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Thoughts From BEA (or, GOD MY FEET HURT)

12 Jun

Last week, I attended BookExpo America (BEA), which is a huge publishing shindig about which you can read a much more entertaining description here. It was a hoot and a half, let me tell you.

I planned to write some sort of “BEA Recap” post. They’re pretty popular in the blogosphere, and I love reading other people’s summaries of the event. But then I realized 1) I didn’t take a whole lot of pictures; 2) I’m too lazy to go hunt for other people’s pictures; 3) IT’S ALL A HAZY BLUR; and 4) mehhhh I LIKE LISTS. So I wrote a kind-of recap, but I’m not sure it really counts.

Anyway, BEHOLD:

THINGS I DID

  • got free books!
  • attended awesome panels!
  • participated in the high-energy Apocalypsies event WHICH ROCKED ALL THE WORLDS EVER
  • cried because Lois Lowry made me, she MADE ME
  • infested the Javits Center with cockroaches
  • diverted my route, on countless occasions, through the booths that had extra padding in their carpets TO SAVE MY BURNING FEET
  • met awesome booksellers!
  • met awesome bloggers!
  • met awesome authors!
  • gave swag to REBECCA “THE STEADMEISTER” STEAD (that is the name I gave to her, fondly, in my head, i.e., she does not know so shhh)
  • had Thai food for the first time!
  • ate too much Thai food
  • got caught in the rain with my editor while discussing Hoarders
  • participated in an impromptu toast to the late Ray Bradbury with some truly disgusting bourbon (which I downed like a CHAMP! hoo-ahhhh!)
  • stood in line
  • stood in line
  • LINES LINES LINES
  • pretty much lost my voice
  • met more awesome people!
  • SMILED TILL FACE FELL OFF

THINGS I THOUGHT

  • “The Internet here is like the cyber-equivalent of flea poop.”
  • “How is my book ever going to compete, like at all? THERE ARE SO MANY BOOKS IN THE WORLD.”
  • “Did my publicist just hug me in a weird way? What does that mean? Did I somehow annoy my publicist? If I circled back and reassured her that if I did indeed annoy her, I didn’t mean to . . . would that weird her out further?”
  • “So-and-so’s hair/dress/body/poise is better than mine. God, WHY AM I SO AWKWARD?”
  • “Someone I recognize. THANK GOD. LET ME HUG YOU. Oh, did I just interrupt the conversation you were having? Please, carry on. WHILST I CLING TO YOU.”
  • “It’s like, the more people I talk to, the more incoherent I become. Maybe I should just start saying, ‘Hello, you are? My name! Gloogleflorp. Books! Purple giraffe.’ I’m not sure people could tell the difference. God, WHY AM I SO AWKWARD?”
  • “I’m so stopping by Duane Reade on the way home to stock up on candy. Or booze. Or BOTH.”
  • “I’m sweatinggggg. Can people see how much I’m sweating? I would go to the bathroom to wipe myself down but THERE IS ALWAYS A LINE. GOD.”
  • “If I go crawl under that table in the Penguin booth to take a nap, would they judge me? Would they kick me out of the event? Do I care?”
  • “[So-and-so authors] on [such-and-such panel] are so pretty/talented/eloquent/[insert complimentary adjective here]. Why can’t I be like that? I wish I could be on a panel.”
  • “Food. Food food. Food food food! Food.”
  • ” . . . Wait. Why am I not on a panel?! This obviously means I am some sort of failure. Because I am not good enough to be on a panel. Everyone else in the entire world is on panels. Oh god everyone hates me. EVERYONE OBVIOUSLY HATES ME.”
  • “Should I give Kristin Cashore a cockroach? Would Kristin Cashore want a pin cockroach or a barrette cockroach? These are sentences I never thought I’d say.”
  • “I think I’m going to keep being indifferent toward John Green just out of spite, because everyone likes him so much. Does that make me a bad person?”
  • “I bet it’ll end up being like with Harry Potter, when I refused to read them out of spite because they were so popular, and then I gave in, and then my life changed.”
  • “Come to think of it, that’s kind of like how I was with cheesecake. The whole thing about cheese and cake being in the same dish offended my sense of order. So then we had denial, denial, spite, denial . . . and then one day, BAM! Cheesecake. And then BAM! Life = changed.”
  • “Mmm . . . cheesecake . . . “
  • “Would you like a cockroach? Would you like a cockroach? Would you like a cockroach?”
  • “The word ‘cockroach’ has officially lost all meaning. So has ‘Cavendish’. So have ALL THE OTHER WORDS.”
  • ” . . . I wish I was cooler. How are all these people so cool?”
  • “My book feels so small. I feel so small. This is impossible.”
  • ” . . . Maybe I’m not cut out for this.”
  • “SHUT UP LEGRAND, YOU’RE BEING DUMB.”
  • “Hey, it’s that person from Twitter who is in fact real!”
  • “I wish unicorns were real.”
  • “Wait. That’s silly. They’re totally real.”
  • “Must not jump the bones of bloggers who are already excited about my book that’s coming out two years from now. Must not jump the bones of bloggers who are already excited about my book that’s coming out two years from now. Must not . . . aw, screw it. *FLINGS SELF INTO ARMS OF BLOGGERS*”
  • “This place would be hella freaky at night.”
  • “This place smells like old underpants.”
  • “This place needs more cake.”

