I am not a member of this chapter. I am a member of the chapters WRW — my local DC chapter — and TARA, which is the Tampa chapter, and which I’m still a member of for nostalgic reasons. (I’m not even a member of YARWA, because 2 RWA chapters is already too many for me.) The only thing I know about this kerfuffle is what I have read on the internet and on the private RWA loops discussing the issue.

Because things on the internet are sometimes completely inaccurate, it has been erroneously reported that this is an RWA National stance. Which is not true. Here is a link to the rules of the RWA national published author contest,w which is called the RITA awards. I am currently judging this contest.

Other things that have been left out of a lot of reports:

• RWA has many members who write LGBT romances. In fact, there’s even an LGBT special interest chapter of RWA. Here is a list of its members. Go buy some of their books.
• This all blew up on the internet on Friday. This is Monday. Just because there has been no official statement from the all-volunteer board of RWA yet does not mean there will not be one.
• My understanding is that RWA National doesn’t have a lot of control over the chapter contests, and if it did, that would be globally bad for the contests for a myriad of reasons relating to the way contests have freedom to make up their own rules (for instance, about what constitutes “published”) that RWA doesn’t necessarily agree with. I don’t know what will happen now, but as it stands, even if RWA National wanted to do something, they might not have jurisdiction.
• The contest has been canceled.
• This small regional contest that hardly anyone ever heard of before Friday had at least one winner last year (I was told two, but I can’t seem to find it) that was a gay romance. The book, called MORE by Sloan Parker, won the award for best first book. Go buy it.

This last point is probably the most relevant of all. Because here’s what I’ve noticed about a lot of these kerfuffles, is that there’s a lot of outcry, but not a lot of follow up. The people on the internet like to pounce and loudly complain about discrimination and threaten boycotts of every book written by every RWA member (no, seriously, that was one email I got this weekend), or boycotts of every book by every RWA member in the chapter in question (another suggestion, to which I say — the only reason I actually know the rules of the contests of the chapters I’m a member of is because I went and looked them up this weekend, given that I am not on the boards, nor on the contest committees, and wouldn’t be entering them myself, so why in the world would I know?), but they aren’t saying, “Hey, you know what? This contest awarded an LGBT romance last year, let’s go buy it and show our support for what they say is an excellent LGBT romance and how it was brought to our attention as such by the judges of this contest.”

Or, hey! Let’s make a list of the people who were GOING to enter their LGBT romances in this contest and read them.

There is an outcry, but there isn’t a lot of follow up.

Last year, there was an outcry over a YA anthology that was prohibiting same-sex stories. There were a LOT of posts about it on the internet. There were a lot of authors who got up in arms and dropped out of not only that anthology, but an anthology being edited by the same editor, an anthology that I was writing for.

In the end, what ended up happening was that the anthology lost half its line up and the editor was removed from the project. We got a new editor, and a new line-up (an AMAZING line up, if I say so myself), and the publisher pledged to donate the proceeds to a homeless shelter for LGBT youth. The new anthology includes several LGBT stories. I’ve read them, they’re great.

And the internet? Is silent. I haven’t seen ONE blog review of this anthology. I haven’t seen ONE comment about the fact that there’s this great new anthology out there with all these LGBT-friendly YA stories in it. About how hey, look at the GOOD we did, by getting all kerfuffly on the internet. It gets better, guys! We complained about discrimination, and there was a response, and now there’s a book out there that would not have existed before, and it’s helping gay homeless youth, and it’s helping gay youth in general, because it’s representing them, and there’s really not enough of that out there.

But hey. Maybe that’s not as fun as being outraged.

You can ask Sailor Boy, I love me some righteous indignation. But I think, if we really want to make things better out there, the best way to do it is to make the fact that there great gay romances out there more visible. I haven’t read More, but I know it beat out debut books in every other genre in that RWA chapter contest in 2011, so that’s a pretty strong recommendation. And I personally think the Brave New Love anthology is fantastic, though I am biased, given that I am in it (though not financially biased, because it could sell a million copies, and I wouldn’t see a penny, being that it was a flat fee).

