Happy Birthday Nikki: Thoughts on Serendipity

When I was in elementary school, I was obsessed with a series of books by Stephen Cosgrove. One of them was called Serendipity.

Isn't she the cutest? I don't honestly remember the storyline, but I remember this was my introduction to the word serendipity. Even as a seven-year-old, I loved the idea of stumbling across something awesome purely by chance.

This happened to me in June of 2012, at a book event called Teen Author Carnival that took place in NYC. I got invited as Fiona Paul because I was going to be at Book Expo America with the 2012 debut group, the Apocalypsies. I remember being overwhelmed by BEA, being exhausted as I hurried from the conference to the library with a group of other authors. I remember feeling outclassed and outperformed by many of the other writers doing panels with me. They were all so polished, so professional. Me, I was sweaty and shy and scared.

After the panels were over, the authors hung out to sign books. My first book wasn't out yet so I was signing ARCs and bookmarks. One of my editors came up to me and gave me an ARC of Venom that someone had won as part of a box of books but forgotten at the library. "I figured you might want this," she said. My first thought was: Yikes. One more thing to fit in my already overstuffed luggage. But I put it away and kept talking to readers. I was sitting next to Lauren Morrill, another 2012 debut (she's awesome, buy her books!), when a tiny sprite of a girl bounced up to me. "Do you know if they'll be giving away more ARCs of Venom at BEA tomorrow?" she asked.

"I'm not sure." (Authors are usually the last to know anything). I paused. "How old are you?"

"Thirteen," the girl replied.

"Hmm. Venom is technically age 14 and up." I looked at Lauren Morrill. She looked at me. This girl looked younger than thirteen. But she was so cute and enthusiastic and it wasn't like the people at BEA were carding book readers to make sure they were old enough to get the free ARCs. I made one of those split-second decisions. "Here." I pulled out the copy of Venom my editor had just given me. "I just happen to have an ARC with me. You can have it, but if any of the material makes you uncomfortable, just skip over it, okay?"


The girl nodded happily. I signed the ARC for her and she bounded off. That girl was blogger Nikki Wang from the blog Fiction Freak. I didn't think too much about the interaction, aside from praying that I wouldn't get an angry email from Nikki's mom if she found the ARC and deemed it too adult for her daughter.

After I got home from the conference, Nikki emailed me about doing a feature on her blog. I said yes. We got to talking. We got to talking some more. Slowly, via the magic of the interwebz, Nikki and I became friends.

Since then, Nikki has been a such huge motivational and promotional force in my writing career that I wanted to write this happy birthday blog post just to thank her. THANK YOU, NIKKI! Many other bloggers have inspired and promoted and motivated me too, and I am grateful to all of them. But Nikki truly has gone above and beyond, in so many ways. Here's just a smattering of things she is to me:

1. One-girl focus group if I have a question about teenspeak or whether teens do or don't like something.

2. Reviewer extraordinaire. The PenguinTeen catalog even blurbed her:

3a. Epic supporter. She sponsored a readalong with blogger Annabelle from Sparkles and Lightning:

3b. She also made my first fan art for both the Eternal Rose series and The Art of Lainey:

3c. She also personally encouraged her friends to read my books.

3d. She also had me on her blog multiple times to promote my writing.

3e. She's also heading up THE ART OF LAINEY blog tour via the company she started with her friends, Merp Squad.

3f. She's also done a lot of other little things to promote me, like being first to sign up for my street team and tweeting and FB likings and sharing my bookmarks, etc.

4. Graphic designer. She made the banner and button I'll be using as part of a multi-author tour this July. More info on that coming soon.

5. Last, but never least, friend :) Maybe it's weird for a "grownup" to have teens as friends, but I like to think of it as one of the best things about the internet. Cyberspace breaks down barriers that might keep people apart in real life.

