Before We Knew the Shooter's Name--poem v1.0

Hi Everyone-

This is a first draft, so forgive the lack of lustre. It felt necessary to respond today and polish later.
Enjoy.

Before we knew the shooter’s name

            by Maren Bradley Anderson

October 1, 2015, 3:00 PM

It’s already started:

            who was the shooter?

            what did he want?

            why was he so angry?

No questions about those whose lives he shattered.

who were they?

            what did they want?

            are they angry?

Is it too terrifying to think of the victims?

            sitting anonymous in class

half listening to the lecture

            or teaching, trying to reach those students who stare out the window

whose car had a flat yesterday—not today

who was late, but made it in time

whose dad was so proud she was going to college

whose motives were to get through today

            so they could get through tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow?

Whose dog will be lonely tonight?

People so like those I see every day

            I saw yesterday in class

            working in the library

            buying textbooks

standing in line at the coffee shop

            giving me excuses why they            

                 didn’t do the reading

or teaching, like me, for the love of the light lit in a few dim eyes

I hope to learn the victim’s names,

            but I won’t be given the chance.

I hope never to learn the shooter’s name

            but I won’t be able to avoid it.

Review of Shadowgirl by @KateRistau

A word about fairy tales. Shadowgirl isn’t a fairy tale. This book is about fairies, but as a folklorist, Kate Ristau recognizes that while pixies in Fantasia dance to classical music and make moon-filled dewdrops, this image of the fair folk is a more modern interpretation. In earlier stories, fairies could make fire and move the earth and the trees. Fairies in this book, in other words, are powerful and frightening.

Kate Ristau and her novel Shadowgirl

Ristau gets so much right with Shadowgirl. It’s a tale about a girl trying to solve the mystery of her mother’s murder, but it’s also a tale about a brewing war in the fairylands. The main character has the typical YA search for her identity, but the discovery and the journey are so extraordinary that neither is typical. Even the love triangle, such a stable trope in the literary world, gets an expert twirl so it lands on its head.

Ristau takes our mundane world—the book is set in modern Ireland—and makes it a place of darkness and mystery to Ainé, the protagonist who has lived her whole life in the land of the fairies and has never seen a shadow. She has dreams of her mother’s murder in the Shadowlands—that’s what fairies call our world—so she crosses in secret to find out once and for all what happened when she was taken as a child to live with the fairies. 

Also, I’m pleased to say that Ristau’s plot swerved in directions that surprised me. I didn’t foresee the plot twists, I didn’t guess the ending, and I was lead merrily astray until the end. It was awesome. The last time that happened to me with a YA book was the first Harry Potter.

The only criticism I have is that I didn’t know that Shadowgirl is the beginning of a series. The book ends with a crossing back to Fairyland, but so much is unresolved. All of the promises of the book are answered, but there is much left for the next book. Naturally, the next book is not out yet, so readers will have the same sweet agony I have now: waiting for book two while savoring the memories of book one.

Find Kate Ristau's Amazon page here.

Awaiting first edits on "Fuzzy Logic" #writing

The Acquisitions Editor at Black Opal Books (BOB) told me last weekend that Fuzzy Logic is on the desk of the editor for first round edits. I had two reactions pretty much simultaneously:

1) Huzzah!
2) Holy crap!

The first reaction is self-explanatory, but I'll explain it, anyway. I've been waiting for edits since I signed the contract in August. Now, I know that eight months is not long in Traditional Publishing time, but it is an eternity in New Author time. I caught myself several times imagining that my manuscript had fallen behind a book case, or maybe caught on fire, or was perhaps so horrible that the editor had refused to work on it.

None of these (except the last, perhaps) were really possible since BOB had an e-copy of the manuscript. However, when my children were born, I have acquired worry-wort superpowers that rival only my mother's. Mostly I keep them in check so my kids can have normal lives. However, sometimes I would slide into this worry slip-n-slide/spiral when thinking about the book.

