I'm up and snorffling fresh new coffee. There's piles and piles of new books on my desk. How odd and pleasant to get giant boxes of books in the mail, for free, shiny hardcovers... But then they turn out to suck unbelievably. I think the publishers are sending anything remotely SF or fantasyish that has a girl in it. Yo, assholes, that's not "expanding and exploring gender" worth a damn!
this one by Av1... Oh, the pain of it! It's so clunky. I wish I could say that a massively prize-winning author who has written 50+ young adult books would write a better opening sentence than: "It was in the year 1046, on a cold winter's night, when a fog, thick as wool and dank as a dead man's hand, crept up from the River Scrogg into the ancient town of Fulworth." yah... okay... then, 20 pages go by with cliche after cliche written in the dumbest-downed alphabet blocks ever! It makes me crazy when every noun has its adjective and it's always the adjective you expect. sludge is sticky, concoctions are hot, a slow simmer, the searing pain, faltering steps, a tattered gown, a clawlike hand, a tar-black raven. Christ. "Once there was an evil old man who was an alchemist. And a raven who couldn't fly. And a plucky orphan girl. And a mysterious monk who knows stuff. Stuff happened and good defeats evil. The end!" what a hack! I can't bear it! Think of how good other books are - like "The Great Good Thing" - and shudder with me!
How strange to wake up and Moomin not to be here!
Rook got in at 4am or so... dazed... I can't wait to hear the weird story of his evening.
Chula had hilarious adventures but I can't tell them - way too naughty.
I laid in bed reading feminist theory and blogging like mad till at least 2 in the morning!
Onwards through the slush! (Cyn says now you know what it's like to be an editor, only your slush pile, for some reason, made it through someone's publishing filter.)
Posted by: whump | May 21, 2005 at 10:59 AM
Still trying to think of kids' books to recommend; mostly it's like you say-- they don't expand or explore gender much that I can see.
Avi's pretty formulaic, though I'm getting caught up in the kids' book by him that I'm reading for work. I was kind of surprised he won the Niwbery.
Ah! The Great Good Thing! What a book. I gave that to a kid-- a boy!--who'd never liked a single book except the Phantom Tollbooth, and he loved it and nagged me nonstop for the sequel.
Posted by: elswhere | May 21, 2005 at 11:14 AM
Maybe that kid would like stuff like Edward Eager or E. Nesbit? Or the "magic" Andre Norton books. I'm trying to think what is that same formula of "suddenly entering the story" or going to magic-worlds but that isn't 80 years old and set in britain.
Posted by: Liz | May 21, 2005 at 12:55 PM