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Crazy Beautiful by Lauren Baratz-Logsted. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Children's Book Group. Publication date September 2009. Reviewed from ARC from ALA.

The Plot: Two teens, strangers to each other, starting at a new high school.

For Aurora, it's welcoming, all the kids like her, she doesn't have to worry about who to sit with at lunch.

For Lucius, not so much. Not that he really cares; but the kids who say "hi" to Aurora shun Lucius.

What's the difference? Is it that Aurora looks for the good in people? Is it that she is beautiful? Dresses perfectly?

Is it that Lucius has hooks for hands?

Oh. Yeah. Did I mention -- Lucius blew his arms off.

But when wounded, isolated Lucius sees beautiful, sweet Aurora; and Aurora looks into Lucius's eyes; sparks fly.

He's crazy, she's beautiful, can they wind up together?

The Good: LOVED THIS. Love, love, love.

Alternate chapters tell this story, first from Lucius's view, then Aurora; there are some clever overlaps, such as both are given pancakes and orange juice their first day of school, yet both have vastly different reactions to their breakfast. We see Lucius starting school, not expecting friends; Aurora starting school, nervous but expecting to like people and be liked.

We also, from the start, see and feel the spark between these two. And let me tell you - H. O. T. There is attraction; and there is tension; but of course these two crazy beautiful kids cannot get together at first glance.

See, Lucius used to have hands. Did up till a year ago. Back when he was a nerd, back when he was a science geek, and had a lab in his basement. An explosion; he blew up the house; and he lost his hands. His family is in a new house, a new town, trying to start over. And Lucius is trying to adjust to his new life; his life after.

Aurora's life looks perfect from the outside; just as she looks perfect. But what people don't know is her mother died last year; a slow five years in the making death from cancer. What keeps her from being unbearably sweet -- unrealistically sweet -- is that she truly is nice. A niceness honed by loving her mother, caring for her mother, and being taught to look for the good in people. Which is why, when she looks at Lucius, she sees him as a whole person, not hooks. Had this been only Lucius's point of view, we may have never understood Lucius falling for her. By seeing her view, her way of looking at the world, how she lights up when sees Lucius, we know her and want these two to connect.

This is an amazing love story, between two people you root for, who have realistic obstacles to overcome.

But it's also the story of a very wounded teenager. Not just physically. Lucius's world exploded -- was destroyed -- because of something he did. Literally. And it's not just himself he hurt; while they escaped injury, he also hurt his family. They lost everything. He's working out what he did to his family; to himself; what type of person he is, after; what type of person he was, before.

But it's not all love and angst (though there is plenty of both); there's also humor. Lucius has a younger sister: "mostly it's like [Misty] got the memo that kid sisters are supposed to be incredibly annoying and she follows those instructions religiously." But later scenes show a sibling bond that Lucius is either hesitant to admit to; or to guilty to acknowledge. Right, humor! Anyway, there are some scenes between Lucius and Misty that had me giggling.

What else? So much else! Because I could also do a paragraph on the parents; and the school dynamics; on Lucius's friendship with the school security guard and his realization of what friendship means; and I haven't even mentioned the school play, Grease, and those gosh darn Australians.

And it's not a long book! Baratz-Logsted does a beautiful job with conveying emotions, scenes, people with just a few words and lines. This is why I love young adult writers; they get to the point. They don't waste time with words that aren't needed and that take away from the story. Instead, it's the pure story that is told. Crazy Beautiful may be short; but it has more than enough to fall for Lucius, to champion Aurora, to know their friends and family, and, at the end, when the last final line is read, to turn back to the beginning and read it again.

I guess I'll sum up this way: check the sidebar, because this is another Favorite Book read in 2009.


© Elizabeth Burns of A Chair, A Fireplace & A Tea Cozy

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by Sarah CrossDutton 2009Alright, once again: what's the rule regarding words in the title of your book that can be used against you in a review?Let me back down a bit here, lest the Blog Review Police accuse me of being snarky.What we have here, in a nutshell, is... could it be a version of the X-Men movie? Avery has these superpowers that manifest themselves as he hits puberty. He's got super

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A. Bitterman has some tips!

He does bring up a moral question that vexes me, though. If I want a copy of, say, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (which Betsy Hearne says I do), am I morally required to go out of my way to purchase it at an independent bookseller? There are two small independents in my neighborhood, but I can't go into either with the assurance they will have any given book I am seeking--one is mostly remainders (Jamaicaway Books and Gifts) and the other is too random (Rhythm and Muse). I can go to the Harvard Bookstore in Cambridge on my way home from work if I take an extra bus and train, but both Borders and Barnes & Noble are on my subway line. I always drop a hefty wad of cash at the Brookline Booksmith when we go over to Coolidge Corner for a movie, but that trip requires a car (and, thus, driver, thus Richard). As far as I can tell, Boston supports no full-service independents. What's an enthusiastic non-driving reader to do? On the one hand, shopping at an independent is, in the particulars, more fun, and I invariably buy more books than I had intended to. And in general, the existence of independents, with their handselling and appeal to big readers, allows more kinds of good books to flourish. But it has been my experience that immediate gratification wins out over virtue when shopping or reading (this is why I don't shop online). It says something great about reading when you just can't wait to get your mitts on a book--but it also makes it unlikely that you will wait until you can plan a day around its purchase.

