Kim Culbertson's Blog
April 20, 2012
BookLoons review
A special thanks to Ricki for this lovely review of THE LIBERATION OF MAX MCTRUE:
http://www.bookloons.com/cgi-bin/Revi...
http://www.bookloons.com/cgi-bin/Revi...
February 19, 2012
MAX MCTRUE: Figment's Read of the Week
Figment.com not only graciously hosted my Flash Fiction contest, but they also had a fabulous post about MAX MCTRUE for their read of the week. I just had to share. Thanks, Figment. I'm blushing. For serious.
FREEEEEEEEEDOOOOOOM! If you haven’t seen Braveheart, then you won’t know why that’s the perfect word to bellow on a Friday afternoon. But speaking of freedom, the book we can’t wait to share with you this week is Kim Culbertson’s novella, The Liberation of Max McTrue (seewhatwedidthere?).
Max McTrue has spent his entire life trying to fly under the radar. He plays sports. He does okay in school. He has a girlfriend. He’s normal. So when, all of a sudden, he’s expected to apply to college and make something of himself, he kinda freaks out a little. And by a little, we mean he feels so paralyzed by all the decisions he has to make that he can’t even make himself send out his college applications. That is, until he meets Clara Jane Ramsey, and has one of the most eye-opening days of his life.
Here’s how The Liberation of Max McTrue scores on our uber-professional point system:
+ 150 points for the MC’s kickass, versatile name. The name “Max McTrue” makes you want to call up your parents and yell at them for giving you such a boring name. I mean, think of the possibilities! On the football field, he’s McTrain. In photography class, he’s McLenscap. In math class, he’s McFractions. The comedy potential is astounding.
+ 300 points for the refreshing lack of supernatural creatures trying to kill/maim/capture and/or otherwise pester the main character. I love me a demon or two. Heck, I even like the occasional angel. They’re pretty. They glow. But for serious? It’s nice to know that, whatever the characters find out about themselves by the end of the book, it won’t be that they’re the last hybrid descendant of some good and evil combo charged with saving the world.
- 100 points for manic pixie dream girl Clara Jane Ramsey. Girls like this always make us feel boring. And also blush when we think about the Justin Bieber poster tacked to the office wall.
+ 500 points for the converted ice cream truck that Emerson, Max’s best friend, gets to drive around. Need I say more? ICE. CREAM. TRUCK. And! AND! Emerson uses the truck to hold her archery equipment/library. We want to be Emerson’s BFFLs. Now. And then we might steal her truck.
- 75 points for Darcy, Max’s on-again-off-again golden girlfriend, whom everybody seems to like. We’re taking points off here just because everyone always hates the golden girl. She gets the guys. She has nice hair. She actually looks prettier after running around on a basketball court for an hour. And she will always smell better than you, no matter what. Sorry, Darcy. You can pout those perfect, glossed lips all you want. You still can’t sit with us.
+ 200 points for addressing a legitimate teenage concern that doesn’t get enough air time. Everyone stresses about college. The people who say they’re not concerned about it are filthy liars. Thinking about the future is worse than trying to find the bathroom at 3 AM without a night light. A huge round of applause.
So, ultimately, our wonderful friend Max McTrue scores a whopping 975 points! Zing. You won’t want to miss this one. Aaaaand it’s a novella, so you have no excuse!
http://blog.figment.com/2012/02/17/th...
FREEEEEEEEEDOOOOOOM! If you haven’t seen Braveheart, then you won’t know why that’s the perfect word to bellow on a Friday afternoon. But speaking of freedom, the book we can’t wait to share with you this week is Kim Culbertson’s novella, The Liberation of Max McTrue (seewhatwedidthere?).
Max McTrue has spent his entire life trying to fly under the radar. He plays sports. He does okay in school. He has a girlfriend. He’s normal. So when, all of a sudden, he’s expected to apply to college and make something of himself, he kinda freaks out a little. And by a little, we mean he feels so paralyzed by all the decisions he has to make that he can’t even make himself send out his college applications. That is, until he meets Clara Jane Ramsey, and has one of the most eye-opening days of his life.
