Thursday, July 28, 2011
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Nanowrimo's Chris Steps Down
Here's the email I just received.
"Dear Esteemed Writer,
Since founding NaNoWriMo back in 1999, I've had the pleasure of sending a lot of emails to participants. I've written pep talks, newsletters, exhortations, thank-you notes, apologies, and donation appeals. And, occasionally, I've threatened you with the release of face-eating guilt monkeys should your writerly output not increase.
Today, I'm sending you an email I've never written to participants before. I'm writing to let you know that this January, after competing in NaNoWriMo XIII, I will be stepping down as OLL's Executive Director. I am going to be taking a page out of one of my pep talks and heading off on the big, fun, scary adventure of being a full-time writer.
Eeeee.
Yep.
When NaNoWriMo began as a bunch of overcaffeinated yahoos, I never dreamed it would grow into a nonprofit with an office, a year-round staff of eight, Municipal Liaison-run chapters in hundreds of towns, and classroom programs taught in almost 2,000 schools.
Every day I come to work feeling lucky to be a part of it all, and so much of that has to do with you. It's no secret that OLL has the best participants in the world—a wildly fun, brave, supportive, and hilarious group. Through NaNoWriMo, Script Frenzy, and the Young Writers Program, I've met so many people who have completely changed my life. We've laughed together. We've cried together. And several times a year, we've threatened each other with face-eating monkeys. Just to show how much we care.
I've loved every minute of it, and when I step down as Executive Director, I want to continue on as a participant. I'll also be taking on the role of OLL Board Member Emeritus, which is a fancy way of saying that I get to offer input and advice without actually having to do any work.
And when I head off to write in January, I'm really hoping you'll come with me. I'll need you to help me maintain my sanity as I sit in front of my computer all day long, so please stay in touch.
And now? Now we have some work to do, because another autumn of creative mayhem is almost upon us. Come December, we'll hire a new Executive Director, and the staff and I will train this person to within an inch of his or her life. There will be wind sprints. There will be broadsword instruction. There will be espresso-based endurance tests.
They will be judged worthy.
On January 20th, I will head off with you to my writing bunker, and NaNo, the Frenzy, and YWP will continue under the same Program Directors who have been running them with passion and vision for years. Our beloved Municipal Liaisons will keep organizing raucous get-togethers to boost our word counts and writerly mojo in April and November.
OLL's mission will deepen. The programs will grow and improve. The inspiration engine we've all built together will help kids and adults discover their creative potential for decades to come. It's going to be good.
Thank you for continuing to be such a central part of this organization, and for being an important part of my life these last 12 years.
With a few monkeys left in me yet,
Chris
Executive Director
The Office of Letters and Light"
I really do hope that they find the right person to fit his shoes. He has done so much for writers everywhere. There are so many authors that are out there today (and published) because of what he started.
"Dear Esteemed Writer,
Since founding NaNoWriMo back in 1999, I've had the pleasure of sending a lot of emails to participants. I've written pep talks, newsletters, exhortations, thank-you notes, apologies, and donation appeals. And, occasionally, I've threatened you with the release of face-eating guilt monkeys should your writerly output not increase.
Today, I'm sending you an email I've never written to participants before. I'm writing to let you know that this January, after competing in NaNoWriMo XIII, I will be stepping down as OLL's Executive Director. I am going to be taking a page out of one of my pep talks and heading off on the big, fun, scary adventure of being a full-time writer.
Eeeee.
Yep.
When NaNoWriMo began as a bunch of overcaffeinated yahoos, I never dreamed it would grow into a nonprofit with an office, a year-round staff of eight, Municipal Liaison-run chapters in hundreds of towns, and classroom programs taught in almost 2,000 schools.
Every day I come to work feeling lucky to be a part of it all, and so much of that has to do with you. It's no secret that OLL has the best participants in the world—a wildly fun, brave, supportive, and hilarious group. Through NaNoWriMo, Script Frenzy, and the Young Writers Program, I've met so many people who have completely changed my life. We've laughed together. We've cried together. And several times a year, we've threatened each other with face-eating monkeys. Just to show how much we care.
I've loved every minute of it, and when I step down as Executive Director, I want to continue on as a participant. I'll also be taking on the role of OLL Board Member Emeritus, which is a fancy way of saying that I get to offer input and advice without actually having to do any work.
And when I head off to write in January, I'm really hoping you'll come with me. I'll need you to help me maintain my sanity as I sit in front of my computer all day long, so please stay in touch.
And now? Now we have some work to do, because another autumn of creative mayhem is almost upon us. Come December, we'll hire a new Executive Director, and the staff and I will train this person to within an inch of his or her life. There will be wind sprints. There will be broadsword instruction. There will be espresso-based endurance tests.
