In the Book Reviewer Hot Seat: Little Willow

Next up in the hot seat, the force behind one of the most comprehensive YA and MG book review blogs in the industry, Little Willow!!! We literally have to raise the roof to fit in all the books she's read and reviewed! In fact it is so crowded, we must part with one--and you can leave a comment for your chance to win Bewitching Season by Marissa Doyle! (Deadline to enter is June 29th, winner announced June 30th).

Okay, here we go with some quick stats:

What's your handle? Little Willow
What kind of books do you review? Most of what I review is young adult fiction, but I read and enjoy a wide variety of books: classic literature for both adults and children, contemporary adult fiction, fantasy, horror, and mystery, contemporary juvenile fiction, non-fiction works pertaining to Ancient Egypt, math, science, and language, the occasional biography, some picture books, and other reference materials. I love words and will read the dictionary for fun.
Approx # of books reviewed?Hundreds.
Where can we find your reviews?
http://slayground.livejournal.com/
http://slayground.livejournal.com/tag/reviews
I also post some of my book reviews at other websites and online communities, such as Young Adult Books Central, The Edge of the Forest, Amazon, and the readergirlz forum. As a freelance journalist, I sometimes submit my reviews to print magazines and papers as well.
Reading turn-ons:Realism. Compassion. Intelligence. Imagination.
Reading turn-offs:Cliches. Excessive swearing. Debauchery.
Class of 2K8 books Reviewed:
The Opposite of Invisible by Liz Gallagher (author interview)
(I also created Liz's website:http://www.lizgallagher.com/)
Shift by Jennifer Bradbury (author interview)
Read My Lips by Teri Brown (author interview)
Alive and Well in Prague, New York by Daphne Grab (author interview)
Undone by Brooke Taylor
Samantha Hansen Has Rocks In Her Head by Nancy Viau

I have additional titles in my to-read pile:
A Curse Dark as Gold by Elizabeth C. Bunce
Bewitching Season by Marissa Doyle
Braless in Wonderland by Debbie Reed Fischer

Wow, awesome list! Okay, let's get into the tough questions, shall we. We love the crazy handles book reviewers come up with - tell us how you came up with yours! A little bit about how you got into book reviewing would be cool too.

The first time I went online was in the spring of 1997, shortly after the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer started airing. I went to the show's official website and found a forum there. Realizing that I needed a handle, I came up with Little Willow. At that point in the show, the character of Willow was a book-smart brunette, so I related to her. I tacked on the Little because I was younger and shorter than the actress who portrayed her.

"At that point in the show..." are you distancing yourself from Evil Willow perhaps? Since we know you're not evil (stay away from that black magic, okay?), let's talk about your grading system and how that translates to the reader?

I don't usually grade books in my reviews, but in some of my booklists, like the Tough Issues for Teens booklist- I give each book a rating according to the United States movie rating guide - G, PG, PG-13, or R - based on content, and a number of stars - four being the best - based on quality, in my personal opinion.

Book ratings are a hot topic right now, but we could be here all day if we started discussing that! Tell us--how do you pick the books you review? Or are they picked for you?

Some book reviewers are employed by newspapers, magazines, websites, etcetera, and they may or may not have to review certain titles. I'm not employed by any such publications. I work as a bookseller full-time and blog about books to share my love of literacy with others. I review books I enjoy and want to encourage others to read.

You say you read books you enjoy, but do you ever read books that wouldn't normally interest you - and if so have you ever been surprised by what you've read?

I read a variety of books. No matter what the genre, I love when a book impresses me and surprises me a good way.

What are the best ways to find new books? Any advice for authors about getting their book noticed by reviewers?

Ask booksellers, librarians, friends, family, and other trusted individuals for recommendations. Don't form an opinion of a book strictly based on the cover, nor strictly based on someone else's review - read it yourself! One person's junk is another person's treasure, so you might greatly enjoy a book that someone else reviewed negatively, and vice-versa. Readers: Read to learn. Read to experience and consider new things. Read to escape. Read for the story. Read just to read. Authors: Be yourself. Believe in your book, your story, your characters, and your writing. Be positive, realistic, and optimistic. Your book will find its way to those who will appreciate it. Consider your audience. Think about why you wrote the book and for whom it was written. Don't be pushy when approaching reviewers, buyers, and others in the book community. Tell them about your book and see if they seem interested. Don't demand that they read it, review it, buy it - just talk about it.

