Happy Thought: Big Sky Country

I'm visiting Montana right now - you know, the place where I lived when I wrote and revised the bulk of Always Neverland. This is one of my very favorite places to be.

It's shocking how pretty and photogenic it is. Brace yourselves for some gorgeous, non-Photoshopped pics, taken over the years:

Right there at the bottom, you can see me and my mom fishing.

Ignore the shot of my adorable brother (taken roughly 8 years ago).
Look at the landscape!

These next few show what a wintry Moonlight Basin looks like from their ski runs.

I kept annoying that adorable brother, because I stopped to take pics.

But I ask you: wouldn't you take pics if you saw this??

This is what it looks like from the top of the Big Sky/Moonlight Basin summit around New Year's, in case you're curious.

I took this with my phone camera while we were driving!!
Like I said, ridiculously photogenic.

In case you wondered what that shot might look like without snow.

This one, we took yesterday in Pray, MT.

Happy Thought: Brave

It should be obvious by now: I love animated movies. I know you're supposed to grow out of those, but I refuse. Some of them are too awesome to miss.

Like Brave. (Well, like anything from Pixar really, but this post is about Brave.)


I just love Merida. She's Pixar's first female protagonist, so they're making a big deal of her being a girl. (I don't mind that - In Always Neverland, Peter and the Lost Boys make a big deal of Ashley being a girl, but Ashley refuses to miss out on adventures just because no other Wendy girl has done it before.) But Merida is tough, resourceful, playful, rebellious, sometimes super grumpy, quick-thinking, and surprisingly short-sighted when it comes to making deals with slightly loony witches. She's also the funniest animated protagonist I've seen since Hiccup in How to Train Your Dragon.


She's the first Disney princess since Mulan whose main focus isn't finding a prince, and I really appreciate that. In fact, the most important princes in the story are Merida's brothers. The most important relationship in the film is between Merida and her mom, and the parent-child storyline is moving and transformative in a way that we haven't seen in a Disney movie since The Lion King. 


Fun and random fact: the voice actor for Merida, Kelly Macdonald, also played Peter Pan in the stage scenes of Finding Neverland! 

Plus, it's set in Scotland!! I'm also a sucker for highland accents, bagpipes, and gorgeously rugged landscapes. :-)


If you haven't seen it, get ye to a theater and go watch! 

Happy Thought: Fleet Foxes

This has been an incredibly busy month, you guys, and it looks like June will be a busy one as well.

So, VERY quickly, I want to share with you my new love - what I've been listening to on repeat about fifty times in the past few weeks: Fleet Foxes' self-titled album.

It's not exactly a new album. It came out three years ago. I actually downloaded it to my iPod months and months ago and ignored it completely.

Then, my new roommate recommended them to me, and a few days later, someone posted this Fleet Foxes cover of "I Can't Help Falling In Love" to Tumblr:



ETA (June 2012): This is mildly embarrassing, but I've just found out that Fleet Foxes didn't do this cover. A cover band that sounds like Fleet Foxes named "Fleet Foxes Sing" covered and recorded this track. So, you can see how I got confused. :-P

Basically, it was my gateway Fleet Foxes song. They match this month's mood completely. There's something lovely, bittersweet, folksy, soulful, and hopeful about them. And calming - which is an invaluable trait during such a busy month.

But isn't that funny? The way something can be around FOREVER but it enters your life exactly when you need it? This has happened to me with books too. I think Ella Enchanted and the Blue Sword entered my orbit in sixth grade, the beginning of middle school - right when I started searching for spunky and strong girl role models. But that's a blog post topic for another day.

Here are a few of my favorites:







And to all you students reaching the end of the school year...

HAVE A GREAT SUMMER!!!

Happy Thought: One Object Can Brighten A Room

I moved in a new apartment recently. Both my roommates are pretty awesome, but for a couple weeks, my room looked bleak and sad and extremely lacking in decorations.

