too Visible' (which I have no intention of linking to again - they don't need any more publicity) and the #yasaves hashtag.

I'm really going to TRY to avoid letting this turn into a giant rant but...well, cut me a little slack, OK?

If you look at the ridiculously comprehensive YA Highway round-up, you can see the scale of the response that came from readers and authors everywhere about this. It was exhilarating and heart-warming to be caught up in such a groundswell of love for YA novels, and such honesty about how they have changed and saved lives.

However, after that initial reaction over the weekend, I noticed that there was a little mini-backlash happening against the idea of #yasaves. Not from the people you might have expected - journalists defending their right to rip YA to shreds even if they'd never done a speck of research, or parents defending their right to read over their children's shoulders and sheild them from dark topics in fiction. No. The backlash came from authors.

The substance of the reaction against #yasaves came in two parts. First of all, some authors stated that they felt uncomfortable with #yasaves because they didn't want people to fall back into that all-too-common belief that books for young adults needed to contain some kind of moral lesson. That YA exists to teach or preach. These authors pointed out that they don't sit down and think: 'Now to write a novel which will teach youngsters the value of honesty and self-belief, haha!' They just wrote the stories they loved and filled them with characters they believed in. They just tried to create art.

I totally sympathise with that reaction. If, by reading a story and by following along with a character's choices, a young person is able to make their own mental and emotional connections, to take away essential truths and be transformed? I'm ecstatic about that. But I'm under no illusions - that is a reader teaching THEMSELVES. I'm not a teacher. I'm a writer. What I do is in many ways selfish. I write to please myself, not to educate anyone else. I just want to tell stories, and that's all I've ever wanted. If I let myself get too tangled up in the idea of being some huge moral influence on my readers I'll probably shrivel up into a pruney mess of insecurities and die.

The other part of the backlash was more extreme. It was anger, directed against everyone involved in #yasaves - even, presumably, the readers who had dared to share their stories. This part of the backlash shrugged off the very idea of #yasaves with a contemptuous snort, stated that saving anyone was not a writer's job, that it was too big of a burden to place on a writer, and the whole idea is ridiculous or presumptuous or some other word ending in 'ous' which expresses how much they loathed the thought of their books changing a reader's life.

And you know what? To those writers I say: Put on your big person pants and stop your damn whining.

You don't want your books to save anyone? It's too big a burden? Don't put that on you? Just what and who do you believe you are?

Every human being on the planet has the ability to change another person's life, for better or worse. You don't get to opt out of that by becoming a writer, dude. If that's what they told you when you signed up, I'm afraid they lied.

If you were only writing for your own satisfaction you wouldn't have queried, got an agent, sold the book and seen it published. You wanted people to read it. You fought and struggled and strove for them to read it. Therefore you have taken on the burden voluntarily.

Thousands of people get up every morning and head out to lives where they can influence, change and even save others. The obvious ones like members of the armed forces, police officers, firemen, rescue workers, doctors and nurses, get lauded for this. But the same is true for teachers, social workers, librarians, customer service operators, traffic wardens, bus drivers and - guess what? - that homeless guy asking for change on the corner. It's what being human is about.

Maybe it's as dramatic as lunging out into traffic to save a little boy from an oncoming bus. Or maybe it's just offering the girl crying on the bus a tissue, or having a conversation with the lady on the checkout about her dog and making her laugh. Maybe it's offering a friend a shoulder to cry on - or blowing that friend off because you're not in the mood. It could be ignoring the little old lady who dropped her shopping, accidentally tripping up the workman as he passes by you or giving that policeman the finger when he stops you for speeding. All these things influence and change the lives of those we come into contact with.

Yes, authors work in a kind of vacuum where many days of the week it's just them and their invented characters. Yes, we write because we want to create art. Yes, we write to please ourselves. But when you're done your work goes out into the world and it touches people. It moves them, annoys them, entertains them - and saves them. if you're honestly saying the very idea that your work might do that is anathema to you? You're in the wrong profession kiddo. 'Cos that's what books - what any form of art - DOES. 

