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Today at Tink's Place, please welcome Shelley Workinger, author of Solid and a brand new addition to her series, Settling. Both are excellent YA reads about a mysterious genetic experiment, cover ups, and what happens when they're found out, and it's surrounded by the US Army and one crazed scientist. Join Calliope's gang to discover more!
Welcome Shelley!!
Today Shelley is going to share some of her thoughts about reading and the love for it. Why we choose to read, what makes us desire to read. So, please help me welcome Shelley to Tink's Place!
The very first time I talked to a newspaper reporter about “Solid,” she asked me if I was a big reader in junior high and high school – the age group I was writing for. I know I shocked her by answering, “No.”
It’s not like I didn’t like books; it was the opposite, in fact – I loved reading until I reached the age where the required reading at school was both so massive and, frankly, so boring, that the last thing I wanted to do was pick up another book in my free time when I was sure it’d no better than the rest.
Things have definitely changed since then; digital formats make so many more titles accessible (I lived nowhere near a bookstore); the blogosphere is filled with targeted suggestions (I had no resource to help me find stuff I’d like); and teachers and schools have changed tack in a big way. My friend that teaches high school English assigns books like “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close” and “The Book Thief,” along with the less-painful classics, like “The Great Gatsby.” I feel that a lot of people in my generation came to the same conclusion that I did – you foster the love of reading by introducing kids to books they’ll love, not massive tomes of ye olde torture – and are doing something about it.
I also think it’s important for staunch proponents of sticking to the same old standards to know that just because many new YA reads are fun and fast, it doesn’t mean they’re dumbed down. I might even argue the opposite, actually! I know that details that yank you out of the narrative – How can that character be using a Droid in 2009 when it didn’t come out until 2010? – get me every time, and I think young adults are the quickest to catch those kinds of slips, which keeps me on my toes! Maybe that’s even one reason why some readers are so reluctant – they don’t always trust the writer, or feel that he or she is really writing for them. Just because I didn’t know anything about chromosomes and bandwidths when I started writing didn’t mean the readers wouldn’t, and I worked to make sure that even though my story was highly improbable, it was not impossible.
I’ve been thrilled with the feedback I’ve received for both “Solid” and “Settling,” and I do hope readers see how seriously I consider their thoughts and time and how the series is very much being written for them.
Now, Shelley would like one lucky reader to have the opportunity to read her new novel, Settling. If you'd like to give it a try, leave a comment. If you're a blog follower, leave a comment for an extra entry. Follow me on Networked Blog to pick up another entry. It's an excellent read!!