I am so glad I made that random serendipitous decision to give my extra copy of Venom to Nikki almost 2 years ago. Whether you're Team Fate or a big believer in free will, I encourage you to remain open to the idea of serendipity. Life hands you amazing things sometimes when you're not even looking for them. You never know--the next person you meet might become your Nikki Wang :)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY NIKKI! <333

The Agony and Ecstasy of Vacation (and Life)

If you know me, then you know I feel things strongly. I live a life of ups and downs, of manic joyful periods and crushing lows. I guess it's only fitting that my vacation followed this pattern.

I had the highest of hopes. Four days kayaking Espirito Santo Island in the Sea of Cortez, hiking and snorkeling, camping under starry skies. Then a day of snorkeling in the open ocean with sea lions and two days of whale watching in Magdalena Bay. What could be more perfect?

Perfect sea. Perfect sky.

But things started on a tragic note. On the shuttle bus ride from San Jose del Cabo airport to La Paz our driver hit a dog. I will never forget that moment--the look in the dog's eyes as it doubled back into the road directly in front of us, the sound of the impact, the lurch of the shuttle bus. I will never forget all the thoughts that raced through my head. No. Tell me that didn't happen. What if it's dead? What if it's not dead? Why aren't we slowing down? Surely, we're going to stop. OMG, the driver isn't going to stop. I should demand that he stop. We can't just leave an animal in the middle of the road to be hit by other drivers. I should say something. But no one else is saying anything. What can we even do? If I don't say something it's like I'm okay with him not stopping. I am not okay with that.

At that point I asked the driver if there was anything we could do, or if anyone would help the dog. He didn't answer. A local man riding with him said someone else would probably help the dog and that it was an unavoidable accident. And it was. I didn't blame the driver for hitting the dog, but I blamed him for not stopping. I understand that Mexican culture views animals differently than I do, but if he had hit someone's car he would have been legally required to stop. I accept that most people view hitting a dog different than hitting a human, but surely hitting a dog is not less of a thing then hitting another car. If you injure a living creature, I think it's your responsibility to deal with it, however that may be. My heart still feels heavy at the idea we might have left a terrified, injured dog in the street.

At the hotel, things got better. I met our guides and the rest of our group--a lovely bunch from the US and Canada. We talked about our trip, and the next day we got our snorkeling equipment and took a boat ride to out put-in beach. Before we were allowed to get in a kayak we had to demonstrate the ability to do a wet exit. This involved being strapped into my kayak via a spray skirt, flipping my kayak, and releasing the skirt and exiting the kayak underwater. I have a fear of drowning and I'm not good at opening my eyes underwater so I was pretty terrified. But I survived. So I got to paddle one of these babies.

Sea kayaks

And it was awesome. There's nothing quite like being out in the waves, working the rudder to stay on course, hearing the slap-slap of manta rays jumping in the distance. The ocean is...magic.

Espirito Santo Island

But I still thought about that dog. I thought about it when I was eating, when I was hiking, when I was sleeping.

Deluxe accommodations for one.

On the fourth day of vacation, we finished with the kayaks and took a panga ride to Los Islotes to snorkel with the sea lions. I've snorkeled with stingrays and it was cool, but there were way more people than rays and it was kind of crowded and touristy so I wasn't expecting much.

Los Islotes. Pretty sweet digs.

Sea lion kiss!

It was AMAZING. The geography of the island was otherworldly, like something out of a high fantasy movie. We were the only boat there when we arrived. And there looked to be over 100 sea lions. But still, I kept my expectations in check. The animals were mostly on the rocks and no one knew if they'd get in the water with us or not.

But they did :) And a couple of little ones took an instant liking to me. For the next hour or so, I snorkeled around the rock formations and played with sea lions--swimming back and forth, twirling around in circles, slapping the water. They swam so close to me that I could touch them, and when I looked into their wide cartoon eyes, it was bliss. And for that hour, I forgot all about the dog. I was in a state of pure happiness.

Oh hai.

