Merry Wanderer of the Night [Search results for charts] 

Last week Ali asked us to step outside our comfort zone and go in search of blogs that were different from ones we usually hang out in -- different in terms of:

• race and/or ethnicity, religion, cultural background, age, etc. from you
• Live the farthest from you
• Have entirely different tastes in books from you (but you love their blog anyway)

Ali also suggested that if we felt our blogs were somehow in the minority, to blog about that experience.

There were only a handful of participants for this challenge - I won't begin to analyze what that means!

• Maree opted for a personal ad - and you'd better like cats to make it into her inner circle!
• At Mysteries in Paradise, Kerrie has some really interesting pie charts on her post showing the percentages of English speaking readers vs other languages (for which she provides Google translation). Though English is the highest by far, a wide range of countries is represented. (Nice charts, Kerrie!)
• Gautami invited us all to visit her in New Delhi, India! She knows of only a few other book bloggers in India. She listed several blogs she likes to visit that focus on very different books than what she generally reads. And you must read her personal ad! I learned a lot about her from that bit.
  
• Sarah joined Weekly Geeks for the first time this week - welcome Sarah! She highlighted a couple of blogs that have inspired her to give genre fiction another try.
  
• Puss Reboots combined the Weekly Geek assignment with doling out awards to several blogs she thought fit the theme.
  

WG 26 asked about world traveling via books - where do you go, how do you get there, where would you like to go... There was a lot of excitement about this assignment.

• Wendy at caribou's mom was quick on the draw with her post; reading globally is one of her passions and, in fact, she has a long term goal to read a book representing every country in the world. You can see her progress and also read about some of her favorite books about faraway places.

• Jason over at Moored at Sea wrote a lovely and heartfelt essay about why he chooses not to read globally

• The host of It's Tuesday, Where Are You, raidergirl3, gets a lot of her global reading ideas from bloggers who participate in her weekly meme. (I highly recommend playing along with her meme!)
  

• A comparison of actual travels and literary travels was what Jackie at Farm Lane Books came up with, and had some interesting results.

• Mystery reader Kerrie had fun with maps and charts! At Mysteries in Paradise she shows us not only what countries she's read about, but includes a pie chart with the country "share;" she also posted a map to show where in the world her blog readers are!

• The Abbot of Unreason (I had to visit a blog with a name like that!) wrote a wonderfully detailed post about the places he's visited, an example from each, and what countries are - so far - missing.
  

It would be interesting to compile all the answers to see where we've been as a group! Anyone up to the task??
.

I am at home sick with the flu, but I have entertained myself by making charts of my reading habits. I reorganized my bookshelves earlier this week by read and unread, but then further by genre. I noticed some definite patterns taking place so I decided to see what the patterns looked like in numbers.

The first thing I looked at was how many books I had read my read shelf from each "genre."

As you can see, most of the books I have read are either general nonfiction or classic fiction, which didn't surprise me. What did surprise me is that I've read almost as many YA & MG books as I have essay collections. When I thought about this it made sense, since a lot of the books I have are from junior high and high school and several of those are YA & MG. I was really surprised by the amount of poetry I had!

I then looked at how many books in each genre were on my TBR shelf.

Once again, most of the books I own are general nonfiction with general fiction and classic fiction also making a large part of the books I own. Just by looking at these numbers it seems like I am extremely likely to read the YA and MG books that I purchase, but I'm less likely to read the historical fiction I purchase. When I first started blogging I was a lot more interested in historical fiction so I purchased more of it, but after awhile I became less interested and now I have some historical fiction I've never gotten around to reading. I've never bought much science fiction until recently, so it will be interesting to see how many of those books I end up reading.

The last thing I looked at was how many books in each genre I've read since starting my blog in October 2009.

Clearly I've spent most of my time reading general nonfiction and YA & MG. This, once again, surprised me. I never read many YA books before I started blogging and never thought I would. It must just be all the great YA bloggers out there! It's interesting that general fiction and classic fiction are evenly split, although I noticed most of my classic fiction is made up of books I read for class. If I wasn't in school I think general fiction would probably be a little higher.

