Mulling it over Monday

June! It's June! And the Houston weather has slipped back to its set point of high in the 90's low in the 70's. The summer endurance contest begins. Next time I will report a temp change will probably be, um, October.

Last night's Game of Throne episode! What can I say without spoiling it? Except that I screamed. I have not read this far in the books so... I knew something wouldn't go well, but not THAT. Didn't see THAT coming. (If you watched, discuss among yourselves. If you didn't, get back to me when you have.)

And my signing yesterday at Katy Budget Books with Sophie Jordan and CC Hunter was such fun. I love Sunday afternoon signings. Everyone's always relaxed and having a good time. Thanks to all who came out.

Mostly this morning I'm fretting over this whole reading trigger warning label thing that universities are threatening to place on books. We're not talking the basic movie/tv kind of warning like: adult language  and partial nudity. We're talking trigger warnings like racism or misogyny. As in a warning to students that what they're about to read might upset them.

So doesn't that change the entire reading experience? And isn't getting upset about the dark stuff part of the point? Shouldn't I be angry as hell at Tom Buchanan in Great Gatsby and not a watered down angry because I've been warned that my tender self might be hurt or shocked by that fact that he's a nasty misogynistic bastard? Isn't discomfort okay? Shouldn't my intellectual sensibilities be, um, challenged? Isn't this a first slide down the slippery slope toward making everything we read and see just one big bowl of mushy oatmeal?

Or is it the opposite? Will an advance trigger warning that, say, Shakepeare's Merchant of Venice contains uncomfortable and essentially unchallenged anti-Semitism enhance my reading experience? Or will it control it?

Where do we draw the line about these warnings? At what level of the human experience? The answer that keeps coming to mind is: all of it.

We are not always our best selves, we humans. Surprise, surprise! We hurt each other and destroy each other in so many ways that it defies the imagination, which is perhaps for the best. I spend enough time as a writer mining those awful possibilities that I'm clear on that. And anything my imagination conjures up is probably a poor substitute for what I will read in the morning news blasts. But I do not believe that I need an advance warning about that. I believe I already am fully aware.

Lots of people have been addressing this:
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/18/us/warning-the-literary-canon-could-make-students-squirm.html?_r=0

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2014/05/trigger-warnings-and-the-novelists-mind.html

Let me know what you think, dear reader

Five for Friday

Simply cannot believe it is already Friday, but 'tis true. Head has been buried in writing --some on new secret project, some on IT WASN'T ALWAYS LIKE THIS--which you won't see until spring 2016 (from Soho Press), essentially 2 years from now. In writing land, that's like, um, tomorrow. I love those heady moments when a story is new and fresh and anything is possible. They make up for those moments like yesterday when you've written a synopsis five times and it's still not working. One of the great mysteries of the author life-- how you can write the whole darn book but the synopsis makes you want to curl up in the fetal position and weep. (which possibly I did)

In no particular order, here's what I'm obsessed with this week:

1. The dog's recovery from her UTI. I will not tell you how much the vet bill was. Let us say that the hubs and I could have flown somewhere. Together. But she is perking up now, Miss Lyla. And seems to find the taste of her new pro-biotic sprinkle quite pleasing. I, on the other hand, think it smells like flowers and rear end. Which, you know, are good smells when you're a dog.

2. Book 4 of Outlander. I said I'd take a break and read something else. I read something else but also kept going. Cause Jamie and Claire are in America now. The New World! And I feel like I'm there with them. And Gavin Hayes just got hung and now Jamie and the other Scots are singing a Gaelic tune to him in the tavern. And so it goes in this addictive series.

3. Maleficent. The movie. I never want to like Angelina Jolie. I really don't. But I think this movie is going to rock. Now I just need to find the time to see it.

4. Upcoming events that I'm really excited about! A library book club visit in Austin! (Will report soon). A signing at Katy Budget Books this Sunday with my girls Sophie Jordan and Christie Craig (CC Hunter). I'll be signing the new A-WORD (Soho Teen) and also SWEET DEAD LIFE and more!

