Running Around Behind My Blog's Back

This week I've contributed to Harperteen's Myspace blog. My blog is about things that get in the way of writing. I briefly mentioned my general dicking about on the Internet, which is for me the NUMBER ONE OFFENDER. I did not, however, mention my hourly visits to gossip websites (learning about cultural trends!), futzing around on facebook (keeping current with people's lives!), and staring at pictures of very expensive horses that are for sale in Holland. Nor did I mention the thing I do that not only interferes with my writing, but also my self-esteem: looking at the reviews posted about my books on Amazon.com.

I've talked about this compulsion before. It's akin to running headfirst into a wall without first putting on a safety helmet. I do it when I'm stressed. For the past couple of months the only reviews of Cowboy were positive. (Okay, there were only two, but they were quite nice.) A few days ago those nice reviews were joined by a stinker. It's not quite as nasty as some of those posted for the first Alice book, which inspired certain people to impressive heights of vitriol (I hate Alice! I hate Susan Juby! I'm going to burn her book and maybe come after her next!), but it's still very bad. Nothing quite like having your book compared to a bad afterschool special to make a person rethink her career choice. So in light of that ad hominem attack by a person who has apparently never been moved to review anything else on Amazon (yes, I looked up his/her stats) I'm giving it up again. Looking at reviews, I mean. I will no longer visit Amazon or anyplace else on the Internet where people might be talking smack about my books. Why? Because I'm strong enough, I'm disciplined enough, and doggone it... it's a lousy way to spend my time. I can put my many and various neuroses to better use. Like thinking up rare illnesses I might have. Yeah. That's it. That'll fill up the time quite nicely.

xoxox

Ah, Narnia!

In the category of what's new with me for a dollar, I contributed an essay to a new Borders anthology that will be released in a few weeks. The book, edited by Herbie Brennan, is called Through the Wardrobe. It includes essays by yours truly, as well as Deb Caletti, Diane Duane, Sarah Beth Durst, Brent Hartinger, Sophie Masson, Kelly McClymer, (the amazingly cool) O.R. Melling, Lisa Papademetriou, Diana Peterfreund, Susan Vaught, Zu Vincent and Kiara Koenig, Ned Vizzini and Elizabeth Wein.

Feast your eyes on the cover!



The anthology raises crucial Narnian mysteries such as:

-Why is Prince Caspian the ultimate teenager?
-What does Narnia have to do with the Nazis?
-How come C. S. Lewis has such a big problem with lipstick, anyway?

It also answers questions, including why Edmund Pevensie is totally crush-worthy.

My contribution is an essay called "Waking up the Trees." In it I share my free floating anxieties about global warming and wanton destruction of the natural environment and celebrate Prince Caspian and the excellent tale of enviro-triumph found within. I'll be hosting a contest to give away a couple of copies so stay tuned.

And before I sign off, I'd like to thank CM for a great review of Another Kind of Cowboy!

Why didn't I think of that?

A friend just sent me this article about James Patterson's new YA series.

I had to laugh at the line on the second page. "I just am convinced that there aren’t enough books like this — books that kids can pick up and go ‘Wow, that was terrific, I wouldn’t mind reading another book,’ ” [Mr. Patterson] said of his “Maximum Ride” series.

OH MY GOD! So this is what I've been doing wrong! I've been writing books in the hopes that kids (well, teens actually) will pick them up and go, 'Wow. This is terrible. I'm never reading another book,'".

Thanks, man. I'm totally changing my approach, like, from here on.

As some of you know, I'm working on a book for older readers. It's a comedy and the working title is The Republic of Dirt. I'm convinced there just aren't enough books out there that adults can pick up and really enjoy. My goal is to change all that.

Rooowwww!

Hello all you rare birds!

A couple of fun things.

First, here's the U.S. cover for my new book, Getting the Girl.



Could it be any cuter?

And lovely Patricia from Harper Canada just sent me the catalogue copy, which, I think, says it all. Or at least most of it:

Getting the Girl: A Guide to Private Investigation, Surveillance and Cookery

He’s a ladies’ man. The ladies just don’t know it yet.

Sherman Mack has just started grade nine at Harewood Tech and he already knows what he likes—cooking class, detective stories, and Dini Trioli. But there’s also plenty to dislike, including an extreme social hierarchy that makes all the usual high-school dynamics look like child’s play.

As in any high school, Harewood has the typical jocks, Trophy Wives, and scholars, but it also has one group everyone’s determined to avoid—the Defiled. No one knows who starts it or why, but sometimes a girl’s picture is posted on all the bathroom mirrors with a D written beside it, and just like that, she’s as good as invisible.

