Maggie Stiefvater's Blog: Maggie Stiefvater, page 400

And YET MORE Live Chatting!

Thanks to everybody who chose our live chat last night over the Superbowl. CLEARLY you are people of culture and good taste.

Like yesterday, I'm going to post the covers and bios of the authors who spoke last night, and again, I'm going to mention that five more authors from the retreat will be chatting tonight at 8 p.m. EST here. I'm not saying who, but these are the authors who have yet to appear on the chat and will appear either tonight or tomorrow night at 8 p.m. EST:

1. Jackson Pearce (SISTERS RED, SWEETLY)
2. me. (me)
3. Tessa Gratton (BLOOD MAGIC, coming May)
4. Natalie Standiford (CONFESSIONS OF THE SULLIVAN SISTERS, HOW TO SAY GOODBYE IN ROBOT)
5. Carrie Ryan (FOREST OF HANDS AND TEETH)
6. Jeri Smith-Ready (SHADE, WICKED GAME)
7. Julie Kagawa (THE IRON KING)
8. Julia Karr (XVI)
9. Jenny Moss (SHADOW, TAKING OFF)
10. Sonia Gesler (THE REVENANT)
11 . Dawn Metcalf (LUMINOUS)

Julia Karr - Julia Karr was born in Indiana, and moved to Chicago when she was fifteen. After the initial culture shock of going from quiet, small town living to Carl Sandburg's "stormy, husky, brawling" metropolis, she fell madly in love with the city. Her schooling in the art of writing came from reading voraciously. While students were being forced to read the classics, Julia was busy going on author binges. As a young mother, reading books to, and eventually with, her daughters, she fell head-over-heels for children's literature. Not a far stretch for someone who had loved reading since the age of three. While still working a nine-to-five job, after hours Julia can be found at home, sitting on the couch tapping out stories on her laptop, with one of several cats draped behind her and her dogs sleeping nearby.







Jackie Dolamore - Jaclyn Dolamore was homeschooled in a hippie sort of way and spent her childhood reading as many books as her skinny nerd-body could lug from the library and playing elaborate pretend games with her sister Kate. She skipped college and spent eight years drudging through retail jobs, developing her thrifty cooking skills and pursuing a lifelong writing dream. She has a passion for history, thrift stores, vintage dresses, David Bowie, drawing, and organic food. She lives with her partner and plot-sounding-board, Dade, and two black tabbies who have ruined her carpeting.









Sarah Darer Littman - Sarah Darer Littman, writer, mother, and unpaid chauffeur, is a living example of the cliche, "Life Begins at 40." After spending much of her adult life doing things she didn't really plan to, including such diverse occupations as financial analyst and farmer's wife, she at long last found her true calling as a writer. Her first book, CONFESSIONS OF A CLOSET CATHOLIC won the 2006 Sydney Taylor Award for Older Readers. She indulges her adult voice as a columnist for the Stamford Advocate/Greenwich Time newspapers.Sarah lives in CT with her two teenage children and an adorable Havanese in a house that never seems to have enough bookshelves.




[image error]Kiersten White - Like most adults, Kiersten was once a teenager. However, Kiersten never outgrew it--literally. Standing at a daunting 4'11", Kiersten decided to write to her height peer group. Everyone knows that teenagers have more fun. Turns out writing for teenagers is more entertaining, too. Born and raised in Utah, Kiersten was lucky enough to marry a native San Diegan and be adopted into the fish taco and beach culture. A stay-at-home mom and full-time writer (if you count scraping in whatever hours she can after her kids go to bed as full-time), Kiersten lives with her wonderful husband and two adorable children in San Diego, CA. She's currently twenty-six, but that's bound to change next year.

Desperate for entertainment, Kiersten started writing shortly after having her first baby and hasn't stopped since. Being an author is quite literally a dream come true for a girl who spent every free childhood moment reading, and still spends most of her moments (free or otherwise) daydreaming.
 