Here’s how The Liberation of Max McTrue scores on our uber-professional point system:
+ 150 points for the MC’s kickass, versatile name. The name “Max McTrue” makes you want to call up your parents and yell at them for giving you such a boring name. I mean, think of the possibilities! On the football field, he’s McTrain. In photography class, he’s McLenscap. In math class, he’s McFractions. The comedy potential is astounding.
+ 300 points for the refreshing lack of supernatural creatures trying to kill/maim/capture and/or otherwise pester the main character. I love me a demon or two. Heck, I even like the occasional angel. They’re pretty. They glow. But for serious? It’s nice to know that, whatever the characters find out about themselves by the end of the book, it won’t be that they’re the last hybrid descendant of some good and evil combo charged with saving the world.
- 100 points for manic pixie dream girl Clara Jane Ramsey. Girls like this always make us feel boring. And also blush when we think about the Justin Bieber poster tacked to the office wall.
+ 500 points for the converted ice cream truck that Emerson, Max’s best friend, gets to drive around. Need I say more? ICE. CREAM. TRUCK. And! AND! Emerson uses the truck to hold her archery equipment/library. We want to be Emerson’s BFFLs. Now. And then we might steal her truck.
- 75 points for Darcy, Max’s on-again-off-again golden girlfriend, whom everybody seems to like. We’re taking points off here just because everyone always hates the golden girl. She gets the guys. She has nice hair. She actually looks prettier after running around on a basketball court for an hour. And she will always smell better than you, no matter what. Sorry, Darcy. You can pout those perfect, glossed lips all you want. You still can’t sit with us.
+ 200 points for addressing a legitimate teenage concern that doesn’t get enough air time. Everyone stresses about college. The people who say they’re not concerned about it are filthy liars. Thinking about the future is worse than trying to find the bathroom at 3 AM without a night light. A huge round of applause.
So, ultimately, our wonderful friend Max McTrue scores a whopping 975 points! Zing. You won’t want to miss this one. Aaaaand it’s a novella, so you have no excuse!
http://blog.figment.com/2012/02/17/th...
February 8, 2012
A Quick Chat with Tammara Webber, YA eBook author
I’m just now dipping my toe into the expanding waters of the eBook world with my novella THE LIBERATION OF MAX MCTRUE. It’s given me a wonderful opportunity to showcase a short piece that might have struggled to find a traditional home; it’s no secret the midlist is ebbing in traditional publishing. And while e-publishing gave me this opportunity for MAX, it also brought some questions about what team I was playing for. “Wait a minute,” a reader wrote me, “are you indie now? What happened?”
What happened was I had a choice. Turns out, I’m not alone. Plenty of authors are choosing to put their books out as eBooks and many are thriving.
This month I wanted to highlight one such author, Tammara Webber, who writes a series of YA contemporaries. I read her first, BETWEEN THE LINES, and found it fun, sharply-written, and engaging. Tammara’s had great success with her books so I contacted her and asked her how she came to find herself in the eBook world. I think her story is one of great optimism – a sign that authors can thrive in this changing market.
She was humble, of course, and suggested she “hit the ebook market at a very good time” when it wasn’t quite as “flooded” and this let her build a readership, build relationships with bloggers, find her footing early on. The cool thing about her story is that she didn’t have a long list of rejections from agents. This eBook move wasn’t done in despair. It was a choice. And her books have hit a sweet spot in a waning contemporary market.
