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Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/994528.html

When We Wake, Awards, and Why I Write

Okay, Internets, brace yourself, because this post has been brewing for a while.

In the last three months, When We Wake has been honored with a number of special things. My science fiction Sleeping Beauty story is:

A Storylines Notable Book.

A finalist in the Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy.

Longlisted for the Silver Inky Award.

A finalist in the Sir Julius Vogel Awards (Best Youth Novel).

And finally, as was announced yesterday, When We Wake is a finalist in the NZ Post Awards for Children and Young Adults.

This means that When We Wake has been honored in New Zealand, Australia, and the United States - all the territories where it has been published.

It's hard to tell you how I feel about that. It's gratifying to be recognised. And I am stupendously relieved that after five years and (as of this week) four books published, I can still write what someone wants to read.

Writing is hard work for me right now, in my first year of full-time teaching. Writing requires time I don't have to spare, and a focus I lack by the end of the day, and an emotional fortitude I'm drawing on to support my work in the classroom instead. It's discouraging when I hit the end of another weekend without writing a word of fiction, or think that I really must update my website, or remember that if I don't get started on my Cranky Ladies story now, like, right now, I'll have to do it right in the middle of report writing.

Occasionally - not anywhere close to regularly, but occasionally - I wonder if I might not be better just to give up on even trying to write this year. Give myself a break, say no, save my brain. Honestly, perhaps I should.

Today my Year Nine class and I went to the school library for our fortnightly visit, where they renew, return and exchange books for our compulsory reading sessions at the start of every English period. I took attendance and then told the girls that I was nominated for the NZ Post award. They applauded, I thanked them, and then we settled into our routine.

Just before we left, I thought about what, actually, we did in this light-filled room with the carefully labelled shelves.

I'm sure every student could give you a different explanation of what she was doing there. What I can tell you is that I saw girls curling on chairs with books, girls perched on desks exploring Project Gutenberg, girls asking each other what they should read next, girls talking to me about what they had read. I saw 25 girls, 25 interconnected universes of experience and interest and ability, all doing the important work of making meaning from words. All reaching through open doors.

It might be better for me to give up writing this year.

But I'm going to write anyway.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/994204.html

When We Wake Awards Eligibility

Awards season is upon us! Here is my official post about what awards When We Wake is eligible for this year.

When We Wake is eligible for:

The Sir Julius Vogel Awards.

NOTE: If you're thinking, "hey, I really liked Karen's book, I'd like to nominate it for something, but I don't have time for a lot of selection and consideration, I wonder which award she'd most prefer nomination for," the answer is: this one.

SFFANZ is awesome, and supporting New Zealand spec fic creativity is very important to me. I also really like that the nomination process is open to ANYONE; nationality, organisation, or con membership are irrelevant. All that's important is that you liked something, and want it to be recognised.

Eligibility: SFFANZ awards apply to works of fantasy, horror, or science fiction, by New Zealand citizens or residents, released in the previous calendar year. When We Wake is eligible for nomination in the Best Young Adult Novel category.

Who can nominate: Anyone at all! Non-New Zealanders are welcome.
How to nominate: email sjv_awards@sffanz.org.nz with the following information:

Nomination for Best Young Adult Novel
When We Wake, by Karen Healey
Young Adult Novel, 2013.
Allen and Unwin/Little, Brown
Author contact: karen@karenhealey.com
Genre: Young Adult Science Fiction
[Your own email address]

You can nominate as many works as you like in as many categories as you like: nomination guidelines are here.

Nominations close: 8pm (NZ time!) 15th February 2014.

The Nebula Awards

Eligibility: "All works first published in English, in the United States, during the calendar year, in the genres of science fiction, fantasy, or a related fiction genre are eligible for the Nebula Awards® in their respective categories." When We Wake is eligible for The Andre Norton Award for Outstanding Young Adult Science Fiction or Fantasy Book. (This award isn't actually a Nebula, but the same process and ceremony take place).

Who can nominate: "A work must be nominated by an Active, Lifetime Active, Associate or Lifetime Associate member of the SFWA (with no fiduciary interest–which means, not the writer, not the editor, the agent, publicist, or significant other)."
How to nominate: Go to this form and fill it out!

Nominations close: 15th Februrary, US time.

The Hugo Awards

Eligibility. WorldCon members award the best works released in the US and worldwide in fantasy, science fiction, and horror (ALSO the fan awards, which are pretty darn neat).

Who can nominate: You! If you are an attending or supporting member of Loncon 3 (the 2014 World Science Fiction Convention), and/or you are an attending or supporting member of Sasquan (the 2015 World Science Fiction Convention), and/or you were an attending or supporting member of LoneStarCon 3 (the 2013 World Science Fiction Convention).
How to nominate: Hugo nominations and voting are a trifle complicated, so I shall link to them here. When We Wake is eligible for Best Novel.

Nominations close: 31 March, 2014.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/993945.html

My 2013, and that of Ghok'ii, Lady of Flame.

I like this survey of the year business. These particular questions I took from Qian.

