Mike Jung's Blog, page 26

Jay Asher's 13 Reasons Why is one of the top selling YA novels and it's for a reason! And John Green would beat out ANY of the women on your lists, half of them I've never even HEARD of. You sound like you're just jealous that your book didn't break into A

well for one i don’t have any books out so i don’t think that’s true. 

but also, if you’d read ALL OF my posts, you’d have seen where i noted that i choose to recommend books by authors who need those recommendations.

you not having heard of them? pretty much why i recommend them in the first place. if you had been following this blog, or my old YA book review blog (which is now defunct RIP), i rarely jumped on reviewing or recommending books that were getting a ton of press. my biggest joy was reviewing backlist and books that got very little publicity. there are tons of popular blogs and people who do nothing but talk about the same 15 up ‘n coming books and i wasn’t interested in it. 

maybe i just really like books and authors and like to encourage people to read more than what everyone else is reading?

Well now I'm curious. I looked up all of the books that you recommended and there's only one by a male writer. You know men write YA too, right? It's not just stories about vapid teen girls. There are real stories in there. Might I recommend you branch out

There are real stories in there

are you trying to tell me, a woman, that a story about a “vapid” teen girl isn’t a real story? dude are you lost on the way to /r/theredpill or something?

i’m not at all interested in the authors mentioned, or their books. they do nothing for me. if you want to recommend books to people, go ahead and do it, but i’m not going to do it for you. and for real, neil gaiman? do you even go here?

ok which one of you is trolling me tho

Well now I'm curious. I looked up all of the books that you recommended and there's only one by a male writer. You know men write YA too, right? It's not just stories about vapid teen girls. There are real stories in there. Might I recommend you branch out

 There are real stories in there

are you trying to tell me, a woman, that a story about a “vapid” teen girl isn’t a real story? dude are you lost on the way to /r/theredpill or something?

i’m not at all interested in the authors mentioned, or their books. they do nothing for me. if you want to recommend books to people, go ahead and do it, but i’m not going to do it for you. and for real, neil gaiman? do you even go here? 

ok which one of you is trolling me tho

Dad

I left home for college in the fall of 1986, and I was not ready. I was emotionally immature and psychologically damaged; I’d spent far too much of my high school tenure in self-hating isolation; and my lack of success in both the academic and social fields felt absolute. Predictably, I experienced a wretched first year that resulted in academic suspension.

My father drove out to pick up me and my belongings, and his disappointment was both understandable and unmistakable. He seemed at a loss, however, because he could clearly see how unhealthy and unhappy I was. He charmed my roommate and all the other people we encountered, as he always did, and we started the long drive home.

Dad had a temper, one which I’ve inherited, and his anger could be intimidating, but it was a measure of how much I’d disengaged from the world around me that I wasn’t afraid or apprehensive. I just waited for it, dull, turned inward, wondering whose luck was worse, mine for being me, or his for having me as a son.

At some point we stopped for lunch, and as we sat in a booth at some unremembered roadside eatery, I could see him struggling for words. I didn’t or couldn’t say much – he asked questions, and I responded lifelessly, mostly by saying “I don’t know.”

He then said something truly remarkable. He said that college wasn’t cheap – that first, awful year had cost him a lot of money, and it was hard for him to see how it had turned out for me. He said that the most important thing was that I learn something from the experience, however, and that if I’d learned something, anything, no matter how badly the year had gone, then it was worth it to him. He would do it again, and try harder to help me.

I couldn’t take it in. I felt damaged, worthless, useless – I couldn’t take it in. I didn’t understand how much it meant for my father, born and raised in a traditional Korean household, the visual artist who’d forsaken his creative impulses in favor of a practical corporate career, a man who’d fought intensely with his sons who were intent on making the opposite choice, to say that. To accept my failure like that was an act of love as great as any I’ve experienced. I just didn’t know it.

April 9, 2014 would have been my father’s 78th birthday – he’s been gone for more than ten years now. Happy birthday, Dad. I’m sorry I never thanked you for that moment. I’ve done better since then – it took me a long time, but I finally figured out how to do better. I’m sorry I didn’t understand back then, but I do now. Finally, I understand.

Sacrifice

I’m gonna write while the rest of the family is at a second grade birthday party. Now, there are definitely some pluses to skipping the second grade birthday party, primarily the fact that hanging around and making chitchat with other parents for 2+ hours is a pretty good match for my personal description of hell, being the deeply introverted, socially maladjusted individual I am. But I’m also missing out on things like the jubilant expression on the 2.42 year old’s face as he pings around inside a bouncy house, or the deep satisfaction on the 7.67 year old’s face as she scores her first slice of cake. I’m doing it anyway, because I want this career, and I intend to have it. But the sacrifice is real, and it’s not easy; it’s never easy.