Did you go to BEA? Did you have fun? Do you like cake? GIVE ME YOUR THOUGHTS.

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Literary Fiction vs. YA Fiction (or, Wait, No, That’s Stupid)

7 Sep

Okay, I must write about this NOW because it’s been bothering me, and I cannot TAKE IT anymore.

Over the past several weeks, I’ve been seeing all these blog posts pop up everywhere, defending and condemning two genres of fiction I really love — literary and YA (young adult). Even if they don’t say it outright, you KNOW that’s what they mean. I’m not going to link to any of those blogs or articles here because 1) I don’t want to single anyone out and 2) the horse is dead, and I ain’t beatin’ it.

Anyway, what I see happening (especially in the comment sections of said blog posts and articles) is the proponents of literary fiction saying, “Ugh all this DRIVEL and TRIPE being foisted upon the poor, dumb masses who don’t know any better, why doesn’t anyone read anything that requires BRAIN POWER anymore,” and the proponents of YA fiction* saying, “Ugh all that self-important DRONING in what they call LITERATURE, nothing ever even HAPPENS, what’s the POINT, at least my fiction is EXCITING and FUN, EXCUSE ME if I think Ulysses sounds like the most boring piece of poop in the history of poop.”**

* = I realize that there is such a thing as literary YA fiction, but I think we’d all agree that that is a very small minority compared to commercial YA, so I’m not even going to address it.

** = I am not above poop jokes here. Consider yourself warned.

Reading all of this makes me so angry and just completely befuddles me. It also reminds me of this wonderful Calvin & Hobbes comic:

You guys. WHY do we insist on tearing each other down like this? Literary vs. YA vs. contemporary vs. speculative vs. BLAH BLAH STOP IT.

I realize that not everyone gets outright angry when they discuss their preferred genre, and why they read/write it, and how it means so much to them. But I really feel like even when people are “nice” about it, there’s still this hostility simmering right underneath everyone’s polite, teeth-gritting exteriors. I read people’s comments and this is what I see:

What the Commenter Says: “Well, I guess, you know, it’s just one of those things where I don’t get it, plain and simple. I don’t see the appeal of [insert popular, usually-YA title/series/author here], but maybe I’m just out of touch. *sheepish laughter* Oh well. I guess I’ll just stick with my [insert literary title/author here].”

What the Commenter Means: “YOU GUYS ARE ALL PLEBES WHAT HAVE WE COME TO I WEEP FOR THE FUTURE. SMH.”

