Here it is.

The Shakespearean YA novel that I’ve been mentioning (briefly, bashfully) for years has a name, a release date, and a cover–and holy cats, is it a gorgeous one. DREAMERS OFTEN LIE, coming from Dial Books for Young Readers on April 5, 2016.

You can read the opening pages and hear more about the book at EW.com: http://www.ew.com/article/2015/09/03/dreamers-often-lie-excerpt. (Thanks to Lindsay Boggs, my magic-making publicist at PYRG, for this incredible launchpad!)

This is a book I began almost eight years ago, while I was teaching Shakespeare to my high school English students and directing school plays. It was repeatedly nudged to the back burner while I finished THE BOOKS OF ELSEWHERE and moved and traveled and toured and had a baby, but each time I lifted the lid on that slowly simmering pot, something new was rising to the surface. I think it has finally boiled down to something pretty cool.

Please go and read the sample, pre-order if you like–or better yet, mention the book to your favorite local booksellers and librarians.

It’s very different from THE BOOKS OF ELSEWHERE…but I’m excited to see this book travel out into the world and into the hands of a whole new set of readers (and maybe to some old ones, who are ready for something else dark and odd and twisty).

Thanks for the love, everybody.

Holy cats, it’s been a while.

I just managed to weather final revisions on the YA novel, Ryan’s scary bout with Lyme disease, buying a new house and packing up an old one, and a few more months of babyhood, and suddenly it’s mid-August. Everything’s on the upswing now — YA novel in copyedits, husband recovered, move rapidly approaching, baby getting bigger and more fun with every hour that passes — but this summer has felt like one long log-rolling competition. I’m starting to look forward to fall, when I can lounge in front of the fireplace (!!) in our new library (!!!) with a baby in my lap, and maybe everything will slow down for a few minutes. Or maybe not.

Proof of Beren’s increasing fun-ness: He’s starting to love books (– and not just sucking on their corners, although he loves that too). As you can see from this photo, he’s a quite a discerning reader already.

…I’m just not buying the characterization here.

Because god knows he’s reading more books than I am these days, I present the first edition of BEREN’S BABY-SIZED BOARD BOOK REVIEWS.

LITTLE BLUE TRUCK: Full of great messages about kindness, interdependence, and the importance of toads. Plus, it forces your parents to make a wide variety of animal and vehicle noises! You’ll want to hear it again (and again and again and againandagainandagain).

WHERE’S SPOT?: I don’t want to be hyperbolic here, but this may be the single greatest mystery since The Hound of the Baskervilles. Is Spot under the stairs? In the closet? Under the rug? You’ll be on the edge of your seat/mother’s lap until the stunning conclusion!

ORANGE PEAR APPLE BEAR: A compelling story told in only five words. If Hemingway had written a children’s book, this would be it.

PAT THE BUNNY: A true classic. A feast for the senses. The standard by which all others can be judged. At that climactic scene where Judy touches Daddy’s scratchy face? Gets me every time.

More news on the YA front to come. For now, it’s back to packing…

I promised some writing news, and here it is!

This is Book 1 of BEEN THERE, DONE THAT, a forthcoming collection for young readers. From the BEEN THERE, DONE THAT website:

Things have been pretty quiet around this blog for a while, and for once it isn’t my fault — it’s this guy’s.

We had a baby last week. It still seems like a vaguely impossible, too-good-to-be-true thing. Every time I bend over his bassinet and discover that he’s really there, it’s a delightful surprise.

His name is Beren, from the legends woven into The Lord of the Rings, and we think he’s pretty much the greatest.

Ryan and I have fallen into Baby World, where time seems to zoom forward during the day and tick backward at night, where yoga pants are formal wear and a walk around the block requires as much preparation as a polar expedition, and our schedules are filled with items like “Take a shower” and “Eat a sandwich” and “Change the socks you’ve been wearing for three days,” and we end up skipping about half of them, because we’ve got better things to do. Anne Greenwood Brown, one of the wonderful writers in my critique group, says that babies are like campfires; you just sit and stare at them, hypnotized by every wriggle and flicker. She’s dead on. We can hardly stand to look away.

So…that’s where most of my time, energy, and brain power has been going for the past several weeks. Luckily, Beren arrived between rounds of revision on the YA novel, and I’ve pared down my travel and appearance commitments for the remainder of the spring, so I can just nestle down inside the house with this tiny new person. So far, I’m loving this quiet time.

