Teen Writers Bloc

I’ve followed Teen Writers Bloc pretty much since its inception, and what I’ve loved most about it is the variety of perspectives the bloggers provide on their experience as writers and MFA students. I graduated from The New School Writing for Children program in 2010, and it’s been fun to read their posts and reminisce about my own time there.

The question the bloggers are tackling this month has to do with whether this MFA program is worthwhile. After reading Mary’s response, I realized how different my experience in the program was compared to hers.

Some things haven’t changed. The program still has its benefits and drawbacks, which I’m sure is true of many graduate programs. Like Mary, I didn’t find the adult literature class I took to be very useful, and I was equally offended by the administration’s assumption that children’s literature writers aren’t real writers unless they study adult lit. What a load of crap!

Also, like Mary, the main reason I loved the program was because of the writers I formed a community with while there. The support I receive from them even now, two years later, is invaluable. Not all twelve of us keep in touch anymore, but the five that I do keep in touch with are awesome.

One point Mary made in her post gave me pause:

“Finally, there’s the problem of low expectations. If you wanted to, you could graduate from the program without ever having completed a novel. The thesis requirement is only fifty pages. You could literally write only fifty pages in the entire program and still graduate.” 

Here’s where I respectfully disagree, and where my experience in the program differed.

I agree that MFA applicants need to decide what their expectations are before entering a program like this, because a lot of it is what you make of it. However, I don’t agree with the idea that if you don’t complete a novel by the end of the program, your expectations are too low. It’s not so black and white. The creative section of my thesis was only seventy pages (18,000 words). I certainly wrote way more than seventy pages over the course of the program (since I started several projects before deciding to focus on one), but I didn’t complete an entire novel.

There were two main reasons for this. One was a lack of time. I had a full-time job while in the program, and was also planning my wedding, so I found it hard to write every day. Along with all of the other program requirements (reading a book a week, critiquing several submissions a week, attending readings, and of course attending class), it was a lot to juggle. Second, I had never written a novel before. I entered the program having only ever written short stories.

My personal expectation for the program was to learn more about kid lit (through the literature classes), improve my writing (through the workshops) and get as far into a novel as I could. I would have loved to finish an entire novel, and I wrote as much as I could, but a completed manuscript wasn’t in the cards.

Despite that, I was so proud of my thesis! And I’ve since finished and revised that book. What I really wanted out of the program was to kick start my career, and it did just that.So while I agree that you do have to think about WHY you want to get an MFA and WHAT you want to accomplish, it’s okay if you don’t end up completing a whole manuscript. In fact, I was one of many people in my class who only submitted portions of manuscripts for their theses and completed their books after the program ended. At the time, none of my classmates had agents or book deals. Many of us (myself included) are still working toward that goal. None of us are unmotivated. We were just at an earlier stage of our careers while at The New School. We took our time getting the pages we wrote for our theses right.

One thing that’s very clear about the Class of 2012 is that they are a very motivated and productive bunch. I’m seriously impressed by how they’ve supported each other and pushed one another to write so much. I’m sure they’ll have long and successful careers, and I feel the same way about my old classmates! If there’s one thing I’ve learned from getting an MFA, and being a writer in general, it’s that everyone follows their own journey and writes at their own pace.

Thanks, Teen Writers Bloc, for letting me share my experience!

Ghenet Myrthil is a 2010 graduate of The New School Writing for Children program. She’s currently seeking representation for her contemporary young adult novel. You can find her blogging at www.ghenetmyrthil.com and tweeting @ghenet

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I’m crazy. Or… maybe it’s my life that’s crazy. Or maybe it’s a little bit from column A, a lot bit from column B.

Now that we’ve hit April and we only have one month left of our MFA program (eeps!), we at TWB are looking at the idea of “spring cleaning.” And boy, do I need some of that. Actually, it’s more like I need a full-time professional organizer, like one of those people on Hoarders.

Here are just a few of the things I’m currently juggling:

- Near full-time job as a writer for a pop culture website.

- Edits (and behind-the-scenes stuff like back cover copy and character and scene descriptions for the cover artists) on my first novel, which will be published by Sourcebooks Fire next year.

- Writing my current work-in-progress, which is a tricky endeavor indeed.

