Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Chapter Ten Was Particularly Good

Monday I took my mother to the doctor (her blood pressure is lower than mine) and Tuesday I took my mother to the dentist (no cavities). Then today I got a reminder from the vet that Scooter is due his annual checkup. It is considerably easier to get my mother into the car than it is to get Scooter into his cat carrier, so I'm none too pleased about this particular obligation.

Scooter won't be either.

I am pleased however to announce that I have finally figured out what Scooter thinks I am. In his eyes, I am a Mouse With Benefits.



Speaking of benefits, I have certainly benefited from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt's support of the moon books (am I slick or what). Look at this goHastings.com promotion of Teen Dystopian novels (well, don't look at all of it, just the bottom).

You looked at all of it, didn't you. I'm crossing you off the dedication list.

Meanwhile, now that the paperback of This World We Live In is sort of officially published, I've been obsessively following its Amazon rankings. It's the first of my books to have an extended period of availability as an ebook before coming out in paperback, and I'm very curious as to how that will affect its sales. Ebook sales are flourishing, but children/YA paperbacks seem to be suffering:

In the Children’s/Young Adult category, Hardcover sales were $31.2 million in January 2011 vs $31.8 million in January 2010 (-1.9%) while Paperbacks were $25.4 million , down 17.7% from $30.9 million in January 2010.


Today was the first chance I had to read Hart in all its gothic/romance/thriller/horror/noir/fairytale glory. Of course I loved it, but I have no taste whatsoever when it comes to my own writing. Still, I plan to polish it and offer it to my agent to see what she thinks.

Assuming I survive getting Scooter into his carrier. Think of me as a mouse with high blood pressure!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi, I'm a fan of the moon books and basically worship them. I was going through my bookshelf and saw that I had this book called "Truth or Dare" and (assuming you are the only Susan Beth Pfeffer) I was wondering what kind of genre you would characterize the book as? Also is there a name for the type of diary style writing you do in LAWKI or if it is simply just diary style?

Susan Beth Pfeffer said...

Hi Anonymous-

Maybe there's a name for diary style writing, but I don't know what it is. There's a lot about writing I don't know.

I did write Truth Or Dare. It's a book for younger kids. I got the idea for it when I was on a photographic safari in Tanzania (I didn't bring a camera, so for me it was a looking at stuff safari). I didn't know anyone on the trip, and there were people I thought would like me and I'd hang out with them. They were polite, but they never warmed up to me (I ended up hanging out with a different people and had a fine time).

Anyway, that got me thinking about how you could like someone more than they like you, and it isn't that they're mean or rude, they just don't like you. And Truth Or Dare evolved from that. Which shows ideas for books can come from anyplace!