Austin Teen Book Fest 2013 #ATBF13

I have wanted to attend the Austin Teen Book Festival for 3 years and could never make it happen. When this year's line up was released, I nearly fell out of my chair in excitement - Rae Carson, Marissa Meyer, Holly Black, MAGGIE STIEFVATER! - and I was determined to be there.

Thankfully, I was able to make it happen and it was an almost perfect day.

via ATBF

Maggie opened the festival up with a poignant and hilarious speech. She made some really great points about how creative types typically have equal stores of fear and imagination, and how we need to be able to balance the two somehow. She said that, as a writer, a person plays the "what if" game - what if someone could physically manifest their dreams? What if shapeshifters were real? - and that that game says that all the dreadful possibilities are just as important as the magical ones.  She spoke briefly about her novels, including the beautiful, perfect creation that is Sam Roth and then The Raven Cycle books, and she ended it by saying that "we are all Dream Thieves because we can choose to manifest our dreams or our nightmares."

It was a really great way to open up the day, and once Maggie spoke, my friend and I headed up to our first panel of the day - Into Hearts of Darkness, which featured Jon Scovron, Mari Mancusi, Robin Wasserman, April Tucholke, Victoria Scott and the fantastic Holly Black.

There were several great questions posed to the authors here, but my favorite tidbits were uttered by Robin and Holly, both in response to the query: Where do your ideas come from?

Robin quoted the amazing Patrick Ness and said that, "One idea is never enough for a book." She talked about how he says he usually gets The Idea, and then other Ideas appear and they all sync and congeal and suddenly, this mass of ideas is a Living, Breathing, Thing, and then there's enough to be a book. I thought that was a really fantastic statement. Holly said the best advice regarding ideas she ever got was to "Honor your obsessions." That's a pretty cool idea, too - the thought that if you love something, you should probably write about it.

It was a great start to the day, and then we went back to the main hall to watch the Fierce Reads ladies face off against the Dark Days gals in a silly set of games. The best part of this, for me, was when David Tennant appeared on the screen and everybody went nuts. O DOCTOR, MY DOCTOR, I LOVE YOU SO!

(Obligatory side note: There were SO. MANY. WHOVIANS THERE. I was basically like, "Hello, you are my PEOPLE!") 

Then, we grabbed some lunch and bought a few books - I got ASYLUM by Madeleine Roux and THIS SONG WILL SAVE YOUR LIFE by Leila Sales - and headed upstairs to try to snag a good couple of seats in the Dark Days panel room. (We ended up on the 2nd row - SWEET.)

Madeleine Roux, via my OG iPhone

The Dark Days panel was, by far, my favorite of the entire day. It included Madeleine Roux, Sherry Thomas, Mindy McGinness, Michelle Gagnon, Amy Tintera, and Rae Carson.

These ladies are clearly all friends, and they all played off of one another so well - and they're all hilarious, so that definitely helped. A couple of observations here: Michelle Gagnon is so cool, I want to read all of her books, ever, now. DON'T TURN AROUND and DON'T LOOK NOW have been on my radar, but she's so fantastic, I kind of want them in my grabby little hands right now. She and Rae both had this really calm, approach and it was just super cool. Mindy is hilarious - and I mean, snarky and smart, and I never would have guessed that she spends her days as a high school librarian. Biggest surprise of the day? Sherry Thomas, who's glasses and general look do sort of speak quiet librarian but is smart and genuinely a riot who had a snarky remark to almost every question, including how, sometimes, ideas are on sale at Costco, and how hers was a free sample.

Favorite moment, though?

Madeleine Roux's answer to "Where do your ideas come from?" The answer involved blood sacrifice by the light of the full moon, a spirit named Dave, and naked dancing.

Like you do.

via my OG iPhone

After Dark Days was Fierce Reads, which was in the same room, so we were able to settle in and really enjoy it.  The authors here were Leila Sales, Marissa Meyer, S.A. Bodeen, and Alexandra Coutts. The tone of this panel was a lot less snark and a bit quieter, but the result was the same - these ladies love to write and they loved interacting with their readres. Having already read Meyer's works, the other three authors were virtually unknown to me, but now I can say that I need to pick up TUMBLE
& FALL by Alexandra, STAT. The idea of a novel that focuses on the time spent waiting for a natural disaster to strike is scary in the best, most real way, and I really have to find myself a copy of that book soon.

