Mundie Moms

Saturday, September 10, 2011

Guest Post with Red author Kait Nolan

We're excited to have Kait Nolan, the author of Red, on the blog today. Here's a little bit about her book:

Elodie Rose has a secret. Any day, she’ll become a wolf and succumb to the violence that’s cursed her family for centuries. For seventeen years she’s hidden who and what she is. But now someone knows the truth and is determined to exterminate her family line. Living on borrowed time in the midst of this dangerous game of hide and seek, the last thing Elodie needs to do is fall in love. But Sawyer is determined to protect her, and the brooding, angry boy is more than what he seems. Can they outsmart a madman? And if they survive, will they find a way to beat the curse for good?



Why Disneyfying Classic Fairy Tales Is An Injustice (Or Why YA Isn’t REALLY Too Dark For Teens)


Earlier this summer, in a now infamous article in the Wall Street Journal, a claim was made that the subject matter of most YA was, in fact, too dark for teens. Aside from the fact that the article lumps all YA into a range of 12-18 and neglects the fact that there are subsets for older and younger teens, the take-home message seemed to be that the subject matter was inappropriate for teens. It even went so far as to say that reading such graphic, dark material would give teens ideas (i.e. that reading about suicide might make a non-suicidal kid consider it).

Bollocks.


That’s a complete insult to teens everywhere and doesn’t acknowledge that they DO have brains of their own, thoughts of their own, and prefer to have them validated rather than ignored because, according to all those well-meaning adults, their lives are supposed to be simple and happy and moral. They’re still supposed to be children. Newsflash: They’re not.


Clearly those adults haven’t walked the halls of a modern high school any time in the last two decades. Or done something even more radical and talked to a teenager. I notice the article’s author didn’t bother to have any teenagers as sources or quotes.


I posit that this apparent appetite for the dark among teens is a backlash against the Disneyfication of young adult entertainment. Now, this is not intended as an insult in any way to Disney. I loved Disney movies as a kid. Still do. I’m that lone adult that’s watching Tangled in the theaters without a kid in tow. With my husband, who is also a closet sap. But there is a trend, one that’s been in place since I was a child, to present all these fairy tales in a very watered down, not too scary, happily ever after kind of way. Which, hey, kids eat up. I’m living proof. I can’t tell you the huge crush I had on Prince Eric from The Little Mermaid when I was in the fourth grade. But presenting kids with nothing but stories that always turn out in the end, no matter what, is a disservice.


Why?

Because that’s not how life works. Life is messy and dark and often doesn’t have a happy ending. And flooding kids with the expectation that it always should sets them up for nothing more than disappointment. Because life’s not fair. Sometimes it just plain sucks.


The original versions of many of these fairy tales we all grew up with are proof of that. Many of these stories are sometimes dark enough to curl your toes. The unsanitized versions were meant to teach a lesson and show the consequences of your actions.


Take the original Hans Christian Andersen version of The Little Mermaid. The little mermaid gives up her voice—the thing that makes her unique and who she is—to get legs to go after the prince. And you know what? He married someone else. Not almost, kinda, but the heroine and her friends rode in and stopped the sham wedding. He totally married somebody else (not the sea witch, I might add). Her sisters went back to the sea witch to make a deal for her to get her voice back. But she’d have to murder the prince and his new bride in exchange. She couldn’t bring herself to do it, so she and her sisters all died and became sea foam.


Creepy? Oh heck yeah. Do I prefer the happily ever after and the wedding and the reunion with Arial’s father? Of course. But there’s real value in the original story because it gives a good life lesson: Girls, it’s so not worth being anything but who you are to try to snag a guy.


Those universal truths and life lessons are the reason these stories have survived through centuries. They have great worth in what they can teach us. And so do the plethora of dark and terrible (and I mean terrible as in dealing with terrible truths, not as in badly written) books that line the shelves in the YA section. These books address real issues that teens face. We don’t live in a Leave It To Beaver world, and any parent that believes blocking their teen’s access to such books means they won’t be exposed to these issues is delusional. It’s real. It’s out there. It’s happening. They’re talking about it with their friends. Don’t you want in on that discussion? Read the book too and talk to your teen, find out her thoughts and answer her questions. Use it as a teaching opportunity. And if you’re lucky, maybe you’ll become one of the cool parents.




