Deja vu Blogfest - Why I Write Teens Who Act Like Teens

Happy Deja vu Blogfest Weekend!

The post I've chosen to rehash for #dejavu2015 was originally posted in February, and is called An Open Letter to My Readers: Why I Write Teens Who Act Like Teens.

It's an honest, heartfelt post that rings true about my published novel (LAST YEAR'S MISTAKE) as well as my unpublished and soon-to-be-published books (BUSTED, coming from Sourcebooks, and a second YA contemporary from Simon Pulse). How do *you* feel about the depiction of teens in YA novels?

***

This post has been brewing for some time, but now that there are ARCs of LAST YEAR'S MISTAKE out in the world, a story that I'm very attached to and very proud of, I feel the need to finally say this out loud.

Look! A stack of LYM ARCs as seen in Chicago
at the ALA 2015  Mid-Winter Conference!

Let me start by saying this: I don't just write about teenagers. I also write for them.

Yes, I'm an adult who devours YA novels. Yes, I know a large percentage of the people who read YA novels are actually adults. But when I sit down to pour a story from my brain to the page, I'm not thinking about the other adults who will read it.

I bring this up because, as someone who does read a lot of YA, I also read a lot of reviews, blog posts, and tweets about YA novels.

And it's become increasingly bothersome to me that there are so many people who choose to read books about teenagers... and then complain when the characters act like teenagers.

Photo credit: movie-addicted

When I decided to write a novel set in high school, I wanted to draw on my own experience. In doing so:

I'm thinking about a girl who experienced total culture shock going from 8 years of city Catholic school to a public high school in a swanky small town where she didn't fit in. I'm recalling the cliques, the jocks, the "popular" kids and the "losers," - things that many are so quick to deem stereotypes, even though they existed and still do. I'm recalling the pain of being teased and called names. I'm thinking about how one look from a particular person could make my day. Or the way it would crush me when the one person I wished and hoped would notice me never even knew I was alive.

I'm remembering falling in love for the first time.

I'm thinking about new friendships being formed, old friendships falling apart.

About words I wish I'd said, words I wish I could take back.

I'm remembering having my heart broken.

In short, I'm thinking about the me that I used to be. And I'm thinking about the girls who are in high school now, living through all of it for the first time.

***

When I was a teenager, one of my favorite shows was My So-Called Life. There's a Twitter account, @MSCLQuotes, that tweets some of the shows best quotes. Like this one:

"Huge events take place on this earth every day. Earthquakes, hurricanes. Even glaciers move. So why couldn't he just look at me?"

Photo credit: towonderland

To me, this quote is the embodiment of a high school crush. Angsty, dramatic, all-consuming. She takes something commonplace, and puts it on the same level as something huge.

I would've fainted on the spot if Jared Leto looked at me like that when I was a teenager, and I'm only exaggerating a little.

Because when you're a teenager, you tend to feel everything, as Kelsey says in LYM, magnified in clear, sharp focus. (I touched on this subject once before, in a post titled The Big Impact of Smaller Things)

And it's natural that when you're driven by hormones and emotion, you're not always thinking straight. You tend to do and say stupid things. Make decisions you wouldn't necessarily make again. Let your passion get the better of you. Break the rules, or at least wonder what it's like to. Feel like you know everything and absolutely nothing, all at the same time. Test your limits. Cry. Say things you don't mean. Say things you *do* mean, but still regret. Try things you end up loving. Try things you end up hating. Pretend to love things you don't. Experiment with your appearance, among other things. Make snap judgments. Fall hard and fast. Get hurt.

Most important? YOU LEARN FROM ALL OF IT. Because you're figuring out who you are.

Later on, it might all seem silly. But in that moment, it's everything.

These are the things I strive to capture when I write a young adult book. So it boggles my mind when I see people citing immaturity or melodrama or "dumb teenage stuff" as the reason they didn't like a YA novel.

These are, by definition, books about teenagers. YOUNG adults, not actual adults. People who don't yet know that hindsight is twenty-twenty, because they're just learning how to adjust rear view mirrors - not analyzing their lives through them.

So, to me, reading a YA novel and then trashing it when the characters act their age is like ordering a banana milkshake and complaining that it tastes like banana.

If there are people out there who managed to get through high school avoiding all the drama, who were treated fairly by all and were a ray of sunshine to everyone in return, who never made a bad choice or let emotions or inexperience get the better of them, then I applaud you. Everyone has their own reality.

But that's not the high school I remember.