How are your shelves organized? Are you surprised by the different genres you see there?

I am an Amazon Affiliate. If you make a purchase using one of my links I will earn a small percentage which will then go back into this blog.

Last weeks Memory Monday post was a list of Contemporary books that I feel are a great introduction to the genre for younger readers. Today's post is a list of books for older readers that I think can make Contemporary lovers out of anyone. It's not really a memory, I suppose, but I have very fond memories/experiences with all of these, so I'm counting it.:)

Not all of these books will be for every reader. But I'm pretty confident that there is at least something among this rather large list for everyone. And I have read all of these and will personally vouch for their insane levels of awesome. Also, this is in no way a complete list. It was impossibly hard narrowing down the books I included, so if you want or need more recommendations, seriously ask away. I am more than happy to share the books that (unfortunately) didn't make this list.

Melina Marchetta. I know I'm already cheating, that Melina Marchetta is a person, not a book, but she is one of my all-time favorite authors. Her book Jellicoe Road not only won a Printz award, but it's also an absolutely stunning and amazingly brilliant book. But, I do recognize that it's not for everyone and sometimes it works for people new to Contemporary and sometimes it doesn't. But I do absolutely and always recommend Saving Francesca and The Piper's Son. They are a bit more accessible to some people but they are no less amazing. Anything by Marchetta will introduce you to people you can't help but love. And the reading experience is never easy, but it is so completely worth it.

The Day Before by Lisa Schroeder is a book that I recommend to everyone. It is, in my opinion, a perfect starter book. It's written in verse (which I adore and push/promote every chance I get) and the story that Lisa tells is so stunning, so amazing and just so beautifully brilliant that I don't know how you could not fall in love. And it's a book I've already recommended to several non verse and non Contemporary readers, and I have not talked to any of them who haven't loved it yet.

Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly isn't straight Contemporary and I think it will appeal to fans of both Contemporary and Historical Fiction. While the book is set during the now, the main character, Andi, finds an old diary and becomes completely invested in the life of a young woman who lived during the French Revolution. And Andi is one of the most painful characters I've ever read. I physically hurt while reading this book because Andi's pain is so intensely real and it's one of the best books I read last year.

Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie by Jordan Sonnenblick is one that I read just recently but can't seem to stop thinking about or talking about. This book is a lot of things, all of which are amazing, but more than anything else, watching the absolute love between these two brothers broke my heart and put it back together again bigger and richer than it was before. I understand that not everyone can read this book. My older sister has children around the same age as the main character and literally cannot read books that deal with children with diseases or death. But it is such a phenomenal and powerful book that I would recommend it strongly to anyone who can. An absolutely beautiful book.

Ballads of Suburbia by Stephanie Kuehnert is a hard book to read. It's a very hard story about a girl who finds herself slipping so far into a world of drugs and alcohol and cutting that she very nearly loses herself completely. It's painfully realistic in its portrayal of the life Kara finds herself living but it is also so powerfully written that you can't deny its impact or its message. And there are stories within the story. Many of the secondary characters who are especially important to the narrator have a chance to share their own stories, in a series of personal ballads and while the whole book is brilliant, those pieces especially made this book so perfect. This was a game changing book for me. It taught me a lot about myself and about life and it's one that I think people need to be more aware of.

No list introducing readers to Contemporary YA would be complete without Sarah Dessen. She's got quite a few books under her belt and so many people absolutely love her. I put of reading anything by her for a long time because I assumed it was too romance-y for my taste (and I was sniffabove books like that) but I started reading them last year and now I own them all. She really is an amazing author. I haven't read all of her books yet, I'm only about halfway through, but my two favorites are The Truth About Forever and Just Listen. Dessen has this way of writing a story that straddles the border between light-hearted fun and serious topics. She's pretty much brilliant and a must read within the genre.

The Disreputable History of Frankie-Landau Banks by E. Lockhart is one of the wittiest, smartest books I've ever read. Frankie is one of the best main characters I have ever read. And it has the word disreputable in the title. Seriously.

Laurie Halse Anderson is another author that I think needs to be read. Her books deal with heavy subject matter but are important and powerful. Speak, Twisted and Wintergirls have all found a place on my favorites shelf.

