dpeterfreund

I am of two minds about posting this. On one hand, the casting decisions have cast a dreadful pallor over the entire production. (Pun intended.) On the other hand, other than the part where the dude takes off his hood and it's so not Aang, I feel like I recognize this. I recognize the sets, I recognize the shots, it all seems so right. Like a cartoon come alive.

Looking at this is like the first time I saw the teaser trailer for LOTR and it was a shot of Eowyn stepping out of Edoras and looking over the mountains and I turned to Sailor Boy and went, "Wow, this film looks like such a LOTR ripoff," and then it actually was LOTR and my heart soared.

Dare I give M. Night another chance, even after the mess he made of the casting? (Jasper as Sokka? Gah.) Even after the unbearable dreck that was The Lady in the Water? (Please, please, M. do not cast yourself as Firelord Ozai. Please.)

(Or, even worse, Roku. For the love of everything holy.)

Dare I hope that this could actually still be good?

(Thanks to my brother-in-law for sending this to me. He's become quite the Avatar fanboy ever since SB and I turned him on to it.)

Check out this great new review of Rampant, from the independent bookstore Russo's Books in Bakersfield, CA:

Like most red-blooded girls, I've always like horses, and unicorns are an extension of that. Being a mythology buff, I'd bump into unicorns in my readings a lot. And I have to say, that's where this book really hooked me.

The unicorns portrayed in the book aren't the sparkly white horses with perfect spiral horns that are the boiled-down and sweetened unicorns popular today. They are based on the historical record of unicorns from around the world. No two unicorns from any region were alike, and that is reflected in this story. These guys are vicious! And yet, somehow, someof them are still quite adorable (like that little stinker Bonegrinder!)

The pacing is excellent, the excitement level is on the ceiling through most of the book, and the characters are completely developed and become like actual, real-life friends. I love Astrid and her cousin, and her mother drives me nuts! Even more than my own mother does! This novel is completely original and different from anything else I've read (and I'm ALWAYS reading) and I can't wait until she writes more-- this NEEDS to be a series!

The bookseller goes on to express concern that it's more a book for older teens, "[especially] in our conservative town of Bakersfield," but says (bolding original to the text):

Otherwise, this book is so much fun, so different from anything else out there,and so well done, I'd be pushing it into everybody's hands as a must-read.

Nice, huh? I know there's been a lot of talk lately about responding to reviews and how it's always A Bad Idea, but I think the downside of that is that authors might feel afraid of participating in discussions they meant the book to engender in the first place.

Rampant, being a book about virgins with superpowers tied to their virginity, deals with the issues of sexuality, feminism, the commodification of virginity, and how religion, culture, and tradition intersect with modern society and the pressures on a teenaged girl. It has a strong abstinence message. It also has what I'm glad to see this reviewer call "well-written, tasteful, and accurately realistic" discussions by the characters in the book regarding the topics above. I'm proud that I've written a book where the female characters are making informed decisions about their choice to remain abstinent. They do it for different reasons, too: some have religious or cultural beliefs that form the basis of their choice. Others want to keep hunting unicorns, an activity incompatible with being sexually active. Some just aren't ready, or just aren't interested. All are valid, and it was important for me to show that. As an abstinent teen myself, I was often surprised and put off by the assumption that "only Christians" or "only prudes" or "only insert-descriptor-here" were saving themselves, and if I didn't have a darn good reason not to, then I should.

For the record, "I don't want to," is one of the best reasons in the world. You don't have to justify it to anyone. Not your friends, not your boyfriend, not your prom date, not that mean girl who put a "V" in Sharpie marker on the door of your locker that everyone could mysteriously translate and make fun of you for. Being a virgin is not an epithet.

I put a discussion of virginity and abstinence in the book because it was something I talked about when I was a teenager, and it was something I was interested in and would have liked to read more books about. Kind of like how I wanted to read more books about women warriors, and ancient Rome, and myths and legends, and really close friends, and kissing boys, and Renaissance art, and all the other stuff I put into Rampant.

Oh, and just in case the bookseller at Russo's sees this... good news: it is a series! I'm writing the second one now, and it'll be out in Fall of 2010. We haven't figured out the title yet, but we have a bunch of finalists.

Yesterday's little creative endeavor* really jumpstarted my work. I went into the day completely fired up and got a ton of writing done. Yay, me!

I wonder whose poetry I can mangle in the name of art today?

Actually, I don't think it's in the cards today. I'm so busy I can barely see straight. Work, preparing for houseguests, and a puppy whose persistent limp since Saturday morning has me finally breaking down and calling the vet to make sure it's not something serious.

Gah. Okay. off to get started. Maybe I'll be by a bit later with something more fun.

______________________________

* Unfortunately, I'm not sure I quite got it across that I was making the whole thing up?

During my intense, embedded foray into the coverage of the unicorn re-emergence (see my upcoming journalistic endeavor, RAMPANT), I have found no evidence that the species survived past the 1850s. So imagine my surprise to discover, care of my buddy Saundra Mitchell, author of the fantabulous SHADOWED SUMMER, this Waterhouse painting from 1900:

Though I suppose it doesn't signify, as all the Pre-Raphaelites were fond of painting scenes from legend -- which, by 1900, unicorns would almost certainly have become.

