“I’ve mentioned earlier in this blog my experience as a judge for last year’s National Book Awards, Young Adult panel. It involved reading 278 novels in a short summer. I knew I’d learn a lot about writing in the process, but was unprepared for the “hangover” effect upon my writing. In a nutshell, the whole […]
Read articleSame Title, Different Book
In 2005, Farrar, Straus & Giroux published my coming-of-age novel Full Service. Set in small town Midwest in 1965, it’s the summer when everything changes (most of have such a time) for sixteen-year-old Paul Sutton. Fresh off the farm, and from a church-going family, he takes a job at a gas […]
Read articleApproaches to Writing Your Novel
My most successful novel for young adults is Memory Boy, a draft of which I wrote in three weeks. That should have told me something. However, as a novelist I’m a slow learner; or more precisely, each novel is its own puzzle to solve, and it’s usually a mistake to hark back to the previous […]
Read articleAuthors and Book Clubs
“Oh, The Places We’ll Go” The famous Dr. Suess book by similar title is most certainly an allegory of authors and books clubs. When I publish a new book I’m certainly “off and away” […]
Read articleWriting and Season
Understanding personal, daily bio-rhythms is a big part of the writing process — are you a morning writer, a late-night writer, or maybe your best time is after a siesta? But don’t ignore the impact of season on your motivation to write and even the quality of your prose. Northern writers with four distinct seasons […]
Read articleAmazon and Denial
Most authors can’t resist checking their “numbers” (book rankings) on Amazon. We do it because it’s the fastest way; sales numbers from our publishers are usually months behind. And Amazon has been increasingly clever in cultivating authors by offering free space for author profiles. I’ve dutifully signed on, though somewhat reluctantly, because I try to […]
Read article2011 Year in Review: Youth Literature
My tenure as a judge for the National Book Awards, 2011, ends today. It was a fabulous, exhausting and remarkable experience. Along with four other judges (Ann Brashares, Nikki Grimes, Marc Aronson, Matt de la Pena), I read 278 books over the summer. Our panel gradually narrowed the entries to about thirty, then ten, and […]
Read articleThe Best of the 2011 Books for Young Adults
If you’ve followed the 2011 National Books Awards, it means you’re a reader. You are interested in what’s going on in American literature and, what with the controversy of the “mistaken novel”, you might be particularly intrigued by what happened in the Youth lit category. A mistake was made, the wrong novel announced, etc. Hopefully […]
Read articleNew Young Adult Lit to Look For (guest blog by Nikki Grimes)
Will says: This summer and fall I had the pleasure of working with four wonderful writers in our role as panelists (judges) for the National Book Awards, Youth Lit division. I’ve blogged some about about our experience, but now that we’ve gotten through almost 300 novels, we are starting to come up for air and […]
Read articleMore on National Book Awarding Judging
As an NBA panelist this year, I can tell you what the judging is not about. It’s not about settling scores. Not about rewarding career achievement. Not about “side-lining already successful titles.” Not about lifting up lesser known authors. In fact, it’s not about literary politics or really anything described above: it’s about the book […]
Read articleNational Book Awards: The Judging Part
Update on my work for the NBA this long summer and fall: finally got through several hundred (yes) YA novels, along with my four colleagues on the Youth Lit panel. We met first in New York City to get acquainted, then had our meetings on a Google document/spreadsheet where we reviewed and ranked each novel. […]
Read articleE-Pub Your Novel?
If you’ve finished a manuscript and think it’s ready to submit, your timing at this moment in the history of book publishing is unique. On the one hand, the “old school” brick and mortar publishing houses of New York are still buying and producing books. However, they are far more cautious about their bottom line. […]
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