Our last panel of the day was Powers Strange and Perilous, which included Robin LaFevers, Lisa McMann, Cinda Williams Chima, Rosemary Clement-Moore, Melissa de la Cruz and her husband Michael Johnston, and the awesome Maggie Stiefvater. (FLAILY FLAIL FLAIL.) I've read something by everyone on this panel with the exception of Lisa and Cinda, so this was a fun one for me. It was interesting to hear how everyone thinks of the supernatural abilities that they've given their characters, and I especially liked how Robin spoke about the extraneous abilities she gave the ladies in her His Fair Assassins series - I love that she correlates them to the ways the infants struggled at birth (which sounds morbid, I know... because it is). Maggie was, as usual, hilarious and awesome but still made a lot of interesting points, and then it was off to the closing speech with the wonderful Holly Black.

Holly spoke of fear, too, and how one of her lifelong obsessions (vampires) manifested from her childhood fears. We really enjoyed her speech, but I'm not going to lie - the lines for autographs were becoming a bit intimidating, so we hopped in line a few minutes before she finished up so we could be sure to have a couple minutes with each author for whom we had a book to be signed.

All in all, I got Leila to sign my copy of THIS SONG WILL SAVE YOUR LIFE, Marissa to sign my copy of CINDER (I already have a signed copy of SCARLET), and Maggie signed my copies of both THE RAVEN BOYS and THE DREAM THIEVES. My little exchange which her while she was signing my books is also one of my favorite things of the whole day.

via my OG iPhone

Actual conversation:

Me: Hi! Thanks so much for coming today!
Maggie: No problem; I love it. <begins signing>
Me: Also, thanks for creating Sam Roth. He remains my favorite YA Boy ever.
Maggie: Well, he's a good book boyfriend to have.
Me: Right? I figure he'll sing me a song and then turn into a wolf with gorgeous amber eyes. What could be bad about that?
Maggie, as she finishes signing, with a grin: Shedding.

HA. And now you know why I say she's 100% awesome. ;)

Anyway, the ATBF was really great. I am thoroughly impressed with how smoothly it ran, how easy the schedule seemed to flow, and how genuinely kind all of the authors seemed. Will definitely try to attend next year's event! 

Thanks to Book People and all the volunteers for making it so great! And a huge thanks to the authors for being generous with their time.

Challenge Results: WHOOP!

Well, my first official Beachbody Challenge is complete, and I'm really happy with the results!

Here were my goals, as posted on 6/22:

• Replace breakfast with Shakeo every day for 60 days. 
• Follow the work out schedule (Supreme Warrior) listed in my Fitness Guide. 
• Lose 15 pounds
• Lose a cumulative 10 inches 

Negative bit first: The only slight disappointment, for me, is that I didn't lose any weight. None. Nada. I realize this is because I was working out HARD, but it's a disappointment, nonetheless. 

I have had Shakeology for breakfast every morning since late June. I love-love-love it.

I didn't miss a single workout from my Supreme Warrior schedule. Not a SINGLE one. I have worked out 6 days a week since 7/1. I'm taking a couple days off now, but will probably start back up tomorrow with 5 workouts a week.

And, most impressive:

Over the span of 60 days, I lost 11.1 inches. ELEVEN POINT ONE. I've replaced 11.1 inches of fat with muscle by working out, eating pretty clean, and keeping my long term goals in mind.

My waist is thinner, my legs are more toned, my arms are thinner, my shoulders are more defined - I'll take that, with no weight lost, over the quick drop in pounds I experienced in the past because I was eating processed, packaged stuff that was likely devoid of much that could be considered healthy any day. This is loss I can maintain simply by continuing my relatively newly acquired healthy habits.

I'm going to keep up Shakeology - it's the best, healthiest breakfast I've ever had in my life, and the benefits of my regularly ingesting so many Superfoods are all over the place. I'm actually satisfied after I have my shake. Beyond that, I have more energy, my body feels more balanced, and I'll go so far as to credit the vitamins and nutrients in Shakeo for the fact that, last month, I could feel a cold sore coming on and my body was able to fight it off without any medicine. Please and thank you!

As for the workouts - for September, I'm going to continue Combat, but I'm going to follow a schedule of my own making, made up of my favorite workouts - Shock Plyo, Combat 30, and Combat 45, possibly with Power HIIT thrown in. Then, in October, I plan to do T25 (ShaunT is a BEAST!) which will last 15 weeks, so it will get me through the holidays. Then, depending on where I am in the new year, I may consider Insanity, though I am already planning to revisit Combat in the Spring sometime.

For now: I was able to easily put on pants I haven't worn in at least 8 years last night. In my goal size.