Arthur

I’m pretty sure it was sometime around this day in 2010 when Arthur A. Levine sent me a Facebook friend request. It’s probably easy to imagine working with Arthur as a very “yes Arthur, whatever you say, Arthur” kind of scenario if you don’t actually know him as a person – his gargantuan editorial achievements and place in publishing history are impossible to dispute, after all, and viewing him solely through the lens of those things undoubtedly results in a highly distorted, non-reality-based image. It’s easier to be intimidated or awestruck by an archetypical construct of a Legendary New York Editor than by the editor as a real person, you know what I mean?

Lucky for me I actually got to know Arthur as the genuine, wonderful human being he is first. I much prefer to see him through the lens of his humanity – it’s a more accurate way to perceive anyone, and personally I prefer working with a real, live human being to working with a fantasy person built from assorted shards of reputation, fandom, and media coverage. It’s true that I have no basis for comparison – I’ve only published one book, and while I’ve worked with other editors on short pieces, novels are a whole different can of hungry caterpillars. But it’s hard to imagine working with an editor who I trust more than I trust Arthur.

Naptime Reading

After lunch on Sunday Miranda and the 3.33 year old both took a nap, at which point the 7.59 year old plucked at my sleeve, pointed at the couch, and said “Da-da, cuddle!” So we grabbed our books (THE HERO AND THE CROWN for me, ANIMORPHS for her) and settled ourselves in the couch (me with my feet on the ottoman, her with her feet on the far armrest and her head on my stomach) for a solid hour and a half of naptime reading.

She made one or two comments about the comfortable squishiness of my belly; I said something about the increasing lankiness of her legs; and I secretly paused to listen every time she giggled or drew in a sharp breath over something she’d just read. I also paused regularly to stroke her hair and kiss her on the top of the head, and every so often she’d reach for my arm and clasp it a little more firmly across her midriff.

It was a very quiet 90 minute stretch. Quiet, contemplative, and utterly glorious. Spontaneously bursting into flames of happiness wouldn’t have surprised me at all.

The 3.23 Year Old’s Favorite Song

This morning as I got ready for work I walked past the kids’ bedroom, where the 3.23 year old was putting on his favorite stripey shirt while unselfconsciously singing his current favorite song, “You’ve Got a Friend.” I paused to listen to his soft, high-pitched voice, with its unmodulated breathiness and its blurry imprecision on the fricatives, and it occurred to me that some people might perceive such a moment as thoroughly mundane – banal, even, if viewed through a lens of uninvolvement – but of course I’m as far from uninvolved as can be. Hearing my son sing about friendship is among the simplest of pleasures, but it’s also one of the most profoundly moving experiences I can imagine having, and I stood there for a minute or two, listening, feeling my love for him fill me up, astonished by my good fortune at having this amazing boy in my life.

The Uncarved Block

I’m paraphrasing, but Michelangelo described the process of sculpting in marble as seeing an already existing work of art within an uncarved block and subsequently freeing it. I’m not comparing myself to Michelangelo (calm yourself, I’m not that deluded), but I occasionally grant myself a pompous moment to apply his description to the process of writing a novel. Of course I tend to get wrapped up in the metaphorical marble removal part of things – when the words are pouring forth easily, it’s like “holy crap, I possess the DIAMOND-EDGE CHAINSAW OF THE GODS” with marble chips fountaining in all directions to the sound of cherubic harmonizing, and when the words come more reluctantly it’s like morosely clawing at the stone with a bent spork. Today I managed to drag myself out of the procedural weeds and assess my progress, however, and you know what, I can see the book in there. It looks like a good book, worthy of all the chipping away and lungfuls of dust and metaphorical sporks. I think I’ll be proud to have my name on it.

Ruth

I first met Ruth McNally Barshaw at the 2011 SCBWI Summer Conference. We’d been acquainted virtually for some months by virtue of my signing with Ammi-Joan Paquette the previous year, but that conference was where we met in person for the first time. In the digital realm Ruth (accurately) comes across as very wise, compassionate, and big-hearted, so I was very happy about meeting her. Like everyone, Ruth turned out to have dimensions that didn’t make their way into her online presence. For example, I was entertained to discover that she’s not just wise and soulful, but also hugely sarcastic and funny. She’s a sly and sharp observer of the foibles of humankind, is our Ruth.

We talked, and she invited me to join a group that was heading over to the food court across the street from the conference hotel. Ruth and I ended up strolling over there by ourselves, amusing ourselves with an elaborate, impromptu, totally fake story about Lisa Schulman running off to Malibu with a morally questionable hotel management professional. We sat together at dinner, and I admired her ability to partake in the slash-and-parry of conversation while simultaneously drawing everyone at the table in her sketchpad.

We’ve been friends ever since. Two and a half years after that first meeting, I find it impossible to imagine a life without Ruth’s friendship, which I’ve come to value beyond measure. That was a happy day.