But don’t take my word for it. Read it yourself. Go out and buy it, knowing that your dollars will be donated to help homeless youth, or enter to win it in the giveaway contest on this very post.

That’s right. Giveaway. Leave a comment in this post, and enter to win your very own copy of Brave New Love. Contest goes until Friday. Since i have two copies to give away, THERE WILL BE TWO WINNERS.

ETA: Hello to everyone here from tumblr. Thank you for coming. I hope you enjoy the post.

ETA2: I have blogged about my story in the anthology (which is not, just to be clear, an LGBT story) and my inspiration for it.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

I was discussing this with my fantabulous roommate Erica Ridley, who was signing at her first ever RWA Literacy signing:

Like me, Erica had no books at her first ever literacy signing. I had a bunch of copies of RAMPANT to sign at this signing, and was so pleased by all the fans that dropped by!

I did manage to attend a few workshops at RWA, and they were great! My favorites were “Mending a Broken Scene” with the brilliant and awe-inspiring Roxanne St. Claire (a workshop you should take if you ever get a chance — and one of hte few workshops taht truly works for writers at any level of their careers), “Do As I Say, Not as I Did” with Mindy Klasky and Maria V. Snyder, and the chat with Meg Cabot. Speaking of Meg Cabot, I finally got a chance to meet her, and she signed my ARC of Zombies vs. Unicorns.

I also made a bunch of new friends, like Molly O’Keefe (who won a RITA this year)!

This is Maureen McGowan, Molly O’Keefe, and me. (I am currently trying to decide if I should change my name to Diana O’Peter or Diana McFreund to better match the others.)

Speaking of the RITA, pals of mine made out like bandits this year. First and foremost, a HUGE HUGE congratulations to the marvelous Simone Elkeles, for rocking out the YA Romance category with Perfect Chemistry:

Man, I was giddy when she won. I felt like *I* had won a RITA (you can see my sticky fingers on hers in the photo). I know everyone’s talking about Julia Quinn’s hat trick this week, but I feel like Simone’s win is one of the best stories from RWA — her book is a true romance for teens, and its RITA nod is a recognition by the romance genre establishment.

Here she is enjoying her golden lady:

Simone is represented by Kristin Nelson, whose whole agency made out like a bandit last night:

Congratulations to Kristin and to Sherry Thomas!

And last, but certainly not least, there’s Kresley Cole’s paranormal win for her #1 New York Times bestselling book, Kiss of a Demon King. Here I am trying to keep up with the beautiful blondes Kresley and Roxanne:

I guess I should be spending more time in the sun this summer. And wear more black.

And, I hung out with so many other wonderful writers! I had lunch with Team Castle-mates Ally Carter and Jennifer Barnes, as well as the aforementioned Meg and Erica:

I met historical author Victoria Janssen, journalist and young adult writer Gwenda Bond and her husband, sci-fi writer Christopher Rowe:

Gwenda was there to receive her Veritas Award. Christopher was there to support her and to get sick of people saying “a sci-fi writer? What are you doing here?” (Not true, actually, I’m sure he only got that like thirty-five times or so.) That night at the Avon party, which took place in the gorgeous wood-paneled party room of the Living Seas exhibit at EPCOT, Gwenda, Christopher, and I decided that my next project was going to be about the forbidden love between a girl and a were-ray. Behold my inspiration (as pathetically dark and blurry as it is):

We had to get this pic quickly, you see, because of that whole forbidden thing. You guys, he’s a CAPTIVE were-ray. A captive of the Disney Corp. It’s gonna be like Twilight meets Finding Nemo, with a dash of Splash! and a soupçon of Lovecraft.

Ah, RWA. It’s so inspiring.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

(Ah, my book list. It grows ever longer.)

