Well, what do you know. The day I finally decide to semi catch up on other blogs I should be reading, I find this: a contest to win an ARC of Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins, you know, the book I was raving about earlier.

check out the entire post here (there’s a very funny, okay, sorta funny, video):

http://onourmindsatscholastic.blogspot.com/2009/06/were-giving-away-catching-fire-arc.html

How to enter: Create a video no longer than one minute in length, of yourself, and only yourself, reciting the following pledge: “I hearby swear, if I am lucky enough to receive an advanced copy of Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins, I, [your name], promise not to spoil the story for those not as fortunate as I am.” Post that video to your favorite video hosting site (such as YouTube), and post a link to it in the comments of this blog post.
Deadline: 11:59 PM EST on 7/5/09
Prizes: Advance Reader Copy of Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
Void where prohibited
For complete rules click here.

Yeah, and it ends soon, so all ye who have not gotten yourselves ARCs of Catching Fire, do yourself a favor and make this very easy video. Not many people are entered so far, so your chances are pretty darn good.

So, I’m video Tweeting at @thefayz.

“What the ____ is a video Tweet?” you ask.  To which I answer, “Hey, watch your ______ language.  Do you even know what ____ means?  It’s a very rude word.  You little ____!”

Well, it seems if you have Tweetie which is a Twitter Client (no, I don’t know what that means, but my 12 year-old does) you can post videos to Twitter.

It’s really easy.  You go up to the Tweetie tool bar, punch “New video Tweet” and then just talk to the camera.  Assuming you use a Mac.  If you’re on a Windows machine I assume there are nine more steps and at least three crashes involved.

So I’m now using this video tweet thing to read HUNGER, a few paragraphs a day.  As you know, HUNGER is longer than the Bible, (but not as violent and the language is cleaner,) so it may take me a while.  The three I’ve put up so far are from my back yard which is my office.  But I’m thinking of doing some from different locations. Maybe from a B&N or a Starbucks or a Borders.  Anywhere that has WiFi.

I’m also thinking of answering fan questions that way.  And that makes sense.

Here’s what doesn’t make sense:  I’m thinking of reviewing books by video tweet.  In fact, I’m thinking of reviewing books I sometimes have to read to my kids.  For example a book series that rhymes with Wearing Stained Pears.  Kind of rhymes with it, anyway.

But I’m thinking it could be a bad idea.  Because I don’t have anything good to say about Wearing Stained Pears.  I kind of hate Wearing Stained Pears.

As you may know, the books are the story of how Mama Be. . . um . . . Mama Pear sucks the joy out of life. Here’s every Wearing Stained Pears story:  Mama tromps around wearing a white polka-dotted blue mumu and a tragic little Martha Washington matching cap, and destroys pleasure wherever she finds it.  You know about antimatter?  Mama Pear is anitjoy.  She’s the Predator drone of fun:  when she sees it, by God she kills it.  Boom!  Were you relaxing?  Boom, Mama Pear will put an end to it.  Were you just blitzing out, chilling, having a pleasant day?  Look out, it’s Mama Pear, Queen Buzzkill.

Junk food?  TV?  Making messes?  Skipping church?   Brother Pear’s heroin habit?  Whatever small measure of joy the Pear family might squeeze out of their tree-bound, rustic existence, there’s Mama Pear in her frumpy fat-dress scolding and nagging.

Her two children, the imaginatively-named Brother Pear and Sister Pear — that’s right, she named her kids for their relationship to each other as though neither of them is entitled to a distinct identity outside the suffocating confines of their grim, repressed family — have to be constantly on watch against any display of enjoyment or they’ll draw their harpie mother like bees to honey.

She’s the shrew of bears.  I mean pears.  She’s the black hole of happiness.  I mean, good lord, woman, climb down off it from time to time.  Shut up and go buy yourself a dress from this century.  Maybe something not shaped like a bag of mulch, you tedious, genderless, sanctimonious, hypocritical, soul-sucking prig.

But see, that would be wrong to do as a video tweet.  Because no one should say those things about the Wearing Stained Pears books.  Because, you know, they teach all kinds of good lessons.

I understand that in the final book Papa Bear . . . I mean Pear . . .  finally gets his axe and comes into the treehouse yelling, “That’s the last time you. . . ”

But I have to stop myself.  I don’t want to spoil it for you!

Well, I sure have some, in fact I have a lot, as I’m sure many other people do (trust me, I’ve experienced it first hand).

