Author Chris Eboch on Voice

On Tuesday, January 14, 2014, author Chris Eboch led a discussion on voice during our monthly SCBWI meeting at the Alamosa Reading Room (the latest addition to Alamosa Books).

She discussed the difference between character voice and author voice, pointing out that the author's voice is that unique style observed across a variety of different characters.

Editor's often say they are looking for authors with a strong voice, but what do they mean?
Chris said the secret is to create a voice that is distinct, consistent, and clear.

When people read examples of writing that shows a strong voice, the excerpts are often poetic and beautifully written, but it's important to note that not all strong voices are poetic. Chris prefers a style where she gets lost in the story even if the voice is harrowing or crude rather than literary and poetic.

After asking each audience member to write a list of some of their favorite books, she said to look for similarities between books.(i.e.stories with sense of humor, a lot of action, sweet picture books, or angsty young adult romances.) She suggested writers look at their own writing for styles they revisit and trends they lean toward.

She concluded by asking - Are you writing what you love? If so, that's a good sign.
That was the best advice of all!

Chris Eboch will be offering a workshop on voice. See the Details below.

FINDING THE ELUSIVE VOICE with Chris Eboch

 

Saturday, February 1, 2014

1:00 to 4:00 p.m.

Fellowship Reformed Christian Church

4800 Indian School. Rd. NE

 

Registration materials are available at www.scbwi.org.  Follow the links to the New Mexico home page and click on Events or contact ra@scbwi-nm.org.

THE IMPOSSIBLE KNIFE OF MEMORY by Laurie Halse Anderson

Laurie Halse Anderson was at Alamosa Books on 1/10/14 on tour with her latest novel, The Impossible Knife of Memory. Laurie is a warm and endearing person as well as a fabulous author. She is probably most well known for her groundbreaking young adult novel, Speak, but she has also written numerous contemporary and historical novels as well as picture books and the middle grade series, Vet Volunteers.

Laurie confessed that she had a hard time learning to read and received assistance from a reading specialist in elementary school. Then she caught the reading fire and started reading everywhere. The library became her refuge. 

I found this aspect of her story fascinating since I work with struggling readers and am always wondering how to inspire them to love reading. 

Laurie said she has a dream of a literate America where every one reads for fun, surmising that if you still read for fun at eighteen then you will also read for information and learn to think for yourself. Unfortunately, every time we hand kids a book they can't connect with we kill that spirit. 

Reading canonical literature, written by old, dead white dudes, made English her least favorite class in high school. She understood the value of the classics later in life, when she had the perspective to appreciate them, so she sees their worth, but she also believes we must provide teens with stories they relate to. 

She suggested teachers read From Hinton to Hamlet: Building Bridges Between Young Adult Literature and the Classics by Sarah K. Herz. One recommendation she shared from that text is to use YA fiction to teach literary devices while tying the teen novel thematically to canonical literature.  Many teachers using Speak in the classroom tie it to The Scarlet Letter.

The Impossible Knife of  Memory, Laurie's latest work, is about a girl, Hayley Kincain, and her father who have spent the last five years on the road, trying to outrun their demons and their memories. They return to her father's hometown to try to have a normal life, but the only method her father can find to deal with his PTSD is through drugs and alcohol.

The story was inspired by the experiences of Laurie's family and her father's bouts with alcohol and PTSD. She shared that during World War II, he helped liberate the inmates of Dachau, one of the most notorious Nazi concentration camps. Her father was working on a college campus during the Vietnam Nam era and it caused his experiences at Dachau to come back to him with a vengeance. He fell apart and lost his job. They lost their home. She said her father now has dementia and sometimes can't remember her mother but he wakes up screaming, remembering Dachau.

The power of memory.

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Laurie ended her talk by stating that one of her aims as an author is to produce literature that connects with the spirits of young people. Anyone who has read her work knows she had definitely accomplished that mission. 

Thank you for another fabulous story!

Stop #2 of the FIERCE READS TOUR

 Wednesday afternoon Kimberley Griffiths Little (far left) and Caroline Starr Rose (far left) hosted a dynamic panel of authors at Alamosa Books for the Fierce Reads Tour. (Left to right - Jessica Brody - author of Unremembered, Leigh Bardugo - author of Siege and Storm, Gennifer Albin - author of Altered, and Ann Aguirre, author of Horde).

