taken at Drumlin Farm in Lincoln, Mass.

I have been treading on leaves all day until I am autumn tired…

They spoke to the fugitive in my heart as if it were leaf to leaf.
They tapped at my eyelids and touched my lips with an invitation to grief.
But it was no reason I had to go because they had to go.
Now up, my knee, to keep on top of another year of snow.

~ Robert Frost, The Leaf Treader

Robert Frost was my first American poet. The first time I read this poem, many years ago, it returned me to Lewis’ Voyage of the Dawn Treader. Perhaps a staggered re-reading of the pair, author and poet together, is in order.

@Edencityoflit’s gorgeous paper sculpture, via Anna @ Anna-Not-Karenina

For those who didn’t catch it on GalleyCat or in The Guardian, a remarkable, new-slash-mixed-media artist has been leaving some rather stunning paper sculptures at libraries and other cultural institutions around Scotland.

The sculptures–usually addressed to the recipient’s Twitter account–are astonishing, tiny marvels of fantastic bookishness. It is particularly dorky, I know, but this one actually made me tear up a little.

There’s been a bit of discussion about who the artist is, with several folks suggesting Su Blackwell, though one commenter on the original post says it’s definitely not Blackwell’s work. Much as I’d like to know, though, I love that these gifts are anonymous tokens of bookish love. Hopefully, they’ll still be on display when I eventually get to visit the Scotland (my mum is from Glasgow, and yet I’ve never been…).

So far, gifts have been made to:

• the Scottish Poetry Library, @byleaveswelive (I love this handle)
• the National Library of Scotland, @natlibscot
• the Filmhouse (home of the Edinburgh international film festival), @filmhouse
• the Scottish Storytelling Centre, @scotstorycentre
• the Edinburgh international book festival, @edbookfest
• UNESCO Edinburgh City of Literature, @edencityoflit (my favorite)
• the Central Lending Library on George IV bridge, @Edinburgh_CC

See them all, with photos by Chrisdonia, here, then pass them on. Also, a few fun pics with the tree sculpture and Ian Rankin @ Anna-Not-Karenina’s post on the Edinburgh Book Festival.

At 11:46:

Did the back to school rush wipe out B&N’s stock? Or is it just inventory error? And since when are the Eragon series, James Patterson, and Stephen King shelved next to Catcher?

Strangely enough, a second search revealed a more reassuring result:

At 12:08:

B&N also has my other fave Salinger, Franny and Zooey, in stock, so props for carrying the lesser known of the two.

Interestingly, I had the same error when I searched for Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash. Has this happened to anyone else?

A few weeks ago, I ran into a friend at a coffee shop, someone I don’t see often enough. And while we were chatting, I had an epiphany.

Having children hollows you  It scoops out all the dross and guts and congealed ideas until you’re left with yourself at your most basic. Luxuries–showers, full bottles of tabasco sauce, unattached, unassigned time–give way to necessities. Necessities like emptying the diaper pail, rushing out for diapers in the middle of the night¹, or always having an applesauce pouch tucked about my person.

Somehow, over a blurred series of sleepless nights, I’ve grown from a tabasco-loving neurotic into a relatively calm mum, the kind who laughs and uses words like kiddo and is almost always covered in goop, or paint, or stickers.

Yesterday, I found a yellow crane sticker on my shoulder. I’m not sure how long it was there, but since I’m in a cast (broken hand) and couldn’t reach (despite thirty minutes of trying), it had to wait until I saw Joe six hours later. Even then, I’d've probably forgotten if the dratted thing hadn’t itched.

I do not know how this happened, where the calm, or the patience, or the normalcy has come from.

For the most part, I don’t mind the hollowness–the extra space can always be filled with chocolate. And I like being described as patient, and easy-going, like having people give me credit for my child’s awesomeness, even though I’m pretty sure his even temperament and propensity toward sharing are less Peta and more dumb luck. And I still have neurotic days, though, in some ways, having a broken hand is a blessing. After all, it’s hard to be overworked and neurotic when:

a. I can’t wash dishes;

b. I can’t open jars;

c. I can’t carry large, heavy grocery bags;

d. The kidlet is drawing butterflies on my cast.