But wait - what's that on my wall?

Tulip not included.
(I bought the flower at the grocery store on the way home.)

I found this at a flea market/crafts fair today! A one-vase wall hanging that makes my room feel more home-y.

The vendor/owner/craftswoman - Vintage Trifles - had a whole bunch of similar ones. One said: flower - another: bloom.

(I picked fleur (which means "flower" in French, btw), because it reminds me of my little sister. About this time last year, she was on her way to France.)

It'll be one of the first things I see when I wake up in the morning, and that makes me happy. :-)

Happy Thought: Powell's Books

Photo found here.

Okay, so you know the bookstore in Hugo, Martin Scorsese's film adaptation of The Invention of Hugo Cabret?

Photo found here.

You know the one I mean - the bookstore that doesn't feel like a store really, or even a library. It feels like a labyrinth of books, novels and biographies and histories and collections stacked up to the ceiling, surrounding you with a expectant sort of calm, as if each volume were patiently waiting for the right reader to come along, open them, and take them home.

That's pretty much how I feel about Powell's Books - in downtown Portland, Oregon.

Photo found here.

There's something wonderful about so many books gathered so close together and so many different kinds - used and new, fiction and non-fiction, children's and adults. It attracts booklovers together like bees to a field of wildflowers, but gathering words instead of pollen.

Photo found here.

It reminds me a little of The Strand in New York's Union Square. It too makes you feel like there are more books here than you can ever shop through in a day. It too requires a map to find the section you want.

Image found here.

But The Strand can get so busy and crowded on weekends; you can never walk down an aisle without squeezing by another six storegoers, some of them grumpier than others. Every time I went there, I was eager to find what I wanted and get out of there.

Photo found here.

Powell's is roomier (a whole city block!), simply by being located in a roomier city. You can shop to your heart's content.

Photo found here.

Obviously, it's my new favorite place. I even found two copies of Always Neverland!

The purple one, if you remember from this post, is a galley - the kind of copy which you're really not supposed to sell, but honestly, I was glad to find it. I gave away my last galley last summer and thought I'd seen the last of them forever. It was sad to think I wouldn't be able to keep the galley of my very first book forever and ever.

But no, happily, I'm now the owner of the copy pictured above. It just reinforces my opinion that Powell's is a place as magical as Neverland.

Happy Thought: Ella Enchanted

Oh, I remember the first time I found this book. I was in sixth grade, and I was searching the library at my new school. (As a middle schooler, I didn't need to wait for my class to go to the library. I could just go whenever I wanted. I thought this was awesome.) 

This was the cover it had back then: 

A retelling of Cinderella? With a cursed, rebellious heroine? Of course I checked it out. 

And you guys, I fell in love with this book. And I haven't really fallen out of love since. It ranks in the top five of my Favorite Books of All Time. (And at this point in my life, I've read thousands of books.) 

I know there was a movie with Anne Hathaway, but if you've only seen it without reading the book, you're missing out. 

This is what the book looks like now.

Here's the description: 

How can such a fairy's blessing be such a curse?

At her birth, Ella of Frell was the unfortunate recipient of a foolish fairy's gift--the "gift" of obedience. Ella must obey any order given to her, whether it's hopping on one foot for a day and a half, or chopping off her own head! But strong-willed Ella does not tamely accept her fate. Against a bold backdrop of princes, ogres, giants, wicked stepsisters, and fairy godmothers, Ella goes on a quest to break the curse--once and for all. 

Happy Thought: Muir Woods

I drove across the country this month, and I got a chance to see stuff I'd never seen before: red hills, deserts, the Grand Canyon, the Pacific Ocean!

But I wanted to share one of my new favorite places. My mom, who helped me drive across the country, wanted to see some redwoods before she left for Charlotte, so we took a trip to Muir Woods National Park.

These aren't my pictures by the way. All of mine turned out blurry, because we went very late in the day.

