Guest Post: Author Maryrose Wood

I was delighted to be approached as a potential stop on Maryrose Wood's blog tour for installment number three of the Incorrigible Children series. I loved the first two and had already put my name in the queue on the library's hold list for when number three, The Unseen Guest, would finally be released.

Today, enjoy a guest piece by author Maryrose Wood, but check back tomorrow for my rundown on the latest in the Incorrigibles' adventurous saga!

“It is easier to change one’s boots than to change one’s mind, but it is far easier to change one’s mind about whether or not to wear boots than it is to change the weather.” —The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place, Book 3: The Unseen Guest

Since the publication of The Mysterious Howling, the first title in the Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place series, I’ve been asked many times about the origins of the sayings of Agatha Swanburne, which pop up frequently in the series. Did I find them in a dusty old tome in some attic somewhere? Was (or is) there an Agatha Swanburne figure in my own life? Do I spend a lot of time eating fortune cookies in hopes of finding pithy nuggets of wisdom to steal?

If only it were that simple. The above-quoted “Swanburnism,” as I’ve come to think of them, was written the way all the rest of them are: our heroine, Miss Penelope Lumley, gets in some sort of predicament, and I, her author, push my chair back from the desk, scratch my head and think, hmm! What specific advice does my plucky young friend need to get out of this jam? It’s the fiction writing process in miniature: we chase our characters up a tree, set a bunch of hungry lions loose around the bottom, and then try to figure out what happens next.

The Swanburnism above is from the first chapter of The Unseen Guest (in stores March 27th). In the scene, Penelope has rather impulsively made a rule, which turns out not to work quite as well as she had hoped. Should she stick to her guns regardless, to avoid looking foolish? Add a slew of new rules to mitigate the untended consequences of the first one? Or should she admit her mistake, learn from it, and start over?

Naturally, she relies on the wisdom of Agatha Swanburne to help her figure out what to do. The adage she recalls is meant to capture the complex nature of making decisions in changing circumstances. One might have many excellent reasons to wear shoes instead of boots, but if it starts to rain, it’s time to rethink your decision—and your footwear. With the help of Agatha Swanburne’s advice, Penelope does exactly that. She scuttles her original plan, sets a new course and leads her young charges into a fresh adventure.

Have you ever found yourself in a situation like Penelope’s? If so, how did you handle it?

(On March 21, the Incorrigible blog tour continues with another Swanburnism discussed, this time at www.readnowsleeplater.com. Please drop by and leave a comment.)

Maryrose Wood is the author of The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place series for middle-grade readers. You can find her online at www.maryrosewood.com, and on Twitter at @Maryrose_Wood.

A PLA Conference Recap

Part of my job in publishing is attending book industry conferences, which can be both incredibly exhilarating incredibly and exhausting. This week, the Public Library Association had its biennial conference in Philadelphia, which was easy travel—only a short train ride away. I was particularly excited to attend PLA because the public library is my intended area of work once I finish my MLS degree!

Conferences are great when you work in publishing because A) it's a nice change of pace from sitting at a desk in front of a computer all day [the worst!!!] and B) you get to chat with the people who actually use your product and it's nice to hear what is working and what isn't. Of course, the thing that stinks for me as an exhibitor, at this conference in particular, is that I'm stuck in a booth all day when I want to attend the sessions and book signings and absorb it all.

However, I did randomly run into a former colleague from the library I used to work at during high school—the job that cemented my future in libraries in the first place. And in the exhibits' closing hours, I did manage to rack up a small collection of some solid books, which is always a plus. But just as a helpful hint, booth representatives from certain major trade publishers: just because I'm wearing an "Exhibitor" badge is no reason to be a jerk to me; we're not even competitors, and I STILL LIKE TO READ AND MAY BUY YOUR BOOKS.

My swag includes:

• Rez Life by David Treuer—a recent recommendation from Jill that I happily stumbled upon; and this booth rep was lovely, fyi
• The Lost Saints of Tennessee by Amy Franklin-Willis—because any book with the word Tennessee in the title immediately interests me
• Heft by Liz Moore—someone I know through Tumblr and was happy to stumble upon her book
• Barnheart by Jenna Woginrich—recommended by the Workman rep who was super nice once I showed interest in an awesome book I will buy called Farm Anatomy that is like an illustrated guide to rural living; he told me the author lived in Brooklyn and decided to move and live on a farm, and I do live in Brooklyn and dream of moving to live on a farm

Fiction | Revolutions of the Personal and National Kind

I picked up Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly at BEA a couple years ago, and it's been sitting on my shelf since. It's made it through the occasional shelf weeding, because I've always thought the premise sounded ok and if I ever needed an easy YA read, this is where I'd go. And that time had finally come!