The next day we went to Magdalena Bay, a protected area where hundreds of gray whales migrate yearly to bear their calves. It was another completely otherworldly animal encounter. We weren't allowed to kayak or swim in the bay, but our group of 12 went in search of whales in our motorized panga boat. The first hour was slow-going, but we made some cute non-whale friends.

Pelicans in Magdalena Bay

But then the tide went out and all the whales flocked to the deeper area at the mouth of the bay. Suddenly they were everywhere. By the end of the second hour, all of us had been able to reach over the side of the boat and stroke the head of a curious whale calf or momma whale. I had touched several and taken a lot of extreme close-up pix.

Extreme blowhole close-up

Giant whale mouth next to my pale, pasty arm.

We returned to the pier, elated--all of us so overcome by getting so close to these majestic creatures. The trip package included two days of whale-watching and I remember thinking: I should skip tomorrow. There's no way it can possibly top today.

Whale flipper

Whale "spying" or orienting itself above the water.

I ended up going back out, though. We were in a small fishing village and there wasn't really anything else to do. I decided to put my camera away and just enjoy the experience. But the next day was not the same. Either our boat pilot was less experienced or the whales were in shy mode. Or maybe it was just the time of day--the tide was high and the whales had more places to hide. Whatever it was, we didn't see much. No whales came to the side of our boat. We cruised by a mangrove area and took pictures of osprey and pelicans. And then we headed back to the pier, a little dejected after the previous day's epic adventure.

And then, just as I was finally starting to let go of the sadness of the dog we hit, tragedy struck again. Our boat slammed into something and several people were thrown from their seats. We hit a whale :( There was disagreement as to whether it was an adult or a calf. I saw an adult just after the impact, but calves travel next to their moms so it could have been either. None of my tour group was injured, but all of us were so horrified at the thought that we might have hurt one of these gorgeous creatures.

Gray whale calf

Our guides assured us that the boat hadn't been speeding. It was no one's fault. Once again, an unavoidable accident. But it left me with so many questions. The tour operations in Magdalena Bay are a huge source of income for the local people. Probably that income helps keep the area protected so the whales can mate and bear their young in the safety of the lagoon. I thought my vacation was eco-friendly. I was kayaking. I was camping. I was pouring money into operations that could only survive by taking good care of their animal populations. But hitting that whale made me wonder if we had done more harm than good. Were we exploiting these animals for recreation? I don't know. But what I do know is this: I would give back all of those amazing animal moments to know that the whale we hit was okay.

So my vacation ended on a sad note, but it gave me a lot to think about. I'm not sure how I feel about touching animals in the wild. In the past I have avoided this (though I have touched animals in captivity), but these whales really acted like they wanted to be touched. Would they be safer if tourists weren't luring them close to boats with splashing and petting? Probably. But what would happen to Magdalena Bay if the tourist dollars evaporated? Would it lose its protection? What's the right thing to do? I don't know. There's so much I don't know. But I probably need to do a better job of considering the possible consequences of my choices.

So there you have it--the agony and ecstasy of my week in Mexico. What was great was very great. I'll never forget the sea lions or the whales. There's nothing more empowering than the feeling of handling a technical kayak in the open water. Just pitching a tent every night and waking up to coffee brewed over a camp stove was its own sort of reward. But hurting wild animals is hard for me. And even though I wasn't driving the van or the boat, I feel somewhat responsible because my money helped make those accidents possible.

It's tempting to try to put this vacation behind me, to forget those feelings of guilt. But it all goes back to my life of epic joys and crushing lows. Sure, I wish the lows were a little less low, but I wouldn't trade the high points for anything, so it seems only fair to acknowledge the entire spectrum. Westerners have a tendency to embrace our happiness and try to let go of or medicate away our despair. Hold on to your moments! As much as race or religion or career choice, the things that move us to tears of joy or sadness make us who we are.

I Blurbed a Book! + The Collective Unconscious

There are few things more flattering to an author than to be asked to blurb a book. It's like a colleague saying to you "Hey. I think you might like my book. And if you do, I think other people might decide to give it a try because you liked it." I mean, that is no small thing, and I'm still kind of warm and giggly that Rachel Harris asked me to blurb The Fine Art of Pretending.