I think what I miss most about Chicago is living a five-minute walk from Unabridged Bookstore. That place is heaven.

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We didn't receive a review copy of Stephenie Meyer's Breaking Dawn, so you won't find any spoilers here. What I've been finding fascinating in a train-wreck kind of way are the vox populi debates over at Amazon.com, particularly a discussion thread attempting to start a RETURN THIS BOOK campaign in protest of Meyer's "betrayal" of her readers: "I agree totally. I saw about 20 returned copies at Target tonight. Returning them is the right thing to do. Burn them and she will still have the money. Don't let that happen." And these are fans talking.

I'm interested in the ethical propriety of returning a book because you didn't like it. Can't imagine doing that myself--the reader is paying for consuming the intellectual content, not just for the physical item. I'm equally interested in the whole question of the difference between readers and fans, if there is one. One distinction the Meyer debates seem to bring to the fore is the way fans personalize the object of their affection--the ones who hate Breaking Dawn feel that Meyer has betrayed them and must suffer; the ones who like the book feel they need to be "loyal" to the author: "You do realize Stephenie Meyer reads these don't you? How disgustingly mean can you get? Stephenie Meyer wrote this for us, the twilighters. Her fans."

What makes people behave this way? I'm aware, of course, that the Amazon posters are probably a distinct subgroup of Meyer's readers, or do her books inspire this kind of Ayn Randy cultishness?

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and the 70s I've been, listening to Julie Andrews marvelously read her new autobiography Home: A Memoir of My Early Years (Hyperion) and reading Sheila Weller's Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon--and the Journey of a Generation. Forget the "You're So Vain" gossip--did you know "Car on a Hill" was about Jackson Browne? And J. T.'s "You Can Close Your Eyes"? Joni.

But, really, it's been like eating a whole plateful of madeleines. My baby-boomer cohort ( a word Weller uses way, way too often in an otherwise delicious book) will understand.

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Is or is not "Stars" the most lugubrious song Janis Ian ever wrote? And that is saying a lot.

In either event, here are the starred books from the March/April Horn Book Magazine:

Dog and Bear: Two’s Company (Porter/Roaring Brook) written and illustrated by Laura Vaccaro Seeger

Rex Zero, King of Nothing (Kroupa/Farrar) by Tim Wynne-Jones

On the Farm (Candlewick) written by David Elliott, illustrated by Holly Meade

Frogs (Scholastic) written and illustrated with photos by Nic Bishop

Spiders (Scholastic) written and illustrated with photos by Nic Bishop

What To Do about Alice?: How Alice Roosevelt Broke the Rules, Charmed the World, and Drove Her Father Teddy Crazy (Scholastic) written by Barbara Kerley, illustrated by Edwin Fotheringham

Pale Male: Citizen Hawk of New York City (Knopf) written by Janet Schulman, illustrated by Meilo So

If you're in need of a sign of spring, go with Pale Male, one of my favorite books thus far this year. It makes you want to take a walk in the park with Janet Schulman (who I never thought of as a walk-in-the-park kind of gal) and Meilo So's watercolors have never been so rich.

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Laini Taylor is the debut author of the young adult fantasy novel Blackbringer, first in the FAERIES OF DREAMDARK series. Read my review of the book. Besides writing, she also makes cool creations like this. (View more here.) She maintains two blogs: Growing Wings, about anything and everything from her amazing pink hair to thoughts on movies; and Not for Robots, which is filled with advice for writers.

What was your inspiration for Blackbringer?

The inspiration for the Dreamdark series came, initially, from artwork. To make a long story short, I spent some time a while back designing and painting a line of elaborate, oil-painted fairy paper dolls. I got deeply into creating these three characters: Magpie, Poppy, and Whisper, and while I was painting, I started working out the idea for a faerie story. At first I thought it would be a series for younger girls, that it would be light-hearted and playful like the art, but . . . that’s not what happened.

It’s a funny thing that my art is very bright and happy, but my writing tends to be fairly dark. (My husband is the opposite -- his art is brooding and dark, his writing silly and funny!) So, when I really got to work on this idea, it developed quite naturally into the kind of book I like to read: horror-influenced fantasy for sophisticated young readers (and grownups).

I put those paper dolls away and once I sold the manuscript to Putnam, my husband submitted his much more appropriate art for their consideration, and they liked it, and hired him!

Dreamdark is an imaginative, creative world. What was your world-building process like?

I always loved “world-building” when I was a young writer. As a kid I made maps of fantasy worlds, and I named the forests and mountains and drew in castles and lagoons and bogs and such; it was so much fun. But when I started conceiving of Dreamdark, it was very important to me that it is not really a fantasy world, but our world, our Earth, but from a non-human perspective. In a way, faeries are the personification of nature -- that is, if “nature” could react to human stewardship of the planet. Imagine, if you were of an ancient race that had been living on the planet for many thousands of years and you saw humans rise to dominance, and you had to witness deforestation and the Industrial Revolution, etc, it would be pretty horrific. So, that’s the backdrop here. Though it isn’t really part of the plot, it informs the world-building.