They will be judged worthy.
On January 20th, I will head off with you to my writing bunker, and NaNo, the Frenzy, and YWP will continue under the same Program Directors who have been running them with passion and vision for years. Our beloved Municipal Liaisons will keep organizing raucous get-togethers to boost our word counts and writerly mojo in April and November.
OLL's mission will deepen. The programs will grow and improve. The inspiration engine we've all built together will help kids and adults discover their creative potential for decades to come. It's going to be good.
Thank you for continuing to be such a central part of this organization, and for being an important part of my life these last 12 years.
With a few monkeys left in me yet,
Chris
Executive Director
The Office of Letters and Light"
I really do hope that they find the right person to fit his shoes. He has done so much for writers everywhere. There are so many authors that are out there today (and published) because of what he started.
Waiting on Wednesday (3)
Waiting on Wednesday (3)
Beautiful Chaos- Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted by Breaking the Spine that spotlights upcoming releases that I’m eagerly anticipating.
“Ethan Wate thought he was getting used to the strange, impossible events happening in Gatlin, his small Southern town. But now that Ethan and Lena have returned home, strange and impossible have taken on new meanings. Swarms of locusts, record-breaking heat, and devastating storms ravage Gatlin as Ethan and Lena struggle to understand the impact of Lena's Claiming. Even Lena's family of powerful Supernaturals is affected - and their abilities begin to dangerously misfire. As time passes, one question becomes clear: What - or who - will need to be sacrificed to save Gatlin?
"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted by Breaking the Spine that spotlights upcoming releases that I’m eagerly anticipating.
“Ethan Wate thought he was getting used to the strange, impossible events happening in Gatlin, his small Southern town. But now that Ethan and Lena have returned home, strange and impossible have taken on new meanings. Swarms of locusts, record-breaking heat, and devastating storms ravage Gatlin as Ethan and Lena struggle to understand the impact of Lena's Claiming. Even Lena's family of powerful Supernaturals is affected - and their abilities begin to dangerously misfire. As time passes, one question becomes clear: What - or who - will need to be sacrificed to save Gatlin?
For Ethan, the chaos is a frightening but welcome distraction. He's being haunted in his dreams again, but this time it isn't by Lena - and whatever is haunting him is following him out of his dreams and into his everyday life. Even worse, Ethan is gradually losing pieces of himself - forgetting names, phone numbers, even memories. He doesn't know why, and most days he's too afraid to ask.
Sometimes there isn't just one answer or one choice. Sometimes there's no going back. And this time there won't be a happy ending.” (Good Reads)
I have been waiting for this book since I finished book Beautiful Darkness. Here’s hoping October 18 rolls around soon…
Anyway, what are you waiting on?
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Review Starcrossed- Josephine Angelini
Starcrossed by Josephine Angelini
“How do you defy destiny?
Helen Hamilton has spent her entire sixteen years trying to hide how different she is—no easy task on an island as small and sheltered as Nantucket. And it's getting harder. Nightmares of a desperate desert journey have Helen waking parched, only to find her sheets damaged by dirt and dust. At school she's haunted by hallucinations of three women weeping tears of blood . . . and when Helen first crosses paths with Lucas Delos, she has no way of knowing they're destined to play the leading roles in a tragedy the Fates insist on repeating throughout history.
“How do you defy destiny?
Helen Hamilton has spent her entire sixteen years trying to hide how different she is—no easy task on an island as small and sheltered as Nantucket. And it's getting harder. Nightmares of a desperate desert journey have Helen waking parched, only to find her sheets damaged by dirt and dust. At school she's haunted by hallucinations of three women weeping tears of blood . . . and when Helen first crosses paths with Lucas Delos, she has no way of knowing they're destined to play the leading roles in a tragedy the Fates insist on repeating throughout history.
As Helen unlocks the secrets of her ancestry, she realizes that some myths are more than just legend. But even demigod powers might not be enough to defy the forces that are both drawing her and Lucas together—and trying to tear them apart.”(Good Reads)
I want to say right from the start that I really enjoyed this book. I checked this out from my local library, (which is where I get most of my books from) but will be buying a copy of my own once it comes out in paperback. For some reason I prefer paperback. Let me also say that I was hooked on this book from page 3.
I have not a single review of this book because I do not want it to interfere with my own opinions. I do want to take a quick moment to say that I know people will find major comparisons to The Twilight Series here, and that is fine. There are some major points for comparisons such as: having special powers, girl who lives only with her dad, fast cars, being rich, a group of family members that arrive to town and have many students at the high school, and all of them living in a big house together. Obviously you can’t avoid the comparisons and any reader who has read Meyer’s series will take note of these. Did I care? Nope. I loved that series and I love this series.