The second reaction occurred when it sunk in that now someone with an opinion was going to tell me what is wrong with the book. Of course, I KNOW that there is stuff wrong with my book. I can list about ten things I'm planning on changing as soon as I get the edits in my hot little hands. However, someone with a valid opinion is going to critique my book, and I'm going to have make changes.

I've been able to take criticism for a good ten years now, but the young writer who equates someone liking my story with liking ME, she still lurks in my deepest heart of hearts. Silly young writer. Get back into your shame box and stay there.

So, now it's back to waiting. However, I'm sure that I won't need to wait another eight months.

m

#4c15 My slides and handout for my talk on Saturday M.05

Hi-

Slides for my talk and the handout are available on the Connected Community part of the CCCC website, but I thought I'd provide them here, too, especially for those of you who don't have access to the NCTE website. Or are just lazy. I get that, too.

Melliferous, the Grammar Dragon makes an appearance in the slide stack. Just so you know, this is a (stock) artist's rendition of Melliferous. No one has been able to get him to sit for a portrait, despite his old mother's pleas for "just one good picture to remember you by."

I'd love to see you all at the actual talk, too. We're session M.05 on Saturday.

Enjoy!

"Knock, Knock. Who's There: Humorous Approaches to Teaching Grammar"
Slides for my talk --Just what it says.
Handout --Resources, links, a reference list, and a coupon for a free ebook.

Not much happening, so I'm writing reviews...

You, loyal reader, may have noticed that I'm writing lots of little reviews these days. I'm writing reviews because it's good for me as a writer to think about why I like certain books, why I admire certain authors, and how I can make my writing better. Reviews help me do this to an extent.

Also, I'm still waiting for my first round of edits on Fuzzy Logic, my romance on an alpaca farm book. Because I know the edits are coming any time (and have been for months), I'm loathe to start any really big projects. I have, anyway (look for a book with Lilith of myth in the future), but it's hard to really get into a project when you know that there's something huge looming in the future.

That's my excuse, anyway. It seems lame now that I've written it down.

If you want some excitment, take a look at my friend Kate Ristau's blog: http://kateristau.com/  Her book Shadow Girl is due out May 5, 2015, and her cover is posted on her blog. She's awesome, and her book is awesome. So awesome.

m

Review of @AimeeBender 's "Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake"

The main character can taste the emotions of the people who make the food she eats. Her brother is trying to literally disappear. Southern California is a wistful, glaringly pastel backdrop for this book about magic so ordinary that it seems to escape the notice of everyone around them.

This book is beautiful, understated, dramatic in a quiet way. It’s magical realism at its most realistic. Just a girl who can taste her mother’s sadness in fresh-baked lemon cake.

(5 stars on Goodreads)

Here's the link to my Goodreads review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/321315769

Review of The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender by Leslye Walton

I like magical realism. I like a story about a girl (Ava) with wings who isn't an angel, a super hero, or a thing that has to be explained or forced to conform. I like a book-long metaphor that isn't explained. I like the nod to “A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings.”

But, I don’t think the reader needed the backstory at the front of the book. The great-aunt who turned into a bird when her love affair soured. The great-uncle, also killed with/by love, whose ghost followed the family. Wonderful characters and stories, but stories that could have been better woven into Ava’s story, rather than laid out in front of it.

(Incidentally, this criticism may be coming from my burnout on stories set in 1850-1910. I’m tired of trash-cluttered city streets lined by tenements and covered in horse-shit. It was the bad luck of this book to be the latest 19th century origin-story novel that I read.)

My only other criticism for this book is that I was aghast to find out “Ava Lavender” is a YA novel given the horrifying way Ava is violated at the end of the book, which is difficult to discuss without a spoiler. I think this criticism points more to the fact that my kids are very young, and I can’t imagine them reading something like this. This is the age of “Twilight” and “Hunger Games,” though, so perhaps I am the one out side of the norm. Kids, and YA readers especially, have been pampered for so long, when what they seem to crave is Grimm fairy tales, the grimmer the better.

Still. I like a story about a girl with wings and no explanation.