What A Reader's Looking For, And What They're Hiding From

I have very little writing experience, but what I do know is reading. After reading approximately two thousand-ish books, I have come to realize that my reading style has pattern; anything. Having a vast variety within reach, I do however stick to YA in place of my much beloved classics. Here is what I mean to provide authors, not exactly sure how it may be interpreted but hey, what turns an average teenager off from a book or series. However, do not write strictly for readers, you will never please everyone. You must tell your story, and all the clichés that you feel need to accompany it. But if you need a little, um, guidelines to making something worth while today.

Numero Uno, A stupid flipping love triangle. It is played out and unnecessary. Unless, of course, it consists of a girl, a fictional character, and food. But let's face it, that is an unlikely novel that I would very much enjoy reading. Off topic, my bad, seriously. Teenagers who read are typically amazing but not the type to be caught between too incredibly attractive supernatural beings, okay?

Secondly, can we stay away from vampires and werewolves for a little while? Now, I am speaking strictly of average werewolves and vampires. By average, I mean the teenage forms of the two that fall in love with whiny girls. Lycans, the creepy things from I Am Legend,  and other deviations of the two are acceptable and still draw intrigue, just maybe keep them out of high school. I sound like I am attacking a certain book series, but I swear I am not doing so intentionally.

Also, let's try some older settings. Trust me, I love post apocalyptic and alien worlds, but we should change things up. I am talking some teen friendly Games of Thrones type books. (Yes, we still read those books but it is frowned upon.) The time of kings and queens and dragons was fantastic, therefore it needs more glorification. By saying fantastic, I am aware I am forgetting the lack of hygiene, modern medicine, and running water... but those can overlooked.

Lastly, where are the cool parents? All the parents I know are pretty awesome. Okay, some are pretty awesome; some, not so much. I keep reading about parents who just do not parent. And they are boring. Parents can be good guys and not all kids hate their parents. I personally love my mommy and tell my friends about it to the point that they just ignore me. Beside the point, parents can have a positive impact on their children and children can recognize it.

Do I know anything, really? No. But, I think I might speak for others. Either way, this is what choir freak, nerd fighting, highly functioning sociopath wants. There must be more of us, so let's just agree upon my cries for variety. If you have any of these, or do not, in your story, that does not make it a bad story or an amazing story. You are the one who makes it; your characters that take form; first in your mind then on the page.

You Stay Classy, San Diego.

Requiem Of A Nightmare.

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There is a fever building inside of me. I can feel it building in my head, words rolling like an oncoming storm I can't run from. I force my eyes open to try to keep the flood of images assaulting my mind at bay to no avail. I don't want to see what I know is about to happen. I want to pretend that the words that have been penned down are forever and the end is just a nightmare I can't escape from.

The world of creativity is closing its once open doors to me until I give in to what the muses have thrown at me. I want to say no to them, but I know they are right. It is time to say goodbye to characters my heart holds so dearly. It is time to write their last words and imagine that once I am done their live will continue. I imagine grand-children and weddings. Car-wrecks and anniversarys. But not for me. For me it is time to part with my beloved friends. It is time I give them the freedom to run their own lives.

But it hurts. It hurts to say goodbye and end a story. I can see it so vividly though, the colors clashing violently with one another, the sounds that are fighting for dominion in my ears. I can feel the thick air of the last page trying to choke me with desperation and pleas for it not to be over.

It is a bittersweet romance with words I have found my self falling into. They caress my soul with the tenderest of touches, letting me know they are always their to comfort, and love me. But then towards the end of writing a novel the caress becomes a vice grip, a worry that I share. Is this about to be over? Must we say goodbye?

Someone once told me if you love something set it free. And maybe I am incredibly selfish but I find it ever so hard to do so. I want to crawl into the warm expanse of endless words and paragraphs and lay beneath the same sun my protagonist is seeing. But I don't. I am tell them this is the end. It is over for now.

Our entangled lives need to part so we can continue our journey. But an ache develops inside of my chest, how can I say it's over? How can I possibly bear to leave this magical world that holds such beauty?


I am not throwing our time together away, but rather cherishing the moments shared and knowing when to say goodbye. I will always love my characters and the adventures that brought us together whether it has been tears of laughter, rage or depression. We have made it through battles and fought together when the wind carried plot devices even I didn't realize was coming.