1. What did you do in 2013 that you'd never done before?

- Spoke at NCTE
- Went to Boston
- Edited my fourth novel
- Became a (qualified) teacher

2. Did you keep your new year's resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA NO. I had all these grand ideas about reading the Four Great Classical Novels and I got about a third of the way through Journey to the West before school ate my brain.

I've got some in mind for next year, though.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

Yes, my BFF. Then she named the baby after me. VICTORY LAP.

4. Did anyone close to you die?

No. Fortunate!

5. What countries did you visit?

The USA, and thank goodness for publishers because I was about ready to claw something if I didn't get out of the country for a moment.

6. What would you like to have in 2014 that you lacked in 2013?

A steady pay check! And I'm gonna!

NOPE NOPE NOPE this is the most boring list ever. I'm going to start lying now.

7. What was your favorite new recipe this year?

Harving of the Deeps showed me an excellent way to roast wild greldebeest over whitewood. The secret is gutting the greldebeest WHILE it cooks.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

Oh, definitely raising up the seven spheres over the seven towers in the Kindred Night. The bards will be singing about that one for at least three ages of the People.

9. What was your biggest failure?

It's hard to choose. Losing Hilam was a bitter blow, and I regret that I could not prevent his drawn-out demise. But also, that time I picked up the Orb of Jer when I had just read the scroll warning me not to pick up the Orb of Jer seems, in retrospect, to have been something of an error.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

Hah! 'Tis but a scratch!

11. What was the best thing you bought?

This cloak pin. It increases my night vision and wards off bad smells! Well, when I say "bought", it was more like, "strip from the loathsome corpse of Kinnear the Ghoul King", but same difference.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?

Deri of the Underhill! Her valiant speeches turned the tide and overthrew the cruel tyrannies of the Pale Lords!

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

Axera the Usurper, Tlench of the Arid Waste, and Ani DiFranco.

14. Where did most of your money go?

Redcap rental. They can carry a lot of loot, so it's worth the expense, but I swear the overtime charges wasn't as described in the contract. I lost the contract somewhere over the Gully of Despair, though, so you get what you get.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

Oh, Free People! When I held aloft the seventh sphere and felt my bones thrill to the music of the First People and their song burst through my unworthy throat like a cataract leaping gladly from the mountain's peak, that was pretty great.

16. What are you looking forward to in 2014?

I hear there's an ogre in Jarnstown who makes armor from starlight! I plan an expedition to barter for his wares in the season of drifting snow.

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?

Smiting. I did quite a lot of smiting, but it's never enough, is it?

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?

Mourning lost companions. May you wander wisely in the vales of night, dear Hilam.

20. How did you spend Christmas?

Burning the bones of Axera the Usurper. They smelt most peculiar.

21. How will you be spending New Year's?

Leaping over the flames with my beloved. Haha!

22. What was your favorite TV program?

I don't possess a TV. However, Graelie would sometimes show us the tales of yore in zir Shining Orb by the campfire of an eve, and that was most grand! I like the tale of Dark Mirpin the Wise best.

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?

I did, but those wretched souls no longer trouble the Free Cities. There's no honour in hating the dead! Haha!

24. What was the best book you read?

I don't go in for that reading much. Graelie is our reader. Zhe's helping me with the writing too.

25. What did you want and get?

My beloved's hand, given most tenderly in exchange for mine.

26. What did you want and not get?

Hilam, come safely back to us from the Howling Peak.

27. What was your favorite film of this year?

Thor 2, obviously.

28. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?

One doesn't ask the Lady of Flame her age! Such information could be turned to deadly purpose. I had a small celebration, with my beloved and my dear companions, followed by a limited, but enjoyable, riot in the local tavern. Hilam had secretly fashioned a wooden image of me from larkswood. I keep it with me always.

29. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2013?

Hide and chic. My beloved gave me this velvet Cloak of Flame, which I wear on formal occasions. It contrasts nicely with my overall battered leather and fur ensemble.

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

Ah, if only I had been faster.

31. Who did you miss?

Graelie, these questions are very personal.

32. Who was the best new person you met?

I don't want to do this any more.

33. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2013.

Ah! Turn the seventh sphere COUNTER-clockwise.

ETA: Edited to change the first name I gave this narrator because I googled after posting and what was a random confluence of letters to me is a real thing to millions of Hindu people and NOPE NOPE. Sorry to anyone who saw that!

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/993776.html

Hey, Karen Elizabeth, how was your 2013?

Hi, Internets!

At the end of a year, I like to write about things I did during that year. I sure did some things this year, yup.

HAHA lies, I basically did one thing, and learning how to be a teacher was the hardest, most exhausting thing I have ever done. The school I went to has a reputation, and that reputation is "our graduates will be competent teachers, and you can trust them to walk into a classroom and be functional immediately, but also we will break them."

As in, we came in and the class before us did all these skits at the welcoming ceremony about how we would never sleep again and the tutors wouldn't let us graduate until we cried, and I giggled nervously with the rest of my classmates because it couldn't be THAT bad. Six weeks later I looked hollow-eyed at the clock and tried to make the decision between finishing a lesson plan and getting more than four hours sleep. Was a tutor going to turn up in my tough class the next day? And oh no, I hadn't done the new seating arrangement to separate those talkers in the back row!