¹Also, an upside down kimono shirt and a crapload of cotton wool work well in a pinch. Or a snowstorm. Or any night the walk to the all-night Shaw’s seems interminably long…

This post was first published in March 2010, but I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. As I wind up the first draft of a new project–I’m in that mad, almost love-drunk rush that comes with knowing the end is nigh–I keep drifting back to these three questions:

1. Can I wrap this up without leaving a tangled mess of loose ends?

2. Have I revealed enough for the end to work, or is it just a poorly fashioned deus ex machina?

3. Am I forcing my leads into roles they don’t want?

And these three, in turn keep bringing me back to the ultimate two: Will my book be satisfying? And is it engaging?

ETA: the original Catching Fire image was having issues, so I’ve replaced it with these German covers instead. I like this much better, anyway.

* * *

See my follow-up, “What Makes a Book Satisfying?” here.

Reading is quite the investment. Not just in terms of monetary cost, but in terms of time spent reading the story, digesting the story, and, if it’s a very good book (or if you’re a deep reader), thinking about the story afterward. Some books are clearly worth the investment (Pride & Prejudice anyone? Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle? L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time?), while others are a win-some-lose-some deal. And then there are the books we give our hearts to freely, only to have the world’s most unsatisfying ending snatch them away.

Unsatisfying Books

So what makes a book satisfying? It’s hard to pin down, partially because it’s easier to work out what’s unsatisfying.
This month, I’ve read four books, two of which (Suzanne Collins’ Catching Fire and Jasper Fforde’s Shades of Grey) had supremely unsatisfying endings. The latter hurt my heart/brain/squeeglesquawk so much that it kept me up the better part of last night.

Picking over the bones of these stories, and a few others I’ve found unsatisfying over the past year or two, I’ve found that the majority of unsatisfying books are those that don’t wrap up properly. At the end of the book, it’s hard to say exactly what it’s about, why we loved/hated it because we don’t really know it. For me, these books are like a song I only kinda-sorta know–the chorus gets stuck in my head, but I can’t recall the singer/band, or resolve the melody without depending on an annoying Hey Jude like fade.

Although it may seem unfair to count Catching Fire as a book I found unsatisfying because it’s part of a series, I think a series book with a frustrating wrap-up is actually worse than a stand-alone book with a frustrating end. Series are all about trust. Trust that–

• the story is going somewhere

• the story is not just a dream, and will not end “and then I woke up”

• the author will reveal key facts as we need to know them, instead of hoarding the answers for a Columbo-esque reveal at the end

• the characters won’t be forced into a happily-ever-after/crappily-ever-after

• the storyline will resolve

Even with series books, there should be a resolution, because while a series has one long arc, the books have smaller arcs that feed into one another. In the first book of The Hunger Games, the main goal is for Katniss and Peeta to survive. Whether or not they achieve their goal doesn’t matter (well, it does, but we’re talking technical stuff here), as long as the issue is decided one way or another, and we have a clear answer–and a resolution of the smaller arc. And the cliffhanger ending? In the best series books, the cliffhanger opens a new arc, but doesn’t journey along too far, for three reasons:

the reader should be able to pick up the second book without re-reading the first one
a new reader should be able to pick up the second book and make sense of the story
if the new arc continues too far, the lack of resolution becomes frustrating rather than a reason to read the next book

Reasons a book may be unsatisfying after that very last page turn:

• Storyline doesn’t resolve

• Romantic entanglements don’t resolve

• Subplot(s) are forgotten about/don’t resolve (notice the trend, yet?)

• The characters are pulled out of the paper bag rather than finding their own way out (deus ex machina)

• In fantasy/science fiction, the world is never fully realized

• There’s a forced happily-ever-after/crappily-ever-after

Happily–or Crappily–Ever After

While I’m not against happily ever afters, books where the story wraps up too neatly and everyone gets kisses and cake are unsatisfying because they’re oh-so-sweet and unrealistic. One way to tell if a story’s happily ever after is too neat? Try imagining the characters’ lives after that last page turn. Can you see them continuing on, getting involved in new stories? Or are you stuck at the riding off into the sunset point?