Great advice! Let me ask you something else, if you really aren't feeling a book - will you make the ultimate sacrifice and finish it for the sake of the review?

If I start a book, I have to finish it. That's my own personal rule. On average, I read a book a day, more if there are picture books and short works in the mix!

One a day! WOW! So if you really love a book - will you read it again? If so - what are some of the books you just had to read more than once?

Oh, yes! As a kid, I re-read my favorite books and checked out cherished stories from the library again and again. It was like visiting friends. Books I've read a countless number of times include Anne of Green Gables, The Westing Game, The Phantom Tollbooth, and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. A few years ago, I sat down with The Great Gatsby intending to simply locate a quote within its pages and ended up re-reading the entire book right then and there. I enjoy reading and re-reading Christopher Golden's books.

Do you have a basic philosophy on what should be included in a review - or does it depend on the book itself?

I like when reviews are informative, passionate, and truthful! Be it a professional or a more informal review, it ought to include the book's premise as well as the reviewer's thoughts on the story and the writing. The style and length of the review may depend not only on the book, but also on the reviewer and/or the publication. Some magazines and reviewers follow a strict format and adhere to a word count. I write what I feel.

Tell us about the last time your jaw dropped open,you laughed, or you cried while reading a book.

Yesterday, I read Toys Go Out: Being the Adventures of a Knowledgeable Stingray, a Toughy Little Buffalo, and Someone Called Plastic by Emily Jenkins and illustrated by Paul O. Zelinski. It made me laugh and smile quite often. It was absolutely precious. I simply did not want to let that book go! I returned it to the library this afternoon like a good little patron. I eagerly await the sequel, Toy Dance Party, which comes out in September. Maureen Johnson's books (and her blog) crack me up without fail. Christopher Golden writes jaw-droppers. Thief of Hearts, the second book in his line of Body of Evidence mysteries, truly made my jaw drop. I couldn't believe my eyes when I read a certain chapter. Oh my goodness. There are few books (or films or TV shows) that bring me to tears. The Book Thief did. So did Wizards at War, one of the Young Wizards novels by Diane Duane.

The Book Thief claims the life of yet another hankie! Now, for a favorite question of any avid reader of YA or MG books. Is there any character in a book that you wish would come to life? Or any place you wish existed?

Yes! Oh, there are so many I could list. I'll limit myself to ten or less right now, or I'll never shut up. Characters I'd love to speak with:
Nick from The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Anne Shirley from Anne of Green Gables
Turtle from The Westing Game
Parker from The Bermudez Triangle by Maureen Johnson

Places I'd love to visit:
Phantásien from The NeverEnding Story by Michael Ende (Fantastica in the English version of the book; called Fantasia in the films)
The Kingdom of Wisdom from The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster
Strangewood from the book of the same title by Christopher Golden
Never Land from Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie

Those would be amazing places to visit! What books do you find yourself recommending over and over and why?

I recommend my favorite books and authors to people every day, but I also pride myself on the ability to personalize recommendations for each reader. I cherish books like Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll and books by Christopher Golden because they are intelligent and inventive.

Okay, you know it's coming, are you ready? Here it is: the Extra Scandalous Question! Really bad reviews - do you ever fear giving them?

I read hundreds of books a year, but I do not review every single book I read. At my blog, I review books I really enjoy and those that I think my readers will like. There are plenty of books I do like that I simply haven't the time to review. I would rather post about good books than bad ones. I write my blog for other readers. I'd rather spend half an hour writing about someone or something I believe in. Time is precious - why waste it being negative? I want to accentuate the positive. If I were writing a weekly column for a publication that asked me to review certain titles, that would be a different situation, but I would still always be honest.