When Sherman suspects Dini is the next target, he’s determined to save her reputation…and that means going undercover. After all, this is one private eye who’ll do anything for the ladies—even if he doesn’t know the first thing about them.

Stay tuned because I'll be posting little snippets from the book for your reading pleasure. Getting the Girl will be out sometime this fall.

Oh, and a huge thanks to book maven Richie Partington for choosing Another Kind of Cowboy as one of his picks! I've always wanted him to choose one of my books and I'm stoked that Cowboy made the cut.

Thanks also to Goody Niosi for the terrific article in Sunday's Times Colonist.

Well worth reading

Sara O'Leary has begun writing a kid lit blog. You may have read Sara's book When You Were Small or heard her on CBC Radio. Her blog is terrific and you should read it if you are interested in children's literature.

And so forth

Many thanks to the new queer book club in Vancouver for choosing Another Kind of Cowboy as their first book and for being so hospitable when I visited. Thanks also to the amazing kids and teachers at Maple Creek Middle School who hosted me and many other writers and performers for their literacy conference.

Now for the excuse portion of the update. I have been making podcasts and then deleting them. The problem is that they are sort of... well, bad. Something about the process of recording your own voice and playing it back is disconcerting. Maybe it's an author thing. I've recently become addicted to audiobooks and almost every one I've tried that was read by the author was AWFUL. All of the authors had this weird slurry thing going on, like they were drunk or had a mouth full of gobstoppers. Now, whenever I record myself, I can hear that same excessive "sssss" sound. I'm not sure I can post the podcast until I go to speech therapy. Which could be a while.

Until I get it together, I encourage you to listen to This American Life and pretend that I had something to do with it. Oh, and if you're into podcasting, check out CBC's The Current podcast for February 12. An entire episode about urban agriculture. That's my dream, baby! A little piece of the farm right here at home. Now if only there weren't all those pesky bylaws to contend with...

Hey, hey, Newsday!

A nice mention of Another Kind of Cowboy in Newsday and the Chicago Tribune!

File Under....

Unasked for advice.

Last week I began teaching my final session of a novel writing workshop at UBC. I've loved teaching the class and have met many interesting and talented people. What I have not loved is the commute. The horror is split three ways. First is my trip on BC Ferries from Nanaimo to Vancouver. Second is the trip via Greyhound into downtown Vancouver. And third is my trip up to UBC via the ever painful Translink. Today I shall unburden myself on the subject of commuting via BC Ferries.

When I first began visiting the island, long before we moved here, taking the ferry was an adventure. One time some friends and I boarded the ferry, ate lunch in the cafeteria, and then subbathed on the top deck (the Lido!) round-trip to Victoria. That was in the days when I had shit-all to do. Now I am busy. Or I like to think I am. And the trip has turned into a burden of the first order. Yes, I'm grateful I have my health and know I shouldn't complain about things like a relatively inexpensive and reliable ferry service. But one must also recognize that taking the ferry is a sure way to lose one's health. It is a veritable stew of airborn viruses. Don't believe me? Try taking it more than three weeks in a row and see how many colds and flus you get.

The ferry would be okay if no one else took it. This is the problem with a lot of public transportation. The public part. Now, I'm a hard core supporter of green transportation. But for me, I'd like to make that into an argument for staying home. Once you've taken the ferries for a while, you'll see what I mean.

Ferries are where many kids go to test the limits of their parent's endurance. The calmest child is apt to have a complete and total meltdown at least once per trip. Like a visit to the nurses's station meltdown. This is tough for parents. It is HELL for the other passengers.

Also, some parents who take the ferry seem to lose whatever coping or parenting skills they brought with them onto the boat. I have a theory that a small but significant percentage of parents are actually on their way to parenting classes for the hopelessly inept. I understand that when your child won't stop screaming it is tempting to dump her next to some random passenger and then disappear into the washroom for forty minutes to collect yourself, but I cannot approve of such behaviour. Just because I smiled at your child, doesn't mean I want to spend forty panicky minutes hoping she's getting enough air in between shrieks and wondering if you will ever come back and if not, how long will the adoptions process take.

However, the unskilled parents are nowhere near the most irritating people on the boat and they at least have an excuse.

BC Ferries is where a certain class of person goes to talk loudly into their cell phones about fake-sounding business deals.

"So you say we've taken an aggressive position in the offshore bollocks group? NO GOOD. Get back to me with some new figures and make 'em sexy."

