Get out there, or get here, and check it out!
3 Comments on Rocking the Drop, last added: 4/14/2011
Display Comments
Add a Comment
new posts in all blogs
By: Beth Kephart ,
on 4/14/2011
Blog: Beth Kephart Books (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: ReaderGirlz, Rock the Drop, UNDERCOVER, Bookslut review of The Heart is Not a Size, Teen Lit Day, Add a tag
I rocked the drop with The Heart is Not a Size and Undercover in support of Teen Lit Day today.
Get out there, or get here, and check it out!
By: Beth Kephart ,
on 7/21/2010
Blog: Beth Kephart Books (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: So You Think You Can Dance, Chanticleer, INTO THE TANGLE OF FRIENDSHIP, Bookslut review of Nothing but Ghosts, matthew quick, Bookslut review of The Heart is Not a Size, Add a tag
As anyone who might have read my second memoir, Into the Tangle of Friendship, knows, I don't have the best relationship with my mouth. Just about anything that could be wrong with it is (I'm talking about structure and soft tissue now, and not verbal emanations; there's much wrong with that as well). And so, through the years, I've had small surgeries and big ones, I've had jaw bones bolted to jaw bones, I've had the mouth wired shut for weeks on end, I've had a root canal gone desperately wrong (a shattered tooth, a pain killer to which I had a nightmarish reaction), I've had gum grafts that have made me feel and look like a flying UFO.
It's just my mouth. It is not life-threatening. People face far far worse things every single day—many people. But still. I woke up this morning and didn't feel like going to the periodontist who is perfectly nice and tres talented (his nephew is also high up on Obama's team, so he tells good stories). I didn't feel like it.
Here's what happened to make the day sweet anyway. My son woke up and said the kindest thing. My husband offered to make me a late-night brown cow (something to savor while watching So You Think You Can Dance). Matthew Quick sent along these generous words about The Heart is not a Size. I heard from friends (I love my friends). And.... the yellow finch that banged on my office window for months following the passing of my mother, the finch that launched Nothing but Ghosts (or its near cousin), started banging again the very instant I arrived following this morning of surgery and stitches. It had not banged for months and months and months. But here it was again—another message, I suspect, from my mother.
Life is good.
By: Beth Kephart ,
on 6/21/2010
Blog: Beth Kephart Books (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: Bookslut review of The Heart is Not a Size, Mary Quattlebaum, Washington Post Review, Add a tag
A dear friend is the one who whispered, this evening, that a very generous Mary Quattlebaum had penned these words about The Heart Is Not a Size in this past weekend's The Washington Post.
Nuanced characterizations and lyrical writing distinguish Beth Kephart's oeuvre, including this third YA novel, The Heart Is Not a Size (HarperTeen, $16.99; ages 12 and up). Reliable Georgia and her artistic friend Riley volunteer through a GoodWorks building project to help a Mexican village. Being away from their privileged American homes, though, brings out secret issues: Georgia's panic attacks and Riley's eating disorder. How Georgia learns to help herself and Riley goes to the heart of this sensitive exploration of self-acceptance, friendship and teen-galvanized social change.
Thank you, my friend, and thank you, Ms. Quattlebaum, and thank you Washington Post for giving Heart this moment.
By: Beth Kephart ,
on 6/7/2010
Blog: Beth Kephart Books (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: chasing ray, Book Blogger Convention, Colleen, Bookslut review of The Heart is Not a Size, Add a tag
Colleen Mondor isn't just the force behind Chasing Ray, and she isn't just an author in her own right. She is also a Bookslut reviewer—writing, for the rest of us, some of the most thoughtful reviews around. I spoke, at the Book Blogger Convention, about reviews that writers learn from. I learned so much from these words about The Heart is Not a Size that I have reprinted them in full, hoping that Bookslut and Colleen don't mind. Colleen gives me cause (gives me strength) to continue to fight for a place for stories for "the quiet ones out there." That can be an enervating fight, a struggle that can at times overwhelm a writer like me. It is also an endeavor with enormous rewards. I am so grateful, Colleen, that you have reminded me of this.
From the review (and please follow the link for all of the reviews in Colleen's remarkable column this month, titled, "No Laughing Matter.")
Viewing: Blog Posts Tagged with: Bookslut review of The Heart is Not a Size, Most Recent at Top [Help]
Results 1 - 4 of 4
By: Beth Kephart ,
on 4/14/2011
Blog: Beth Kephart Books (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: ReaderGirlz, Rock the Drop, UNDERCOVER, Bookslut review of The Heart is Not a Size, Teen Lit Day, Add a tag
Get out there, or get here, and check it out!