5. And this line of Ciersi's from Game of Thrones. "Everywhere in the world, they hurt little girls." 

Enough already, world. Seriously. Enough.

There's much more, of course, like how I wish I was at the Children's Author Breakfast at BEA, which so loved attending 2 years ago. Or how I think Crossbones might be worth watching. And how if you're not watching Watch What's Happening Live with Andy Cohen on Bravo, you're seriously missing out on amazing live television. I am not joking.

Tonight is the launch party at Blue Willow for my buddy and debut author and fellow YAHOU, Jennifer Mathieu. THE TRUTH ABOUT ALICE is going to be huge. It is a phenomenal new voice. It's out next week from Roaring Brook. Jen will be touring with Fierce Reads. She is funny and whip smart and a fellow NU grad. She writes like a dream. Pick up this book!

Okay, that was way more than 5, right?

Happy Friday!

Five For Friday

And somehow it is Friday again!
Actually, it is technically still Thursday night. It's me and Jimmy Fallon -- who just told his 2nd Vladimir Putin joke-- and my laptop and this post. And the dog, who is snoring. Yes, this is the glamor life of an author.

Anyway, Friday!
So what am I obsessed about this week?

1. Just read THE OTHER SHEPARDS and WHERE I WANT TO BE, both by Adele Griffin. Brilliant! Simply brilliant. She explores family and loss and desire and achieves this delicate otherworldliness that just blows me away. Did I say brilliant? Times a zillion. An amazing talent, and if I'm lucky, I'll snag a galley of her upcoming ADDISON STONE (Soho Press, August 2014)

2. Popovers! Ordering a popover pan from Crate and Barrel. Popovers! I want to make popovers! It looks easy and I still have this luscious memory of the popovers and butter and salt they served with my fig Old-Fashioned at the bar at BLT at  Camelback Inn in Scottsdale. Okay yes, this was like 3 years ago! But I've been too busy to follow through. It is hard being both lazy and obsessed, I tell you. These huge puffy yummy popovers with melty butter.

*Oooh. It's now me, snoring dog, Jimmy Fallon and also Daniel Radcliffe. Hello little Harry Potter!

3. Game of Thrones Season 4! Starting Sunday. Now my only worry is: Exactly how many days are left on my free 6 months of HBO? Or will Comcast cut me off just as the opening credits roll? I shall let you know. But Game of Thrones! You are almost here!!

4. Secret News!!! I have secret news!!!
Okay, enough shameless self promotion. But seriously! Secret news. I have some. And I'm really excited about it.

* Ooh! Daniel Radcliffe is a fan of the Food Network! He watches Chopped! Harry Potter watches Chopped! Just like me. (let me note here that Chopped makes me very nervous. Because it's all: Okay, here is a baguette, corn, some kind of horrible fruit no one has heard of, canned haggis and gummy bears. Make an appetizer. You have 20 minutes. This makes my heart race. I'm all: Good God almighty, what is that ugly fruit? And haggis? In a can? I think I would puke. And then I'm all: Hey, I hope someone uses the ice cream machine or starts a fire or cuts their finger. Yeah. Chopped. I love it. I have this idea that we need to put YA authors on Chopped. Yup. Me (since it was my idea), John Green, Rainbow Rowell and Maggie Stiefvater all opening our mystery baskets. IT COULD HAPPEN*

5. It is only a month until THE A-WORD comes out! That's the weird thing about books: It's months and months or often years until a book arrives. And it feels like it's never going to happen and you wander along all la la la and then you're like "crap!" It's almost here. And then SLJ says some nice things and you're pretty happy. Which is a relief when it's book 2 in a series.

*Jimmy Fallon and Daniel Radcliffe are wearing jumpsuits and playing sticky balls* In case you were wondering.

Happy Friday, my lovelies!!
If you're at TLA, please, please don't let me be alone in the Author Area signing line. Come get a galley of A-WORD on Thursday morning at 11. Tell your friends. I will give you candy.