And of course, Libba’s talk was gorgeous. Have you all read GOING BOVINE? It’s not the easiest read in the world, especially if you have a weakness for hamburgers, like me. I had to put it down a few times because I’m freaking terrified of prions, y’all. Pretty much any disease of the brain give me the heebie jeebies. It’s that whole “I think, therefore I am,” stuff — I would like to be able to trust my own brain. It’s why zombies are so terrifying. And [spoiler spoiler spoiler spoiler spoiler spoiler]. But GOING BOVINE is such a powerful, masterful work that I kind of had to get past that, because it is the sort of book that must be read.

I loved hearing Rick Yancey speak, because hearing him talk about crafting his gory Monstrumologist and freak himself out in the middle of the night and deal with his spouse’s take on him writing such a gory book — well, it reminded me of my own process with Rampant. I thought Monstrumologist was definitely gorier than Rampant, but I was pleased that YA had too such bloody books on the shelves at the same time last fall. Occasionally, I see us linked on “if you like this” type of features. I guess we’d fall under the “if you like creepy, coming of age fantasies with maggots, decapitations, and severed eyeballs” heading?

I haven’t read Punkzilla or Charles & Emma, but now I really want to! (See above, re: book list).

I got to sit with Ally Carter and right behind David Levithan and John Green. I caught sight, a few rows back, of Annette Curtis Klause — squee!

Afterward, at the reception, I ran into even more YA pals: Jennifer Lyn Barnes, Coe Booth, and Holly Black.

Some pictures from the evening:

Team Castle reunion! (Me, Jen, Ally, and Holly)

I bask in the glow of talent emanating from David Levithan and Coe Booth. (Do you think it’ll rub off?)

The stunning Libba Bray and her glorious Printz.

I also got to chat at length with a bunch of fabulous librarians, as well as a bunch of folks from New York.

And and AND I got my bookmarks. They are fantastic. But I don’t have a picture of them. I seem to be having some sort of problem with my photo uploader. I’ll remedy that and be back later.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Oops. My agent’s totally going to kill me.

The next day, I left the house at 6:30 AM to make my early, early early morning breakfast with Harper Collins, where I met some other authors and a bunch of lovely librarians. Man, I love librarians. So knowledgeable! So passionate! So stylish!

Then, I headed back to the exhibit hall, where I ran into heaps of authors, attended a few signings, picked up even more swag — swag! Swag! How do I love thee? A few of the authors I hung out with: Malinda Lo, author of Ash; Danielle Joseph, author of Shrinking Violet; John Green, author of Looking for Alaska and PaperTowns and Will Grayson, Will Grayson.

Here I am with the beautiful Malinda Lo, whose moody, evocative debut ASH I read last year by firelight during a blackout. It’s also a great book to read over your air-conditioning vent this summer, though. Malinda’s next book is called Huntress. As you can imagine, I’m all over that. We had lunch and talked about researching hunting. She lives in Northern California, which is great for that.

I ran into Alaya Dawn Johnson ever so breifly — just long enough to tell her how much I love her story in Zombies vs. Unicorns (it’s awesome, ya’ll, even if it is about zombies). Speaking of zombies, check out this travesty:

She was so SMUG about it, too! To my face, y’all. To my face. Do you think Astrid would put up with that?

Actually, Astrid is afraid of zombies, too. She has no special powers to deal with those.

And, since I know y’all are wondering about the ice cream, I am so happy to report that at ALA, ice cream is free! Yeah, they were just handing it out on the street corner. Here’s Malinda, me, and Danielle Jospeh eating our free ice cream, in a picture taken by John Green. (You’d think someone who spends so much time filming could have snapped a pic where we were all looking at the camera, but whatever):

This was taken on our way to lunch with Pam Bachorz, author of Candor, Jon Skovron, author of Struts & Frets, Holly Cupala, author of Tell Me a Secret, and L.K. Madigan, award-winning author of Flash Burnout. Yeah, it was kinda a debs party I crashed. They’re very nice.

And yes, that means we had ice cream on the WAY to lunch.

After lunch, I rushed back to the exhibit hall for my signing. Yay, signing!