But where neat, happy wrap ups are somewhat unsatisfying, forced unhappy wrap ups cross into pitch-the-book-across-the-room territory. This isn’t to say all stories need happy endings–they don’t. Some stories, like Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, or, in YA, Wendy Mass’ A Mango-Shaped Space are better for their sad, tear-jerker endings. (To be fair, Mass’ book did make me cry in a couple of spots, but it does have a generally happy end.) Sometimes, though–particularly in fantasy and science fiction–an author’s need to make a point or echo their world’s bleakness results in a forced, overwrought crappily ever after. In these stories, the author piles on difficulties and throws obstacle into the characters’ paths in the last few chapters without giving them the chance to overcome. Sometimes, a technicality–one mentioned only in passing–prevents the happy ending; other times, a subplot comes to back to bite the reader, wrenching the happily-ever-after away for no real gain.

So what makes a book satisfying? I’m still working that out–but I’ll have a post about it on Tuesday.

What have you read lately? Was any of it unsatisfying? Why?

“Housework can kill you if done right.” ~ Erma Bombeck

I am drowning in other people’s stuff.

Since having Mir, I have been downsizing–giving away clothes, books, toys. But most of what I’ve cleared is my own: My books, my clothes, a few stuffed toys & trinkets. I am down to around two weeks’ worth of regular wear clothes; I’m buying mostly ebooks; and I’m curating my collections with a careful eye, weighing every possession by the seasoned mover’s metric, “Is this worth paying to move?”

And still, I am drowning–in toys, and books, and other people’s clothes. Yet these things are not my issue, but rather an (annoying) symptom. My time is scarce, and I feel as if I am fighting to write, to read, to run, doubling up on my commitments so that now I read as I run, lest I not have time to touch a book the rest of the day. I write as I shower, or tidy, or walk the kidlet in his stroller, keeping copious mental notes, scribbling memory-joggers when I’m tired in pigeon scrawl that is barely recognizable as my own.

I bring this on myself. Taking care of a toddler (mostly) on my own while attempting to work is a special breed of insanity. But much as I love husband and kidlet, they are not enough. I can’t function without writing or reading–it’s like my mind goes into a quiet, desperate kind of sensory deprivation when I do nothing, and I feel like I will explode.

I am being slowly subsumed by my husband and child, like they are eating me from the inside out and soon there will be nothing left but dust and bones. And it is my fault, because I am letting them, but I do not know how to keep them from taking everything I am while still being a good person, a sane person, a person who is there for them when they need me, but still in some semblance of charge of her own life.

Somehow–and I really, truly do not understand how–I am failing at mothering, and wifing, and bad wifing, and bad mothering, because I cannot seem to decide on which I want to be. Instead, I flit between needing to scream and wanting to plunge headfirst into a basin of water to do it so no one can hear me, and thinking I am the luckiest woman in the world because I have two people whom I love so much I feel like my heart will tear from the sheer effort of it. There is no middle ground; I seem only able to do extremes, and extremes are exhausting.

But this is the price of mothering–and writing. Being a stay-at-home mum, a homemaker, or a “domestic engineer,” a term I despise almost as much as overripe mangoes and movies with mawkish soundtracks, is an underrated living. Tack on writer in the dawning of a new age of self-publishing, and you are left with a double whammy of somewhat frowned upon and illegitimate positions, particularly in an area where there are more universities than chocolate shops. I need a road map, and I do not know where to find one.

