Friday Ephemera, 8/26/11 Edition

BOOKS OUT THIS WEEK I’M IN LOVE WITH

Jackson Pearce’s book SWEETLY was released this week! I can’t wait to read this! The cover is gorgeous and I loved Sisters Red.

This Dark Endeavor: The Apprenticeship of Victor Frankenstein by Kenneth Oppel – Oh how excited I’ve been for this book to finally come out! Like Sweetly, I’ll be buying this in hardback because I just really love this cover.

Writing

• Author Maggie Stiefvater made my life easier this week by posting a list of her writing advice greatest hits. Some of my favorites include:
• Seven Steps to Starting a Novel
• How Maggie Preps for Writing a Novel
• Rough Drafting
• Why Normal People Can’t Be Characters
• On Harming Characters
• Death to Line Editing
• Purposeful Characterization
• On Treating Readers Badly
• Author Justine Larbalestier writes about why her book Liar wouldn’t have existed without Scrivener. (She means the Mac version, of course. The Windows version is STILL IN BETA. I will be old and wrinkled and grouchy by the time it is finally released sans bugs.)

Publishing

• Ewan Morrison wrote an article for The Guardian which is so bleak you might want to get a pint of ice cream out before you even begin reading. I think this article is the far edge of publishing apocalyptia and is probably more like an “absolute worst case scenario” than “Absolute Truth.”
• Dear Author responded with a similar “Whoa, pump the breaks, Ewan” reaction that I had when I read it.
• The Rejectionist had a pretty strong reaction to this article in the NYT that talks about how the reason boys aren’t reading anymore is because there are too many girls involved and I don’t know about you but this article makes me feel oh-so-slightly-homicidal.
• One of my favorite YA writers, Courtney Summers, just announced her next book will come out sometime around June of 2012. It is called THIS IS NOT A TEST. And dude, it’s about zombies.

It’s the end of the world. Six students have taken cover in Cortege High but shelter is little comfort when the dead outside won’t stop pounding on the doors. One bite is all it takes to kill a person and bring them back as a monstrous version of their former self. To Sloane Price, that doesn’t sound so bad. Six months ago, her world collapsed and since then, she’s failed to find a reason to keep going. Now seems like the perfect time to give up.

As Sloane eagerly waits for the barricades to fall, she’s forced to witness the apocalypse through the eyes of five people who actually want to live. But as the days crawl by, everyone’s motivations to survive begin to change in startling ways and soon the group’s fate is determined less and less by what’s happening outside and more and more by the unpredictable and violent bids for life–and death–inside.

When everything is gone, what do you hold on to?

Contests!

• YA Highway is having a First Lines Contest. Up for grabs are 6 ARCs, including The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer and Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi. I WANT THIS SO MUCH.
• Lydia Kang is hosting a 900 followers contest. As a blogger rolling up on 200 followers, I just sort of can’t imagine having that many awesome people within arms reach.
• Lisa McMann has some prize pack contests going on

Holy Crap Our World is Awesome

• Astronomers think they’ve discovered a very dense carbon planet that is essentially a big, strange, orbiting diamond. If I remember correctly Dr. Who already discovered this planet and with it a super creepy shadow creature that infected a chick and then started evolving rapidly. This episode scared the holy crap out of me.
• Thank you io9 for confirming my doodle problem is actually a doodle solution since apparently now doodlers are shown to learn faster. DOODLERS 4 EVER.
• Bully victims learn to fight back – I love love love this story. My husband studies Kung Fu and was one of the best things he ever got involved in. Everything about this article is so accurate. Bullied kids can learn so much about self confidence and control through martial arts.

Wicked & Tricksy

• Find your people – Writers’ Platform-Building Campaign
• If you give a moose a muffin: Making Big Conflicts from Small Missteps
• One Writer’s Symphonies and Bagatelles
• How Learning to Write is a Bit Like Mountain Climbing

 Things You Should Join

(Because they are good for the soul)

Alex J. Cavanaugh is like, the master of blogfests and community ideas, and he came up with one that I am so in love with. I think all of us can benefit from getting involved in his Insecure Writer’s Support Group.  From his blog:

“Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!”

The first post date is Wednesday, September 7th. For more info and to sign up, go here.

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Have you signed up for the Writers’ Platform-Building Campaign yet? Honestly, I don’t know how you’ve held out this long if you haven’t. But you’ve only got a couple of days left to give in, so you might as well make today the day See you there!

Awards

I am terrible, terrible, terrible about posting about awards I am given for my blog. I have a couple to post about not next week but the week after, so for those of you who gave them to me, THANK YOU SO MUCH I HAVE NOT FORGOTTEN YOU. I just plan several weeks of posts in advance and then have trouble adapting when something like a cool blog award comes up. Since next week is Hot Dystopian Summer Nights, I’ll update my awards the following week. Thank you again, I love you all!