In the News: Redemption

Am I the only one taken by this story? I suppose you can be a novelist and a cynic. Heck, I've even had more than my share of cynical protagonists in my books.

But I still get to write a happy ending if I want. And something about the story of the Man with the Golden Voice tugs at my heart strings.

English teachers tend to drive students nuts, right, with "themes." Like the good versus evil painting of St. Michael defeating Satan, themes are nothing new. I'm sure the first cave people told stories of the great hunt. And tales of defeating enemies.

Themes bind us and they talk to us. And for me, as the New year unfolds, there's no greater theme than an old-fashioned story of redemption.

And maybe that's even more fitting when you're a teen. Because we all make mistakes, and I know in my teen years, I made PLENTY of them. And it's nice to know there's usually a chance for a second act, a part II, a turnaround, a redemption. In books. And in real life.

Thoughts? Any great tales of redemption you know about?

Tweet

In the News: SNOW

Although I am no longer trapped in my Brooklyn apartment, it's still mighty snowy outside! In the news, they called it SNOWPOCALYPSE (I'm not exaggerating. They might be, but I'm not.) All this snowy news got me thinking about a book that I really want to read: Michael Northrop's Trapped.

It's the story of seven mismatched students who must adapt in order to survive when they're stranded at their high school without heat or power during a massive, weeklong blizzard, according to Publisher's Marketplace. And according to Michael, it's:

(That's The Breakfast Club meets The Shining, in case you aren't familiar.) How good does that sound?! It's out in early February officially, but word on the street is it's already on some shelves. I'm going hunting.

Is it weird that news, and happenings in the world, makes me think about the books I want to read? What's on your list this week?

Tweet

Money, Money, Money... In the News

I've lived in three countries and traveled to five continents and I have to tell you, US money may be one of the most collected currencies in the world as far as holding its value goes, but it's also been the most boring to look at.

I mean, what's up with the monochromatic theme we've had going on for so long? I like color. I like shiny. So it was fun and interesting to me to read this article... and to see that our new bills are taking on a European flair!

Look at all this assembly line money! Makes me want to sing a little O'Jays...

Tweet

In the News: Sandra Bullock (and Archie's new friend, and male fairies) Hooray!

For this week's News theme, I considered writing about the new gay character in Archie comics (yay! Meet Kevin, left) or Disney creating boy fairies for their online games (at the demand of kids who didn't get why there were only Tinkerbelles flying around Neverland).

So you can see, that although I do read the newspaper (at least on weekends, thankyouverymuch), my news is kind of pop culturey in nature. Which brings me to what I actually want to write about: Sandra Bullock!

It's a little weird how happy this PEOPLE cover made me. Of course she must be devastated over the terrible things her soon-to-be-ex-husband has done, but she's been working on adopting this baby, Louis Bardo Bullock, for four years (she brought him home in January) and now she's going forward with the adoption as a single mom.

She'll have teary nights and a lot of pain to work through over Jesse, but Sandy's choosing to be strong, move on and choose happiness. I'm inspired!

A question: Is it weird to be so affected by pop culture? I'm also finding myself upset over Jill and Bethenny's friend-fued on The Real Housewives of New York. Maybe I should get a hobby.

Tweet

In the News: "Do local newscasters confound you on purpose? What it may mean for gas prices this summer."

Like Erica, who posted yesterday, I don't really watch the TV news. I keep up by listening to Morning Edition on NPR, skimming and/or reading the New York Times, and with the occasional viewing of The News Hour on PBS. Even if I had cable, you could not get me within a hundred feet of cable news. But, once in a great while, I'll watch the local news. Oy gevalt!

Nothing highlights the absurdity of most commercial news media like minor-market local coverage. Desperate for viewers, local stations drop in teasers during prime-time commercial breaks, teasers that are apparently meant to variously annoy you, scare you, or make you go: WTF? Or, as we say in Utah, what the crap? Their purpose is definitely not to give you helpful information. Here's the kind of thing I mean:

"A grandmother, a phone call, an inmate. Why they matter to your bank account."
"Rain? Snow? Sun? All of the above? Will it be time to break out the bbq, or unpack the umbrellas?"
"How childhood obesity is affecting the safety of your pets, and what it could mean for Southern Utah."

I guess sometimes we just don't have news here. Like for example last night. After watching another fine episode of Parenthood, I thought I'd catch a few minutes of the local news to see what's going on. Top story: It's Windy. After a couple of days of beautiful spring weather, a storm was a-brewin'. So there were about ten minutes of on-location reporting and recorded interviews of people all saying more or less the same thing: "It's really windy." At one point, we saw a picture of a tree that had blown over. The reporter mentioned a power outage and said, "...possibly caused by this downed tree." Orrrr possibly not. Possibly caused by a downed tree fifteen miles away, or by someone simultaneously using their toaster oven and Wii in a poorly-wired house. Who can say for sure?

My feelings about local news got some indirect play in my latest book, Once Was Lost. Melinda Ford is a local reporter in the fictional town of Pineview. Bits of information about Jody Shaw's kidnapping are revealed throughout the book in the form of Melinda's newscasts. She's one of those side characters for whom I imagined an entire life outside of the book...I pictured her as a cross between Nicole Kidman's character in To Die For and a young, ambitious small-town Nancy Grace who practiced saying, "For KPXU, this is Melinda Ford" in the mirror every night, with different dramatic inflections. Like Samara's mom says in the book, "There's nothing that girl loves more than bad news," and in a way Jody's kidnapping was the best thing that ever happened to Melinda Ford.

