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What it’s like to be a speechwriter

Do you have a gift for knowing what people are trying to say, and how to help them say it so they shine? Do you enjoy researching topics, and have an ability to encapsulate that research into a clear message? Is the persuasive essay your favorite assignment in English class? If so, scroll down to read more about speechwriting from a professional in the field, former speechwriter Rob Costello. And check out all the other cool careers in writing profiled on TIPS FOR TEEN WRITERS!

How did you get started as a speechwriter?

I never set out to become a speechwriter. In fact, when I was a teenager I didn’t really set out to be much of anything. I graduated high school not having a clue what I wanted to do with my life, and for most of my 20s I worked in a series of low-skill, low-wage jobs. I cleaned toilets and flipped burgers. I dealt cards in a casino. I processed trade documents for an international bank.

When I met my future husband, I moved to Ithaca, NY to be with him. There I got a job dispatching police and emergency services for the Cornell University Police Department. What a crazy, intense job that turned out to be! I quickly realized answering 911 calls all day long was way too stressful for me, and so after only a year of doing that, I managed to snag another job at Cornell that was much more my speed: receptionist in the Dean’s Office of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS).

This is where I spent the next decade, working my way up from receptionist, to the dean’s administrative assistant, and finally to her executive assistant and chief of staff, where I helped her run the college. I enjoyed this experience very much. CALS is one of the leading ag and life sciences research institutions in the world. Working for the dean, I got to learn a great deal about the cutting-edge environmental, biological, and food systems research happening in the college. I also met tons of interesting people, from Nobel prize-winning scientists and Fortune 500 CEOs, to senators and members of Congress, and some of the brightest, most dedicated students in the world. Finally, I learned the ins and outs of what it takes to run a world-class research and academic institution with well over a thousand faculty and employees, and an annual budget in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

It was during this period that I first realized I could make a career out of writing. A big part of my job was helping the dean manage the huge volume of correspondence she received, literally hundreds of letters and emails a day. Because she couldn’t possibly answer all of these messages herself, I often drafted responses in “her voice,” which she would then review, edit, and sign. I’d always loved to write, and over time this became my favorite part of the job.

Eventually, I went back to school, earning my bachelors degree in English and an MFA in writing for children and young adults, while still working full-time (something I don’t recommend if you can possibly avoid it). When the position of the dean’s speechwriter became available, my educational background, extensive  knowledge of the college, and deep familiarity with the “dean’s voice” made me uniquely qualified for the job.

What is a typical day like?

It’s hard for me to pin down what a typical day as a speechwriter was like, because speechwriting was only half of my job. At the same time, I was also the college’s social media manager, which meant I ran CALS’ Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr, and YouTube platforms, and wrote articles for various college publications. Depending on the dean’s public speaking schedule, which varied widely throughout the year, I could spend as much as 80% of my time working on speeches or as little as none.

That said, when I left CALS a few years ago to pursue fiction writing and teaching full-time, the dean was giving anywhere from 90 to 120 public addresses a year, which breaks downs to something like two to three speeches a week. Of course, not all speeches are created equal, and many of these were brief remarks that required minimal research and preparation.

On the other hand, some of the major speeches, such as the annual State of the College address, could take weeks to prepare. These involved massive amounts of research and data collection, interviewing faculty about new college initiatives, reviewing financial and budgetary reports with college officers, creating graphs and gathering photographs for slide presentations, familiarizing myself with the venue and A/V equipment that would be used for the speech, and then finally crafting the speech, followed by multiple rounds of revision with the dean.

In general, when I was working on a major address like this, most of my day was spent at my desk in front of my computer, doing research, drafting the text, and preparing the slides.

What training, education or preparation would help someone to be a good speechwriter?

To be honest, the most important training I received came from my high school English teachers, who taught me how to write a persuasive essay. When you reduce them to their essence, most speeches are merely persuasive arguments read aloud. They begin with an introduction that leads to a thesis statement, followed by a series of supporting points that build to a summary conclusion. Since I was also active in speech and debate as a teen, I had experience crafting arguments about complicated issues that were accessible and easy to convey while speaking. Who knew the basic skills I learned in high school would turn out to be so important to my job years later?

In college, I did coursework in speechwriting, presentation making, and rhetoric that was all very valuable, too.

Finally, all those years working in the dean’s office furnished me with a wealth of knowledge and resources that proved invaluable to my speechwriting career. Having a basic understanding of the different kinds of scientific research conducted in the college was crucial, because so many of the dean’s speeches involved promoting that work to alumni, politicians, and other stakeholders. It also really helped that I’d become something of an expert on the institution of CALS itself. This meant I always knew just whom to ask to get my questions answered quickly and accurately. Furthermore, because I was so familiar with the college’s inner workings, I understood many of the complicated subjects the dean spoke about, such as the budget and various policies and initiatives. This enabled me to craft speeches without a lot of coaching that were coherent and authoritative on these complex matters. I can’t imagine how hard it would have been for me had I not spent so many years beforehand getting to know the dean and the college so well.

Of course, this experience was unique to me and my job in CALS. But generally speaking, I think for any aspiring speechwriter the lesson here is to become as much of an expert as you possibly can on the subjects you will be writing about. Do your research. Ask questions. Be curious. Learn as much as you can before you ever sit down to write, because all of that knowledge will lend your speeches clarity and authority.

What skills do you think helped you do the job of speechwriting well?

Writing well persuasively is the most important skill to master. Knowing how to frame an argument and anticipate counterarguments is a big part of this, as well as being able to translate complicated issues or ideas into simple, clear, compelling language. Listening is also an essential skill, as well as being able to take critical feedback. Time management and organizational skills are invaluable, especially when multiple deadlines loom. Basic research, journalism, and interviewing skills are also extremely useful. Being comfortable setting up and troubleshooting A/V equipment is important, as is proficiency with presentation and graphics software like PowerPoint, Prezi, InDesign, and Keynote.