I don't think there are enough genuinely funny books out there, so if you are looking for more light-hearted, fun, laugh your face off in public books, you should definitely try Audrey, Wait! by Robin Benway about a girl whose life becomes a media circus after her ex-boyfriend writes a breakup song about her that goes viral & rockets to the top of all the charts (yay for music in books!). Babe in Boyland by Jody Gehrman is also absolutely hysterical. It has a similar plot to the movie She's the Man with Amanda Bynes except instead of soccer it's "investigative journalism" but it's seriously laugh-out-loud funny and there was more than one time that I had to stop reading because I was getting funny looks from the people sitting around me. Man its hard to breathe when you are laughing that hard! Yvonne Collins and Sandy Rideout have also written some really cute and fun books together. I've only read Girl v. Boy and Love, Inc. but both were super fun and entertaining. Definitely a fun way to spend a few hours.:)

And, of course, I can't not mention the phenomenon that is Stephanie Perkins. I can't tell you how many reviews I've seen that talk about — not being a Contemporary reader, but then I read this and!!!!!. Seriously you guys. Anna and the French Kiss is a book that has a little something in it for everyone. It's super cute, but the characters are also real people who do have issues beyond what they are going to wear that day, or whether or not super cute guy likes them. This is a book about real life without being heavy or emotionally draining. Something about Stephanie's writing makes the story reality to everyone reading. Definitely one you should check out. I can't think of anyone off hand that I would not recommend this one too. It's companion novel, Lola and the Boy Next Door is also completely full of win.

Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher is another book that I think many people, Contemporary readers or not, can get caught up in reading, but more than that, I also think it is a book that more people should be reading. It's a story that makes us accountable, even if only to ourselves, about what type of person we are and makes us recognize on a deeper level that what we do really does affect other people, that our choices impact others and we have no way of knowing what they are going through right now. Teenagers especially need to read this, need to recognize and understand that life isn't only about them and that other people matter too.

This is only the tip of the iceberg. There are so many wonderfully amazing books that I had to leave off this list. Books like Please Ignore Vera Dietz by A.S. King or Harmonic Feedback by Tara Kelly, The Sky is Everywhere by Jandy Nelson, Fixing Delilah by Sarah Ockler, Five Flavors of Dumb by Antony John, Amy and Roger's Epic Detour by Morgan Matson and on and on. The Contemporary Genre has so much to offer readers. So very, very much. And I hope that you give it a chance, give it the opportunity to show you what it's made of, to show you what it really can do.

Australian Muay Thai legend John Wayne Parr is many things; lethal, fighter, champion. Now add movie star to the list. Parr is the subject and star of a new documentary, Beneath The Venom, which charts his evolution from a kid dreaming of being a boxer to his current status as one of the most recognised fighters in the world.

In January Parr and a camera crew headed to Thailand where they interviewed trainers, promoters and opponents who were there for the first part of his professional journey which began at a Muay Thai camp when he was 17.
``I was a kid with a dream who in 1996 had the opportunity to go to Thailand and I was only supposed to be there for six months but after I won a few fights they saw I had the potential to go all the way,'' said Parr.
``I went and lived in Thailand for four years and had about 40 to 45 fights over there.
``It did a lot for the Australian Muay Thai scene and I was the first Australian to fight at Lumpinee Stadium and on the Thai King's birthday which had crowds of 150 000 out in the park.
``I was the first Westerner to really make an impression on them and we've managed to get fight footage from those early days in Thailand that no one's ever seen before.''