And so, dear readers and critics who've either read or are thinking about reading my novels, I sum up my post with this:

If you are looking for books about people who always make the best decisions, featuring sage adult brains in teenage bodies and teenage bodies in adult predicaments, then my novels are probably not for you. My characters are flawed, they make mistakes, they feel things with their whole, bleeding hearts. And I like them that way. I celebrate the "young" in "young adult." Many of my favorite authors do the same. And I think that if my novels make you feel something - even if it's annoyance at people who don't have it all figured out - then it means I've done something right.

If you agree, then I encourage you to read LAST YEAR'S MISTAKE. Review it. Share your thoughts with me. I'd love to hear from you. To those who already have - thank you, from the bottom of my still-seventeen heart.

Happy reading, everyone.

Deja Vu Blogfest!

Hi all! So today I'm participating in DL Hammons' Deja vu Blogfest, The Day of The Do Over.



I love that title, because who doesn't have at least one blog post that they'd like to keep blasting into the universe repeatedly?

Today I'm actually going to offer up two, and here's why:

As writers, we experience so many ups and downs. The agony of the query trenches, the frustration of agents not "connecting" with your work, the long hours of revisions, the manic joy of finally hearing that someone believes in your story enough to represent it, the silent hell of being on submission, the sting of editor rejections, the sheer and utter elation of finding out your novel is going to be a real, tangible book.

The list goes on, but since I've yet to experience the rest of it, I thought I'd give people the option of

A) Commiserating over the frustration of querying and trying to find an agent with this post:

Fact Or Fiction: Querying is the Best Way to Get an Agent's Attention

or B) Proving how things can turn around when you absolutely positively least expect by re-sharing the story of how my debut, LAST YEAR'S MISTAKE, found its home at Simon Pulse: 

You Never Know. No, Really, You Don't: My Pub Story

Getting To Know You Blog Hop And Giveaway!

Hi All!

Today I'm participating in Cuddlebuggery's Getting to Know You bloghop, where a bunch of fabulous writers can learn a little more about one another, and give away some awesome prizes while they're at it!

So here are some random facts about me, both authorly and otherwise:

- My name is Gina Ciocca, and no one knows how to pronounce my last name. For the record, it's See-OH-ka :)

- I'm seriously grossed out by feet and potato buds.

- I'm the worst Italian ever. I speak maybe 3 words of the language, hate coffee, rarely drink wine, have never been to Italy, and can not make homemade pasta sauce without the assistance of my mother or grandmother.

- I write YA contemporary romance, and have a soft spot for paranormal of the I-see-dead-people variety. Which is why I write that too. (PARANORMAL IS NOT A 4-LETTER WORD! POWER TO THE DEAD PEOPLE! *steps off soapbox*)

- The first book I ever fell in love with was Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson, and the first literary couple I ever fell in love with was Anne Shirley and Gilbert Blythe from the Anne of Green Gables series.

CLASSIC.

But....

- I totally credit Smallville and the romance between Lana and Clark as the inspiration for keeping my romance-obsessed brain fueled with teen angst.

SWOOOOON

Speaking of which...

My YA debut, LAST YEAR'S MISTAKE, releases June 9th, 2015 from Simon Pulse, and is available for pre-order on Amazon now! It has a pretty atypical pub story, which you can read here.

Is there anything that electric chemistry can’t overcome? The past may be gone, but love has a way of holding on in this romantic debut novel told in alternating Before and After chapters.


The summer before freshman year, Kelsey and David became inseparable best friends—until the night a misunderstanding turned Kelsey into the school joke and everything around her crumbled, including her friendship with David. So when Kelsey’s parents decide to move away, she can’t wait to start over and leave the past behind. But David’s not quite ready to be left.

Now it’s senior year and Kelsey has a new group of friends, genuine popularity, and a hot boyfriend. Her life is perfect. That is, until David’s family moves to town. Old feelings bubble to the surface and threaten to destroy Kelsey’s second chance at happiness. The more time she spends with David, the more she realizes she never let him go. And maybe she never wants to…

For my giveaway, I chose books that are near and dear to my heart.

The first combines my love of paranormal and romance - UNEARTHLY by Cynthia Hand (paperback). It's one of my absolute favorites, and therefore my go-to anytime I'm asked to give away a book that's special to me. 

AND - to represent the straight up contemp in me, I will also giveaway one copy of BEHIND THE SCENES by my fabulous CP, Dahlia Adler, AND a pre-order of my own book, LAST YEAR'S MISTAKE! (And if you don't win, there's still time to enter my very first ARC giveaway here!)