Being positive is a good thing! Now for a bad thing--Ever had an author get upset with you? (It's okay - you can tell us, just don't name names!)

Yes, I have, and it hurt. I always get upset when someone doesn't like me.

And what advice do you have for authors who get a bad review?

Of course, an author hopes to receive favorable reviews. Everyone likes being liked, and anything negative in life can sting. There's a difference between offering constructive criticism and tearing something or someone apart, between being thoughtful and being flat-out mean. As I said earlier, I encourage authors to believe in their stories and in themselves. Don't get hung up on any negative reviews. Keep writing.

Great answer! One last question:if they aren't scared off by all that bad review talk and an author would like you to review her book, what should she do?

To me, there's a difference between asking, "Would you like to read my book?" and "Will you review my book?" The latter implies a written review, published in some way, while the former is more casual and less pushy.

Here are some places you can find Little Willow:

http://www.slayground.net/
http://slayground.livejournal.com/
http://www.slayground.net/yourgirl/
http://www.slayground.net/rocktherock/
http://www.slayground.net/bildungsroman/

Don't forget to leave a comment for your chance to win Marissa Doyle's Bewitching Season! Little Willow has yet to review it but here's what others are saying:

"This wonderfully crafted debut novel braids several very different storylines into an utterly satisfying whole." --Booklist, starred review

"Doyle offers a heart-throbbing romance full of magic and royal-court intrigue....Fans of historical mysteries will find this a page-turner."--Kirkus

(Click here for more great Hot Seat interviews)

More from The Class of 2K8 at NJSCWBI!

Class of 2K8 & 2K9 at NJSCBWI

Marissa Doyle, Daphne Grab, Albert Borris (2k9 Co-Pres), Nancy Viau, Nina Nelson

Editors! Agents! And Authors, Oh My!

New Jersey has one of the largest SCBWI chapters on the East coast, and writers from Maine to Maryland sign-up early to attend the annual conference in lovely Princeton. This year top editors like Cheryl Klein, Robin Tordini, Jessica Dandino Garrison, Samantha McFerrin, Stacy Cantor, Nick Eliopulos, and came ready to dish out advice, provide critiques, and give workshops. Approachable agents were in the mix, as well, and the line-up included Dan Lazar of Writers House, Stephen Barbara of Donald Maass Literary, and Linda Pratt of the Sheldon Fogelman Agency.

Author Daphne Grab and Agent Stephen Barbara

Author Marissa Doyle signs her book Bewitching Season for fellow author Susan Steen

Agent Stephen Barbara, Hallee Adleman, Daphen Grab

Nina Nelson and Bringing Home the Boy

Nancy Viau and conference organizer Kathy Temean

Marissa's Last Launch-Week Post

Today is the last day of Marissa Doyle's launch week for her uberly fantastic young adult historical, Bewitching Season.

Which means it's our last opportunity to pick her brain.



Hmmm....hmmmm...hmmm
What should we ask her?



We've got it!

Inspiration! When you’re struggling for ideas, Marissa, what do you do to get recharged?



And Marissa says...


Ideas are never the problem. I have notebooks full of ideas for stories, some with synopses already written. Ideas are a dime a dozen, which is why writers crack up when someone walks up to them and says, “I’ve got this great idea for a book! I’ll tell you what is it and you can write it, and then we’ll sell it and split the money.”

Struggling occurs when I’m in the middle of a story. I’m more of a plotter than a pantser; that is, I have a pretty good idea about the arc of my story before I start writing it though of course it can change and usually does. Changes mostly happen because as I write, the characters become more and more their own people, and if I have it plotted that character X is supposed to behave this way and do this, but he won’t because that’s just not who he is anymore…well, it can be a problem.

The best thing to do at this point is get up from the computer and do something else that has nothing to do with words, something that occupies the surface of the mind and leaves the rest of my brain free to work on the problem. Quilting is great for this, though there’s always the danger that I’ll get sucked into it too deeply and start going through fabric and flipping through designs and planning a new one...and then the creative part of my brain gets occupied with the quilt instead of the book. So I try to leave little stacks of cut-out pieces of fabric by my sewing machine, ready to be sewn together just in case I need them.

