Up until I moved in fall of 2011 I had the great (great!) pleasure of heading out to monthly lunch dates with some fabulous friends. All writers. All talented. And all readers of MG and YA. Eventually those luncheons expanded into us bringing books to exchange. We'd show and share the books around the table and each of us would pick the books we wanted to take home and read. Next month (or so) we'd return with the books we borrowed and new books to lend. Needless to say the table was often filled with piles of books! It. was. wonderful. As were some of the lunches (er, yeah, we have some lunch horror stories otherwise I would have said all). As was the company (talking about family, writing, the craft, the business). Now I don't get to do that so much anymore. BUT. Decided that in the spirit of those lunches I'd start a new blog feature. I talk about MG on Marvelous Middle Grade Mondays, but have yet to get going on YA. That's why YA Roundtable was born. Today I am going to feature only one book. Sometimes it be more than one, but never less (ha ha!).
I'd recommend it to my writer buds (some of whom have probably already read, lol!) and all of you. And I'd say read it for the great story but also to see how you can use back story to create mystery and tension. The kind of mystery and tension that keeps you turning the page. The best part for me was also the timing...that is, how the author pulled you along to almost the middle of the book, but then finally revealed the whole story behind the back story. If she'd gone on any longer with it, it would have been too much, frustrating the reader (er, me). The main story line was compelling in its own right and had to be. If it had not been only being given hints at the backstory, the what happened would not have worked. The balance the author had worked. And as I writer I TOTALLY admired how she did it. A bit of take away on how to use backstory for aspiring author me. So. Would ya like to know about the book in case you don't already? Of course you would!
The trailer:
From IndieBound.org
Everything about Jessie Gillmansen's life changed when her mother died. Now even her hometown of Junction is changing. Mysterious dark things are happening. All Jessie wants is to avoid more change. But showing a hot new guy around Junction High, she's about to discover a whole new type of change. Pietr Rusakova is more than good looks and a fascinating accent--he's a guy with a dangerous secret. And his very existence is sure to bring big trouble to Jessie's small town. It seems change is the one thing Jessie can't avoid...
That be it from me. Hope to see you soon for another YA Roundtable where I'll share my YA reading and what books I think you can learn a lot from as a writer. Or something along those lines. I imagine this feature will grow and change as the year moves along. If there is anything in particular you'd like to see (maybe to soon to ask) do let me know! Plus...any books you know of that make particular good use of back story?
Love the roundtable idea. I haven't read 13 to Life, but I think revealing/finishing the backstory by the mid-point to two-thirds of a novel so it's out of the way by the climax sounds like a good rule of thumb.
ReplyDeleteThe two novels that I've written with significant back story are Frost and Dreamfire. In Dreamfire I handled it the usual way: little hints dropped in each chapter then the big reveal, again at about the mid-point, placed (hopefully) so that it brought the two MC's closer together. In Frost I did something different. I used the device of an English assignment for Johnny to try to tell some of his backstory in ch.8, but because of Kathy's jealousy she attaches no significance to the story and it isn't until ch. 14 that the penny finally drops...
Thanks, Nicole! I'm excited to actually get it off the ground. And thanks for sharing what you did with your books, too! Maybe I could have you on the blog to talk more about your books via this feature-character development, plotting, writing (and surviving) the first draft, lol!
DeleteSure! Any time.
DeleteSounds good! Just waiting on a couple more of your books to get here, then....let's talk!
DeleteMy favorite example of this is A Northern Light, by Jennifer Donnelly. Then again, I think pretty much everything about that book is perfect....
ReplyDelete