- Working on edits for my thesis with my thesis advisor Sarah Ketchersid.

- Contributing to my various blogging projects, including TWB!

-Working with my awesome critique group (holla Amy, Caela, Mary, & Riddhi!) each week.

- Starting a new manuscript-critiquing business with the fabulous Dhonielle Clayton.

- Other. (In this case, “other” includes such things as finding time to see my husband, friends, and family, cleaning my apartment, paying attention to my dog, and sleeping.)

The good news is that, though my schedule is filled to the brim, it’s filled with good stuff. I was able to quit several of my part-time and freelance jobs so that I don’t really have to do much bull**** work anymore. That was the first step in my spring (life?) cleaning process. Step two is getting organized. Writing lists, setting iPhone reminders, banishing the word “procrastination” from my life. I think I can, I think I can…

In a perfect world, I would be able to work on my own books full time. And hopefully someday that will happen. But until then, it’s going to have to be “spring cleaning” – all year round!

Futurama photo courtesy of 20th Century Fox

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Hurray for women! And especially hurray for women authors!

In honor of March being Women’s History Month, we at TWB are taking a look at our favorite groundbreaking female authors from history and today. My favorite female author from the past came to me immediately, but choosing just one from the present was a hard one for me. But after weighing all the wonderful merits of today’s female authorial world, I finally reached a decision.

Jess’s Favorite Female Author from History:

Jane Austen! Duh. Not only was the woman a total genius, she managed to write six amazing novels (and publish four while she was still alive) while living in a less-than-ideal time for women who wanted to work outside of the home. And on top of that, she managed to use her stories to somehow get away with making thinly-veiled and oftentimes scathing observations of the society in which she lived.

Jane figured out something long ago that many of us writers are just only starting to realize – in fiction, anything can happen. Though she desperately wanted to fall in love and get married, it never happened for her. So she made certain that her characters would get to live the life she always wanted for herself but could never have. Elizabeth, Emma, Elinor and Marianne, Fanny, Catherine, and Anne all live get their “happily ever after” – even if they do face some obstacles along the way.

Jess’s Favorite Female YA Author Today:

Laurie Halse Anderson! The woman is a genius, ‘nough said. One of the main reasons I love Laurie is that she isn’t afraid of the scary issues. Speak, her first young adult novel, is about a 13-year-old girl who becomes mute after being raped. Wintergirls is about eating disorders and self-mutilation. Catalyst is about incest and death. Twisted is about depression and suicide. Yeah, not exactly light reading, but these stories are so, so important and I commend Laurie for tackling them so beautifully and astutely.

Happy Women’s History Month, everyone!

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#DidYouKnow that we live in a world of technology? Everyone has a cell phone – now-a-days the iPhone is like the common cold: everywhere and hard to shake – and with the surge in applications like Twitter and Facebook comes the death of #grammar.

I’ve noticed this when I’m editing papers. When did it become acceptable to write “n” instead of “and,” or “cuz” instead of “because”? When did the use of the semi-colon become so widespread it’s like the plague of essay writing?

It’s commonly referred to as Text Language, as if improper spelling and grammar deserves its own proper name. What used to only be commonplace in instant messaging (you know, back when AIM was an actual form of communication) is now creeping into academic essays and worse – young adult fiction.

Maybe it’s a believability issue, but I think writing in Text Language in a YA book is not an artistic move; it’s just perpetuating the idea that all teens write grammatically incorrect sentences when they text their friends, or update their statuses (or worse, when teens IM each other in books – since IMing is so popular #insertsarcasmhere). Take, for example, my 17-year-old sister, who is a frequent contributor to my Facebook Newsfeed. I’ve had conversations with her multiple times over the last few years where she has expressed her disgust when her friends (or people she knows) text her grammatically incorrect text messages. In her words, “How %@$^&#$*& hard is it to type a complete sentence with punctuation?!”

I just think that those who write young adult novels and employ Text Language are just encouraging today’s youth to continue writing (and text messaging) in grammatically incorrect sentences. If not, I fear the apocalypse. Trees will shrivel up like old, dried-up broccoli. Volcanoes will spew out venom-squirting raccoons that will take up residence in our garbage cans and eat us when we throw out the trash. Stars will collide (and not in the romantic way that songs inaccurately depict – I’m talking Bruce Willis in Armageddon or Tea Leoni in the oft-forgot about Deep Impact). Britney Spears might even cease to exist altogether.