Driving is a great place to work out book problems too, preferably on familiar roads. But an even better place is the shower. Again, I think it’s that doing something familiar and rote--and what’s more rote than shampooing your hair?-- that occupies the “front” of the brain and allows the deeper bits to get to work without distraction.

I wish I could add doing housework to the list. My house would be a lot cleaner if dusting and vacuuming were more conducive to working on solving story problems, though folding laundry is boring enough to be useful.




Marissa, thank you for a wonderful week on the blog. It's been a treat getting to know you better. We wish you every single kind of success there is with Bewitching Season and your writing career!

Totally Important Post!

TWO of our 2k8 books have been chosen for the Association of Booksellers for Children's (ABC) New Voices project: The Opposite of Invisible by Liz Gallagher and Magic Thief by Sarah Prineas. To give you an idea of how amazing this news is, only FOURTEEN books are chosen each year! Woot! Woot!

AND Magic Thief is a Top Ten Book Sense Pick for spring/summer 2008!

A BIG FAT THANK YOU and shout out to And Another Book Read for the fabulous review you gave Read My Lips by Teri Brown.

ANOTHER big fat thank you and shout out to Literate Lives for a wonderfully wonderful review of The Gollywhopper Games by Jody Feldman.

AND guess who loves Bewitching Season by Marissa Doyle? The Looking Glass Review!

With all this great 2k8 news, all of Broadway might be cheering!

Then again, it might just be us.

We're a pretty noisy class.

Day 4: Marissa Doyle on "Inspiration by Teacher"...

Today, Marissa Doyle, author of the historical young adult novel, Bewitching Season, talks about which teacher inspired her to become a writer. Take it away, Marissa...

The teacher who got me started writing was…

I think that it was actually one teacher and assignments given by two other teachers that helped make me a writer. Coincidentally, they were in grades 3, 5, and 7.

In third grade my teacher, Miss Billington, was very happy to let us go to the bookshelf and read when we’d finished our classwork…but she also liked us to do projects about the books we read when we were done reading them. I cut my hands into ribbons carving a dugout canoe from a hideous bright gold bar of Dial soap after reading a book about Pocahontas, so it was with great relief that at Halloween we were given the option to write and illustrate a spooky story. My illustrations were (and still are) limited to stick figures…but I had a great time writing about a little girl named Geraldine who didn’t believe in Halloween and who ended up being sacrificed to the Halloween God for her impiety by an outraged group of witches, ghosts, and vampires. I’ve since come to prefer happier endings, but I still remember how exciting it was to create that story.






In seventh grade I discovered the usefulness of writing prompts when my English teacher Mrs. LaBelle sent around little bags of words in strict order (adjective-adjective-noun-verb-adverb-adverbial phrase) that we had to pull one word out of, then write a paragraph or story based on the sentence we formed. Almost miraculously, my sentence read, “Several confused stewardesses fell bitterly without stopping”. No, I didn’t peek when I pulled my words…and darn, I had fun with that topic sentence.





But my fifth grade Language Arts teacher, Mr. Souza, gave me the most valuable writing gifts of all--those of discipline and craft. He assigned us projects that involved A LOT of writing--chapter summaries (I wrote a summary of every single chapter of Little Women, all fifty-odd of them), informational paragraphs culled from reading the classroom encyclopedia, or our own original stories and opinion pieces. By the end of that year, we'd each written a couple hundred one or two paragraph essays. You’d better believe I learned grammar and usage…and how to sit my backside in a chair and just write.

Thanks, you three.

Day 3: YA Books that influenced Marissa Doyle

Marissa Doyle, debut young adult author of Bewitching Season reads. A bunch. Just ask her family and friends and neighbors and pets. Yes, she has a reputation.

(Marissa also likes to curl. But that's another post for another blog for another time.)

We cornered Marissa in study hall to ask this burning question: Which young adult book influenced you the absolute most?

And this is what she said...