The nightmare is over, I have awakened and yet the requiem plays on. My journey with Voda has ended and through my tears I can somehow make out a new adventure resting just over the horizon.


LLAP,
Lexi Brady

SIGN UP NOW! The groundhog says Spring is coming early and I believe it.

HarlequinTEEN and KismetBT are putting on a major event in March 2013 - Spring Reading into Romance. You want to be a part of it? NINE YA authors in NINE days & daily giveaways!

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It's Actually Happening

Imagine waiting for Christmas to come for four years. On Christmas Eve you'd probably have a mixture of excitement and disbelief. Would tomorrow really come? What was going to happen when it did? Would it be everything you'd hoped for? Those mixed-up feelings are probably the best way I can describe what I'm experiencing right now, since tomorrow my debut novel comes out.

 When I sat down four years ago and wrote what is now more or less the first chapter of my book, OLDSOUL, I really didn't have any idea what I had started. I didn't actually set out to write a book at all. I've always enjoyed writing, and had played with the idea of writing a book for a while. But it wasn't until after I'd written that chapter that I thought hey, maybe I could make something out of it.

From that point it became a goal and a dream to have the book published and for people outside my family to read it. It's been a roller coaster ride ever since then, and it's exciting to finally be just one day away from the dream coming true. I'm not counting on it becoming a bestseller. I'm definitely not expecting everyone who reads it to love it. But hopefully the majority of those who read it will find it worth their time.

On the long path to publication, I've learned a ton about the industry and about myself, and have met some amazing people. One of the most important things I've learned is that you can make that dream come true. It takes hard work. It takes putting yourself in situations well out of your comfort zone. It takes learning when to give in and when to fight for the story you want to tell. But it's possible.

The world won't be changed because my book comes out tomorrow. I understand that. But at the very least I'll have some fun stories to tell my kids about the whole experience. And I'll be able to tell them that like so many other things in life, it's worth every second of hard work. Now excuse me while I go put some milk and cookies out.

OLDSOUL is available 4/24/2012 on Amazon and BarnesandNoble.com in paperback, Kindle, and Nook editions. 

Books vs. Movies

The adaptation of books has always been a part of movie making. As far back as 1903, when the first adaptation of Alice in Wonderland was made, filmmakers have looked to the literary realm for inspiration. It makes sense. You take a story people are already familiar with and present it to them in a new medium, chances are they'll want to see it.

The relationship between books and film continues to this day, and in fact is probably stronger than ever. Think about some of the biggest film franchises of the past decade: The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Twilight, as well as the superhero movies based on comic book characters such as Batman and Spider-man. Even this year, the first two big tentpole films of the summer are John Carter, based on Edgar Rice Burroughs' books, and The Hunger Games.

It's a trend that's never going to stop so long as it continues to be profitable. Something that invariably comes with film adaptations is a comparison to the source material, and I've been thinking about it a lot lately.

There are basically three ways a film can be viewed: better than the book, worse than the book, or as good as. Of course it's all subjective, but most films are viewed in general according to these terms. In my own experience, I find that the source I view first, be it the book or the film, tends to be my preferred version, with a few exceptions. Below are some examples.

The book was better than the film:

This is probably the most common, especially when I've read the books first. There's just something special about discovering a character on your own, about taking the author's words and creating the look and feel of a world without any other influence. The best example I can think of is Harry Potter. While the films were good, and they got better as the series progressed, they simply couldn't compete with the books. This has much to do with the time constraints placed on a movie and its inability to include all the minutia of the book. But it also has to do with JK Rowling's incredible writing ability.

What bothers me most about the Harry Potter films isn't what they took out of the movie, it's what they added to it. (The Burrow burning scene in Half-Blood Prince comes to mind.) For some reason this really bugs me in Harry Potter, but not as much in other stories. The world of Harry Potter was and is one of my favorite literary places to visit, and while I can say they did an excellent job with the cast for the movies, it's a little sad to me that future readers will likely be picturing Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson as they read, instead of creating the characters' likenesses in their own minds.