Which brings me back to last night's news, and me saying to my husband, "What are they smiling about?" They were grinning like fools there behind the news desk. I guess that wind storm made them pretty happy.

Tweet

In the News: Other

I'm supposed to blog about the news, but I can't watch the news. I used to watch the news, but then somewhere along the line, it became about splitting the screen and having two people yell at each other--and suddenly, that's news. Heck, sometimes they even split the screen by four and FOUR people yelling their opinions.

Me? I'm looking for a little peace. See that little guy? That's my baby when I took him to march on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. I also took my other three kids, and we gathered, peacefully, with about 50,000 other protesters against the war. I'm trying to raise my children with a sense of purpose, peace, and tolerance.

So the news? It's about anything but. I'll read the news--every day, in fact. But I can't listen to the animosity. Because when I boil it down, it is almost always about OTHER. After 9/11, I met a Sikh who was attacked. He couldn't drive his cab for a couple of weeks in fear for his life. Sikhs are not Muslims, but they do wear turbans. They look different--they are Other. In Arizona right now, they want to make it a law that if you look like Other, you can be asked to produce proof you are a citizen or else get hauled to jail. Other extends to fear of gay people, fear of people whose skin is darker, whose religion is different. Fear of Other extends all the way to offices of power, and all the way down to the corridors of high schools. Like millions right now, I know the name of Phoebe Prince, a girl who was "bullied to death." High school, when people are trying to figure out who they are, seems to magnify Other. A lot of kids are looking to fit in, not stand out.

So do you watch the news? Do you see a hatred for Other consuming our world? And even our high schools? Does it disturb you? How can we combat it?

Tweet

Top Books of the Decade

This week at TFC, we're talking about what's in the news. There's the Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen, the ongoing Olympic torch relay toward the Vancouver Olympic stadium, and for those of us in the US, the winter storm on the east coast and the weekend Senate vote on the health care bill.

And there are lists. Lots of lists.

Since we're reaching the end of the decade, all sorts of lists have popped up in the news. The best of this, the worst of that. Top news stories, most watched you-tube videos, worst celebrity moments. My personal favorites are the book lists. Here's a list from Good Reads of readers' favorites. I pulled the top picks from this decade (including more than the top ten because Stephanie Meyer and J.K. Rowling take up half that list!) Here we go...

The Best YA Books of the Decade

Twilight - Stephanie Meyer (2005)
The Graveyard Book - Neil Gaiman (2008)
Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows - J.K. Rowling (2006)
Holes - Louis Sachar (2000)
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2003)
Eclipse - Stephanie Meyer (2007)
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - J.K. Rowling (2000)
The Book Thief - Markus Zusak (2005)
Uglies - Scott Westerfield (2005)
The Hunger Games - Suzanne Collins (2008)
Eragon - Christopher Paolini (2005)
City of Ember - Jeanne DuPrau (2004)
Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants - Ann Brashares (2001)
Great and Terrible Beauty - Libba Bray (2003)
Looking for Alaska - John Green (2005)

How many of these books have you read? Which ones did you love? What would you add to the list?

Tweet

In the News: Is Crime Linked to Candy Consumption?

My friend Anne wrote about this Time magazine article that links candy consumption to crime, which is a funny/disturbing concept. Basically it has to do with impulse control (if you don't have much of it, you'll eat candy when you're a kid and maybe commit crimes in adulthood--there's a better explanation in Time). There's a lot to think about there, but here's how my train of thought went:

Eating candy --> committing crimes --> living in candy jails --> behind candy cane bars --> sleeping on marshmallow pillows --> wearing licorice stripes.

That's right: I started thinking about candy. Which made me think about how author Elizabeth Scott is asking people what their least favorite Halloween candy is this week (for a great contest--go enter)... and lots of people are saying Candy Corn. But I love candy corn! Those people are nuts.

What do you guys think? Favorite Halloween candy? I'm for candy corn! Who's with me?

Tweet

in the news: how smart is your city

At the Daily Beast this week, there is a sorta scientific and sorta not ranking of the country's smartest and dumbest cities. Here's how they did it. Now, if you are a reader of my blog over at sarazarr.com, you know I am a transplant from San Francisco to Salt Lake City, and my husband and I are starting to look for a way to go back. Since SF is so freaking expensive, we are open to other cities. The intellectual environment is important! So maybe this list could help us decide where we'd consider living. Here are how our current and past dwellings ranked, along with the rankings of the cities we've been talking about moving to:

San Francisco Bay Area (the homeland) = #2! See? My love for SF is not just about the mild climate, the ocean, and dim sum. And here I would like to point out that the Raleigh-Durham area is #1. Guess who is from Raleigh? My mother and her whole family. Booyah!

Salt Lake City (the current residence) = #14. Not bad at all. It is only one city away from New York (#13). High scores in book sales pushed us over the edge, apparently. There are a lot of great writers here, you know, and we love to buy books.

Denver = #5. I've always liked Denver, and now that I know how smart it is I like it even more. Drawback: still too far from the ocean. Drawback #2: Broncos fans.

Seattle/Tacoma = #7 in a tie with D.C. Who wouldn't want to live in Seattle? I know the rain is a killer, but it is gorgeous and full of walkable, livable neighborhoods.

Portland, OR = #9. I fell in love with this place when there for the KidlitBloggerCon or whatever it was called last year. It's progressive, beautiful, and has great public transport. And now I know it also has a really big brain.

That's it! We haven't really considered moving east or south, but if we did maybe we'd go for #1 Raleigh or #12 Austin. Everywhere else in the top 15 is too cold!

Tweet