Nope. Can’t name just one. There are dozens, actually, but I have to mention these three…all of which are historicals. How coincidental.

1. The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare. I read and re-read this book to pieces in sixth grade. It had everything: an outsider heroine (and oh, was I an outsider in sixth grade!), fascinating historical details (I love the scene where Kit starts unpacking her trunks and pulling out her jewel-colored dresses in the middle of that drab Puritan kitchen), a New England setting that I already knew so well, excitement, romance…it was the perfect book as far as I was concerned. Then in seventh grade I found...

2. The Perilous Gard by Elizabeth Marie Pope. Again, an outsider heroine who comes into herself over the course of the book, more amazing detail (this time about Tudor England, which already enthralled me), more romance and peril and excitement…and paranormal elements, too, that didn’t take over but meshed seamlessly into the story line.

It took me a while to find another book that stood with these two…in fact, it wasn't published until I was already an adult. But that didn’t stop me from loving...

3. A College of Magics by Caroline Stevermer. A rich, well-realized alternative early 20th century setting, magic, romance, sly humor, and supporting characters who are as real and fully developed as the main ones. This book really should be more widely read, because it’s wonderful.



2k8: Pop back tomorrow when Marissa chats about the teachers who inspired her.

Day 2: Interview with Marissa Doyle

We're back with Marissa Doyle, debut young adult author of Bewitching Season. Our goal on this second day of Marissa's book launch week: a hard-hitting interview that gets to the heart of this talented author. Let the interview begin...


2k8: Where do you do most of your writing? We want a picture. And please don't tidy up before snapping the shot.



Marissa Doyle: It used to be the guest bedroom…and there is still a bed in there, so I suppose technically a guest could still sleep there. But first they’d have to remove the stacks of papers and reference books for the story I’m currently working on and albums of nineteenth century fashion plates and pile of fluffy bunnies and my Jane Austen action figure from the bed. They could always put it all on the other side of the room, but that’s where my boxes of fabric and sewing machine and quilts in progress are. It’s a good thing my family are all relatively nearby and don’t need to stay overnight very often.

The room is very cozy and very mine, full of things (books and rabbits and antique china on the walls) and colors (periwinkle blue and yellow) that I love. I’m a nester, so I can go in and close the door and lose myself in my work-in-progress and feel secure and happy.

2k8: You revealed yesterday that you began writing Bewitching Season from a prompt at a RWA meeting. More details, please.



Marissa Doyle: The prompt, “Oh my God, you killed him!”, worked very well for an opening. After that, the story mostly just came out like a ribbon unrolling from a spool. I write very linearly, and almost never skip around writing scenes as they occur to me though I will jot down notes if I have an idea for later on in the action. And I always know what the end will be when I start a book. It’s so much easier to write if you have something to aim at.

2k8: And how did it find a publisher? Give us the *real* dirt!

Marissa Doyle: It was all very boring and textbook, actually. I researched and queried agents and signed with one, and she sold the book a couple of months later. It always bemuses me when people say, “The only way to get an agent/sell a book is to have connections! It’s all a matter of who you know!” Umm…maybe sometimes having an “in” somewhere will help. But it’s certainly not the only way. Utter newbie authors sell. Most of us in 2k8 will attest to that.

2k8: Did anything surprise you or catch you off guard when you were writing your book?


Marissa Doyle: Oh, you bet. Before selling, I was very fond of entering writing contests. The RWA has dozens of them, with finalists having their entries judged by editors and agents. It’s a great way to get feedback on your work and possibly get it in front of an acquiring editor. Bewitching Season did pretty well on the contest circuit, winning contests and getting requests from editors, but one anonymous first-round judge whom I will forever bless wrote on my entry something along the lines of, “This reads more like a young adult story than a romance.”

Well, it was like sirens and klieg lights suddenly switched on in my head. I was writing young adult? Really? I’d had no idea! So I could focus on my heroine’s character growth and not force the story into romance conventions and have fun!
This was a major moment for me, though I feel like rather an idiot for not having figured it out myself.