Brenna Yovanoff - Brenna's good at soccer, violent video games, and making very flaky pie pastry.Brenna's bad at dancing, making decisions, and inspiring confidence as an authority figure. She suspects this is because she is short, and also terrible at sounding as though she have any idea what she's talking about.
She was homeschooled until she was fifteen, which has probably affected her world view in ways she can't fathom.
Also, she really, really likes parentheses. (Really.)

Last Night's Live Chat

So, last night's chat was a huge success -- we'll be doing it again with four or five different authors tonight at 8 p.m. EST. I wanted to post everyone's covers last night in case you wanted to know more about their books, and I reckon I'll do it again tomorrow night for this night's batch. Etcetera, etcetera.

Without further ado (There is frequently further ado on this blog, I've discovered), the authors from last night were:

Saundra Mitchell - A screenwriter and author, Saundra Mitchell penned the screenplays for the Fresh Films and Girls in the Director's Chair short film series. Now an executive producer and head writer for the programs, she mentors young screenwriters from first page to production.

Her short story "Ready to Wear" was nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and her first feature film, Revenge Ends , debuted on the festival circuit in 2008. Her debut novel, SHADOWED SUMMER, won The Society of Midland Authors Book Award for Children's Fiction, was a 2010 Edgar® Award Nominee, a VOYA Summer Reading selection, a Junior Library Guild selection, and an ALAN Pick in 2009.

In her free time, she enjoys studying history, papermaking, and spending time with her husband and her two children. She lives in Indianapolis and welcomes you to visit her on the Web at www.saundramitchell.com .



Victoria Schwab - Victoria is the product of a British mother, a Beverly Hills father, and a southern upbringing. Because of this, she has been known to say "tom-ah-toes", "like", and "y'all". She lives in Nashville, TN when she is not wandering in search of buried treasure, fairy tales, and good tea.













Beth Revis - Beth Revis grew up in western North Carolina reading the classics of CS Lewis and Madeleine L'Engle and devouring YA fantasy and science fiction by Robin McKinley, Patricia Wrede, and Orson Scott Card. Her debut novel, a sci fi novel for teens who don't like sci fi, is coming from Penguin/Razorbill in January 11, 2011. ACROSS THE UNIVERSE, the first of a trilogy, tells the story of a girl born of Earth but cryogenically frozen for a centuries-long trip across the universe and the boy born on the ship who she meets when she's woken up fifty years too early.










Myra McEntire - Myra McEntire knows the words to every R&B hit of the last decade, but since she lives in the country music capital of America where her lyrical talents go sadly unappreciated, she chose to channel her mad word skills into creating sultry Southern timeslip novels. But if you catch her at a signing, she can probably be convinced to rap with you anyway.












So again, we'll be live again tonight at 8 p.m. here: www.livestream.com/jacksonpearce. Come ask questions!

Live Show with Authors tonight at 8:00 P.M. EST

SO I am reporting live from Branson, Missouri, the site of the writers' retreat I'm hosting. Hijinks have already occurred and we are eating cookie dough under the shadow of the stuffed moose head, but that's not what I'm popping in to tell you. I'm sticking my head into the blogosphere to say that every night February 5-8, we will be hosting a live chat with four or five authors from the retreat from 8:00 p.m. eastern to 9:00 p.m. You can ask them any questions you like (no guarantees they'll ANSWER them) and they're all yours for an hour . . . but I'm not telling you which authors will be there on which night. I CAN tell you that each of these authors will appear at some point on one of those nights:

