Ya - Blog Posts

*singsongy* ohhh @katiethedane12 look what I found! :0

so i just made a psych personality quiz, is anyone interested?

Claire here!

Okay, so I have recently finished the lovely Kate Hattemer’s new YA novel The Land of 10,000 Madonnas.

It is about a group of 5 teenagers sent on a quest to Europe as a dying wish from their friend and cousin, Jesse, who died of a heart defect nearly a year previously. It is beautiful, sad, funny, bittersweet, and sometimes slightly gross. The gross factor is mostly due to Ben’s penchant for smoothies for every meal which sometimes include unusual choices for a liquefied meal.)

Kate’s sophomore novel reminded me a little bit of Maureen Johnson’s 13 Little Blue Envelopes. But I suppose that is more for the similarities between their teenaged characters going on trips across Europe after losing a loved one. I find Kate’s characters more real and relatable than Johnson’s. Cal, Trevor, Ben, Lillian, and Matt aren’t meant to discover some great and magical cure for their grief and then fall in love. They are and have been grieving. They deal with their grief on a daily basis and in myriad ways. And they are only beginning to come to terms with Jesse’s death. As teenagers, they are often prickly in their mourning, and don’t always agree. And like many teenagers I know, they do not say what they mean and feel immediately or clearly to each other. Hattemer’s portrayal and the perspectives she offers from her characters is one of her strengths in this book. They aren’t special in any extra way, they are normal, and they have been dealt a tragedy. And they react and exist accordingly. 

The book did take me a little while to get through, but that is in part because I tend to be a distracted reader and also this is a book that will make you think and reflect.  This is a novel that will be a good cathartic read. Hattemer made me tear up more than once while I was reading, but she brought me out on the brighter side at the end. I will be recommending this to fans of David Levithan, Maureen Johnson, Ava Dellaira, Emery Lord, and even John Green readers. I think that Kate Hattemer is going to be an author to keep an eye on and a voice to be heard in YA in the coming years.

Release date is April 19th 2016. I highly recommend it. And if you can, get it from a bricks and mortar bookstore or the library!

Drew my monster girl I made in @ghoulkiss's cool app

So today is Day 6 of the #authorlifemonth challenge 😊 I'll be doing two parts, so here's Part II It's supposed to highlight fanart/edit. I've found that with #NA vs #YA readers are less vocal when they read and like something. So people who've loved our #NA #romance #SamePage don't necessarily shout it out as opposed to #TheMarkOfNoba I've decided to make cool homemade fanart😇 The two ppl who inspired their looks were Travis Garland, a bomb ass singer I met and loved 😆 and Chime Edwards a hair vlogger I have hair envy over! So that's what inspired the art👍 #naturalista #naija #nigerian #interracial #bwwm #diversebooks #bookstagram #diverse #diversityjedi #diverseromance #booknerdigans #portugueseboys #blackgirlmagic #providence #messyromance

Help me find a book!

My sister brought up many stranded braiding today and I remembered vague details of a book I read once and now not knowing is driving me insane.

here’s what I know:

I probably read this in middle school, so it was generally appropriate for that age, but I was reading way above my age level so it may have been a little above that

The main character was a girl who’s mom died

she had gigantic, poofy, uncontrollable red (I think it was red (but orange red not died red)) hair that she would put in an 8-stranded braid to keep it out of the way

Her dead (or maybe missing but I think dead) Mom also had this hair and would braid it this way

Her dad braided her hair this special way (because mom was dead) and eventually taught her how to braid her hair this way and learning to do her own 8-strand braid was important to her and s big thing about her independence

I think the inciting incident had something to do with her dad being killed/kidnapped but I might be wrong

she went on some sort of adventure to uncover clues and such that involved puzzle she had to solve that was 8 strips of cloth (I think they were red? (Red as in red, not red as in orange like hair)) that she had to braid in the special way to reveal the secret message, which then told her something about her mom and the origin of the braid

To braid the fabric she had to drape it over her head like hair because she had only ever done the braid on herself and she thought about her missing (or dead?) dad and how he used to braid her hair.

I think there was some sort of wise old man who helped her out with the puzzle but I might be making that up considering my interest in books it was probably fantasy and/or YA but idk

Anyway, lmk if you know what book this is and can confirm this is it a fever dream or have a recommendation on how to find it. Thanks!

I legit don't understand how fandoms with both books and movies have this one discourse about how SOME book readers believe they're a "better" and "more knowledgeable" fan than everyone else.

I GET IT- THE BOOKS AND MOVIES DIDN'T POTRAY THE EXACT THE SAME THING. I get it dawg the movies weren't accurate. I get it that the books are more accurate and have more significant and important events that WERE NOT POTRAYED in the movies.

And yes, it is 100% YOUR RIGHT to find these flaws. It's your right to ACKNOWLEDGE and CALL IT OUT.

But you guys try to PUT DOWN OTHER WHO DON'T READ THE BOOKS??? 💀💀💀

You don't get to SHAME others who haven't read the books yet. You don't get to shame others who just started watching/reading/following the series. You don't get to shame others based on how many books of THAT SERIS they've read/finished.

Being a fan and being a part of a fandom IS NOT a competition. And it is certainly not a race to finish a book/movie of that series.

Have a nice day 😋🫶 -April