It was exactly that bad. There is definitely crying at grad school*.

But can I teach? Yes, I can.

Grad school turns out much fewer teachers than most teacher training schools in New Zealand, but has notably higher employment rates. I think that's largely down to three things: selective application procedures; giving us a lot more classroom exposure; and normalising the incredibly stressful working conditions. They warned us it would be hard, and Internets, they were not kidding.

At most NZ teaching programmes, you arrange with your tutor to come in and observe you on a day when you have prepared a lesson plan and will be taking the whole class. At grad school, we told the tutors when and where we were teaching each class (and if we weren't doing full classes by the end of week two of our placements, it was time to get worried). The tutors might not turn up, but also they might. Without telling us they were coming.

This had the salutary and absolutely terrifying effect of making us exhaustively prepare for every single minute of every class, which is why I racked up massive sleep debt every week and would be out by 7pm each Friday. I used to put in at least two or three hours of prep for every class hour - now it's more like one and a quarter, which feels a bit more like Real Teacher time.

The tutors watched us so often so that they could give us feedback and I love this feedback model so very much. They asked us to articulate the things we did well (positives) and the things we wanted to do better next time (advice), and they told us what they thought in each of those categories. No one interrupted. No argument. No defense. Just me, and them, and what we both thought of my performance.

I did well with the feedback model, partly because at the age of 32 I have finally realised I don't need to be perfect to be worthy, but mostly because I am used to editing and I know exactly how I respond to critique:

Stage 1: WHAT RIDICULOUS NONSENSE SPEWED BY IDIOTS**.
Stage 2: Oh, yeah! *edits*.

But I wasn't great at everything aha oh no. We had academic presentations - self-directed research, presented to a tutor, who would then skewer exactly the point I had neglected to investigate. And at the end of every term we had to write a lengthy and detailed reflective report on what we'd done, and we had a week to do that, and I was so terrible at this you do not know. But Karen, fellow students said, you write books. I DO NOT WRITE BOOKS ABOUT MYSELF. IN ONE WEEK. I inevitably reached toxic levels of boredom by Tuesday. I would have done anything other than write that report but I had to do it, so I did. It felt like dripping acid into my brain.

I knew I had a chance of getting out in term three, and I very deliberately cut almost everything out of my life but work and sleep. I went to weekly game night twice. I looked at my budget for the potential term four and then I stopped cooking. I used the remnants of my savings to buy prepared food every day for nine weeks. It was ruinously expensive, but it meant I had an extra 40 minutes or so every day, and I needed that time.

It paid off. By the end of term three, I was getting long lists of positives and very little or no advice, which meant that I was ready to graduate. A friend helped drag me through my final academic presentations, and I wrote that final report (a third of it I wrote TWICE, because that is how bad I was at that aspect of my training), and I was done. I have a job starting in late January.

Teaching: I started out terrible, and I got better, and now I am good. I aim for excellent within the decade.

Learning how to be a teacher was what I did this year. It was worth it.

* ACTUALLY I DIDN'T CRY ONCE; TINY TRIUMPH IS REAL TRIUMPH.

** Dear critique partners and editors: you are not idiots.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/993382.html

Cover Reveal!

Internets, what does one do during a six hour layover at Auckland airport?

If one has the money and inclination, one buys an ad hoc pass to the Koru club international lounge, which is about ten thousand times quieter and more relaxing than the regular terminal, even though they don't have proper diet coke, but only Coke Zero, that weak shadow of the perfect form of non-food non-sustenance.

(I saw some reviews for the lounge while I was looking to see if I could buy access, and saw one business-class frequent flier wanting to know SINCE WHEN the GENERAL PUBLIC could gain access by PAYING MONEY for a SERVICE. I sincerely hope that person is in the lounge right now and I am offending them with my middle-class economy-flying presence. I also hope that during their next flight, they spill orange juice on themselves just before a lengthy bout of turbulence.)

One then shows one's readers the Australian/New Zealand cover to one's next novel:

I got this on the bus on the way to the airport and I grinned so much I think my seatmate might have thought I was contemplating some terrible deed.

And here's the American cover again:

Abdi Taalib thought he was moving to Australia for a music scholarship. But after meeting the beautiful and brazen Tegan Oglietti, his world was turned upside down. Tegan's no ordinary girl - she died in 2027, only to be frozen and brought back to life in Abdi's time, 100 years later.

Now, all they want is for things to return to normal (or as normal as they can be), but the government has other ideas. Especially since the two just spilled the secrets behind Australia's cryonics project to the world. On the run, Abdi and Tegan have no idea who they can trust - and, when they uncover startling new details about the program, they realize that thousands of lives may be in their hands.

Karen Healey offers a suspenseful, page-turning companion to When We Wake that will keep readers on the edge of their seats and make them call into question their own ideas about morality -- and mortality, too.