The film was better than the book:

This usually occurs when I've watched the movie first. The first two examples that come to mind are Stardust and How To Train Your Dragon. In the case of Stardust, the filmic world had a more enchanting feel to it, and Tristan's journey seemed much more complete. While I love Neil Gaiman, the book to me was underdeveloped, and the ending of the movie was far better and more romantic.

Now I want to watch this again.

The same applies to How To Train Your Dragon. The movie bears little resemblance to the book, and I think it's so much better for that. I spoke with a friend at DreamWorks, and he said the original take on the film was much closer to the book, but they eventually moved away from it, which is a move I can't applaud them enough for. By enhancing characters as well as the scope of the story, the filmmakers improved on the source material and created two excellent, memorable films.

The film and book are equally good.

Comic books are interesting, because often there isn't a definitive take on a character, both in film or the comics. Adam West's Batman, Michael Keaton's Batman, and Christian Bale's Batman are vastly different, yet still remain true to the source material in their own way, and I think their respective movies are awesome. (We don't talk about Val Kilmer or George Clooney. We just don't)

Oh the pain.

I first watched Miyazaki's amazing animated version of Howl's Moving Castle, and it's one of my favorite films of his. I later read the book, and though it has a different feel, it's also an excellent story. I feel as though the best book version of the story was told in the book, and the best film version of the story was told in the film. Telling the stories in the other medium may not have worked as well.

The best example I can think of is one of my all-time favorite stories, both in book version and film, and that is The Lord of the Rings. I read The Hobbit way back in junior high, but didn't get around to reading LOTR until right before the first film came out. Though the book is long and there may be a song or two too many in it, I love Tolkien's classic story. So much so that I was worried about the upcoming films. But my worrying was wasted, as Peter Jackson and company delivered one of the greatest film franchises in history.

The films, especially the extended editions, did what most good adaptations do best. They take the key parts of the story and they present them in a way that is both new and true to the source material. At times, this means leaving beloved parts behind. But when done well, as in this case, the movies are so good you don't miss those parts for long.

And I honestly get chills watching this. Can. Not. Wait.

So what do you think? What are your favorite or least favorite book to film conversions? How much does watching or reading the story first influence your experience in the other medium? Feel free to debate me about Harry Potter, but I'm right about George Clooney as Batman. I promise.

The Making of a Book Trailer

A note from Jennifer Archer

I was so excited when Emily Greaser, the motion designer of the book trailer for my YA novel Through Her Eyes, agreed to guest post about her process.Although I have previously written several novels for adults, this was my first book trailer. I found the process of collaborating with Emily on the project to be fun and exciting, as well as a wonderful new creative challenge. It was so surreal seeing certain elements in the story come alive through graphics, motion and sound. Emily did an amazing job of capturing my vision and the tone of the novel. Working with her on the project was a wonderful experience, and I look forward to collaborating with her on the design of more trailers for my future books. Since Emily can explain better than I the creative progression she went through in order to arrive at the beautiful and eerie finished product, I asked her if she would share her process with us, and she graciously agreed! So without further ado . . .  here’s Emily!  

_____________________________________

Thank you for this opportunity to speak to your readers about my work! As a motion designer, book trailers provide me the perfect opportunity to utilize my design skills, and to jump right into visual storytelling by combining beautiful graphics, typography, photography, and live footage. When Jennifer and I first discussed the possibilities of creating a trailer for Through Her Eyes, the ideas I had were electric. The main character, Tansy, exists on the brink of two different worlds. I was intrigued by the challenge of visually communicating a mood of tension, along with an edgy and exciting aesthetic for readers.

I began the process by asking Jennifer to send me a rough script of the content  she wanted to communicate to the audience. From there, I jumped straight into the “visual concept phase” of the design process. A large part of this phase involves researching and sorting through stock photos and footage, as well as my own media libraries... and then mentally absorbing the material in order to establish a visual direction.From there, I brainstormed and storyboarded my ideas in order to pitch them to Jennifer. We exchanged thoughts and ideas about the storyboards, and discussed budget in order to know how much stock materials the project could afford. We eventually chose a direction based on some of the thematic elements, including text on a page, photography, crystal pendants, and the contrast between color and black & white. We also decided that the technical approach would be based on still photos combined with typography.

