Well, here I am, fighting for every blooming second alone to write my Dangerous Neighbors (Egmont USA) prequel—a book featuring brothers and two boy best friends, a murder and its avenging, a stint in a terrible prison, the rescue of animals—and here this wise and lovely soul sits, in a room somewhere, talking about why we don't have more teen boy readers, and why we need them, and what we (as a society and publishing community) can do about it.
I have three corporate projects I have to finish today so that I can turn (secretly, feverishly) to the 20,000th word of my work in progress.
I'm letting this young woman speak for me.
2 Comments on Too Much Teen Paranormal Romance, last added: 8/12/2011
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Well said! I always wish teen and tween boys were given more 'permission' to read in our culture. I think it goes beyond there not being books out there for boys to read-- mostly because I think that's just not true. This is totally unscientific but out of the last 10 books I read for young people, 7 of them featured male MCs and 4 of them were written by men. And look, you're writing a 'boy-centric' book right now and so are many of my writing friends. I think the question has to be asked: Is it really, truly the publishing industry that is failing them?
Three corporate projects to finish in one day: YIKES!
FYI: There is a site devoted to boys and reading. It's called GUYS READ and it was started by children's book author Jon Sczieska. It's at www.guysread.com