Monday, October 30, 2017

Mondays Need a Good Book: THE PEARL THIEF

 The Pearl Thief (Code Name Verity #0.5)



THE BLURB: When fifteen-year-old Julia Beaufort-Stuart wakes up in the hospital, she knows the lazy summer break she’d imagined won’t be exactly like she anticipated. And once she returns to her grandfather’s estate, a bit banged up but alive, she begins to realize that her injury might not have been an accident. One of her family’s employees is missing, and he disappeared on the very same day she landed in the hospital.

Desperate to figure out what happened, she befriends Euan McEwen, the Scottish Traveller boy who found her when she was injured, and his standoffish sister, Ellen. As Julie grows closer to this family, she experiences some of the prejudices they’ve grown used to firsthand, a stark contrast to her own upbringing, and finds herself exploring thrilling new experiences that have nothing to do with a missing-person investigation.

Her memory of that day returns to her in pieces, and when a body is discovered, her new friends are caught in the crosshairs of long-held biases about Travellers. Julie must get to the bottom of the mystery in order to keep them from being framed for the crime.

 
THE SCOOP: Prequels hardly ever work for me, but I loved this one SO. MUCH. It's a mystery set in 1938 Scotland oozing with historical and antiquarian significance. The tone is much lighter than Code Name Verity, but, honestly, it was so refreshing to see Julie's life and character before the tragedy of the next book. The research was impeccable, the world brimming with life, the characters endearing. The mystery played on some fun mystery tropes, including amnesia.

THE VERDICT: I loved everything about this. And now I want a necklace of Scottish river pearls.

Friday, October 27, 2017

Caught My Fancy Friday: Midwest Storymakers Conference, Part II

I take pages and pages of notes at every writing conference I attend. Mostly, I don't look at them again. But it helps me learn.

I've had a few weeks to digest what I learned at the conference--in classes and out--and here's the short version:
  • Indie publishing just might be the wave of the future.
    • Writing to market can be lucrative.
    • It's so FAST. Write, revise, publish, make some moolah. Wow! 
    • I still don't think it's for me, but it was fascinating to learn about it from successful indie authors.
  • Tropes are okay. Readers of certain genres like and expect tropes. Good writers use tropes to their advantage instead of dismissing them.
  • I love critiquing Regency manuscripts, even though I've never written one and don't enjoy many of them besides Georgette Heyer. 
  • I really wish I had had the change to take Gregg Luke's class on poisons BEFORE I researched, wrote, and revised my novel about a poisoner at Peter the Great's court. It would have saved me a lot of time!
  • Now I kind of want to write murder mysteries, now that I have the low-down on all the best poisons.
  • There are patterns to writing successful romance. Don't laugh! I don't read or write strictly romance, but I love romance side plots, and I've never thought much about them. Victorine Leiske's class opened my eyes. 
  • She talked about avoiding insta-love, which is a problem in YA. She says it happens when characters build physical intimacy without matching emotional intimacy. She suggests making a list of their secrets and revelations from smallest (I hate onions) to largest (I can't get over my last lover) and let the characters leak them to each other in ascending order. Genius, right?
  • Writers are really, really, really nice; anxious to share what they've learned; and pretty much always riddled by self-doubt.

Monday, October 23, 2017

Mondays Need a Good Book: THE INQUISITOR'S TALE

The Inquisitor's Tale: Or, the Three Magical Children and Their Holy Dog 

THE BLURB: 1242. On a dark night, travelers from across France cross paths at an inn and begin to tell stories of three children. Their adventures take them on a chase through France: they are taken captive by knights, sit alongside a king, and save the land from a farting dragon. On the run to escape prejudice and persecution and save precious and holy texts from being burned, their quest drives them forward to a final showdown at Mont Saint-Michel, where all will come to question if these children can perform the miracles of saints.
THE SCOOP: I loved everything about this book. The meticulous research, the medieval setting, the unlikely friendships, the redemption of {some} characters, the storytelling frame, the lovely ending, and, most of all, its meditations on faith and God and why evil exists in a world made by God.

The book's twists and turns surprised and delighted me, and I loved seeing bits and pieces of medieval history I remembered from my reading in college. The illustrations are delightful as well.
 
THE VERDICT: My 11-year-old gave it to me, saying, "I don't know if you like this kind of book, but I think it's really good." He was shocked at how much I loved it. There's something magical about a wonderful middle-grade book that both elementary kids and moms can go crazy over.

Friday, October 20, 2017

Caught My Fancy Friday: Midwest Storymakers Conference, Part I

I taught for the first time at a writing conference! I attended the Midwest Storymakers and Indie Hub conference a few weeks ago and taught a class on research. It went well . . . I hope? I enjoyed teaching it, at least. I probably had enough material for a couple of classes, but my philosophy has always been more of a fire-hose-gives-everyone-water approach. I don't enjoy classes where teachers appear to struggle to fill time.

It was marvelous. I felt a bit like a fraud, since I'm unpublished, but, hey! My topic was research--more specifically, using research to plot and world-build (I think of research as the lazy woman's world-building). And after writing an undergraduate honor's thesis, a master's thesis, and multiple highly researched manuscripts, I do feel (over)qualified to teach that topic.

Let me know if you're stuck researching . . . I'm a good helper with that.


Monday, October 16, 2017

Mondays Need a Good Book: THE WAR THAT SAVED MY LIFE

 The War that Saved My Life (The War That Saved My Life #1)


THE BLURB: Nine-year-old Ada has never left her one-room apartment. Her mother is too humiliated by Ada’s twisted foot to let her outside. So when her little brother Jamie is shipped out of London to escape the war, Ada doesn’t waste a minute—she sneaks out to join him.

So begins a new adventure of Ada, and for Susan Smith, the woman who is forced to take the two kids in. As Ada teaches herself to ride a pony, learns to read, and watches for German spies, she begins to trust Susan—and Susan begins to love Ada and Jamie. But in the end, will their bond be enough to hold them together through wartime? Or will Ada and her brother fall back into the cruel hands of their mother?
 

THE SCOOP: I almost quit reading after the first chapter, because the mother was so awful, but the story's focus is redemption, love, and growth, and it is absolutely heart-warming as only excellent middle grade can be. 

Ada and Jamie remind me of Alf and Binnie in Connie Willis's Blackout/All Clear books, a bit. Their growth--especially Ada's, once she's given the chance to bloom--propels the story forward.
THE VERDICT: LOVE. I mean, LOVE. I'm suggesting it to my book club for next year.