Guest Post from Shauna Kelley, author of Max and Menna

Remember Max and Menna?  Yeah.  I loved it.  Not only was I lucky enough to get an ARC, author Shauna Kelley was also kind enough to agree to guest post about her inspiration!  I don't think I've ever been as surprised by a novel as I was with this one, and I cannot stress enough that this book is worth of buzz.  Spread the good book love around, folks - I'll re-post about this closer to the publication date - and on that note, I'll let Shauna take it from here!

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Since Maggie graciously invited me to be a guest blogger, I have been struggling with what to write. As a new novelist, and really a soon-to-be newly-published author, the idea of the validity of my voice is daunting. In other words, it is surreal that people care what I have to say. I am a middle child—I am sure this is something most of us would struggle with!

And yet, what an opportunity! To contribute to a blog that continues to impress me each and every time I read it. So I feel like I must work through my own insecurities and lend my words. This does little to contribute to my concern and questions over what to write, though.

I have it now, though. As the press and pre-pub activities for my novel Max and Menna begin to pick up and get busy (and my are they ever getting busy!) maybe I can answer a question that I am frequently asked. It’s a simple query (and one I would pose to Maggie as well): why do you write?

My hometown paper ran an article on me and the book this Sunday, and my blubbering, half-intelligible response to this very question was a focal point of the article. In trying to read it objectively, I was struck by a simple and somehow frightening understanding. Why does she write… she doesn’t know.

And I am rather fuzzy on the general reason, though I do have a good sense. Specifically, why did I write Max and Menna, a novel hurdling towards its November 1 pub date? For that one, I haven’t the foggiest. I remember why I started to write it, but why I latched on to an idea when I was so young (I began it at the tender age of 17)and allowed it to carry me through some of the toughest and some of the best times of my life remains a mystery.

To sound totally goofy and cliché, Max and Menna started as a dream. At the tender age of 17, hormones raging I am sure, I had a dream about kissing a boy. We were in the attic of the house across the street from my grandfather’s house, and we were quite innocently kissing. This boy had long, dark hair and strong arms, and he made me feel calm (which, trust me, was not a familiar feeling to me at that age). Those who have read the book might immediately recognize this dreamy man as the impetus for Nick, the tertiary character in the book, and the man (albeit fictional) who has held my heart longer than any other in my life.

Yes, I know Nick is fictional. Trust me, no issues accepting reality,

I woke up from this dream in early September of my junior year of high school, right as fall began to descend. I have always found fall to be exhilarating and thrilling. It is my favorite season, and I emerged that morning for school to find the perfect day in front of me. Nonetheless, the sadness of the end of summer made me yearn for June, for the days when…the sun seems to melt from the sky like butter.

Over the course of the short walk from my house to the bus stop, my sweet but innocent dream mixing with the inspiration I felt from the onset of fall and a torrid wish for the freedom of summer, Max and Menna Soother were born.

I wrote the first draft of the short story between then and Christmas, and added on and on and on to it until, when I reached 29, it was finally done.

There is a non-answer for you if ever there was one!

In general, though, I did say one thing very truthfully to my hometown paper this Sunday—I write because I have to. I am typing out this post from seat 28F on an Airtran flight from Orlando to Baltimore. I have been on the road and completely swamped for six days. When I boarded the flight (half an hour late) I realized that I was more anxious than usual.

And trust me, “usual” for me is pretty anxious.

But we taxied (forever) I began to think of some changes and additions and deletions I wanted to make on my second novel, and I began to feel a bit calmer. Now, even constructing something as informal as this blog, I can feel my shoulders loosening and my mood elevating.

I write because if I don’t, the emotion that grows inside of me pushing me to write makes me very, very nervous. If I have an idea and go more than a couple of hours before I can pour it out from my fingers onto a hard drive somewhere, I feel a panic like I cannot describe to you. I will throw in a terrible analogy—its like a helium balloon reaching capacity. I have to take some of the pressure off, or surely it will pop.

Again, I am so grateful for the opportunity to lend my voice to this page. I have probably accomplished little besides convincing you all that I am a nut case, but I hope that Maggie’s readers will find a copy of Max and Menna and see if they like the story this nutcase has to tell!