This painting of course depicts the famous unicorn hunter Lady Clare, of the family Temerin. Her story was revised and set down by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, in 1842.

Interesting story about that poem. Though there were still unicorns in 1842 (barely), Tennyson decided that the story was more properly focused on the question of the Lady Clare's inheritance, and so de-emphasized the role of the unicorn in the story, downgrading it to a "lily-white doe." See, the problem here is that to a contemporary audience, her possession of a pet unicorn -- which marks her a hunter -- would have been a clear impediment to her marriage beyond the issues of her rank and inheritance. In such a short poem, Tennyson did not want to deal with both issues.

Luckily, I have found an original version. In the original, it is not a "lily-white doe" that is the Lady Clare's companion, but an einhorn, which is not a lover's gift from her betrothed, but rather, a part of her dowry. And the part where the Lady Clare says:

"He does not love me for my birth

Nor for my lands so broad and fair;

He loves me for my own true worth,

And that is well," said Lady Clare.

Was followed, in Tennyson's original draft, by this stanza:

For, were I to learn his love was scorn,

That he counts my wealth the greater part

I'd take my pet's most toxic horn

And drive it through his faithless heart.

Interesting, what?

This looks fun: Kelsey of Reading Keeps you Sane, Khyrinthia of Frenetic Reader, Jordyn of ten cent notes, Persnickety Snark, and Trish Doller compiled lists of their favorite YA crushes. It was interesting to see, as some of them crushed on characters other put on their "least favorite" lists. I was wondering who would be on mine. (Dude, Logan, if TV counts. which I don't think it does.)

Boys List

1. Edmund Pevensie. My love of Kind Edmund the Just of Narnia is well-documented. You can pick up a copy of Into the Wardrobe and read all about it. I wonder, however, if it counts as YA? Possibly not in Wardrobe, but he's older and wiser in Prince Caspian and Dawn Treader (and way older and wiser in Horse, which is where I truly swoon) so I'm going to count it. Honestly, the only male in that seires I love more is Reepicheep, and you guys are sure to think I'm gross for saying that.

2. Gilbert Blythe. Swoonie swoon swoon. You want to hear why I love Gilbert? This is why. He's so sexy and stalwart. And plus, he's the hero of one of my favorite novels of all time (Anne of the Island).

3. Remus Lupin. Yeah, I know he's an adult in a YA novel, but I was an adult when I read it, and I just found him adorable. Rumpled, long-suffering, brilliant, tortured. I was so sad when he broke poor Tonks's heart. Again and again. And then... man, now I'm getting all teary. RIP, Remus.

4. Ravus of Valiant. Rrroawr. I seriously need me some troll love. Why was that never a thing, the way vampires were? Sexy sexy. There is nothing I like more than a troll who can teach me how to swordfight.

5. Hmmmmm.... this last one is tricky. Should I pick Po of Graceling? Evan of Bloom? Rex of Midnighters? Kartik of the Gemma Doyle Trilogy? Drew of Major Crush? Should I just call it a tie? Okay, even narrowing down, there is no way I can decide between Po and Rex. No, it's Rex. Man, I love Rex. I love how great he is with Melissa, I love what a badass he is after he's darklingified. I just love Rex.

Girls List

1. Aravis Tarkheena from A Horse and His Boy. She's so kickass.

2. Sophie and Darla of Dull Boy. It's a twofer of superheroey goodness! Actually, we can add Catherine into that, too. It's three amazingly awesome heroines in one novel!

3. Elnora Comstock of A Girl of the LImberlost. Dare I say it? Even cooler than Anne Shirley.

4. Dess of Midnighters. Run away with me, Dess! You deserve so much more than being stuck in that one-darkling town!

5. Man, I know I'm forgetting heaps. Like Diana Holland of The Luxe, who is delicious and irrepressible. And Philippa Gordon of Anne of the Island. And Tally Youngblood, natch. Ooh, and Nicolette from Top Ten Uses for an Unworn Prom Dress. And Bitterblue of Graceling, who, is it just me, but does she have a bit of the Alia Atreides about her? Am I wrong? Oddly prescient, wise beyond her years Bitterblue? But I digress. Ooh, and Alanna of Trebond. How could i forget her!

Too bad I can't do that for TV too. Willow Rosenburg and Cordelia Chase and Veronica Mars and Mac would certainly have made the cut.

Rio thanks you all for the sweet birthday wishes, yesterday!

Long week. Yoga last night was really good, though. I finally did a decent half moon pose. Yay, me!

I'm really looking forward to this weekend. I'm going to a booksigning, then to see King Lear. Anyone got any cool plans?

In other news, it's nice to see that people are still discovering Secret Society Girl, three years later. Hey, any time's a good time to pick up one of my books!

"My Thoughts: This is not a particularly deep book, but then, most of what I read wouldnt be described that way. What it is is immensely entertaining, with interesting and likeable characters.

"The one thing I was worried about going into this book was that the poor little rich girl trope usually doesnt work for me. I was thinking that if I had to read about the troubles of some well-off suburban white kids Id be rolling my eyes a lot. Thankfully, that is not the case. I found Amy quite likeable. Shes got the snarky first-person tone of most chick lit heroines down, but I especially liked that she wasnt so much a raving bitch, and the book is written as if shes looking back on her life, and she makes plenty of self-depricating asides. I liked her so much better for it."

