Quick Recs for Lovers of Well Told Stories

I'm definitely in the camp that says we're in the midst of a golden age for TV. As a novelsit I hate to say it but you'd be hard pressed to find more consistently great writing than on TV. If you love to consume stories, and if you love to be schooled by folks who really know what they're doing,  I can't recommend Mad Men and Breaking Bad more heartily. They are without a doubt the best dramas on tv right now. Absolutely masterful writing.  I know I'm far from the first person to mention these but it bares repeating.

I think Breaking Bad is probably the best long form charcter study I've ever seen. That show deals with characters being transformed right down to their core and manages to do it in a way that's riveting and absolutely believable. And on top of all that it's a kick ass crime show. Genre story telling at its best.

Mad Men has moved into a time when you can tell the writers are just masterfully in control of their abilities. They can do straight up relationship drama, Non-linear LSD freakouts, comedy, drama, whatever, and tie it all into the idea of the 60's as a transformative time in American society--for the country, and individuals and families. The world of the show and the characters are working in perfect harmony to explore the 60's as a time and as a kind of state of mind. It's incredibly sophisticated, and entertaining stuff.

Any recommendations from you all?

Rollercoaster

Ok folks, here we go! It's just become clear to me that at some point last week my friends at Scholastic started shipping my book out to bloggers, setting off a chain of appearances in people's "In My Mailbox" posts. The first one I saw was the below. Definitely watch the whole thing, but you can see the bit about The Eleventh Plague at around minute 5:40.

As you can imagine, when she reads the bit from the letter my editor David Levithan wrote in support of the book, I was kind of floored.

At this point I've seen my little green book show up on several blogs, Goodreads status updates (My favorite? "On page 111. Uh Oh.") and random tweets and it's always amazing. The idea that my book is out in people's hands after all of this time feels like approaching the very top of the rollercoaster. You know? When that low click. clack. click. clack. vibrates up through your body as you ratchet up to the crest of the first hill where you'll be perfectly suspended for a split second before--ZOOM!

It's super exciting and--I won't lie to you, friends--more than a little terrifying. In any case, it's out of my hands now. All I can do now is focus on the 2nd book and hope for the best.

Hope you guys like it!

Holy Crap Suzanne Collins Blurbed my Book

And I have a cover! And I'm doing my first ARC GIVEAWAY!

Thanks to everyone at Scholastic, especially the awesome Phil Falco for the beautiful and foreboding cover.

And of course, a very special thanks to Suzanne Collins. As a writer published by Scholastic I had the fleeting thought that maybe they'd send my book to Ms. Collins, but I never thought something like the above blurb would actually happen. The day I got the email saying that not only had she read it but that she liked it was was willing to tell the world that...well, that was one of the most amazing days of this entire publication journey so far.

Thanks to everyone who helped make this real! Ok! On to the important stuff. With this picture came a stack of advance copies of my book and they're burning a hole in my pocket!  Want one? Just leave a comment on this blog for a chance to win!

And hey, while you're at it, I'd really appreciate it if you became a follower of this blog and/or followed me on twitter. 

I Thought Maybe I'd Feel Like an Idiot a Little Less Often

I knew the world wasn't going to change when I sold my first book. I knew angels weren't going to sing and I wasn't going to magically put bad writing days behind me, but, well...see title of post.

I ended the year with a bunch of leftover vacation days so I thought I'd take the majority of this week off and use that time to write. For the last week or so I have been seriously close to finishing the 1st draft of Magisterium (Book # 2) and I was sure that with a few uninterrupted days of writing I'd be able to type "the end" sooner rather than later.

So my first day off came and I leapt out of bed. I had my coffee. I spent the absolute minimum amount of time on Twitter and then I opened up my Word doc and...

I choked.

I completely freaking choked.

For 7 1/2 hours I stared at my computer screen like it was on the far side of a deep fog bank. My characters were complete strangers. The story I've been writing for months felt like some dim, half remembered thing without logic or urgency or tension. I typed listlessly. I deleted. I typed again.  I was sure I could read the cat's mind from across the couch. "Hey there Mr. Professional Writer Man," she seemed to taunt. "Aren't people like, paying you for this stuff now? Don't you think you better, you know, Get. On. It."

Like I said, I didn't expect angels wings when I sold a book but maybe I thought, I don't know, that somehow the validation would open up a well of confidence I could draw on in times like these. Maybe I thought that given all this time writing, and all that I've learned from editing my last book, I would have solidified some kind of instinctive story sense, some batch of first narrative principals, that could guide me through the rough days.

But that's not how it works, is it?

Just like a marriage license doesn't make you married, a book contract doesn't make you a writer. It does not make you immune to sitting on a couch under the withering glare of an American short hair, feeling like a complete noob. It does not stop you from thinking, despite whatever evidence to the contrary, "I can not do this."

At least this is true for me. Maybe, horror of horrors, there are some writers out there who really do "go pro." Writers who sit down at the computer and see the path in front of them clear as a cobblestone drive.  Maybe.

As for me, all I can do is sit down at the computer each day and hope for the best.

How about you guys?

Can Someone Please Tell Me What Was so Great About Inception?

Yeah, saw it last night and I'm really on the outside looking in on this one. So many smart people seem to really love this movie and I thought it was....ok. I was never bored, I thought it was absolutely fantastic to look at and had some fun sequences, but I'm reading reviews that toss out words like "masterpiece" and "complex" and "mind-bending" and I just don't see it.

I mean, it all seemed kinda straight forward to me. Too much so actually. A heist movie playing out across a few different stages of consciousness featuring some seriously wooden dialogue and fairly one dimensional characters. I guess there's that nod towards ambiguity in the very last shot, but I had a hard time buying it since I never saw anything anywhere else in the move that called the reality of all this into question.

Like in The Dark Knight (Yeah, I was a dissenter on that one too. Liked Batman Begins and Memento though)  I think Nolan has an incredible ability to cast this veneer of weighty seriousness over his movies that I don't know is actually backed up by anything that happens in the movies themselves. Important and meaningful things always seem to be going on, people talk like they are, but when I stop and think about it seems like a lot of talk, grimly serious acting and gorgeous visuals.

So please, dear blogging friends, help me justify the $12.50 plus $11 dollars for popcorn and soda I paid for this movie. Set me straight. Is there something I missed? Is there a deeper level here that I'm not seeing?

Oh by the way. I just saw that I have 50 followers now! Hurrah! Thanks for following everybody! It's great to have you all here!

Aw hell, now I gotta go out and get a porcupine

Continuing in my recent trend of cute animal related posts... It's a porcupine! Who thinks he's a puppy!

Something Keeps Getting Between Me and My Writing

Not my most productive morning...

Tough day? Here, look at some sloths. You'll feel better.

You know, sometimes all this stuff about writing and career and the end of the world is just way too heavy and you need a break. It is in that spirit that I present the below. If only these guys would take over the world. I would gladly hand over the reins of power if it would guarantee a world consisting of naps, scratching ourselves and snacks. All hail our new sloth masters! Pass the greenbeans!

Meet the sloths from Amphibian Avenger on Vimeo.