Next came one of my favorite and challenging parts of the design process... the sound design. Fortunately for this project, I was able to find the perfect audio track. This is one of my favorite parts of the process because the audio is so key in inspiring and driving a project. However, often times it's not so easy to find (or afford) the ideal audio solution, and in those cases, I choose to hire a sound designer to join the collaboration and to create the perfect audio track.

During the animating and editing phase, Jennifer and I were able to consistently communicate back and forth in order to reach a successful solution. I would create a draft, we would talk about revisions, and then I would reply with a next draft. This is another part of the process that I really enjoy, because it is true collaboration... two professionals feeding off of each other's creative energy. Also, in my experience, working with authors usually results in smooth teamwork due to the fact that our creative processes are very similar.

The experience of working with Jennifer was extremely positive and professional, and I look forward to more collaboration within the realm of book trailers. We are both very proud of the finished trailer for Through Her Eyes and think it captures beautifully the tone and subject matter of the book. I hope you enjoy it!   -Emily Greaser

WATCH THE TRAILER

 

After earning a BFA in graphic design at Montana State University, Emily Greaser completed her education at Vancouver Film School in British Columbia, Canada.  Since then, she has spent time traveling and gaining experience through a variety of freelance projects, spanning from Seattle, Washington all the way to Sydney, Australia. Significant projects include:  Book trailers for award-winning author Jennifer Archer and  NY Times Bestselling author Linda Castillo, a series of logo animations for K2 Skis, and a series of visual effects composite shots for a feature film produced in Australia.  Emily currently resides in New York City, and can be contacted through her website www.emly.net 

Visit Jennifer Archer's website 

YA: How Dark is TOO Dark?

Brett here...Today I'm honored to present a guest post by my good friend Alexandra Sokoloff. Alex is a screenwriter and novelist who has made a name for herself in the world of adult supernatural thriller fiction and is now dipping her toe into the YA world. Something, for which, we should all be glad!

Enough from me...here's Alex:


First, I am thrilled to be in the company of the Adr3nalin3 writers. Thank God conference season is upon us and I will get to see all your shining faces soon (hopefully on the dance floor!).

Second, Happy Mardi Gras, y’all!!!!!!!!!

And third. . . oh, God, this is such a dark post for Mardi Gras.

See, the thing is, Brett cleverly roped me into blogging for him by cleverly calling today TUESDAY, not MARDI GRAS. I only realized in retrospect...

But this blog is ABOUT dark, isn’t it?

And nothing in New Orleans (or Brazil) is ever just sweetness and light, right? Well, neither is this post.

We can party in a minute, or two, I promise, but first I actually have a serious question for all you darkside writers.

Is there such a thing as TOO dark in YA?

I know, I know, I can hear you all thinking back at me: Well, Hunger Games is dark. Twilight is – well, at least twisted. The Wicked Lovely series is TRULY twisted, and dark, especially in later books. Beautiful Creatures deals very realistically with teenage depression in a fantastical setting. Forest of Hands and Teeth has ZOMBIES, yo, of course it’s dark!

But fantastical dark, or paranormal dark, or sci-fi dark, or steampunk dark, or dystopian dark, is different from dark as it happens in real life. For example, I love the first Hunger Games, but it’s SO high concept - for once I’ll use the odious “It’s ---- Meets -----!!!!!!!“ paradigm: It’s Survivor meets The Lottery!!!!!!!!

I mean, unquestionably brilliant, but let’s face it, there is nothing that is not Hollywood about it. And Hollywood just doesn’t do dark, these days. Not on a budget over $1 million, anyway, not since the seventies (or unless you’re Steven Spielberg and you’re doing the Holocaust. But that was a while ago, even so.).

The sheer VASTNESS of the Hunger Games setting undercuts the darkness of it. These days, Hollywood is not going to go all the way to the dark side. Sorry, but it’s simply not. Edgy, fine, but Katniss is not going to die, okay? That’s not a spoiler, it’s just the way it is.

And that’s what I’m trying to get at for today’s discussion. Dark in a fantastical, paranormal, dystopian, sci-fi setting, is not the same as dark as it happens . . . in real life.