Authors shared their thoughts on writing books as a part of a series vs. creating stand alone stories. Gennifer Albin told how she wrote the first draft of her first novel during National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). Her husband had lost his job, they had gone bankrupt, and she used the computer in the library to create her story because she didn't have a computer of her own. She rewrote and polished her story to perfection, of course, but it all started with that NaNoWriMo first draft. Selling the Crewel World series to Macmillan Publishing changed the course of her life. She continues to promote NaNoWriMo.

That should serve as inspiration for everyone taking part in this November's challenge which starts tomorrow!! To find out more about this terrific FREE online writing event, visit nanowrimo.org.

There will be a special interview with the Fierce Reads authors in the December 2 issue of Spellbinders. Stay tuned for more details. In the meantime, go on over to Alamosa. There are still plenty of autographed copies of these amazing books.

REBEL SPIRITS at Gettysburg

Author Lois Ruby celebrated the release of her latest ghost story, REBEL SPIRITS, on July 3 at Alamosa Books. If you live in or near Albuquerque and you have not visited Alamosa, get yourself on over there. It is the only independent bookstore in town focusing primarily on children's literature. Alamosa is located at 8810 Holly Ave. Suite D (Next to Bahama Bucks). If they don't have the book  you want, they will order it and teacher's get a 20% discount!!

 July 3 was the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg. Lois even brought a woman civil war re-enactor. Over 500 women and girls served in the Civil War disguised as young men. There was a great slide show and treats - including hard tack that Lois made herself, but we were all warned not to try it without soaking it first - or else we might break a tooth. Good luck on your new book, Lois!!

Twinkle Light Parade

 

This was the float Alamosa Books created for Albuquerque's Twinkle Light Parade. See the Christmas tree in the left hand corner? Now check out the close up below...

Sean and Elizabeth, the owners of Alamosa, decorated the tree with books. Forget Me Not is one of the featured titles, along with May B. by Caroline Starr  Rose and Circle of Secrets by Kimberley Griffiths Little.

The three of us, along with several other local authors, will be at Alamosa Books in Albuquerque, on December 11 from 6-8 p.m. In addition to mingling with librarians and conducting a multi-author book signing, we will be collecting books for the Albuquerque Public Schools - Title One Homeless Project. This project has already served over 400 students this year alone. A book is a gift a child may treasure forever. If you are not located in the Albuquerque area, consider donating books to your local homeless shelter, or better yet, partner with a local bookstore and start a book drive of your own.

As part of the evening's entertainment, we will be singing Christmas Carol Spoofs. I must give kudos here to the staff at Alamosa (Chris Warner, Megan Herceg, and Corey Bowen) for helping me brainstorm these wacky songs. They were the ones who suggested zombies and brought out a host of Jonathan Maberry books (see last weeks post for the Zombie song as well as for tips for creating your own holiday spoofs).

To see my second song spoof - "Hunger Games Holiday Traditions," visit the Spellbinders Blog.

Book Launch Success

Thanks to everyone who gathered at Alamosa Books on Saturday night to make the Book Launch for FORGET ME NOT such a success. Since it was so close to Halloween we had a costume contest along with all the other festivities. Here I am above in the mask I bought in New Orleans two years ago. It's been hanging on my wall just waiting for an occasion to be worn.

We watched the book trailer and then I read poems from the book. Music was provided by Kyle Ruggles dressed as Schroeder. His girlfriend came as Lucy. Kyle was the one who created the music for the book trailer. In this photo he was joined by Josh to sing the theme song from "The Addams Family." Josh is the talented young man who produced the book trailer. He's dressed as Calvin above. His girlfriend came as Hobbes.

There was also a Raven Trivia Challenge. People searched the bookstore looking for the eight ravens hidden among the shelves. Each raven had a yellow card that displayed a bit of raven trivia. They answered the questions and then turned in their answers to be part of a drawing.

Sherri Erler, Debi Hennigan, and Shauna Mellady displayed their fabulous jewelry. Many of the pieces were created specifically for the book launch. Winners of the costume contest and Raven Trivia Challenge each got to pick a piece of jewelry to take home. Check out the photos on the GHOST TOUR page to see closeups of their handiwork. If you see anything you'd like to buy you can contact Sherri here. 

And finally, no book launch would be complete without a cake. Thanks again to everyone who came out for the event. For those of you who weren't able to make it, there are autographed copies of FORGET ME NOT at Alamosa Books.