I always had specific real places in mind when I was writing, though the only one that crops up by its human name in Blackbringer is Rome. Dreamdark, by the way, is in Scotland. It’s been so much fun dreaming up a magical “world within a world” -- with all the wonders and horrors of Earth, mixed up with the wonders and horrors of my imagined, magical culture.

The second book takes place in various locations in Asia. I have a huge fascination with exotic flora and fauna, so I’ve loved researching the details of jungle and mountain settings, what kind of leeches there would be, what trees and birds, etc. I love this play between reality and fantasy, our real, magnificent planet inhabited by magical beings with their own cosmology and lore.

In Silksinger, there are caravans of traders that travel amongst the faerieholds, like the Silk Road traders of old, only instead of camels they use dragonflies, and they’re guarded by faerie mercenaries. A few years ago on a trip to Turkey I got to visit some real Silk Road cavaransarays, and those were a big influence. I also had a blast imagining what life might be like for rainforest faeries living amid the monkeys, carnivorous plants, fig vines, etc. Such fun!

Do you outline? If so, what is your outlining process?

I do, but I don’t force myself to follow my outlines. I’ll make a plan and follow it until it clearly doesn’t work anymore, which may be a few chapters, or maybe only a few pages. I find it is impossible to predict how a plot is going to work until I’m actually writing it. That doesn’t mean I don’t spend a lot of time up front plotting; I do. But then, I adapt as I go and re-outline many times in the course of a book. I think of outlines as kind of like “aerial photography” -- they give you an idea of the topography of your story, but it’s superficial. You aren’t going to truly experience your story until you’re down on the ground, walking through it. That’s when it comes alive. That said, that “aerial” view is absolutely crucial to me from the outset. I need to have that sense of where I’m headed -- even if that ends up changing along the way.

The next FAERIES OF DREAMDARK book is Silksinger. Can you tell us anything about the new book?

Silksinger picks up a few months after the end of Blackbringer, and it weaves together two storylines, one involving the characters from the first book, and one following new characters. They’re two young faeries with desperate secrets who meet on a dragonfly caravan crossing the
Sayash Mountains. One is the title character, Whisper Silksinger, the other is a young mercenary who isn’t who he claims. There are hobgoblins and apothecaries and devils, flying carpets and jungles and dungeons and Djinn. I’m just about finished with it now. (Whew!)

How many books are you planning on writing in the series?

The plan is five books, but that might change.

What are your favorite faeries in literature?

You know, I can’t really think of any! It seems a little weird to say this, but I’m not really a “fairy person.” More than fairy stories I love world folklore; it’s the richest vein imaginable to draw from: the whole collective imagination of our species, for all of human history! The amazingly bizarre things that people have dreamt up to explain phenomena like the northern lights, or bad luck, or drought. The monsters and demons and faeries that folk have imagined lurked in their world. That has been more of an influence on me that any particular faeries I can think of in literature.

What were some of your favorite books as a child?

I was (am) a big Madeleine L’Engle fan. I coveted the life of Vicky Austin -- it occurs to me now I really need to reread those books: Meet the Austins, A Ring of Endless Light, Troubling a Star, etc. As I recall, she had scientist parents, spent summers on an island with a stable converted into a library, with books in the stalls (can you imagine? I want that now); she got to swim with dolphins (and, I think, a handsome boy); take a journey to Antarctica, and of course there was romance! I also loved L.M. Montgomery, the three Emily books especially. Other favorites were From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler; Dragonriders of Pern; The Phantom Tollbooth; and The Trumpeter Swan.

What's your favorite thing about being a writer?

I think my favorite part of being a writer is getting to dream stuff up and put it in the world. It dazzles me that I can invent something and then see it -- hold it -- as a real thing: a book! And that other people can read it too. That’s so cool. I love knowing that whatever I imagine, whatever I write, I’m the only one who could ever have written precisely that, and if I didn’t, it would never exist. And the possibilities! It lights my mind on fire. There are so many stories to tell. Now that I’ve figured out how to finish a book (it took me a while to learn that), I wonder how many books I’ll have written by the end of my life. I have a pretty good idea what the next several will be, but who knows? Some other ideas may well cut in line. So much to do! I’d better get to work!

Thanks so much, Laini! I can't wait to read your future books!

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It's hard not to be charmed by Laini Taylor. This ultra-cool artista is one talented lady. You want vibrant art? Got it. You want pretty, adorned ladies who will prance about with inspirational quotes in your face? Got it. How about a faerie tale thriller that will keep you reading page after page? Yup. Got that one, too.

Laini is married to artist Jim Di Bartolo, and together, this couple is just oozing with hipness and talent. Jim designed the cover art for Faeries of Dreamdark: Blackbringer and is currently working on illustrations for Laini's other works.

Faeries of Dreamdark:Blackbringer is a tale of a devil hunting faerie. Yup. You read right. A devil hunting faerie. No sparkly dresses, fairy wands and sweet spells here. We're talking an unstoppable faerie, Magpie Windwitch, who is chosen to hunt down an evil demon who is intent on destroying the world. And she stalks this devil down with the prowess of a true heroine and the finesse of a Cirque du Soleil acrobat. Add her posse of loyal crows who will make you smile, a determined knitting warrior prince faerie who discovers a way to fly, a loyal friend, a disgruntled scavenger imp who is out for himself, and an evil faerie who pretends to be what she is not, and you've got one dark faerie tale of sweeping proportions that clips along with fresh language, action, humor, fear, and joy.