And then a totally unexpected surprise, but Rampant was picked as a top ten summer read by the New Jersey Newsroom:

2. Rampant by Diana Peterfreund. There is a lot of buzz about these killer unicorns. They are not for sissies. Bring on the girl power!

Sadly, they'll have to wait another two months... :-( That's right, boys and girls. Two. Months. W00T!

I'm designing bookmarks. What do you think?

______

Rio - Duran Duran

I've been having a few conversations with friends recently about the best under-the-radar books. Books that aren't getting the huge buzz, for reasons that remain a mystery. Some of the books I've been thinking of are old books, some are new. Some are by seasoned authors, some are debut.

Why isn't everyone reading Megan Whalen Turner's Attolia books? Everyone I know who has read them is Capital-O Obsessed. The recent announcement that she'd be writing a new book set in that world *did* set off a huge flurry of blog-located squeeing, but it was a drop in the bucket of the tidal wave of talk for, say, Catching Fire. A few months ago, Justine threatened to never speak to me again unless I read The Thief nownownow, so I bought it, and then Sailor Boy stole it to read on the metro and I haven't seen it since.

I should really find that book. People adore it.

Why isn't everyone reading anything Betina Krahn puts on a piece of paper? Why aren't people BREAKING INTO HER HOUSE and stealing her grocery list? Her first Harlequin Blaze Historical, MAKE ME YOURS, is hitting the shelves at this moment (Amazon shipped me my copy yesterday) and it's as delicious as everything else she's ever written. I just love her heroines. They're smart and spunky and capable -- really all these things, not just lip service to the qualities. And the heroes are simultaneously flummoxed, infuriated, and secretly totally loving it. I can't get enough. Plus, she's just so funny. She has this incredibly witty way with words. An rather bawdy example from her latest, in which the heroine is teasing the hero by dragging him into dress shops to try on sexy black silk gloves:

"Infernal woman. He'd barely escaped the shop before his John Thomas turned into a full blown Jonathan Thomasville."

Too funny! Oh, I wish I could write historical romances like Betina Krahn!

Why isn't everyone reading DULL BOY, by Sarah Cross? This debut novel is one of the best books I've read all year. Everyone I know who has read it postively loves it. I've spoken about it in detail before, but this book is really something special.

I want everyone else to be feeling the love for these books that I feel! I want everyone else to be talking about it so I have wonderful fangirl conversations to listen in on! Why isn't everyone else reading them too!

What about you? What authors, what books, do you wish everyone else were reading, and why should they be reading them?

A few links from around the internets:

• The BookMaven responds to another one of those tiresome genre snobbery posts. I agree with a lot of it, but I'm not sure she goes as far as I would. So, I don' have a PHD in Literature, just a lowly BA, but I'm baffled by the attitude that books are some different sort of story, that they are somehow required to only exist on a certain level which is not true for television, film, theater, etc. The BookMaven argues for her early genre snobbery by talking about how she liked to read Poe as bed time stories as a child. Um.... So Poe is thumbs up and Stephen King is thumbs down? What's the difference, aside from a hundred years?
  
  

  Poe and Dickens, and Shakespeare, and so many of the writers who are considered the luminaries of the form wrote FOR THE MASSES. In college, I studied Radcliffe and Austen and Behn and Scott and Burney and all those damned scribbling women whose novels were ridiculed by the literary elite of their time. I wrote my college thesis on LOST HORIZON, which Pocket Books likes to fashion "the first paperback." (It's not, but it's a cute marketing ploy.)



• The Guardian is opening their doors for a short story competition. As I just finished my first short story in years and years (and my first ever for publication), I'm in such a short story mood. Would probably enter were I not busy busy busy with KU2.


• Lilith Saintcrow is off on another one of her exquisite rants about the publishing industry in "a good book ain't all you need." Check it out!


• An agent points out the lie that's Bookscan numbers.

And finally, since I've been plotboarding, I found this especially amusing:

Apparently a side effect of being completely snowed under with deadlines and stress is that I'm in a constant state of bad mood. This weekend I saw two fantastic pieces of art: BEST WORST MOVIE, a hilarious documentary about the cult status of TROLL 2 (at SilverDocs), and RADIO GOLF, an August Wilson play, at the Studio Theater. They lifted me out of my grumpiness, if only momentarily.

So did this: (updated with correct link)

So yesterday was kind of a disaster. Nothing major went wrong, it was just small annoyance after small annoyance that added up to me not even having a chance to sit down at my work until around 5 PM.

SB had to leave the house super early to catch a train, and then the power went out for several hours, which made it impossible for me to charge my phone, computer, anything. Usually, that would be fine (after all, I can write on a piece of paper) but I had planned to do some editing yesterday, which required my computer and printer. Gah. To add insult to injury, TempDog2 has taken to crawling under the deck at every opportunity, which, given the storm yesterday, meant that she went from a white dog to a black dog in no time flat, then proceeded to shake all over every wall of my house. (I think i mentioned this yesterday.)

Later, I went to take the dogs for a walk, and TempDog2, bless her monstrously large soul, pulled me off my feet twice. The second time I went down hard in the mud and rocks and scraped myself up pretty badly. Suffice it to say, I was pretty frustrated with her by the time I got home. I pulled into the garage, opened up the door, and she bolted!