Click here for source.

Isn't it awesome? Doesn't it look just like a fairy tale?? It actually reminded me a lot of The Secret of Kells.

Click here for source.

Click here for source.

Anyway, Muir Woods is what scientests call an "Old Growth" forest, which basically means that there's a mix of young trees and really really old - and big - trees. One sign showed a tree that was a thousand years old! But "Old Growth" forests are rare nowadays, because when more people moved into the area, they cut down a lot of the biggest trees for lumber - they needed it to build buildings.

Kind of sad actually - A forest like this is definitely something to see!

Click here for source.

Happy Thought: Audiobooks

Okay, I know that this is a kind of a big category. But they are my NEW FAVORITE THING.

Of course, I wanted to share them with you.

I've stayed away from audiobooks for most of my life. I have to admit: I'm not the best listener in the world. And plus, I just like the feel of books - the texture of pages, the shape of the binding, the smell of paper.

But I found myself in a bit of a bind this month. I'm making some of my presents for Christmas this year, and they require sewing. (I know - Ashley, my main character, can't say. She tells the Lost Boys so several times. But I actually do it for fun. Ironic, huh?)

I can knit and read at the same time, but I can't sew and read at the same time. So, I sewed in the evenings instead of reading.

And I found that I totally missed reading.

I mean, I tried watching TV while I sewed, but that wasn't the same. Plus, I had to look away from the television while I worked, so I didn't take in all the details.

Which led me to audiobooks. Or more specifically, to the audiobook section of my library.

And I'm totally a fan now! It's bringing me back to the days when grown-ups used to read to me. A long time ago now, but still, it's pretty awesome. The actors hired to read the audiobooks do voices and everything, and even though I'm still not wonderful at listening (and often have to replay sections), it's really refreshing to hear someone else bring the books to life.

The pics will show you all the audiobooks that I've listened to this month, and I recommend them all highly. :-)

I confess, though: I'm only a fourth of the way through Chime.

 It's good so far, though!

Happy Thought: MY BOOK!! (Take 2)

Okay, so I really did this month's Happy Thought post a few weeks ago, but I just wanted to add a couple things on to that.

Starting with these:

Spotted at the Cotswold Books-A-Million

Spotted at the Southpark Barnes & Noble

It's a strange feeling to walk into a bookstore and find your own book, even you're looking for it. I kept telling myself not to get my hopes up - lots of stores don't unpack their merchandise right away, because there's always so many new releases to unpack. And at first glance, my eye skipped right over it. Since the book has been lying around my house for a few weeks now, my mind just goes, Oh, there's your book. No biggie. 

But then you see it, and it sinks in, and a slow satisfaction creeps in, filling you from the tips of your fingers to ends of your toes. It is - without any exaggeration - a dream come true, and a very happy thought.

If I were Ashley, and Tink lent me fairy dust, I would be flying right now!!!

Happy Thought: MY BOOK IS HERE!!!

Okay, lies: no pre-ordering has occurred, because guess what I have in my possession right now?

A BOX OF ALWAYS NEVERLAND!

(They're actually contractual copies, which means that the publisher promises in the contract to give me a set number. They're intended as a part of your payment - also, so that when your grandma demands a signed copy of your book, you don't have to buy your own book to give it to her.) 

Wait, can we just take a minute to admire their beauty and marvel at the finishedness?

Those are my words! Inside of a book! I can put it on the shelf! And other people can take it down, and read it!

But what happened is kind of a funny story:

Here I was, in complete neurotic author mode, wondering if maybe the printing of Always Neverland was running late and hoping nervously that I would get to see a copy before release day. Today, someone told us that we had packages waiting for us at our old front door - you know, the one we moved out of in February? So, I immediately rush over, and there they were!!!

So, you know, I then loaded them all up in my car, and of course, I spent the rest of the day book-happy (it's the author's version of punch drunk). I keep resisting the urge to copies to complete strangers. So, instead, I've taken to carrying it around with me like a security blanket.