I'm not saying you have to care. You don't. You can just keep on writing what you want to write without ever reading a review, responding to a reader email or answering a fan's questions. You can tell yourself that your books aren't important, if that's what you need to believe to write them. You can pretend that no one but you will ever read it, even as you're pressing the send button to email it to your agent.

But if you turn around to your readers and say they have no right to react however they damn well please to your work? That they shouldn't laugh or cry or get angry or be changed or saved by it?

Frankly, it makes me hope that you'll stop writing right now, no matter how talented you are.

HOW DO YOU PICK YOUR TITLES?

Welcome to the 67th Road Trip Wednesday!

Road Trip Wednesday is a "Blog Carnival," where YA Highway's contributors post a weekly writing - or reading - related question and answer it on our own blogs. You can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic.

This Week's Topic:

How do you pick your titles?

 

Yes, I know it's not Wednesday. But I'd already written a post on Wednesday before the YA Highway topic came out and I realised that it was such an interesting one. So, never to be left out, I decided to do Roadtrip Wednesday on a Friday instead.

 

Shut up.

 

Okay, then: how did I pick my titles?

 

Well, I've got to admit that titles aren't really my forte. I struggle with them. A lot. And hardly any of my books make it through even the first draft without being re-titled several times. I find it infuriating and distracting to use a title that doesn't feel *right*, and I worry away at the problem like a coyote worries at a paw caught in a trap.

 

The Swan Kingdom was originally titled Wild Swans after the fairytale that inspired it. But although I liked this title and felt it fitted, there was already a very famous book with that same title. Once the book was accepted for publication my editor and I came up with many title possibilities. 

 

For a little while the book was called A Shadow of Swans, but marketing vetoed that. For a while I favoured The Cunning Woman, but my then agent hated it. My American editor suggested Red Fox, White Swan. Eventually my editor sent me a postcard just saying 'The Swan's Kingdom?' And I sent a note back saying 'The Swan Kingdom?' and that was it. I have to admit that I'm still not entirely comfortable with it, but I've never get come up with anything better so... *Shrugs* 

 

Daughter of the flames was originally called Signs of Fire. And it had that title for a long time in my head before I actually started writing. However, as soon as I got stuck into the story it started to feel vaguely wrong. I'm not sure why. I still think it's an okay title. It just didn't fit. 

 

So I held a brainstorming session with my writing group. At the end of which, I felt utterly bewildered because NO ONE had come up with a suggestion that fitted. I had dozens of scribbled suggestions in my notebook and was trying to make sense of them when, suddenly, the words 'Daughter', 'Of' and 'Flames' leapt out at me. I added a 'the' to improve the rhythm, and, since my publisher loved it, we were set.

Shadows on the Moon was a tricky book to title. I knew that I wanted the word 'moon' or 'shadow' in the title because both were important metaphors and images in the story. Until about halfway through the first draft the manuscript was called Fair as the Moon (which is a Biblical quote) but although I liked the title, it didn't really feel right to use a Biblical quote for a story set in a faerytale Feudal Japan. And it felt a little too...pretty. A little too NICE. I wanted something that hinted at the darkness in the story.

Friends suggested The Shadow Weaver, but Google told me this was a character from a cartoon. Shadow Spinner was already a book title. For a little while the book was called The Moon Mask, but again, it didn't feel ominous enough. Frankly, I was stumped.

 

But luckily my subconscious was hard at work. Having decided to make my heroine's father a poet in the story, and the heroine herself a musician, I decided that I would write all my own poetry and songs for the book. One night I was scribbling away, trying to come up with a haiku that would encompass some of the story's themes about love and transformation, when this appeared on the page:

Love comes like stormclouds

Fleeing from the wind, and casts

Shadows on the moon

 

Instantly I knew I had found my title. And of all my book titles, Shadows on the Moon is probably the one I love most, because it's a phrase that is an integral part of the story and which sums up the book's most important themes perfectly. I also think that it subtly hints at the setting of the story.

 

So what about you guys? What titles have you used, and how did you come up with them?

GROUNDHOG (BOOK)DAY

Road Trip Wednesday is a ‘Blog Carnival,’ where YA Highway's contributors post a weekly writing - or reading - related question and answer it on our own blogs. You can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic.

We'd love for you to participate! 