Of course, things aren’t actually quiet. Friends and family drop in to shower us with food and gifts and stare at the campfire for a while. And then there are the noises Beren makes. Sometimes he sounds like a squeaky door hinge, and sometimes he sounds like a baby pterodactyl; sometimes he chirps like a bird, and sometimes he hums and smacks his lips like a greedy little gourmand.

There will be more writing news here in the not-too-distant future. In the meantime, I’ll be here, in my wrinkly pajamas, staring at a baby.

We had a sludgy brown Christmas here in Red Wing, but as I type this, snow is falling, and an untouched layer of whiteness covers the world outside my windows. AT LAST.  I’ve been waiting–at first hopefully, then hungrily, then poutily, then trying to pretend that I didn’t care, even while using each evening’s early-falling darkness to imagine that everything outdoors was blanketed in snow–and now, with a cup of coffee beside me and Brom Bones snoring softly at the other end of the couch, I am content.

It’s been a strange year. And a speedy one. (My last post here had to do with All-Hallows Read, which shows how the final months of 2014 slipped away from me entirely.) The end of a five-book, thirteen-years-in-the-preparation series. Two cross-country tours. More school visits than I can count. New writing projects. Hard losses. One very big, slowly approaching gain. But whatever was happening around me or inside of me, written words kept me company, as they always have.

They’re a lot more reliable than snow.

Here’s what I read this year (rereads marked with asterisks, and read-alouds in bold):