It went great — we gave away ALL my copies of Ascendant ARCs, and the unicorn horn lollipops were a hit. Killer unicorns FTW!

No matter what John Green says. (Also, I totally did the filming of the part where John steals the book.)

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

This article is the topic of much discussion amongst the YA writers I know. One writer, who has experience with her books being challenged, wondered if she should move to adult lit. Others reported that their editors stuck their oars in before publication, concerned about how certain words or topics in their books might “limit the audience.” The thing that is so insidious about self-censorship is the way it can’t be tracked. You don’t know if your books are being “limited” due to so-called objectionable content. A few choice quotes:

“one 2007 study by the University of Central Arkansas shows that less than one percent of school libraries in that conservative state have books containing gay subjects or story lines.”

“Interestingly, [David] Levithan says he intentionally wrote Boy Meets Boy as clean as possible so that if the book were ever challenged, the only logical reason would be because it features ‘happy gay characters in love.’”

My first four published novels are adult novels, and so these issues did not concern me during the writing, despite the fact that books contain many of the hot-button issues the article discusses: sex, homosexuality, religion, etc. They do enjoy a large teen audience and are often recommended for teen library collections. Given that, in my high school, we read classic works of literature dealing with rape, incest, sexual abuse, war, death, impotence, adultery, violence, racism, religious strife, murder, torture… I’m not sure exactly what teens can’t handle. The Crucible, The Magus, and The Sun Also Rises are way more intense than anything I’ve written!

Yes, there is a fear that saying that is going to cause some parent to run into a library and rip Arthur Miller off the shelf. Some dude gets tortured to death by having rocks piled on top of him in the last act of that play. I wonder if people forget sometimes that most of the classic works of literature touch upon these subjects. Romeo and Juliet weren’t playing Parcheesi that night. Neither were Calypso and Odysseus. (Penelope, of course, played Parcheesi and did her weaving. Poor girl.)

Which is not to say that I think my books are for everyone. I recently received a letter from a father who wanted to know if Secret Society Girl would be appropriate for his 13 year old. Personally, I wouldn’t give the book to middle schoolers, though I know some who read them. As I read Clan of the Cave Bear at twelve, I’m not going to freak out over that. I related to him the mature content in the book so that he could make his own decision. But it’s difficult. Asking whether a book is appropriate “for teen readers” (which he did) is a far different thing than asking if a book is appropriate “for a 13 year old” which he later clarified. I think my adult books are appropriate for older teen readers (let’s say 15-16 and up) but not for the younger, “tween” market. I recommended Ally Carter’s spy school series instead, as it has many of the same “classmate camaraderie, comedy, and zany antics” aspects as my books, but in a sweeter setting (with younger characters!) more appropriate to young teens.

But that is not self-censorship. I’m giving my recommendation to a parent. The books are adult books, not YA. (The characters are in their twenties, have been living on their own for years, and hang out in bars legally. Does the thirteen year old watch How I Met Your Mother? There’s a good litmus test.)* However, I’m not in charge of making the books available or not avialable to the reader, as well as there being no expectation that I wrote the book with that reader (middle schooler) in mind. The father is free to make his own decision. A friend of mine gave my books to her 13 year old with no problem. Parents get to make these decisions for their kids.

Of course, then you see in the SLJ article:

“Librarians need to remember that it’s not their job to impose their own ideologies on the kids they serve or to parent or protect them, Scales says. And even though schools are required to act in loco parentis—Latin for ‘in place of parent’—the doctrine only applies to school librarians when it comes to the safety and health of their students, not when it comes to censorship, she adds.”**

Now, my YA novel is written for a teen readership. It’s about teens (the main character is 16), and it’s told in a fashion that takes that sensibility into account. It does deal with mature themes, such as death, violence, and sex, though it does so in a young adult tone, for a young adult audience. Unlike the heroine of the secret society girl books, who is an adult (a young adult, struggling with the trapping of adulthood, but an adult all the same), Astrid is a teenager, who very much lives within the world of childhood and being a minor. She is subject to the will of her mother, of her guardians, or her teachers. She is not ready to face many of the things in the adult world (though she is asked to face far more in terms of life-and-death choices, than the heroine of my comedies is!).