What the Commenter Says: “Maybe I’m just too stupid or something to get why literary fiction is ‘literary,’ or why it matters, or what it means? *sheepish laughter* I don’t know. I guess I’ll just stick with my YA/commercial/genre fiction and give up on understanding the appeal of [insert literary title/author here].”

What the Commenter Means: “YOU GUYS ARE ALL PSEUDO-INTELLECTUAL ELITIST SNOBS WHO WOULDN’T KNOW A GOOD STORY IF IT BIT YOU IN THE ASS. DIAF.”

I mean, maybe I’m over-dramatizing things, but this buried, inter-genre hostility is, like, the only thing I can focus on when I come across these posts, articles, and comment threads. It makes me really uncomfortable, sad, and frustrated.

It also makes me feel weird about myself, because, while I have written mainly for children and young adults thus far, I have adult works planned for the future, and some of my future projects are YA, and some are literary, and some are science fiction, and is it WRONG that I love reading all these genres equally, and is it WRONG that I want to write all of them, and MUST I PICK A SIDE BECAUSE I DON’T KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH MY EMOTIONS.

I feel like I’m stuck in a growing war between opposing nations — commercial and literary, adult and young adult, etc. I have never understood such disdainful rivalries WITHIN THE SAME PROFESSION. It’s like how (I have learned) some academic librarians scorn public librarians, and vice versa. HELLO YOU ARE IN THE SAME PROFESSION OF HELPING PEOPLE FIND INFORMATION STOP IT YOU’RE BEING CHILDREN.

Seriously, guys. With the current changes going on in the publishing industry, stores closing, uncertainty rising, why are we trying to cut each other down like this? Why does everyone get so defensive? I’ll tell you why — because A LOT of people go on the offensive first, dissing people’s reading choices, turning up their noses at authors who write certain genres, deeming certain genres UNWORTHY, and then people have no choice but to go all Mama Bear and defend their cubs, and then things get NASTY.

But we’re all still polite on the outside because you don’t want to burn bridges, you know. Do you see what I’m saying? Gross.

And YA peeps, y’all aren’t exempt from this here rant. Reverse elitism is just as bad as the literary folks turning up their noses and saying that what you read isn’t important. Don’t say that “nothing HAPPENS” in literary fiction and “they aren’t good STORIES” because reading is subjective and what might seem boring to you is someone else’s Hunger Games, okay?

Now, I myself am not exempt, either. I’ll admit that sometimes I see people reading certain books, or I see the popularity of certain books, and I think to myself, “WHY DO PEOPLE READ SUCH SCHLOCK OMG.”

But I’m really trying to remind myself that it doesn’t matter what people read, whether it’s Hemingway or Rowling, Franzen or Collins, literary or commerical/YA, Bloop Blop or Blip Blorp. If it makes them happy, if it affects them positively, it’s worthwhile. Even if you can’t understand it, even if reading it would make you want to claw your eyes out and headdesk yourself into a concussion — it’s worthwhile to them, and we’ve GOT to start having more respect for that, because I feel like we’re losing that respect. Rapidly.

You know what I saw this weekend? I wish I had taken a picture because it would have been perfect for this.

I was at a Barnes & Noble, and I saw a display near the front of the store with two newly released books displayed, side by side.

One was Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom.

The other was Cassandra Clare’s Clockwork Angel.

That right there is what we should strive for. Genres are not mutually exclusive. Don’t attack others (or their genres) because it’s not your cup of tea. Don’t do that whole passive-aggressive justifying what you read thing, either (“Well, I don’t get it, but whatever, I must be stupid/a snob for reading what I read”).

Psh. Just read what you want to read. Let others do the same. Explore other genres. Try to see the value in every story, no matter how simple, no matter how obscure. Don’t scoff at people’s reading choices.

And for the love of all that is good and pure, CHILL.

Please?

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