Revolution is about a moody troubled teen, Andi, living in Brooklyn. Her 8-year-old brother tragically died the previous year (though we don't know how for quite some time), her mom has gone a little crazy with grief, and her dad is off somewhere being a famous geneticist. It's her senior year, and with the way she's heading, she's probably not going to get to graduate. She doesn't do her work; she's not working on her senior thesis; she just doesn't care about any of it. The only thing she does care about is music lessons, and she's an extremely talented guitarist.

When Christmas vacation rolls around, Andi's dad drags her to Paris where he is working on a special project to prove whether or not a tiny, preserved heart (eww, I know) was that of Louis Charles, the son of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette who was imprisoned by Revolutionists until his death. In Paris, Andi finds an old guitar and journal belonging to a girl named Alexandrine who lived during the Revolution and was closely tied to Louis Charles. Andi becomes obsessed with the journal and begins a quest to find out how it all ended while coming to terms with her own tragedies and future.

I really did like this book, and I'm glad I'd never weeded it off my shelf! I loved the historical story; it was almost like a scavenger hunt that we, the reader, got to play alongside Andi as she made new discoveries. But there's one thing...and maybe this is just intrinsic to the written word format...but teenage emotions just sound so whiny on paper. I was thinking the whole time that if this was a movie, the subtlety of expression and staging of the scene would convey a mood without any words needing to be uttered, but because it's on paper, all of that is described and it just makes me roll my eyes and say, "Oh boy, here comes the flood of emo." I honestly don't think there's a solution, and maybe it's just me—cinematography has somewhat ruined descriptive language for me. And it's certainly not an issue unique to this book (so don't be turned off by my rambling!), but I just especially noticed it.


On a coincidental side note, a few days after I finished this, Marie Antoinette popped up on my Netflix queue, and I love that movie. It is just so stylistically beautiful yet apparently slightly controversial in its portrayal of Marie Antoinette. And both of the trailers featuring New Order were perfection.

March 1 (ok, 5th): Next On the List

Ok, so I'm a few days late with the beginning of the month update, and that is just representative of my February and March so far. February was a pretty pathetic reading month for me. I finished a whopping two books, which is pathetic considering I have more time than usual to read as I haul 75 minutes to and from class twice a week.

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I've officially given up on Jonathan Raban's essay collection, Driving Home. I got up to page 180 or so and was intending to read and post on it in stages. I reached a stopping point so I could read Sea of Poppies for book club, and as you can see, I still have not written about that first chunk of Driving Home (or Sea of Poppies, for that matter). Once I tried to get back into it and write about the first part, I couldn't even remember anything significant, and it was just looming as something I thought I should read but wasn't really enjoying. And I think this ended up holding me back for a lot of last month. Overall, this book was just not what I expected. A couple of the essays were really good, particularly one about Mark Twain, but the rest were not a journey of America, per say. They felt more like literary analysis of various authors, some of them not even American! In a nutshell, I was looking for a road trip, and this was not one. Oh well.

The other pitiful part of February is that I've been reading the same two books for 2-3 weeks. I don't usually read more than one book at once, because my brain can't focus in depth on more than one story. I've been reading the new graphic novel Marzi by Marzen Sowa since before Valentine's Day. I really like it, but this is something I'd usually breeze through in a weekend. When I didn't finish it one weekend, I needed a novel to read, because I didn't want to carry the large graphic novel in my purse, so I started West of Here by Jonathan Evison, which is a chunkster. It's almost 500 pages, so it's just taking a while for that reason. Plus, I don't really like any of the characters too much. The ones in the present day sections are just so miserable, and I hate reading about miserable people. It puts me in a miserable mood. So perhaps this is also why I'm not flying through it. Add to this the numerous children's books I have to read each week for class, and my leisurely reading is just subpar right now.

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This week...THIS WEEK...I will finish BOTH of these books! On the coming agenda, I have a couple things:

• The Go-Between by I. P. Hartley, finally another NYRB classic for my next book club meeting. The meeting isn't until the 22nd, so I've got a bit of time.
• The Unseen Guest by Maryrose Wood, the third in the Incorrigible Children series. I was so excited to receive an advanced copy for an author tour which will happen later this month!
• Lions of the West by Robert Morgan is still on my agenda...I just have to get through these two books first!

Did you know that this month is the Public Library Association conference in Philadelphia? I am attending for work, but I'm especially excited since the public library is the realm I intend on entering once I finish my MLS program. (And I am also very excited for the cheesesteaks.) You know what conferences mean...NEW BOOKS. I only hope to duplicate my awesome book score from ALA in January!

