Holy Crap - I met Neil Gaiman!

We are very excited

Kayso, on June 21, I turned 30. The Beau threw me a party - there was punch and pie - and my Florida parents surprised me : it was awesome. But, the day before something even more awesome happened: The Beau drove me like 5 hours to Saratoga Springs so we could see Neil Gaiman speak. That's right, beyotches...I met Neil Gaiman. We are totally best friends now.  Here's how it went down:

Neil's (Because we are close personal friends now I'm going to refer to him as Neil - because we are clearly on a first name basis. Deal with it.)Anyway, Neil's new book The Ocean at the End of the Lane just came out. He was doing his "last" book signing tour, and one of the stops was in Saratoga Springs, hosted by Northshire Books. Neil came out and was interviewed by Joe Donahue of the Book Show - but I'm not sure if it aired yet.
Neil talked about the new book and his inspiration for it. He talked about how he was writing it for his wife, Amanda Palmer, when she was away and he missed her. He hadn't planned on it being a novel, but it just kept growing. This was really interesting to hear, because just maybe a day or two before, I'd read Amanda's take on the book. Her version is slightly more personal and emotional, which is cool. Kind of neat to hear them both talk about it from their own point of view.

Cooler than you

  Then Neil read a selection from his book. Very cool to hear him read it; he's a great audiobook reader but in person he was awesome. He also read (because Donahue happened to have a ARC copy of the book) a selection from Fortunately, the Milk his next children's book coming out in September. That was cute and funny, and I can't wait to get that as well.

After that he talked a little more candidly about why it's his last tour: so get this, there were 1500 people in Saratoga to hear him speak, and I would guess that about half or more stayed and waited in line to get their books personally signed. That's a butt load of signing. We waited in line for about 3 hours, and we were not the last people. Imagine signing books and trying to be cheerful to fawning strangers for upwards of 4 hours. How exhausting! Gaiman said that he loves it, but it's too much to do such large events, so he plans on doing more ninja signings in the future - like Twittery flash-mob type things. But he also said he loves reading to an audience so he won't stop doing that.

So back to the signing part, like I said, we waited a long time. We talked with a guy who is planning on taking a road trip based on Gaiman's novel American Gods. We saw lots of cool t-shirts. We saw Neil sign a ukelele. Neil was signing in sort of an assembly line and you could tell that he was tired, but that he was trying to talk to everyone at least a little. There were like 6 employees laying out the books and pushing them to him. There was a lady who was wrangling different colored sharpies. It was intense. Then it was my turn. I was all nervous, because I wanted to say something cool, but I'm usually a fangirl dork and I end up sounding like a herb. But he was cool and smiled at me and I told him I put his quotes up in my library all the time and he goes: "You're a librarian? I love librarians! They're my people!" and he cheered for librarians a little. I swooned and was all: "We love you too!" So now Neil and Amanda and I are all married and living happily ever after. Or not, but either way, I got my book signed and it was awesome :-)

Yes, he signed everyone's with a heart, but ours was obviously a love connection...

               

Me looking 12, Neil smiling at my sparkling wit, and the Sharpie wrangler

           My book review of Ocean at the End of the Lane will be coming soon. For other Gaiman reviews by me, go here.      For Neil's website, go here. For his Twitter, go here.                     

Crank by Ellen Hopkins

• Reading level: Young Adult
  
• Paperback: 544 pages
• Publisher: Simon Pulse (October 5, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0689865198
• ISBN-13: 978-0689865190
• List Price: $9.99
• I finished this book on July 15