Tammara would blush at this, but I think her success has mostly to do with Tammara. Yes, she had a good story to tell, but she also did her homework and made sure the manuscript was polished and professional. “I didn't write in a vacuum. I had critique partners (other writers/authors for whom I in turn critiqued manuscripts), and beta readers.” And she made sure her covers were bright and engaging. This, I think, is the key to indie publishing: going about it with grace and professionalism as part of the writing community at large – not a secondary part, an important part. Tammara, for me, represents the very best of an online writing presence: thoughtful, hardworking, kind. When two of my Goodreads covers suddenly vanished, she emailed me to let me know so I could fix them. Yeah, she’s that nice. She participates in the writing community in a helpful and supportive way. She writes without some sort of chip on her shoulder. It’s refreshing.
Hers is the community I want to be a part of as a writer, the community that knows the value of having a mix of good, polished work out there. I don’t know if I’ll write another eBook. In my typical Gemini way, I don’t want to have to choose a team – traditional or indie. I just think it’s nice to have options. The irony isn’t lost on me that Max McTrue, the MC of my novella, finds out that simply making a choice is greatly liberating, another example of art imitating life. Mostly, though, this eBook choice for MAX gives me the opportunity to meet cool writers like Tammara who have shown me the kind of wide choices authors currently have. And that feels like a success story to me.
From my February Point of View Newsletter:
http://www.kimculbertson.com/newslett...
What happened was I had a choice. Turns out, I’m not alone. Plenty of authors are choosing to put their books out as eBooks and many are thriving.
This month I wanted to highlight one such author, Tammara Webber, who writes a series of YA contemporaries. I read her first, BETWEEN THE LINES, and found it fun, sharply-written, and engaging. Tammara’s had great success with her books so I contacted her and asked her how she came to find herself in the eBook world. I think her story is one of great optimism – a sign that authors can thrive in this changing market.
She was humble, of course, and suggested she “hit the ebook market at a very good time” when it wasn’t quite as “flooded” and this let her build a readership, build relationships with bloggers, find her footing early on. The cool thing about her story is that she didn’t have a long list of rejections from agents. This eBook move wasn’t done in despair. It was a choice. And her books have hit a sweet spot in a waning contemporary market.
Tammara would blush at this, but I think her success has mostly to do with Tammara. Yes, she had a good story to tell, but she also did her homework and made sure the manuscript was polished and professional. “I didn't write in a vacuum. I had critique partners (other writers/authors for whom I in turn critiqued manuscripts), and beta readers.” And she made sure her covers were bright and engaging. This, I think, is the key to indie publishing: going about it with grace and professionalism as part of the writing community at large – not a secondary part, an important part. Tammara, for me, represents the very best of an online writing presence: thoughtful, hardworking, kind. When two of my Goodreads covers suddenly vanished, she emailed me to let me know so I could fix them. Yeah, she’s that nice. She participates in the writing community in a helpful and supportive way. She writes without some sort of chip on her shoulder. It’s refreshing.
Hers is the community I want to be a part of as a writer, the community that knows the value of having a mix of good, polished work out there. I don’t know if I’ll write another eBook. In my typical Gemini way, I don’t want to have to choose a team – traditional or indie. I just think it’s nice to have options. The irony isn’t lost on me that Max McTrue, the MC of my novella, finds out that simply making a choice is greatly liberating, another example of art imitating life. Mostly, though, this eBook choice for MAX gives me the opportunity to meet cool writers like Tammara who have shown me the kind of wide choices authors currently have. And that feels like a success story to me.
From my February Point of View Newsletter:
http://www.kimculbertson.com/newslett...
January 23, 2012
Max McTrue Flash Fiction Contest!
Calling all writers!
On February 3rd, I'm joining Figment for a whirlwind weekend of Flash Fiction to celebrate my new ebook, The Liberation of Max McTrue!
Enter the Max McTrue Flash Fiction Contest!
There will be a Total of three prizes: Each winner gets a free download of The Liberation of Max McTrue as well as a custom-made “beautiful things” journal. The first place winner will also receive a 30 minute manuscript from me.
All you have to do is write a super short story under 500 words that follows one of the four prompts below. Submit your entry between 11:00am on February 3rd, 2012 and 11:59pm on February 5th, 2012. The Figment editorial staff will choose the top ten entries as finalists, and I will choose the winners from those finalists.