Which is why, I was so darn excited when I opened a nondescript white package from Scholastic to find my very own ARC of…dun dun dun…Catching Fire.

Be jealous. Be very jealous.

And after about a half of hour of jumping up and down excitedly and squealing to my family (who aren’t big YA readers by the way, so they had no idea why I was so happy), I holed myself up in my room to start reading. About four hours later, I was done (okay, technically, I went to sleep before I finished the last 15 or so pages, but if I stayed up for like ten more minutes…)

And all I can say right now to those who have been as lucky as me to get a Catching Fire ARC and have not read it, READ IT NOW! And for those who just aren’t that lucky, I’m very sorry, but you’ll have to wait until September to read this *very awesome* sequel to The Hunger Games.

What does every fictional Superhero need, besides their powers? Cast your vote in the sidebar poll here!

What brought on this poll? This post.

Who doesn’t love a book full of emotionally unstable teens with destructive powers and evil villains squashing all good and hope? Doesn’t that just sound thrilling!

A few of these awesome books:

The Awakening (Book One in the Quantum Prophecy Series) by Michael Carroll

The Extraordinary Adventures of Alfred Kropp (Book One in the Alfred Kropp Series) by Rick Yancey

Gone (Book One in the Gone Series) by Michael Grant

Heir Trilogy (The Warrior Heir, The Wizard Heir, The Dragon Heir) by Cinda Williams Chima

Hidden Talents (followed by sequel, True Talents) by David Lubar

Jack: Secret Histories (Book One in the Jack Series) by F. Paul Wilson

Jimmy Coates: Assassin? (Book One in the Jimmy Coates Series) by Joe Craig

Keys to the Kingdom Series by Garth Nix

The Magician (Book Two in the Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel Series) by Michael Scott

The Named (Book One in the Guardians of Time Trilogy) by Marianne Curley

Raven’s Gate (Book One in the Gatekeepers Series) by Anthony Horowitz

Strange Angels (Book One in the Strange Angels Series) by Lili St. Crow

Did your wish list just grow, or what?

Twilight… With Cheeseburgers (I thought this video was hilarious!)

Click here to read what I thought of the Twilight Movie.

A lot has happened.  Much of it boring.  Some interesting.  In no particular order:

1- I finished LIES: a GONE Novel.  I’m working on the rewrites right now.  Stage one:  Editorial Whack-a-Mole.  They send me the manuscript marked up with little red notes in the right margin.  Most of these notes say things like, “Deleted: and.”  Or “Deleted: ,”  I get a lot of those.  Apparently I, don’t exactly know where, to use, commas.  Anyway, there’s a little check mark inside the little comment box so I have to go through the not-quite-600 pages and hit the little check mark accepting all those “comma deleted” boxes.

2- Yep, writing’s kind of boring isn’t it?

3- Went to England.  Attempted to sign 1,000 books in one hour, like Meg Cabot.  Instead signed 1,300 books in four hours.  I have run the numbers:  I actually kicked Meg’s butt.  Shut up:  I did too.

4- Talked to various Hollywood weasels re: ANIMORPHS and GONE.  Results:  blah blah blah, we respect your work, blah blah blah.  

5- Hung out in Hollywood with “the boys.”  The boys are changing the entire face of web media.  And yet I end up picking up the tab.  Hmmm.  (By the way, the link takes a while to load.  Click on the arrow on the lower right of the screen.)

6- The boys want me to rewrite a TV script I came up with a  long time ago.   Are they paying?  Not yet.  So . . .

7- . . . I started work on The MAGNIFICENT 12.  Having so much fun.  I get to write funny.  I get to write silly.  So not GONE.

8- Editor Teresa asked me for cover suggestions for LIES, easy enough, and PLAGUE, the 4th book.  This is tougher because I have to commit to a couple of lead characters when I haven’t spent eight seconds thinking about that book.  I sent her some pix I grabbed from Google and Flickr.

9- The great and powerful K.A. Applegate is flossing, pauses to ask, “What are you writing?”  I answer, “Stupid Blog Name.”  She asks, “What’s the topic?”  I answer, “Topic?”

10- Much Purell being used around here.  No one wants the flu which I think should be called the “Carnitas Flu.”  See, it’s swine flu originating in Mexico.  Ah hah.  Okay, it’s not actually funny, but it’s mildly witty, right?  Right?

11- I totally missed the LA Book Fair.  Instead I mopped the floor.  Also wrote.  And cleaned the front of the refrigerator.  And bought shoes for the kids.  And ate chile relleno at Z Tejas.