So this is a call to all YA writers: #GrammarSavesLives

Cartoon courtesy of Chris Madden

Popularity: 21%

Shaw. Professor Shaw.

That’s my new title. Okay, well technically my title is Assistant Professor Shaw, but Professor sounds so much cooler. I can finally thank The New School for that master’s degree — that $40k piece of paper that hangs on my freshly painted bedroom walls. It feels good.

I’ve known for many years now that I wanted to teach. That’s half of the reason I decided to go to The New School (the other half was to improve my writing so that I could get an agent and get published. Ahem … Earth to agents. This is for you. Ahem!), so it’s nice to know that I am finally teaching.

Where: The College of New Rochelle.

What: Writing 102: Critical Research Essay

When: Why am I telling you this? So you show up and slaughter me on my way to class?

It’s a required freshman writing course geared towards showing students how to write a well-developed research paper.

Typically, the thought of writing is one that makes students want to scream. So you could imagine what writing a research paper must do to them. That’s why I’ve decided to take a mass media/pop culture spin on the proceedings.

What do Facebook, Britney Spears, Suzanne Collins, South Park, Saved by the Bell, Modern Family, People Magazine, The New York Times, Drake, Lady Gaga and Beyonce, Don Henley, Chuck Klosterman, Dove, United Colours of Benetton, and many, many more pop culture references have in common?

They’re all a part of my class.

Example: On the second day of class, we listened to a few songs about fame and media influence, like Drake’s “Headlines” and Lady Gaga’s “The Fame.” My first essay assignment had my students compare Britney Spears’s “Piece of Me” to Don Henley’s “Dirty Laundry” and discuss what each says about the media’s influence. I’m also having them read Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games because of what it says about our reality TV-obsessed culture. (Does anyone think Hunger Games is basically one giant commentary on Britney’s head-shaving, paparazzi-umbrella-attacking breakdown?)

Not your typical run-of-the-mill writing course, eh?

Exactly.

It’s weird being on the other side of the red pen. But it’s natural. I come alive during class time, and I live to create assignments. My goal is to foster a fun learning environment that provokes discussions that ignites my students’ creativity, hopefully gives them ideas for their writing, and helps them dive deeper into their own thoughts. Last week, I had them read a study on online gender-swapping. Then I had them use Facebook to study a member of the opposite sex and write a few paragraphs on gender construction.

I’m employing everything I’ve learned in my career as a writing student (and that of a writing tutor) to kick ass as Professor Shaw.

We’re entering the fourth week of classes, and so far I have a wonderful group of students who really seem to respond to the material. We have our first writing workshop on Monday.

Stay tuned for more stories and lessons from The Other Side of the Red Pen as they develop!

Photo Credit: The Daily News and New York Post

Popularity: 20%

Happy holidays, everyone! Now that we’ve reached the end of 2011, we at Teen Writers Bloc have come together with our favorite kid lit and YA books of the year. Here they are, in alphabetical order by author:

Bronxwood by Coe Booth
Caela says: Bronxwood is a must-read for any kid who has ever had a parent in prison.  Tyrell’s struggles to love, obey, and still disagree with his father when he returns from incarceration are poignant and heart wrenching.

Crossed by Ally Condie
Jess says: Though it’s not quite as gripping as its predecessor, Matched (read the review here!), Crossed, the second book in Ally Condie’s series, is a solid “middle book,” filled with beautiful language and a compelling story — complete with a giant mystery that will keep you guessing until the very end. It is also told from Ky’s, as well as Cassia’s, point of view, so those of you who didn’t get nearly enough of Ky in the first book will be super happy to be inside his head in this one.

Circle Nine by Anne Heltzel
Jane says: I went to one of David Levithan’s book readings at the NYPL and heard an excerpt read by Circle Nine’s author Anne Heltzel. Abby wakes up outside a burning building and is pulled away by Sam, a boy she doesn’t recognize but somehow feels a connection to. She has no memories of who she is or where she came from. Abby is happy to start a new life with Sam, but events and memories bring up the need to figure out who she is and what happened the night of the fire. Read the TWB interview with Anne Heltzel here!

The Eleventh Plague by Jeff Hirsch
Jane says: I chose to read this one because I don’t know of a lot of YA books that have a male narrator. It’s about 16 year old Stephen who’s living in a post-apocalyptic future with his dad and grandfather. The family wanders the land, looking for a place to live and where they can avoid being found by gangs that find people to enslave them. Grandpa dies and Dad has an accident that results in a coma, so when Stephen looks for help, he finds Settlers Landing, a town that’s rebuilt by a group of people trying to regain civilization. Stephen becomes involved in a prank that puts Settlers Landing and lives in danger, and he has to figure out how to deal with the aftermath.

The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin
Jess says: The book starts off with our narrator and heroine, Mara, telling us that Mara Dyer is actually not her real name. Her lawyer insisted that if she is to tell her story to the world—the story of how she committed several murders—she must choose a nom de plume. So, right off the bat, we know this is not going to be a story for the faint of heart. Mara is going to kill people, and she is going to get caught. But how it all goes down is anything but predictable. If you are a sucker for dark, paranormal teen romances, trust me when I say you will love this book. Read the TWB review here!

Icefall by Matthew J. Kirby
Mary says:  Full of well-drawn characters and emotional pull, the story builds slowly and grows on you until you are right there in the frozen, claustrophobic fortress. Each person has their own motivations, feelings, and strengths. No one is idealized, and no one is simple. Kirby has done a masterful job of creating tension, intrigue, and action—even though the characters have limited space in which to move. Solveig especially is many-faceted and manages to be both relatable and awesome. Readers will enjoy exploring this world with her. Read the TWB review here!

Bumped by Megan McCafferty
Jess says: Bumped is one of the most fascinating books I’ve read in… maybe ever. Though it has a sort-of “popcorn” feel to it, filled to the brim with cheesy references, corny names, and teen celebrity lust, underneath all that, there is an extremely edgy, daring story. What would happen if everyone over the age of 18 became infertile and it was up to teenagers to continue the human species? In this day and age of Teen Mom and 16 and Pregnant, it’s a question that, amazingly, doesn’t seem so far-fetched. This book is a fun, quick read, and yet, I guarantee it will really make you think.

A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness
Mary says: A Monster Calls is a great illustration of how fantasy can depict reality better than so-called “realism.” What, after all, is more real than our greatest fear? For younger children, that fear might be a monster under the bed or in the closet, but as we get older, we begin to realize that real life contains monsters that can’t be scared away by a bright light. The author’s writing is sparse but lyrical. With few characters and not a single gimmick, Ness brings us into a world of nightmares. Whether the nightmares will end depends on Conor. How will he face the monster that stalks him? Ness’s poignant answers make this book required reading for anyone, young or old, who appreciates the power of a story to reveal truth. Read the TWB review here!

Lisel & Po by Lauren Oliver
Dhonielle says: Liesl & Po has the best blend and balance of both magic and mystery, danger and safety. The tale reminds me of the books I used to stay up late to read as a kid — both classic and modern. Each character has layers and secrets, and Oliver’s flowery prose brings them alive. This book will stand up for multiple readings.

Glow by Amy Kathleen Ryan
Jess says: Part Lord of the Flies, part Bumped, and part Battlestar Galactica, Glow is filled with murder, deception, and nonstop action. The characters are layered and complicated, to the point where you never entirely know who to trust. Sometimes that can be frustrating, but Ryan pulls it off quite well. Read the TWB review here!

And Then Things Fall Apart by Arlaina Tibensky
Corey says: This is a beautiful contemporary YA about a Sylvia Plath-loving teen whose family is falling to pieces the same summer she has come down with an epic case of chicken pox. Left alone with her dysfunctional family, her confusing relationships, and her virginity to ponder, she spends a lot of time with an old typewriter and a well-loved copy of The Bell Jar. Narrator Keek is one of my favorite YA narrators of all time, and this creative, quirky, honest novel was a good reminder of why I became a writer and why I love writing for teens.

Popularity: 21%

Life after The New School is odd.