Drowning in other people’s stuff, though, helps me appreciate the small things: The solitary shower I had this morning, surrounded by bath toys, but with no trains or buses wending their way inexorably closer to my exposed (and sensitive) feet; the quietude of a cup of tea, knowing I don’t have to share it with small fingers (Mir loves herbal tea);  turning off the air conditioner and being able to sit with just one blanket rather than two, or three, or four. It’s also given me a greater appreciation of the bathroom because, in a small, one bedroom apartment, a bathroom is a full room, a room with outlets for a computer and a seat that’s not too uncomfortable if you bring a cushion. A room that has a door, a lock, and, with earplugs, some small semblance of privacy. Add a cup of coffee and a slice of cake, and it’s better than a trip to Starbucks.

Image Credit: Housework, by Becky F, via Flickr

Mir is a writer, too!

Good morning, book people! I’m at a Starbucks working this morning, soaking up the yuppie-artistic vibe of Harvard Square. How about you?

In slightly sad Peta & Joe news this morning, I had an epiphany: We have lived in the US so long that Starbucks has become a way of measurement for us. Over the weekend, I had a rather heavy parcel of papers to mail–43 oz’ worth. Joe’s response? “Wow, that’s more than two ventis! Or almost a trenta and an half!”

And now for something completely different…

First up, literary agency Dystel & Goderich is entering the e-publishing game–sort of. Rather than becoming a publisher (as a few other agencies are doing), they will:

facilitate e-publishing for those of clients who decide that they want to go this route, after consultation and strategizing about whether they should try traditional publishing first or perhaps simply set aside the current book and move on to the next. (via @lkblackburne)

Next on the docket, YA Highway has an excellent post on “building a heart bridge” to your reader. It’s a great follow-up to #YAsaves. Very quick read, but long-lingering thoughts.
Stuck for time to write this summer? Over at Literary Rambles, Casey shares how she’s carving out time to write over the break. She also has a great-looking book giveaway. Head on over to win a copy of:

• Lauren Oliver’s Delirium
• Kimberly Sterling’s Desires of the Dead
• Stephanie Perkins’ Anna and the French Kiss
• Julie Kagawa’s The Iron Queen

…by becoming a follower (of Casey’s blog, though I love followers/subscribers too!) and leave a comment before July 9th.

Over at Pub Rants, Agent Kristin Nelson has a quick read on riding the cultural zeitgeist–when agents start seeing submissions that aren’t on-trend, but center on a certain theme anyway. Are they seeing the birth of a trend? Maybe.

Finally, NPR has an interesting read on using computers as part of classroom learning. I find this particularly intriguing since the kidlet is learning to count with an iPhone app we play together-he simply can’t get enough of it, and he’s really glomming onto the concept of numbers (eight is his favorite). (via Scholastic’s On Our Minds)

And for some Monday morning fun (which I could use, since web goblins ate half this post the first time around), The Onion, America’s finest news source,  is lobbying for an #onionpulitzer. There are lots of great videos of support on YouTube already, here are two I particularly love: Neil Gaiman (American Gods, Coraline) and Ricky Gervais (The Office, Extras). Two more I’d love to see? Old Spice Man Isaiah Mustafa and George Takei (preferably together).

On children: “Is it wrong that I just want to have one of these to grow up and resent me?”

Rain patters outside our window, its scent lingering at the edges of the room. In the center, toys–trucks mostly–curl around our ottomans and errant goldfish, lost in an imaginary wooden sea. A stuffed bear with blue, slightly pocked fur, sprawls across a quilted book, glaring accusingly.

The bear, I know, is right. I should be tidying up, flinging toys into the giant Tonka truck toy box, sweeping up crumbs, folding the blankets that collect around me every time I sit down. Even in summer, I am always cold, goosebumps tingling on my skin at the slightest breeze. Instead, I lounge around, eating ice cream, pretending the chaos scrawled across my house is non-existent, the by-product of an over-active imagination.

It’s funny how mummy guilt spreads beyond basic child care: I know my child is fed, clothed, mostly bathed, and happy. Mold is not growing on our walls; spores are not lingering in the cupboard beneath the kitchen sink. We do not live in a House episode. But the crumbs and clutter nag at me, even when I’m so tired my feet are swollen, my legs and back ache, and the thought of getting up, even for chocolate or a searingly hot bath, makes my whole body sag with exhaustion. Still, the guilt spills over into sleep, work, and play so that the simplicity of curling up with a bowl of ice cream becomes something overwrought (overwritten?), almost overwhelming.