Not that you needed the evidence, but...

Today, it came with me to Starbucks, to the library, to the library, and to three clothing stores where I shopped for something to wear to a friend's wedding next weekend. (I'm pretty sure they call that flash marketing...)

Six more days, people! SIX!!

And it's so pretty!!!

Happy Thought: Morin

Her real name is Mae Brauer. She is my great-grandmother, and she turns ninety-eight today.

HAPPY 98th BIRTHDAY, MORIN!!

This is Morin on the night of my uncle's wedding a few years back - at about 3AM, she was still keeping the party going. (The weird floating hand in front belongs to me, btw. :-P)

Just a couple weeks ago, Morin told me over the phone that she found not one but TWO scorpions in her house. (She lives in Texas, by the way.) And she killed them both with her feet - in her house slippers. She may be a little old lady, but she's tough too. "Good thing they didn't sting me," she said. "I'm so old - it might have been the end of me."

That's right - she's morbidly funny too. (My favorite kind of funny!)

If you've read Always Neverland, then her name may sound familiar to you. It's on the dedication page. :-)

I'm still waiting on finished copies of the book, though - I was hoping that one might reach my mailbox early, so I could get it to Morin for her birthday. But two weeks isn't too long to wait though....

Happy Thought: Zippy

Yes, I did name my car. I named her Zippy, and isn't she adorable?

Unfortunately, my new favorite thing will soon be in the shop. I got rear-ended on the way back from the beach, and the bumper got all torn up. I was very sad - especially since I had only had her two weeks. I don't even have a real license plate yet!

But I wanted to let you guys know: Sorting out Zippy's recovery - ie. dealing with the insurance people and the schedulers at the body shop - is taking some time. That's why you haven't seen me much around here.

Never fear - good things are coming! To this blog!

I'll share soon. :-)

Happy Thought: The Secret of Kells

If you haven't watched this movie, you really really really REAAAALLLLYYYY need to. It is one of my favorite movies of all time.

I hadn't heard anything about it, but I found it on Netflix streaming* back in April and decided to give it a go.



Beautiful animation. Gorgeous music. And a sweet hopeful story about the necessity of art in the worst of times.

Here's the description on the back of the DVD:

Magic, fantasy, and Celtic mythology come together in a riot of color and detail that dazzle the eyes in a sweeping story about the power of imagination and faith to carry humanity through dark times.

In a remote medieval outpost of Ireland, young Brendan embarks on a new life of adventure when a celebrated master illuminator arrives from foreign lands carrying a book brimming with secret wisdom and powers. To help complete the magical book, Brendan has to overcome his deepest fears on a dangerous quest that takes him into the enchanted forest where mythical creatures hide. It is here that he meets the falry Aisling, a mysterious young wolf-girl, who helps him along the way. But with the barbarians closing in, will Brendans determination and artistic vision illuminate the darkness and show that enlightenment is the best fortification against evil?

Need I say more? Are you looking at the pictures?

Can you spot the people in this still?

WARNING, though: This is not an American movie; it's an Irish-French-Belgium co-production. It has a happy ending, but it's not the kind of happy ending you have come to expect from Hollywood animation companies, like Disney, Pixar, and Dreamworks. 

Here, why don't you watch this clip? I dare you to. And then see if that song doesn't stay in your head so long that you buy it from iTunes.



(Confession: I have the whole soundtrack. I write to it.)

As of today, it is still streaming on Netflix, and I also saw it in Target last time I was there (that's where I found my copy). Go check it out!

It's so hard to tell - from all the pics in the post - which one is my favorite character. :-P

Happy Thought: The Long List of Favorite Books, plus A Theory

I have a theory about people and the genres that we prefer.