Internets, my publishers have been pretty generous with showing you pretty ladies on my covers*. I thought long and solemn thoughts** and then I said, "publishers, it is time for there to be a pretty gentleman on my cover. I feel this is important. For reasons. Equality reasons? Misandry!"*** I yelped, much like an MRA who has just been contradicted by someone whose lived experience as a woman is somehow not as valid as his deeply considered assumptions about how sexism doesn't exist any more.

"Karen, you know misandry isn't actually a thing," they replied. "But how about a pretty gentleman because the narrator is actually a pretty gentlemen?"

"Oh, right," I said. "Much better reason, let's do that."

And it was so, and I was very pleased! I love these colours, I love the way the tone is so different to Tegan's cooler mood and style in the When We Wake cover. I think both of the models chosen show a different aspect of the Abdi in my head, and that this perhaps will help connect readers to that Abdi. I think the designers and editors and everyone involved did a really great job.

I say this every time I get a new cover, but I say it because it's true; I am SO lucky with cover design. I am lucky that the designers are so talented and hard-working, and I am lucky that my editors take my thoughts into account. And I am very, very lucky that I work with people at Allen and Unwin and Little, Brown who will most absolutely put people of colour on the front cover without me having to explain why that's important and right.

Oh, also, why am I flying? I am flying to Boston! To do some stuff at NCTE, to wit:

2:30 – 3:45 PM Convention Center – Room 307, Level Three:

I am speaking with MALINDA LO on Fraying the Seams: Using YA literature to explore overlapping and contested identities.

Me and Malinda, that's going to be great. I imagine you can't go to that unless you're actually at the conference, but if you ARE, you should come see us; we will be awesome.

Also awesome will be our school visit to Wellesley High the next day. You probably can't go to that either, sorry.

But if you happen to be in Boston, you CAN go to:

6:00 – 8:00 PM Event with MALINDA LO and A.S. KING at Cary Memorial Library.

<em>Growing up is tough, and no one knows that better than writers of Young Adult fiction. Their teenage characters solve mysteries, unravel conspiracies, and rebel against a world of unfair expectations. YA authors tell stories about overcoming obstacles, falling in love, and the fight against injustice. Their stories teach us how to survive in an uncertain world.

Join us for a special after-hours event as Karen Healey, A.S. King, and Malinda Lo talk about identity and coming of age in contemporary teen fiction.</em>

I think actually that most people who are currently growing up know growing up is tough much better than I do, but, you know, we try. And all three of us got through it. Come and get some survival tips.

* There was actually one time when we wanted a non-pretty lady on the cover - Ellie Spencer, of Guardian of the Dead, and we couldn't find a damn stock photo anywhere. I talk about that, and about whitewashing, in another post. Instead the covers for that book are a creepy white mask (US hardcover), a pretty lady with her back to you (ANZ) and a pretty, creepy lady's face (US paperback). ONE DAY THERE WILL BE A PLAIN LADY ON A COVER.

** Lies.

*** Total lies.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/993103.html

To New York, From Christchurch, With Love

Yesterday, I read an article and by the end I was so angry that my eyes turned into burning coals and shot right out of my face.

I was so angry that my howl reached the heavens and the stars extinguished themselves in fear.

I was so angry that I stamped my foot three times on the earth and the impact shattered my body into a trillion pieces hurtling through the cosmos, each a dense, screaming microcosm of my rage.

Then I put myself back together and started writing this.

What set me off was an article by Ruth Curry, excerpted from Goodbye to All That: Writers on Loving and Leaving New York.

It tells the story of a young woman who moves to New York, falls in comfortable love with a dude, and then he moves to New Zealand and she follows, and things do not go well. And it talks weird smack about Christchurch, the city of my heart.

Christchurch "spreads out like a spreading stain". Christchurch "really was exclusively populated by angsty teenagers and the middle-aged". Christchurch is where Curry "jokes, meanly" that "the only options for arts, culture, and entertainment were respectively rugby, rugby, and rugby." Also, there were no bagels in Christchurch in 2006 and she is forced, FORCED, to order interesting pizza with corn and shrimp on it instead of the boring pepperoni-sauce-cheese pizza she could get in any pizza place in New Zealand if she really wanted. I will concede the horrible enchiladas. There is decent Mexican in Christchurch, but it's hard to find.

Anyway, all of this is largely bullshit, but sure, whatever. (Christchurch spreads like a GLORIOUS MICROCHIP, thank you very much). I was rolling my eyes at the exaggerations and inaccuracies, but largely feeling sorry for Curry.

Curry had apparently never anticipated that she'd hit culture shock in an English-speaking nation, and it hit her hard. She was trying to break into publishing in New Zealand on a working holiday visa (yeah, no - retail, service jobs, and seasonal fruit picking are all you're going to get without some major chops) and her boyfriend kept telling her to grow up and dragged her away for hiking trips.

Curry was living the cold, poverty-ridden, tenuously-employed life of the student without the fun parts, like hanging out with fellow tenuously-employed, poverty-ridden, cold students or learning anything. And she was living in Lyttleton, a port town just barely connected to Christchurch through a tunnel cut through the Port Hills. She crashed her boyfriend's car into an SUV and totaled the car (no indication of the health of the SUV or its driver). She was totally miserable, and she left, and he did not follow her. I nodded sympathetically along. I've had the culture shock, the employment woes, the shitty boyfriend. I got it.