Thanks to Beachbody's programs and my love of Shakeology, I'm the healthiest I've ever been, weight be damned. Yes, weight loss is an eventual goal, but for now, making the complete transition to clean eating is where my focus is.

So, in short: this whole experience was pretty awesome.

Til next time,
Ang

Summer Reading Programs: DONEZO!

I'm excited to say that B completed all three of her Summer Reading Programs as of yesterday. All together, she read THIRTY-TWO books this summer, of varying lengths. We did read Lewis Carroll's ALICE IN WONDERLAND together - I read it aloud, chapter by chapter - but I made her read me the remainder aloud, and she did remarkably. We had her first official Meet the Teacher night last week, and I told both her teachers she can read independently and they both just sort of nodded. All of her teachers have been like that at first - the "yes, everyone thinks their child is a genius" sort of brush off - but give it two weeks and they'll change their tune.

Anyway, photos of my B and her rewards:

1) Reading Challenge #1: Austin Public Library's Summer Reading Program

2) Reading Challenge #2: Barnes & Noble's Imagination Destination Program

3) Reading Challenge #3: Book People's Give Me Summer, Give Me Books Program

It makes me happy to no end to know that this focus we've helped her grow, regarding reading and words and art, will be a lifelong one.

I'm so very proud of my little reader.

The #SWEATTour's Austin Stop - 4 YA Authors at Book People!

This evening, I had the absolute pleasure of attending the Austin stop of the SWEAT Tour. SWEAT: SoCal Writers' Excellent Adventure in Texas. Cute, no? Also, it was (of course) over 100 degrees today, so it's probable that that other meaning of sweat was a possibility.

In preparing for this event, I was looking into a couple of the authors' information and when I pulled up Amy Tintera's bio and picture, I realized she looked super familiar. When her novel, REBOOT, was released, I thought the name was familiar too, but I never looked into it, assumed that it rang a bell because I'm pretty involved in the YA community as a whole, and let it go.

Yeeeeah.

She and I graduated from High School together. So, that's pretty cool.

Anyway, a quick conversation with her via Twitter later, and I said I'd say hello this evening at the event (I did, and she's very sweet, and she even signed my book with a "Go [school mascot]!" which I thought was pretty darn cute).

The panel, as a whole, was really fantastic, partially because all the ladies were so very different and partially because the books they represented were all so different. Authors were:

Amy Tintera - author of REBOOT and its forthcoming sequel
Shannon Messenger - author of The Keeper of the Lost Cities and Let The Sky Fall series'
Debra Driza - author of MILA 2.0 and its forthcoming sequel
Kasie West - author of PIVOT POINT and THE DISTANCE BETWEEN US

photo taken with my crappy iPhone

The moderator - Jen, I believe - led the ladies through some really great questions. At this point in my YA Reading Career, I've been to quite a few author events, and I feel that her questions were the best I've experienced. I took a few notes on the questions and their responses. Here are my favorite highlights:

If you could summarize your book by using only the names of TV shows or movies, what would you choose? 
Amy: The Walking Dead meets La Femme Nikita
Shannon: (re: LET THE SKY FALL) The Last Airbender meets Twister
Debra: The Bourne Identity meets AI
Kasie: Pride and Prejudice meets Pretty in Pink

Then, they ladies played 2 Truths and a Lie. Mrs. West has a pretty hilarious truth about choking on her own hair. That's all I've got to say about that. ;)

What's the worst (and best) writing advice you've ever been given? 
Amy:
Worst: Always know the end before beginning to write.
Best: Finish the writing.

Shannon:
Worst: You can't move on to the next chapter until this one is perfect.
Best: from Ellen Hopkins: "It's never to early to begin treating writing like a job."

Debra:
Worst: It's OK to query before the writing is done.
Best: From Cindy Pon: "Let yourself write utter poo."

Kasie:
Worst: You have to outline to be a serious writer.
Best: Don't compare yourself or your experience to others'; No two stories or writers are the same.

Which "current" books do you wish you'd had as a teenager? 
Debra: SAVING FRANCESCA by Melina Marchetta (and several members of the audience, me included, gasped. Because YES. ALL KINDS OF YES. Marchetta FTW.)

Amy: IF I STAY by Gayle Forman

Kasie said she didn't have a specific favorite, but that she wished Sarah Dessen had been a writer when she was a teenager. Shannon said she simply wished YA had existed; it would have stopped her from becoming a non-reader in her teens.