12- My editors asked me to take down my old Facebook picture because it gave the erroneous impression that I was some grizzled, mean-looking old man who smokes cigars and drinks whiskey.  Not exactly the image we’re going for apparently.  So I replaced it with a picture of Katherine and me.  Awwww.  Sweet.

13- While I was in the UK I did a brief shoot for Wordia.  

14-GONE is sold out on Amazon UK.  Kinda cool, huh?  Unless they only bought two copies.  In which case it’s pathetic.

15- These kids?  Cool.  Demonstrating one of the themes of GONE: that kids can step up, be so mature, so capable, so good.  On the other hand, this story also demonstrates one of the themes in GONE: that kids can be every bit as rotten as adults.

16- I’m loving Southern California.  I bought actual shorts.  I won’t wear them in public, I’m not a sadist, but I will wear them in my yard when I write.

17-The thing I buy when I shop for food that I don’t actually eat:  cheese.  I love cheese.  But I kind of love it more when I’m at a nice restaurant and it’s a cheese course.  For some reason I don’t eat it at home.  

18- Next week we’re all going to Minneapolis so Katherine can do some big HOME OF THE BRAVE thing with the library there.  Also some school visits.  I’ll maybe sign some books at the International Reading Association.   Then I’ll take the kids to the Mall of America and eat junk food and hate myself for it.

19-End of May I go to Chicago, to Anderson’s Bookstore min Naperville for the launch of HUNGER: a GONE Novel.  Don’t miss it if you’re in the Chicago area.  

20- Speaking of Chicago, I wrote about the city for the London Telegraph.

21- In the battle of the XLT black t-shirts, I give it to Land’s End over Eddie Bauer.  If it’s XLT black polo shirts I take Eddie.  

22- Kind of sad:  my relatively cool Audi A6 isn’t as much fun to drive as my totally uncool Toyota RAV 4 (6).

23-Can you have a list that’s 23 items?  I mean, it’s a prime number, doesn’t it have to be a multiple of ten?

Okay, just kidding. I’m not in the UK. I am on vacation (if you count visiting colleges on the East Coast of the US of A is a vacation). The UK part comes from something else very exicing:

For the first time ever, I have been quoted in a published book. Eek! Trés exciting for moi (pardon my franglais). It’s the UK version of Gone by our very own Michael Grant. This has seriously been like my dream for a while. I’d always see this or that person in the acknowledgements or quoted and be like, well, that would be cool if that was me. And now it is. Squee!

Now, all I need to do is buy myself a copy of this UK version…

Some pics so you can share in my happiness if you so choose.

THe pictures are a little small, but you can click to enlarge them.

So, I’m in London about halfway through this book tour thing. Today I did some improv stuff for Wordia.com. That went fine. As did the interview with 13 year-old Hugh yesterday. And the Burgers with Booksellers thing last night.

But today I had to give an actual speech. A dozen people in a small room. No podium. Nothing to separate me from those piercing, judgmental, critical eyes. The eyes! The . . . eyes!

Okay, actually there were no eyes. It was a dozen eyeless people. And that was creepy, quite frankly.

Anyway, I give this speech. And there’s a kind of appalled silence. Questions anyone? Yes, I have a question: what the hell is the matter with you? What in God’s name does Ulysses S. Grant have to do with your book?

Here’s what was cool tonight. I walked from my hotel at London Bridge all the way to Selfridge’s department store on Vegemite Street. (That’s right: I am sticking with the Vegemite.) A long walk. Maybe an hour or so. Over the bridge, through the City of London with banker types spilling out of pubs, drinking beer and smoking cigarettes. Along the river. Run-down old ships anchored along the way, turned into banquet halls. A drunk, skinny punk and his mate hoot and challenge, looking for trouble. I’m wearing a topcoat. Hands come out of pockets, we exchange glares, they decide that I may be a little larger than they’d like.

I walked through Trafalgar, said “Dude!” to Nelson way the hell up on his column. Through Picadilly Circus. (Turns out it’s not actually a circus. Huh. Not so much as an elephant.) Think Times Square minus 90% of the neon. The Brits still can’t touch us for jaw-dropping over-the-top excess. Seriously: their bankers are still stealing millions, apparently unaware that we’ve all moved on to stealing billions.

Up Regent Street which is unfortunately all the same damned stores we have in the States. But there were all these tiny side streets I didn’t have time to wander down. A trio played what was probably Mozart, the cello drowned out by passing cop cars.

