If you're on social media, please give her a visit and tell her how grateful we are that she stopped by the blog to share her stories and her wisdom. You can find Jen here:
We've talked about her upcoming release, The Storm Runner, but be sure to take a look at Jen's award-winning debut novel, Tortilla Sun. That cover makes me want to fly!
Today's panel question is:
Jen: Childhood is the time of imagination and mystery. Of dragons and monsters. Of first loves and magic spells. But truth be told, I didn’t “decide” per se. The universe tapped me on the shoulder and I answered. Once I wrote my first kids’ book, I knew something magical and rare had happened, something that would change me forever. Plus, I really love magic and monsters!
Steph: I don’t know, honestly. I’ve tried writing for adults a few times, and I really struggle with it. Even though I’m a legit adult and it doesn’t seem like it would be that hard. There’s just something about the untapped potential of the teenage years that draws me.
Jill: My husband and I were working in youth ministry at the time, so I was around a lot of teenagers. I have always gravitated toward the readers and shared books with them, so when I started writing, that was the only age that interests me. I have since written books for kids and some for adults, but I am still partial to the teen years. There is something about discovering life and adventure for the first time that makes a story more interesting to me.
Shan: I get asked this question a lot. And so sometimes I feel like a broken record when I answer it, but the truth is just as powerful and just as true as when I first started writing for teens.
One of the most inspiring things to watch is when a person, any person, rises up to face their fears and instead of being swallowed by them like they have a zillion times before, they ball up their fist and punch fear square in the face. Fear may steal things from us from time to time, but I don't believe we have to let it win. Those teenage years are so full of angst and growth and trials and grappling and coming into your own. It's the ideal place to examine the fight and the superiority of a soul that says, "I'm afraid, but I'm doing it anyway." Stories that capture the genuine spirit of this set me weeping and cheering. I want to write those stories.
I love your guys answers!
ReplyDeleteI write for young women, I believe, because I feel I have so much to tell them. And without looking for it, younger girls and girls my age flock around me asking for advice, and so I love to give half of it in the form of a story. For awhile I taught a girls class that incorporated learning hand work with scripture. But I also mentor girls through texting, video calls, and such. At times I don't know how it happens, because I'm still a young girl myself and I don't really want to do this. . . it just happens.
Great book! Looking forward to have a copy of these. Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteSuch fun answers!
ReplyDeleteAs a little kid I did read kids and middle grade fiction, but even then most of what I was reading would be considered young adult. I loved it. The kids were old enough that they could plausibly do the things in the stories, yet not so old to be constrained by all the limits of adulthood. That has stuck as I’ve started writing my own stories. I still love reading YA, and I feel like that age range of characters gives me the best of both worlds. The vulnerability of childhood, mixed with the new developments of being a grown up. So many possibilities.
Awesome answers! I especially loved Shannon's. I feel like that's one of my favorite parts of reading YA. I love watching people around my age rise up and face the fears that try to bring them down. It reminds me that I can too.
ReplyDeleteI started writing for young people because I am a young person. It's something comfortable for me to write about teenagers. (I've been writing about teenagers since I was seven, first because they were older and cooler than me, and then as I got older because they're like me as I could theoretically be if I lived in their fantasy world.)
ReplyDeleteAs I read more and more YA, though, I'm coming to also write for the YA audience because I think it needs a more healthy selection, particularly when it comes to romance and "strength." So many of the books in the YA section have unhealthy relationships - romances, family relationships, etc. - and such damaging views on strength and what it means to be strong (especially as a female) and I think that needs to change. Those sorts of messages - that those unhealthy relationships are normal and that physical strength is the most important thing - are damaging to people of any age, but how much more so to young people who are still learning how life works and how they need to do things right and how to be independent?
This is a bit of a deviant from this post, but I didn't know where else to post it. I am having a feeling of the plot of my WIP tumbling about my head, and I don't want to work on it, as I have what I feel are more interesting projects, but I have a deadline. How do you combat this and push through?
ReplyDelete