Anyway, this book is mainly told from the point-of-view of Helen Hamilton. She lives in Nantucket and attends the high school where she meets the 5 new Delos kids. Things start to get out of control when Helen finds that she literally wants to kill them....Mythology plays a very large role in this book, and Josephine obviously did her research. It is not hard to keep track of how the characters relate to their mythology counterpart. I believe that Angelini does such a great job with world building and characters. There are so many great characters in this book! I did feel a little bad for Noel since all she does is cook for…well, read it and see what I mean. Apparently she likes it, though. These are the kind of characters where you wish that they were yours to play around with. Does anyone know what I am talking about? I found myself constantly flipping forward in the book to get to the romantic bits and rereading parts that I really liked. In short, I couldn’t get through it fast enough.
My two/three only complaints about this book were the big, descriptive paragraphs at the beginning of the book. Do not get bogged down with this because this only occurs for the first 30 pages or so. Also, there are two to three times where the point-of-view randomly switches during the book to either Lucas’s or Creon’s. I just found this weird since the whole thing is basically from Helen’s standpoint. There are a couple of scenes that are described in such a weird way at first that the reader (at least me) was wondering what was going on. (Flying/Other Dimensions etc) One final thing is that I noticed three or four really obvious errors in the book that didn't get fixed in the editing process. Most of these were where there was an extra word in the sentence that didn't belong in the sentence at all. I know that editing a book is hard work and there are bound to be mistakes, but these were so obvious that it immediately pulled me out of the story. Maybe hardcover first editions always have big editing mistakes that get fixed for the paperback?
This is a book that I definitely recommend and will be purchasing myself once it comes out in paperback. I will be continuing on with this series and can’t wait to get my hands on Dreamless.
Monday, July 25, 2011
IMM (4)
This in my mailbox is a little late this week because I was out of town for the weekend. IMM is hosted by Kristi at Story Siren. This is a weekly meme that I really enjoy because it highlights a lot of books that I am interested in reading, but don’t have the time to read and/or write a review for.
This week I got: Delirium-Lauren Oliver
Conspiracies-Mercedes Lackey and Rosemary Edghill
The Pace- Shelena Shorts
Amy and Roger’s Epic Detour-Morgan Matson
All of these books were checked out from the library. My library is really great for reserving books and delivering them from the other branches. I'm so excited for Delirium and Amy and Roger's Epic Detour.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Waiting on Wednesday
Lola and the Boy Next Door- Stephanie Perkins
Budding designer Lola Nolan doesn’t believe in fashion . . . she believes in costume. The more expressive the outfit -- more sparkly, more fun, more wild -- the better. But even though Lola’s style is outrageous, she’s a devoted daughter and friend with some big plans for the future. And everything is pretty perfect (right down to her hot rocker boyfriend) until the dreaded Bell twins, Calliope and Cricket, return to the neighborhood.
When Cricket -- a gifted inventor -- steps out from his twin sister’s shadow and back into Lola’s life, she must finally reconcile a lifetime of feelings for the boy next door.
“You’re going to fall in love with Lola and the Boy Next Door. Madly in love! Every page sparkles.”
— Sarah Mlynowski, author of Bras & Brookmsticks and Ten Things We Did (And Probably Shouldn’t Have)
September 29, 2011
It seems like everyone and their dog in the blogging world already has their hands on this book. It's ok. I can wait. Then I won't have to wait as long to read the third, right? I will be putting up my review of Anna and the French Kiss even though there are already so many out there. That was a book that I would have never picked up if not for starting to read blogs again. More on that book next week.
A Million Suns- Beth Revis
It’s been three months since Elder unplugged Amy, tearing her from her family and the life she always knew. Now, Eldest is dead and Orion awaits judgment for his murder as a frozen. Elder is finally free to enact his vision for the ship’s population—no more Phydus, no more lies. But when Elder learns harrowing news about the ship, he and Amy are sent on a race to discover the truth behind life on Godspeed. They must work together to unlock a puzzle that was set in motion hundreds of years earlier, all the while dealing with the romance that’s growing between them and the chaos that threatens to tear them apart. Beth Revis wows us again with a brilliantly crafted mystery filled with action, suspense, romance, and deep philosophical questions. And this time it all boils down to one mind-bending conclusion: They have to get off this ship. (Good Reads)
Coming January 10, 2012
I read Across the Universe a little while back, and I am planning to do a book review on this one soon. This is a book that was hyped up a lot, but I don't find a lot of reviews of it. It's sad, I always see it on the shelf at my local libraries too...
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