Odd Lots

In school I bonded with a girl over our shared love for the classic The Dark Crystal movie -- and our love for David Bowie in Labyrinth. (Oh, admit it. You were all about David Bowie, too.) Today I had to email her, because via Bookshelves of Doom, I discovered that there's more Dark Crystal -- manga style. Whoo! Tell me you don't recognize those pointy Muppet ears! If ever a storyline was perfect for the medium -- The Dark Crystal is it. I think they should go ahead and do the Labyrinth, too... because who doesn't like a good Goblin King?

Via The Guardian blog, all writers should write -- outside of the house. Viva la shed! Or, as the case may be, the coffee shop... That never has worked for me -- I'm far too nosy. But apparently all the 'greats' don't write at home. Maybe I have a greater ability to ignore piles of laundry than the average person?

The library here had a great display with Before I Die featured prominently on the shelf... Of course, I snatched it up. Stay tuned for my response to the book, but as for my thoughts on Shaken & Stirred's (and others) comments on the stupid Entertainment Weekly quotes - who on earth really believes that a novel is "handicapped" by being put in a YA category? I mean, who seriously, really and truly believes that? I can't help but think this was the author's moment to just make a cheap shot at YA because it's supposed to be for children or something.

There are enough issues in book classification otherwise to make a snark about YA just pointless. What about all of the books written by authors of a certain ethnicity, which get shelved by ethnic group instead of topic? Talk about a "handicap." At least a YA label means the book will still. Get. Read... (Eye rolling sigh.)

Like Big A, little a, I was heartsick over author Siohban Dowd's untimely death, and unlike that intrepid blogger, I can't quite bring myself to read Dowd's book. (No. That doesn't make sense. I know, I know. It's on my pile, but I'm wincing, for some reason.) Anyway - check out the review at Big A, little a, written by Bigger A -- Big A's MOM. I tell ya, that blogger manages to get more of her family working! Occasionally there's a 'little a' review, and I think there's even a 'Big A' on a Cybils team...

I was SO JEALOUS of S.E. Hinton when I was a kid. I mean, who was she to have written a novel when she was like, seventeen? And why couldn't I? And here it is, forty years later, and The Outsiders is still a book that sucks you in. I can only hope that forty years from now, that's still true of what I write!