squeetus

Why I love singing, dancing, animated felt

I can't remember the last time I was inspired to write a blog post about a movie, but the Muppets did it! We saw it this weekend with our 7yo & 4 yo, and it earned a unanimous Boy Howdy from our family.

Dean and I later were trying to identify what we love so much about the Muppets, besides just being funny and fun. They take what is popular and make it silly, but never in a mean way. They can say, "Hey, let's look at ourselves and the things we love. Isn't it all ridiculous and magnificent at the same time?" And that allows us, the viewers, to laugh at ourselves, which is a lovely gift. As I write this, it occurs to me that's exactly what I was trying to do with Austenland, and I wonder how much of that instinct came from The Muppets.

I know I'm not alone in still mourning the loss of Jim Henson 20 years later. The latest Muppets movie also saw the departure of Jim Henson's collaborator and supreme puppeteer Frank Oz (Miss Piggy, Fozzie, not to mention Yoda, etc) It occurs to me that the genius of Jim Henson and Frank Oz is that their creatures are so robust, so enduring, that they can survive without them. Frank Oz's Miss Piggy and Fozzie are so memorable, others can write their lines and give them voices, and their appeal and life aren't diminished. They truly are creators, and their creations live on.

And the music! Has Glee done an episode dedicated to the music of the Muppets yet? If not, they should. Beautiful, haunting, funny, insightful, genius music. I'm surprised top artists haven't done covers of Gonzo's song from The Muppet Movie: "I'm Going to Go Back There Some Day." Or Ernie's "I Don't Want to Live on the Moon." And of course "Rainbow Connection," one of the best songs ever written, up there with Lennon's "Imagine." The entire original Muppet Movie soundtrack, done by the supremely talented Paul Williams and Kenny Ascher, is a masterwork, that if not dismissed as kiddie music, would be recognized and awarded as it deserves. I think the new Muppets soundtrack is up there on par with the original, largely thanks to Bret McKenzie (of Flight of the Conchords and Austenland!). If he doesn't get an Oscar nomination for best song for "Life's a Happy Song," there will be an UPROAR here on squeetus. Go itunes it!

PS. No update yet on the Austenland movie. I won't forget to tell you as soon as I know anything.

Counting words

I'm a word girl, not a numbers girl, but the daily chore of writing is so much about numbers for me. How many words did I write, or as the case may be, how many did I manage to cut? These little goals help keep me on task. I'm swamped with my deadline coming up, sweating through final drafts, but I thought it might interest you to see the final word counts of my books.

Goose Girl – 91,199
Enna Burning – 75,553
Princess Academy – 63,486
River Secrets – 64,300
Austenland – 53,000
B1000 – 63,600
Actor & the Housewife -- 130,400
Forest Born -- 90,563
Midnight in Austenland -- 73,838

Biting off more than I can chew, and then chewing

I am on deadline with a book. And I have four children. There really is nothing more complicated about my life than that. I am slaving over a story and playing with kids and trying to keep my home from tumbling into irrepreble chaos. Those are my days. And, often, my nights. (Also, I watch Survivor. Team Dawn.)

The rewrites are a struggle right now. Sometimes I wish writing a book could just be easy for me at last. But when I think about it practically, I am glad it's a struggle. I am (as usual) attempting to write a book that's too hard for me. I'm telling a story I'm not smart enough to tell. The risk of failure is huge. But I prefer it this way. I'm forced to learn, forced to smarten myself up, forced to wrestle. And if it works, then I'll have written something that is better than I am.

"Write what you know" is for sissies.

A little bit of heaven

Having a kind of crappy day, getting too upset about things I can't control, so I want to share with you the happiest, most precious thing I can.

And winner #2 is...

Whoops, forgot to post this yesterday! And the winner is...Amber! Who wrote:

"I've been trying to think who I'd dedicate a book to and it's a harder question than I thought it would be. My husband dedicated his doctoral dissertation book to me (yes, so romantic! lol) so I'd probably have to return the favor. Or to my dad who's always wanted to publish a book but hasn't."

Please email me at squeets (at) gmail (dot) com with your address and who you'd like the book dedicated to. Thanks all for playing the random comment sweepstakes! I hope you all get that book published and get a chance to use your lovely dedications.

I'm dedicated to getting you a free book!

One more day on the character name auction.

If you're on Facebook, go "like" the Shannon Hale fan page (supported by Bloomsbury--no, I didn't make my own fan page, I swear). Bloomsbury will be giving away Midnight in Austenland ARCs shortly! And ongoing giveaways all year. Good stuff to come.

Speaking of giving away MIA ARCs, I got two more! One I'll give away on Twitter, and the other here. Add a comment on this post to enter, and I'll get a number from a random number generator to pick the winner. (and then I'll send you the one you won, Carly, I swear!) One comment per, I'll announce the winner Saturday. To give yourselves something to talk about, if you were publishing your first book (or if you already have, your next one) who would you dedicate it to?

Books and pumpkins: together again

Happy Halloween yesterday! And...I'm a dork. Last year I posted about holding a costume contest and forgot. Next year? Remind me in August someone? Argh. If you dressed as one of my characters this year, keep the photos! They'll work for next year too. I really am so much more useless than you can imagine. My life is feeding babies 5x a day, cleaning up after them 5x a day, playing with them in between, besides the older kids and writing and...you get it. I won't bore you.

Auction is up and kicking! I may never do this again, especially since most of my books don't have a contemporary setting and so don't allow me to name characters after people. Think what an awesome Christmas gift for someone that a character in one of my books (or one of the other authors') is named after them! I'll mention the person in the acknowledgements as well. All to support a great charity that gets books into disadvantaged libraries.

And now a little pumpkin goodness, from our perennial squash goddess, Laura. As always, I'm in awe of the talented people I get to claim as friends. These are real, carved pumpkins. They are spectacular in person.

And for those of you also following Survivor this year and my kickbutt friend Dawn, who is KICKING BUTT:

Here are a couple more literary jack-o-lanterns, featuring my sweet friend Ally Condie's books (Crossed out now!). Didn't they turn out gorgeous?: