Bad, Bad Blogger!

It's confirmed. I'm a bad blogger. I have not blogged in over a month. For the last week I've been standing in a corner with a dunce cap on as self-inflicted punishment.

So I don't have much to report from the book world, except to say that "Dear George Clooney: Please Marry My Mom" is "at pages," meaning it's all typeset and everything (meaning it actually looks like the pages of a book). And now that it's really, truly, out of my hands ... my mind starts to turn to the next book. Fortunately, I've had an idea, and a character, percolating in my head for a number of months now. The character's been talking to me. Weird, huh? He's another boy, a little older I think, probably 14.

Here's the part where I make non-Vancouverites jealous: This is what it looked like on Christmas Day in Vancouver.

That's my son and me, on the Stanley Park seawall. It was a spectcular day. The day before, on Christmas Eve, we drove to the local mountains a half hour away and cross country skied.

I read a lot over Christmas, including two great young adult novels. The first was "Bucking the Sarge" by Christopher Paul Curtis. I love Christopher Paul Curtis's writing! My son and I read "Bud, Not Buddy" a number of years ago, which is one of my all-time favourite young adult books. That book actually inspired me to write "Word Nerd" in the first person, and was an exceptional example of how one could blend hardship with humour.

The second book was "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian" by Sherman Alexie. This was a fantastic book. I won't say anything more about it except that it's a book that can be read by teens and adults alike. It was brilliant. Funny and gut-wrenching and sad and honest.

I will try to be a better blogger from now on.