So, okay, first off, this has nothing to do with that movie of the same name starring Jason Statham. Good cover, though, isn't it? If you look close you can see that the words are made up of meth, and that's the main character in this book.
You might think that our narrator: Kristina/Bree is the main character, but the true force in the story is the crystal meth she becomes addicted to. Kristina goes to visit her long lost dead beat pop and on the way becomes enamored with a boy and addicted to crank. Sucks. When she comes home you almost hope she will kick it, but you know she won't. She finds boys at home who can supply her with more drugs, and, as a party favor, rape. Good times.
The downward spiral depicted here is, imo, more jarring than Go Ask Alice because it's a bit more of a narrative story. Oh, did I mention it's written in verse? Cause it is. Hopkins stories are written in a free verse style that allows the scattered thoughts of our girl anti-hero. Also, many of the poems are readable in more than one way (up and down, left to right).
I read one of Hopkins' other books and saw her speak in person (more on that in another post) and she was funny and smart. I really liked listening to her talk about her books, how they are banned and also how they are used in many rehab programs. They are really powerful stuff. But what's most interesting to me about it is this, Crank, along with its sequel, Glass are fictionalized versions of her own family. Her daughter is Kristina/Bree. I think that is really brave. What is even more exceptional, is the way she portrays herself (through her daughter's eyes) as a 40-something career and workout obsessed not perfect mother. It's very powerful stuff to know that someone who seems as reasonable and honest as Hopkins does in person can have a daughter who is a crystal meth addict.
Moral of the story: Read this book. Also, don't google meth unless you want to see the incredibly fucked up things it does to people's faces. Yikes stripes, babies.
Soundtrack: Sanctified by Nine Inch Nails. Most people think this song is about a lady, but it's about drugs.

Blogoversary!

That's right, guys and ghouls, it's been one hot sexy year of blogging for this booknerd.
Also, remember how I did a 50 book recap? Well, after this post my next review will bring it up to 99 books in a year. Not too shabby.
I started the blog last year as a way for me to keep track of what I've read. I wanted to be able to look back and see, and I honestly didn't think anyone would read it. So, thanks, my lovelies.
Some fun facts:

• I have read 26527 pages this year.
• I have given the bee seal of approval 9 times.
• The biggest tags on my tag cloud are: Supernatural and YA
  
• Many of the books I read since the 50 book benchmark are series, for example: His Dark Materials, The Twilight Saga, the Abhorsen Trilogy, and of course, Harry Potter.
  
• I added a tag called "In which I claim to be dating someone famous" because I like to say that people are my boyfriend all the time. Here's the ranking on that so far: Stephen King - wins it with 5 times. Trent Reznor - 2. Snape/Alan Rickman - 3. Tim Curry - 1. Laurie Halse Anderson - 1. My actual real life boyfriend? Yeah, I mentioned him once. Only to tell you that he's a slower reader than me. Pwned!

In addition: I have been contacted by two different authors of books I've reviewed this year. Because I am fucking awesome. Who are they? Guess. Seriously. Okay, I'll tell you. Laura M. Zeises commented on my review of her book: here. Graham Joyce sent me a meebo message and friended me on myspace (I'm basically goddamn famous). This gave me major warm fuzzies and a hugely big head. I'm now sitting around and waiting for SK or Mr. Gaiman to waltz on by and ask me to tea (or not).

Also, please enjoy another booknerd recap feature: What keywords brought you here? The following are keywords people used and ended up here. Last time there were lots more sex ones, seems I'm loosing my touch, or, people are getting better at finding internet porn.

• wikipedia warm fuzzies (aw)
  
• whats cher doing lately does she have a boyfriend (i dunno, but she's probly not gonna date you)
  
• invisible man movie sex (huh? perv. i think)
• sexy indian
• dark witchraft (spooky)
• sexy lines stephen king books (heehee)
• sexy male pictures
• rebels rape pretty girls (yucko)

So, Merry New Year, my darlings, and thank you for reading. Please allow me to suggest some resolutions for you: add booknerd to your RSS feeds. Tell a friend about this kickass blog. Comment on booknerd. Talk to bee on meebo (cause she's nice!)
Seriously, thanks for reading.
Cheers!

P.S. the nerdy cake images are from a blog post, here. If you're interested in baking me a cake I would like a Labyrinth theme cake, please and thank you (Bridget, I'm looking at you).

Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List by David Levithan and Rachel Cohn

• Reading level: Young Adult
  
• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers (August 28, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375844406
• ISBN-13: 978-0375844409
• List Price: $16.99
• I finished this book on Dec. 24