What type of person would be a good fit to be a speechwriter?

Somebody who is tenacious about getting the facts right. Somebody who enjoys writing persuasively and changing people’s minds with words. Somebody who doesn’t seek the spotlight and who doesn’t mind having another person receive the glory for what they’ve written. Somebody who cares passionately about the agenda being pursued by the person or organization they work for. (For example, it’s probably not a great idea if you’re an environmentalist to take a job writing speeches for the President of Exxon!)

What are the down sides of speechwriting?

You spend most of your time alone at a desk! It can be a challenge to find a good speechwriting job. Your job satisfaction is often dependent on whether or not you are able to satisfy one person (the person giving the speeches), so if you have a difficult or demanding boss, it can make your life a real drag.

What are the up sides of speechwriting?

Speechwriting is a great job for an introvert! It’s also tremendously rewarding to be able to work with an influential leader to craft a speech that may change people’s minds and influence lives. In my time at CALS, I worked on several major addresses the dean gave about the environment, education, and the value of scientific research in promoting a better world, all issues I care deeply about. Speechwriting gave me the opportunity to feel that I was contributing to the academic and scientific mission of the college, without actually being an academic or a scientist. Speechwriters can often play an important role in helping to spread the word about important issues and ideas. If you care about things like politics and activism, but aren’t the kind of person who can get up in front of others and lead, being the one behind the scenes who helps those leaders be more effective in communicating their messages can be extremely empowering and satisfying.

What resources, professional journals, organizations or social media sites keep you informed about your industry?

Unfortunately, I’ve been away from speechwriting for a while now, so I haven’t kept up with current resources. However, I do know that the Professional Speechwriters Association was founded in 2013 and offers information and links to non-members on their website.

Any words of advice for people interested in speechwriting?

I think it’s most important to develop a good rapport with the person you’re writing speeches for. After all, you are essentially putting words into their mouth. Words they will be speaking in public. Words they may be judged on and/or criticized for later on. By the very nature of the job, speechwriters are often working for influential public figures, such as politicians and other leaders. It can be a strangely intimate experience to see these powerful people with their guard down, expressing fears, anxieties, and vulnerabilities that don’t always correspond to their well-honed public images. It’s important, therefore, that you earn their trust by doing everything you possibly can to make their job easier. This means listening to how they speak, their unique speech patterns, vocabulary choices, and sentence structure. It means familiarizing yourself with the kinds of jokes and anecdotes they’re comfortable telling, as well as the subjects they wish to avoid. It means being scrupulously well-prepared and always having your facts straight, so that they are not embarrassed by giving out bad information or saying something inadvertently offensive or disrespectful to their audience. Finally, it means understanding what’s most important to them about the speech they are giving, what their goals are for it, and what message(s) they are trying to convey. After all, it isn’t about you and your pretty words. Your number one priority is to make sure they shine!

Rob Costello writes fiction for and about queer youth. He holds an MFA in Writing from the Writing for Children and Young Adults Program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. An alumnus of the Millay Colony for the Arts and the New York State Summer Writers Institute, his short fiction has appeared in Hunger Mountain, Stone Canoe, Eclectica, and Narrative, and is forthcoming in Rural Voices: YA Stories of Growing Up in Remote Communities (Candlewick, Fall 2020). He teaches creative writing to teens and adults, and has been on the faculty of the Whole Novel Workshop at the Highlights Foundation since 2014. He recently finished work on his debut young adult novel entitled An Ugly World for Beautiful Boys, and lives with his husband and various four-legged companions on top of a wide and windy hill in upstate NY.

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Only the Good Stuff: An English Ghost Story

AN ENGLISH GHOST STORY by Kim Newman

“They would fall in a clump, like ripe apples. Mother, father, daughter, son… The Hollow awaited the family with a welcome. It needed them. Unpopulated, it tended to drift. Without people in residence, it might disperse on the winds. That afternoon, the place was on its best behaviour, spring green promising summer gold.”

What happens when you transplant a deeply dysfunctional family in crisis from the chaotic pace and corrosive distractions of London to an enchanting, yet ever so slightly menacing English manor set in the idyllic Somerset countryside?

One hell of a satisfying ghost story.

Kim Newman’s An English Ghost Story begins with just such a family, the Naremores — husband Steven, wife Kirsty, teenage daughter Jordan, and youngster Tim — falling in love with and relocating to an historic country estate. The Hollow, as it is known, is a charming stone and thatched-roof pile dating back to the Middle Ages, featuring turrets, a bountiful orchard, and a life-force seething in secret that’s as old as the land itself. Lifelong home to the recently deceased Louise Teazle, a well-known children’s author whose beloved series of books were set there, the Hollow at first appears to be a blissful refuge for the Naremores, welcoming them with its proverbial arms wide open and using every means within its considerable power to set them at ease and erase every care and anxiety.

The first third of the novel centers on this seduction, as the family settles into their bewitched surroundings, soon relinquishing old resentments and patterns of dysfunction as they bask in the golden glow of their new home. The Hollow makes no effort to hide its supernatural power from them, though it shows itself to each Naremore in a different guise. Kirsty, for example, discovers a whimsical bureau that was featured prominently in the Teazle books and contains drawers in which items magically appear and disappear. Likewise, Tim plays soldier in the orchard with an army of friendly spirits, while a chilly Jordan finds her shawl floating helpfully in midair.

Yet, as the happy influence of these apparitions papers over the cracks in the Naremore walls, it becomes increasingly clear that the family’s foundation remains profoundly unstable. When Jordan suffers an unforgivable heartbreak and lashes out in a cruel act that leads to tragedy, the resulting misery quickly poisons the atmosphere of the Hollow, and the ghosts that live there turn against the family with blood-curdling ferocity.