That sort of thing. These people seem physically incapable of modulating their voices. Everything must be bellowed at top volume for fear that other passengers might not be aware that they are VERY IMPORTANT PEOPLE engaged in CRUCIAL BUSINESS. This type of passenger is fond of coming by where you are attempting to nap or work to conduct conversations. On the rare day when I score a workstation, which is a single desk with an outlet for plugging in my laptap, I can be certain that a VIP will lean over top of my desk to carry on an ICC (INCREDIBLY CRUCIAL CONVERSATION).

That said, the VIPs are almost bearable compared to the UNBELIEVABLY POPULAR PEOPLE. These are the ones that have eight or more meaningless conversations over the course of one trip. They call person after person to say the following:

"Hey, asshole. Whatchaupto anyway? Cool. Nah. Nothing. Just on the boat. Yeah. Nothing. Tonight? I don't know. Maybe. Whatever."

"Hey, fartbreath. Whatchaupto anyway? Cool. Nah. Nothing. Just on the boat. Yeah. Nothing. Tonight? I don't know. Maybe. Whatever."

x 4.

These passengers often put their feet up on the back of your seat because they have confused the boat with their bedroom, where, presumably, they go to have many thousands of other pointless conversations.

The way to avoid some of this is to hide on the car deck. I often bring a pillow and blanket and spend a useful or at least quiet trip tucked away in my car. The possibility of peace that exists on the car deck makes it that much more enraging when people's car alarms go off because of the motion of the trip, b) people decide that the people sleeping in the cars around them would really love to hear their Greatest Hits of the 80s CD, or c) and weirdest of all, the people who do calisthenics. Seriously. I can't tell you how many times I've been napping and someone has suddenly appeared beside my car and begun doing jumping jacks and Chi Quong maneuvers.

So for anyone who may be interested in Susan's Rules of Ferry Travel, may I suggest the following.

1. If your kids are having a tough time, remember that there is an entire section of the ship that's designated kid-friendly. There's a playground and everything. Maybe other kids will help distract them. If you yourself are going to start screaming and crying (yes, I have seen this), perhaps you should go to the nurse's station. Or take some deep breaths until it passes. Being a parent is tough. Being a parent on BC Ferries is strictly for heroes. There is help available.

2. If you are a committed cell-phone talker of the business sort, feel free to conduct your conversations in a normal voice. You don't have to yell. Also, consider going to an area where people are already chatting animatedly, such as the cafe or snack area. If you are worried you might lose touch with all of your acquaintances over the course of the hour and a half trip, why don't you write them letters? Seriously. It will surprise the hell out of them.

3. If you are going to spend your time on the car deck, feel free to keep your music turned down low. For your ears only, as they say. And if you get a sudden, uncontrollable urge to do jumping jacks, head out onto the outer or top decks. Take in the sights. There might be dolphins! Or whales! Just imagine doing jumping jacks and burpies, brisk sea wind whistling through your hair, as dolphins cruise along beside you! Now that's living.

Remember, none of us likes the public, but we can can all do our part to tolerate them.

Love,

Susan (Grumpy much) Juby

Book Lover's Paradise

Do you love books and live in or visit Vancouver? Well! If you haven't already had the privilege, I am thrilled to tell you about a little piece of paradise at the corner of 8th and Alma called Christianne's Lyceum of Literature and Art. It's one of those cozy spaces that make you feel you'd like to move in. The walls are covered with illustrations by some of Canada's best artists for children, there is comfy furniture provided, including giant pillows, for relaxing with one of the amazing books with which the place is so well stocked.

What is the Lyceum for? in brief, it's designed to celebrate every aspect of literature. The proprietor, Christianne Hayward, a guru of children's lit, has designed programming for everyone. There are book clubs for every age and programs for writers. There are professional development courses, book launches and early childhood education programs. In other words, a banquet of plenty for those of us who love words and books!

This week I had the opportunity to speak with an excellent kid-parent book club called the Bibliophiles about Another Kind of Cowboy. Jessica asked the first question. It was about why I used alternating first and third person point of view for my narrators. In other words, it was a great question and it was the first of many. We all filled out a Cowboy crossword puzzle (designed by Christianne) which, I'm ashamed to say, I had some trouble with. We ate terrific snacks, all inspired by the novel. Spencer (at least I think it was Spencer. It might also have been Morgan) made me a very cool pin with a horse doing an extended trot which is going to take up permanent residence on Tango's stall. All in all, a terrific evening. If I lived closer, I would HAUNT the Lyceum. I strongly recommend all writers and readers check it out.

Okay. I will stop gushing now. And start plotting how to get myself invited back.

Thanks, Christianne and the Bibliophiles!

The Future of Vancouver Island's Forests?

A must-read post...

Bip Bam

In lieu of an actual post

Dressage: The Sport for Every Schweppe