WICKED PLANTS – Amy Stewart
MANHOOD FOR AMATEURS* – Michael Chabon
QUIDDITCH THROUGH THE AGES, THE TALES OF BEEDLE THE BARD, FANTASTIC BEASTS AND WHERE TO FIND THEM – J.K. Rowling
THE VAMPIRE LESTAT* – Anne Rice
THE ELEGANCE OF THE HEDGEHOG – Muriel Barbery
THE STRANGE CASE OF EDWARD GOREY – Alexander Theroux
GOBLIN SECRETS – Will Alexander
BOXERS AND SAINTS – Gene Luen Yang
EMMY AND THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING RAT – Lynne Jonell
WONDER WOMAN 1 & 2 (Blood and Guts) – Brian Azzarello, Cliff Chiary
ADVENTURES OF A CAT-WHISKERED GIRL – Daniel Pinkwater
SPIN – Robert Charles Wilson
QUIET: THE POWER OF INTROVERTS IN A WORLD THAT WON’T STOP TALKING – Susan Cain
THE PLEASURES AND SORROWS OF WORK – Alain de Botton
SIN AND THE SECOND CITY – Karen Abbott
THE FOURTH STALL – Chris Rylander
A RELIABLE WIFE – Robert Goolrick
BAD MOTHER* – Ayelet Waldman
THE CHILDREN OF ODIN – Padraic Colum
CULTURE SHOCK: JAPAN – P. Sean Bramble
BRADBURY SPEAKS: TOO SOON FROM THE CAVE, TOO FAR FROM THE STARS – Ray Bradbury
COUNTRY GIRL – Edna O’Brien
THE MASTER BUTCHERS SINGING CLUB – Louise Erdrich
THE DROWNED WORLD – J.G. Ballard
TOM WAITS ON TOM WAITS: INTERVIEWS AND ENCOUNTERS – Paul Maher Jr., Ed.
VIRGINIA WOOLF: A BIOGRAPHY – Quentin Bell
DANSE MACABRE – Stephen King
THE BOOK OF JEZEBEL – Anna Holmes, Ed.
A WOLF AT THE TABLE – Augusten Burroughs
THE OCTOBER COUNTRY – Ray Bradbury
FIVE FLAVORS OF DUMB – Antony John
A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE: A GAME OF THRONES – George R. R. Martin
THE OLD WILLIS PLACE – Mary Downing Hahn
CAUTIONARY TALES FOR CHILDREN – Hilaire Belloc and Edward Gorey
THE GHOST IN THE GLASS HOUSE – Carey Wallace
ROOFTOPPERS – Katherine Rundell
SKELLIG – David Almond
THE HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES*  – Nathaniel Hawthorne
SONG WITHOUT WORDS: DISCOVERING MY DEAFNESS HALFWAY THROUGH LIFE – Gerald Shea
FAR FROM THE TREE: PARENTS, CHILDREN, AND THE SEARCH FOR IDENTITY – Andrew Solomon
COUNTY O – Robert Hedin
THE TRIP TO ECHO SPRING: ON WRITERS AND DRINKING – Olivia Laing
WHAT’S THAT PIG OUTDOORS: A MEMOIR OF DEAFNESS – Henry Kisor
THE APOTHECARY – Maile Meloy
SCARY, NO SCARY – Zachary Schomburg
DOLL BONES – Holly Black
WOULD COULD THAT BE AT THIS HOUR? – Lemony Snicket
THE CABINET OF EARTHS – Anne Nesbit
GALVESTON – Nic Pizzolatto
WE WERE LIARS – E. Lockhart
EON – Alison Goodman
A CROOKED KIND OF PERFECT – Linda Urban
HOW I LIVE NOW – Meg Rosoff
DOLL BABY – Laura Lane McNeal
CLEMENTINE – Sara Pennypacker
CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY* – Roald Dahl
PICTURES OF HOLLIS WOODS – Patricia Reilly Giff
DIAL-A-GHOST – Eva Ibbotson
WISCONSIN LORE – Robert E. Gard and L.G. Sorden, collectors
DANNY THE CHAMPION OF THE WORLD – Roald Dahl
ALABASTER: GRIMMER TALES – Caitlin R. Kiernan
WAIT TIL HELEN COMES* – Mary Downing Hahn
ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT – Erich Maria Remarque
THE GHOST OF CRUTCHFIELD HALL – Mary Downing Hahn
MADE FROM SCRATCH: DISCOVERING THE PLEASURES OF A HANDMADE LIFE – Jenna Woginrich
CHANGING MY MIND: OCCASIONAL ESSAYS – Zadie Smith
THE BLUE JAY’S DANCE: A BIRTH YEAR* – Louise Erdrich
DEMIAN – Herman Hesse
CARSICK – John Waters
DANIEL DERONDA – George Eliot
SEX, DRUGS, AND COCOA PUFFS: A LOW CULTURE MANIFESTO – Chuck Klosterman
CLASS MATTERS –  Correspondents of the New York Times
SPLENDORS AND GLOOMS – Laura Amy Schlitz
THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO – Stieg Larsson
UNACCUSTOMED EARTH – Jhumpa Lahiri
THE MAN IN THE EMPTY BOAT – Mark Salzman
SEX & VIOLENCE – Carrie Mesrobian
OPERATING INSTRUCTIONS: A JOURNAL OF MY SON’S FIRST YEAR* – Anne Lamott
REIGN OF ERROR: THE HOAX OF THE PRIVATIZATION MOVEMENT AND THE DANGER TO AMERICA’S PUBLIC SCHOOLS – Diane Ravitch
THE BEST OF FRIENDS: MARTHA AND ME – Mariana Pasternak
SEXUAL POLITICS – Kate Millett
THE UNLIKELY ADVENTURES OF MABEL JONES: THE VOYAGE OF THE FERROSHUS MAGGOT – Will Mabbitt
NEW ORLEANS CITY GUIDE: AMERICAN GUIDE SERIES – Federal Writers’ Project/WPA, 1938
AN ACCIDENTAL ADVENTURE #3: WE GIVE A SQUID A WEDGIE – C. Alexander London
ANNA AND THE FRENCH KISS – Stephanie Perkins
TALES FROM MOOMIN VALLEY – Tove Janssen
THROUGH THE WOODS – Emily Carroll

It’s crazy — as I type this list, I can suddenly recall exactly which book I was reading at the gate in Reagan International Airport, or Richmond, or Phoenix; which book was with me on a balcony on Jekyll Island, Georgia, or in a teeny white cottage in coastal New Hampshire, or in a patisserie in the French Quarter; which books I read to Ryan in the car on Thursday night trips between Minneapolis and Red Wing and which ones he read to me in the kitchen while I made dinner.  Thank goodness for books. Without them, a lot more of this year would be a blur.

There are lots of wonderful things on this list, including some old favorites, but a few first-time reads that stand out in my mind are David Almond’s SKELLIG, a British children’s novel published in 1998 that is so spare and subtle and strange and beautiful I’ve had trouble describing it without getting teary, THE MASTER BUTCHERS SINGING CLUB, which is one of those books that is so perfectly constructed that you don’t even notice the complex, distinctive writing until it knocks you over with its beauty (and then does it again and again), and THROUGH THE WOODS, Emily Carroll’s 2014 graphic novel, which uses that increasingly well-worn trick of re-imagining fairy tales, but in a way that feels entirely sharp and fresh. Distinctive, rich, eerie, and lovely.

Wishing you a New Year full of good stories–both the true and the almost-true kind.

