Posts for category ‘HGBG’

I’m reading the January/February issue of Poets & Writers. The cover story is an extensive interview with agents Julie Barer, Jeff Kleinman, Daniel Lazar, and Renee Zuckerbrot (who is wearing a really cute skirt in her picture, by the way). Great stuff that everyone currently looking for an agent or thinking they’re ready for an agent should read.

Then there’s an article introduced this way: “As the new year begins—after a groundbreaking presidential race and against the stark backdrop of an economic crisis—we thought now would be an especially good time to reflect on what drives us to write. We asked a handful of innovative authors about what inspires them most, hoping their insights could serve to strengthen our resolve and focus our energies going forward.” Looking forward to reading that.

Sometimes YA authors (me included) complain about not feeling like full citizens in the bigger conversation about the literary life and industry. It’s great if you’re getting the ALAN Review and the SCBWI Bulletin and Horn Book, but, you know, if the mountain won’t come to you, go to the mountain. Get yourself (or your writer friend) a subscription to Poets & Writers, or to a literary journal like Tin House, IMAGE, Zoetrope: All-Story, a university press quarterly review, something. If you feel ghettoized as a YA author, de-ghetto yourself and jump in the fray.

By the way, why didn’t Michael Cart’s excellent YA lit journal Rush Hour ultimately succeed? Did enough of us think it was important? Did enough of us even know about it? Was it because the journals were published as if they were paperback books, with a book-marketing paradigm, rather than as journals? (As I recall they did not contain any advertising.) Will somebody try something like Rush Hour again? I’d love to see it happen, but meanwhile, maybe we, YA authors, should be submitting our YA material—short fiction, creative nonfiction, critical essays, personal narratives—to the mainstream journals. YA lit has a lot more in common with adult lit than with children’s lit anyway, if you ask me. Maybe we stay in the ghetto because we don’t try hard enough to get out. I don’t know. (On the other hand, I know that many reasonably successful YA authors sell a lot more books than reasonably successful adult literary authors, so maybe they should be coming to us.) Curious to hear what you think.

Now I’m going to go read that “why we write” article and get back to my revision…

Like a lot of food-lovers, I harbor many kitchen fantasies about fresh-baked bread. Fresh bread is pretty much the ultimate definition of home and hearth, and the person who bakes her own bread is also the person whose house is the go-to place for neighborhood kids, who makes the stranger feel welcome, who has exactly the right advice for every friend with a problem, who has long glossy hair she usually wears in a bun, who composts, hangs laundry to dry in the sun, and never has a cranky day.  

Or maybe she just has a copy of Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day by Zoë Francois and Jeff Hertzberg. I acquired this book after a taste of the bread from their master recipe at my friend Ann Dee’s house about a month ago, and since then have baked six tasty loaves my very own self. It really is an amazingly fast and easy technique, and now I want to evangelize to everyone I know who cooks.  

While reading the acknowledgments for the book I discovered that Jeff and Zoë and I are all represented by the same literary agency, so of course I immediately exploited the connection to get them over here for a Q&A as part of my Shop Local Holiday Gift-Guying Guide. It makes a terrific gift for the cooks in your life, and you may as well get a copy for yourself while you’re at it. The basic ingredients for homemade bread are so cheap, this really pays for itself after the first four-loaf batch of dough. If you don’t see it on the shelf at your local indie store, ask! They can order it for you and have it in quickly. 

And now, let’s hear what the authors have to say… 

SZ: Congratulations on the success of Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. I’ve bought a lot of bread books in my time, and this is the first one that actually delivers on its promise of do-ability! What do you think it is about the prospect of bread making that strikes fear in the hearts of the average home cook? Read more »

So, you’re giving books to friends and family this holiday season, and the wrapped package maybe looks a little…lonely. Or you need something for the stocking. You know what goes great with a book? A cup of coffee or tea! Buying coffee out can seem like such a guilty indulgence when you’re trying to manage the budget—there’s nothing like a gift card to defeat the guilt part of the equation, because when you have a gift card it’s like you’re being forced to buy a gingerbread latte. Yay!