At each street I pause, check the “Look Left,” or “Look Right” signs painted on the street. It’s bad enough these people insist on driving on the wrong side of the road, but every other street is one-way so there’s no way to make any sense of it.

I finally reached Selfridge’s which is a world-class department store. Dutifully bought crap for my kids. Spent a small fortune on four cigars from a certain Caribbean nation which shall remain nameless because we don’t want to poke US customes in the eye, now do we?

Cab back to London Bridge. London cabs are flat out the best in the world. No! Don’t bother to argue. They find their way around a city that was, as we know from history, laid out not by an architect but by drunken sailors on leave from Her Majesty’s Navy. What they would do is tie a string to a sailor before he was given his freedom and a guinea (no, not an Italian, Jesus, keep up,) and told to go wherever he wanted. The sailor promptly took a large quantity of rum on board, set off in pursuit of hookers and wherever he went, that became a London street.

Yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s true. I checked Wikipedia.

Picked up a sandwich and cheese at Marks and Spencer in the train station. Insipid bottled bitters. Good cheese. Peaches. A puzzling sandwich.

I’m back in my room, sated, scanning British TV. Sweet lord: they’ll put a gardening show on in prime time! People are planting flowers at 9:00 pm. Seriously? We’re mulching in prime time? American TV executives must come over here and think they’re anthroppologists studying aboriginies. Do these people know nothing of The Demo?

Yesterday I was watching Robin Hood, and Friar Tuck was a black dude. No explanation. None of the Merry Men saying, “Jesus, it’s the 12th freaking century, it’s freaking England, none of us has ever traveled further than Ye Olde Swine Faire over in Twaddle, and yet, here’s a black dude and we don’t even notice!”

English Guys: as the more experienced member of the Special Relationship when it comes to racial balance in TV, allow me to gently suggest: it’s okay to mention that a black guy might stand out in Sherwood Forest. That’s not racially insensitive. You know, as it turns out, black people know they didn’t play much of a part in fighting the Sherrif of Nottingham. I’m sure they would have been happy to help out, but your typical Masai was not terribly well-informed on the whole John vs. Richard the Lion Heart thing.

Anyway, Moll Flanders is on now, and it’s an American movie with a bunch of American actors pretending to be English. And Morgan Freeman. So much for laughing at British racial idiocy. But on the other hand you can’t argue with Morgan Freeman. There’s never a bad time to have Morgan Freeman around. He could be here, right now, narrating and I’d be cool with that.

Morgan Freeman: “Michael takes another swig from the bottle of Bowmore 12 year.” How great would your life be if Morgan Freeman was doing the voice over?

The point is — and you thought I had no point, hah! — is that London is like the woman you deliberately don’t get to know because you’re happily married. (WTF? Seriously? That’s your analogy?) I think I could totally fall for this city. And I can’t. Kids, schools, sunshine . . . all that is great in California.

But I almost have to avert my gaze, not look at London too much, not think about it too much. Because it may be the greatest city on earth. It seduces without trying. And I can’t live here.

So, off to London this afternoon for a week-long book tour thing.  Sign some books, schmooze with booksellers, hang out with the Egmont people, do some panel, an interview or two.  And then on Wednesday I’m hoping to get some free time so I can watch the demonstrations/riots at the G-20.

Apparently demonstrators will be converging on the Bank of England, which is just across London Bridge from my hotel.  I’m supposed to be running around from bookstore to bookstore while all this converging is going on, glad-handing and signing books and generally being charming.   Yes, that last one is a stretch.

Meanwhile the demonstrators will be shouting whatever it is one shouts at central bankers.  I’m going to guess:  No more bailouts! But it could be:  Longer weekend hours! Or:  Shorter lines at the drive-thru! Or:  Hotter tellers!

I’m not sure.  Because like every single member of the human species, I have no idea how to solve the economic and financial crises.  Oh, there are plenty of people who think they know how to solve it all.  But they don’t.  When you have ten experts and you hear two opinions from them, that’s standard partisanship.  When you have ten experts and you hear ten opinions, you have “experts” in quotes and none of them knows a damn thing for sure.

Nevertheless, people enjoy a good rage, so a lot of people will pour into the streets of London, surround the B of E, and furiously demand conflicting or even nonsensical solutions to a problem the guys inside the Bank of England will have no clue how to solve.

Good times, good times.

Here’s my defense in case the rioters turn on me as I’m passing by:  I only ever took out 30 year fixed mortgages! Or possibly:  I’m just a stockholder and I never even bought on margin!