I think I've actually managed to find out the REAL question for this week's Road Trip Wednesday in time this week - one of the advantages of Twitter. And the topic is:

It's Groundhog Day! Pretend you're Bill Murray in the 1993 movie-- what book would you read over & over forever?

Frankly, the idea of never being allowed to read a new book again would probably make me spend the first few hundred endless repeating days curled up in a corner crying (shut up, I love new books, okay?).

But following that, presuming I could chose just one book, I would spend some serious time in contemplation. As long-time blog readers know, I am a champion of re-reading. I re-read pretty much every book that I liked. So it's tough for me to isolate just one re-readable book. Should I pick a really loooong one? I probably shouldn't pick one that makes me cry every time, right? Argh, choices, choices!

After much thought, my shortlist goes like this:

1. The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold. I've already re-read this book about twenty times, I think. Although it is a story full of suffering, tragedy and darkness, it is also about the power of love, faith and redemption, and I can't express how deep down HAPPY it makes me. Problem: I practically already know it by heart.
2. Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones. Again, I must have read this book twenty or more times. It is a riddle within a puzzle within an enigma, and people's theories on the plot and characters are endless. It still makes me think deeply each time I read it, and it still makes me laugh. A good choice. Problem: it's so short!
3. NightWatch by Terry Pratchett. I've re-read this book a lot less times than the ones above, because it is a HARD read. It's multilayered, twisty and in many places, downright grim. It's also funny, as is PTerry's trademark, but the humour is black, black, black. I love and admire this book in every way. Problem: Blubbing. Every. Single. Time.
4. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. What can I say? It's one of the best books ever written. It's moving. It's funny. It's impeccably written. It's reasonably long. It features probably the most memorable characters ever written. Problem: Um...there isn't one.

So there you have it. If I had to read one book over and over for the rest of my life, it would be Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. But don't blame me if I start wearing bonnets and addressing people as 'Sir' and 'Ma'am', after a bit...Still, if I'm stuck in the same day, they'll never get around to putting me in the psychiatric ward, right?

Darcy and Elizabeth FTW! And the the way, if you've not yet read one of more of the books on the shortlist, I urge you to run to your local library or bookshop and do so at once! After all, YOU'RE not stuck in Groundhog (Book)Day.

GIVE A CHARACTER A CHRISTMAS PRESENT

Today I'm thrilled to participate in the YA Highways's Road Trip Wednesday, where YA Highway's contributors post a weekly writing - or reading - related question and answer it on their own blogs. Readers can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic, and people are welcome to add their own contribution - which I will be doing today for the first time! Hurrah!

Today's topic is: Give a book character a Christmas Present.

I'm going assume that it's good form not to give your own characters presents (which is a shame, really, as I'm sure Frost, Luca and Arian would just luuurve some new daggers, a new sword and possibly a small war-axe to play with) and this means I need to search for a fictional character that I feel really deserves something for Christmas.

And not in the 'Valentine Morgenstern deserves a nice hard spanking' sort of way, either.

So if I could reach into one imaginary world and give one fictional character a present, what would it be?

It depends on whether or not I'm giving a present as The Author, omnipresent creator. Because if I could give any fictional character ANY fictional present, I'd have to give a gift to Eugenides from Megan Whalen Turner's The Thief, The Queen of Attolia and The King of Attolia, one of my all-time favourite characters. And that gift would be his hand, which he lost in The Queen of Attolia.

It would simply reappear on the stump of his arm overnight, and after the scene in which he cries with joy in the arms of his beloved wife - and she cries too, at being redeemed from the consequences of her own cruel and hasty actions - I would sit back with tears on my own face, and happily wait to see what chaos and mischief he stirred up with two sets of opposible thumbs.

On the other hand (ha ha) if I'm giving a present just as a normal person who can't grow hands back overnight, then it's a tougher decision to make. But I think in the end I would have to plump for a special, sensitive skin spa-treatment for Derek from Kelley Armstrong's amazing Darkest Powers series.

For those who haven't read the books, Derek is a grumpy, prickly young man who has - among his many issues - some serious skin and hygiene problems. But underneath all that, the guy is sweet, funny and intelligent, and possesses a heart of gold. I reckon if he got a makeover, including a haircut and a skin polish, he'd feel much better about himself, and then maybe Chloe, the heroine of the books, would have an easier time.

