do i agree in ratings for YA books?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303657404576357622592697038.html?KEYWORDS=ya+books

http://cba-ramblings.blogspot.com/2011/06/on-darkness-in-ya-literature.html

No,not really. all this endless kerfuffle about #YA - why don't they just use the coloured dragon rating system they used to use when I was young? or - here's a radical thought - let the parents take some bloody responsibility as to what books they buy for their kids.

My mother researched every book that she bought for me and she was not fussy about 99,99% of it. She let me read books that were far too old for me as long as I could discuss it with her afterwards and we'd go through any issues I had. Her major bugbear was whether a book was well-written or not—so I romped through Perelandra, Out of the Silent Planet, The Triffids, War of the Worlds, as well as all the normal kid's books. But she wouldn't buy me any Enid Blyton or Dr Seuss because she considered them dumbing down and not particularly well written. (This of course meant that I developed a craving for Enid Blyton that I still carry to this day and still love reading Malory Towers and the like.) My parents had books in their library which had sexual scenes in them. If I was old enough to read them, and old enough to ask questions about them

Look at Tracy Beaker. It deals with all kinds of issues that we'd probably LIKE to shield children from. Violence, adoption, care homes, bullying and everything in between, but these books are hugely best selling here.

and no, before you jump down my throat, I'm not suggesting that little Alice aged eight can go into the bookshop or the library and get out "Motherfuckers on Hogs" – but (I have no idea how libraries are arranged these days but when I was a kid you had a kid's ticket and could only take books out of the kid's section) – the bookshop/library should be able to look at little Alice and see that she's not old enough to read that book.  If shops selling cigarettes and alcohol can see she's too young, then booksellers certainly can do it. The most books should (perhaps) have on them is "adult" imo, to aid the bookseller. Differentiating between whether a child is old enough to read a 13-15 book or a 15-18 book is not up to the bookseller. It's up to the parent, and the capability of the child.

If Alice really wants that book—or drugs—or a gun—she'll get it whether there's a label on the book or NOT. Seems to me that labelling the books simply devolves anyone from having any responsibility, when we all should have.

(I mean—has anyone READ the real version of Pinocchio? Or Cinderella? And Disney made kiddies films of those!!!???? what if the kids went and read the originals?! It's like making Disney Fight Club…)

A-Z meme–C is for Characters

I whined on my blog the other day that I couldn't blog about my WIP because of spoilers, and that's all to do with the character I'm writing.

You see, if I were to explain the kind of person he is, it would ruin the entire book (as far as I'm concerned!)

I did blog about him, at first, and I talked about him more, but as I got to know him, I realised how the plot and the characterisation was linked, and so sank back into my hermitty cave.

Thing is, that I am a pure and utter pantser. Only one plot has ever come to me almost entirely ready made, like a bolt out of the blue, and that was Muffled Drum. Everything else is like water dripping in limestone caves. OK – well perhaps not that slow, but still…

When I start, I may have an name (often not, though) like Ambrose Standish or a profession – such as Gideon Frost's in Frost Fair. But that's it. I start to write about a man who is entirely unknown to me, and I learn about him at exactly the same speed as the reader.

Some writers, I know, ( Read more... )

So going back to the beginning, I wonder what you'll make of Harry in "I Knew Him" because he's quite the favourite character I've written so far. (But then perhaps all my characters are as I'm writing them. He's so charming, so personable, you'd want him to be your friend. But will you want to by the end of the book?  I know I would, but there are reasons why I'd probably make excuses if he called around. More than that I cannot say for spoilery reasons, but I hope he's interesting. He's grown on me, because I've let him develop, organically as he's been written, he's been a delight and a jaw dropping surprise at times, but that's really the best thing about writing, isn't it?

Do share your character building with me, do you start with a fully formed guy, or does he come to life under your fingers? does he change as you write, from what you originally planned?

I was going to do Coaches too, but BAH! already too long. I'll cover that, hopefully, in H is for 'Orses.

any suggestions for D?

how do plots like this get published?

 “A virus engineered for genocide has been released in Colorado Springs, leading to mass, and seemingly unexplained violence. Some of the survivors of the infection begin to evolve into something that is both less than and more than human. The race is on to prevent world-wide release of the virus.”

I mean – there is nothing original about that blurb – at all. Wasnt dustin hoffman in one of the versions?