So, okay: this is the new to me book from David Levithan and Rachel Cohn, who wrote Nick and Norah and who fucking rock. I was very excited when this came in at my library right before Christmas. Also: remember last spring when I went to that young adult book fair and I saw Mr. Levithan speak? He read a chapter of this then, saying that he probly shouldn't because it wasn't published yet etc. and he read it substituting the word "frock" for "fuck" which is also awesome. So, yeah, I lurve him.
Anyway, try this on for size: Naomi and Ely are these hot toddies living in NYC and they have been best friends/soul mates for just about ever. Except, Naomi is in love with Ely who is gay (insert Nelson Muntz Ha Ha here). Anywho, the pair have a No Kiss List in place to ensure against a N and E breakup, which includes a few random hotties they both know. Naomi is currently dating Bruce the Second (cause he's the second boy she's dated named Bruce. God, I love them) but she's not really into him, she's more biding her time until Ely realizes maybe he wants her instead of the cock. Either way shenanigans ensue when Ely kisses Bruce the Second. Naomi is really more hurt because she realizes Ely will never love her that way than because of the adulterous making out. This starts a huge fight/drama/journey of awesomery.
This is written in alternating chapters as was N&N but the cool thing is: it's not just Ely and Naomi talking, it's lots of people. Aside from there being two Bruces (I always think of this Bruce when I hear that name, btw) there are two Robins (one is from Schenectady) a chihuahua and lots of insomniacs. Lots of different people have a say in this story and somehow all of their mini dramas and points of view add up to one very well told story. I totally didn't know which author was writing which chapter when I was reading it and was amazed that they both shared writing the same characters. Fucking rad. Naomi's chapters have these little symbols instead of words sometimes, which I thought was cooler in theory than in the execution.
To read an interview with the authors: go here. Or check out their websites go here for Levithan's and here for Cohn's.
The cool thing about this book is it speaks to so many different kinds of relationships and contains problems everyone can relate too. Also, the main characters share sparkly belts. I'm in frocking love :)

The Realm of Possibility by David Levithan

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers (May 9, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375836578
• ISBN-13: 978-0375836572
• List Price: $8.95
• I finished this book on Dec. 3

So, Mr. Levithan is the scribe of other booknerd reviewed books. One I really like, and another that got the coveted bee seal of approval.
Anywho: in addition to having a great title, and am amazing cover, this book is in free verse. Fucking rad. It is poems from a huge variety of high school students. It is a dozen stories from all different points of views. It is song lyrics, anguished cries for help, and love letters.
The books starts and ends with a poem about a young gay couple: Daniel and Jed. These couples are mentioned throughout the book in other people's poems, and the book finishes with them as well in a poem that makes me all mushy inside. Some of the other poems include a girl who retaliates by wailing a bully in the schnoz with a lunch tray and another from the bully in question. There is a girl with an eating disorder, a lesbian musician with unrequited love. My favorite is the girl who writes all the amazing phrases on desks, lockers and walls and then the reaction from others. Some of the choice phrases: YOU ARE HAPPY EVEN IF YOU ARE AFRAID TO ADMIT IT, YOU ARE FOOLISH IN YOUR UNHAPPINESS, and the ever popular: YOU ARE IMPLICATED
I confess that I'm not entirely sure how one is supposed to read some of these poems, and I often found myself sort of singing them to myself in my head (yeah, I know that makes me sound like a wacko. whatever, I stand by it.) There are four sections and they give different points of view. If you really pay attention, or maybe take notes, you can figure out who everyone is and how they are related. That is very cool, but even separate, each character is interesting.
Did I mention that I saw Mr. Levithan speak once and I thought he was dreamy? (Maybe I do think all intelligent gay men are dreamy, but that doesn't make him any less so.) Either way, this didn't disappoint and I can't wait to read more of his stuff.
I wouldn't suggest this for just anyone, but I am sad for those who wouldn't appreciate it. It is honest, sad, sweet, hopeful and beautiful.

Twisted by Laurie Halse Anderson

• Reading level: Young Adult
  
• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Viking Juvenile (March 20, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0670061018
• ISBN-13: 978-0670061013
• List Price: $16.99
• I finished this book on Nov. 17