Working on the documentary with Parr as the writer, director and producer is Guy Norris, best known for his second unit directing work on the Oscar-winning Lord Of The Rings trilogy.
Parr, who's known of Norris' work as the head stuntman on films such as Moulin Rouge, Superman Returns and the upcoming Mad Max 4: Fury Road, said he was ``very lucky'' to work with him on the doco.
``He showed a lot of interest and got behind it,'' said Parr.
``He's got contacts to some big players in Sydney who helped get the doco going financially.''
Parr said the documentary is ``about ninety per cent finished'' and already they are in talks with several major Australian TV networks for the broadcasting rights. Beneath The Venom is also expected to get a limited theatrical release in America later this year. In the meantime the seven-time world champion, based at the Boonchu Gym in Burleigh, is concentrating on defending his World Kickboxng Federation title against Mike Zambidis in Melbourne later this month. Parr has six more fights scheduled for the year but after that he said he's looking at hanging up his gloves and pursuing a career in film.
``I wanted to be a fighter since I was five or six-years old and now I'm almost 35 and have been lucky enough to live my dream many times over,'' he said.
``Hopefully this documentary opens a few doors.''
Parr made his acting debut in the short film The Violent which won the Best Fight Choreography Short at the Action On Film International Film Festival in Los Angeles. Beneath The Venom is set to debut on Australian television later this year.

VIA Parr-ty time, excellent

This is the last official Award Winning Wednesday of the challenge! I've loved having a reason to review an award winner once a week, since I read so many of them! I hope you all have enjoyed them as much as I have! So, be sure to wrap up your reading, wrap up your reviews and link up!

For my last official AWW post, I decided to review Please Ignore Vera Dietz by A.S. King which won a Printz Honor this year. It's the story of Vera, a teenage girl who just wants to make it through high school and out of her town as far off the radar as she can. But things don't always work out, and when her best friend Charlie starts acting like a total pr*ck and then has the nerve to up and die on her, she's left totally conflicted about what she's supposed to feel, what she wants to feel, and what she wonders if she's allowed to feel.

First, let me just say that I absolutely love the way this book was written! Like, seriously. Vera is the main character and the main narrator, but every few chapters we get A word from the dead kid (aka dead ex-best friend Charlie), advice and discussion from the dad (complete with flow charts) and a few thoughts from the Pagoda (yup. An inanimate architectural eyesore gives us a commentary). And each of them are given their own distinct voice, their own attitudes, their own way of speaking that I didn't need the headers announcing which narrator was being given voice, because it was just so surely theirs that it couldn't have been anyone else talking.

The story itself is also so well told. This is again why I love Contemporary YA. Seriously. It's a raw and emotional story of trying to deal with all the crap life throws at you in high school, and Vera has definitely had her share of the major crap. As the story progresses and you learn more and more of what Vera has gone through, more and more of what happened with her and Charlie, or to Charlie, the more your heart breaks and the more you just sit there and hope that there is going to be a way to happily settle the story. But when several of the chapters are narrated by the dead kid, it's not like he's going to be coming back.: (

But even with that, Vera is such a strong character. She is the type of person that I would love to know in real life. She's got just enough attitude and sarcasm to be funny and witty without being obnoxious or a total b*tch. One of my favorite lines from the book, one that I feel illustrates the large angst of the novel as well as both Vera and Charlie as characters perfectly is — "Let me tell you — if you think your best friend dying is a bitch, try your best friend dying after he screws you over. It's a bitch like no other."-pg. 7 And that right there my friends, is Vera.

I honestly and truly cannot think of one single thing that I didn't love about this book. Everything about it feel authentic and believable and it's just so incredibly real. This is a book that I could read over and over again and never tire of. There is just so much to this story and I absolutely loved it. Honestly and truly, Please Ignore Vera Dietz has been one of my favorite recent reads. This is the type of book that makes me love reading award lists. Because without the Printz Honor, I might have missed this one. It wasn't really one I'd seen around a lot. But it would have been a shame to have missed this one, and it's one that I highly recommend you go out and read. Now. (But no, seriously... Make this one a priority. If you haven't read it, go. Get it. Read it.)

I have loved all of the authors I've invited to participate in Just Contemporary. They were all invited because I especially loved whichever of their books I've read. But I definitely have to admit that Melina Marchetta agreeing to participate is the icing on my awesome cake. I've never tried to hide how much I love her writing or how strongly I've connected to her books, so here is my interview with Melina Marchetta! (runs off to fangirl squee more)

You've written both Contemporary and Fantasy. What made you decide to switch genres? Which do you prefer writing? Which is more of a challenge?

