Reading Assignment

At the SCBWI/Southern Breeze Writing and Illustrating for Kids (WIK) conference on October 17, Steven Chudney of The Chudney Agency critiqued the opening chapters of one of my young adult novel manuscripts. This novel developed from the middle to the end, leaving me struggling with the problem of how to get my character into place.

The good news is that he liked my writing style and was enthusiastic about my synopsis. He found my opening chapters implausible, however, and gave me a homework assignment: Put the manuscript away for six weeks and read twenty contemporary novels for teens. "Then," he said, "you'll know how to begin your novel."

"Put it away for six weeks!" I wanted to wail. "But I just pulled it out again after about five years!"

While I stand by my research, I concede the point to Steven, especially since he offered an easy alternative to what he found implausible. So, when I returned home from the conference, I went to the library and checked out several middle grade and teen novels.

I looked first for books written by Southern Breeze authors. My county's library system is short on those, but it does have Shirley Harazin's Blood Brothers. I'm next on the request list for that one. I also requested a copy of The Youngest Templar: Keeping the Grail, a book that Steven represented and talked about while a group of conference attendees ate breakfast in the hotel lobby.

Next, I headed for the Y section and looked for books by Jane Yolen so that I can multitask on this assignment. Yolen is the key note speaker for Springmingle 2010, the Southern Breeze conference for children's writers and illustrators that takes place February 26-28, 2010 in Atlanta. I'm the coordinator for that conference, so I'm brushing up on our speakers. I chose the Scottish Tales co-written by Jane Yolen and Robert J. Harris.

Finally, I stopped by the center-of-the-floor display kiosk of 2009-2010 Georgia Book Award Nominees and picked up three of those.

I've now completed three of my twenty books. I'll be blogging reviews on the titles over the next few weeks (see below). I've also been getting recommendations from friends on what my next book should be. My stack is tall, but Blood Brothers is the one calling to me now. I read the first few pages of it before I left the library.


1. How to Steal a Dog
Barbara O'Connor
When Georgina Hayes looks through the windshield and reads the sign offering a $500 reward for the return of a lost dog, she comes up with a simple plan. All she has to do is find a lost dog, return it to the owners, and collect the reward money. Then she and her mother and brother can move out of the car and into an apartment. Georgina works the plan out in her school notebook. She needs to prod the idea along by actually stealing a dog. Then she'll just wait until the owners put up reward signs. It seems so simple. But after she steals the dog, things keep coming up that she hasn't thought of. Where will she hide the dog? What will she feed the dog? What if the owner doesn't put up reward signs? Now, in addition to the strain of being homeless, Georgina has to worry about the mess she's gotten herself and her little brother Toby into. It doesn't help that there's a terrible feeling in her stomach all the time now, making her feel sick and miserable. O'Conner hooks the reader from the first page. Georgina pops off the page like a real girl, and you can't help empathizing with her.
BIBLIO: 2007, Frances Foster Books/Farrar, Straus and Giroux
REVIEWER: Heather N. Kolich
FORMAT: Middle Grades Novel
ISBN: 978-0-374-33497-0
ISBN: 0-374-33497-8

2. Leepike Ridge
N.D. Wilson
This book starts out slow and kind of ordinary, but boy does it build tension from there. Thomas Hammond and his mom live in a house that's chained to the top of Leepike Ridge looking down over a valley stream. Thomas doesn't like the man his mom is seeing. To sort out his frustration, eleven-year-old Tom takes a moonlight float down the valley stream, falls asleep, falls over a series of waterfalls, and ends up in a partially water-filled cavern deep inside the mountain. His ordinary story quickly becomes a story of survival with surprising discoveries and a sinister twist. The story begins and ends with a first person narrator, but the other chapters alternate between Tom and his mom. Sometimes there's a feeling of distance, but Tom seems close and immediate while he's in the mountain. I was running out of pages and wondering how Wilson could possibly wrap up the story in the small space he had left, but he did it quite satisfactorily.
BIBLIO: 2007, Random House Children's Books
REVIEWER: Heather N. Kolich
FORMAT: Middle Grades Novel
ISBN: 978-0-375-83873-6

3. Uprising *
Margaret Peterson Haddix
Crackling with emotion and strong characters from the first page to the last, this incredibly well told story takes readers back to 1909-1911 New York, to the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory strike and disaster. The story unfolds through the experiences of three young women: 15-year old Bella, a new immigrant from Italy; 16-year old Yetta, a Russian Jew fleeing from pogroms; and 16-year old Jane, a wealthy socialite. In a time of extreme discrimination against immigrants and women, these three stood with thousands of other women laborers to fight for fair treatment. Their separate lives unite during the 5-month Triangle strike that grew into a general strike reaching as far as Pennsylvania, when wealthy women worked with factory girls to advance their dreams of achieving women's suffrage. Yetta, Bella and Jane face and survive dire circumstances by supporting each other. Throughout the story, readers know that the historic fire is coming. But when it finally happens, it is as much a shock as it was to the workers locked in the factory. Haddix sweeps the reader along as swiftly as the fire swept through the Triangle factory. Grab some tissues and savor this book.
BIBLIO: 2007, Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, Ages 12 and up, $16.99.
REVIEWER: Heather N. Kolich
FORMAT: Young Adult
ISBN: 978-1-4169-1171-5
ISBN: 1-4169-1171-5
*This novel was represented by Tracey Adams of the Adams Literary Agency. Her husband and business partner, Josh Adams, will be a featured speaker at Springmingle 2010.

4. Blood Brothers**
S.A. Harazin
Seventeen-year old Clay Gardener has no hope of going to college, no self esteem, one friend and a job he loves. Now he's got a really big problem, too. His best friend, Joey, is in serious condition in the hospital where Clay works as an orderly, and Joey's friends are saying that Clay put him there. Which is true, in a way. Clay found Joey, naked, hallucinating, seriously messed up and violent, and called 911. While Clay talked with the 911 operator, Joey attacked him and tried to strangle him. Clay pushed Joey off of him, and Joey fell and hit his head. The next day, Joey falls into a coma. As his friend deteriorates, Clay alternates between trying to take care of Joey -- both on and off duty -- and trying to find out what happened to him before their fight. Clay is so emotionally distant from all the people around him, it takes a long time to warm up to his character, especially since he seems so willing to take the blame for something he didn't do that he even casts it on himself sometimes. The actions of the characters don't always make sense, but it's hard to put this book down before the end.
BIBLIO: 2007, Delacourt Press/Random House, Ages 14 and up, $15.99.
REVIEWER: Heather N. Kolich
FORMAT: Young Adult
ISBN: 978-0-385-73364-9
** S.A. Harazin is a Southern Breeze member. Her agent on this novel, Steven Chudney, was a speaker at the Southern Breeze Writing and Illustrating for Kids (WIK) 2009 conference in October.

In case you're wondering, yes, I'm still reviewing children's nonfiction for Children's Literature Comprehensive Database and writing for Discovery Communications. Check out some of my recent articles using the links on the left.