An English Ghost Story is not a conventional contemporary horror novel, in that it does not rely on gore or extreme violence to generate frights. Rather, much as in the tradition of the great old-fashioned ghost stories like The Haunting of Hill House or The Turn of the Screw, the book weaves an intricate web of psychological terror, as each Naremore gets caught up by his or her own fears, insecurities, and resentments, all of which are used against them to tormenting effect by the ghosts of the Hollow. Although the last third of the book is particularly spine-chilling, as the ghosts divide and conquer the family, minimal blood is spilled, while dread manifests as much from what remains unseen in the shadows as what leaps out from the page.

Though at times a touch predictable, An English Ghost Story is nevertheless beautifully written, well paced, and highly evocative of a certain type of English countryside, with misty moors and a distant tor where sits an ancient, Stonehenge-like site that can only be seen at certain times, by certain members of the family. The book is told through the alternating points of view of each of the Naremores, which not only renders the characters compelling and believable, but also darkens and complicates the terror beyond the merely superficial boos of ghouls. Comic relief (with a decided edge) is provided via a group of rudely obsessive Teazle fans who pay an intrusive visit just as events reach their boiling point. Newman also uses a particularly clever and satisfying meta technique to convey the backstory of the Hollow by inserting text from the Teazle novels and excerpts from an historical account of English hauntings.

I loved this book. I was as enchanted by the Hollow as the Naremore family, and was quite sad to leave it, despite the nasty events that transpired there. Like the very best ghost stories, the haunted house itself is the most fascinating character of all — brooding, wounded, lonely, in need — and Newman portrays it with a kind of depth and sensitivity I found not only appealing but oddly sympathetic. Though the book was clearly written with an adult audience in mind, it has much to offer younger fans of horror fiction, particularly in the character of Jordan, whose deep insecurity, resentment of her parents, and despair over the loss of her boyfriend are highly relatable and the source of much of the conflict in the story.

Recommended for anyone who loves a few good chills, especially of the folklore- and history-infused English variety.

This review is posted as part of The Book Review Club. Click below to check out more cool reviews from other members of the Club!

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@Barrie Summy

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Only the Good Stuff: Butterfly

BUTTERFLY by Sonya Hartnett

“Plum is soon to turn fourteen, and one evening she stands in front of the mirror with her school dress around her ankles, her body reflected naked and distressing in the glass.”

In Butterfly -- Sonya Hartnett’s wise, lyrical, and melancholy exploration of the tangled hurts and betrayals of adolescence and the much knottier disappointments that come with adulthood -- Plum Coyle is a girl poised at the threshold of becoming a young woman, with all the restless confusion and insecurity that entails. Is she pretty? Is she fat? Why do her friends treat her so poorly? How can she prove to her family that she is no longer a child? The answers to these questions soon arrive in the alluring form of a glamorous and solicitous older woman named Maureen, who takes the young girl under her wing seemingly out of the goodness of her heart, but whose disquieting agenda leads to the unraveling of Plum's entire world.

It would be hard for me to overstate how highly I think of Sonya Hartnett. I would rank her near the top of any list of the finest writers for young readers in the world, and easily among my two or three favorite authors of all time. In 2008 she won the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award (the Little Nobel) and is considered a national treasure in her home of Australia. Yet, she remains criminally below the radar in this country. Her voice is like no other, brimming with, as the Lindgren Award Jury put it, "…psychological depth and a concealed yet palpable anger…" Her prose delivers worlds of meaning within each passage, and her empathy with the poignancy and quiet savagery of adolescence is without peer. Her novels strike with all the force of a fist to the gut, yet leave the reader feeling as if he's seen stars for the very first time.

Butterfly is no exception.

Take, for instance, the following passage, in which Plum confronts the consequences of revealing to her friends the compliment she has received from her new mentor, Maureen:

“… I met somebody who knows about modeling, and she said I could do it — fashion modeling. She said I have the hair and the face and the bones that magazines want . . .”

She trails off, realizing too late that she’s peeled herself of skin. Under the navy shade of the oak tree her friends stare in post-nuclear silence. Scattered across the lawn are young ladies in paste-colored uniforms chatting, walking, squealing, luxuriating, smoothing Reef Tan into thighs. There are teachers wandering about on yard duty, pointing out rubbish that must go in a bin. There are leaves blowing about, chip packets scooting across the quadrangle, trucks changing gear beyond the gates. There is the school dog, Ebenezer, an overweight Labrador housed at the adjoining convent, rambling from lunch box to lunch box. From the tuckshop in the undercroft comes the summery scent of jam doughnuts, chocolate milk, damp salad rolls. Soon a bell will ring, summoning everyone back to class, where the teachers will drone exhaustedly and wilted discussions will take place, and the clocks above the blackboards will be watched with gamblers’ intensity. It is Monday afternoon. It is the start of March. The week, the year, the whole torturous span of Plum’s education stretches ahead of her. She doesn’t know why she insists on making unbearable for herself this place that is already so hard.

Then they explode.

“Hair like a wig?”

“A face like a cat’s bum?”

“Everyone’s got bones! What’s so good about your bones? Even a dog wouldn’t want your bones!”

…And even Plum is chuckling, as she absolutely must. Not being wounded by any of it, as she absolutely must not.

“I’m just saying what she said!”

“Are you sure she wasn’t blind?”

“What sort of fashion will you model? Paper bags for heads?”

Even lovely Victoria has never had the gall to suggest she could be in magazines: Plum sees in the eyes of her friends something hotter and more drying than the wind. With the exception of Rachael, who’s calmly determined to study law, none of the girls know what they want to do with their lives. They foresee husbands and babies for themselves and each other, but there’s emptiness surrounding these. Certainly there’s nothing enviable awaiting Plum Coyle…

This passage illustrates the deftness of Hartnett's hand. With cutting imagery and an unsparing eye for the viciousness of young girls, we come to understand the impossibility of Plum's situation with her friends and get a taste of her admirable, if dispiriting self-awareness. She is a character keenly mindful of her barely-tolerated status among her peer group, and her efforts to improve her lot through an abortive home ear piercing and an utterly disastrous 14th birthday party are rendered by Hartnett with excruciating precision. Like many girls her age, Plum is a raw nerve, vulnerable to every slight and injury. Yet, despite her neediness and the many humiliations she brings upon herself, Plum retains her dignity throughout the book. She is someone with tangible goals and dreams, and though she makes many painful mistakes in their pursuit, her underlying decency and the strength of her character keep the reader rooting for her, even as we begin to recognize the threatening situation she has blundered into with her unquestioned devotion to Maureen.

Maureen seems at first a wise and sophisticated confidante, someone whom Plum can trust and freely admire without judgement. Maureen offers advice on makeup, clothes, and Plum's diet, and even encourages Plum, whose birth name is Ariella, to begin referring to herself by the more exotic "Aria."

Yet, as their unusual friendship develops, the terrible toll of Maureen's self-limiting life choices becomes apparent. She has stumbled blindly into motherhood and a loveless marriage, and feeling trapped, has turned desperate and calculating. It's safe to say without revealing too many details of the plot that her reasons for befriending and using Plum prove to be both despicable and pathetic, and by the end of the book they resolve themselves in one of the most shocking and heartbreaking final passages I've read.

Like much of Hartnett’s oeuvre, the intended audience for this novel is difficult to classify. Though marketed to young adults, the narrative shifts between the POVs of Plum and Maureen; Plum's twentysomething brothers Justin and Cydar; and even Maureen's little boy, David. While the focus remains largely on Plum herself, there are significant narrative digressions exploring grown-up themes of marriage, infidelity, motherhood, sexual frustration, and the restlessness of young men. The pacing is slow and seductive. The writing is complex and literary, rich in imagery and an emotional honesty that is at times brutal in its ugliness, and at other times breathtaking in its pathos. The book is not a light read, and anyone hoping for uplift or a tidy conclusion should probably look elsewhere.

Still, for young readers with more cultivated tastes looking for something fiercely original and uniquely moving, Butterfly is a book of profound beauty and intelligence. I give it my highest possible recommendation.

This review is posted as part of The Book Review Club. Click below to check out more cool reviews from other members of the Club!

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@Barrie Summy

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Only the Good Stuff: Monica Never Shuts Up

MONICA NEVER SHUTS UP by A.S. King

“Have you ever touched a dead tongue? Have you ever felt the nothingness of what will never be said again?"

A.S. King is one of the most compelling voices writing YA today, but this month I'm reviewing her collection of short fiction for adults, Monica Never Shuts Up.

Despite being a bantamweight of a book (clocking in at a mere 117 pages), the dozen stories within pack a cumulative wallop. Each is a brief, powerful jab to the solar plexus, reminding the reader again and again of King's remarkable facility for harnessing the authentic voices of real people in dire, if highly unusual straits.

The unifying theme of the collection is oppression and the way in which the lives of mostly ordinary, working class folks are fundamentally distorted by social and familial pressures they have little ability to confront or overcome. A woman goes from suffering under the financial burden of having a mother in a nursing home to becoming such a burden on her own children. The innocent love shared between two misunderstood autistic children with very special gifts ends in tragedy. A teenage girl murders her sister's rapist, only to realize later in life that there is no escape from the pervasive rape culture that infects every corner of society.

We meet marginalized characters whose personal struggles reflect, through a kind of funhouse mirror effect, the sort of grinding social problems that diminish lives and suffocate hope. The father of a rapist laments the practice of circumcision and sees in it a metaphor for the way our culture damages its young men. A woman fantasizes about chopping off all the parts of her body that her misogynist ex-husband used to insult. A father is consigned to live the rest of his life as a slave in punishment for his son's flouting of strict recycling rules in an environmentally ravaged post-apocalyptic future.

Families and the dysfunctional relationships between parents and children, siblings, and spouses are a particular source of distress. A sister struggles to cope with the outrageous pathological liar her naive younger brother has chosen to marry. A young woman raised by a promiscuous mother sees the imaginary figure of a matador who shows her visions of the infidelities committed by the men in her life. A sensitive teenager fights not to be destroyed by the obesity caused by growth hormones his callous father insists on dosing their cattle with on the family farm.  

Though none of these stories could be called "light," King's style is consistently funny, down-to-earth, and more than a little off-kilter. As a result, despite the often bleak subject matter, the collection rarely feels depressing or heavy-handed. In fact, she reminds me quite a bit of George Saunders in her use of first person narrative voices; comical, blue collar vernacular; and surreal, Vonnegut-esque situations. Though these stories are clearly aimed at an adult audience, most will be equally appealing to King's sophisticated teen readership, who love her young adult novels for their honesty, authenticity, quirkiness, and touch of cynicism.

This review is posted as part of The Book Review Club. Click below to check out more cool reviews from other members of the Club!

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Everybody want to be Hollywood.

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Only the Good Stuff: Slasher Girls & Monster Boys

SLASHER GIRLS & MONSTER BOYS Edited by April Genevieve Tucholke

YA horror stories by: Stefan Bachmann, Leigh Bardugo, Kendare Blake, A.G. Howard, Jay Kristoff, Marie Lu, Jonathan Maberry, Danielle Paige, Carrie Ryan, Megan Shepherd, Nova Ren Suma, McCormick Templeman, April Genevieve Tucholke, and Cat Winters.