Directly for the busy street at the end of my block.

Rio, under the vastly mistaken impression this was all some kind of game, ran after her. I called them. Rio, bless her well-trained heart, stopped and trotted back to me, at which point I snatched her up and threw her over the fence into my backyard, because two loose dogs were way more than I could handle. Then I turned around to look for TempDog2.

Gone. Completely nowhere to be seen.

Cue half an hour of desperate searching, and a profound understanding of just how important recall is for a dog. TempDog2 is a lovely animal, and has a sweet personality, but is not trained. We've only had her two weeks, and in that time, she's gotten down "No" "Leave it" "Kennel Up" and "Sit" -- but recall and down are problems. In the house or the backyard, she'll come, but apparently once she senses the call of the wild, she's off like a shot.

Well, I finally cornered her in a backyard, and at this point, she's not very high on my list of favorite people, so I marched her home and threw her directly into her crate w

hile we both cooled off for a bit (and some of that mud speckling her snowy white flanks dried and fell off. Rio looked at me like I was nuts and I repeated the mantra about what a rewarding experience fostering was, because right now -- hoo boy.

Don't they look cute and innocent? Lies, I tell you. All lies.

So I change my clothes and after about forty five minutes or so I look in TD2's kennel to discover that her eye is cherry red and leaking pea-sized globs of green goop. Call the vet. Vet says I can come in but I'll have to wait, since I don't have an appointment.

Yesterday might have been the worst day to visit the vet's office. I saw three animals being brought in to be put to sleep. THREE. I heard all their stories, I comforted the owners, I cried a lot. I'm really not going to tell you the gory details, but it was highly traumatic. All I wanted to do was go home and snuggle my Rio and thank God that she's young and healthy.

Oh, and my phone died. In the middle of a conversation with my editor.

So there I am, no phone, hanging out in this horribly depressed waiting room with an increasingly nervous TempDog2 for like three hours. (on the plus side, we got a few training sessions in). But they finally see her and give me some antibiotics that I have to put in both her eyes three times a day for three weeks.

Did I mention that Rio has a 50% chance of getting the infection, too? Gah.

So then I trudge home at 5 PM, exhausted, still feeling a little muddy, and having done absolutely no work at all. And that was *my* day.

I hope today shapes up better. The one -- well, I don't want to say nice, since it's depressing for her -- thing about the infection is I have to limit her activity for a few days, which means it's just going to be me and Rio on our walks for a bit. Rio is a joy to walk with. She's the kind of dog that lives for tromping around the forest at my side, and whenever I walk with her, she just gives me this look of pure joy and affection.

Which is not to say that TD2 doesn't enjoy walks. She's just harder to walk with, since she's not leash trained yet, and it makesthe walk both slower and shorter for all of us, since I stop every time TD2 starts pulling, and RIo can't figure out what she's doing wrong. I need to start looking into no-pull solutions, though.

Anyway, I'm going to get all glass is half full. It's a gorgeous day, it's a Friday, which means SB is going to be home all weekend and I'm going to go to Jeri Smith-Ready's signing tomorrow, and TempDog2 is going to be FINE after her course of antibiotics, so, yay!

Anything you need to vent about? Anything cool happening that might cheer me up? Tell me in comments!

It might be because it's five AM and Temp Dog just splattered mud, quite literally, in every single room (and most of the walls) of the downstairs of my house (so much for the benefits of "floorplan flow" -- homes with untrained dogs in them should be more like those college dorms designed in the 60s to deter rioters), it might be because at five AM, the entire world seems a little bit surreal (I just watched all the streetlights between my house and the metro stop change from blinking yellow to green -- and was inexplicably proud that I got the first green, rather than the first red), and it might be because I'm incredibly slow on the uptake, but this is just to say that I woke up this morning and, for the first time ever, it occurred to me that:

Killer Unicorns are a really weird topic for a book.

People have been telling me this for months. Most reviews of the book contain some variation on "I thought this was a really weird topic for a book, but then I really got into it."

I guess since I've been into it for a while now, I've kind of forgotten that. When I tell people about the book and they go, "Srsly?" I am surprised. When I see conversations that are essentially "Killer unicorns? WTH?" I bristle. Yes, darnit! Killer unicorns. And you're going to like them, I say! More, even, than Green Eggs and Ham.

I get it. I get it now. It's weird. And I understand that when you first walk into this world, you are as Vince Vaughn in that great classic of American cinema, Dodgeball:

But give it a chance. I hope you'll be surprised.

Thing the First

Tonight, they are showing this on PBS. Yay, Chess! I love Chess!

Actually, I've never seen Chess. But I was totally obsessed with the soundtrack in high school.

Thing the Second

This awesome review of Rampant at Sharon Loves Books and Cats:

I do not usually review books this soon before the publication date, but I am just so excited about Rampant. I have to share how awesome Rampant was with the entire blogosphere! If ever there was a book to question my loyalty to team zombie, it would be Rampant.