Or I could run away, but really, at my age what are the odds that I can outrun a wild-eyed anarchist?  I could maybe beat one up, because it’s not like they can organize and come after me in a group, but really, I’m hoping that if beating is required I can be matched against some mildly irate Unitarians rather than, say, drunken punks.

Here’s my defense in case I am chased by drunken punks:  I love Rancid and even the solo projects Lars Frederiksen and Tim Armstrong do!

And if it’s Unitarians?  I appreciate your lack of dogma!

Or maybe I’ll just skip the whole thing, stay in the hotel bar and get drunk.

I used to think I had the best job in the world. Day after day, I sit around in my sweatpants and make stuff up. And people pay me for it! What could be cooler? Okay, it would be cooler if people paid me more for it, but – you know. I do okay, all things considered.

As it turns out, if you take money out of the equation (and with most writing jobs you have to), a woman named Jeanne Hoffa has the best job in the world. She writes the daily crime log for my local paper. Being from New Jersey, I love that someone named Hoffa writes the crime log. (Confused? Google “Hoffa” and “Meadowlands” and all will become clear.) Beyond that, I am in awe of her ability to encapsulate entire lives in a few short lines. Example:

Transient – white man in his 50’s wearing a baseball cap, a black trench coat and carrying a camouflage bag is blocking the driveway at the Kinder Care Learning
Center stating the governor owes him money.

Bear in mind that the paper is published in California – which means the governor in question is Arnold Schwarzenegger. Hasta la vista, baby.

More from the same issue:

Suspicious – Caller states there is a bloody knife in the dirt to the rear of the House of Bibles on Harbor Blvd. Final Case: Halloween knife. No blood.

Patrol Check – Caller request patrol car due to her husband having an affair. The husband of the woman her husband is cheating with is threatening to pummel him.

Suspicious – Man is standing in the middle of the street attempting to pull his pants down. The pants are jeans. Also wearing a baseball jersey. Possibly drunk.

Possibly drunk? You think?

And, finally, file this one under “I believe the children are our future”:

Suspicious – Authorities at Fullerton High School have student in principal’s office who asked what smoking methamphetamine does after taking ADD meds.

All of this goes to show that the best material does not lie between my ears but outside my front door. However, having also read the less-amusing entries (Disturbance – Caller’s grandson was standing outside on 600 block of e. Imperial Highway when an unknown subject pulled up in a red Volvo and pointed a black handgun at him), I’m thinking I should keep my front door locked.

Hello, old friends. Long time no write. I’m moving; I’ve shut YA New York up for awhile so I can do some revamping (and also some moving), and I have a bone to pick about books.

You see, I have a lot of books. So far I have packed up about ten boxes to keep, given away two boxes, and set aside what looks to be another two to four boxes to give away.

I’ve even thrown away — recycled — a few that had fallen into the bathtub one time too many.

But it’s hard to choose what to keep and what to part with. As a reviewer, I get tons of books. Tons. Some are completely inappropriate for YA New York — picture books for small children, adult romance novels for some reason — and others are books I didn’t find worthy of review.

Then there are the books I did like, and did review. Do I keep them? If I do, I will soon collect so many books that no apartment is big enough to hold them all.

So I use a system. Will this book have a sequel? If yes, keep. Is this book or book series iconic? If yes, keep. What if I don’t like this series? Keep it anyway. What if I feel I’ve gotten all I need from this series? Keep the first book. (Examples:Lemony Snicket, which is tween lit and not really my area of expertise, Gossip Girl: the original series, which I’ve committed to memory though I can’t say I loved every one of the books. My YA LA correspondent should, of course, own every Gossip Girl book, because one of these days she’s going to have to write some TV pieces about the whole thing.)

But what else determines whether I’ll keep something? It feels like a sin to throw away a book … and not just that second copy of the The Book of Mormon, a duplicate gift from the boyfriend’s parents. No, anything that someone has put time and effort into feels like a living being to me.

Still, the idea that I’ll give this book away, and maybe it will circulate, and a few new people will pick it up from the library or the Salvation Army or wherever else books end up, is something that makes me feel better. My galleys of Alma Alexander’s books will live on, and I get to keep the nice hardcover copies for myself. Those books I never reviewed and never will? They too may find an audience. (And some of those books, by the by, are books I meant to review and never got around to. Which is why I’ll be restarting some sort of catchup review thing over at my site, when things get going again.)