And then put my blurb on the COVER!

SEE:

Is this cover not adorbs? I love it!

What's super-fun about being asked to blurb this particular book, is that it's similar to my own book, The Art of Lainey. It's not just the "Art of" titles and fluffy romantic comedy genre that our books have in common. Both Rachel's MC and my own enter into agreements with boys where they pretend to date them to further their own agendas. Is the outcome the same? I'll never tell :)

Now maybe you're thinking "Whoa. You wrote the same idea at basically the same time? How did THAT happen? Are you in the same writing group?" No. Rachel and I have never met. We wrote our books without ever mentioning to each other what we were working on. I credit this coincidence to a little thing called the collective unconscious. If you're not familiar with the collective unconscious and you want to ponder some deep thoughts, give this link a read. Basically the idea is that everyone has an artificial conscious made up of our experiences, and then a deeper level of consciousness that we all share, which is only accessible via dreams and mystical experiences. When we tap into our creativity, we tap into this more fluid mystical level of consciousness, and sometimes end up in the same place.

This happens all the time in publishing. You see it in titles. You see it in covers. You see it in plots. Sure, super-jaded people will roll their eyes and mutter about copycats (I'm talking about you, Hunger Games haters), but often it's just two people with the same ideas at the same time. I remember when I queried The Art of Lainey and pitched it as "for fans of Jennifer Echols or Elizabeth Scott." My agent told me she was going to send it out on sub as "for fans of Stephanie Perkins" because she felt we had a more similar voice and tone. Well, all I knew about Stephanie Perkins was that she was cool and had fun hair, and that her books were mega-popular. I hadn't read them yet because I was on a major dystopian kick at the time.

So one weekend, while LAINEY was on sub, I sat down and read both Anna and the French Kiss and Lola and the Boy Next Door. And had a panic attack. I couldn''t even appreciate how awesome the books were because I was so terrified.

Stephanie's books have a sassy girl who says "dude" a lot and bleaches a streak of her hair. They have a short guy who is afraid of heights, who happens to be a hot British male. And LOLA has a mom who reads tea leaves. The narration is in first person, present-tense. Guess whose book ALSO had all those things? Yep. Mine. Well, my MC wears a teal clip-in hair extension, but STILL. I was freaked.  I emailed my agent at 0200 like WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME I WAS A PSYCHIC PLAGIARIZER?? THE WHOLE WORLD IS GONNA THINK I'M A COPYCAT. OMG, I HAVE NEVER SEEN TEA LEAVES IN A BOOK BEFORE *CRY* I expected her to tell me I was overreacting, but she was like "Huh. That is a lot of similarities."

Ultimately I decided to revise the book, making the short guy taller, and eventually eliminating the fear of heights and hot British guy completely. I kept the "dude" though, because that's true to my character. Plus, after writing all those historicals, I believe I've earned the right to say "dude" as much as I want :) Dude, dude, dude. Dude--you have no idea how good that feels. And I kept the tea leaves, because I researched them to death and they were literally part of my book's first sentence from my very first draft.

And I have heard much stranger stories than mine. An author-colleague once finished a very detailed draft of a historical book about a certain period of time only to read an issue of Publisher's Lunch and see the deal announcement for her exact same setting and plot--a book by an NYT bestseller, naturally. She ended up abandoning the project. [Note to self: NEVER read Publisher's Lunch.] And not too long ago a friend of mine told me how the first draft of her book had a special planet called Elysium where the privileged lived. And then that Matt Damon movie came out, with a special planet called Elysium where the privileged lived. Awkward. Thank goodness she had time to change it.

So next time you see twin covers or twin synopses, think about the collective unconscious. And be sure to add The Fine Art of Pretending to your TBR, because Rachel Harris really is gifted when it comes to creating relationships. I'm in love with every single one of her book boys. And in case you're wondering, even though our books have a common genre and plot element, the resulting stories are very different--both totally readworthy books in their own right.