2k8: Imagine you have an offer from your dream press to publish your dream book, no matter how insane or unmarketable it might be (though of course it might not be). What story do you want to write next/someday and why?

Marissa Doyle: My secret dream book is already written and on my hard drive--I just haven’t asked my agent to try selling it yet because the end needs work and I’m up to my eyeballs in other books. It’s a contemporary fantasy for adults and begins with the premise that the Greco-Roman pantheon is (secretly) alive and well and teaching Classics at a large, prestigious New England university. I LOVE this story, and hope to sell it someday. But for now I’ll be focusing on young adult books.

2k8: What question won’t most people know to ask you? What is your answer?

Marissa Doyle: “Were you really once an avid curler?”

Okay, the answer is obviously yes…but first, how many of you know what curling is? ☺


2k8: To recap, we uncovered that Marissa Doyle mostly writes in a cute converted periwinkle blue + yellow guest bedroom. Bewitching Season began with a writing prompt from a Romance Writer's meeting. She realized she was writing young adult thanks to a comment on a contest entry. Her dream book is already written. She was an avid curler.

Not too shabby an interview. If we do say so ourselves. :)

Psst. News that's hot off the press! Bewitching Season is an Editor's Choice pick for this quarter at the Historical Novel Society, a review mag dedicated to historical fiction. And it's a super nice review too. :)

With pomp and fanfare and circumstance, enter Marissa Doyle!

April is a VERY VERY VERY VERY busy month for the Class of 2k8 with FOUR, yes, count them, FOUR book launches. Last, but certainly not least, is Bewitching Season by Marissa Doyle.



2k8: Okay, Marissa, give us the scoop on Bewitching Season. What's it about?

Marissa Doyle: In 1837 London, young daughters of viscounts pined for handsome, titled husbands, not careers. And certainly not careers in magic.

Shy, studious Persephone Leland would far rather devote herself to her secret magic studies than enter society and look for a suitable husband. But just as the inevitable Season is about to begin, Persy and her twin sister Pen discover that their governess in magic has been kidnapped as part of a plot to gain control of the Princess Victoria. Racing through Mayfair ballrooms and royal palaces, the sisters overcome bad millinery, shady royal spinsters, and a mysterious Irish wizard. And along the way, Persy discovers that husband hunting isn’t such an odious task after all, if you can find the right quarry.

So, let us give you the 411 on Marissa. She's been obsessed with history since seeing The Six Wives of Henry VIII on Masterpiece Theatre when she was nine. Her first (uncompleted) novel was begun when she was thirteen, and of course was a Tudor time travel. Several history-soaked college years ensued, followed by several years dedicated to motherhood…and now she’s back into the history again. Some people never change.

2k8: How'd Bewitching Season come to be? What's the story behind the story?

Bewitching Season is the result of a serendipitous writing prompt. My local RWA (Romance Writers of America) chapter decided to do a just-for-fun writing exercise: any member who wanted to participate had to take the sentence, “Oh my God, you’ve killed him!” and write the first few paragraphs of a story using it as the opening. The point was to show that even with the same first sentence, all our stories would differ in subject and voice. So after I forced myself to stop thinking about references to Monty Python (“Lovely plumage, the Norwegian Blue!”), I got a picture in my head of a girl in long skirts standing over a boy lying on the floor. Who was she, and what had happened? Well, she’d been practicing her magic, and her little brother had gotten in the way…or had she been practicing on him, and he decided to play a trick on her?…and it went on from there.

The royalty part came in because I was reading a biography of Queen Victoria while the above was going on. I was at the part of the book that told of Victoria’s years of struggle against her mother’s household comptroller, Sir John Conroy, who had ambitions of becoming the power behind the throne when Victoria became queen. But Victoria loathed him, and as it became clear that she would probably become queen in her own right and not require a regent, he got desperate and actually contemplated locking her up and forcing her to promise him a position as her Private Secretary. And again, it just popped into my head: what if Sir John had resorted to magic to try to subdue the Princess, and my young witch had to rescue her?

2k8: Well, Marissa, with thoughts like those, this is going to be one interesting week!