There's one genre that feels like home, one where we spent the majority of our creative and recreational time, the one we have grown up around, our true literary love. Most of our favorite books come from this genre. Well, maybe some people have more than one, but every reader has a preference for a certain kind of book.

We are most likely to forgive the faults of whatever comes out of that genre, because it already speaks our beloved language, so to speak. Just by existing in the domain we know the best, it already has a lot of the pieces we love the very most.

Now, for something to make our favorite list from outside our "home genre," it has to be really and truly exceptional. This is where we start to use words like TRUE ART and MASTERWORK and MAGNUM OPUS and THE BEST THING EVER. It has to be the very best of the best, the cream of the crop, the stand-out.

Now, for me, that genre is the middle grade fantasy. (If we were talking about movies, it would be romantic dramedies.) Yep, I have to say: over half of all the reading and re-reading I've done in my twenty-five years of life comes from this awesome subcategory:

• C. S. Lewis's Narnia books
• Harry Potter (of course!)
• Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials
• Madeleine L'Engle's the Time Quartet 
  
• Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson series
• Patricia C. Wrede's The Enchanted Forest
• Tamora Pierce's Song of the Lioness, the Immortals, and The Protector of the Small series
• Peter Pan (also, of course!)
• Ella Enchanted
• Robin McKinley's the Blue Sword, Beauty, Rose Daughter, and Spindle's End
• Sherwood Smith's Crown Duel
• Anne McCaffrey's Dragonsong and Dragonsinger, 
• Mary Downing Hahn's Wait Till Helen Comes, 
• and Shannon Hale's The Goose Girl.

And dear reader, I'm sure it comes as no surprise that I've started writing books that aiming these realms.



(Note: But all of these books are the ones that were favorites BEFORE I started writing professionally. So, you shouldn't see books that have been published in the last two years.)

But some of my other favorite books in the entire universe coming from genres I don't normally read are:  

• Salman Rushdie's Haroun and the Sea of Stories
• Nicole Krauss's A History of Love
• Jonathan Safran Foer's Everything Is Illuminated
• Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice
• Brian Selznick's The Invention of Hugo Cabret
• Helen Fielding's Bridget Jones' Diary & BJD: The Edge of Reason (better than the movies!)
  
• Markus Zusak's the Book Thief (197 weeks on the NY Times list and still there! That's nearly four years!!)
  
• Sharon Creech's Chasing Redbird 
• A. S. Byatt's Possession (winner of the Man Booker prize)
• Francesca Lia Block's Echo 
• Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things
• Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife
• Peter S. Beagle's The Last Unicorn

The funny thing about these favorites is that most have ended up on bestselling and/or award lists. :-P

Moral of the Story: People are going to like the books that they're going to like. And they'll surprise themselves by loving the books which are super awesome. :-)

P.S. Can you tell that I felt bad for missing a few Happy Thought posts in recent months? And that I'm trying to make up for it by telling you about a whole bunch of my favorites at once? :-P

Happy Thought: Adele

Okay, I know I'm not being very original with this one. Everyone has been squeeing over Adele since the release of her new album, 21.

But I can't get over her.



I mean, my little sister and I BOTH love her. She and I very rarely have the same taste in music, but we totally bonded the other night when we watched the video "Someone Like You" over and over and YouTubed a bunch of Adele interviews to allow us to fangirl some more.

(I have even heard my sister blasting this song in her room and singing along at full volume 5+ times this week.)

This is what I love most about her: Yeah, she won a couple Grammys with her first album. But did she rest on her laurels? Did she sit in her studio and create something just as good as her first work? Did she make more of the same?

No, she went, lived a little, and grew up some. And then she created even BETTER music.

I am astounded by her ability to make people feel. We call this tugging at heartstrings, but really, it's a gift. Not everyone can feel something so strongly that they can draw other people into the emotion.

Happy Thought: Dragonsong & Dragonsinger

The move has occurred, readers. With a minimum of broken glass and injury, no less.