Then the review goes on to say some really nice things about my hero, Astrid, and the other characters:

Astrid was a very emotionally complex character. Throughout much of Rampant Astrid struggles with her role as a unicorn hunter. This was one of my favorite things about her character and about Rampant. I just loved Astrid! Astrids older cousin Phil also had issues with being a unicorn hunter. Phil is a vegetarian who is at odds with unicorn hunting. It was fascinating to see how both Phil and Astrid handled their roles as hunters. In general, all of the unicorn hunters came from a variety of backgrounds. It was refreshing to see such a diverse set of characters.

And then she announces that she's giving away her copy of the ARC. So if you want a very valuable, very rare Rampant ARC (seriously, I don't have any), head on over there!

Thing the Third

I'm still buzzing from the awesome signing down in Tampa this weekend. Great fellowship, great turnout, and lovely hospitality from the folks at the Dale Mabry Borders (they even brought us fresh cookies!) You can see a few write ups of the event on Roxanne St. Claire's post at Murder She Writes, on Terri Garey's post at Writers at Play, and at the Examiner (this last one took, shall we say, a few "liberties" with facts about me -- to start with, the first short story I ever tried writing for publication was in March of 2009).

And look who I met! Patrick the Spacelord! Isn't he a cutie? He drove all the way over from the other side of the state to come to the signing, then vanished before I had a chance to talk to him -- or introduce him to Roxanne St. Claire, who lives in his neck of the woods and would be very happy if the Spacelord were to show up at a Spacecoast Authors of Romance meeting one of these days soon (hint, hint, Pat).

I also met Trish Doller and her lovely daughter and mom (and boy, that picture turned out bad, for all of us, so no way you're going to see it), as well as Brooke of Brooke's Reviews.

Thing the Fourth

I'm kind of super-excited about an unexpected turn my manuscript took yesterday. Like, really excited. And scared. Scared, but excited. However, this will mean heading out to buy a new color of post-it note for my plot board.

The winners of the Serena Robar GIVING UP THE V Giveaway are:

Julia (comment #3)

and

Jess (comment #11)

Send me your addresses to receive your prize!

In other news, today's post is up at Writers at Play. It's about Art and the Killer Unicorn books.

[Confidential to a blog reader.]

The other day, I was talking to a writer friend of mine, who tells me that her industry-icon mentor takes her out to lunch every year and makes her make a list of goals for herself to accomplish that year, then, at the following year's lunch, goes over it like a status report to see how the writer is doing.

Pretty impressive, huh?

I'm not that disciplined -- but then, few of us are. At the same time however, during the signing and TARA meeting yesterday, one thing that came up over and over again was how we got started in this business, and most of us set a goal for ourselves to write a book, and did it. Simple as that.

Which made me think of the first time I ever did something like that. I was 11 years old. At my summer camp, they had just added a circus activity. At the beginning of camp, they held auditions for the different circus acts that the campers would perform for their friends at the end of the summer. I instantly fell in love with one act known as The Spanish Web, where the performer would dangle and form poses high above the ground on a rope. It remains to this day my favorite of all circus acts.

I really, really, really wanted to perform on the Spanish Web.

So at the audition, the instructor asked each of the campers who were interested in the web to climb the rope, then do an "easy" position to test their potential. Reader, I failed the first step. I could not climb the rope. I have terrible upper body strength -- terrible. So there I sat for the rest of the summer, working on my tightrope act and watching the Spanish Web performers with barely-concealed envy.

And then I went home and started practicing rope climbing.

I can't say I did it every day. After all, I was 11 years old, and camp is just a few weeks out of an entire year. I can't even say that I practiced it every week. But every time I thought of the Spanish Web, and how much I wanted to do it, I went out and climbed a rope in my backyard. Or tried to climb. Sometimes I could only get a few feet up. But eventually I could make it all the way to the knot on the top. (It was a much shorter, fatter rope than the Spanish Web rope. This concerned me, but, even at 11, I figured the point was to build up my rope-climbing muscles.) As we got closer and closer to camp time, I escalated my workouts.

And at the circus auditions that summer, when the Spanish Web instructor asked who wanted to be first, I popped up, walked over to that rope, and climbed it to the very top. It might have been "cooler" of me to hang back or whatever, but I'd been at home climbing ropes all winter! I wanted this bad! I was so excited to finally try out the Web!

When I found out that I had won the role, I was ecstatic. I loved every moment of my work. I loved the dizziness, I loved the positions, I even loved the blisters on my feet (I still have scars). I love the Spanish Web. It's still my favorite circus act. I would love to do it again sometime, though I bet my sense of self-preservation (read: fear of heights) is far more developed now than it was at 11. But my reward for a year of rope-climbing in my backyard was more practice, more hard work, and then a single fun performance. But I wasn't even in it for the performance. I was in it for every day, practicing on that rope. I would ask my instructor to go up on it during off-hours too. I loved being on the Spanish Web. It was like flying. (It was actually way more fun than the flying trapeze, which was the act I did the following year since I wasn't allowed to do web two years in a row -- though I did do the pre-audition demo.)

Now, just because I'd done all that preparation was no guarantee I'd be the one performing. Maybe there was an actual gymnast who was trying out too, one who not only had killer upper body strength, but also could do splits and all kinds of other acrobatic feats that kicked the pants of my paltry rope-climbing skills. Maybe all that work was for naught. (and maybe there was another person trying out whose raw talent was more impressive, but my enthusiasm outweighed that. Who knows?) But the thing is -- I may not have gotten that part after working and preparing for it, but I definitely never would have gotten it if I'd been unable to climb the rope to start with.