So what about you, guys? If you could give one present to a character from a book, who and what would it be?

SNORKTASTIC!

I stole this from YA Highway - it made me snork so hard I simply couldn't resist posting it here in it's entirety. Some of them are actually great, some of them stink so bad they require removal by a trained team of medical professionals. 

 

56 of the Worst (or Best) Analogies Written by High School Students 

"Apparently the washington Post held a contest in which high school teachers sent in the “worst” analogies they’d encountered in grading their students’ papers over the years."

1. Her eyes were like two brown circles with big black dots in the center.
2. He was as tall as a 6′3″ tree.
3. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.
4. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.
5. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.
6. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.
7. The ballerina rose gracefully en pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.
8. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame. Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.
9. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.
10. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.
11. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife’s infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM.
12. The lamp just sat there, like an inanimate object.
13. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.
14. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.
15. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at asolar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.
16. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.
17. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.
18. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.
19. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.
20. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.
21. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.
22. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant and she was the East River.
23. Even in his last years, Grand pappy had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it hadrusted shut.
24. He felt like he was being hunted down like a dog, in a place that hunts dogs, I suppose.
25. She was as easy as the TV Guide crossword.
26. She walked into my office like a centipede with 98 missing legs.
27. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.
28. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.
29. “Oh, Jason, take me!” she panted, her breasts heaving like a college freshman on $1-a-beer night.
30. It hurt the way your tongue hurts after you accidentally staple it to the wall.
31. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.
32. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.
33. The politician was gone but unnoticed, like the period after the Dr. on a Dr Pepper can.
34. Her eyes were like limpid pools, only they had forgotten to put in any pH cleanser.
35. Her date was pleasant enough, but she knew that if her life was a movie this guy would be buried in the credits as something like “Second Tall Man.”
36. The thunder was ominous-sounding, much like the sound of a thin sheet of metal being shaken backstage during the storm scene in a play.
37. The red brick wall was the color of a brick-red Crayola crayon.
38. She caught your eye like one of those pointy hook latches that used to dangle from screen doors and would fly up whenever you banged the door open again.
39. Her pants fit her like a glove, well, maybe more like a mitten, actually.
40. Fishing is like waiting for something that does not happen very often.
41. They were as good friends as the people on “Friends.”
42. Oooo, he smells bad, she thought, as bad as Calvin Klein’s Obsession would smell if it were called Enema and was made from spoiled Spamburgers instead of natural floral fragrances.
43. The knife was as sharp as the tone used by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex.) in her first several points of parliamentary procedure made to Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.) in the House Judiciary Committee hearings on the impeachment of President William Jefferson Clinton.
44. He was as bald as one of the Three Stooges, either Curly or Larry, you know, the one who goes woo woo woo.
45. The sardines were packed as tight as the coach section of a 747.
46. Her eyes were shining like two marbles that someone dropped in mucus and then held up to catch the light.
47. The baseball player stepped out of the box and spit like a fountain statue of a Greek god that scratches itself a lot and spits brown, rusty tobacco water and refuses to sign autographs for all the little Greek kids unless they pay him lots of drachmas.
48. I felt a nameless dread. Well, there probably is a long German name for it, like Geschpooklichkeit or something, but I don’t speak German. Anyway, it’s a dread that nobody knows the name for, like those little square plastic gizmos that close your bread bags. I don’t know the name for those either.
49. She was as unhappy as when someone puts your cake out in the rain, and all the sweet green icing flows down and then you lose the recipe, and on top of that you can’t sing worth a damn.
50. Her artistic sense was exquisitely refined, like someone who can tell butter from I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter.
51. It came down the stairs looking very much like something no one had ever seen before.
52. Bob was as perplexed as a hacker who means to access T:flw.quid55328.com\aaakk/ch@ung but gets T:\flw.quidaaakk/ch@ung by mistake.
53. You know how in “Rocky” he prepares for the fight by punching sides of raw beef? Well, yesterday it was as cold as that meat locker he was in.
54. The dandelion swayed in the gentle breeze like an oscillating electric fan set on medium.
55. Her lips were red and full, like tubes of blood drawn by an inattentive phlebotomist.
56. The sunset displayed rich, spectacular hues like a .jpeg file at 10 percent cyan, 10 percent magenta, 60 percent yellow and 10 percent black. 