Faeries of Dreamdark:Blackbringer has only been out since this summer, and it has already been nominated for the ALA Best Book for Young Adults, the Booksense 2007 Summer Pick and the Cybils. If you're looking for a book to buy a favorite teen for the holidays, you're gonna want to put this book on your list. Wait. If you want to choose a book for any occasion, add this to your list. It's good.

Laini Taylor was kind enough to stop by and share her brainstorming ideas, tell about her writing projects, how she comes up with names, how she finished writing her novel and she shares wonderful writing tips. Laini seriously wants to help everyone else get to the finish line with her. How cool is that? So, pull up a chair and read awhile. You'll be so glad you did.

Without further ado, please welcome Laini Taylor...

HWM: What made you realize you wanted to write children’s books? How did you get your “break” into children’s books?
Laini: I’ve always wanted to be a writer, but it took me a while to find my voice and genre. After college I was writing mainstream, “grownup” stories and I wasn’t having much fun. Looking back, I realize I was writing what I thought I should write, what was “literary” etc, after being an English major and having teachers like Maxine Hong Kingston.

It took a gradual rediscovery of children’s books throughout my 20's, fantasy in particular, before I finally felt the fit. You know, I can’t remember if I was actively reading YA fantasy before the first Harry Potter book, but I don’t think I was. Once it occurred to me to write fantasy (which I loved as a child but got away from in my “literary snob years”), it was a revelation. Now I don’t think I could write “mainstream” if I tried; some fantasy element would creep in no matter what.

My “break” came at successive years of the SCBWI summer conference. It seems, in retrospect, that everything that kept me on my path as a writer happened right there in the Century Plaza Hotel. One year I met both my agent and a wonderful editor who expressed interest in my faerie illustrations, and agreed to take a look at the first few chapters of my novel-in-progress; after that, she really helped me develop it and I will always be deeply grateful. Without her, it’s really likely I’d have set the manuscript aside. At SCBWI I also attended a seminar by the writer Dan Greenberg about writing series for kids that helped me build my ideas into a world and a story. And later, I heard both of my current editors speak there, and asked my agent to send them my manuscripts. Now I will be doing my first SCBWI workshop this spring in Seattle!

HWM: Tell me what inspired Faeries of Dreamdark: Blackbringer.
Laini: It all began with paper dolls, oddly enough. I spent a few rainy months one winter drawing and oil-painting a set of elaborate faerie paper dolls. The characters were Magpie, Poppy, and Whisper, and I was planning a series of books to go with them, but at the time I envisioned them to be short, light-hearted tales for younger girls. Once I really got into the story, though, it grew naturally into the kind of book I like to read: sophisticated fantasy with the influence of horror (I’ve been a fan of horror since I was a little girl) and I put the paper dolls away and went with it.

HWM: When did you know you had the right ending for Blackbringer?
Laini:There’s something that happens in my head when I get the right idea; I think of it as the “snick.” It’s the sound and feel of a puzzle piece settling into place. You know how you just feel the rightness of it. I brainstorm a lot. I almost never stop at one idea/solution. Maybe it’s a holdover from art school where we were taught to always draw lots and lots of thumbnails before deciding on a final layout. That’s what I do with ideas too. I audition as many as I can possibly get, and when the right one comes along, I get the glorious, unmistakable “snick.” I’ve heard from other authors who have their own words for this -- one was “ping,” and I can’t remember the other.

HWM: Which character is most like you?
Laini: Hm. That’s tough. I feel really boring saying this, but I don’t think any of them are. I feel like, as the writer, I’m kind of a cipher, sitting in my little room dreaming up characters who are out dagger shopping at the bazaar or having breakfast picnics in the cemetary. There are a few characters I’ve written (one of them is in Goblin Fruit) who are sort of tongue-in-cheek homages to my teenage-self, filled with huge daydreams and wild yearnings, but none of the Blackbringer characters feel like me.

HWM: Who was the hardest character to write about?
Laini: The hardest were the main characters, Magpie, especially. I had never written a novel before Blackbringer; I had never created a character who could sustain a long narrative. This book was like “writing school” for me. In early drafts, Magpie was too perfect, too accomplished; I had to figure out how to make her feel real and lovable and flawed. There was a period of probably a year of writing chapters and dialogues, trying to figure out who the characters even were, what they cared about, what they would talk about, and none of that discovery process even made it into the book. In fact, in those early drafts, Talon had not yet come into being. There was another character named Acorn, and he just wasn’t working out. I had the idea tucked away in my brain for a later book that one day Magpie’s soulmate would emerge and that he would be a Rathersting warrior. And then it occurred to me: why save that? Why not use that now? And with that puzzle piece settling into place (“snick!”) the book started racing forward. Quirky or wicked characters like the crows or Batch and Vesper are always easier, I guess because they’re almost caricatures.