It's funny, but the harder you work, the luckier you get.

It's been 19 years since that summer, and I still think about the Spanish Web whenever I'm faced with what looks like an insurmountable obstacle. That first summer, there was no way I could have climbed that rope. I could barely get a few inches off the ground. And The first few times I practiced at home, it was the same way. But, bit by bit, my strength increased. Bit by bit, I made it up the rope. Because I really wanted it. I really, really, really wanted it, and every time I thought about how much I wanted it, I went and climbed the rope.

Every time you think about how much you want to write a book, sit down and type out a few paragraphs, a few pages. Every time you think about how much you want to get a book published, send out a query letter. Climb that rope.

And then, when you're up on that web, don't think about the performance. Just remember what it feels like to fly.

Borders Signing

Tampa Area Romance Authors

Date: Saturday, June 13, 2-4 PM

Location: 909 N. Dale Mabry Highway, Tampa FL 33609 (Near 1-275)

Today we have a very special treat, an interview with Serena Robar, whose hotly anticipated GIVING UP THE V is out now from Simon Pulse. As you can see from the interview, it's a topic near and dear to my heart, and I enjoyed getting into the nitty gritty of the theme.

And, both Serena and I will be giving away copies of GIVING UP THE V to lucky readers. To enter the giveaway, leave a comment at the end of this blog post.

Hi, Serena! Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by the blog and talk about your new book, Giving Up the V. I have been excited about this book ever since you announced the adorable title. Can you tell us what inspired this story for you?

If Judd Apatow (40 Year Virgin) reimaged a Judy Blume novel, that would be Giving Up the V. Its a candid view of high school today and how kids discuss sex and the peer pressure associated with making the decision to go all the way, mixed with a sweet message.

I think the story is ageless. It goes hand in hand with growing up. Your first time is considered by many, to be a landmark decision and I look at both sides in Giving Up the V. Spencer Davis is a normal girl who, on her 16^th birthday is given a very untraditional present by her forward thinking mother. She gets her first gynecologist visit and a prescription for the pill. Even though she is nowhere near ready to Give up the V. Now that Spencer has the Pill, her friends become obsessed with her first time. Her best friend Alyssa thinks she should just pick someone and get it over with, while her male friends offer to service her themselves, but Spencer isnt fixated with sex like her friends seem to be, that is, until the new boy in school takes an interest in her. Suddenly she starts to see what all the fuss is about, but she cant decide if Ben is V-worthy.

The inspiration for the story came when I was sitting in the doctors office for my yearly GYN visit. A harried, fifty-something male doctor was talking to the young female receptionist. He asked her what Giving up the V meant. It seemed his last patient was a teen girl who was there because her mother wanted her on the Pill, but she told the doctor she wasnt ready to give up the V yet. I knew instantly I had to tell that story. I had to explore the reverse peer pressure of a girl who wasnt obsessed with sex when even her mother seemed on the pro-sex bandwagon.

That's fascinating. As the daughter of an OB/GYN, I can completely picture that scenario!

As you may know, I also have a YA novel coming out this summer with a focus on the topic of female virginity and how it is viewed in modern times -- albeit from a fantasy perspective. I am fascinated by the many ways modern society is still obsessed with virginity -- from purity balls to "re-virginization" surgeries. And of course, the double standard! In what way did urban legends and social mores about virginity influence your writing?

The fascination with virginity is complex because opinion is deeply influenced by so many factors (Social, religious, personal, etc). The right time for one person is not necessarily the right time for another. I wanted to explore that theme in Giving Up the V. You see the double standard alive and well in Ryan, Spencers promiscuous male friend. Since sex means a different level of intimacy to different people, I wanted to drive that point home. Ryan sleeps around and doesnt think there is anything wrong with his behavior because he assumes the girl knows the score, which we discover is rarely the case.

My mother was raised in a strict Catholic household and attended Catholic school. It was ingrained that you waited to have sex until you were married or you would go to hell. Since we werent church goers, when it came to my sex talk, she told me that I shouldnt have sex until I was married. Period. End of discussion. I couldnt understand that line of thinking. Why wasnt sex okay in a committed relationship? Why did I have to be married? And because she wouldnt discuss the possibility of pre-marital sex (probably thinking any discussion about it meant she was condoning the decision-which she did not), she wasnt guiding me. I had questions and she wasnt answering them. So I asked my friends and made my decisions based on that information.

The physical act itself isnt much of a mystery with the wealth of information available on the internet, its the psychological and emotional impact that confounds. I wanted to write a story that answered the questions I had as a teen. The thing I was totally unprepared for was the emotional impact of sex, especially the first time. The vulnerability, insecurity and high emotions that converge. Giving Up the V explores all of that in a humorous and honest way.