And of course, there’s that strong abstinence message.

The word “edgy” is batted around a lot in YA circles. Books like 13 Reasons Why and Living Dead Girl are pronounced “edgy,” whereas there is also the “sweeter” fare of I’d Tell You I Love You But Then I’d Have to Kill You or Twilight. I was having a discussion with another author last weekend who asked if my YA book is “edgy” or “sweet”. I didn’t know what to say. There are long battle sequences in Rampant, with a fair amount of blood and injury to the main characters. There’s a body count, both human and unicorn. The storyline deals with the question of sex (though, so does Twilight), though it does come down pretty strongly on the side of chastity (they are nuns, after all). A friend told me that in the US there is more tolerance to violence in books than sex, while in the UK, it is the opposite. I wonder, then, if my book would be considered more edgy overseas.

__________

* Interesting note: it is published as a YA novel in Brazil. As I do not speak Portuguese, I couldn’t tell you if there is any substantive editing going on.

**Hee hee. Does anyone remember that scene in A Series of Unfortunate Events where Mr. Poe (I believe?) is trying to explain to the children what “in loco parentis” means and the kids are like, “drop dead? We know!”

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

http://arcaedia.livejournal.com/

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

My contention has to do with, for instance, (as your link to the Knight Agency page explains) high concept books as “accessible” and “commercial.” A lot of my favorite novels are probably neither.

(Most people I know would NOT call George Eliot’s Middlemarch, for instance, but it’s one of my all-time favorites. And given time, I swear I could write a high concept pitch for it that would remain true to its “quiet” stature.)

So ultimately, I guess what I’m saying is that the phrase “high- concept book” seems…I don’t know…

ANY book could be a high-concept book…because it’s not a matter of what the book IS…it’s a matter of how the book is presented.

Actually, if you read the article, I do not say that any book is high concept, nor that any book that is “accessible and commercial” is necessarily so. I do say that high concept is a somewhat slippery term, as it both describes an innate characteristic of the storyline, and also the way said storyline is described.

Sadly, I haven’t read Middlemarch (I know, shocker), so I can’t whip out a high concept description for you, nor can I make any kind of argument for whether or not it’s high concept, but my understanding is that it’s an ensemble piece about social reform, is it not?

I’m not a fan of books where “very little happens” I must say. (For the modern, trendy definition of “characters don’t learn, don’t grow, and that’s somehow supposed to show the plight of humanity, etc.” — I took that short story class in college, and it was torture.) Even in a “low concept” story (let’s say On Golden Pond, since I’m not familiar with the Eliot and can’t say anything about it), you’ve got a lot “happening” — you’re really showing something about characters in conflict and in growth. But that’s difficult to describe or show the power of in a few short sentences and thus, not high concept. Not BAD, but not high concept.

However, the line is not drawn at “literary.” There are literary books that are high concept, and literary books that aren’t. Literary, as used today, is a genre unto itself, not unlike mystery, or romance, or science fiction. It denotes a certain tone, style, and often, characterization and storyline. Today, “literary” is seen as an intrinsic, objective characteristic of the text.

I don’t like that definition. I believe that what is “literary” is not decided by us. It’s decided by history. What is it about Aphra Behn’s adventures and romances that make them interesting to study today, compared to so many other populist writers of the time. Do we still read Radcliffe because she was the most popular writer of that kind of book at the time, or do we read her because she was doing something that the penny dreadful folks weren’t? And what of Dickens? And what of Dumas, who, like James Patterson, wrote by committee? Nowadays that would be seen as the height of pedestrian and commercialist, but we study Dumas in English classes all over. The Count of Monte Cristo is one of my favorite novels. In fifty or a hundred years, will we be studying Along Came a Spider?