1. Jackson Pearce (who's hosting -- thanks, Jackson) (SISTERS RED, SWEETLY)
2. me. (me)
3. Tessa Gratton (BLOOD MAGIC, coming May)
4. Natalie Standiford (CONFESSIONS OF THE SULLIVAN SISTERS, HOW TO SAY GOODBYE IN ROBOT)
5. Beth Revis (ACROSS THE UNIVERSE)
6. Carrie Ryan (FOREST OF HANDS AND TEETH)
7. Jeri Smith-Ready (SHADE, WICKED GAME)
8. Brenna Yovanoff (THE REPLACEMENT)
9. Julie Kagawa (THE IRON WITCH)
10. Julia Karr (XVI)
11. Sarah Darer Littman (LIFE, AFTER)
12. Kiersten White (PARANORMALCY)
13. Myra McEntire (HOURGLASS)
14. Jenny Moss (SHADOW, TAKING OFF)
15. Victoria Schwab (THE NEAR WITCH)
16. Saundra Mitchell (THE VESPERTINE)
17. Jackie Dolamore (MAGIC UNDER GLASS)
18. Sonia Gesler (THE REVENANT)
19. Dawn Metcalf (LUMINOUS)

So please come? The link is here: http://www.livestream.com/jacksonpearce.

Weird Posts About Writers' Retreats

Every time I organize a writers' retreat, I'm struck by the weirdness that the Internet brings to relationships, and then I'm further struck by the further weirdness that any degree of fame (or notoriety) brings to relationships, and then I'm further, further struck by the further, further weirdness that being a sensitive, creative person brings to relationships.

Basically, since I organized this last retreat with me and 24 other authors, I've gotten such a bizarre range of e-mails and gotten sent such a strange array of blog posts referring to it that I feel like I should say something about it.

This is how I pick my invites for retreats.

- I'm going for harmony. You know how reality show producers cast folks they think are most likely to fight? I do the opposite. Every invite list I draft looks like a mix tape. I have to think that the songs go together. Because otherwise, one of those songs is going to end up hiding in her room for the entire retreat sobbing and rocking and I have that emotional blood on my hands. WHAT KIND OF A MONSTER DO YOU THINK I AM?

- I have to know you. I sort of feel like this should be obvious, but dude, I need to have some concept of whether or not you're going to kill me in my bed. I would never, ever pick some random person to come to one of these events. Also, like I said: harmony. I try to add personalities I think will fit in and enjoy the brand of conversation that's likely to fly around and to know that, I have to have actually communicated with you on a slightly less than cursory level.

- It's professional. Though we will have loads of fun at this particular retreat of Moose Head Wonder, it's also a professional thing where we talk about the industry. I have a few emails and comments from folks who expressed wistful sadness about not coming, since clearly we would be sitting around fangirling about each other's characters. True confession? I haven't read all of the authors' books that are coming to my retreat. We'll be talking industry and deadlines and creative processes, but probably very little about specific books. I try to add people I think think about the industry like I do.

- Ego. It's really easy to get a bruised ego as a creative person in a room full of people more and less successful than you. Bigger advances, better covers, better reviews, more books published, better looking editor -- so many things to compare yourself too. I invite people I think can stand the heat. And trust me. There's heat. When you're sitting next to someone at dinner and they're five years ahead in their career than you, the conversation needs to not be sulking, awe, or any degree of self-deprecating fangirling. If I add unpublished writers I know to the mix, I want to be relatively confident that they're not going to melt into ooze. Likewise, if I ask hotsy totsy authors to the mix, I want to be certain they check any ego at the door. We enter the door of the retreat, we're equals. This is the #1 reason I add someone to my list or take them off.

Okay, that said, these are NOT reasons I pick or exclude people:

- how famous you are
- how much I love your books
- how unfamous you are
- any sort of clique
- the size of your book deal
- whether or not you're published
- who you're published by
- who you're agented by
- whether or not you have an agent
- whether your blog/ hair/ face/ book/ etc. is shiny and beautiful

Basically, what I've been hearing is that people -- especially not invited people -- are regarding an invite to a Maggie Stiefvater retreat as a status symbol. And this annoys me. No decisions that I make over a pot of tea and a spoonful of cookie dough while dancing around listening to techno should be used to establish anyone self worth. The idea of it hurts my soul.

Now go out and create a writers' retreat.