This book has had at least six covers. This is a super old one, but
I think it's pretty. Old-fashioned, yes, but look at the
swirls and the pretty colors.

The unpacking has not.

(I'm going to try not to think about this.)

But I do want to share with you one of the most awesome aspects of moving. It's re-discovering old, worn books that I literally loved to bits as a kid. I had all but forgotten these until I had to pack them!

In fact, it inspired a MFT post.

(Oh, don't give me that oh-you're-so-corny eye-roll - you knew this was coming. Look at the title of this post!)

Ladies and gentleman, we now have a subset in the Happy Thought series. I call it OBG (a.k.a. "Oldies But Goodies"). These are backlist titles brimming with awesomeness. At least in my book.

(Hahahahahaha. Sorry. I couldn't resist the chance to be punny. Feel free to roll your eyes for this one.)

Dragonsong
&

Dragonsinger

Okay, these are the first two books in Anne McCaffrey's Harper Hall trilogy. (I have the third one, Dragondrums, too, but because the main character is different, I've only read that one once.)

Even wikipedia agrees, Anne McCaffrey's claim to fame is the Dragonriders of Pern series. Pern is a far-off planet, where this acid-rain type substance called Thread falls regularly. The only people on Pern who can fight it are the dragonriders, who establish mind-to-mind connections to one dragon and have a lifelong bond. The rest of the people hide out in specially fortified living areas called Holds and heart the dragonriders like whoa for keeping them safe. 

(Stop rolling your eyes!! I swear, I'll get to the point in a second!)

These two books are set in the same world, but they're not about a dragonrider. They're about

This is the current cover. The one you
be able to buy today.

Menolly, a fourteen-year-old girl who lives in an isolated Sea Hold, where people are a bit close-minded (hint: this is an understatement). And Menolly's dad, the Hold leader, is a bit more close-minded than the rest (hint: this is another understatement). Normally, this would just be annoying. But Menolly wants to be a Harper - a guild-trained musician who is assigned to the Hold to teach the youngsters - more than anything else in the world. Menolly's dad believes - well, most people believe - that girls can't be Harpers. 
Even though Menolly is a very good musician, even though she writes incredibly catchy songs (which only the best Harpers can do), her dad won't let her do what she loves. 

Again, the current cover.

You may be able to guess what happens next. 

(I have been told that this is an old-fashioned plot. I can't argue with that. But who cares? Really, who? Especially when you're say, eleven years old, and haven't really read much of that kind of thing before.

Anyway...)


In Dragonsong, Menolly's life gets rough after Petiron - the Hold's Harper, her

This is the cover of my copy.

mentor, teacher, and closest friend - dies. Suddenly, no one in her home understands her. When her dad catches her making up a new song, he punishes her and forbids her from even touching an instrument. Then her knife slips and cuts open her hand, and her mother tells Menolly that she won't ever be able to play again. Even worse, when the new Harper arrives, no one will even let her sing - not wanting any outsider know how close Menolly was to the old Harper. 

So, Menolly runs away from home. She manages to survive on her own - Hatchet-style - despite Thread falling at regular intervals, which is supposed to be just as impossible as a girl being a Harper. She even manages to get some cool legendary pets called fire lizards, which you can see on every single covers.

I would tell you what happens in Dragonsinger, but it would spoil the ending for Dragonsong. It's awesome too. I promise. :-)

This one is the super pretty one.

Now, let's say that you're a sixth grade girl, who has a dream - an impulse - like Menolly's. Except to write books instead of songs. Let's say, you're also growing up in the South. No one's really telling you that you can't write, but you're starting to recognize that most of the people around you still have some backwards ideas about girls.

You can see the appeal, right?

Now you know why I reread it over and over. It was like gulping down girl power juice.

For any girl entering adolescence, or any kid who has a dream that not everyone believes in, or any young lady who finds herself living in the South again, I TOTALLY recommend it. :-)