Happy March!

Westward Ho!: Sherman Alexie's Modern Indian

When I was in the fifth grade, my teacher made me read a book and write a report on it...that NO ONE ELSE HAD TO DO. The intent of it, I know, was to keep my mind challenged because there was no "Encore" program at my middle school, but the overall significance of this was lost on me as an eleven-year-old; I was just bitter I had to do more work than everyone else. Though I have no idea what the book was called nor what it's plot was, I know it was about the Trail of Tears. And I remember its existence because it sparked in me a curiosity of these cultures that are spoken of so predominantly in terms of the past and not the present.

I've been wanting to read some Sherman Alexie for a while now, since I've been motivated to read about American cultures and lifestyles that are unfamiliar to me. The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fist Fight in Heaven is the short story collection that pulled Alexie out of the blue and to the forefront of modern Native American literature. Earning a Hemingway/PEN Award nomination in 1993, The Lone Ranger and Tonto is partially a memoir of Alexie's life growing up on the Spokane Indian Reservation. The stories are somewhat connected, mostly by character overlaps, and often focusing on a character named Victor who has quite a cynical outlook on life.

That, in fact, is the predominant tone that just drips from Alexie's stories: cynicism. Some of the stories are told from Victor's perspective and some are told about him by others, but no matter the narrator, most are just filled with an overwhelming disenchantment with people and society. A common theme that shows up in many of the stories is alcoholism and how widespread and destructive it is in this tribe. The edition of this book that I read had a preface by Alexie in which he stated (and I'm summarizing by what I remember) that he did not have a motive in writing about the alcoholism; he was not trying to make a statement nor validate a stereotype; he was just writing about what is. I would hate to believe that this is, in fact, the life and mindset of today's Indians, but as I said before, it's a lifestyle unfamiliar to me and one I am trying to learn more about. And though Alexie is perhaps the most well-known modern Indian author, he is but one voice, and his voice alone should not define or generalize a vast group of people.

Alexie's stories are not deeply complex, nor action-filled. They are brief snippets of time or conversation between characters, revealing thoughts and emotions that Alexie has seen and felt. In the first story, "Every Little Hurricane," a nine-year-old Victor witnesses a fight between his uncles on New Year's Eve. We see pieces of a young Victor's history and will be able to understand, as the stories progress and Victor ages, where he is coming from and what he is relating to. "The Only Traffic Signal on the Reservation Don't Flash Red Anymore" merely contains a conversation between two characters on a young, talented basketball player who succumbed to alcoholism and their hopes that a young, talented artist doesn't follow suit. These stories, no matter how brief, create a history for the reader, so that we will understand how experiences have led to how these people see the world today.

I had a thought while reading this, one that doesn't have much literacy importance but is a discussion point nonetheless: the appropriate term for indigenous peoples of America is still a tricky one to define, depending on who you're talking to. Most of us probably developed the habit of using "Native American" while in grade school, as "Indian" was deemed to have negative stereotypes. But throughout Alexie's book, the only term he uses (when using as a blanket statement and not referring to specific tribes) is "Indian." Now, before reading this, I was still in the grade-school mindset in which "Indian" seemed slightly un-politically correct, but this made me think—think about the history of the term and the environments that have demanded specific language—and the "Native American" I had been so used to suddenly sounded, to me, so...forced. With an evolving language, it's difficult to get an entire population on the same page, and what sounds correct to some may still hold inappropriate connotations to others. So this, and so many more examples of "politically-correct" terms, are still drifting in uncertainty.

Overall, I felt Alexie presented a strong voice through his stories, but he's still only one voice of a population of people that is over-generalized despite carrying vastly different cultures and histories. And to further understand the whole, you need to explore its individual pieces.

Nonfiction | Starving Artists in the City

Patti Smith's National Book Award-winning memoir Just Kids is a book that's been on my periphery for quite a while. For a period there it was one of the books you'd most frequently see on the subway and on the 'featured' shelves of bookstores. In fact, I think I'd checked it out from the library no less than three times before I ever got around to actually reading it.

Before reading this book, I had no idea who Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe were. I got the impression that maybe these were people that are well-known to a certain crowd, a certain New York City artsy crowd, but it wasn't their story that drew me to the book in the first place; it was that the book (supposedly) captured a particular moment and lifestyle in New York City history, and as a resident, that's always exciting to read about.