For Halloween this year I treated myself to a little horror, namely the 14 delightfully unsettling tales compiled by April Genevieve Tucholke in the new YA horror anthology, Slasher Girls & Monster Boys (SGAMB).

SGAMB features some of the best writers of fantasy and horror in YA today. Each has drawn inspiration from a mashup of mostly dark works in film, TV, music, and literature to spin new and wholly original spine-tingling tales of the macabre. Half the fun of reading each story is trying to suss out what inspired it, whether a classic gothic novel, a throwback Masterpiece Theater import, a late 90’s Hollywood fright fest, a below-the-radar Nirvana tune, or some combination of the like. While I won’t divulge any spoilers here, rest assured the answers are all provided at the end.

Unusual for an anthology of this sort, there are no weak links among the stories. Credit editor Tucholke for her fine taste and commitment to involving top writers at the peak of their craft. While the style, manner, and intensity of the frights vary from tale to tale, each is a compelling and entertaining read. And though the book is being marketed to a young adult audience, don’t expect any Goosebumps here; these stories have much more in common with Stephen King (who’s cited in the dedication) than R.L. Stine. Whether trafficking in straight-up blood and gore, the darkly supernatural, sinister folklore come to life, a kick-ass zombie apocalypse, or the twisted corridors of the mind, there is something here to appeal to every horror fan.

Though I enjoyed each of the stories in SGAMB, I had several personal favorites. Nova Ren Suma’s beautifully crafted slow-burner, “The Birds of Azalea Street,” portrays the delicious downfall of a neighborhood lecher… In “Emmeline,” Cat Winters presents the budding of an unlikely romance in the midst of WWI between an American soldier and a curiously cold and pale French girl… “Verse Chorus Verse” by Leigh Bardugo imagines the truly horrifying fate that awaits a Britney Spears-style pop star confined to a strange and forbidding rehab clinic… Tucholke’s own wonderful entry, “The Flicker, The Fingers, The Beat, The Sigh,” unravels the heartbreaking truth behind a series of cruel pranks and the fateful decision that destroys the lives of five teenagers… “On the I-5” by Kendare Blake weaves a seductive tale of innocence lost and vengeance on the open road… And perhaps the finest story in the entire collection, Marie Lu’s “The Girl Without a Face,” is a small masterpiece of psychological terror, plumbing the complicated depths of guilt and trauma that result from a tragic sexual assault.

Overall, SGAMB is not for the faint-of-heart. There are serious scares on offer, including occasionally graphic depictions of violence, disturbing images of cruelty and depravity, and troubling references to sexual assault. And yet, none of this material ever comes across as even remotely gratuitous. Each story is carefully calibrated to push only those hot buttons it needs to push in order to be effective. Indeed, the authors should be commended for exercising a great deal of discretion and restraint in a genre (horror) not generally known for an overabundance of either. While younger children should definitely steer clear, mature teens and adults with a taste for the grisly, ghoulish, and grotesque will find much to savor here. I know I did!

This review is posted as part of The Book Review Club. Click below to check out more cool reviews from other members of the Club!

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@Barrie Summy

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Okay, I defy anyone not to love Neil Gaiman.

Nothing like wanting to read some Neil Gaiman short stories when you have no money, Google refuses to cough up PDFs, and you can’t exactly get up and run to the town library to see if they have anything.

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Only the Good Stuff: What Jamie Saw

WHAT JAMIE SAW by Carolyn Coman

“When Jamie saw him throw the baby, saw Van throw the little baby, saw Van throw his little sister Nin, when Jamie saw Van throw his baby sister Nin, then they moved.”

This past August, I had the privilege of once again participating in the Highlights Foundation Whole Novel Workshop as a teaching assistant. Though the experience always furnishes numerous delights (including incredible food, beautiful surroundings, and the opportunity for uninterrupted writing time), one of the chief joys of spending the week in the company of so many amazing and accomplished writers is being introduced to all the great new books I have yet to read, as well as to older favorites I should have read a long time ago.

Carolyn Coman’s Newbury honor-winning and National Book Award Finalist What Jamie Saw falls into the latter category.

This slight but immensely powerful middle-grade novel is about surviving trauma. Not the trauma born of war, accident, or disease, but the insidious and pervasive trauma caused by the epidemic of domestic abuse.

When the story begins, Jamie is a small boy living with his mom, Patty, and baby sister, Nin, in the apartment of Patty’s current boyfriend, Van. The novel opens with one of the most powerful and startling first lines I’ve come across in a long time (quoted above). In a fit of anger over her incessant crying, Van hurls the baby across the room. Fortunately, she is caught by Patty, who immediately packs up her two children and leaves in the middle of the night. The rest of the book focuses on the small family’s struggle to adjust to life in the immediate aftermath of this horrifying event.

For me, what’s most remarkable about What Jamie Saw is the way in which Coman carefully and realistically portrays the impact of domestic abuse through the eyes of a child. Though the only explicit act of violence in the entire book occurs in the very first line, the atmosphere of the rest of the novel is suffused with Patty’s and Jamie’s lingering dread. It’s apparent, though never shown, that Van has been abusive before. Jamie is far too young to fully comprehend what’s really going on, yet it’s clear from the shadow of fear that overhangs every aspect of his life that he and his mother are terrified of Van. They attend a local Christmas carnival, only to panic and flee when they see a man who resembles Van. Patty keeps Jamie out of school for days and calls in sick to work. They hole up in their new home, a little camping trailer in the isolated wilderness, living in a constant state of unease that Van will find them. Jamie obsesses about how he will protect Nin by hiding her in a dresser drawer should Van arrive. He is literally driven sick with fear and anxiety.