The Prompts:
(1) Write a story set against the backdrop of a scavenger hunt.
(2) Write a story confined to the periods of a school day. The character can be in school or out of school.
(3) Write a story in which a character is deeply afraid of something.
(4) Come up with a totally ordinary character and then set him/her up to have an extraordinary day.
How to enter:
1. Go to www.figment.com and sign up.
2. Once you have received your confirmation email, go to your Figment profile page, click “My Writing,” and “Create Something New.”
3. Before you start writing, read the full rules on the Max McTrue contest page, which you’ll be able to find under the “Contest” tab on Figment on February 3rd, 2012.
4. Write an original story, under 500 words, that follows one of the four prompts above.
5. Go to the “Details” tab of your story, and put maxmctrue in the “Tags” section.
6. Wait the 2 hours it sometimes takes to see your story appear on the contest page.
On February 3rd, I'm joining Figment for a whirlwind weekend of Flash Fiction to celebrate my new ebook, The Liberation of Max McTrue!
Enter the Max McTrue Flash Fiction Contest!
There will be a Total of three prizes: Each winner gets a free download of The Liberation of Max McTrue as well as a custom-made “beautiful things” journal. The first place winner will also receive a 30 minute manuscript from me.
All you have to do is write a super short story under 500 words that follows one of the four prompts below. Submit your entry between 11:00am on February 3rd, 2012 and 11:59pm on February 5th, 2012. The Figment editorial staff will choose the top ten entries as finalists, and I will choose the winners from those finalists.
The Prompts:
(1) Write a story set against the backdrop of a scavenger hunt.
(2) Write a story confined to the periods of a school day. The character can be in school or out of school.
(3) Write a story in which a character is deeply afraid of something.
(4) Come up with a totally ordinary character and then set him/her up to have an extraordinary day.
How to enter:
1. Go to www.figment.com and sign up.
2. Once you have received your confirmation email, go to your Figment profile page, click “My Writing,” and “Create Something New.”
3. Before you start writing, read the full rules on the Max McTrue contest page, which you’ll be able to find under the “Contest” tab on Figment on February 3rd, 2012.
4. Write an original story, under 500 words, that follows one of the four prompts above.
5. Go to the “Details” tab of your story, and put maxmctrue in the “Tags” section.
6. Wait the 2 hours it sometimes takes to see your story appear on the contest page.
October 22, 2011
Stages on Pages: Why Stasia Ward Kehoe Rocks
This month, YA author Stasia Ward Kehoe kicked off the book tour "Stages on Pages" as part of the launch for her wonderful new YA novel, Audition.
But this was no ordinary launch. Stasia did something really special and generous. She asked 11 other authors (and some special guests) to be a part of her big event. Stasia's a former dancer and choreographer and Audition was very much inspired by her passion for dance and creativity. Inspired to showcase the arts and their importance in young people's lives, she reached out to other authors (myself included) whose books are very much responses to the arts that inspired our youth - theatre, music, dance, visual arts.
I am honored to be invited to share the spotlight with Stasia and I'm inspired by her generosity and communal spirit to showcase the importance of the arts. I invite you to check out Stages on Pages -the site, the tour, and the wonderful author who got this all started. I look forward to joining her for the Northern California portion of the tour!
http://www.stagesonpages.com/
But this was no ordinary launch. Stasia did something really special and generous. She asked 11 other authors (and some special guests) to be a part of her big event. Stasia's a former dancer and choreographer and Audition was very much inspired by her passion for dance and creativity. Inspired to showcase the arts and their importance in young people's lives, she reached out to other authors (myself included) whose books are very much responses to the arts that inspired our youth - theatre, music, dance, visual arts.