I’ve been severely MIA from TeenWritersBloc.com. I sincerely apologize and promise to be a better writer. Do you forgive? Good. Because I have lots of news!

The past couple of months have been a little busy for me. In August, I completed my third novel, How I Set Myself On Fire, after a year and a half of working on it extensively and exclusively. It’s gone through three complete rewrites to become what it is now. And what it is now is something that I’m incredibly happy with. More than happy: ecstatic.

Yes, I be a wee bit dramatic. But I’m proud of my work.

After writing two novels prior to this one, I can say without a doubt that this is the beginning of my career as a writer. This is what I’d want people to associate with me. This is my debut. Now if I could get some damn representation!

This summer has also been a different one for me. I graduated from The New School and had to come to terms with the fact that I wasn’t going to be starting classes in the fall. It’s a weird feeling, being in school for 24 years and just like that, it’s over.

I still feel like I should be taking some sort of class. Maybe basket-weaving.

At the end of the summer I found out I got a job at Westchester Community College as a Senior Writing Tutor in their Writing Tutorial, which is pretty rad. Although now I work six days a week and have no time to write. I’m still getting used to working so much and adjusting to this schedule.

But the start of September brought great promise. The promise of a literary agent. Well, not so much the promise as the idea. Which, as any great writer would know, is the way the best things start. I started querying just last week.

Do ya’ll know what goes into writing a query letter? In blatant terms: it sucks. Condensing your life’s great work into a two paragraph succinct summation is daunting. In fact, it’s down right frightening. It took me two weeks to get something that I liked enough to send out. (Special thanks to fellow TWB writer Corey Haydu, who gave me great advice!)

Now I’m working on the querying process.

So that’s what I’ve been up to, in addition to turning 25 years old, balancing a wonderful relationship with the most amazing person, and trying to fight off pesky colds. Still, I promise to be better, if you’ll have me!

It’s good to be back.

Popularity: 19%

One boring day in the library, I was searching Amazon for books with debut authors coming out in 2011 and I came across the name Anne Heltzel. Huh, I thought, that sound familiar. Upon further inspection I discovered that this debut author was not only a graduate of our fantastic program at New School, but also attended my alma matre, The University of Notre Dame (Go Irish!). It dawned on me that I had actually met Anne Heltzel at ND (through my musical-comedy writing brother, Danny Carter) long before any of us were writers. I caught up with Anne to congratulate her on Circle Nine which is debuting in September, and to catch up with her on life post-ND and post-New School.

Tell us a bit about yourself and how you became a writer.

I’ve wanted to be a writer as long as I can remember, but I always assumed it was unattainable as a career. I’ve always been passionate about books (and in particular, what books do for kids). I wrote for myself, in local contests, and later for undergrad electives. I did it because it brought me all kinds of enjoyment, but there are so many things that seem impossible when you grow up in a small Midwestern community. (Namely: creative/impractical careers.) I imagine it would have been different had I grown up in New York and been exposed to professional writers on a regular basis as a kid. (Not better, just different.)

I didn’t really do anything much post-college before “officially” becoming a writer. Once I decided to work toward my MFA, there was never a moment when becoming a published author was not the final goal. But I did random filler things to make money while in grad school. I had a bizarre experience working for a fitness company (where I was lawsuit-worthy harassed, by a Brazilian jiu jitsu master). I babysat every day after work for two years for a family I am still close to. (They now live in Paris, and I’m visiting them in the fall!). I was an assistant to a literary agent; I was an editorial assistant; I tutored algebra and geometry and writing on the weekends; and I moved to India for a year to travel and write. I also sold old clothes at Beacon’s Closet or on eBay when short of cash, and I came frighteningly close to nude modeling for a painter and, on a separate occasion, a photographer. (In the end I just couldn’t do it. I mean, I was trying to write children’s books, for God’s sake.) Right now, I’m working as an Associate Editor at Penguin.

Can you give us a quick synopsis of Circle Nine? How did you come up with the concept for the book?

Circle Nine is the story of Abby, a girl who loses her entire identity following a traumatic incident. She wakes up near a burning building next to Sam, a guy who says he knows who she is. She trusts him because she has no memories and therefore no choice. They have an intense romantic relationship that, to Abby, seems perfect…until memories of her past slowly begin seeping through the façade of the life she and Sam have built. Then she realizes that the things she thought were perfect have a sort of sinister underbelly. She has to figure out who she is and who Sam is and make some difficult choices about moving forward.