Coman paints a realistic portrait of the many economic hardships poor women trapped in abusive relationships must face. As a checker in a grocery store, Patty has few options. When she decides to leave Van, she renders herself and her kids homeless, with nothing but the family’s few personal possessions and her beat up old car to call her own. Although she has a good friend to turn to, who provides her with some measure of stability and a place to stay, the book ably conveys the terrible insecurity and financial burdens poor women and their children must endure to find safety. 

Further reinforcing Coman’s commitment to realism, when Van finally reemerges at the climax of the book, he is not portrayed as a frothing monster, but as an troubled man who is obviously contrite over what he has done. Yet, for Patty and Jamie, there is no forgiveness to be given, no acceptance of hollow apologies or of promises soon to be broken again. Instead, they finally confront the architect of their fear and unhappiness in a simple, quiet, yet profound catharsis, promising at the book’s conclusion a better, stronger, more independent life for the little family.

I loved What Jamie Saw, not only for its realistic and sensitive approach to a difficult and important topic, but also for its remarkable restraint and delicacy. Despite the challenging subject matter, this is a book I would feel comfortable sharing with most children, and especially those who have endured similar violent situations and might feel empowered by the way Jamie comes to terms with his fear in the end. But even for children who have thankfully never experienced violence in their lives, the book provides a subtle and effective portrait of what that kind of trauma is like, generating a great deal of empathy for those in less fortunate situations.

What Jamie Saw is one book surely worthy of all the acclaim it received. Many thanks to Sarah Aronson and Nicole Valentine for the recommendation!

This review is posted as part of The Book Review Club. Click below to check out more cool reviews from other members of the Club!

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@Barrie Summy

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A Letter I Just Sent to the Toronto Star

Dear Editor, 

I am writing in response to what can only be described as a bizarre piece in defense of a writer who needs none, Heather Mallick’s “Jonathan Franzen’s new novel comes pre-hated.” What I found most disturbing was, frankly, not any of the misguided worrying about a writer whose book also comes pre-anointed by the literary establishment and will inevitably be a bestseller, but her attack on what she refers to as “an obscure Minneapolis children’s book author with three cats and a murderous rage.” This unidentified writer’s work has been longlisted for the National Book Award and is widely considered among the best in the children’s literature field. Part of the reason so many people object to Jonathan Franzen’s privileged treatment in the media is then underscored here: the kind of attention given to his work is often denied women writers. It is definitely denied to women writers of children’s literature (who must be simply obscure murderous cat owners), even though many of history’s finest novels belong to this very genre. Perhaps in the future the columnist could take five minutes to do a little homework.

Best,

Gwenda Bond

(And yes, I put in supporting links after so they could verify. I’m posting here in case they decline to run it – which something tells me they will. But you put down Anne Ursu? Defending Franzen? YOU GO TOO FAR.)

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Only the Good Stuff: So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed

SO YOU’VE BEEN PUBLICLY SHAMED by Jon Ronson

“And then one day it hit me. Something of real consequence was happening. We were at the start of a great renaissance of public shaming. After a lull of almost 180 years (public punishments were phased out in 1837 in the United Kingdom and in 1839 in the United States), it was back in a big way. When we deployed shame, we were utilizing an immensely powerful tool. It was coercive, borderless, and increasing in speed and influence. Hierarchies were being leveled out. The silenced were getting a voice. It was the democratization of justice.”

The “great renaissance of public shaming” that bestselling author and journalist Jon Ronson refers to in the opening chapter of his latest book, So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, is, of course, the result of the rise of social media. Yet, while it may level hierarchies and democratize justice, Ronson quickly discovers that this brave new world also comes with a hefty cost.

The book chronicles several stories of the crushing impact that public shaming via social media has had on the lives of helpless and hapless individuals. Ruined careers and reputations, destroyed relationships, and even threats of violence and death have all resulted from seemingly innocuous crimes, like telling questionable jokes or posting offensive images without the benefit of their ameliorating context. While social media may give voice to the voiceless, it quickly becomes apparent in Ronson’s book that there is no guarantee that the voiceless will use their newfound power in a just or humane way. Indeed, I walked away from this read more wary than ever about the dangers of the mob mentality inherent in social media. We are all, it seems, a poorly phrased tweet or ill-conceived Facebook post away from a viral infamy that could ruin our lives.

This is by no means a hyperbolic statement.

Case in point: In December of 2013, Justine Sacco was about to board a plane to South Africa to visit some family members when she tweeted an admittedly cringe-worthy joke about AIDS to her 170 Twitter followers:

“Going to Africa. Hope I don’t get AIDS. Just kidding. I’m white!”

Though Sacco intended the joke to be an ironic critique of white privilege related to the AIDS crisis in Africa, that context was completely lost on the Twitterverse. By the time her plane landed in Cape Town, her tweet had gone viral, and she was the number one trending topic in the world. Ronson chronicles in painful detail the resulting fallout. Millions of people followed the fracas, with thousands tweeting their outrage, calling Sacco racist, ignorant, and disgusting, among other, more profane insults. Threats of physical violence ensued. Numerous demands were made for Sacco to be fired, which she quickly was from her "dream job" as a P.R. executive at a New York-based Internet firm. She was castigated by her family in South Africa and was forced into hiding for her own safety during the remainder of her visit. On her return to the U.S., she spent months in isolation, unable to find another job in her profession because of her now toxic name and reputation. Ronson interviews her several months after the incident to find that she still suffers from depression and has been unable to piece her life back together. She won’t even dare go on a date, because, as she suggests, everybody Googles the people they go out with nowadays.

This is only one of many similar stories described in the book.