I’m overdue for a tour recap, but this is just a mini-post to spread the word that over at my main Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/pages/Jacqueline-West/112573782122159?ref=bookmarks ) between now and noon on Halloween, you can enter to win one of two signed paperback copies of THE STRANGERS, along with some creepy books of my choice.  Go forth and comment!  Happy All Hallow’s Read!

(Poster via Introverted Wife.)

…one of my favorite places to be.  (And here’s something great to read while you’re there.)

With October in Minnesota comes the Twin Cities Book Festival: a big, free, day-long event at the State Fairgrounds on Saturday, October 11.  All the info you possibly want is here.  The lineup of authors is incredible, and I’m honored to be included.  Here’s what’s going on at Middle Grade HQ:

I’ll be telling lies (and some truths) with Margi Preus and S.A. Bodeen from 12:00 – 12:45, and you can find me at the signing tables afterward.  Then be sure to head over to the Teen Tent and/or the Children’s Pavilion, where you won’t be able to swing a book bag without hitting an amazing author. (This is not one of my lies.)

Reviews of STILL LIFE are still coming in — including a recent one in Newsday that concludes, “This exciting book will have you on the edge of your seat.”  Nice to hear, and a nice place to hear it from.

Event news/reminder: One week from tomorrow (in other words, on Tuesday, September 16th) I’ll be at the public library in New Ulm, MN at 6:00 p.m. to read, talk about The Books of Elsewhere, and answer questions.  Books will be available for sale, and I’ll happily sign anything readers buy or bring.

On to the actual blog.

Last month, the Guardian featured this: A Previously Unpublished Chapter of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Roald Dahl is one of the reasons that I write for young readers. I had coincidentally just finished rereading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory when my husband sent me this link, and I’m approximately halfway through the first draft of a new middle grade novel of my own.  Reading this was just what I needed, and not just because the chapter is full of fudge.  It was what I needed because the chapter isn’t “previously unpublished” in the way of those “bonus scenes” that appear on DVD menus — like something finished and polished and fully-formed but that just didn’t make the final cut.  It’s from an early draft.  Maybe even the very first draft.

And the final draft is so DIFFERENT.

– First of all, the Vanilla Fudge Room doesn’t even get a whole chapter in the final book.  It’s cut/combined with another room in the factory where there is indeed a fudge mountain, and pickaxe-wielding Oompa-Loompas are scaling it.
– Second, the chapter starts out by telling us about ‘the remaining eight children,’ when anybody who’s read the book or seen the movie knows that there are only five golden ticket-winning kids to begin with.  Who are these Wilbur Rice and Tommy Troutbeck anyway, and what is up with their boring names? (Also, Augustus Pottle eventually became Augustus Gloop, which is a really good thing.)
– In this draft, it’s Charlie’s mother who accompanies him on the factory tour, not scrawny, elderly, adorable Grandpa Joe.
– THERE ARE NO OOMPA LOOMPAS.  The factory workers are just ‘men.’ And they don’t chant any long and scathing rhymes about the children’s flaws.  All we get is one measly couplet.
– Then there’s the writing itself.  It doesn’t read or sound or feel like Roald Dahl yet.  It’s a little…well…bare-bones and bland.

This chapter is proof that all of the Dahl-ian magic–the vivid names, the wordplay, the oddity, the tone–came later.  Maybe in the second draft.  Or the fifth draft.  Or the thirty-third.

At school visits and writing workshops, I try to emphasize the importance of revision.  That revision isn’t just about misspellings and grammar mistakes and word choice and sentence structure, or any of those little tweaks that happen at sentence level.  That it’s the magic that happens between the first draft and the final one.  I explain that, in fact, your very first draft might seem to you like a pile of flaming poo (although I usually don’t use those words).  I say that every writer I know of is or was unsatisfied with their first drafts, and that even great writers make massive changes in plot, characterization, style, you name it, between the very first version and the final one.  Even though I’ve repeated these ideas to other people hundreds of times, I sometimes need to be reminded of them myself.  Especially when I’m halfway through another flaming pile of a first draft.

Hello, world!

Lots of good news on the Elsewhere front:

VOL. 5: STILL LIFE was included in this roundup of recent MG/YA releases by the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. (“Still Life winds up the McMartin saga with emotional complexity and suspense, and the denouement of the tale is generous and joyful.” Lovely to hear.)

Meanwhile, VOL. 4: THE STRANGERS has been selected as a finalist in the Middle Grade category of the 2014 Silver Falchion Awards.  (Also lovely to hear — although I did have to look up “falchion,” an admission that would shock and disappoint Middle Ages expert Rutherford, I’m sure.)

