wrapped up in books

Here’s my collection of interesting posts from this week in my journeys around the web.

ON WRITING

Lauren Oliver posted a short, thoughtful piece on characters and how you have to be mean to them to sustain conflict. I’ve read Delirium, but not Before I Fall (I’m next on the hold list at the library, so I plan to review them as a pair).

Aimee at Seeking the Write life had a great post titled YA and the Inessential Penis. Yeah, you know you want to read that. It references Laini Taylor’s Daughter of Smoke and Bone, which I’ve got to read this week. If you couldn’t figure it out from the title, it’s about sex scenes in young adult literature.

Fresh Ink had this short post on punctuation that really packed a punch.

If you struggle to come up with titles for your books, here’s a great post that breaks titles into categories from Write It Sideways.

FOR TEACHERS AND LIBRARIANS

Since I work in the young adult section of the library and my partner teaches high school English, we talk about kids and books a lot. Here’s a couple of posts I sent him this week: Reasons to let kids pick their own books from Nerdy Book Club and this essay from NYT about how teaching standardized tests robs children of rich, cultural experiences of reading diverse and challenging books.

IN THE KITCHEN

I’m making butternut squash quesadillas tonight and these strawberry chocolate cupcakes for a baby shower tomorrow.

Have a great weekend!