But I want to ask all of you, especially Mr. Michael Grant, what you do with your books when you move? Other reviewers, how do you deal with all the books you receive?

In spite of it all, there are always too many books I can never part with — I’m looking at you, Ms. Cabot, with a little bit of resentment because I absolutely must keep every one of your books, always. Books by people I care about, or books about things I care about, or books that are one of a kind, or books I want to study and compare to other books, or books I just want to hug and love forever because they’re so good.

My boyfriend, by the way? Is totally annoyed by how many books I insist on lugging along with me to our new apartment. We’ve been keeping books in a closet for the last year or so, and now we’ve got to buy yet another bookcase.

All right, Meg.  I’m in.  

Oh yeah:  we are on!

Some time ago Meg Cabot issued the Crack and  Stack challenge.  Confident of her superhuman book-signing abilities, the Queen of Chicklit issued a challenge to authors: sign a thousand books.  In one hour. I’m not sure why she insists we smoke crack, but what the heck.

Wait.  Okay, I re-read the part in Meg’s post about the crack.  So never mind that.

On Tuesday, March 31st, I will present myself at the offices of Egmont Publishing, #3 Vegemite Street in the quaint English village of North  Eelpie on Gorge, Nossex, UK and whatever random string of numbers those foreigners use in lieu of a decent, God-fearing zip code.  (Maybe I should double-check that address.) There I will be presented with (up to) 1,000 books to sign.

I will proceed to school the arrogant Ms. Cabot.

However.  I would like to make note of two facts.  One: I’m 100 years old and afflicted by most of the illnesses diagnosed on House during that show’s first three seasons.  (That’s right:  leprosy. I’m down to a thumb, a finger and a nub.)  Two: there are online rumors that Meg Cabot has a prosthetic robot arm.   I don’t have any proof of that.  I’m just putting it out there, you be the judge.  So it’s possible that a fair-minded person would want me to benefit from a small handicap.  Let’s say 300 books.

The winner will be chosen by this blog’s Alistair Spalding (or his representative,) who can be relied upon to set aside the fact that his employer publishes me while some (possibly Communist) competitor publishes Meg Cabot.

Today Stephen King — yeah, that Stephen King — wrote this to my editor, Katherine Tegen:

I’ve been corresponding with your “Michael Grant” about his Gone books. More important, I’ve been reading the Gone books–the first and Hunger, the follow-up. These are exciting, high-tension stories told in a driving, torrential narrative that never lets up. There are monsters, there are kids with mad-crazy super powers, there’s the mystery of where all the adults went. Most of all, there are children I can believe in and root for. This is great fiction.

If you want to quote any or all of that, be my guest. I love these books.

Stephen King

I don’t want to go all sincere on you people, but if you showed me starred reviews from everyone with a star to give, it wouldn’t mean as much to me as this does.  Reviews are really great.  But this is Stephen King.

If you get past my affinity for German cars, tasting menus, molecular cuisine and single malt whiskeys (ahem) I’m a blue collar guy.  My father was Army.  I had a decidedly lower middle class childhood.  High School drop-out.  College drop-out.  I was a stock clerk, a house painter, an office cleaner, a resident manager of crappy apartment buildings.  But mostly I was a waiter.  For a decade.  

When I waited tables I carried a bigger station than anyone else in a given restaurant and I worked more shifts.  I worked every shift they’d let me have.  I would carry eight tables — two regular stations — and do it 7 nights a week.  I love work.  Work gave meaning and structure to my life and even at my lowest, when I was a hopeless screw-up, when I was broke and (deservedly) friendless I still worked my ass off.  At one point in my life I was sleeping under an overpass in Austin, Texas, with my busboy black-and-whites in a locker at the Trailways station and I still worked every shift.    

There are a lot of good writers out there.  (Some of them blog here.)  There are other people who can write (almost) as well as Stephen King.  But no one else is as good as he is and also as hard working.  He doesn’t stop.  He doesn’t let up.  He doesn’t whine about writer’s block.  He gets it done, and when he gets it done it kicks ass.  He’s seven years older than I am, he’s been through addiction, and he got run over and almost killed for God’s sake, and he still outworks me. He carries that eight table station on a Saturday and he’s got everyone loving him at the end of the night.

If there’s one guy I want to be when I grow up (an event delayed by, oh, about 30 years so far,) it’s Stephen King.  I’ve had some high points in writing:  big checks, bestseller lists, fans, nice reviews.  But this?  This is really cool.

