So. Many. Links.
All right, time to clean out my inbox and share a bunch of links I've noted lately. In no particular order:
Whew! Lots of random linkage to enjoy!
- Mary Pearson takes a stab at what YA books are all about at Tor.com. I find her prejudices against adult novels interesting, since I go exactly the opposite way about my adult reading (I have no need to read books I should have "grown into" by now). I do wish she'd delved a little more into what makes Margo Lanagan's Tender Morsels book a YA title -- I read it and didn't particularly like it (I expected to like it very much; it's fairy tales, twisted and changed, but they almost all end hopelessly, and I didn't feel I got more out of either the original tales or anything out of the new versions). I also could not for the life of me figure out why it was a teen book -- it didn't seem to be geared toward a teen audience; it didn't feature teens as protagonists; there weren't really any coming of age stories that I noted. I'd hate to think it was just YA because it was a fairy tale collection, and thus relegated to the "not for grown-ups" section. (Via janni.)
- Like government conspiracy theories? Then you'll be fascinated to read about how the attack on the Death Star may have been an inside job. The facts just don't line up, people! (Via janni.)
- Last year at this time, Halloween flash fiction and monster descriptions got posted up at Flames Rising. The link provides a list of the entries from last year (including my own Hounds of the Morrigan).
- SLJ ran an interesting article about librarians as truth detectors, whose job is helping users sort out trustworthy information from information that needs to be debunked.
- What should you not put in a query letter to an agent? Goals to write multiple books per year for multiple houses. That may eventually be your style, but your potential agent may be suspicious of your promise to write four to five books a year before you've worked with an editor at a publishing house to experience the whole editorial process. (Via irysangel.)
- Friend of the blog cinda_cite posted a lovely entry last week about living local fiction, which is something I think about quite a bit in both my own writing and in my UF reading. She also brings in some Tolkien-esque tips on subcreation.
- I'm a bit late posting on the new FTC regulations, so you may have already heard about the new rules for blog reviews. Apparently, getting an ARC or review copy of a book from a publisher is considered compensation, and must be disclosed. (The FTC is under the impression that reviewers return copies of the book they receive to the publishers. Huh?) There's also some discouragement about linking to sites where you can purchase the books, as this would then be considered a paid advertisement. I'm not sure whether the disclosure allows you to then freely link to a purchasing site or not. At any rate, expect to hear whether or not I received a book as an ARC when I mention it here.
- PW ran a good article about the growing market for digital comics.
- This week's NYTBR ran an interesting review of classics without universal appeal, prompted by the new film version of Where the Wild Things Are.
- An amateur metal detector uncovered the largest Anglo-Saxon gold hoard ever found. Larger than the cache found at Sutton Hoo, one of the major Anglo-Saxon sites in England, this hoard was recovered in a field in Stratfordshire.
- Jeri Smith-Ready is running an ongoing YA prize-a-day for October, to celebrate the five-year anniversary of her blog (congratulations!), as she gets closer to her new YA book release.
Whew! Lots of random linkage to enjoy!