What We Need to Know: 5 Statistics About Sexual Abuse

Earlier this week, I was honored and honestly, ecstatic that Amanda MacGregor at SLJ's Teen Librarian Toolbox gave FINDING PARIS this glowing and very thoughtful review.

And I'm good with the spoilers if I say that this paragraph in particular made me happy:

"There is so much to discuss here—the family dynamics, the silence, the secrets, the distrust, the suspicion, the denial, the shame and more. Because of the late reveal about the sexual violence, it forces readers to rethink what they think they know about the story and the characters. It also makes readers think about what the future will hold for Leo. This is a great addition to the list of titles that discuss sexual violence."

Because, as I've talked about before on this blog and elsewhere, here's what I know to be true. Despite social media where we seemingly tell every detail of our lives in painstaking detail, the truth is, we really don't. Too often--for so many reasons--we keep the bad stuff a secret. We can't bear to tell or we are afraid or ashamed or we just don't have the words. Even now. Even today where we have a hashtag for every social change, every paradigm shift we hope to make. The world is still, as it always has been, a very dangerous place for women, and even more dangerous for young women. Not everyone lives in a safe family. Not everyone has parents who do the right thing. Bad things happen even when you do. And despite what we might want, we aren't always talking about it. Particularly teens. Particularly those  most vulnerable.

So it was important to me to write a book where once you got to the reveal, you had to think back to all you were being told and shown page after page but weren't processing. To all those moments you were thinking, where is this road trip going? What is Leo really showing us about Vegas and LA and her life and Paris?

Here are some sobering statistics, courtesy of RAINN, the nation's largest anti-sexual assault organization:

• 44% of sexual assault victims are under age 18
• 80% of sexual assault victims are under age 30
• Every 107 seconds another sexual assault occurs
• 68% of sexual assaults are not reported to the police
• 98% of rapists will never spend a day in jail

And that's just the beginning.

Organizations like RAINN  www.rainn.org are making a difference. 

YA novelists are making a difference too.

Of course one of the well-known examples is Laurie Halse Anderson's SPEAK.

I'll be talking about others on this blog during the coming weeks, including ALL THE RAGE by Courtney Summers, which is out now from St. Martin's Griffin.

Three for Tuesday

So much going on right now, but the Tuesday three shall be:

1. Happy surprise this morning with this review from a source I very much respect and thus I am totally honored and thrilled about what School Library Journal's Teen Librarian Toolbox had to say about FINDING PARIS:
http://www.teenlibrariantoolbox.com/2015/05/book-review-finding-paris-by-joy-preble/

Every author leaps for joy when a review totally GETS IT, totally understands what your novel is trying to do and how it's trying to do it. Makes my heart quite happy!!

Read the whole thing if you have a chance, but here's a snippet:

 "While this is a mystery and (less so) a romance, it is the much darker and more serious elements of the story that make this a hard book to put down and an even harder book to forget."

2. Just finished ALL THE RAGE by Courtney Summers, which is often a brutally emotional read, about a girl named Romy Grey, a small town, rape culture, recovery, bullying, and how hard it is for some people to believe the truth. As much - although not all-- of that is part of Finding Paris, I think they might someday make a fascinating companion read…

And also on the nightstand: Just started my precious arc of Julie Murphy's DUMPLIN' and I'm already swallowed up in WillowDean's world and hoping she gets the happily ever after I want for her.

Skimming through editor Cheryl Klein's SECOND SIGHT, because if anyone is a genius at breaking down plot, character, voice and revision techniques (besides my own wonderful editors), it's Cheryl Klein over at Scholastic!

And I'm a few pages in to THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN by Paula Hawkins, which everyone is reading and now so am I! I'm sensing this is not going to be a happy read, but a fascinating one. 

3. And in my pop culture report, Jane has had her baby on last night's JANE THE VIRGIN, which if you haven't watched, you should totally catch up on this clever series. I'm newly addicted to CALL THE MIDWIFE, a BBC show that's been on for a few years now and why didn't anyone tell me?! Even the hubs is watching with me, having been primed and perhaps broken in by a few seasons of DOWNTON ABBEY. For now, as I have revisions to finish, let me just say "Chummy Noakes!" I am totally Team Chummy forever. On the Housewives front, Carole is having her fling on RHONY, Bethenny is back and feisty and understandably cranky with all the divorce shenanigans and I kinda like Dorinda, although she needs to dump the boyfriend. (Just saying). 

There's more of course, but like I say, there's writing to do and a talk I'm giving in June to write about setting and a new manuscript to get back to and so I leave you for now.

Coming soon: My interview with debut author Adam Silvera, about his forthcoming MORE HAPPY THAN NOT, out in June from our mutual publisher, Soho Press!