And then the article concluded:

I saw Russell once more. About six months after we split up, he came through New York and stopped by to return the stuff I had stored at his sister’s. Her basement had flooded, and a lot of his own things had been ruined, but not, he said, the sweet, silly notes I had left for him every morning when we first met. A year later he got married. I know his wife; they started dating three weeks after he and I separated.

A major earthquake struck Christchurch in 2011. It was the second-deadliest natural disaster in New Zealand history. Almost every place I remember well was destroyed, the rest damaged or irrevocably changed by what’s fallen down around them.

The sympathy train screeched to a halt. Flaming eyeballs, extinguished stars, a trillion dense spinning microcosms of rage, etc.

It is not a good idea to make a deadly and very recent natural disaster the snappy conclusion to your sad travelogue. It is not okay to talk about how much you disliked a place and how down it made you and then casually mention that large chunks of it are now destroyed, because whether you meant it to or not, that comes across with a very strong hint of "and thank goodness." The 2011 earthquake is not an excellent metaphor for your failed, destructive, romantic relationship - unless your relationship killed 185 people and shattered the heart of a city.

That conclusion is not clever, nor wryly amusing. It is glib, nasty, and oblivious to the very real pain that cracks through the city Curry so despised.

I am angry. This is why.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/993017.html

Road Warrior

Hi, Internets! I have a teaching job that starts next year at a great school; that's exciting!

And it has promoted another thing that is less "exciting" and more "deeply terrifying": I am learning how to drive.

When I turned 17 my parents gave me six driving lessons for a present. They were eventually redeemed by my brother when he turned 17, 2 years and 4 months later. My parents were disappointed. I was sorry they were disappointed. But I was not sad that I hadn't used the gift.

Up until now, I have not needed nor wanted to drive, so I have not learned. I lived in Christchurch and Fuchu-shi (Japan) and Melbourne, all of whom had public transport systems that went from "okay, mostly" to "superb, cleaned by people wearing white gloves." But my teaching job is in a place where a car would, finally, be very close to essential.

So I have to learn.

Five reasons being able to drive would be kinda cool:

1: I could buy a whole bunch of groceries at once!
2: Lugging piles of resources to school would be significantly easier on my back and shoulders.
3: I wouldn't have to check with people if I can get a ride to a thing that isn't within public transport + walking reach, and turn down the thing/take a taxi if no ride was available.
4: Road trips! I like those! I could offer to spell the driver!
5: If there was an emergency I could drive someone someplace, although frankly I would not put me behind the wheel in an emergency unless there was absolutely no other option whatsoever.

Ten reasons driving is super awful:

1: So bad for the environment. Like, ridiculously, terribly bad.
2: I will need to acquire an exercise regime beyond "walk places".
3: A CAR WEIGHS ABOUT FIVE HUNDRED TIMES MORE THAN A TODDLER AND IF I HIT A TODDLER WITH A CAR THEY WILL DIE AND I WILL CARRY THAT GUILT FOREVER.
4: Ugh cars are so expensive to buy and upkeep and fill with petrol.
5-10: SEE REASON THREE.

I acquired my learner license on Tuesday. My Fabulous Sister has given me two ten-minute lessons in an empty parking lot, because that's about as much panic-stricken babbling is fair to unleash on her in a session:

Me: "Okay, I'm stopping, gently, gently, I turn on the indicators, I check my mirrors, I turn the wheel a bit, I put my foot on the accelerator, I turn more TURN MORE TURN MORE."
She: "You're fine, now straighten up."
Me: "It's NOT STRAI- okay, I slow down a bit, I - OMG ANOTHER CAR IS COMING INTO THE PARKING LOT."
She: "You're fine, just make sure you stay to the-"
Me: "No, nope, I'm just going to stop and wait for it to go. THIS IS SCARY."
She: "No, it's not! You're being negative again!"
Me: "DID I NOT TELL YOU ABOUT THE TODDLER?"

I'll get there. I have to learn, so I will. But at the moment, my driving life is a slow* disaster movie.

* Very, very slow.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/992550.html

Hello, there

Hi, internets!

I'm back! I graduated early! That means I get three months to look for teaching jobs and write a book and sleep and bake and and BLOG and all those good things. I was thinking about some sort of Grand Return Post, and then I decided that no, the more I thought about one of those the less likely I was to write it.

So here is a brief observation for you: my sister is a filthy liar. She talked me into coming to a Body Balance class at the gym today, promising fun times and nothing I would hate. I am fat and stretchy, so low-impact "let's hold a position for a while and breathe!" stuff sounded good. And indeed, it was super fun until:

Instructor (who taught me PE in high school; my hometown is a small town): "And now for the ab work!"

Me, not at all quietly: "I'm going to kill you."