What Reviews Mean to Me

In case you missed it, the lovely people at HarperTeen made The Art of Lainey available on Edelweiss a couple of weeks ago. That doesn’t mean everyone can read it for free, but it does mean if you’re a book blogger, book reviewer, bookseller, or librarian who is a registered Edelweiss user, you can probably access the text of the ARC.

If you are one of those people, and enjoy contemporary YA books, I would love for you to read and review my novel. I am grateful for every single review: the glowing, the critical, and all of those in between. I can’t speak for other authors, but here are a few reasons why reviews are so important to me:

1. Reviews provide helpful feedback. This isn’t the most important reason, but it’s the most obvious. If a lot of reviewers enjoyed the book, that tells me I did something right. If a lot of reviewers despised the book, that tells me that maybe I didn’t execute the story as well as I would have liked. It stings a little bit to read bad reviews, but they inevitably fall into one of two categories—the ones I agree with, which can be helpful in my future writing, and the ones I don’t agree with, which is simply a matter of different strokes for different folks.

True story: my very good friend Christina, who happens to be a book blogger and reviewer, was one of the first people to read The Art of Lainey. “I love it,” she said. “There’s only one thing I didn’t like.” She told me what that one thing was and it turned out to be something my publisher had concerns with too, something I thought I had addressed but maybe not well enough. I thought about Christina’s reaction. I went back to the MS and took a hard look at it. And I made a couple more changes because ultimately I agreed with her. My book is better because my friend had the guts to say “Hey, maybe you want to do this a little differently?” Thank you, C.

By the time you write your review, it might be too late to make changes to the book, but it will never be too late for me to consider your comments and use them to grow and improve as a writer. So please, please, if you know me in real life or online, don’t refrain from posting an honest review of my books because you don’t want to hurt my feelings. My feelings can take it, I care what you think, and also because…


2. Reviews sell books. When I stumble across a book on a website with tons of reviews, my initial thought is “Wow. This is popular. How come I’ve never heard of it?” It doesn’t matter if the average rating is 3.0 or 4.5—I’m immediately curious to find out what I’ve been missing. I don’t usually read indie published books (nothing against them, I just prefer to support the traditional publishing industry because I'm a part of it) but I bought a copy of Susan Ee’s Angelfall** when I saw how many reviews it had.  And I loved it--I’m buying the sequel. I never would have given that book a second glance if it only had 20 reviews—even if all 20 were 5-star ratings. No one expects a book to have only glowing reviews. Your middling or negative comments legitimize the positive reviews, if that makes sense. Also...


3. Reviews sell books to the right people. Sometimes I’ll read a negative review that says “This book had too much swearing and underage drinking” or “I hated that this book had a love triangle.” Readers are totally justified in not liking those things. However, those things don’t bother me, so those reviews they don’t affect whether I’ll buy a book. Other reviews says stuff like “This book was really slow-paced and took 250 pages to get to the inciting incident” or “I hated that the heroine’s pet kitten died a brutal death.” When I read that, I’m less likely to pick up a book, and that’s actually a good thing for everyone involved. Maybe it means that I don’t buy a book I was thinking of buying, but I am much more likely to buy the author’s future books if I haven’t labeled her or him in my brain as slow-paced or “Violent Kitten Killer Author.” 

I’ll be the first to tell you that if you don’t like funny romantic books or movies like Clueless and Easy A, that you probably won’t like The Art of Lainey. Maybe you think that’s me harming my sales, but I am looking at my long-term career, not just maximizing sales on one book. My second contemp, Liars, Inc., is much darker in tone and context, with dead bodies and plot twists galore. I am not sure how much reader overlap I will have between LAINEY and LIARS, and that’s okay. But I would rather not alienate potential LIARS fans  by encouraging them to buy LAINEY if it’s "not for them." So in that way, I see the critical reviews I get for LAINEY as possibly benefiting my overall career. Finally...