I can relate to that. Spencer, your main character, seems like a really grounded young woman, especially in the face of some of the sexual-status obsession of her friends. She's more interested in other aspects of her life, and wants to wait for the right time. I must admit that she reminds me a little of myself at her age. Whenever the topic of my sexual non-activity came up, what seemed like a non-issue to me (I'd also never traveled to Egypt or gone sky-diving) was a mystery with some of my friends. For them, there had to be a "reason" I was "saving myself" -- some kind of grand religious or cultural tradition I was following. It was a topic I wanted to explore with Astrid's story in RAMPANT, and I was surprised, while writing, to receive the same critiques from adults that I once got in the high school cafeterias! Do you think teens like Spencer, Astrid, and my teenage self deal with a different type of peer pressure? Can you talk a bit about why some justifications are viewed as more valid -- and why people think they even have the right to ask!

This theme is explored in the relationship between Spencer and her best friend Alyssa (who is also a virgin). Spencer believes her first time should be with someone she loves and has a relationship with however, Alyssa doesnt think the first time is a big deal and, in fact, considers her virginity a nuisance. She believes sex for the first time will be embarrassing and painful so she wants to pick a random guy to relieve her of her virginity so when she has sex with a guy she loves, it will be a happier memory. Two completely opposite views on virginity and both are analyzed in Giving Up the V.

The teen sex debate in the media seems to center around a false dichotomy of puritannical "abstinence only" vs. panic about the "hook up" culture. A book like GIVING UP THE V argues what I find a far more sensible path: that teens can make responsible sexual decisions, including the decision NOT to have sex.

Congratulations, by the way, on your Publisher's Weekly review, whose praise includes: "this novel stands out for its thorough, no-holds-barred discussion of sex in its many formsfrom the ugly to the beautiful." I think a book like yours comes in the tradition of Judy Blume's FOREVER and similar stories -- not prurient, not scare tactics, just honest. What are your thoughts on this and what do you hope readers come away with after reading GIVING UP THE V?

In my opinion, Spencer is a very typical teen. She has her opinion on sex. She believes that its okay in a committed relationship, but shes never had a serious relationship. She doesnt believe her first serious relationship has to be about going all the way. There are so many firsts for Spencer and she is savvy enough to see that rushing into every first at once might not be such a great idea. She discovers passion and desire which cloud her decision making process and she knows that. To say all teens fall into either of the two extreme camps isnt fair or reasonable. Teens arent stupid and it bothers me when media and experts discuss them like they have no decision making skills. Most think about sex, its ramifications, if they are prepared and if now is the right time. But the majority isnt news worthy. Its the minority that sells stories with shocking revelations of seedy sexual encounters, and thats who gets the focus. It doesnt seem fair and hope readers walk away entertained, satisfied and perhaps a bit more savvy than they were before they started reading. Its the perfect ice breaker to open a dialogue about teen sex. Id love to see both teens and parents reading it.

Hi, guys. Diana again. Remember to leave a comment here to enter into the GIVING UP THE V giveaway! And, head on over to Serena's site because today she's giving away a copy of TAP & GOWN to anyone who signs up for her newsletter! (There's a book-a-day giveaway going on over there this month. Don't miss out!)

And if you're in the Tampa Bay area, don't forget to stop by the big booksigning this Saturday at the Borders on Dale Mabry from 2-4. For more info on the signing (and who will be there, other than moi), check out the Events page.

When I was in Australia, Sailor Boy and I were intrigued by the fact that they seemed to have a type of kangaroo to fill every biological niche. They had kangaroos like deer, like rabbits, like mice -- even like lemurs. This came back to me as I was researching unicorns for Rampant and trying to reconcile the astoundingly different legends in my mind. Unicorns were described as being monstrous, gigantic animals that could attack elephants in one legend, and as being analogous to goats in another.

What if, like kangaroos, they were actually just different kinds of the same animal, filling different ecological niches?

From that brainstorm, I devised my magical world's five species of unicorns, each of which correspond, loosely, to a different legend/mythology. This decision really opened up my world, because the different behavior and characteristics of different unicorn species provided much fodder for plot and world development.

And that was just the tip of the iceberg. Though, from a biological standpoint, my creatures don't fit neatly into any taxonomic structure, I took as a jumping off point the family of bovids (though my killer unicorns aren't actually ruminates -- i.e., multiple-stomached grazing animals).

This was actually the source of an interesting Twitter conversation the other day with Tiffany Trent, fantasy writer and scientist, who said she always thought of unicorns as being closest to deer (cervids). But the reason I've generally avoided that classification in my world is because the defining characteristic of my unicorns are, of course, their horns, which are, like many venom reservoirs (think snake fang resevoirs), hollow. Bovids (sheep, goats, antelope, gazelles, bison, yaks, etc.) have hollow horns. Deer have bony antlers that they shed once a year. For the other deerlike characteristics of certain of my unicorns (since, as I said before, they do not all conform to the European forest-dwelling heraldic/Beaglesque vision), there are analogous antelope species. The oryx for many years was mistaken for a unicorn by folks who only saw it from the side.

However, I did love this picture of a fanged deer skull. Slap a horn on that and it looks a lot like one of my unicorns:

This is part of the fun of fantasy -- you can decide that your utterly made up creatures fit any taxonomic classification that you like. Obviously, despite outward appearance and certain social structure analogies, my unciorns are not bovids. They don't have those stomachs. They aren't grazers. They're sharks, jaguars, hawks... and, um platypus.

Yes, you read that right. See, platypus is one of the few mammals (and they aren't even proper mammals, but monotremes) that are venemous. Male platypus have a poisonous spike in one leg that can fell a dog.