My sister: *wide, delighted grin*

I hate working my abs, and she knew it. I hate ab exercise more than any form of exercise, and I have quite a lot of hatred for many forms of exercise. Ab work HURTS. I can't seem to do any form of lifting without straining at my neck and shoulders, and those are parts that are already high-tension wire level strained. (Don't give me advice on this, btw. I know you'd mean it well, but I have bona fide expert advice from said filthy lying sister). And then my abs themselves are not strong, and have to move quite a lot of me, and all in all, it's a painful time of torment.

Anyway, I grimly flailed my way through about half of each ab exercise, and spent the rest of each one on my back, fighting to breathe and wondering if I could write a good book about a teenage sororicide.

I decided that I could.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/992492.html

Sunday Reading

New school tomorrow! Promises to be a super interesting experience; I am excite.

Finished Reading:

Re-reads both: Iorich and The Phoenix Guards by Steven Brust. I have been a planning, assessing, academic bidding, first pass pages correcting ROBOT for the last week, and in those situations I go straight for something familiar and well-loved - i.e., something by Brust, Bujold, Mahy, or Pamela Dean's Tam Lin.

Currently Reading:

A History of the Wife, Marilyn Yalom. It's still really good I was just distracted.

Code Name Verity Elizabeth Wein. I anticipate a big, spoilery review of this later, but at this stage I am past the halfway point and full of THEORIES. I would hate to spoil for anyone else, so instead I will just make this observation: Usually when reading an Elizabeth Wein novel I have to brace myself against the terrible things that are going to inevitably happen to characters I care about. In this novel the terrible things happen from the very first page! What a relief!

The Shadowed Sun, N. K. Jemisin. I was all, what? Who? What's happening? for about thirty pages. And then I looked it up and realised the book takes place ten years after The Killing Moon. Ohhhhhh. Okay!

The Single Witch's Survival Guide, Mindy Klasky. Deeeeeelightful! Especially love the fake Brit lady.

Acquired:

The Bone Season, Samantha Shannon. Acquired for me by lovely publicist Abba! She is curious to see what I think of it, and thus so am I.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/992120.html

My mother is going to be astonished.

Internets, it turns out I really like teaching special ed.

Trust me, I'm more surprised than anyone. But it turns out being a fast-paced, enthusiastic teacher with high expectations, an ability to tactically ignore restless/distracting behaviour and - most importantly - an unshakably nerdy love for charts, graphs, and data collection works steadily in my favour.

Something to encourage me when I hit my next classroom placement!

Sunday Reading

Okay, it's a day late, but I WROTE it yesterday. I just did lesson planning and forgot to post

* * *

Internets, I have chemicals in my hair, chemicals in my face, and I'm about to put some more on my nails.

Femininity is FUN!

Finished Reading:

Cold Steel, Kate Elliott. YAAAAAAAAY. Pretty much everything happened that I wanted to happen. I loved Cat's spirit nature becoming more and more relevant to her characterization (no time for thinking! Must sex!) and Bee going, you know what? I AM AN AMAZING ORATOR, WATCH ME CHANGE THE WORLD WITH SPEECHES. And Rory, holding the hands of the dying, oh SWEETIE. And Vai, you tricky arrogant darling, so torn between your varying obligations and your beliefs. Yaaaay! Highly enjoyable, third in a series, grab the first two. Very YA friendly, too.

Hawkeye: My Life As A Weapon and Hawkeye: Little Hits, by Fraction, Aja, et al. EEEEEEEEEE how I love the unheroic bits of superhero life. Clint Barton and Kate Bishop (both Hawkeye) function as perfect foils for each other in this awesomely written, superbly drawn, INCREDIBLY colored comic saga. Long may it live.

Currently Reading:

A History of the Wife, Marilyn Yalom. Fun! Super readable! I really like the way it tracks the history of the companionate marriage, as well as some interesting things on birth control, suffrage (DO YOU KNOW WHAT IS NOT IN THE INDEX? NEW ZEALAND IS NOT IN THE INDEX) and abortion.

Illustrated Daughters of Britannia, Katie Hickman. Enh. The pictures are pretty, and I like the anecdotes, but there's not a lot of oomph to this slight history of British ambassadorial hostesses.

Acquired:

The Single Witch's Survival Guide, Mindy Klasky. Yaaaaay, Jane Madison returns! With all new troublesome magical times, plus yummy David. I really love the lady relationships in this series, and this promises more excellent fun times.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/991842.html

Sunday Reading

Finished:

Nothing! Oh my paws and whiskers, can this be so?

It's academic bidding time in my teacher training cycle. We don't write essays - we make presentations, while tutors ask us sharp questions to expose gaps in our knowledge. It's a little like defending your thesis A LOT.

So far, I have done a presentation on NZ's National Education Goals and Guidelines and the National Administration Guidelines. Next, my various study partners and I have presentations on human development theory and practice, legal and ethical issues in teaching, and NCEA (the NZ qualifications system).

As you might imagine, this involves some reading! Some of it's dull, and some of it's incredibly fascinating, but none of it is what I consider leisure reading.

(We've also been preparing for our special education fieldwork. That starts this week, and Internets, as you can imagine I really don't want to stuff that up. Oh, and we've been working on Te Reo Māori. Thanks to Japanese, I can roll my Rs like anything! But also thanks to Japanese, I always mispronounce "au".)