Kait Nolan is stuck in an office all day, sometimes juggling all three of her jobs at once with the skill of a trained bear—sometimes with a similar temperament. After hours, she uses her powers for good, creating escapist fiction. The work of this Mississippi native is packed with action, romance, and the kinds of imaginative paranormal creatures you’d want to sweep you off your feet…or eat your boss. When she’s not working or writing, she’s in her kitchen, heading up a revolution to Retake Homemade from her cooking blog, Pots and Plots.

You can catch up with her at her blog, Twitter, Facebook, and Goodreads.

Her debut YA paranormal, Red, is currently available from Smashwords, Amazon, Amazon UK, Amazon DE, Barnes and Noble, the iBookstore, and All Romance EBooks.

Book Review: Intrinsical by Lani Woodland


Published by: Pendrell Publishing
Released on: August 20th, 2010
Source: book from author to review
4 stars: I enjoyed it
Purchase from: Amazon|

Sixteen-year-old Yara Silva has always known that ghosts walk alongside the living. Her grandma, like the other females in her family, is a Waker, someone who can see and communicate with ghosts. Yara grew up watching her grandmother taunted and scorned for this unusual ability and doesn't want that to be her future. She has been dreading the day when she too would see ghosts, and is relieved that the usually dominant Waker gene seems to have skipped her, letting her live a normal teenage life. However, all that changes for Yara on her first day at her elite boarding school when she discovers the gene was only lying dormant. She witnesses a dark mist attack Brent, a handsome fellow student, and rushes to his rescue. Her act of heroism draws the mist's attention, and the dark spirit begins stalking her. Yara finds herself entrenched in a sixty-year-old curse that haunts the school, threatening not only her life, but the lives of her closest friends as well. Yara soon realizes that the past she was trying to put behind her isn't going to go quietly.

Talk about a unique ghost story! Intrinsical is an engaging fast paced read with a fabulously twisted plot. Lani Woodland definitely kept me on my toes with trying to figure out everything that was going on in her story, and surprisingly, she kept me guessing the entire time. I love that when a book isn't predictable. She hooked me with her refreshing take on ghosts and intrigued me with the world she created. Lani's world building is descriptive, alluring and really sets the tone for her story. Each of her characters are fun, in-depth and realistically portrayed.

Yara is an enjoyable character to meet. She's a smart, head strong sixteen year old who knows what she wants. She's also someone that teen readers will be able to relate too, as she allows readers to connect with her on so many levels through out the story. I was really impressed with how much her character grows from the start of the story to the end. I liked being able to be apart of her experiences and getting to understand why she makes the choices she does. She's just a fiery, refreshing character and I finally understood why so many of my reader friends love her and have been telling me I needed to read her story.

I adored her friends, and for once I didn't immediately fall for the love interest Brent. I mean, I liked him, but like Yara, I took me a bit to fall in love with his character. Don't get me wrong, he's fabulous. He's the good looking, intelligent, cocky guy who knows he's all that. He doesn't go around flaunting it, but he doesn't hide it either. I liked that he's very sure of himself, and I mean that in a good way. He's got confidence and I love that it took him awhile before he really won Yara over. The way their relationship develops is fantastic! It's so realistic and creditable. There's times in the story they annoy each other, there's times their chemistry just ooze off the pages, and there's other times they get frustrated with each other, but in the end they learn to trust each other, help each other out and end up falling for each other. It was fabulous! I really enjoyed that fact they have normal conversations and communicate with each on a relatable level. They made me sigh, they made me laugh and they both make mistakes they learn from.

My only hangs on the book are the few times I felt the plot line got a bit confusing, and the way Yara acted towards Brent near the end of the book. With out saying too much, I got a little annoyed with after all Brent does for Yara and what they end up experiencing together, she still kind of strings him along. But Lani threw me for another surprise with the ending, and what Brent does makes me love him that much more. I gave a little "yes" with the scene between him and Yara. Being the first book in the series I like that Lani didn't leave me with a cliff hanger, and I thought the ending wrapped up the story nicely. I'm definitely looking forward to reading more of Yara's story. This is a clean cut book I'd recommend to YA readers 13 yrs & older.

Labels