Oh, my sides! My sides! They hurt so much...

BEST AND WORST FIRST LINES

It's true, guys. The Pencils are out to get us...

Hello! Monday again (groan) but only three days until Friday (whee!).

Now, since I never seem to be able to participate in Road Trip Wednesday (the Blog Carnival on YA Highway) I've decided to just start stealing their topics at random. Mwaah-haa-haa! Ahem. No, really, I'm sure they wouldn't mind.

I'm particularly interested in first lines because I never seem to be able to start work on a book until the main character has 'spoken' the first line to me. I know this sounds weird. It IS weird. But that's just the way I roll. I can plan, plot, sketch character's faces, draw maps, use up whole pads of Post-Its, but until I 'hear' the character speak, I can't actually start the writing. For The Swan Kingdom, Alexandra piped up to tell me:

My first memory is of the smell of sunwarmed earth.

That line set the tone for the rest of the story, instantly showing me the dreamy, sensory 'voice' that I needed to get used to. It's a first line that, in a way, encapsulates the important themes of the book - a book about memories, about the earth and feeling a connection to it. And it's a sort of mirror image of the final line too, which is:

In the end, I know all will be well.

Coming up with the first line of Daughter of the Flames was a rather different experience. Having just finished TSK, I was trying to give myself some time off, but Zira (typically for her character, it turned out) was having none of that. She wanted her story told RIGHT NOW. And so she spoke in my ear:

I never knew my mother's name.

I mean, who could resist that? I started writing that day and six months later the book was finished. Once again, I see that in a strange way the first line is twinned with the last one, which is: 

My people.

The heroine has gone from being lost, not even knowing who she is, to having a perfect sense of her own identity and her place in the world. Looking at the first and last lines of my two upcoming books, I can see this bookend effect is something I apparently do all the time (without actually realising it before now!) but telling the first and last lines of Shadows on the Moon or FrostFire would be rather a spoiler, so I'll move on.

Although my first line is really important to me as a writer, I'm not sure first lines are as all important to the reader as some people seem to think. Very, very rarely do I read a first line and find myself utterly sucked into the narrative. The last time was Magic Under Glass by Jaclyn Dolomore:

The audience didn't understand a word we sang.

I'm not really sure why that worked for me, it just did. However, because I'm aware that authors agonise over their first lines to the point of bleeding from their eyes, most of the time I tend to open books at a random page, somewhere in the middle, just to see what the writing is like when they've relaxed a bit. To me, that's the true test of the story. After all, you're not buying a book for a great first page, you're buying it for a great STORY.

That's not to deny that first lines do seem to make a big impression. Amazing first lines seem to enter the common vocabulary, even among those who've never read the book at all. Most people know the really famous ones, like the first lines of Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen ("It is a truth universally acknowledged...") and Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier ("Last night I dreamt...") and A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens ("It was the best of times..."). But what about some modern YA ones?

Despite my well documented dislike for the Twilight books, I have to admit that the opening line of Stephenie Meyer's saga is pretty darn good:

I'd never given much thought to how I would die - though I'd had reason enough in the last few months - but even if I had, I would not have imagined it like this.

Not PERFECT, mind. I reckon it would be a lot stronger if it just read:

I'd never given much thought to how I would die.

But still compelling, and definitely enough to get me to read on.

Meg Rosoff's debut YA novel How I Live Now, which is one of the most haunting books I've ever read, begins:

My name is Elizabeth, but no one's ever called me that.

A fantastic introduction to the main character's unconventional voice, and a line which tells you more about the story - with it's themes of alienation, loss and identity - than you can possibly realise at first. Another opening line which recently sent a shiver down my spine was:

Mommy forgot to warn the new babysitter about the basement.

*Shudder* That's from The Summoning by Kelley Armstrong, and, again, it warns you exactly what is coming up next. Spookiness. Lots of spookiness.

