Chirp Chirp!

Note: I never posted the following post, which I wrote in October, so I'm posting it now, in November. (Post, posting, posted.)


I am in a twisted sort of place of late as a writer. No publication dates before me, though I do have hope. (Springs eternal, etc.) Wrestling with a new manuscript that still needs substantial work. So, no glitter, no glory. I believe in the future writers like me will become extinct, because we are not chirpy.

Some form of bright-eyed chirpiness is the necessary gene in today's market. It is certainly necessary for a blog, and, as we already know, dear reader, I do not chirp. My parents never apologized for this woeful lack, for their failure to transmit chirp. Tsk.

I have gnashed my teeth about this before on this blog. Indeed, it might seem it is all I do. That's because of the twisty sort of place I am in. Like being a kebab over the charcoal briquettes. What else is there to do but twist and burn and complain? The unchirp.

In the interest of writing about something else, I have decided to list a number of books I have read over the previous several months that I found especially compelling. Most of them are young adult titles, a couple are children's, one is adult. (I actually read more than these titles, but not all of them made my personal Go! list. Also, there are a lot of new books I have not yet had access to; some of those might appear on a later list, at another point when I am still not chirpy.) I love some of these books more than others, but I enjoyed them all. In no particular order, here goes:

Crossing Paradise - Kevin Crossley-Holland
What I Saw and How I Lied -- Judy Blundell
Jellico Road - Melina Marchetta
The Underneath - Kathi Appelt
Nation - Terry Pratchett
Black Rabbit Summer - Kevin Brooks
Hush - Donna Jo Napoli
Breath - Donna Jo Napoli
Knife of Never Letting Go - Patrick Ness
The London Eye Mystery - Siobhan Down
Creature of the Night - Kate Thompson
One Lonely Degree - C. K. Kelly Martin
Carbon Diaries - Saci Lloyd
Mothstorm - Philip Reeve
Here Lies Arthur - Philip Reeve
When You Reach Me - Rebecca Stead
Peril On the Sea - Michael Cadnum
Marcello in the Real World - Francisco X. Stork
The Brothers Story - Katherine Sturtevant
Reality Check - Peter Abrahams
The Story of Edgar Sawtelle - David Wroblewski

finis, for now