HWM: I now look at crows in a whole different way. Why crows and what inspired the idea of these wonderful characters?
Laini: Very early on in the planning of Dreamdark, back when it was still a very different, gentler sort of book, I had the idea of a young faerie raised by gypsy crows, and I just loved the idea, and through all the changes the book underwent, that one stuck. I love crows and ravens; I’d love to have one for a pet. When I was writing Blackbringer there were always a good half-dozen crows always right out the window, as if they were posing! I heard once about a woman who had a pet raven who flew beside her car when she went places. Can you imagine?

HWM: How do you think of names of your characters?
Laini: I love naming. For the most part I’ve used names that come from the natural world and that in some way reflect the personality of the character. Talon is from a warrior clan; all his family have tough-sounding names like Hiss and Nettle and Shrike. Magpie is descended from the wind and her family are named for birds -- her mother Kite (a small hawk), grandmother Sparrow, etc. Poppy, the plant mage, has a flower name. Bellatrix the huntress is named after the star Bellatrix, which forms the bow shoulder in the constellation Orion the hunter. It means “female warrior.”“Batch” is a funny one. It’s a family joke, but “batch” is my dad’s made-up word for any nameless icky substance -- the stuff that dribbles out of a leak in a garbage bag, the unidentifiable goo in the treads of a shoe. I decided that’s what “batch” means in the scamper language too!

HWM: I understand you’re in the process of writing a sequel to Blackbringer called Silksinger. What can you tell me about the new book? When is it due to be released?
Laini: Silksinger picks up a few months after Blackbringer ends, and there are two threads to the story: the continuing story of the characters from the first book, and the new characters. The title character, Whisper Silksinger, is the last of a great, ancient clan, left alone in the world to bear her clan’s terrible burden (much as the old Shadowsharp warrior in the beginning of Blackbringer was left alone with his clan’s duty, if you remember what that was). Journeying over the Sayash (Himalayas) by dragonfly caravan, hunted by devils, she meets a young faerie mercenary with an ancient scimitar and secrets of his own. It takes place not in the snug world of Dreamdark, but all across Asia from the jungles of Borneo to the islands of Halong Bay to the peaks of the Himalayas. I’ve had a wonderful time dreaming up exotic faerie cultures to go with these places! Hobgoblins feature, as do flying carpets. And there are a lot more devils. I’m not sure of the release date yet. Some time in 2009, most likely.

HWM: What are the challenges in writing a sequel?
Laini: This is new to me, but what I’ve found to be my main challenges are: coming up with a compelling storyline that works within the overall series arc and carries it forward; and giving readers what I think they will want after the first book, plus lots of new surprises they couldn’t have anticipated. From the very beginning of planning out the series, I knew I wanted new characters in book 2, but when it came time to write them, I couldn’t shake the feeling that the characters from book 1 couldn’t be left in secondary roles so I’ve had to figure out a way to entwine their storylines, making the most of both, and all the while working with the series arc. It’s more complex than Blackbringer because of that, but I never wanted it to feel complicated.

HWM: You have recently sold Goblin Fruit to Arthur A. Levine Books. What can you share about this project? Has a publication date been set yet?
Laini: Goblin Fruit consists of three supernatural tales -- two long stories and one novella -- about kissing! That is, each story is a supernatural romance that pivots on a single kiss with profound ramifications for the kissers’ souls. The title story is influenced by Christina Rossetti’s poem Goblin Market, which I have loved since college.

The other two are called “Spicy Little Curses Such As These” (set in Raj-era India) and “Hatchling.” They’re for teen and adult readers and are sensual and creepy and mysterious. I’m really excited that the book is going to be lavishly illustrated by my husband/art monkey, Jim Di Bartolo (who also did the art for Blackbringer), though it remains to be seen quite what this will look like, as that process is only just now beginning. The pub date isn’t firm. Probably 2009. I can’t wait to see what it will look like!

HWM: I never realized what an incredible artist you are, until I read your blog. Do you have any desire to illustrate books or work on an illustration project with Jim or write/illustrate your own book, or write a graphic novel or….. Laini: Thank you! I really would like to write and illustrate a picture book some day. That’s why I went to art school to begin with (in my mid-20s). I wanted to illustrate my own books! But I’ve since figured out that what I really want to write [now] is novels. Since I’ve gotten more serious about writing full-time, it’s been hard to keep up with painting.

I still make time for designing Laini’s Ladies, my “other job,” of course. But I haven’t painted in ages, and I miss it. Jim and I collaborated on a graphic novel a few years ago called The Drowned, published by Image Comics. We’d like to do more graphic novels some day, but I have no desire to illustrate one -- it’s way too big an illustration job for me!

HWM: What do you enjoy about your different careers? What do you do to organize both careers and keep things in balance?
Laini: Well, they’re fairly lopsided in terms of time devoted to each. I spend far more time these days writing than doing art. A few times a year I do a new line for Laini’s Ladies, but otherwise I’ve had to put illustration on the back burner. Each does provide a nice change from the other, so it’s nice to go back and forth. But what I’ve found is that for me, real balance just isn’t possible.

HWM: Do you outline or free form?
Laini: There’s not a free-form bone in my body. (Well, maybe it’s in there and just sadly underdeveloped!) I plan and outline like a maniac. When I feel like I’m on solid ground and ready to move ahead with the writing, I go for it, but I always end up coming back to outlining. It’s like my default setting is: planning! That said, the only truly joyful times I’ve ever experienced in the writing process are the times when I’ve hit a stride and I’m just writing, the scene unfolding ahead of me, fingers flying on the keyboard. It’s magical when that happens; I wish it happened every day.