When Finnikin the character came to me, I knew I couldn’t set it in the here and now. It would have been too political, so I decided to set it in a world that looked like the year 1000. But I didn't want to deal with the Crusades so the fantasy novel was born. I had always been frightened of writing fantasy because I’m a bit in awe of good fantasy writing and didn't think I was good enough.

With regards to my preference, I always prefer the novel I’m working on so if you asked that question two years ago when The Piper's Son was being written, I’d say contemporary. I’m writing the follow up to Froi at the moment, so I’m preferring fantasy. With regards to difficulty, what I actually find is that the Contemporary novels are emotionally the hardest to write and the plot driven novels (Jellicoe and the Lumatere Chronicles) are structurally the hardest. The Lumatere Chronicles require much more research and world building and I’m currently in a great state of anxiety. Do not believe for one moment that writing gets easier.

Jellicoe Road is absolutely one of my most favorite books of all time. I recommend that book to so many people, more so than any other book I've ever read and I honestly doubt that I will ever find another book that affected me the way Jellicoe Road did. So, I'm so curious — What was it like? Writing that book?

Out of all my novels, it’s been in my head and heart the longest. I started writing a version of it back in 1993 and still today I’m putting the last full stop on the film script. So Taylor’s been there for quite some time. Plot, as I said earlier, is difficult. If you get one thing wrong, the whole thing pretty much falls to pieces and every time I solved one problem, I’d discovered another. It really hurt my head trying to get it right. While writing the film script I had to find a completely different way for Taylor to piece together the clues of the past so it hurt my head a second time. In the script, there are visuals like maps and wall charts and photographs and artwork to do the job of the words in the novel. I never want to have to replot this story again.

I think the key word is patience. I would never ever criticise someone who can write a novel a year. But I can’t. Some of the magical moments come to me when I've let it simmer between drafts. Jonah Griggs was born in that simmer. He appeared as a multi-dimensional character in Taylor’s story almost ten years after I first started writing it. I’d wait those ten years again for another character like him.

On a similar note — I've talked a lot of people who feel the same, who just so fully connected to the characters and the story you created. What does it feel like, knowing that you've inspired and created such intense emotions in so many people?

Overwhelming seems a cliché, but that’s what it is. What I love best is that most readers have responded to the friendships rather than just the love story. There are many things you want as a writer. Awards, shortlists, starred reviews etc are fantastic. But I want to be read, not just referred to. So knowing that someone in the deep south of America or a reader in Russia or Korea or Sweden or Spain is relating to Taylor, well that’s pretty mindboggling for someone on the other side of the world. Twenty years ago when my first novel was released, I calculated I knew two hundred people in the world and that only 200 people would ever read my work.

You said you wrote The Piper's Son because Tom wouldn't leave your thoughts alone. Are there any other characters that have been sneaking back that we might get to see again?

If that’s a surreptitious way of asking about Jimmy Hailler, no. I don’t know where Jimmy is. I think he’s happy though because the real Jimmy is happy and I never thought he would be. I looked up the real Jimmy’s profile on facebook the other day and under interests he wrote, “ laughing at people when they fall down”. Cruel, but very Jimmy-like and it made me laugh in the same way as when I knew him as a teenager.

The problem with revisiting a character is that you don’t just have to concentrate on one. You have to work out where they all are. How can I do that without breaking a reader’s heart with life’s realities or fooling them into believing in perfect endings for everyone? What I try very hard to do is leave the ending open for the reader so they can work it out for themselves. But I promise that in my head, they get a happy ending. Jonah appears in his little brothers book, The Gorgon in the Gully and I think I’ll be writing another Danny Griggs novel next year so Jonah’s bound to make another cameo. A friend and I are also working on a 10 part TV series which may go nowhere, but we think it’s about Jessa McKenzie, four years on.

You caught me.:) Although I'm beyond delighted to hear that Jonah makes a reappearance, I was most definitely hoping we'd get to see more of Jimmy!

Jellicoe Road is one of the most complex and layered books I've ever read. There is so much, so many secrets and hidden things to learn. Did you start Jellicoe Road knowing how the story was to unfold, knowing where it would take you? Or did the story surprise you too, unfolding slowly, layer by layer as you wrote?