I am honored to be invited to share the spotlight with Stasia and I'm inspired by her generosity and communal spirit to showcase the importance of the arts. I invite you to check out Stages on Pages -the site, the tour, and the wonderful author who got this all started. I look forward to joining her for the Northern California portion of the tour!
http://www.stagesonpages.com/
September 10, 2011
Banned Books Month
It's September - a month where as teachers and authors we get to talk a lot about banned books. Donna over at Bite My Books gave me the honor of talking about the idea of book censorship as a guest post on her blog.
Here's my post:
http://www.bitemybooks.com/2011/09/ba...
Here's my post:
http://www.bitemybooks.com/2011/09/ba...
August 19, 2011
What is the Soundtrack of Your Life?
Head on over to Momtastic and mention a song that brings back a memory for you!
http://www.momtastic.com/parenting/fe...
http://www.momtastic.com/parenting/fe...
May 27, 2011
Shine the Light
When I was in college, I used to go to a bookstore near my apartment that I loved. All over the store, small little cards would stick out of certain books with little comments from the people who worked there, "Try this out!" or "A great summer read!" and it would be labeled with the name of the employee who provided the suggestion. They were, after all, suggestions, perhaps more than reviews. One of the guys who worked there, Ryan, and I seemed to have the same taste in books. He introduced me to books like The Shipping News and The Golden Compass. One thing I loved about Ryan was that he would never say anything bad about a book. If someone came in and asked "Did you read this? Did you like it?" holding up a copy of something, he would say something like "You know, I didn't connect to that one mostly because I'm not a crime thriller guy," and then direct them towards Sarah, the crime thriller girl who worked on weekends. When I asked him about it one time, he said, "I think my job as a bookseller is to just shine the light, you know?" Amen, Ryan.
Recently, someone on Goodreads wrote to ask me why all my books have four or five star reviews. "Yeesh," she asked, "Do you like everything you read?" Simple answer. No. I don't like everything I read. But I feel like this site, for me, is about suggestions. It's about sticking that little piece of paper with my name in it above a book to say, "I liked this one - check it out" so that maybe people can start to say "Oh hey, she likes Richard Russo as much as I do, I wonder what else she's reading?"
This world is a busy, messy place. I get that, I do. It's full of snark. People get kudos for being mean disguised as honesty or straight shooting. That's become very popular. On TV. Online. People get attention for it. And that's their choice. I believe very much in presenting myself in a certain way online. Again, my choice. But as far as suggestions for books - I prefer to shine the light.
Recently, someone on Goodreads wrote to ask me why all my books have four or five star reviews. "Yeesh," she asked, "Do you like everything you read?" Simple answer. No. I don't like everything I read. But I feel like this site, for me, is about suggestions. It's about sticking that little piece of paper with my name in it above a book to say, "I liked this one - check it out" so that maybe people can start to say "Oh hey, she likes Richard Russo as much as I do, I wonder what else she's reading?"
This world is a busy, messy place. I get that, I do. It's full of snark. People get kudos for being mean disguised as honesty or straight shooting. That's become very popular. On TV. Online. People get attention for it. And that's their choice. I believe very much in presenting myself in a certain way online. Again, my choice. But as far as suggestions for books - I prefer to shine the light.
May 17, 2011
5 Reads for Summer
This is the assignment I'm giving my students this week and I think it's fun so I thought I'd share.
I'm asking them to share 5 books they're hoping to read this summer and I'm asking them to explain why they're interested in them. We're going to talk about why we're drawn to certain books. We'll explore the idea of a "beach read" but also the idea that summer can let us set goals for our personal reading needs.
Here's my list that I'm sharing with them:
Please Ignore Vera Dietz by A.S. King
A very edgy contemporary YA novel about friendship, bad choices, and death. I know, I know – not exactly a sit by the beach or pool sort of summer read – nothing light or fluffy about this one, but it was named a 2011 Printz Honor book and I always like to read the novels that get attention from the Printz award.