Now, on the shop local topic, I have to confess here that I’m not one of those people who sees national chains as the Evil Empire (unless we’re talking about Best Buy, where I’ve never in my life had a positive experience, or chain restaurants that claim to give you an authentic ethnic dining experience but are in fact as American as apple pie, but that’s a topic for another day). When it comes to coffee, especially, one could make a pretty good case that the Starbucks revolution basically created a market that was not there before, and that has benefited local coffee shops. Unless it was a local coffee shop across the street from where a Starbucks opened in the mid-nineties when S-Bucks was still new and exciting and the customer base was not as huge as it is now…

Anyway, I am more than certain that your neighborhood has a number of locally-owned cafes that offer gift cards or certificates. I know, I know, Starbucks gives you a consistent product with speedy service, and those are two things sometimes hard to find at your local joint. There are some cafes here I avoid because of the consistency issue, or the slow service, or the snotty you-are-invisible-to-me-if-you-don’t-have-a-tattoo attitude. But there are still plenty of good options left, and, dang, I’m in Utah! So I bet your town has even more options, and it wouldn’t hurt you to walk in and drop $5 or $10 or more on a gift card to go with that book you are already buying for someone. And, I’m a little sentimental about local coffee shops. A cafe (and any small business, really) is someone’s dream. The same way you want someone to buy your book so that you can have a writing career, the owners of these shops would love for you to patronize them even 25% of the times you buy coffee.

A few of my favorite local shops where the product and service are good: Raw Bean, local chain Beans & Brews (cheapest au lait in town), Salt Lake Roasting Company, Cafe Expresso drive-through/walk-up hut, and my neighborhood favorite spot for beans and when not in a rush, Jack Mormon Coffee Co. Jack Mormon seriously does roast its coffee one pound at a time, and brew it one cup at a time. The owner is knowledgeable and enthusiastic. Today he roasted a half-caff blend for me while I went out and did other errands, ground it for my office coffee pot (I don’t have a spare grinder there!), and had it ready for me to pick up on my way home. I’m calling it Sara’s Special Revision Blend, because I’m going to be at my office, um…a lot…in December. A girl needs a little pick-me-up in the afternoon, but also wants to sleep at night. And I hope there is a magic bean in there because lord I have a mountain to climb and need all the help I can get.

Before I forget: Today I blogged over at the Teen Fiction Cafe on this week’s topic – books! Specifically, Sinclair Lewis’s Main Street, which I’m now reading on my Kindle.

I wrote last week about giving books this holiday season, and supporting your local independent bookseller in the process. E. Lockhart is giving some holiday shopping recs at her blog, and I will be, too. But today I’m making a recommendation based on one of my other great passions: movies. I bet you have a cinephile in your life who might not be a huge reader. A membership in your local film society is a great gift for movie-lovers, and a terrific way to make sure that these groups don’t go away during tough economic times.

Here’s one directory of local film societies. Most of them offer a basic membership for under $50.

If you’re in Salt Lake, there are really only two places to see independent movies, The Tower and The Broadway. Did you know that both are run by the Salt Lake Film Society, which is a nonprofit. And you know what helps a nonprofit? Membership! In related news, the SLFS is holding two Sing-Along Sound of Music events as fundraisers, December 12 & 13. Tickets are $15. Maybe you will get to see the little-known alternate ending. (Some of the pages on the SLFS site are woefully out of date, so I recommend subscribing to the email newsletter.)

While doing my blog reading over the weekend, I came across this heartfelt post from Drew Goodman of the University of Utah book store about the value of books. His indiebound (formerly Book Sense) button really grabbed me, too (so much that I stole it for sarazarr.com). It asks: Why a book? One answer: “Because a scented candle never changed anyone’s life.” As the recipient (and, sorry to say, sometime giver) of many a scented candle, I say amen to that. “Nurture your community this season” is another slogan from indiebound. Hopefully, that means shopping at an independent book store for your holiday gifts. If that’s not possible for some reason, you can still nurture the community of your friends and family by giving books as gifts. And you don’t have to buy up the latest hardback best seller – there are thousands of great options under $10.

Drew’s memories of books he’s gotten as gifts over the years and how those are the only gifts he still has got me thinking about a few that stand out in my memory. Like the boxed set of Newbery winners that included Roller Skates by Ruth Sawyer, the copy of Taffy of Torpedo Junction one of my North Carolina aunts sent, and Robert A. Heinlein’s The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, given to me by my dad. I tried (but ultimately failed) to read that one, to please the giver, because he gave it to me after the divorce and it seemed like a way we could connect. Finding just the right book for someone can be difficult and you don’t always hit the mark, but it’s a lot more meaningful than a gift certificate (though I’ve never turned one of those down).

I am hereby swearing off scented candles and other space-taker-uppers this year, and instead will do the harder work of attempting to choose the right book for the people in my life this holiday season!