I like to think of an outline as the equivalent of “aerial photography” -- you get a flattened-out, two-dimensional view of the topography of your story, with no sense what it’s really going to be like once you get “down on the ground.” You can plan all you want, but only once you’re in your story will the real life of it reveal itself -- the fragrance and predators and quicksand -- and you’ll have to be nimble and resourceful to adapt to what you find.

HWM: Where do you like to create?
Laini: I wrote Blackbringer at the kitchen table, and have since converted a spare room to my “writing room,” and that’s mostly where I write, with occasional changes of scenery to this or that sofa. And we have an art studio upstairs which is where I draw, paint, and design. It’s also where Jim works.

HWM: What is your writing process or ritual?
Laini: Ideally, I get up early, about 6, make coffee, and sit down to write. For me, the words of Emily Bronte ring true: “A person who has not done half his day’s work by ten o’clock, runs a chance of leaving the other half undone.” I’m a morning person, and though often I’ll work all day and evening, my most productive time is morning.

As for “process,” it’s always changing as I come up with new stategies to keep myself working, but my basic ritual is to start out my day’s writing in my “working doc” -- that is a sort of “decoy” document that I always have open next to my “real manuscript.” That’s where I trick my perfectionist-self into getting started, where I chit chat a little with myself about where I’m at in the story, etc. At some point, if things are going well, I switch over to my “real manuscript” and just write.

HWM: What has been the biggest challenge of your writing career and how did you tackle it?
Laini: Finishing a novel has been my biggest challenge. Muscling through to the end. First with Blackbringer, now with Silksinger. Goblin Fruit was easier because the tales are shorter. I hope it gets easier as I write more books, but finishing a novel is HARD and there’s only one way to do it: to just do it. No tricks or secrets. Just stubbornness! Learning that kind of “applied stubbornness” has been crucial for me. I tend to get paralyzed by perfectionism and want to rewrite early chapters over and over, rather than ploughing ahead. I need to constantly push myself forward.

HWM: What has been the biggest surprise of your writing career?
Laini: Goblin Fruit has been a big surprise from the very beginning. It was an entirely unplanned book. Each of the three tales began as one- or two-word writing prompts on Sunday Scribblings (they were “real life,” “monster,” and “music”) while Blackbringer was being edited. My intention was to get back to writing short pieces after spending over two years working on a novel; it was really just an exercise. Once I got into it, the ideas started flowing like crazy and these stories were born and formed themselves around a theme, and -- even more surprisingly -- Arthur Levine wanted to publish them! It has made me so aware of how ideas are always, at any moment, ready to give themselves up to you if you just put yourself in the right state of mind.

HWM: If you could share any unique writing tip to aspiring writers, what would it be?
Laini: From my own experience, it has been crucial to me to go to conferences. Not only do you learn a lot -- you truly begin to internalize the fact that writers are real people, no different from you, and so are editors. Under the influence of a good conference, writing begins to seem not like a crazy dream, but a real career.

HWM: What was the best writing advice anyone ever gave you?
Laini: I love what Jane Yolen said at a conference a few years ago: “Write the damn book.” I’m considering stenciling it on my wall!

HWM: Why do you blog?
Laini: I initially started blogging as a curiosity and found an instant connection to so many “kindred spirits” all over the world. I now can’t imagine NOT having it. I would feel incredibly isolated as a writer if it weren’t for blogs, being able to connect with readers and other writers this way. I don’t have a writer’s group or know any local writers, so it’s really important to me to have this community online.

HWM: What is your favorite post?
Laini: This might be my favorite. I posted it after my first ever book talk and signing (at ALA Midwinter last year), and I also posted the transcript of my talk. That was such a fabulous experience -- I [heart] librarians! And here’s a short fiction I wrote for Sunday Scribblings.

HWM: Why did you start Sunday Scribblings and Not For Robots?
Laini: I co-created Sunday Scribblings with one of my first blog friends, Meg, who lives in England, because we wanted something like “Illustration Friday” but for writers. I wanted to get myself working on short fiction and it has really worked -- as I mentioned above, all the stories in Goblin Fruit began as exercises for that site.

With Not For Robots, I didn’t intend it to be an active site, but just a place to post a series of essays on writing. I was inspired to write the essays partly because I was struggling with my own writing at the time and sometimes writing about writing helps me inspire myself, and partly because I have noticed that a lot of published writers don’t really talk about how hard writing is. Or if they do talk about it, they downplay the difficulty. I wanted to share the things I’ve learned, and all the tricks I have to use on myself to overcome my issues with perfectionism. When I have more time, I’d like to update the site and start including author interviews about process.

HWM: What inspired Laini’s Ladies? What is your process for creating one of your lovely ladies?
Laini: Laini’s Ladies was a serendipity in much the same way that Dreamdark was. Funny to think, the roots of my two careers are both: paper dolls! Dreamdark came about after I got obsessed with drawing and painting faerie paper dolls and created the characters of Magpie, Poppy, and Whisper. Laini’s Ladies were a further evolution of paper dolls that I created as my Christmas cards one year. They were laminated ornaments with bead feet, and I tested them out in my craft booth the week before Christmas, and I started selling out! It was a light bulb moment that really shifted the entire direction of my art career, and it was really a result of playing and following my creative whimsy.