A few books that I have read in the past few months all share in the respect that the main characters are all dealing with pain. They all need healing of the body and mind, but will they be able to heal? You’ll have to read to find out!

Below are snippets of my reviews of a few books that could be looked upon as books of pain, but more accurately books of healing.

North of Beautiful by Justina Chen Headley
Publication Date: February 2009
5 out of 5 stars

“Author Justina Chen Headley has a real, hard-to-find skill in modern day authors. She entwined intuitive philosophies generated by a simple object, a map. She wove a beautiful novel with substance… North of Beautiful was a profound, thought provoking novel that was crafted with an intelligent, insightful hand.” For my whole review, click here.

Evermore
By Alyson Noel
Pub. Date: February 2009
4 out of 5 stars

“Evermore wasn’t mind-blowing, but its slight suspense, eerie mystery, and strange magic were interestingly entertaining… Evermore was clearly a first book in the series because many profound outlooks were hardly explored. I’m curious to find out how Ever is going to deal with her new life and I also hope to see more illustration of Damen’s supposed compassion in the second book, Blue Moon.” For my whole review, click here.

Privilege
By Kate Brian
Pub. Date: December 2008
4.5 out of 5 stars

“Privilege far surpassed my expectations. The writing and characters of this book stands out from other YA literature currently available… Ariana was a mentally unstable murderer. Yet I really liked her. She had many great qualities that all centered around her morals and guilt ridden conscience. She was a mind-boggling naughty main character who was trying her best to do what’s right.” For my whole review, click here.

Willow
By Julia Hoban
Pub. Date: April 2009
5 out of 5 stars

“Willow was a powerful book that was entirely phenomenal at expressing the perspective of a teenage cutter… The main character, Willow, was a chaotically layered mess of colors. Her naked canvas of pain was hidden under many layers of conflicted feelings… Willow was an extraordinarily real person…” For my whole review, click here.

I’ve recently converted to Twitter. I’ve always enjoyed updating my facebook status and now I get to do it my mobile (or while I’m supposed to be at work). Here I am.

I like the format, the 140 character limit and the instantaneous nature of the updates. So I just have one question. What should I twitter about?

Anybody with followers on Twitter are either famous (I’ve chosen a famous Brit that I hope you recognise) or are offering some kind of service. What do I do if I can offer neither of these things?

Okay, so I’m kind of happy to follow a few other people that I find interesting, but I’m not a follower, I’m a leader! I just point me in the direction of a topic to lead on!

I’ve put a few tweets on there about my ride to work (time, attire and instances of near death) so I could run with that.

I’ve put a few tweets on that are surreal in nature, but grounded in my flawed understanding of Physics, so that could be the way forward.

A friend of mine already stole my other idea. He’s twittering about his life as a zombie/living amongst zombies.

So what should I do, use one of these ideas, or twitter on another topic of your bidding? I await your ideas with baited breath.

There are a large number of book publishers on twitter and it’s quite revealing to follow them, so if I’m not interesting enough I’ll just have to do it on behalf of Egmont.

If you read enough behind-the-scenes writing by famous authors, you’re probably over-familiar with the “Why I Write” essay. Sometimes these are pretty damn inspirational (I’m thinking of Paul Auster’s pieces collected in The Red Notebook), and other times a wee bit indulgent and hateful (probably best not to name names, sorry). But it is all too rare to come across an essay about why we read.

For me, it has always been about What Happens Next, about storytelling at its most fundamental, that breathless and then, and then, and then. It can be easy to forget that, sometimes—I become enamored with a writer’s wit or pyrotechnics or form-bending exercises, and I spend ages hacking through wildernesses of metafiction, giving my brain a workout on playgrounds devised by genius loons. (I’m thinking, of course, of the usual suspects: Thomas Pynchon, David Foster Wallace, Jeanette Winterson, Paul Auster—really, this shelf is endless, and endlessly fascinating.)

And so I forget about plain old story. Until I stumble upon it again and recall, Oh yeah! This is what it’s all about.

Which brings me to The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas. I began reading this the other day, and it’s a struggle to pull myself away from it. Yes, it is wordy and long and taxes my vocabulary, but good God! It moves like it’s on speed. Things happen, pretty much from the first few pages. Our naif hero d’Artagnan takes offense and challenges a stranger to a duel; the stranger can’t be bothered because of a mysterious plot he’s involved in with the beautiful Milady; d’Artagnan suffers a theft of the thing he most prizes in the world. And that’s all in the first chapter. I don’t know where it’s going, but I can’t wait to get there.