I think I failed for so long because I didn’t know what the story was about. I only knew who the story was about and where it was set. But plot is very important in a mystery and it wasn't until I read the novel, Holes, that I figured out I was going to have a parallel story line. There are things that did surprise me. Without giving anything away, I remember exactly when mid-writing I discovered why Jonah was on the railway platform that day when they were younger. I've said before, there are parts in this novel that make me cry every time. The Jonah on the platform incident is one of them.

As you've probably guessed, I'm not exaggerating when I say that I LOVE Jellicoe Road. Are there any secrets or unknown tidbits you can share?

Just a few film script things. We have a producer, director and a complete film script. The two major differences between the script and novel are that Sam, the kid from Taylor’s past, isn't in the film script. But I do promise that the emotional impact of those scenes is still there. The other thing is that the Hermit is now part of the present, rather than the past. I’m almost sure we’ll cast mostly complete unknowns. It will be shot in Australia and I do have a dream actress for Taylor. I don’t think we have a chance of getting her but I spent twenty years on this story so I’m not exactly one to give up on a dream

What's next from you in the Contemporary world? Will there be a Finnikinthree, or will another Contemporary be next?

Well Froi of the Exiles has a cliffhanger ending. Not a Finnikin ending, but a true cliffhanger. The third novel, Quintana of Charyn, begins three weeks after and every time I read a fantastic review of Froi, I’m elated and stressed out of my head at the same time. QoC comes out in October 2012. After that I think I’ll be concentrating on our TV series idea. We want it to be really edgy and dark, but with a great sense of hope and powerfully flawed relationships and characters. That will be keeping us very busy.

Thank you so incredibly much for participating! I loved learning a little more about the books and your writing!

And to everyone reading this, go pick up a Melina Marchetta book pronto!!Seriously. She's amazing.

I'll admit right off the bat that I haven't quite finished Angelology yet, but I think this might be a good thing. The ending will be very important to this book as it is supposed to be a thriller of sorts, and it might end up clouding my feelings about the book thus far. And my feelings about this book are a little strange because this is so unlike anything I usually read. Sister Evangeline has found herself amidst an old correspondence between her convent's mother superior and the famous and wealthy Abigail Rockefeller. She isn't the only one trying to understand how the two are related, and in the process she is plunged into a world of secrets that forces her to reevaluate the way she sees the world. Angels do exist, and their descendants are amongst us. They are rich and beautiful, and some of them are well known.

This book has gotten a lot of comparisons to Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code, which I read several years ago. They are both very exciting books, but Angelology seems to be more well written. That said, Angelology does drag on a bit more because Danielle Trussoni doesn't repeat ideas like Dan Brown does. The book jumps around a lot. We see the story from multiple characters' points of view, we visit their pasts, and we read their journals. Everything moves seamlessly.

Angelology appears to be a very well researched book. I know very little about the Bible or angels, but I put my trust in what she said. There are several "realistic" elements to the book, like diaries, charts, and excerpts from books that actually put you in the adventure. As a lover of nonfiction I always enjoy it when a fiction writer includes these elements to their storytelling. While I said I put my trust in Trussoni I did find that I was wondering about angels as I read through her book. It definitely makes me want to go out and learn more about their history.

I probably haven't been very convincing, so be sure to check out some of the other reviews of this book from TLC Book Tours. I've been purposefully vague throughout this review because it would be so easy for me to ruin this book for you. If you're looking for something to pull you out of your reading slump or are interested in well researched thrillers I suggest you pick this one up. You might be surprised, as I was, by how much you like it. And I get to give two copies of this book away. If you would like to be entered in this giveaway please leave a comment with your email address and the name of one book you recently read that really knocked your socks off. The winners will be chosen randomly. You have until February 4, 2011 at midnight. This giveaway is only open to US/Canada. The winners of this giveaway have been chosen. Thanks to everyone who entered!

I am an Amazon Affiliate. If you make a purchase using one of my links I will earn a small percentage which will then go back into this blog. I received a review copy of this book as part of TLC Book Tours.