HWM: Do both you and Jim work at home? It must be great for bouncing off ideas and for support, but I would imagine it can get stressful at times depending on deadlines, writer’s block, creative bursts of energy, etc. What type of arrangement did you have to work out, if any, to create in peaceful co-existence?
Laini: Actually, it’s effortless. Truly. We have an art studio that takes up most of the 2nd story of our house, and we work in there together; and I have my writing room downstairs, which is where I am mostly to be found these days. And we’re really lucky to share the same work ethic -- we’re basically always working. I think it would be hard for a “normal” person (ha ha) to be with either one of us. We’d drive them crazy never wanting to go out and “do things” when we’re working on a project. And, since we’re both home, we still get to see each other a lot, and then go back to our own workspace.

HWM: If you were a superhero, what powers would you want and why?
Laini: I would want the power to stop time so I could get more work done!! Really. I know that’s boring, but it would be so great. If I really were able to pick out a super power, though, I would probably have to go with something like invulnerability or healing ability (like Wolverine or the cheerleader on Heroes), because then I would never get sick or hurt or old. (I’m married to a comic book geek and we’ve played this game before!)

Other Places to Find Laini:
Laini's blog
Laini's website
Laini on MySpace
Sunday Scribblings
Not For Robots
Laini's Ladies

Excerpt from Faeries of Dreamdark: Blackbringer
Podcast of Laini reading the first few chapters of Blackbringer

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by Laini Taylor

How many young adult fantasies have you read with a fairy as the protagonist? Stop and think a moment. Having some trouble, aren't you?

That's what makes Faeries of Dreamdark different from any other fairy story. The main character is a fairy. She's a young (in human years, that is), spirited lassie named Magpie Windwitch. The ensnaring and destruction of devils is her trade . . . devils that clumsy humans are (unknowingly) setting free from captivity. When a dark, mysterious creature - that might not even be a devil - enters Dreamdark, Magpie and her crow friends really have cause for worry. And fear.

For some reason, this book strongly reminded me of the Redwall series. It had the same feel to it as those stories. It took me a little while to get into the book, but once I did I became totally immersed. From the halfway point to the end in particular, I had a hard time setting the book down . . . it was so exciting and good! Faeries of Dreamdark is humorous and thoughtful, and it has a unique kind of magical style to it. From its funny parts to its sad parts, it's obvious that Laini Taylor is quite the powerful storyteller. Despite the slowish beginning, I would highly recommend this book. I had loads of fun with it. Bring on the sequel!

**Originally posted on WORD blog

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FUN FACT:
On this date in history the following people were born -

• William Shakespeare
• Shirley Temple Black
• Vladimir Nabokov
• President James Buchanan
• Me
  

Yep. I'm hitting 29 and feeling fine. Fine as fish hair. Which is to say, this is my last year to celebrate not being 30. Or, another way of looking at it might be to say that this is the first year I'll be informing anyone who asks that I'm 29. Ho ho!

As per last year, I tend to celebrate this day on Fuse #8 with the reiteration of the book I'm pushing the most. Last year it was the delightful Fly By Night. Ah, Fly By Night. My favorite British children's book of 2006 (not to be confused with A Drowned Maiden's Hair which was my favorite American children's book of 2006). Now that we are well into 2007, I have decided to place my love firmly on a Yankee. This book is one that I've been pushing like mad since I first read it. So it is that I republish my favorite 2007 book review of the year (as of this moment)...

Faeries of Dreamdark - Blackbringer by Laini Taylor, illustrated by Jim DiBartolo. G.P. Putnam's Sons (an imprint of Penguin Young Readers' Group). $17.99

If you read only one fantasy book this year, read this one.

Gotcher attention, eh? I think that if you knew me, you’d know that I don’t throw out statements like this willy-nilly. I’ve read enough books for children and teens to know that no matter how good a story seems while you are reading it, there’s bound to be another that steals your heart a day or two later. Good books are published every single day, and declaring one to be the be all and end all of any category is just plain wrong.

That said, if you read only one fantasy book this year, read this one.

I mean it. First time author Laini Taylor has written a doozy of a debut. It’s one of those books you read and then find you can’t put down. I repeatedly found myself on the New York City subway system in a state of frustration every time I arrived at my stop. Somehow, Taylor is able to write a fantasy novel so compelling that you can never put it down because you've found yourself at a particularly exciting moment. Separating itself from every other fantasy series out there (an accomplishment in and of itself) Taylor’s written a book with just enough humor, tension, excitement, hope, joy, and pure unadulterated despair to please even the most jaded of fantasy loving kiddies. And it’s about freakin’ fairies.