This book was so weird to write. It started as a story about a girl who meets a guitar-playing guy in the subway, and she gets off at his stop and realizes he’s from a totally different world. Aside from the obvious (though not purposeful) Harry Potter-rip-off aspect, it sounds way better than Circle Nine, right? Anyway, I kept writing it and writing it and it just didn’t feel right. Then this random voice popped into my head in the form of a sentence, so I wrote it down. That was the voice that felt right, so I scrapped 100+ pages and started over. Once I had the voice, I wrote the story in two months. I dreamed about it all the time. I was in a very difficult emotional place, and I think that’s where the darkness that permeates the book came from. So then I gave it to my agent (Adams Literary, whom I’d signed based on a different project) just before Christmas in 2009. Josh called me just after Christmas to tell me he’d stayed up all night reading the book, and he took it on submission right away. It sold a couple of weeks later in early 2010 to Hilary van Dusen at Candlewick. The book is coming out in September, so it actually sold a full 20 months prior to publication.

We notice that a lot of the reviews call Circle Nine a “psychological thriller.” Do you agree with this categorization? Did you realize that’s what you were writing while you were writing it?

Yes, I guess it’s a psychological thriller. (Heavy on the psychological, light on the thriller) No, I had no idea what I was writing. I just went with it. The voice had me so tight in its clutches that (this is going to sound insane and melodramatic, sorry!) it felt like Abby was telling me the story and I was just transcribing. It was the weirdest writing experience I’ve ever had, and it has not happened to me again since, alas!

What’s your writing process?

When I was writing full-time, my typical day looked like this:
-Wake up obscenely late. (Say 10 or 11.) Make coffee. Make eggs! Or maybe go to the bakery for a muffin. Read the news. Answer emails (if by some miracle my unreliable Indian internet was working). Dawdle. Open Word Doc. Stare at previous day’s writing. Write furiously for an hour or five, depending on level of inspiration. (Write 5 pages minimum, sometimes up to 20.) Go to gym? Or maybe just watch movie. Read book. Make dinner. Die of boredom. Even though I was in India, I lacked a community of fellow writers (at least for the first six months or so), and I felt lonely and claustrophobic. It was difficult. Amazing, but difficult.

Now I’m working full-time, so writing is relegated to the occasional weekday morning (at Café Regular across the street from my Brooklyn apartment) or weekend afternoon/evening. But I have writer-friends to hang out with, so writing has become a community-oriented experience for me. I usually write in cafes or bars in Brooklyn – anywhere out of the apartment! My inspiration can come from anywhere – any weird detail I notice during the day (like a burned-out jeep I noticed on the street, or a quirky exchange I had with my barista). I use basically anything that moves me emotionally, EXCEPT my personal relationships. Those are sacred, and I never want the people who are close to me to feel exploited. Okay, I broke that rule maybe once in Circle Nine. But never again. And I’m not telling you where.

What has your path to publication been like?

It’s been long and ever-intriguing! I suppose the most surprising part has been dealing with the public aspects of this private craft. Writing is so personal – and then there’s your manuscript in the world, for anyone to comment on. So far, people’s reactions (good and bad) have been much stronger than I anticipated. In terms of The New School: some faculty members were particularly supportive when I was a student there. Tor Seidler was emotionally supportive, because he seemed to believe in my talent. And David Levithan was the first to suggest, via my agent, that I try a YA voice — up to that point I’d been focusing on MG — and that paid off in a big way.

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever gotten? What advice would you yourself give aspiring authors?

I once read or heard somewhere that 80% of getting published is finishing the manuscript. I think there’s a lot of other stuff that goes into it, but knowing that a large part of writing is sheer work – and that you just have to sit down and do it, much like any other difficult task – has been somehow comforting.

My advice: care about your novel. If you’re emotionally attached to your subject matter, it will automatically seem more authentic and powerful.

What was your favorite book when you were a teenager? What are you reading now?