When was the "moment" you realized that this was real, that you were a 'real' writer?
Debra: The day before her book released, and she promptly had a panic attack as she considered all of the possibilities ahead of her.

Kasie: When she received her first review from a stranger.

Shannon: At her launch party, when a class-full of Middle Grade aged students were actually in attendance; also, the first time she received a letter from a parent saying that her book was what made their child a reader.

Amy: There was a moment in her kitchen in which she just determined that she was going to write, and after that, she began to work toward publication.

photo taken on my crappy iPhone

I found it really interesting to hear so much of my writing style in various comments the authors made. Amy advised that her main character arrived first, and the world was built around her. This is often how things work with me -  more often than not, actually. Kasie said she can't outline; it takes all the creative juices out of her. I am a terrible outliner. It's impressively bad. Shannon said she *can* write for hours and hours on end, but the outcome isn't pretty and she'd rather not. It was kind of cool to hear others express the same traits that I see in myself.

Anyway, at the end, I bought a copy of Amy's book and she signed it; I also picked up a few signed bookmarks and a tattoo for REBOOT. It was a pretty great event... and it's one more thing to check off #59 on my 101/1001 list.

:)

10 Things I've Finally Learned

(in no particular order)

1. Letting go is better, sometimes. Even if you're not good at it. Even if it hurts all the while. You shouldn't have to fight for some things. If you do, they weren't worth it to begin with. Sometimes, life gets in the way. If a separation happens, but you come back together later, it's probably genuine. So it goes.

2. Chbosky was right: We accept the love we think we deserve. If you don't love yourself truly, you won't allow anyone else to, either.

3. It's OK to not be OK.

4. Do not ignore your own needs. Not for long, anyway.

5. It really is the little things. Be reasonable, but don't deny yourself.

6. You should always be developing and growing yourself. Learn, change, move. That's life.

7. "Call few people enemies and call fewer people friends." * Watch who you open your heart to.

8. "Don't do it for the wealth; do it all for the love. Love everything you do and do nothing halfheartedly." *

9. "Be what you speak, man. Never speak on what you be." * Only you can do you. Respect yourself and be who you are.

10. You are responsible for your inner peace. You can let people or situations rob you of it, but ultimately? It's on you. Hold onto it.




* lyrics taken from Deep Puddle Dynamics' song "The Scarecrow Speaks" which contains an insane amount of quotable lyrics. We can talk about my attachment to that song in another post.

15. Throw Bella a crazy awesome 5th birthday bash - DONE!

Bella's fifth birthday was the biggest party we've ever had for her, and it was Alice in Wonderland themed. It was really simple to put together, though, and she was so excited all day. All of our People were there, and there were tons of kids. We had cupcakes, Eat Me cookies, sandwiches, unexpected barbecue, perfect weather, and an amazing array of gifts, when all was said and done.


I was also able to take off work for her actual birthday, and we spent the day together, just relaxing and wandering around town. It was an all-around great day.

(all photos are mine. do not take them without permission, please.)

Big Top Candy Shop! :)

We so rarely allow her to eat candy, this was a big thrill for her.

DIY goodie bags at the party.

I put up quotes around the space the party was held in.

NOMZ.

My little archery fiend. ;) 

I'm so glad I was able to put this together, and that it went off (mostly) without a hitch. Thanks to everyone who came out, and to Erin for allowing us to take over her house for the afternoon.

Til next time,
Ang

Update: Summer Reading Challenges!

Well, hi there.

At this point, with 23 days before Kindergarten is slated to start (OMG WHAT), Bella has made great strides in all of the reading challenges she entered this summer.

1) Reading Challenge #1: Austin Public Library's Summer Reading Program
As of right now, we are on book 22 of 32. The deadline for this program is 8/24. She'll reach this goal, no problem.

2) Reading Challenge #2: Barnes & Noble's Imagination Destination Program - DONE!

3) Reading Challenge #3: Book People's Give Me Summer, Give Me Books Program
As of today, this is DONE, too! We'll probably take her to Book People tomorrow to pick up her gift card and let her pick out a book to buy. So exciting!

I plan on taking a photo of all her spoils once she's done with all three challenges - should be three brand new books - and posting it here. It's so cool and so great for me to see her excelling as a reader. I simply love it. And her, of course. To the moon and  back.

As for me and my Goodreads Challenge, here are my current stats (I won't hit this goal til probably November/December, but still, I'm working on it throughout this summer, so here we are):

Books read: 61 of 85

Pages read thus far: 23029

Thanks for reading this! ;)

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