2k8 Classmates are turning heads...

There are ONE, make that TWO, make that a whopping THREE starred reviews from Kirkus Reviews. Let's hear it for:




Shift by Jennifer Bradbury

A Horse of Her Own by Annie Wedekind

The Magic Thief by Sarah Prineas

AND


Marissa Doyle's Bewitching Season is an Editor's Choice pick for this quarter at the Historical Novel Society, a review mag dedicated to historical fiction. Here's the really nice review.

Spring Break!

In honor of spring break, we have compiled a week worth of vacation stories. We have the odd, the sinister and the embarrassing from many of our 2k8ers who all agree on one thing… vacations don’t always turn out like you think they will!

First off, we have Marissa Doyle, author of the Bewitching Season.

Marissa: When I was in my twenties, my mom and I did a self-guided tour of southern Spain and Portugal. We landed in Madrid, rented a car, and drove ourselves all over the place, stopping wherever we wanted. Some of it was sublime: driving from Lisbon back to Madrid in the middle of the night across a vast empty plain, where the stars were visible down to the horizon...wandering through the Alhambra...climbing to the top of the Rock of Gibraltar. And some of it was downright silly.

One of my favorite silly bits happened on our first day away from Madrid, en route to Valencia. We had stopped for a late lunch at this restaurant on the outskirts of Madrid. There were a fair number of cars, which we took for a good sign...but when we went inside, we saw that all the cars belonged to a group of rather sinister-looking middle-aged men all seated at one large table. The rest of the restaurant was empty. I was kind of in favor of moving on at that point (I mean, some of them were wearing pin-stripe suits, for heaven's sake), but mom was hungry and wanted to stay. Things got worse when the waiter seated us a scant two tables away from the group. They all eyed us from time to time, but seemed intent on their own affairs. The extent of my Spanish was asking where the bathroom was and how much things cost, so I had no clue what their business might be.

So we ate our lunch, but the room felt increasingly tense and expectant. To make matters worse, our waiter had vanished, so I couldn't ask for our bill so we could get the heck out of there. Just when I was about to go try to track him down, the door to the kitchen flew open, and two waiters marched out carrying an enormous birthday cake covered with candles, and all the men started smiling and singing "Happy Birthday to You"...in Spanish, of course! They even had the waiter bring us pieces of cake, which we dutifully ate, bowed and waved our thanks for, paid, and hit the road. After about forty-five minutes we agreed that it had all been quite funny.

That trip was full of funny moments.

Check back tomorrow when Elizabeth Bunce, author of A Curse Dark as Gold, will share her vacation story.

A Bookstore Remembered...

For Marissa Doyle, author of the fantastic novel Bewitching Season, the best bookstore in the world exists in memory (well, and in Massachusetts too)...

I actually haven't set foot in one of my favorite bookstores in almost twenty-five years...but I don't think I'd be a writer today if I hadn't gone there frequently as a child and young teen.

The store is The Bunch of Grapes Bookshop in Vineyard Haven on Martha's Vineyard. I grew up spending a lot of time on the Vineyard when it was still a funky, artistic-y place, before it was "discovered". So you got used to seeing James Taylor or Walter Cronkite or Ruth Gordon or Art Buchwald on the streets or in restaurants, and you just ignored them, because on the Vineyard it just didn't matter.

I had (still have!) a wonderful mom who could never say no to buying me books, so a trip to the Bunch of Grapes was de rigueur every weekend we were on the Vineyard. And it was during some of these trips that I found books that I'd never seen anywhere else--books like Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising series and Dorothy Hartley's Lost Country Life and Evangeline Walton's The Mabinogion, a retelling of ancient Welsh myths and a book I still re-read and buy for people to read because it's that good. These books are a big reason why I write YA historical and fantasy fiction today...and I might never had found them at a critical time in my reading life if the wonderful people at Bunch of Grapes didn't have a fabulous children's book section back before children's books were "important".

Thanks, guys, for introducing me to those books.

Sounds like she needs to plan an author event on the Vineyard! We'll come to that!