By: Beth Kephart ,
on 7/21/2010
Blog: Beth Kephart Books (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: So You Think You Can Dance, Chanticleer, INTO THE TANGLE OF FRIENDSHIP, Bookslut review of Nothing but Ghosts, matthew quick, Bookslut review of The Heart is Not a Size, Add a tag
It's just my mouth. It is not life-threatening. People face far far worse things every single day—many people. But still. I woke up this morning and didn't feel like going to the periodontist who is perfectly nice and tres talented (his nephew is also high up on Obama's team, so he tells good stories). I didn't feel like it.
Here's what happened to make the day sweet anyway. My son woke up and said the kindest thing. My husband offered to make me a late-night brown cow (something to savor while watching So You Think You Can Dance). Matthew Quick sent along these generous words about The Heart is not a Size. I heard from friends (I love my friends). And.... the yellow finch that banged on my office window for months following the passing of my mother, the finch that launched Nothing but Ghosts (or its near cousin), started banging again the very instant I arrived following this morning of surgery and stitches. It had not banged for months and months and months. But here it was again—another message, I suspect, from my mother.
Life is good.
7 Comments on Things don't always fall apart, last added: 7/22/2010
Display Comments
Add a Comment
By: Beth Kephart ,
on 6/21/2010
Blog: Beth Kephart Books (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: Bookslut review of The Heart is Not a Size, Mary Quattlebaum, Washington Post Review, Add a tag
Nuanced characterizations and lyrical writing distinguish Beth Kephart's oeuvre, including this third YA novel, The Heart Is Not a Size (HarperTeen, $16.99; ages 12 and up). Reliable Georgia and her artistic friend Riley volunteer through a GoodWorks building project to help a Mexican village. Being away from their privileged American homes, though, brings out secret issues: Georgia's panic attacks and Riley's eating disorder. How Georgia learns to help herself and Riley goes to the heart of this sensitive exploration of self-acceptance, friendship and teen-galvanized social change.
Thank you, my friend, and thank you, Ms. Quattlebaum, and thank you Washington Post for giving Heart this moment.
4 Comments on The Heart Is Not a Size: The Washington Post Review, last added: 6/23/2010
Display Comments
Add a Comment
By: Beth Kephart ,
on 6/7/2010
Blog: Beth Kephart Books (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: chasing ray, Book Blogger Convention, Colleen, Bookslut review of The Heart is Not a Size, Add a tag
From the review (and please follow the link for all of the reviews in Colleen's remarkable column this month, titled, "No Laughing Matter.")
Sometimes being a teenager is not just hard, it’s scary. Here is a stack of books about how serious the teen years can be, and why our younger selves deserve a lot more empathy then most adults are willing to give.
Beth Kephart is a National Book Award nominee who, in recent years, has been creating a name for herself as the writer who slices through the dramatics of teen life, and dwells instead on the quiet wonderment and worry of being a girl. While she does not neglect that age-old struggle to fit in, or defiantly embrace outsider status, her stories are much less about what everyone else wants and thinks, and instead look at the seriousness of being an individual. Her girls must find their way, and more often than not, that means letting go of what others hope and want for them. These are worrying girls, concerned girls, girls who want to do the right thing for everybody, but all too often find they cannot, because, after all, no one can. That is when Kephart’s girls grow up, and when readers who are just like them discover their own paths forward as well.
In The Heart Is Not a Size, Kephart introduces Georgia, who has a very nice family; a fun, creative best friend in Riley; and academic achievements that make college an obvious choice. She also is being bodyslammed by panic attacks that defy all efforts at control. Georgia is losing her grip, and because she is holding on so tightly to her own worries, she cannot reach out to Riley, who is literally (and figuratively) losing herself.
In a desperate bid for authenticity, Georgia urges Riley to sign up with a group of volunteers who are traveling to Juarez, Mexico, to build a community washroom. It is, she thinks, the ultimate opportunity to gain “release from the narrow outlines of my life.” Georgia is half convinced she is going crazy, but doesn’t know how to stop the rollercoaster her achievement-oriented life has become. With a little arm twisting, Riley is along for the ride, which Georgia thinks is a good thing. Maybe Juarez will be a way for her to save her friend also, or at the very least, to force Riley to admit what she is doing to herself.
4 Comments on The Bookslut review of The Heart is Not a Size, last added: 6/8/2010
Display Comments
Add a Comment
You rock!
How cool!
way to go!