Mummy guilt, I suppose, is about choice. Or rather, it’s about choice, where there is, for the most part, no real wrong choice. Sure, there are times when the laundry absolutely, positively must be done–especially since I’ve culled my wardrobe so that I have only around two weeks’ worth of clothes. And, as much as I might want to, I can’t simply hide dirty dishes in the oven or toss makeshift rugs over the toys and goldfish slowly taking over my living room. But, for the most part, there is nothing wrong with choosing to rest–or better yet, write–instead of sweeping up once in a while. (Or more often than not. They’re really the same thing.)

And then there’s the flip side: Writing guilt. Writing guilt is similar to mummy guilt, though without the lovely reading snuggles, or a happy “Ma! Ma!” to come home to. In some ways, I think writing guilt is more insidious, because there’s no concrete reason to write. It’s not like bathing, or eating, or breathing. Except that it is–like breathing, I mean, if most people didn’t understand why breathing is necessary.

I have a feeling there was once a point to this post, but I’m not entirely sure what it was–except that perhaps it’s an attempt to assuage my writing guilt and my mummy guilt at the same time. Is that possible?

Ask the ice cream.

Good morning, book people! After slogging through a lot of freelance work, I’m easing back into the world of my own blog, but it’s a slow process. But with a little luck, I’ll settle back into the usual routine soon. Some longer thoughts this morning, so fewer links.

ETA: Also, as you can see, I’m transitioning site design again. Unfortunately, there are always small bugs installing a new theme on an older site, so it may be a while before everything’s quite perfect. Please bear with me!

First up this morning, The Guardian’s Harriet Evans has a piece about e-books and editing. Although she’s writing about the loss of the editor in the self-publishing e-book world, the post made me think about the editing process for digital media.

If you’ve read at least five e-books, chances are you’ve run up against a host of spelling and grammatical errors. In some novels, they’re small things, in about the same numbers as a print book. But in others, the books have the feel of a galley, rough and hard-edged. Which begs the question: is there an editing process in play for e-books? Are there editors and copy editors who either work exclusively with a digital edition, or spend, at least, as much time proofing it as they do its print brethren? And if not, why not?

I know–like most folks who call themselves readers–that publishing is an expensive venture. It’s also riddled with archaic business practices and hard to understand contractual language. And (good) editing costs money, regardless of whether the publisher is paying for your editor (traditional) or you’re paying her (self-pubbed). The costs in running essentially two editorial teams per book would be high–hence the greater number of errors in digital editions. But here’s my big question:

If publishers don’t up their editorial game in the e-book arena (say that 5 times fast!), will self-pubbed books surpass them?

There’s a lot of dross in the self-publishing world, but there are clearly a few good eggs–the folks who spend the time working past the “I’m Finished!” happy dance, tightening, tweaking, and editing. And a lot of these people hire freelancers to edit their work–their digital only work–which means a much cleaner manuscript for the reader.

Right now, I’m all for traditionally publishing. But watching a friend of mine wade through the pros and cons of self v. traditional, and seeing her lean toward self, makes me wonder. Why? Because my friend isn’t a hot head, or egotistical about her work–she’s put long hours into her manuscript, not just writing, but revising, and polishing, taking all her feedback into account. If she did self-pub, she’d hire an editor, too, and I know that her manuscript would be almost flawless…

Next up,  at The NYT, the estate of late memoirist and novelist, Donald Windham, will soon be awarding some of the largest literary prizes in America. Although the prizes don’t directly affect YA authors (as far as I can tell), there will be some opportunities for “promising” writers.

And last but not least, Becky Tuch over at Beyond the Margins have a fun piece on yoga for writers. It rings a little too true for me! (via @YAHighway)

Image Credit: Kindle. Coffee. Pumpkin. by Doreyexmachina, via Flickr.