ANYWAY, upshot is, nothing completed in my downtime. (ahahahaha "downtime").

Reading:

The Coldest Girl in Coldtown, Holly Black. Oooooh, sibling stuff and media in action. I am a sucker.

Cold Steel, Kate Elliot. VAI WHAT ARE YOU DOING. STOP.

Also, I feel I should note that the copy-edit on this book is sublime.

A History of the Wife, Marilyn Yalom. Non-fiction, about just what it says. Euro-American focused, with a brief stopover in ancient Israel, but acknowledges this straight up. Awesomely feminist, intriguingly historical.

Acquired:

Supernaturally, Kiersten White. The continuing adventures of Evie! Can't wait. Although I have two weeks of academic bidding left, so I suspect I must.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/991620.html

Sunday Reading

Back to teacher training tomorrow, after an excellent, relaxing, and productive break. With many books!

Finished:

Our Mutual Friend, Charles Dickens. OH MY GOD there was a freaking MORAL. Man, I'm so annoyed about that. Bella revealed herself to be GRATE and then you continue the charade? Not cool, John! Not cool, Boffins! But the good people ended happily and the wicked unhappily; that is what fiction means.

Also, I was reading an electronic copy, and then I spotted a beautifully bound and truly ENORMOUS paper version in a bookshop and was mightily impressed with myself.

Courtesans, Katie Hickman. Continued as delightfully to the end. Highly recommended if you want to know what English and French demimonde ladies were up to and the societal norms they exploited and flouted during the long 19th century. (ETA: Historical accuracy apparently not a high point, but entertaining nonetheless!)

Reading:

The Coldest Girl in Cold-Town, Holly Black. Holly is SO good at writing girls who are angry and damaged and proud and dangerous. I can't wait to see where Tana's going.

Cold Steel, Kate Elliot. CAT! BEE! RORY! VAI! Also, politics, magic, revolution, gender, power, control, freedom, and sport. Which are awesome! But let's face it, I'm a character reader, and I love the hell out of those four. If any of them die, I'm going to sulk for days.

Acquired:

Code Name Verity, Elizabeth Wein. Y'all, don't tell me a THING.

Sunday Reading That Is Actually On A Tuesday And Also I Skipped The Last... SEVEN Weeks? Oh, Self.

It's holidays! There was one week where I did a lot of sleeping and making pancakes for breakfast at 2pm and replaying Mass Effect 2 in order to seduce Thane this time (important). And cleaning my room. My lord, it is clean.

The other week, I am halfway through. I went home to Oamaru, where I have been fed and warmed. I have been writing, internets! Writing! I love it! Killing people with science!

Anyhow, a partial list of what I remember:

Finished:

The Summer Prince, Alaya Dawn Johnson.

Blew my freaking mind. Teenage artist June is trying to win a competition that is one of the few ways a young person like her can get recognition in her rigidly controlled futuristic Brazilian city. But her association with best friend Gil and the charismatic, brilliant, and doomed Summer King Enki might end up changing much more than her personal future. Art! Sex! Politics! Class! Privilege! Technology! Bitter and petty teenage emotions that are so damn real. Worldbuilding! SUMMER KINGS. You should go and read this right now, that's why I put it first. It's really, really good.

The Chaos, Nalo Hopkinson.

I LOVE talented heroines. Like June, who is a great artist, and Scotch, who is an excellent dancer. Anyway, Scotch's biggest concerns are some family drama about her brother going to jail and having to conceal her real clothing and sex choices from her parents, and also whether she might be going crazy. And these are big concerns! But then a volcano erupts in Toronto and everything goes super weird and now she has to worry about Baba Yaga and her chicken house and a big black tarry monster called Spot and her brother has disappeared ON TOP of the other stuff. Jeez. Awesome speculative YA.

Foreigner, CJ Cherryh.

LET US DISCUSS CULTURE SHOCK AND THE PERILS OF INTERSPECIES COMMUNICATION FOR 300 PAGES AND IT WILL ACTUALLY BE TOTALLY INTERESTING, HOW DOES SHE DO THAT? Although I really didn't like the sectional nature of the prologuey bit - I half thought the whole book was going to be these short vignettes, and was so relieved when it settled into the story.

Invader, CJ Cherryh.

I could get over the introspection real quick, but I love how, at the same time Cherryh makes me go, "AWWWW JAGO I LIKE JAGO" I am constantly reminded that Jago doesn't have a concept of "like" and my feels would confuse and irritate her.

P.S. Jago is my favourite, and then Isildi. Bren stop talking to yourself. I hear that later in the series there is an atevi-central PoV, that sounds interesting.

Orleans, Sherri L Smith.

Fen, one of the residents of a hurricane-torn and Delta Fever-struck Orleans that has been cut off from the USA for decades, had a good tribe and a good life. Until the blood hunters came, and she was stuck with a newborn who didn't yet have the Delta Fever in her blood and might be able to get over the Wall - WITH the help of naive Outer States scientist Daniel, who is such an idiot. INCREDIBLE worldbuilding. Not convinced I like the ending, though ask me again tomorrow.