Now, I’ve read some dark YA. Dark as I am, I tend to seek out the dark. Um, compulsively. And currently, for me, the winner of that particular lottery on the YA front is Chris Lynch’s Inexcusable, a riveting and completely realistic exploration of a high school boy who walks the line between high school jock narcissism and sociopathy, and –

Well, read it. It’s not pretty.

Speak is dark, too. Can you believe people have tried to ban this book? Like, let’s pretend rape just doesn’t happen. After all, it wasn’t even a felony for. . . a REALLY REALLY LONG TIME. Oh and especially don’t let teenage girls know how often this happens, with them as the primary target. Although boys certainly aren’t exempt—but that’s even darker to write about, isn’t it? Nobody wants to talk about THAT. But with that monster Jerry Sandusky all over the news, maybe we’ll finally have to.

But this is the thing for me as a writer, writing dark YA. What I write, personally, is a cross between reality and - supernatural, paranormal, horror, whatever you want to call it – it confuses even me. So when I write dark, which I do with my adult thrillers and which I have done in spades with my own first YA, THE SPACE BETWEEN, it’s fantastical, sort of, and supernatural, sort of, and sci-fi, sort of, and horror, sort of - and maybe even paranormal, sort of - but the thing that makes it dark is the reality of it.

A reality so dark that I made this novel my first indie-published novel after - five traditionally published books and four more traditionally contracted books coming in the pipeline. I didn’t even want to try to publish THE SPACE BETWEEN traditionally, because I didn’t want to undercut the reality of it, and I didn’t want to fight with the powers that be about the content, I just wanted to DO it. Because I REMEMBER high school. I had a wonderful time in so very many ways; our school had an awesome theater department and I had some of the best times and the best professional training of my life there. But I remember how – outside theater – how high school really was, the stuff no one really talks about. And I’m not just remembering as a student – I taught incarcerated teenagers in the Los Angeles County prison system before I sold my first film script, when I was just 22 years old, so as a young teacher I was able to observe the darkness of that teen age while I still had all the feelings of BEING that age. And it impacted me, let me tell you.

So my first and only-so-far YA is dark in a way I was just too uneasy to unleash on traditional publishing. It’s not like there’s no hope in it, I swear! In fact, because of the subject matter, there are so many potential endings, light and dark, I’m going to have to make the whole thing a trilogy. But I did not want anyone telling me you CAN’T DO THAT, and I truly believed that was what would happen. I’m a hopelessly right-brained person in reality but I had to research and come to some understanding of advanced algebra, probability, and quantum physics just to make this book a reality, and I knew going into it that the scariness of the science involved could make it a hard sell, let alone the themes of school shootings, sexual harassment, sexual predators, mental illness, PTSD, dwarfism, some pretty brutal bullying and teenage sex. But no one was going to tell me I couldn’t do it, and the miraculous thing is, these days, we authors don’t have to worry about people telling us what we can and can’t do.

And so far, so good. The book IS too dark for some people but it really lights others up with its subject matter, fascinating dreamworld and emotonal reality.

So my questions for the day are: Do you ever worry about writing TOO dark? Can you give me examples of YA books that are so dark that you are shocked they were ever published?

Or – tell me how was your high school? Light? Dark? Grey?

And please, if you know any – give me good examples of YA horror. I’d just like to know!

Thanks for having me, and Happy Mardi Gras! Laissez les bons temps rouler!!!!

- Alex

http://alexandrasokoloff.com


The Space Between

Sixteen-year old Anna Sullivan is having terrible dreams of a massacre at her high school. Anna’s father is a mentally unstable veteran, her mother vanished when Anna was five, and Anna might just chalk the dreams up to a reflection of her crazy waking life — except that Tyler Marsh, the most popular guy at the school and Anna’s secret crush, is having the exact same dream.

Despite the gulf between them in social status, Anna and Tyler connect, first in the dream and then in reality. As the dreams reveal more, with clues from the school social structure, quantum physics, probability, and Anna's own past, Anna becomes convinced that they are being shown the future so they can prevent the shooting…

If they can survive the shooter — and the dream.

Based on the short story The Edge of Seventeen – winner of the ITW Thriller award for Best Short Fiction.

$2.99 on Amazon.com

Alex

http://alexandrasokoloff.com