When I was a teenager, I was in love with This Side of Paradise by Fitzgerald. When I was extremely young, I loved Little Brother and Little Sister by The Brothers Grimm. Now I like to skip around. I’m reading Rules of Civility by Amor Towles. (So far so good! The writing is beautiful.) And I’ve been flipping through Nine Stories (Salinger) and some other short story collections while I’m on the train. I have a lot of reading to do for work, so personal reading is a rare and treasured experience.

What’s next for you writing-wise (and otherwise!)?

I’m writing a dark, grounded YA for Candlewick, and I have a thriller signed up with Penguin under a pseudonym. They’ll both be out in 2013. I think I might like to give fantastical Middle Grade another try after that. Otherwise, who knows? As long as my writing and my relationships continue to grow, I am not averse to adventure and change. Maybe more travel! I just want to live a good story. =)

Do you believe in being part of a “bloc” of writers? Are critique groups and writing communities helpful to you?

I do believe in the wonders of being a part of a supportive writing community. I don’t personally belong to any writing groups, mostly because of my day job – I read and critique manuscripts all day long, and I’m not sure I could take on any extra editorial-esque endeavors right now. Plus, I’m private and don’t like many people to read my writing prior to completion of a semi-respectable draft. But I do have one friend whom I exchange with on occasion, and I frequently write in close proximity to a bunch of amazing, Brooklyn-based writers (many of whom I met through the editing world). Going through the process with a bunch of other like-minded people helps a lot. And then when the successes (and setbacks) come around, it’s great to have people in your life who really get it.

Thanks so much for stopping by TWB, Anne! Readers: be on the lookout for anneheltzel.com coming soon!

Popularity: 32%

So I’m going old school with this one. When I was 14, perusing the shelves of the local Barnes & Noble, as I often did, I came across a teen tome titled “Just Friends,” by Norma Klein.

At that point (and actually, still to this day), I had never read a Klein book besides “Mom, The Wolf Man and Me.” A lot of her canon was way before my time. So I didn’t know that her YA list frequently courted controversy — and, of course, often made the banned books list. A young 14-year-old in the days pre-Internet-everything, I was blissfully unaware.

And this book, “Just Friends,” looked innocent enough. It was about Isabel and Stuart, two smart teenagers who grew up together as pals — and, as usual, had a bit of trouble navigating their relationship once hormones and teen angst kicked in. Isabel had feelings for Stuart, and Stuart was going out with their other friend, Ketti. So, to get on with her life, Isabel hooked up with the gawky, skinny, unappealing but decidedly available-and-interested Gregory. And it’s with him that she experiences some of those awkward teen firsts.

And that was the shocking part. Unlike other teen fare I’d read, Norma Klein wasn’t afraid to go there, the body parts, the confusion, the humiliation. Klein drew her characters in 3D, from the teens facing the trauma of growing up and apart to the adults dealing with their own version of adolescent angst. It was a vivid, satisfying and frequently shocking read. And it made me want to write.

In fact, I do recall some horribly derivative dribble I scribbled back in the day, at all of 14, which may be officially dubbed my first attempt at fiction. I likely have it stashed in one of my high school journals, never to be seen by prying eyes. There it will remain. But when I think of books with bang, Klein’s books, as little as I’ve read of it, surely make the list. In fact, maybe I’ll go back into teen fiction history and hunt down some more of her titles this summer, to see what I missed.

Popularity: 18%

Currently, I’m working on two realistic narratives. Both are in the beginning stages and won’t get fleshed out until summer. My stories tend to be about friendship and love. They are also about how teens react to being given once in a lifetime opportunities — do they squander the chance or take full advantage of what’s in front of them? One day, I can only hope to see my books in the amazing company of such wonderful authors as Sarah Dessen and Jenny Han.

When I write, I usually sit at my desk or on my bed, but I’ve been known to bring notebooks to various Starbucks around the city, too. No matter where I end up though, I need to listen to music in order to block out any background noise that could potentially distract me.  That’s not the only purpose music serves though. We all know that music has the power to inspire. For me, a certain song can spark an idea or trigger a memory that leads to a possible scene or plot point or description. Music influences my emotions in other ways as well. When I’m stressed it relaxes me and refocuses my energy. There’s no way I could write, let alone live well, without it.

Popularity: 22%