Scary, huh? When I was in Australia, I saw two platypus: one in the wild, and one in captivity. I watched them feed the captive one a few (live) prawns. You want to see a vicious eater: watch a platypus at dinner. there were prawn bits flying EVERYWHERE.

Where was I? Right, Imaginary monsters.

So I borrowed liberally from different mammals -- predator, bovid, etc., to create my monsters, and added a big dose of magic.

I'm a firm believer that in a fantasy world, you have to work to make everything else that much more believable, if you expect people to swallow "unicorns." Since my fantasy is set in this world -- a world with cell phones, animal rights activists, long range sniper rifles, endangered species laws, and animal testing, I had to work all that into the story. I also had to deal with the reality of fake unicorns.

The most common fake unicorn was the narwhal, whose spiral,, toothy "tusk" was for years harvested and sold throughout Europe as true unicorn horn. Most of the royal houses of Europe possessed one of these, and they were sometimes worth more than their weight in gold.

Unicorn horn, you see, was said to possess magical healing/purifying properties. To eat and drink with utensils/cups made with unicorn horn, or possessing a rim of unicorn horn, was supposed to prevent poisonings. There was lost of fake horn (narwhal and otherwise) being passed off as belonging to a unicorn. In my book, I treat this legend as one of false metonymy, though unicorn horns themselves do have magical properties, at least where hunters are concerned.

And, in more recent times, folks have used animal husbandry to actually make unicorns. Did anyone else see the unicorn that used to tour with the RIngling Bros. Barnum & Bailey Circus? That unicorn was one of a herd created by a pagan church leader in the 70s and 80s out of a type of Angora goat. He even patented the procedure!

I love this picture of the created, goat-like unicorn. Though the behavior of the zhi in my novel is a result of an ancient Chinese legend about a zhi, this is a surprisingly accurate depiction.

And, finally, there are unicorns that are a result of genetic mutation, such as the Italian deer pictures at the top of this post. I was thrilled when that news story started popping up last year. The fact that it was a wild unicorn found in Italy made it feel like it was a present, just for me.

I'm excited for people to read the book, since most go into it with an assumption that the unicorns I'm talking about are horses with horns -- and come out with a very different impression. I know that there are some readers who are just going to say (actually HAVE said to me -- heck, we even got some rejection letters that said it) "I don't like my unicorns like that" or, worse, "unicorns aren't like that," which I find really funny because throughout the history of humanity, unicorns have been very much like the creatures I describe.

A friend of mine recently described RAMPANT as a "unicorn book for people who don't like unicorn books," on account of that fact that I veer away from the fluffy, sparkly, innocent Trapper Keeper unicorns populating most books for children. But at the same time, I don't know. I love Beagle, and I love my book. I think it's possible to hold both of these images in your head at once.

Maybe not if you're Astrid, and have to actually kill the things, but for the rest of us... sure.

Someone sent me a link to this article about giant Belgian cows, who possess a genetic mutation called "double muscling." I'm sure this individual only meant to point out to me one of the grotesqueries of animal husbandry, but the second I saw this photo, my jaw dropped.

This is so how I picture the re'em, which is the second largest unicorn in the RAMPANT world. (For those of you who are interested in reading up about some of the others, check out my unicorn research page.) It's the same color and everything as the one that shows up in the book.

So, naturally, I had to wield a little photoshoppery:

Behold, a re'em! (And his yellow-suited lunch.)

The unicorns in RAMPANT are the unicorns of myth and legend, both the ones you've heard about, and the ones you haven't. Most people in the west think of white deerlike creatures when they think of unicorns (or, thanks to 70s rock album covers and 80s Trapper Keepers, a white horse with a horn), but there are also Middle Eastern, Chinese, Japanese, African, and even South American myths about unicorns that often have nothing to do with the Peter Beagleesque creation that comes immediately to mind.

The Trapper Keeper Unicorn. Yeah. Not so much.

One of the discussions my editor and I had during the production of RAMPANT was whether it was best to depict a unicorn on the cover that was reflective of the ones inside the books, or resonant with a public who has this "white horse with horn" image in their heads. In the end, we decided on the latter. After all, if we're going to say, "Hey, here's a book about unicorns," we're going to have to start with what you think of when you think of a unicorn. Putting a creature like the above-pictured re'em on the cover of my book is not going to trigger "unicorn" for most people. (At least, not before they've read the book.) So, instead Harper did this.

It's very common for authors to receive covers depicting people who don't look like their main characters. In fact, it's something of a joke in the industry. Well, the Astrid on my cover looks a lot like the Astrid I see in my head. However, there is no white horse-like unicorn in Rampant.

And the reason for that is that the white horse unicorn is not a traditional unicorn. Even the unicorns seen in heraldry and medieval and Renaissance European art, which is the closest depiction to the Trapper-Keeper Unicorn, is not a horse. It's a creature depicted in medieval bestiaries of the time as having the body of a deer (that means cloven hooves, folks), the tail of a lion, the beard of a goat, and a single, great spiral horn.

More on that, tomorrow!

Remember those games from the comics page of Sunday newspapers? I was playing it the other day when this little beauty on the right popped up on Amazon.You can click on the picture to enlarge.