First, let's say that I actually began listening to this book on Random House audio book read by Mike Chamberlain. However, this was proving to be a super pain in the ass, because my car is a time machine from 1995 and it has a tape player (remember those?) and my iTunes was being a bitch downloading the disks to my iPod. Wow, that was a horribly boring story. Sorry. Anyway, so I finally snagged the book at my library. We have two copies which have literally not sat on our shelves more than a day since the beginning of the school year. On Friday when I saw one in the return bin I did a little happy dance and claimed it as my own.
Okay, first thoughts: this book is about Tyler Miller who is a senior in high school and a bit of a loser by his own admission. It is a bit weird to have a grown man with excellent diction read this story in with a teenager's voice. Especially when he says things like "trouser snake" (yikes). Oh, would you like to hear it? No problem: booknerd provides. Please enjoy a clip of a chapter early on in the book courtesy of Random House Audio Publishing:
It's kinda weird, right? My favorite favorite is when the dude makes the "chicken" noise. Ba-gock! (which makes me think of Bangkok which makes me think of this.)
Anyway, so this cheerful sort of underdog story takes a pretty serious turn when some major shenanigans occur at a party. (for the record, I never knew of any party like this when I was in high school. where are these parties happening?) Tyler, having gotten busted for his Foul Deed (of defacing the school), is the first suspect after the shit goes down. Anywho: he goes through a lot and you really feel for the poor kid. Also, his dad is a turbo douche. (this is the second book in a row with a dad who's a total ass) but Tyler is lucky to have a cool mom, a cooler sister and a best friend who is named after a Star Wars character.
Of course I loved the other books that I've read by Mrs. Anderson, and I saw her speak once and she was phenomenal. She held someone in the crowd's baby, it was cute. She was very funny and cool. Either way, this one did not disappoint in any way and it's amazing to me that she's so versatile a writer. She writes these amazing books from the point of views of these very different characters, and of course a really cool historical fiction book too. I can't wait to read more of her books, if they ever make it back to the library...

Book Divas Author Visit

So, apparently there is a cool book site I somehow missed out on. It's called Book Divas and it's a book club for YA books. There is a very cool discussion board and a section for teachers and librarians. Even though I do not like to consider myself a "diva" I think I might just have to sign up.
Anywho: the reason I'm telling you this, my lovelies, is that they are having a online author visit on August 13th that I thought you might be interested in. I, for one, love schmoozing with authors, especially when it's free.
The author is Mellisa Marr, and her book is Wicked Lovely. I haven't heard of Mrs. Marr yet, but I am intrigued by the description of the book: fairies, delicious romance scenes? I'm in!
I just thought you might be interested, so you should check it out.
p.s. I'm sure you'll be seeing a review for this book from me, when I can get my hot paws on it.

Oh! I almost forgot! I have been thinking adding reviews of new movies made from books that I have read on the blog. Just a short blurb sort of comparing, cause there are lots of good movies based on books coming up. So, what do you think? Let me know.

Kissing Kate by Lauren Myracle

• Reading level: Young Adult
  
• Hardcover: 176 pages
• Publisher: Dutton Juvenile (April 14, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0525469176
• ISBN-13: 978-0525469179
• List Price: $7.99
• I finished this book on July 23

I'm not sure where I first heard of this book. It may have been from one of the many blogs I read, or from some list of gay teen books or even when I saw the author in Fairport at the Teen Book Festival. I didn't see Ms. Myracle's whole presentation but I thought she seemed funny and cool.
Anyway, because I have read many different YA books about gay boys and not so many about the ladies, well, I figured it was really my duty to do so. You know, to be fair. And cause I love the gays.
So, anyway: Lissa and Kate have been best friends for a long time. The kind of best friends I am always jealous of because the seem to get along so well. Anyway: shit goes sour when Kate gets snookered at a party and the girls kiss. A lot. Then, nearly busted, they stop snogging and Kate ignores Lissa, who slips away. Now they aren't talking, resulting in appropriate sturm und drang.
Did I mention that Lissa's parents are dead and she lives with her well intentioned Uncle who kinda sucks at parenting, leaving her to take care of her younger sister? Cause, you know, she needed more problems. Oh, and she's trying to figure out how to have lucid dreams. Or something.
I felt that the devices used in the story were kind of obvious; and while it's not groundbreaking I am still not mad at it. It's a simple story of a girl trying to figure out her sexuality. Some of the characters were interesting, and it was a quick easy read. I'm not sure this is making or breaking some kid's coming out or anything, but it's a good story nonetheless. And extra points for the cool cover. If you stare at it long enough it looks like the blue hearts are moving. Or maybe that's just me.
This did not touch me the same way that Annie on My Mind did, and that is certainly the most popular lesbian YA book I have heard of. For those interested, I suggest checking that one out as well. Here is a list of other gay themed books, and of course, there are lots more out there. Here's another list geared totally toward gay YA. For good measure here's links to resources for gay teens and local LGBT youth groups.