I am fascinated by the way certain books manage to, over time, worm their way into the canon and gain a modicum of respectability. I like how everyone is currently in love with Du Maurier, but her reputation seems to ebb and flow. Sometimes she’s lauded; others, derided. I am fascinated by the rise of science fiction as a highly-respected genre. (In passing, I find it interesting that when we study Orwell, it’s his science fiction, and not his “realistic” character studies or reform novels.) When I read 1001 Books To Read Before You Die, I was surprised that I’d read so few of the novels from the late 19th and early 20th century. Most of the ones I had were, in fact, science fiction. I think that is because my taste runs (and always has run) to adventure stories, which are vastly out of fashion with the literary set these days. (Of course, not solely. For instance, I adore As I Lay Dying. Ironically, the title comes from The Odyssey, the most adventurest of adventure stories!)

Perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised. I did, after all, write my senior thesis on Lost Horizon and the social construct of Shangri-la. Hilton’s adventure novel, cribbing together as it did ideas of orientalism, the sublime, cultural reform, and eastern mythology in an unabashadly populist package, was actually the first book published by Pocket, which had been started to print light, popular fiction in mass market paperback form. And it’s also very high concept.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

As the full PM announcement is a paid service ($20 a month), and those paid subscriptions are what keep the program going, it feels odd to just pass out that information. If the information in PM is available everywhere, then what is the incentive for someone to pay for it? If no one pays for it, then maybe they’ll stop providing this service, which I think is one of the best around.

I’ve been known to slip and talk up particular books that I’m super excited about (my sitemeter regularly checks in on the hits I still get from posting on Ellen Emerson White’s latest Meg book) so I’m certainly not perfect on this stance. I did this once in February of 2006, and once (much more recently) in April of 2007. I also occasionally discuss something I learned in a conference workshop. But I don’t go around posting full Deal Lunches, nor do I report in from a conference with every tidbit that all the other conference goers are paying for (except, you know, the ones who sneak in).

Is it “fair” that people who can’t afford access to this subscription can’t get the benefits from it? Well no, of course it’s not fair. Fair would be free. If I want information that it costs money to get, I pay for it. I’m not a subscriber to Publisher’s Weekly, so I know I only get to see a few of their articles in their free online version. Ditto with RT. Don’t even get me started on Bookscan.

PM isn’t cheap, but it’s a subscription I think is worth it. For those who can’t afford it, I have often suggested signing up for one month and doing an archive deal search. best $20 you’ll ever spend if you’re about to start on an agent search.

Meanwhile, there is SO MUCH information that’s freely available online, it’s astounding. The first year I was writing, I amassed a huge amount of knowledge from free online sources. I was too poor for any paid services. Too poor for RWA. I practically lived on Writers Weekly (which taught me the fundamental rule of writing: money flows toward the writer). I got the free version of Pub Lunch for years and managed just fine before I finally splurged on the full version (supposed to be just a trial, but I loved it so much I made the full-time investment). And now, six years later, there is even more information, in the form of industry pro blogs, newsgroups, etc. Most of these didn’t exist in 2001.

So what do you think? Is it fair to post Deal Lunches that only subscribers should receive? Is it fair not to?

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Shelley Tougas asked:

Has Hollywood come knocking yet? I think SSC is ripe for adaptation.

I’m so glad you think so! I’m a big movie fan, so I take that as a high compliment. The short and technical answer is no, I have not optioned the book for film, television, or other performance media yet.

Obviously, I’d be thrilled if I did, but it’s not something that is making me lose sleep at night. It’s not something I think of. I’m a writer, and more particularly, a novelist. So I want my books to be books, and I’m happy when they are. And I hope that if my books are made into a movie or a television show or who knows what else, that they will bring new readers to my books.

I have no desire to write screenplays or get into the movie business. I remain undecided about television but there are no current plans there. I’m happy to write books and let Hollywood be Hollywood. If I do someday sell my books to Hollywood, I’m going to take Hemingway’s advice about driving to the border of California and lobbing your book across, grabbing the money, and driving like hell back. My book is my book and I like that.

__________________

Bookmark It

Hide Sites