I personally think that the main purpose of that first line is to do exactly what Kelley Armstrong's line does, which is to make a promise to the reader about what kind of story is coming next. If you raise a question in your opening, you need to be sure that a) you answer it and b) that it's important to the story over all. By which I mean, not that you need to set your main conflict up right there in the first line, but that you need to understand what tone you're creating and what expectation you're raising. Let's say your first line is:

I never knew how much a dead goldfish stank until Mark Hinkey put one down the back of my shirt in biology.

If you story is going to be a snarky and hilarious contemporary story about school bullying, you're fine. If you story is going to be about an teenage outsider who is obsessed with death and figures out she can speak to ghosts, again, you're fine. If your story is going to be about a modern teen who falls in love with the school bully and has to figure out how to make it work, or how to let him go, fine.

If, on the other hand, your story is going to be a historical fantasy? This is a problem. But less obviously, if the story really has nothing to do with the school setting, if bullying is not a theme and never emerges again, if there's no grim, stinky-dead-goldfish undertone to the tale, then this opening line is not right. It's a great first line, but it's not setting up the right expectations for, say, a lyrical, dreamy story about a girl dealing with losing her sister to drowning. Just like:

Emma watched the sea turn to molten copper as the sun rose, the jagged rock spires casting black shadows onto the sand.

Is a nice opening line, but NOT for a hilarious and snarky story about contemporary bullying. Your first line, for me, is not just about trying to draw a reader in. It's about giving them some idea what they are going to get if they read on.

Now, given my title, I really need to 'fess up about my least favourite opening line that I've read recently - and it has to be the first line of Raised By Wolves by Jennifer Lynn Barnes:

"Bronwyn Alessia St. Vincent Clare!"

I'm not one of those writers who gets all prescriptive about other people's work. I think almost anything can work, so long as it's done well. Open with weather! Open with a dream sequence! Do what makes you happy! But... this - this opening with the main character's name being shouted - is just so overused. And so inefficient. What do we get from it? Only the main character's (overlong, way-too-poetic-to-be-real) name, which could easily have been revealed to us a dozen other ways, and the fact that she's in trouble, in an 'Oh, look how CUTE, he uses her full name when he's cross!' sort of way.  It tells us nothing about the book's tone, setting or themes, and it's also misleading in terms of character - the person shouting is NOT cute, for a start. This is a rare case where the opening line nearly put me off reading the book completely.

What are you favourite, or most hated first lines? Or, if you're feeling daring, the first lines of your WIPs?

TEENAGE SUPERHERO

Road Trip Wednesday is a "Blog Carnival," where YA Highway's contributors post a weekly writing- or reading-related question and answer it on our own blogs. You can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic. We'd love for you to participate! Just answer the prompt on your own blog and leave a link in the comments - or, if you prefer, you can include your answer in the comments.

ETA: Turns out that YA Highway changed the topic for this week to 'Your favourite First Lines' after I had already written this post, meaning that once again I am unable to participate. This is what happens when I try to join in, people. It never ends well. But I thought I'd post what I wrote anyway, because it's heartfelt and it took a lot of effort to get it all down.

I've been wanting to take part in Road Trip Wednesday for ages now, but I always forgot or had something else important to post. So I was thrilled when the stars aligned this week and I not only remembered to check the YA Highway blog in time, but had nothing planned for Wednesday's post.

And then I saw the topic. 

Who did you want to be like in High School?

Brain freeze. Because here's the thing. When I was in school I wanted to be like:

Buffy Summers. Beautiful, brave, resourceful and strong, Surrounded by great friends. Willing to sacrifice her life for the good of others.

Elizabeth Bennett. Highly intelligent, quick-witted and funny, but also doing her best to live to strict principles of integrity, even when her own family were pushing her to make bad choices.

Daine from Tamora Pierce's The Immortals Quartet. Tough and competent, with hidden and still developing talents and a completely no-nonsense attitude.

But since I have a feeling this topic is related to the upcoming book Like Mandarin by Kirsten Hubbard, that means the topic is actually asking, what REAL person did you want to be like in school?