One random commenter will win all three. Looking forward to getting to know YOU!

Origins Blogfest!

Today I'm participating in the Origins Blogfest!

The object is to talk about when and how you first became a writer. So here goes:

I'm pretty sure I've been writing stories ever since I knew how to write. I've mentioned before that I was the dorky kid who brought books to parties and picnics, because I'd rather lose myself in a made up story than face the boring reality around me.

Which is probably why my earliest stories were kicked-up versions of every day life.

In 2nd (or was it 3rd?) grade, my friend Bridget and I decided to write stories about each other. We used to dictate plot lines to one another - she wanted to go on vacation in France and have Tom Cruise's look-alike son fall madly in love with her, and I'd give her an equally outlandish scenario - and then we'd bury our noses in our notebooks and write as much as we could without getting caught by the teacher. When we were finished, we'd swap notebooks and read and giggle and put in our orders for what we wanted to happen next.

If only life were really that easy, right?

So that's where it all began. We may not get to dictate our own life events (at least not all the time), but the ability to create and lose myself in a world where I call the shots (or at least where no one does boring things like go to work 8 hours a day and clean the house and cook dinner) is what keeps me writing to this day.

Looking forward to reading about your Origins!

Deja Vu Blogfest!

Today is the Deja Vu Blogfest! Which means I get to explore a bunch of great new blogs, and I don't have to come up with an original thought for today!

Why?

Because the object of this blogfest is to re-post a favorite old blog post and that, my friends, is definitely something I can handle.

Or so I thought.

I couldn't pick just one, and as a result, I'm giving you options! Yay!

If you're seeking a helpful/writing related/commiserative post, please check out:

One Year Ago... What Not to Do with your First Draft

Or:

What Manuscripts and Hideous Pink Bathrooms Have in Common



And if you'd like to make fun of form rejections (because let's face it, if we don't, we'll cry) please see:

Share Your Favorite Rejection






Looking forward to checking out yours!

Pay It Forward Blogfest!

It's been a very long time since I participated in a blogfest, but I really liked the concept of this one hosted by Matt MacNish and Alex J. Cavanaugh.

The idea is to inform everyone of a few blogs that might not be getting all the love they deserve. I was only supposed to pick three, but that proved too hard.

So here is my list. Feel free to click three of your choice, and spread some love!

1) Aleeza Rauf at Aleeza Reads and Writes
Aleeza does fantastic, insightful, enthusiastic book reviews. If you ever want an honest, hilarious opinion on a book, this is where you need to go. No joke, she can probably read us all under the table. And she's a sweetheart, too.

2) Heidi Windmiller at ...then she writes
Heidi wears many hats: Teacher. Lawyer. Mom. CP Extraordinaire. She puts out thought-provoking posts and also has a great feature on Fridays where she gathers up interesting and informative links from the blogosphere and lays them out for everyone. What's better than getting to copy a smart girl's homework?

3) Leigh Ann Kopans at The Naptime Novelist
Leigh Ann's posts are introspective and funny, and she almost always takes the time to respond to her commentators, which I think is great. She comes up with great metaphors for the different phases of writing, from the joys to the heartbreaks, and once you visit you'll wish you lived close enough to have lunch with her. I know I do!

4) Francesca Zappia at Zap's Lobster Tank
If you're looking for someone who tells it like it is, Chessie is your girl. She's also a ridiculously talented writer and artist, and her creativity blows me away. She's one to watch, ladies and gentleman. Because I firmly believe that you'll be seeing her Sci-Fi novels on book shelves in the very near future.

And since I already broke the rules, I want to mention a few more popular blogs. Because they are popular for a reason.

1) Brodi Ashton
Brodi is the author of upcoming novel EVERNEATH, and is all around awesome. Her blog is hilarious, heartfelt, and well worth visiting.

2) Agent Vickie Motter's Navigating the Slush Pile
Vickie's blog is one of my favorite writing resources. She's done posts on everything from common spelling and punctuation errors to what you should and shouldn't say when you receive "the call." (From her lips to God's ears!) She also does book recommendations, and says why she would or would not represent the books she reviews. Even if you don't plan to query her, follow along anyway.

3) Katie Mills at Creepy Query Girl.
For real. Does anyone NOT love this blog? Katie is one awesome chick and I'm anxiously awaiting the day she becomes Creepy Agented Girl followed by Creepy Published Author.

Go forth and enjoy!