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Thank you so much for your time and insight, Shauna, and congratulations on your first novel.  I hope to have you back someday!  You can find Shauna Kelley on her blog, and keep an eye out for Max and Menna from Lucky Press, releasing November 1st of this year!

The Dust of 100 Dogs

The Dust of 100 Dogs by A.S. King
Find it at an indie bookstore!

• Why I picked it up: Cover, awesome blurb, author presence on Twitter, buzz, pirates!
• Disclosure: Purchased a final published edition.

In the late seventeenth century, famed teenage pirate Emer Morrisey was on the cusp of escaping the pirate life with her one true love and unfathomable riches when she was slain and cursed with the dust of one hundred dogs, dooming her to one hundred lives as a dog before returning to a human body -- with her memories intact.
Now she's a contemporary American teenager and all she needs is a shovel and a ride to Jamaica.

This was one of those books where I just knew I shouldn't have, but ended up happy anyway.  Cash-strapped in an indie bookstore, I was there for Mockingjay and nothing else.  Only...only...they didn't actually have Mockingjay.  As depressed as I was, I saw this book on the shelves and just couldn't let it stay there.  Never mind the fact that I had all of twenty five bucks in my wallet at the time, Mom came to the rescue.  I mean, come on.  Not only had I heard fabulous things about the book and found the author witty and wise on Twitter, when was the last time you read a really excellent book about pirates?  (I wrote about this last week, remember?)  In my post-Mockingjay daze (I ended up finding the last copy at the fourth bookstore we tried), up to my eyeballs in environmental biology textbooks and St. Augustine's Confessions for English class, I somehow managed to make time for this book.  And boy, was I ever not disappointed.

While the narrative is choppy and hard to understand at times, A.S. King does an excellent job of navigating Saffron, Fred, and Emer's stories with a distinctive and unflinching voice.  Whether it's Ireland under Cromwell, a Jamaica beach, or a trailer park, I do not exaggerate when I say it feels like we're there.  The characters are well-drawn and believable, and *issue* topics are navigated with a savvy understanding of how the world works that's a joy to read.  In fact, I would say that my favorite subplot of the whole story was queer-or-not-queer Fred.  Maybe it was the fact that you knew he was a train wreck waiting to happen, or the fact that it's fun in a sick and twisted way to get into that old creep on the beach's head, or the fact that you know he's really, truly broken inside.  No matter what, I'd love to see A.S. King write a novel geared more towards adults with that voice.  She really nailed that am-I-gay? angst that I'm pretty sure everybody, at some time or other, especially in this day and age, has experienced.

Despite the fact that Emer's a pirate and Saffron's "just a kid", I actually thought Saffron was tougher and crueler.  Her harsh evaluations of her parents and her habit of dismembering in her mind the people that tick her off made her a very dark protagonist, the kind that makes you face the way you relate to the world around you.  Emer was softer around the edges, but no less real.  And I've already proclaimed my kind-of-icky love for Fred.

One thing that was a bit of a "Huh?" about this novel were the flashbacks to life as a dog.  They felt the least polished and most confusing, and detracted from the rest of the book.  This is mostly just the perfectionist in me rearing its ugly head, though, so don't let that put you off.

The final thing I must say about this book is heck yes to the multiple lives thing.  The first novel I ever finished a draft of - now scrapped, but I'm sure I'll come back to the idea someday - featured living out your past lives prominently, mostly because it's a theme I adore.  There are just some things in life we can't explain: some gut feeling, some inexplicable attraction or repulsion to somebody or something.  And as a storyteller, naturally, I have to wonder if that feeling has a root sometime before.  So beyond characters and description, that was probably my favorite aspect of this book, especially in the final pages.

This is one of the most un-eloquent reviews I've ever written, but I hope you'll get the point.  This book pretty much rocked, and I can't wait to read Please Ignore Vera Dietz.  After reading a lot of bad and/or totally exhausting (I'm looking at you, Mockingjay!) YA books lately, it's refreshing to read something as fun and excellent as this!  I have never been so tempted to use the words rip-roaring in a review.  Four and a half out of five stars.