YA New York

The New York Times published this article today. It included interesting observations about why today’s teens don’t relate to Holden Caulfield.

Alas, one of these observations provoked the high school debater in my head.

Barbara Feinberg, in an e-mail to The New York Times: “Holden is somewhat a victim of the current trend in applying ever more mechanistic approaches to understanding human behavior … Compared to the early 1950s, there is not as much room for the adolescent search, for intuition, for empathy, for the mystery of the unconscious and the deliverance made possible through talking to another person.”

Emphasis added. I think that today’s YA novels, many of which are masterpieces, are addressing that need better than Holden does. It’s not because Catcher in the Rye is something teens can no longer understand because they don’t understand whining, or feeling alone, or wanting to experience something new. It’s because the current generation has good literature to read that documents their struggles.

For instance, my top two authors of ‘08, as you may remember, were E. Lockhart and Laurie Halse Anderson. They’re both writers who address Big Complex Issues, write well, and … let’s be frank. We’ve got better heroes for our time than Holden Caulfield could be. Studying Holden is like studying our parents.

Now, I haven’t read Catcher in the Rye in about five years, but I don’t think the fact that it’s a bit pathetic to the modern observer makes it completely obsolete. Wes Anderson has a whole career in making films — good ones — that are all basically about variations on Holden Caulfield.

Right. So what do you think? Talk amongst yourselves. Oh, and while you’re reading that article, tell me who you think today’s Holdens are? We’re not really stuck with Harry Potter, are we? I’ve got some more interesting characters in mind.

Michael Grant — yes, the Michael Grant of Gone and Hunger fame — stopped by today to let us know that his latest opens at number eight on the New York Times Bestsellers list. (The list will show up on June 21, as Michael said in his comment here.)

Woohoo! Congrats, Michael.

FYI:

A gaggle of teen authors will be doing their thing at the Jefferson Market Branch of the New York Public Library tonight. Six p.m., Sixth Avenue at 10th Street.

From the FaceBook page:

Micol and David Ostow: So Punk Rock
Elizabeth Scott: Love You Hate You Miss You
Delia Sherman: The Magic Mirror of the Mermaid Queen
Jennifer Smith: You Are Here
Suzanne Weyn: Distant Waves
Jake Wizner: Castration Celebration
Jessica Wollman: Second Skin

Of these books, I’ve only read Distant Waves, but I can tell you that David Levithan, the venerable author, editor and event organizer, has excellent taste. (Oh, and Distant Waves is awesome.)

Hopefully I’ll be able to snag copies of some of these books for you tonight, as well as taking pics and writing up the event for those of you who are not in New York or who are unable to make it to tonight’s reading.

But if you’re free, and you’re in or near NYC, please do come. It should be a blast!

PS. Elizabeth Scott is crazy prolific. I just read Something, Maybe, which debuted in April, and it turns out that Love You, Hate You, Miss You is her brand new book out this month. Wow!

Dearest, darling readers:

I have not forgotten you, nor have I abandoned YA New York. I’m working on a re-design, and I’ve got some great books to tell you about in coming weeks. Also a few fantastic interviews, with the likes of Alma Alexander and Ned Vizzini. So don’t worry, my friends. I’ll be back so soon your heads will spin.

If you have any requests for things you’d like to see here on the site, this is your chance to chime in and tell me about how really, it would be so nice if the site had X and Y and Z. But please note that any requests for winged pink unicorns will be rejected outright.

We’ll be right back.

Much love,
brina

Dahlings,

YA New York is moving. Or rather, I am moving (about ten blocks away from where I live now), and so I’m temporarily putting a hold on YA NY. But don’t fear: once I’m settled into my new place I’m coming back with a new design, new author interviews, and tons of new reviews. There are so many books I can’t wait to tell you about! But first I need to pack them, unpack them, and so forth.

See you soon, and much love,
brina

Hello there.

I’ve been recovering from yet another bout of illness, this time necessitating a brief stay in the hospital. (The food there was awful, I must say!) Anyway, that is to explain my recent absence, and I must admit I’m not yet up to updating regularly.

But there are more important things afoot: My alma mater, New Rochelle High School, has removed pages from Susanna Kaysen’s Girl, Interrupted, which seniors are reading in class. The offending pages? Mentioned oral sex.

Oh noes! S-E-X? The horror!

Now look here: There are plenty of teen books that are much more graphic than Girl, Interrupted, which is really a fantastic memoir about struggling with borderline personality disorder — although I must admit I disagree with some of Kaysen’s conclusions, it’s a good book and a fascinating read.

I don’t disagree with her inclusion of the topic of S-E-X, though. Because, let’s face it: teens know about these things. Indeed, when I was a wee girl of seventeen — a very bratty one, too — my health teacher went into quite a lot of detail about various sexual acts. Of course she provided these details so that we students would be able to protect ourselves from STIs, but she provided the info nonetheless.

And you know, not everything we read in high school was so very chaste. I vividly remember a discussion about The Turn of the Screw by Henry James, in which some of us couldn’t help but wonder if the book featured a woman having … err … improper relations with a young boy. There was also the day, when I was a lass of fourteen, that my English teacher stood in the hallway ringing a bell and shouting, “It’s the sex scene! It’s the sex scene!” because we were watching Romeo and Juliet (the awesome seventies version) and our teacher wanted to make sure everyone was in attendance that day. When we did indeed watch the sex scene.

We watched Schindler’s List, too, unedited. And we read other inflammatory books.

The school administration’s decision to bowdlerize a book is not something I appreciate. Ripping pages out? Really? This is what you do to protect teenagers? And from what, exactly?