Ronson, the author of such offbeat titles as The Men Who Stare at Goats and The Psychopath Test, is a sympathetic and humorous writer with a conversational prose style that enlivens his insightful exploration of this complex issue. As a result, So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed is an absorbing and thought-provoking read. Ronson manages to cover a lot of ground in fewer than 300 pages, touching upon the history of public shaming in Western civilization, its psychological impact on the individual, its efficacy in deterring socially unacceptable behavior, its tendency to skew more violently against women, and the positive impact that social media can have in fighting injustice and combating privilege and abuse of power. Yet, the most lingering images from the book are those of the victims of public shaming, individuals whose mistakes seem all too easy for any of us to make, and who have paid a far higher price than any compassionate person could ever possibly justify.

Indeed, the need for greater compassion in social media is the overarching theme of the book. For someone like me, who has been known to transform into an outrage troll from time to time, this message of compassion forced some serious soul searching. As Ronson’s book makes clear, it’s all too easy to pile on when someone is being publicly shamed for something that seems superficially offensive, but when viewed within the appropriate context may not be nearly so cut and dry. How offensive does one have to be in order for total destruction to become the appropriate response? And who gets to decide?

These are the kinds of troubling questions posed by So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, a book I would highly recommend to anyone who uses social media or is interested in its evolving impact on our daily lives. In particular, I think teenagers are an ideal audience, because of how inextricably modern teenage life is intertwined with social media. When one considers the devastating impact of online bullying, Ronson’s message of compassion, particularly for the young, really hits home.

This review is posted as part of The Book Review Club. Click below to check out more cool reviews from other members of the Club!

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@Barrie Summy

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Only the Good Stuff: Revolver

REVOLVER by Marcus Sedgwick

“They say that dead men tell no tales, but they’re wrong. Even the dead tell stories.”

Marcus Sedgwick’s taut, absorbing Printz-honor book, Revolver, opens with 14-year-old Sig Andersson sitting alone in his family’s cabin staring at the corpse of his father. It is the bitter Swedish winter of 1910, and Einar Andersson has just fallen through the ice of a nearby lake and frozen to death. Sig’s sister, Anna, and stepmother, Nadya, have fled to the nearest town to call for help, leaving Sig on his own to ponder why his father would have so recklessly ventured onto the thawing lake, apparently in a mad dash to return home to his family.

The answer to that question soon arrives in the form of a brutal and menacing stranger, Gunther Wolff, who carries with him terrible secrets from the past. Wolff demands that Sig return to him a fortune in gold allegedly stolen by Einar – a fortune Sig knows nothing about. With nowhere to run and no other way to protect himself and his family from the murderous Wolff, Sig must decide whether or not to use the only means of defense at his disposal: his father’s old Colt revolver.  

The eponymous weapon in Revolver looms over the entire book with the foreboding promise of Chekov’s gun. Surely, any novel thusly named must end with a gun going off. Yet, the genius of Revolver is the way in which Sedgwick meticulously manipulates plot and character to make this seemingly foregone conclusion anything but. Through a narrative structure that shifts between 1910 and a decade earlier (during the family’s ill-fated time in a Nome, Alaska stricken by gold-fever), Sedgwick carefully unravels the Andersson’s tragic backstory. Touched by violence and a series of cruel hardships — including the untimely death of Sig’s mother, Maria — the family has managed to survive through a dash of luck, Einar’s shrewdness and pragmatism, and the legacy of Maria’s deep and abiding faith in God. It is this faith that Wolff and the revolver ultimately put to the test for Sig, and his decision whether or not to use the weapon becomes the central moral question of the book. Sedgwick’s answer, when it arrives, is both surprising and deeply satisfying.

Marcus Sedgwick is one of the most interesting and gifted writers working in YA today, and the praise heaped upon Revolver when it was first published in 2009 was well deserved. Rarely have I encountered a more tightly constructed, suspenseful, and exciting novel. What’s even more remarkable is that while it entertains, it also manages to effectively engage readers with larger questions about the necessity of violence, the toxicity of vengeance, the redemptive power of faith, and how the choices we make irrevocably shape our future. This is a book that can be enjoyed and appreciated by all readers, though I suspect it will be especially appealing to boys, who will be drawn to its action, fast pace, wilderness setting, and strong and relatable protagonist.

This review is posted as part of The Book Review Club. Click below to check out more cool reviews from other members of the Club!

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@Barrie Summy

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Love this... Love Andrew Smith...

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Only the Good Stuff: Locke & Key

LOCKE & KEY by Joe Hill, illustration by Gabriel Rodriguez, coloring by Jay Fotos

Reading the Eisner-nominated Locke & Key graphic novel series is a mind-blowing experience. Spanning more than two centuries of American history and set in the fictive New England town of Lovecraft, the series of six full story arcs (encompassing 37 comics, plus two stand-alone issues) centers on the travails of the Locke family, residents of the grand and mysterious Keyhouse. The house conceals many dark secrets from its storied past. Chief among them: a collection of magical keys that unlock a variety of amazing and potentially deadly supernatural phenomenon. For example, when one key is inserted in the keyhole of a door, that door becomes a portal to any other door in the world. Other keys allow users to change gender, transform into ghosts or giants, bring shadows to life, and open an individual’s head to literally remove or insert memories, fears, and personality traits.

The first story arc in the series, “Welcome to Lovecraft,” focuses on the arrival of the Locke children at Keyhouse after surviving the horrific murder of their father. Mother Nina, daughter Kinsey, and sons Tyler and Bode all suffer from PTSD to varying degrees, and the books do a superb job of exploring the different ways each copes with this trauma, while the mysteries of their new home slowly unravel around them. The Locke children soon make friends with a local teen named Dodge, who charms his way into the heart of the family but is not all that he seems.