Tricky. You see, I was not and never have been a 'follower'. Most of the girls I went to school with bent themselves into strange and awkward shapes, trying to make sure that they fitted in with everyone else. They all had to wear their hair a certain way - permed and scrunched, with at least one large, teased quiff at the front - dress a certain way - tight trousers, top with a certain label, a particular kind of shoes and bag - speak a certain way - lots of swearing, lots of scornful phrases, all topped off with a certain regional accent.

Of course, the less popular ones came off as a sort of cheap imitation of the really popular crowd, but that was okay, because by showing that they were willing to follow, they gained a kind of protection. Even the girls that I was friends with - the ones I knew were clever and funny and interesting people with their own unique traits - were desperately trying to suppress anything different about themselves so they could follow along in the popular kids footsteps. 

Don't stand out. Don't do anything different. Don't put your hand up in lessons. Don't smile at teachers. If you get a good mark, don't look pleased about it. For crying out loud, don't let on that you actually READ for fun.

These were the rules, and I broke all of them. I refused to pretend to be anything I wasn't, I refused to pretend to be stupid, and I emphatically refused to perm and scrunch my hair. No way. In fact, the more the other kids my age lectured me, made fun of me and picked on me, the more stubbornly I clung to being different.

That had consequences. Consequences which in some cases skated dangerously close to being life-threatening (like being pushed down stairs, having stones thrown at me, having my head repeatedly hit against a concrete wall) but which were always unpleasant (having ink flicked at my back, being spat at, having dozens of tiny balls of chewing gum thrown at my head so that I had to pull handfuls of my own hair out).

One by one I watched all my friends give in to the pressure. None of them defended me against the attacks - verbal or physical - because doing so would have put them in the line of fire. What's more, as time went on, they got angry with me for being the way I was. It was my own fault people bullied me, they said. Why did I have to be so different? Why couldn't I just fit in? In squashing themselves into the box that the other kids had told them they needed to fit, my friends had lost their bravery and compassion. All they gained was a craven desire not to stand out.

So school was a pretty damn lonely place for me. And the hardest part was knowing that with a few tweaks, a few changes, a few things that seemed so small, I could have turned it around. I was smart, and I could have done a really good impression of one of those cool girls - talked the way they did, acted the way they did. I was quite capable of fixing my hair to look as hideous as theirs did. I could stop putting my hand up in class, hide my books. And, just like had happened to my friends, within a short time the worst of the bullying would have stopped. I'd never have been in the popular crowd, but I wouldn't have been defying them anymore. They'd have lost interest.

Looking back, to be honest I'm stunned at the absolute core of steel I must have had as a teen. I remember so many days when I got home and went straight to my room to cry for hours over things that had been done to me at school. I remember broken glasses and bruises, I remember taunting words that used to echo in my head for hours. But I never let the other kids see me cry. I remember hearing someone say: 'She's too stuck up to feel pain'. Well, I wasn't. But I was too proud to ever let them see me feeling it. I was too proud to give in. And I was too proud to change.

For a long time after leaving school, I didn't like to think about it. I tried to block all the memories out. When random images of school days swam into my head, I'd take deep breaths, or hum under my breath, or flick the inside of my wrist, to try and drive them away. But as I've gotten a little older, I've started to realise something about the whole experience. Yes, it was dark, and scary and lonely. Yes, no one should ever have to go through what I did. But I didn't do anything wrong. The fault lay with the other children, and the teachers and parents who let them get away with acting like they did.

Teenage Zolah? She was AWESOME.

I truly don't know if I could find that kind of inner strength now. I don't know, if I was subjected to that kind of daily, constant harassment, the threat of violence, the verbal abuse, if I could stand up to my tormenters. I don't know if I'd last a week, let alone five years. But somehow that girl - that teenage girl between the ages of eleven and sixteen - managed it. She did something that most adults couldn't do without breaking down. She endured. She went back to that school day after day. And in the end she WON.

So. The reason this topic is tricky for me to answer, is that the person I wanted to be like in school?

Was me.

And if anyone out there right now, reading this blog, is going through something like Teenage Zolah did, back in the day? Just take a moment to realise how amazing you - like Teenage Zolah - really are.

You are a superhero. And you don't have to be like anyone but you.