I should mention that New Rochelle, New York is a rather liberal city. It’s not a bit podunk or backwater or anything like that. And I don’t recall there being any censorship issues with the school newspaper or the school literary magazine when I was there oh-so-many years ago.

Which makes it even more disappointing that the district would rip pages out of a book.

But let’s face it: censorship is a rite of passage. All our favorite teen authors have been banned somewhere by someone. When Rachel Vail wrote recently of her children’s book being banned, I was of half a mind to congratulate her and half a mind to console her.

Although, at the end of the day, the “rite of passage” argument doesn’t make it any less frustrating that people can be closed-minded and, frankly, idiotic.

ml,
brina

I read this book awhile back, and to be honest, I wasn’t sure I was going to review it.

But author Judy Blundell won the National Book Award for What I Saw and How I Lied, and so, you know … a review it is.

We begin our journey in Queens, New York in 1947. Evie, a teenager who seems to have too many angles and not enough curves, is hoping that life will return to normal now that her stepfather is back from the war. Instead, he acts moody, receives strange phone calls, and then takes the family on a spur-of-the-moment vacation to Palm Beach, Florida. The bulk of the story unfolds as Evie and her parents meet various people at the hotel, including the handsome Peter Coleridge, who served in the army with Evie’s stepdad.

The book deals with a lot of important issues: anti-Semitism, sex, coming of age … and, of course, lies. There are all sorts of twists and turns in this story, and it’s sure to make readers feel a lot of things: lust, jealousy, fear, anger … if you haven’t yet read the novel, I assure you your feelings will run the gamut.

… But. Oh, you knew there’d be a but, didn’t you? And with me, there is almost never a but. I suppose I feel like I missed something hugely important and incredibly brilliant. It’s like I’m in high school all over again, reading Nathaniel Hawthorne or F. Scott Fitzgerald and asking the teacher if we know the author meant to put all that symbolism in there, or if we just see it as a result of a million years of over-analyzing. (I can say now that I’m fairly certain my teachers were not trying to pull one over on me, but back then I felt certain that they were.)

So I must have missed something vital, and that’s how I’ve been feeling about this novel since I first read it. It’s enjoyable, yes. Although the ’40s lingo grates on my nerves a bit (”It’s not all polka dots and moonbeams” — a choice example, along with lots of ’40s-esque words like “jeepers” and “keen.”)

Still, I can’t say it’s not a good book.

And obviously it’s quite good, or it wouldn’t have beaten out my personal top two picks, The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart and Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson, for this year’s National Book Award.

It is time, I think, that I sit down and re-read this thing (again), and I’m just going to keep going until I’m madly in love with What I Saw and How I Lied. Right now, I’m definitely in like, but not in love.

But you know, I always want to hear your opinions. So let’s start with this: Have you read the book? Did you love it? If you did, what did you love about it? And if you’ve read any of this year’s other finalists in addition to Judy Blundell’s work, tell me who your top pick was. (If you want to go even deeper, tell me what book should have been a finalist and wasn’t.) Also, zombies or unicorns?

I just read this article by Lucy Maud Montgomery’s granddaughter, telling the world that the great novelist suffered from depression and eventually took her own life. It’s a sad story, especially when you put it in context: She died in 1942, during the second world war. She had written, during the first world war, that to see the entire world at war was too painful to watch. (This is a paraphrase; I can find exact quotes later on.) She was deeply depressed, as am I, and she was the wife of a conservative minister, and she didn’t have the resources we have now. A variety of medications, sympathetic and knowledgeable doctors, and most importantly, good friends who understand that mental illness is not a character flaw.

I have an entire shelf in my bookcase devoted to her writing. She was, without a doubt, the most influential author I read during my childhood. You know that feeling you have, especially when you’re very young, that certain authors are like friends to you? That if you ever met them, you’re sure they would be kindred spirits, because their stories capture you entirely? That is how I felt about LM Montgomery growing up, and I feel it even more today.

Dot Lin from Tor Books sent me this link, and it couldn’t have come at a better time for me, as right now I’m sitting at the bottom of a giant hole. What is amazing is that, in spite of her illness, Lucy Maud achieved so much. She wrote wonderful books and connected with generations of readers.

So for today, all I have to say is this: Read the article. And then go back and re-read some of Lucy Maud’s best work. If you haven’t read anything by her, start with the Anne books and go through the first three at the very least. Otherwise, try the Emily trilogy. You won’t regret it.

Sorry for the long absence; I’ve been ill and still am. Actually, I shall soon be returning to my bed, where an IV drip of YA fiction awaits me. But I’ve got a bunch of reviews and interviews coming your way as soon as I’m back up and around and back to my normal peppy self.

Speaking of which, I’m looking for a second writer for this here site. If you’re interested, shoot me an e-mail with some info about your reading habits, writing creds (blogs count!) and maybe a sample review or a link to your own site. I’d especially love to have someone on board who is interested in graphic novels, manga, and any other YA stuff you think the site needs more of. Last thing: You don’t need to live in New York if you want to join up in this volunteer effort. You can live anywhere. Alaska. Oklahoma. Finland. Etc.

Back soon, and much love,
brina

Not to get too political on y’all, but Maureen Johnson has started an online networking group called YA for Obama. I’ve been staying away from politics this election cycle, not because I don’t care but because I want to make sure everyone feels welcome at YA New York. But the thing is, folks who write teen fiction tend to be somewhat political. And they’re often somewhat liberal, which is why there are a lot of cool authors with informed opinions on Maureen’s site, which officially launches on Sept. 22.

Want more? Click on the little ad below:

Visit YA for Obama