Tag Archives: young adult fiction
latest read: the hunger games
It was time to find out what the fuss was about. Moms, precocious children and teenaged students had been raving about The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, the story of chosen youth from a dystopian future. Candidates fight their adversaries … Continue reading
latest read: wondrous strange
In my quest to read more y. a. titles, I somehow got railroaded into the lives of present day, lusty Canadian boys. Charming as they are, I was antsy for change and Wondrous Strange supplied the goods. The novel was … Continue reading
latest read: only in the movies
This novel for teens and adults with adolescent tendencies ranks 10 on the fun-o-meter. William Bell’s Only in the Movies (Doubleday Canada, 2009) features Jake, a filmmaker wannabe who keeps lapsing into impromptu movie scenes in his head when the … Continue reading
latest read: chanda’s wars
Remember when kids were shielded from topics considered too disturbing? When, say, alcoholism was an edgy topic for teen fiction? In the young adult novel Chanda’s Wars by Allan Stratton (HarperCollins, 2008), a teenaged girl raises her younger siblings after … Continue reading
latest read: the astonishing lIfe of octavian nothing (volume 1: the pox Party)
M.T. Anderson pushes the boundaries of disturbing, fictional settings. In his novel Feed, he pitches himself into a technologically-perverse future. In Octavian Nothing, the author visits the past–the slave trade in 18th century America. Octavian is a boy who lives … Continue reading
Signpainting and Novelwriting
This week I caught my first glimpse of the book cover design for Signs of Martha, my novel coming out in the spring with Great Plains Publications. I emailed my publisher a scream of delight. The novel features a misguided … Continue reading
Writers Retreat
Five writers of fiction-for-kids-and-other immature-people converged in a cosy chalet on Georgian Bay this weekend. We could do that because of a Very Nice Woman who let us write, eat and sleep at her place. Thank you, Very Nice Woman. … Continue reading
Latest Read: The Uninvited
What’s not to love about Mimi? The potty-mouthed NYU sophomore in The Uninvited carries mace in a hand-knit holster and has a bad habit of lusting after men who turn out to be blood relatives. Oops. Mimi sojourns in remote … Continue reading