Yesterday, we spotlighted the RAISIN RODRIGUEZ series by Judy Goldschmidt. But what you might not know about Judy is that, in addition to being an amazing writer, she's also a crazy-talented editor who has worked on many of your favorite series (in fact, she was one of the original creators of the A-List series).
As you can imagine, she's a great person to talk to about all aspects of writing, and I'm not the only one who thinks so - Judy currently blogs over at Miss Literati, giving writing advice, tips, and even prompts and assignments for aspiring teen writers. Personally, I wish something like Miss Lit had been around when I was a (much) younger writer!
If you're a teen looking to find a writing community, definitely head over to Miss Literati and see about setting up a profile. You can send Judy questions and with any luck, she'll pick yours for her column. But in the meantime, here are some tips she shared with me especially for the Contemps:
Read as much as you possibly can and write everyday. At least in your journal if nothing else. Also, writing in the style of some of your favorite authors helps you find your own voice, believe it or not. Writing involves a lot of creative borrowing.
I totally agree on both points - emulating someone else's style is a great way to flex one's own creative muscles. And often we forget that, as writers, READING is actually part of the job!
Now, excuse me while I go back to work - curling up with a book, that is...
Pitched as "Harriet the Spy meets Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret," Raisin (actually the first book in a trilogy) turns the girl-with-journal trope on its ear and ushers it into the digital era. Here's what Booklist had to say about it:
Lost and lonely when she moves in with her stepfather's family in Philadelphia, Raisin Rodriguez, 13, talks on her blog to her two best friends back in Berkeley, California. Her daily, sometimes hourly, narrative is frank, needy, hilarious, intimate, and crude. On one level it's the usual diary about the new kid trying to fit in with the cool group. But Raisin, who admits she's way beyond Judy Blume, also writes about examining her intimate body parts, comparing what she sees with the wrinkled "face of Mervis the librarian." There's also the teacher who looks as if he has "pubic hair coming out of his ears." When she forgets to log out at school, someone prints her blog for all to read. Blogs tend to be ephemeral, but what will last here is the close-up of peer cruelty, personal intimacy, and public embarrassment. Raisin can't help wondering if the word embarrassment comes from the root words bare and ass.
Raisin is hilariously authentic, capturing that moment of not-quite-teendom in all of its excruciatingly magnified detail. When it originally released, Raisin was one of the first books to integrate teen blogging into its plot. But now that teen blogging is more pervasive than ever, I think the series remains uber-relevant - and laugh-out-loud funny!
We'll hear more from Judy tomorrow, but in the meantime, here's a fan-made trailer for Raisin:
We're the Contemps and we are passionate about realistic fiction because these are the books that remind us we're not alone in this real world. Our mission is simple - to spotlight contemporary fiction for young adults. We'll spotlight a new or fairly recent contemporary title every Tuesday and Wednesday. Thanks for stopping by and we hope you'll spread the word and come back again and again. We'd love to be THE resource on the web for contemporary young adult fiction.
