Weekend (and Crossover) News

For the teens who loved Hardwicke's Red Riding Hood, there are tie-ins available: Liesl Bradner highlights Daniel Egneus's seriously-beautiful illustrated version of Little Red Riding Hood for the Los Angeles Times Jacket Copy blog and Susan Carpenter tells of the ebook version of the Red Riding Hood film written by Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, also in the Los Angeles Times.


Lee Wind interviews Jodi Picoult for SheWired.com.  Wind asks, "you have a huge teen and young adult following...Does awareness of your teen readers shape your writing?"  And Picoult answers:

I love my teen fans. First of all, they're not shy. They write me all the time and talk about how much they enjoy my books, and who wouldn't like that kind of feedback!?...I love teen narrators because they have a built-in BS meter. They won't let you get away with a lie; they always cut to the heart of the matter. 

This is an excerpted question and answer.  Don't miss the entire exhange!

Last week I linked to an interesting article on teen books today in India, and this week there's a fascinating article on feminist publishing in India and its growing success on livemint.com (&The Wall Street Journal).  One feminist house, Zubaan, has a new imprint for children ("upt to teens") called Young Zubaan.  Commissioning Editor Anita Roy says this is foucs is due to the fact "children’s books in India are conservative, preachy, derivative and just not very good."

Tad Vizner profiles Amanda Hocking, the young writer who made tons of money selling her YA fiction in self-published ebook format, for TwinCities.com. Interestingly, Hocking credits bookbloggers, to whom she sent print-on-demand copies of her books, with her early success.

Do you want your teen or tween to read "great books" they haven't read in school?  Then check out this article on "Great Books Camp" in The Christian Science Monitor.


Marlene Charnizon rounds up what teens are checking out from public libraries for The School Library Journal.