Cheryl’s Comments (group member since Jul 30, 2011)

Cheryl’s comments from the More than Just a Rating group.

"YA is a book intentionally written for Young Adults." Well ok then. Considering they're generally written for teens, that seems to be an odd definition. But let's say we substitute the word teens, or the phrase 'the Young Adult market.' Ok. It works. But I'm glad my library doesn't adhere to that definition, but rather does put copies of TKaM on the YA shelves.

Personally, I'd tag good books with as many categories and keywords as I could, to try to get them to the widest possible audience. :)

Hm. Isn't 'incorrectly' a judgement call? Who arbitrates YA and decided these shouldn't be called that?

Fwiw, my library has two copies of several books that could be considered Juvenile or YA - they bought two copies simply so the book could be simultaneously shelved in both places.

Similarly, calling TKaM YA doesn't mean it's not *also* Adult. I'm not sure your analogy works toward the discussion of magical realism. (But I definitely could be wrong or confused!)

Still thinking about magical realism. By the logic of this statement, about Gulliver's Travels and others, "But none of those would be magical realism because they predate the literary movement that was named magical realism," Jules Verne did not write science fiction.

Seems to me that if we can retroactively apply the term science fiction we can do the same with MR. Or am I still confused?

If magical realism is tied to a specific movement and to use it anywhere else is seen as ignorant or disrespectful or something, then a lot more people than I need to be admonished.

Concept driven - ok, thanks - I've never seen that before, but I do like it.

Plot arc - I have no knowledge or opinion - hope someone else does.

Thanks for elaborating - that all makes sense to me. I see it as an 'element' of a story. Don't know how to explain what I mean - but I do believe it can be used when talking about other genres than capital L Literature, including picture-books.

Ah. Ok, then I would think the book I mention qualifies. The metaphor represented by the magic isn't political, but it's still significant.

I like that sentence and I'll add it to the post in the Cheat Sheet, tx.

Oh, yes, I forgot about the sad face. :(

From Dawn (trimmed by me just a bit):

Your is of or relating to yourself, or possession of. "The table is to your left", "Is this your book". You can see how 'you are' could not work in these examples.

You're is a contraction of personal pronoun 'you' and 'are'. It is used like she's, it's, we're and so forth. "You're (you are) coming to the dinner tonight?" "If you're going, I will too."

To combine the two. "You're on your way."

I can't figure out any emoticons except :) and ;). I try to avoid initializations, but they're *so* handy....

If someone has a good mnemonic trick or quick way to talk about your and you're I'll add it to the cheat sheet. I agree it's probably an error due more to haste than ignorance, but maybe not always.

:)

See that Sarah has already found an external link and put it in the 'point to external links here' topic, in the 'resources' folder. So, you've got at least two places to check now. :)

And Isis explains another common issue:

In a very similar vein, I see an awful lot of "could of", "should of" and "would of". This is just plain wrong. It arises because in speech when people say "could've" "should've" and "would've" it can sound to the unwitting like "could of" and so on. In fact "could've" and the rest are simply more contractions of two words using apostrophes - and in two separate words they are originally "could have", "should have", and "would have". If you think about it, a sentence won't make sense if you use "could of", "should of" or "would of".

Also from Isis:

Many people confuse "it's" with "its". If you use the rule above that I mentioned for use of apostrophes, you can't go wrong. "It" is not a proper name, it's a pronoun. So if it has an apostophe like this "it's" that is a contraction of "it is". "Its" indicates posession and ownership, like "their", "your", "his" and "her".

There - a place, or a declaration entreating the attention of others to look, as in; "Over there!" or "Here and there."

Their - indicating ownership by multiple people, as in ; "Their house" or "Their day was ruined."

They're - whenever you've got an apostrophe and it's not a proper name, it means the word has been contracted from two other words, in this case "they are", as in; "They are going to the park" or "They are tired."

(Thanks Isis!)

An example to help you remember, from Elizabeth (Alaska):

They're going over there with their picnic basket.

[They are] going over [place] with [possessive/ownership] picnic basket.

Sure, I'll start a new topic and lock it, so only Sarah and I can add to it. Questions & discussions here, results/answers there.

Everybody please give a welcome shout-out to Sarah C., my new lovely assistant! ;) Seriously, I'm thrilled to have such capable and enthusiastic back-up. Thank you Sarah!

"Magical Realism" It sounds self-explanatory, and I can guess a vague idea of what it means... but do any of you use it? Do any of you think it means something rather particular and I should be careful how to use it, or is it broad/ inclusive?

Right now I'm reading The Sound of Colors: A Journey of the Imagination and I *think* the term might apply, but I don't want to use the term in my review, and be wrong, and lead potential readers to expect something they won't get.