Raven Mania

Join me today over at the Open Book Society with Heidi Holzinger for the Raven Trivia Challenge and Stop #7 of the FORGET ME NOT Ghost Tour.
Discover the names of the ravens that belonged to Odin, the Norse god of death and poetry and find out why they were referred to as Observation and Memory.


Then head over to Ghost Tour Central and scroll to the bottom of the page to the Rafflecopter to find out how you can win the Observation and Memory glass bead necklaces above that were designed especially for the tour.

The Raven Trivia Challenge is also going on LIVE over at Alamosa Books until the book launch on October 27 where there will be music, food, and more prizes.

If you live in Albuquerque, NM, head on over to the bookstore at 8810 Holly Ave. NE where you will find ravens lurking all around the bookstore.

Find raven trivia posted next to the birds and discover other ghostly books nearby written by Albuquerque authors like Ghosts of Old Town by Cody Polston above. He's president of the Southwest Ghost Hunters Association and he's talking about his experiences with ghosts on October 27 at Alamosa books from 4-5 right before my book launch from 6-7.

Several SCBWI friends are featured. Check out Haunted by Chris Eboch, The Secret of Laurel Oaks by Lois Ruby, and Circle of Secrets by Kimberley Griffiths Little.

And while you're there, check out the display for Forget Me Not. Wow! That's a lot of books. Don't forget the book launch on October 27.



Fantasy and Science Fiction and Everything In Between - Interview with Bookseller Elizabeth Anker

The following is an excerpt from an article I wrote for this week's SPELLBINDERS post:

I was recently preparing to give a writing workshop entitled, "What's Hot in Teen Fiction." As I sat down to write my definitions for topics such as Steampunk and Dystopian, I realized I wasn't altogether sure about how to describe these fantasy sub-genres myself

That's when I decided to interview Elizabeth Anker, the owner of Alamosa Books, our local independent children's books store. I figured teachers and librarians would also be interested in exploring these different categories and hearing what a book seller thinks of their appeal to young readers. A large part of being able to recommend a book to a young person is knowing what these different genres contain. Below are Elizabeth's thoughts on the subject.

She says Steampunk started with good writers, mainly in Britain, writing on the edge of science fiction. Then editors saw the trend and began looking for other books with similar themes. These stories tend to be more about a similar look and an idea rather than a similar story line. The look is basically Victorian with Victorian type costumes, gadgets, inventions, and creative weaponry. Goggles of some kind are almost always involved. Plots involve adventurers out to seek their fortunes or defeat bad guys in creative and technological ways. Although drawing on elements of Victorian England, these stories are not so much set in the past as they are set in parallel worlds with Victorianesque influences.

Elizabeth says Sherlock Holmes stories, which actually take place in Victorian times, are a strong influence. Holmes's nemesis Moriarty is the perfect model for the archetypical steampunk bad guy is often based upon reliance on high tech (for the times) weaponry used by a villain who is trying to take over the world. Moriarty is not influenced by morality at all and many steam punk villains are equally as capitalistic.

Steam is often the primary energy source of the times, but something magical is usually involved as well. There is a lot of true science and pseudo science woven through these stories. In the better cases it's real science with pseudo science on the edge, but based in a true science like physics. In books trying for the trend but not so concerned with research it's purely magical in many cases.

Read the rest of the post at the Spellbinders Blog

EXCITING PREPARATIONS

The release of FORGET ME NOT is 17 days away (and counting).

Last week, in between working at three different high schools, attending soccer functions, arriving late at our monthly SCBWI meeting, and going to craft stores on three different occasions to find 14 t-shirts (all the same shade of neon green - at which time I discovered that an XL youth is the same size as a S adult), I met the gals who are making the jewelry for my October Ghost Tour and Bookstore Book Launch and found something exciting from UPS waiting on my doorstep...

It was the box containing my author copies of FORGET ME NOT.

Earlier in the week I was absolutey stunned when I met Sherri Erler, Shauna Mellady, and Debi Hennigen at Alamosa Books to work on the display for the book launch and saw the amazing pieces they had created. Here is Sherri showing off her many different styles of forget-me-not bracelets, necklaces, and earrings.

And here are some pieces created by Shauna and Debi. Each piece is linked to a stop on the blog tour and has symbolic significance in the book. Ravens figure prominently at Raven Valley High School and there is an allusion to Odin, the Norse god of death and poetry. He had two ravens called Hugin and Munin, also known as Observation and Memory, who travelled the world and returned to report what they saw... exactly what a writer does, by the way.

