Seekerville Welcomes Zondervan Debut YA Author Melanie Dickerson

What do you think of when you think of Young Adult (YA) books?

I think of Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, a favorite of mine that brings back great memories both of reading it when I was younger and reading it to my daughter. So many of my favorite YA’s are sweet romances, like the romance of Anne Shirley and Gilbert Blythe in the Anne of Green Gables books. And my favorite books of all time are Pride and Prejudice—and all the other Jane Austen books—and Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.

In addition to these classics, nowadays Young Adult readers have Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (Which I have to admit, I picked up in the library one day, opened to a random page, and started to laugh out loud, it was so irreverently funny. Forgive me, Jane.), not to mention a proliferation of vampire stories, not begun by the phenomenally successful Twilight but certainly perpetuated by it.

A recent article in The Los Angeles Times titled “Young Adult Lit Comes of Age” called the YA genre a “juggernaut of a trend.” It also said, “Where adult hardcover sales were down 17.8% for the first half of 2009 versus the same period in 2008, children's/young adult hardcovers were up 30.7%.”

I recently got an email from Amazon.com with the subject line: Spring Reading for Teens. Here were some of the titles:

Burned (House of Night Novels) Spirit Bound: Vampire Academy Book 5 The Carrie Diaries The Vampire Diaries: The Return: Shadow Souls Fallen The Reckoning (Darkest Powers Book 3) The Dark Divine

Anyone for a little light reading?

Ah-hem. Anyway, after I got over my dismay at the “dark” subject matter, I got to thinking, is this really all that different from what I was reading as a teen? I can remember reading Bram Stoker’s Dracula, the originator of all the vampire books. I also loved a good ghost story, and I didn’t mind the violence in Ivanhoe, or the dark subject matter of Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre. Still, it does appear there is a serious fascination today with vampires, werewolves, zombies, and other “paranormal” characters.

Not only has the subject matter changed, but the audience has changed as well. Here’s a quote from that same article in The Los Angeles Times:

“It used to be that the only adults who read young adult literature were those who had a vested interest -- teachers or librarians or parents who either needed or wanted to keep an eye on developing readers' tastes. But increasingly, adults are reading YA books … Attracted by well-written, fast-paced and engaging stories that span the gamut of genres and subjects, such readers have mainstreamed a niche long derided as just for kids.”

Out of curiosity, When was the last time you read a YA? What are your favorite YA’s, whether they’re classics or new titles?

Besides the ones I mentioned above, here are three more of my favorite YA’s:

Beauty by Robin McKinley
Christy by Catherine Marshall
A Countess Below Stairs by Eva Ibbotson


Please leave a comment because I will be giving away a copy of my new YA, a medieval romance, The Healer’s Apprentice, autographed and hot off the presses—when I get my first copies in a few months.

You can view the official trailer for The Healer's Apprentice here.



When destiny sleeps, it can only be awakened by true love’s kiss.
In this historical romance loosely based on the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale, a woodcutter’s daughter becomes the town healer’s apprentice. Rose’s job is to care for the sick and injured in Hagenheim Castle. But Rose gets sick at the sight of blood and is more suited to making up stories than sewing up wounds.

Lord Hamlin, the future ruler of the region, is injured and Rose must overcome her squeamishness to save him. He is everything that is noble and good, but loving him is forbidden, as he’s already betrothed to a mysterious woman in hiding.

With two noble-born brothers vying for her affections, Rose learns that the people of Hagenheim are not always who they seem, and her own heart can mislead her.

You can preorder The Healer's Apprentice here.

BIO:

Melanie Dickerson is an award-winning author who earned her bachelor’s degree in special education from The University of Alabama. She has taught in Georgia, Tennessee, Germany and the Eastern European country of Ukraine. She now spends her time writing, daydreaming, chatting on the Seekerville blog when she should be working, and taking care of her husband and two daughters near Huntsville, Alabama. Visit her on the web at www.melaniedickerson.com or at her blog Melanie Writes.


The Healer’s Apprentice … Fairy Tales Do Come True

Good news and what I learned from it

Camy here, with some great news! I just got another 3 book contract with Zondervan!

The books are not a series—they’re 3 stand alone titles. The first book is slated to release May 2010 and is tentatively titled The Year of the Dog (they’ll probably change it). It’s a women’s contemporary novel. Here’s the back cover blurb from my proposal:

Tessa Ota, a professional dog trainer, is having a bad year.

While moving ahead with renovation plans for her new dog kenneling and training facility, Tessa needs to move in with her disapproving mother and her antagonist sister. She convinces her ex-boyfriend to take her dog for a few months … but discovers that his brother is the irate engineer whose car she rammed a few weeks earlier.

Charles Bretton has enough problems. His mama has just shown up on his doorstep all the way from Louisiana, and his brother has to move in with him after being kicked out of his apartment—with a dog in tow. And guess who the dog’s owner is?

His brother’s slovenliness, Mama’s diabetic bouts with low blood sugar, and the dog’s bad behavior are all distracting Charles from his wedding plans with a woman whose family connections will help Charles in his career. But he can’t help being attracted to the dog trainer whose sunny smile masks her bitterness at hypocritical Christians, and he starts to wonder about his own professed faith.

Will Tessa’s disjointed family and Charles’s disruptive home prevent both of them from discovering what’s really important?

But my post today is not about my good news (although I hope you are all setting your calendars with a “buy Camy’s book” reminder in May of 2010!).

After I finished writing Single Sashimi in Fall of 2007, I asked my editor at Zondervan, “What do you want me to write next?”

She said, “I want a contemporary romance with a dog in it.”

Did I say, “No, I don’t want to write romance, I like writing chick lit.” or “No, I don’t feel like it”?

Of COURSE I’d write what she wanted. I’m not STUPID.

But here’s my point: Your muse is a myth. Get over it and write what you should write.

I am not saying to write to the trends, because they come and go too fast.

And I’m not saying to write what you don’t feel comfortable writing.

But I am saying that for writers to cling to their “muse” and what the “muse” is telling them to write is just plain dumb. And bad business practices.

There is no such thing as a muse. What there is are writers who target their energies toward writing good books. Period.

“You should write historicals.”
“You have a great historical voice.”
“No other historical writer writes that setting/time period.”
“Your historical books are better than your contemporaries.”

Are you going to listen to your “muse” who says that the “book of your heart” is a contemporary women’s fiction about your traumatic past, and only focus on that, or are you going to listen to peers and professionals who say you have a great historical voice?

Look at Ruthy. Tina dared her to write a non-women’s fiction novel, and it ended up winning the Tara contest.

Did Ruthy say, “No, I don’t write anything except Women’s Fiction”? Heck no. She said, “Sure, I take your dare,” and look what opportunities it opened for her!

The “book of my heart” is a fantasy epic novel hidden under my bed. Did I cling to my “muse” who said that fantasy is my favorite genre and I should only write it?

No. I wrote chick lit because I also like reading that. I wrote romantic suspense because I also like reading that. I stuck the “book of my heart” under my bed to play with the dust bunnies.

Bottom line: Be flexible. You will not survive in this business otherwise.

Contests are a great opportunity to experiment with different genres, different “brands” for yourself.

Be willing to try different things. Be willing to focus your energies on sound business decisions about what to write next.

Be willing to be willing.

Camy Tang writes romance with a kick of wasabi. Her novel Single Sashimi is out now, and she runs the Story Sensei critique service. In her spare time, she is a staff worker for her church youth group, and she leads one of the worship teams for Sunday service. On her blog, she gives away Christian novels every Monday and Thursday, and she ponders frivolous things. Sign up for her newsletter YahooGroup for monthly giveways!