Tender is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
I’m a huge Gatsby fan and I’ve always wanted to read this one. My book club decided to read it so now I have a reason. I think it’s interesting that there are apparently two different versions of this novel – one with a disordered chronology and one published after Fitzgerald’s death where they tried to “fix” some of the chronology issues (hmmm, wonder how Fitzgerald would have felt about that?). If I’m really motivated I’ll read both of them.
If You Were Here by Jen Lancaster
This will be my first “beach” read of the summer – very light and funny – the kind of book you read whilst dipping toes into a pool. I love that the main character is an Amish-zombie-YA author. Hilarious. What I love most though is Lancaster’s title is a nod to the Thompson Twins song that plays at the end of Pretty in Pink (one of the high school movies I was in love with as a teen). The story takes place around the house John Hughes used in the movie and the couple that now buys it and sets about renovating it.
The Understudy by David Nicholls
I loved Nicholls’ novel One Day and so I look forward to this story of a down on his luck actor. Nicholls has a really cinematic quality to his writing that I connect to (I guess he’s also a screenwriter so that makes sense) and I think he’s really funny while also having some good weight to his stories.
My American Unhappiness by Dean Bakopoulos
So I’m a big dorky fangirl when it comes to Dean Bakopoulos. I loved his first novel Please Don’t Come Back from the Moon and this one comes out the day after my birthday. Bakopoulos is such a gorgeous writer – so lyrical and yet so gritty at the same time. Reading his work is like listening to a Bruce Springsteen song. I can’t wait to read this.
I'm asking them to share 5 books they're hoping to read this summer and I'm asking them to explain why they're interested in them. We're going to talk about why we're drawn to certain books. We'll explore the idea of a "beach read" but also the idea that summer can let us set goals for our personal reading needs.
Here's my list that I'm sharing with them:
Please Ignore Vera Dietz by A.S. King
A very edgy contemporary YA novel about friendship, bad choices, and death. I know, I know – not exactly a sit by the beach or pool sort of summer read – nothing light or fluffy about this one, but it was named a 2011 Printz Honor book and I always like to read the novels that get attention from the Printz award.
Tender is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
I’m a huge Gatsby fan and I’ve always wanted to read this one. My book club decided to read it so now I have a reason. I think it’s interesting that there are apparently two different versions of this novel – one with a disordered chronology and one published after Fitzgerald’s death where they tried to “fix” some of the chronology issues (hmmm, wonder how Fitzgerald would have felt about that?). If I’m really motivated I’ll read both of them.
If You Were Here by Jen Lancaster
This will be my first “beach” read of the summer – very light and funny – the kind of book you read whilst dipping toes into a pool. I love that the main character is an Amish-zombie-YA author. Hilarious. What I love most though is Lancaster’s title is a nod to the Thompson Twins song that plays at the end of Pretty in Pink (one of the high school movies I was in love with as a teen). The story takes place around the house John Hughes used in the movie and the couple that now buys it and sets about renovating it.
The Understudy by David Nicholls
I loved Nicholls’ novel One Day and so I look forward to this story of a down on his luck actor. Nicholls has a really cinematic quality to his writing that I connect to (I guess he’s also a screenwriter so that makes sense) and I think he’s really funny while also having some good weight to his stories.
My American Unhappiness by Dean Bakopoulos
So I’m a big dorky fangirl when it comes to Dean Bakopoulos. I loved his first novel Please Don’t Come Back from the Moon and this one comes out the day after my birthday. Bakopoulos is such a gorgeous writer – so lyrical and yet so gritty at the same time. Reading his work is like listening to a Bruce Springsteen song. I can’t wait to read this.
May 7, 2011
Means the World to Me, too
Today a very sweet blogger had me on her blog to talk about what inspired me to write INSTRUCTIONS FOR A BROKEN HEART. What I probably should have mentioned is that it's bloggers like Mia that mean the world to authors like me. :)
http://girlaboutbooks.blogspot.com/20...
http://girlaboutbooks.blogspot.com/20...