Teen Book Festival

So, today I sent a super fun day with a library school pal seeing authors. This is the second year in a row I've gone to the Fairport Teen Book Festival. As with last year Terry Trueman was the keynote speaker. I also saw him speak at NYLA this year. He is funny, charismatic and entertaining. The day began with introductions of all the authors, Terry speaking and then all the authors answering a few questions. Then we moved on to the breakout sessions- to hear authors present. As you can probably guess I have been preparing for this in my infinite geekdom, so I had already chosen the people I wanted to see.
First I saw Barry Lyga, whose Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl I quite enjoyed. Lyga gave a presentation on the History of Geekery which was very funny. In it he defined the term Geek and gave the five most important characteristics of geeks (such as loves details/minutiae, knows everything and is a social misfit) and then named some famous geeks. Notable geeks covered were: Bill Gates, Leonardo DaVinci, Einstein, George Lucas, and God (fyi: google results for God are both humorous and kind of sad, besides, I don't think you need any background info on him.) who, following Lyga's checklist, is in fact a geek.
Next I moved on to David Levithan, whose Boy Meets Boy got the totally distinguished Bee seal of approval. He read from Nick and Norah, which was cool. The best part of that is the copious use of the f-bomb in the chapter he read. Mr. Levithan subsituted the bomb with the work "frock" which was endearing. Example: "Now I'm frocked." funny. Then he answered questions about the writing process of splitting a book with another author and collaborating mostly via e-mail. It totally made me love the book more. Then he read us a section of a new book that he's working on in collaboration with Rachel Cohn about a girl in love with her gay best friend. It was excellent to get a sneak peak. It was dreamy.
Next I saw Nancy Werlin, who seemed shy at first, but opened up. She talked about how the things in her life often serve as a background for her novels. She discussed the genetic research (or lack of) she had to do for Double Helix and how she sort of looked the stuff up bit by bit, which was neat. She also mentioned that when writing The Rules of Survival she had to put it away for a while due to the upsetting subject matter.
Plus, I got some free books from TokyoPop, which is good times, because I am a girl who loves free swag. Barry Lyga also gave away little canvas bags with the Fanboy and Goth Girl logo, so points to him. All in all it was a pleasing day and I'm happy I could go.

Various titles by Nancy Carlson

So, okay, I'm student teaching, and we've been preparing for this author visit for about three weeks. Nancy Carlson is the author of over 50 children's picture books. We have about 30 of them in this particular library, and I estimate that I have read all of them at least once, and some of them approximately a gajillion times. I think the titles I've read the most are Think Big, Loudmouth George and the Fishing Trip and Louanne Pig in the Perfect Family.
I must say this outright, I do not love books. Okay, actually I like the Harriet books fine, and I don't hate Luanne, but: here's the thing. The characters are not cute. That bugs me. They are mostly animals. Luanne is a pig, Harriet is a dog (modeled after Carlson's golden retriever) and George is a bunny. Sure, some of them, like Henry the mouse, are cute. But it literally took me three weeks to decide what kind of animal Arnie even was (turns out he's a cat). I do not hate them or anything, I'm just not enamored with the characters. However, Ms. Carlson does her illustrations in colored pencils, and they are super colorful, and textured. I like the backgrounds and wallpapers much more than the characters themselves. Perhaps I am so critical of them at this point because I read them on average 5 times a day for a week and a half. I'm just saying.
Either way, it was really cool hanging out with her today. She was good with the kids (she did 4 presentations to 7 grade levels, something I would not want to do) and they all seemed into it. She showed them all how she drew the pictures, and I have to say that was neat. Her drawings (though, like I said, not all that cute) were flawless as she did them on a big easel with markers. She also personally signed many of the kids' books and drew a little picture in each of them. I totally appreciated that. Meeting her totally upped my opinion of her books.
The moral of this whole story had two parts: number 1, I'm glad I don't have to read Nancy Carlson books out loud anymore (too much of a good thing...you know?) and number 2, I heart meeting authors!
Now, for your viewing pleasure, an additional photo of Ms. Carlson and I together.