There are also allusions to Shakespeare, Dante, Poe and 2Pac, so come back October 2 when the Ghost Tour begins, right here on my blog. In the meantime, if you live in Albuquerque, mark your calendars for the book launch at Alamosa on Saturday, October 27th at 6:00pm.

See you there!

Writing Workshop: What's Hot in Teen Writing

In preparation for my upcoming workshop on writing for teen's on July 28 (see information below) I stopped by Alamosa Books, an independent Children's Bookstore here in Albuquerque, to talk with owner, Elizabeth Anker, and ask her impressions about the popular fantasy genre.

We started off with a discussion of steam punk. Then we explored the fantasy sub genres of dystopian literature and urban fantasy. I won't go into detail here because I'm using a lot of the information in my upcoming workshop, but I will follow up with a more detailed post in a few weeks. I will say I left the bookstore with several new books, so I know how I'll be spending the rest of my summer. Here's the steam punk title at the top of my reading list:

Elizabeth said that unlike many bookstores, Alamosa makes a distinction between fantasy and science fiction because she believes these are two different genres with two distinct audiences. She says science fiction has a bigger male audience with more sience based reality and less romance. Fantasy, on the other hand, attracts more female readers and contains more magic elements with lots of romance. This can make some novels hard to place if they contain elements of both fantasy and science fiction.

For more information about my upcoming writing workshop in Albuquerque call Southwest Writers Workshop at 505-265-9485

WHAT'S HOT IN TEEN WRITING

Carolee Dean

Saturday, July 28
9 AM - 12 Noon

Bear Canyon Center

4645 Pitt NE

Albuquerque, NM 87111

Call to Register: SWW Office 505-265-9485

 Learn about the popular subgenres of teen fiction such as novels in verse, paranormal romance, steam punk, contemporary Young Adult (YA), and dystopian fiction. Then learn how to plot your story like a professional, using the presenter’s twelve step story analysis method called "The Secret Language of Stories." With this method, based on the Hero's Journey, explore a variety of plot ideas. Come prepared to brainstorm! Don't worry if you don't have an idea yet. You will by the time you finish this dynamic workshop.

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Alyson Noel and FATED in Albuquerque

Alyson Noel kicked off her new Soul Seekers series in Albuquerque last Tuesday with FATED at Alamosa Books. FATED is the story of Daire Santos, a young girl who's mother sends her to Enchantment, New Mexico to live with a grandmother she has never met. Only Daire's grandmother knows what the girl's visions mean - that Daire is destined to travel between the worlds of the living and the dead as a soul seeker. Filled with romance, shamanism, and charm, this new series is sure to be a hit.

Go here to listen to the Audio Clip of FATED available through Macmillan Audio Books at Amazon

Alyson talked about her journey as a writer and said the beginning wasn't easy. FAKING NINETEEN was rejected by several publishers, including her own St. Martin's Press. At the time they didn't even publish YA. Then a new editor came on board who wanted to try books for teens. Her agent pitched the book again, and it sold. FAKING NINETEEN was the first teen title published by St. Martin's Press. Alyson said sales for her first seven books were unremarkable. Then EVERMORE hit the New York Times Best Seller List and she's been on a roll ever since. She attributes the initial success of EVERMORE, in part, to the fact that Walmart put in a huge order. They loved the book and loved the cover. She pointed out that a lot of towns don't have bookstores and Walmart is where a lot of people find books. Of course it also helped that EVERMORE was a really good story.

When rewriting her first novel, Alyson said her agent recommended she read STORY by Robert McKee. She knew within just a few pages what was wrong with her book and how to fix it. She still looks back through STORY before starting a new manuscript. The other book she recommended was SAVE THE CAT by Blake Snyder. Snyder, like McKee, bases his story analysis on screenplay format. He breaks stories into fifteen "beats" that keep the action moving forward. Alyson said one of the first things she does when she sits down to write is to make sure that her story has all fifteen of the "beats."

 

Regarding having other people critique one's writing, Alyson said she is a very private writer and does not like to share her work with anyone until it's in pretty good shape. She said "Advice comes in all forms and not all of it is good." She warned against getting too many people's opinions in your head and losing track of who you are writing for. If you are going to work with someone, make sure they understand and appreciate your genre. You don't want someone who focuses on literary fiction to critique your romance novel or vice versa.

It was very special to have Alyson Noel in New Mexico for her first stop on the FATED tour. Fans will have a special treat in store with this exciting new series.