Over subsequent arcs in the series, we learn more about the long, troubled history of Keyhouse and the powerful keys it contains. It’s a history that stretches back to the Revolutionary War and leads up to the present-day. In each era, members of the Locke family confront the treacherous Dodge, who obsessively searches for the Omega Key, which has the ability to unleash an evil so menacing it threatens the entire world.

Joe Hill, who won the Eisner Award in 2011 for his work on the series, does a spectacular job of telling what is a highly complex and thematically rich story. The characters are all well developed and affecting, the pace remains brisk throughout, and the story is breathtakingly imagined and always engrossing. But I think Gabriel Rodriguez deserves the highest praise for his absolutely gorgeous illustrations. He truly brings the story and characters to life, capturing in beautifully detailed and vividly imagined renderings everything from the subtle inner turmoil of eldest Locke son Tyler, to the epic and astonishing powers of each of the many keys. Finally, Jay Fotos also deserves kudos for his exceptional coloring work throughout. 

The series contains adult themes and some pretty graphic depictions of violence, so younger children or those sensitive to horror and images of gore should be wary. But I highly recommend Locke & Key to sophisticated young readers who enjoy fantasy and/or horror stories and are looking for emotionally engaging, thought provoking, and totally original storytelling.

This review is posted as part of The Book Review Club. Click below to check out more cool reviews from other members of the Club!

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@Barrie Summy

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Can't wait for Skyscraping!

First review is in from Cordelia Jensen's Skyscraping and it's a great one! 

From Kirkus: 

"...Jensen’s spare free-verse poems and accessible imagery realistically portray the fraught moments of adolescent identity formation with great empathy."

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Worthy read for those who care about YA and a worthier read for those who dismiss it.

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Only the Good Stuff: Jackaby

Review: JACKABY by William Ritter

“Miss Rook, I am not an occultist,” Jackaby said. “I have a gift that allows me to see truth where others see the illusion—and there are many illusions. All the world’s a stage, as they say, and I seem to have the only seat in the house with a view behind the curtain."

With more than passing nods to a certain TARDIS-piloting, dimension-hopping Time Lord and a pipe-smoking, deerstalker-donning detective lately enjoying a renaissance in film and TV, William Ritter’s delightfully told Jackaby manages to pull off the seemingly impossible: a fresh and intriguing hero bred from strands of DNA leftover from two of the world’s most beloved (and brilliant) fictional oddballs.

The book is told from the perspective of Miss Abigail Rook, a plucky, persistent, and perceptive young woman recently arrived in the late-Victorian New England port of New Fiddleham. Miss Rook answers an ad for an “exciting opportunity” and soon finds herself petticoat-deep in the investigation of a gruesome killing spree. Her keen ability for noticing mundane details (like the contents of a wastebasket) appeals to her new employer, R. F. Jackaby, a private detective with an eye for the paranormal who has his hands otherwise full reading auras and sussing out supernatural clues. Together, they embark on the hunt for a mysterious killer who has brutally murdered a local journalist, leaving the victim inexplicably drained of blood.

Beyond his lack of social graces and penchant for unusual attire, what most closely ties Jackaby to his fictional progenitors is his ability to look beyond what others perceive. Yet, unlike Sherlock Holmes’ superhuman gift for deduction, or Dr. Who’s unearthly command of time and space, Jackaby's specialty is seeing the unseen realm that exists in parallel with our own humdrum reality. Ghosts, ghouls, and monsters of every stripe are the stock of his uncanny trade, and Ritter has done a yeoman’s job of assembling a wide variety of spirits and creatures from European folklore to populate his tale. (Hats off in particular for introducing young readers to one of the creepiest, most grizzly, yet least known of all folkloric fiends.)

As appealing as Jackaby is as a character, however, what makes the book truly hum is Miss Rook. She is an industrious young woman of considerable strength and intelligence. Unsatisfied with the limited options available to her gender, she breaks free from the repressive conformity of polite society and travels alone halfway around the world seeking adventure and personal fulfillment. In Jackaby she finds not merely an employer, but a mentor who encourages her to use her wits and stand on her own two feet, things that respectable young women of her era are simply not expected to do.

By giving us such a modern-thinking narrator, Ritter ably bridges the gap between his Victorian setting and his contemporary readership. Moreover, much as Dr. Watson does for Sherlock Holmes, Miss Rook humanizes Jackaby, enabling the reader to appreciate and enjoy his eccentricities, without revealing too many of his secrets and spoiling the air of mystery that surrounds him.

Yet, if I have any criticism at all of Jackaby the novel, it’s that the riddle of Jackaby the man is a bit too scrupulously maintained. Ritter doesn’t give the character the opportunity to display much range or complexity, and we see little of the inner workings behind the facade of his quirks. I would have liked to get to know more about what makes Jackaby tick, a glimpse at his history, perhaps, or a sense of his vulnerabilities and the burden his special gifts force him to bear. I hope I have that opportunity over the course of upcoming sequels. (Ritter’s website indicates that the character’s next appearance is in Beastly Bones, slated to be released in September, 2015.) 

These niggles aside, there is much to enjoy about Jackaby, including: a handsome and duty-bound police officer with an alarming secret; a rival police detective whom Jackaby humorously outclasses; a kind but melancholy ghost who barely tolerates Jackaby living under her roof; trolls, banshees, and werewolves (oh my!); a smoke spewing frog; a duck with a transformational backstory; and more than enough action, suspense, humor, and misdirection to keep the pages flying. By skillfully mixing all of these elements, Ritter succeeds in conjuring a magical and rare alchemy with Jackaby, creating a novel that will enchant both boys and girls, young and old alike.

I've recently joined the The Book Review Club and will be posting fresh reviews of some of my favorite recent reads on the first Wednesday of the month. Click below to check out more cool reviews from other members of the Club!

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@Barrie Summy