So, if you also have no idea who these people are, don't worry. In a nutshell, they're sort of vagabond artists of the Dylan, Morrison, Warhol generation. They lived paycheck to paycheck, worked whatever job would pay, moved wherever was cheaper, saved pennies and occasionally splurged on treats. They did what they had to do to get by, but art was always at the forefront of their minds—creation of something...photography, painting, drawing, sculpting, writing, composing...didn't matter what. The late 60s and 70s are not often reflected upon fondly in New York City. It's an era defined by the city's decline—uptick in crime, heavy drug use, neighborhoods falling apart—but it produced some of the twentieth century's most lasting artists. Intentional or not, Smith's memoir describes the connection between art and environment, how having nothing inspires creating of something, how surroundings influence what an artist wants to say.

Patti Smith encountered a lot of famous people in her youth, people with much bigger names than hers. She never describes these people to name drop. Her own described insecurities keep her placed her on a rung below the most famous, but she did share their world. She recalls encounters with Hendrix and Joplin and describes them as the gods they have become, leaving me wondering if she remembers them with the status they have attained in the past forty years or if they really were so far above in their own time.

Smith paints a full picture of the era, complete with secondary characters and locations, but the focus of the story is always on her relationship with Mapplethorpe. Ultimately, she tells the story of two people who support each other endlessly as they each try to achieve their goals and reach their dreams.

February 1: Next On the List

In an attempt to mentally organize and motivate, I think I'm going to start taking a monthly mental pause to assess what I want to read, where I am with any reading goals, and what exciting things are on the horizon. It sounds silly because reading should be a relaxing, enjoyable activity, but it can sometimes get a little overwhelming to think of all I have and want to do!

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In January, I started my own personal Westward Ho! reading project, for which I read two books (but only blogged on one; I'll get there!). I don't have anything on the immediate agenda for this, only in the abstract future—the next couple of months. I am going to be reading Lions of the West with Aarti, but that's not going to start until at least March.

Yesterday I started the book for my February book club meeting, Sea of Poppies by Amitav Ghosh. I've been taking a bit of a break from book club for the past two months. It's not that I grew tired of it, it's just...well, the last two meetings went on for two and a half hours. I mean, I enjoy talking about books, but that is a long time to discuss one book. The discussion is great for about an hour and then it gets too detailed, like people are grasping for straws for something to discuss, and it's the same couple of people who just keep talking. It is possible to over-discuss a book. Anyway, I just needed a breather and now I've had one, so I'm excited for next week's meeting! The book, by the way, is "eh" so far (I'm 100 pages in). Like every book I've read for this book club, I probably won't love it but I will enjoy the discussion of it.

I started Jonathan Raban's essay collection, Driving Home, last week, and it is a chunkster. I took a break from it for a bit to start my book club book, but it's a library book so I plan on finishing it in the next two weeks. (The only time I'm able to start a new book in the middle of another one like this is if it's essays or short stories!) So far, some of the essays are interesting and some are boring. I thought it would be more of a travelogue, but a lot of his essays are just analyzing other authors' works and have little to do with American travel. It's not really what I expected from the book as a whole.

I got some fabulous books from ALA Midwinter, including:

• Marzi, a new graphic novel that the girl at the Random House booth generously let me take
• Maggie Now, a Betty Smith novel I'd never heard of, thanks to the HarpeCollins booth
• Come In and Cover Me, the new Gin Phillips (I loved The Well and the Mine) thanks to Penguin's $5 all-you-can-hold sale
• The Man in the Wooden Hat by Jane Gardam (I have Old Filth but haven't read it yet!)

Conferences are fun, but when you're working at one and have to stand in your exhibition booth all day...well, you miss out on the fun of discovering new books! Luckily, the last day was pretty slow and I got to wander a bit.

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If you live in Brooklyn (or even just in NYC) and you don't know about WORD yet, you should. It's an independent bookstore in Greenpoint, and they have some fabulous events. It's where I've gone to readings with Emily St. John Mandel and Jon Michaud. In December, I missed Haley Tanner, who was coincidentally there as I was reading her book. But in February, they have some great things coming up, including an event with Jonathan Evison (of West of Here) which I will sadly have to miss because of class, one with Joe Wallace who I met there once and subsequently read his book, and one with Michael Showalter of comedic fame. 

Related: Wet Hot American Summer is one of my top 5 movies of all time, and in college, my friend Gretch and I once spent an entire three-hour studio painting class throwing Wet Hot quotes back and forth until, at the very end of class, a guy sitting next to us finally asked, "Are you guys quoting Wet Hot?" I asked Colin if I could tell Michael Showalter that story, and he said no, it would not impress him. I think it would. We quoted the movie longer than the movie itself.

Happy February!