And my editor, the absolutely splendid Jessica Dandino Garrison, was recently featured on the Penguin Blog to talk about Jandy Nelson’s upcoming book, I’LL GIVE YOU THE SUN, and everyone should read this and see how absolutely splendid she is (and to check out the row of books right behind her in the photo!).

August is when invitations for the upcoming school year turn from a dribble into a deluge.  I’m trying to keep my head above the email flood, but my reader mail response time has been pretty unimpressive lately.  If I owe you a reply: I’m sorry for the lag, and it will eventually be on its way, I promise.

Thanks to that email flood, fall is shaping up to be an exciting season: the Twin Cities Book Festival, school and book club visits, a five-state tour in October…  If you’d like to know where I’ll be, keep an eye on my appearance calendar.

Finally, because every post should have a picture, here’s what I made for the 2015 Waupaca BookFest tote bag fundraiser.  (Sketching this showed me just how rusty I am with pen and ink.  Which is a way of pretending that I used to be better at it.)

Apparently I last posted here on June 16th, the day before STILL LIFE’s release.  Between then and now, there have been reviews and interviews, book parties, family trips to Yellowstone and Virginia, lots of writing, a strange muddle of post-book-release/series-conclusion emotions, and some other news that will have to wait for a later post to be revealed.

There’s been too much STILL LIFE stuff to sum it all up here, but I’ll mention a few highlights.  Kirkus called the book “A thoroughly satisfying reward for loyal fans of the series”; School Library Journal wrote that “The suspenseful and well-realized world that West has created comes to a satisfying conclusion”; VOYA gave it a star (Hooray!) and said “This final volume emphasizes the importance of friendship and support. . . . Olive’s efforts bring great rewards for herself and her readers. . . . Order the series” and according to KidsReads.com, “STILL LIFE is like a firework finale. It’ll make you “Oh” and “Ah” as the writer increases the intensity of the book to its final crescendo… There are twists and turns that will have readers guessing, and surprises are abundant.”  All of this is lovely to hear.

And, as promised, here are some event photos:

(Party at Red Balloon, signing at Fox Den Used Books, HoverDraft reading at Wild Rumpus)

And there are more events to come.
Locally, I’ll be at Chapter2Books in Hudson, WI on Saturday, August 2nd, at 2:00 p.m. The bookstore has been hosting a “Where’s Olive?” scavenger hunt involving a bunch of local businesses, and the event on the 2nd will feature prizes, games and activities, and treats.
On Saturday, August 16th, I’m teaching a single-session class called “Reading (and Writing) Minds: Creating Believable Characters” at Crossings at Carnegie in Zumbrota, MN. Lots more info here.
Then, at 10:30 a.m. on Thursday, August 21st, I’ll be speaking at Spring Valley Public Library in Spring Valley, WI.

And not-so-locally…
My marvelous publisher is sending me on a five-state solo tour this fall. (There’s a whole other muddle of emotions–mostly really good ones–that comes with having this on the horizon.) I’ll get the chance to stop in several cities I haven’t visited before (at least not on book business), and I’ll get to make a bookstore stop and a school visit in each location. Here’s where you can find me:
Sunday, October 19, 3:00 p.m. Schuler Books & Music, Lansing, MI
Monday, October 20, 7:00 p.m. Anderson’s Bookshop, Naperville, IL
Wednesday, October 22, 5:00 p.m. Changing Hands Bookstore, Phoenix, AZ
Thursday, October 23, 6:00 p.m. University Book Store, Seattle, WA
Friday, October 24, 7:00 p.m. Powell’s Books, Portland, OR
Saturday, October 25, 4:00 p.m. Barnes & Noble, Orem, UT

If you’re interested and in the area — or if you know any young readers who would or could be — I’d be really, really grateful if you turned up and/or spread the word.

Just as I hoped, the best thing about wrapping up The Books of Elsewhere has been finally getting the time and brain space to plunge into a new project.  I’m about halfway through a first draft of a first book in what I think might become a trilogy, but I’ll have to see where the story leads me.  Fortunately, it’s starting to do just that.  The characters are becoming complex and interesting and sometimes disobedient, and I’ve already had the wonderful flash where suddenly a bunch of plot pieces tear themselves up, recombine, and fall into new and better places, and all of this feels reassuringly, reinvigoratingly good.

More to come.  And in less than a month.  I almost promise.