Funny story. Remember that old fairy tale about the guy who found a genie in a bottle and when he opened it he was granted three wishes? Well, it won’t surprise you too much then to hear that these days whenever a human finds a bottle their first instinct is to uncork the sucker. Problem is, genies aren't the denizens of these bottles. Demons are. And when the demons are let loose upon the world there’s only one gal with the guts to put them in their place. Magpie Windwitch just happens to be the granddaughter of the West Wing (it’s a long story), a fairy, and she's traveling with her seven crow companions. Her job is to track down and recapture these wayward devils by any means possible. She’s good at her job, but little of her training prepares her for the darkest creature let loose yet. Called the Blackbringer, this nasty piece of work is intent on destroying the world, and its chances happen to be pretty darn good. To defeat it Magpie will have to cross over to the world of the dead, befriend the flightless, scurry, kill, confront the creator of the universe (who is SUCH a pill these days), and discover her true past. If you didn’t know her, that might sound like a tall order. If you knew her, it would still sound like a tall order, but at least you’d know she’ll tackle it with everything she's got.

Hopes were not high when I first picked up this book. I’ll level with you here… author Laini Taylor was previously best known for a line of fairy ornaments called “Laini’s Ladies”. From that you might imagine the book to be a sweet little flower fairy tale with a lot of dew-sipping and moonlight dances. Thank God for Laini’s husband Jim DiBartolo, then. Basically, it’s going to be hard to sell any book with the word “faeries” in its title to the male fantasy-reading public. That’s where Jim comes in. His illustrations for the book are fairly spare, with less than ten dotting the book. Still, Mr. DiBartolo has nailed the tone of his wife’s text. The image of Magpie on the cover is perfect. She looks like she means business. All the characters in this book look that way, actually. There’s nothing soft, flower fairyish, or namby-pamby about these sprites. And one can only hope that exposure to the Artemis Fowl books will have given readers an inkling of the kick-butt nature of faeries in general.

Not that there isn’t a healthy dosing of humor to boot. The crow brothers that accompany Magpie at all times act like a feathered version of Terry Pratchett’s Wee Free Men, language and all. They smoke cigars and put on plays at the drop of a hat (which is particularly amusing when you consider the lack of opposable thumbs and all). Every character here (except maybe the villains) has a sense of humor, and it’s an honest one. Taylor doesn’t have to force the jokes. They come naturally and lighten an already quick and fancy book.

Okay, but what’s the most important thing in any fantasy novel? The quality of writing, duckies. First and foremost there’s the language in this book. Taylor’s managed to create a kind of new speech that is infinitely understandable, but at the same time distinguishes itself from the pseudo-Gaelic slang so many other authors indulge in. There’s a great deal of pleasure to be taken in phrases like, “hush yer spathering,” or, “it shivers me,” or, “un-skiving-likely.” . She’s also a keen ear for lush otherworldly descriptions too. Some are gorgeous and remarkable. Others are so horrific you’re half amazed no one’s thought of them before. “Its mottled brown skin had the texture of dried gut stretched over a skull, and so crude were its features it seemed to have been sculpted in the dark, and with one obvious omission: it had no mouth.” I won’t describe any more except to say how it goes about GETTING a mouth is grotesquely unique.

Of course, the inevitable comparison here is going to be with Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The funny parts and mix of fantasy and horror placed alongside a heroine with supernatural powers who fights demons? Yeah. We’ve seen it before. The thing is though, this isn’t a Buffy rip-off. It’s powerful in its own right with its own distinctive mythology and unique world. Then again, it can definitely be boiled down to one girl saving the world. Why? Well, as the book explains at one point, “As with each devil she captured, she was the only one trying.” The nice thing about having Magpie as your heroine is that even when you’re worried for her, you’re not so worried that you don’t trust her. She may have the manners of a pit bull and the self-grooming talents of a mangy cat, but she’s tough and fun and will take on anything her size or larger if you let her.

You know what I liked about this book? No rhyming prophecies about the future. Can I tell you how rare it is to find a fantasy that doesn’t contain at least one, if not more, poorly rhymed prophecies about a “chosen one”? Okay, so fine. Magpie is kind of a chosen one. But she doesn’t have to solve any riddles about it and her destiny isn’t written in stone on an ancient parchment somewhere or anything. Besides, as the book puts it so perfectly, “She decided finally that it’s not so bad to find out you have a destiny when it’s something you were going to do anyway.” And by the way, when someone dies in this book it matters. It matters intensely. This isn’t one of those books where people die left and right and the stoic hero doesn’t feel the loss. Nuh-uh. If someone dies Magpie feels mourns it up. This is something not all authors think to do, and I for one appreciated it.

Oh. And there’s a warrior prince that knits. And a horrid little scavenger imp who enjoys putting his toes in his nose. And a host of other interesting, terrible, wonderful things all packed together in this book without ever feeling rushed or overused. For all its 400-some pages, “Blackbringer” moves at a remarkable clip, never getting bogged down or slow it doesn't sacrifice character or plot for the sake of action. Laini Taylor’s balancing act with this novel should be studied intensely by those wannabes that want to break into the world of fantasy writing for kids. It’s one-of-a-kind and worth a taste. I meant what I said and I said what I meant. If you read only one fantasy book this year, read this one.

Notes On the Cover: Fierce. As I mentioned in the review, the problem here is going to be selling this book to boys who think fairies fey. What G.P. Putnam's Sons should do is sell this to the Tamora Pierce market. Pierce fans are the perfect potential readers for this series. They like their fantasy smart and to the point. Female protagonists don't scare them off and they'll appreciate the humor. I think this cover should help. Plus I love how Jim counters Magpie's intense expression with flowers in her hair.

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