Dumas keeps the reader on a need-to-know-basis, telling us no less than but no more than we need at any particular point in the story, filling us in as things develop. He perfectly illustrates the tried-and-true reliable story mnemonic  ABDCE—Action, Background, Development, Climax, Ending. That formula is usually used to discuss the short story, but it applies just as much to the novel, and to sections within novels: engage readers with action, parcel out just enough background to pique our interest, escalate to some sort of breaking point, get out.

We can all learn a thing or two from that kind of story. Speaking of which, I’m going to get back to it.

I have just returned from Oslo, Norway after a long weekend break with my wife.

Oslo is an amazing city. How amazing is it? From the city centre we grabbed some ski’s, hopped on the Metro system, and half an hour later we were cross-country skiing through the countryside to another metro stop. We got back on and were home in time for dinner. It’s that amazing.

I fell over about 15 times and wiped out a three year old child. A Norwegian three year old child already has three years of skiing experience and was doing great until I slammed into them at full pace, completely out of control. The childs Norwegian parents were quite upset until they realised I was British. Then they just kind of rolled their eyes in a patronsing way.

I went to the offices of my Norwegian colleagues to find out how things run in Norway with book sales and marketing and was reassured by the similarities of the UK and NOR systems. They also set me straight on an issue that I had previously maligned Norwegians for:

Actually the biggest tragedy is that reading isn’t big in Norway, despite the fact that it’s dark and cold most of the time. They’d rather watch blu-ray DVDs on big screen TVs instead. Oh - and occasionally they go skiing.

Actually they said that Norwegians read a massive amount of books per/capita and I did see an awful lot of bookstores in the capital. So apologies Norway - you do read - there is no tragedy.

My holiday reading was The Phoenix Files: arrival by Chris Morphew who I spotted commenting on my own insightful posts here. His publishers Egmont Hardie Grant were kind enough to send me a copy.

I have to say that it’s terrible holiday reading. It’s much too interesting, much too fast-paced and much too unputdownable. I finished it on the plane on the way to Oslo leaving me without a book for the rest of the weekend. I’m thinking of writing to complain.

Chris lists one of his interests as Animorphs (Michael Grant take note) and the book is a really engaging story about a creepy corporate-run town that seems to be bent on the destruction of the rest of the world. Luke Hunter, the new (and final) arrival to the community, uncovers the beginings of the truth behind the town. It’s a perfect YA read, great characters, a really engaging story and leaves you desperate to know more at the end. Well done Chris and good luck with the rest of the series. The faster you write them the better!

When my son was two years old, he used to play with Power Rangers figures. I hope he never reads this, because now that he’s a teenager, he’d probably wire a bomb to my car for saying it. Or strangle me with his iPod earbuds.

His favorite was a green one. Trevin’s Green Ranger was missing a leg, so my son named him “Lucky.” He explained, in perfect two-year-old oral arguments, that the Power Ranger had to be “Lucky” because he wasn’t missing the other leg, too. Trevin took Lucky everywhere with him, even several times to Hawaii, when we’d go there to visit my wife’s side of the family.

We live on a farm. I brought home some baby chickens a few years ago, but they were too small to put out in the henhouse, so we kept them in the bathroom. One day, our Aussie dog came into the house to herd and play with our little chickens. The dog played with one of them a little too enthusiastically, and ended up removing all the bird’s feathers. But the chicken didn’t die (yet), so, of course, we named her “Lucky.”

When the chickens got big enough to move out to the henhouse, they thrived there (except for the ones who got eaten by a mountain lion). They lay so many eggs that we have to give them away. And they pretty much have their run of the place, going anywhere they want to (they’re fast enough to keep clear of the dogs).

One day, one of our horses stepped on Lucky’s leg and broke it. So I guess there was some kind of weird prophesy in naming her Lucky. Anyway, she still didn’t die (yet). But her leg was permanently bent backwards, and she didn’t so much walk as hop. But she still got around okay.

When we go out to the henhouse in the mornings, all the chickens follow us inside for food. Sometimes, when we stir around the straw and nests, we’ll uncover mice. The chickens love to chase the mice. They’ll even fight over them and eat them.

I have no doubt that if chickens were big enough, they’d eat people.

And chickens can live a long time, but not Lucky. When she died (finally), I found her outside the henhouse. She had choked to death on a really big mouse. The mouse was dead, too, hanging half-way out of Lucky’s unlucky beak, a weird kind of barnyard murder-suicide.

We still have lots of chickens, but none of them have names (yet).