4. Reviews motivate me. On those days when I'm banging my head against the wall and wondering if the writing life is really worth it, I sometimes flip through my emails or reviews. When readers say stuff like "I loved this book!" or "this book helped me through a tough time" it reminds me of why the writing life will always be worth it.

**Angelfall is now being published by Amz/Skyscape. My copy was purchased before that sale happened.

Ten Ways to Support Your Fave Authors for Free

I've had a couple people come up to me and basically apologize for getting Venom or Belladonna from the library, as if maybe they're not really a fan of the books since they didn't buy them. Truth time: The only books I bought recently were those released by close author friends or those bought at signings. This year was really hard for me financially, and I also knew I was going to be moving. Even with all the books I didn't purchase, and the books I gave away while packing, half the moving boxes still stacked in my bedroom are full of books. So yeah, I simply couldn't buy more.

But I read over fifty books in 2013--most of which I got from the local library. And that's okay. In fact, that's great. If people quit going to the library we'd probably quit having libraries. And that would be terrible. If you're in a place physically or financially where you can't buy books, that doesn't mean you can't support your favorite authors.


Here are ten ways to give a little author love without spending a dime:

10. Skip the piracy and use the library. Librarians take notice when books are in high demand, and they can be powerful author allies.

9. Follow your favorite authors on Twitter and like them on Facebook. Don't feel bad if they can't reciprocate--Twitter isn't very useful if you're following 10,000 people. If the author posts something that resonates with you, share or retweet the post.

8. Request books. If your school or local library isn't carrying a book you enjoyed, ask them to order it. Again, librarians are superheroes in the publishing world.

7. Reviews, reviews, reviews. I don't care if you bought the book, checked it out of the library, or read it slowly over several visits to Barnes & Noble--honest reviews are an author's best friend. Nothing says "Hey, this must be good. It's really popular!" like seeing a new book pop up on a website with loads of reviews. Copy and paste your reviews to all the major sites--Goodreads, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, etc.

6. Comment on the author's blog. Most blogs seem to get fifty page views for every one comment. Take the time to respond to posts that are especially meaningful to you. Yeah, it sucks to figure out some of those captchas, but authors love to know that someone is listening.

Andrea Cremer and me. Even authors like meeting authors!

5. Go see authors in person. Nothing is more horrifying than spending weeks stressing out about and preparing for a bookstore appearance only to have three people (two of whom are related to the author) show up. Don't feel like you can't attend a signing or speak to an author because you don't have money to buy the featured book. You matter to us. We want you there.

4. Sponsor a read-a-long. A read-a-long is like an online book club discussion. You invite the author to provide some questions about his or her book and recruit a group of readers who want to read and discuss the book at the same time.

3. Become a member of Goodreads. GR is chock-a-block with ways to support your fave authors. Start simple and add the author's book to your to-be-read list. Maybe vote for the book on Goodreads lists or add your favorite quotes from the book. Recommend the book to other members you think might enjoy it.

2. Tell your friends about the books you love. Tell them in person and on GR and Twitter and on your blog if you have one. Before the internet was big, there used to be a saying in customer service like "A satisfied customer tells 7 people about his experience. An unsatisfied customer tells 25." Pretty sure nowadays an unsatisfied customer tells thousands of people. But you can use the internet's power for good too! Most books don't get six-figure marketing budgets. The way they become successful is through word-of-mouth. That means you!

1. The most basic thing of all--send the author a tweet or an email. They may not be able to respond to you--some authors get thousands of messages a week--but that doesn't mean they're not reading them and appreciating them. No one ever gets tired of hearing someone say "Your book changed me/saved me/ helped me/ made me laugh my butt off." And when we're struggling with our newest project, sometimes it's your emails and tweets that motivate us to keep going.

Can you think of other ways to support authors for free? What about ways for authors to support their favorite bloggers? List them in the comments.

Happy holidays! And as always, thanks for reading :)

Seasons Greetings from Mufasa AKA "Moo."