Reading:

Our Mutual Friend, Charles Dickens. I didn't think I liked Dickens, but it turns out I like this just fine. I was eyerolling through the first part being all, "oh and at the end we'll learn the Secretary is actually the lost heir bleh bleh bleh" but then it was revealed! Nice plotting, Dickens! Also Lizzie and Bella should run away together y/y? Although I wouldn't want Eugene to be sad. I like Eugene, who is very much of the "... feelings? I has them?" mode.

Courtesans, Katie Hickman. (Non-fiction, not like me). Ladies of the 18th and 19th century, no better than they should be, but much better off than many. I love this entertaining and source-rich look at the lives, finances, and weirdly contradictory independence of women of the English and French demi-monde. Little bit of psychological reading of the "Surely she must have felt" mode, but most biographical detail relies on sources, not mind-reading.

Tam Lin, Pamela Dean. It's about that time again. Yaaaay, magical college hijinks! Yaaaaaay, joy of reading!

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/991229.html

(no subject)

Hello, Internets!

I of course must respect the privacy of my students, so I don't talk about them directly here, or much about what I do with them (and wouldn't even if I had the time!) but I think professional conduct allows me to say this:

Today we were doing a creative writing lesson on writing an action scene. I gave the students this for an example:

At the soft scrape of a bare foot on stone , Luisa whirled.

The Grey Man stood directly behind her, reaching for her throat. Luisa didn’t waste a second. She took one step forward, lifting her knee sharply. Her tensed foot snapped up. Too late! With the speed of a snake, the Grey Man caught her ankle and yanked.

Luisa went down hard, the gritty rock of the clifftop scraping her hands and knees raw. She tasted blood in her mouth and felt the sharp pain of a bitten tongue. With a monumental effort, she forced herself back to her feet. The Grey Man was waiting. Watching.

“Give me the stone,” he said, his voice soft and sibiliant. “The secret stone. Give it to me.”

Luisa risked a look over her shoulder. The ocean below was rough, the sharp rocks jagged teeth. And there were predators in the water.

But none of those were as dangerous as the creature that blocked her exit.

No safe way past him. The only way out was down.

With her heart pounding in her chest, thumping against the stone in her pocket, Luisa turned on her heel and fled. Towards the edge of the cliff.

She felt a tug at her hair, but she wrenched free and leapt. For a breathless moment, she felt suspended in air, flying past the startled gulls who screamed their displeasure.

Then, she fell.

"What happens next?" they wanted to know.

"You tell me!" I said merrily, and set them brainstorming, planning, and drafting.

I think Luisa dies in about half the stories. 14 year olds LOVE gore.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/990721.html

Sunday Reading II

New school placement! Very exciting, very different. So many new names to learn!

Naturally, I have caught the latest round of plague. Apparently, new teachers (and teacher trainees) had better just resign themselves to regularly getting sick in the first couple years of practice. I have occupied the weekend in 1) writing mentorship first thing Saturday* 2) laundry and 3) sitting on the couch/in my bed, feeling extremely sorry for myself.

Never mind, self, reading over the past week!

Finished:

The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There, Catherynne Valente. Deeeeelightful. I particularly like the differences between childish heartlessness and teenage raw hearts, and the ethical quandaries of selfhood and autonomy.

The Adoration of Jenna Fox, Mary E. Pearson. A re-read, as it happens, but this is the novel I am/will be teaching in two classes, much as I taught The Hunger Games in my last placement. I knew my writing would be useful to me as a teacher, but I wasn't quite expecting, "we're going to study future-set YA exploring the ethics of violence, power, humanity and medical advancement! Do you know anything about that, perchance?" It's nice to feel useful.

Dirty Little Secrets, C.J. Omololu. Child of hoarder has managed to conceal the circumstances in which she lives from almost everyone, but when you have a great bestie and a guy who seems to be interested, it's really hard to keep your dirty little secrets from coming to light. Stark and subtle in turns, with some lovely psychological reasoning.

Also, some really great cleaning descriptions for people into that kind of thing, which is definitely me. If you're the sort of person who likes to read UfYH because descriptions of people cleaning their places and restoring order are soothing, I would recommend this book. Or even if you're another sort of person. But if you DO like the cleaning stuff, definitely grab it.

Reading:

Thud!, Terry Pratchett. Another re-read, in snatches on the bus to and from school. I like it very much.

Acquired:

Dirty Little Secrets, C.J. Omololu.

My TBR piles are disturbingly high, so I may have to institute a no buy rule until I've restored them to a reasonable height. Or at least a single pile.

* I don't think I've talked about that? I mentor a couple of adult writers who are doing some interesting YA work. It's fun.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/990619.html

Sunday Reading I

Over the last week! I read some stuff! Lists.

Finished:

Sandman Slim and Kill the Dead, Richard Kadrey. I picked up the first one of these at a friend's house and borrowed it because Holly Black had blurbed it. Then I bought the second ebook. Good choices, self! Fast-reading, tough-talking, no-time-for-emoting-I-gotta-kill-people-and-or-bodyguard-Lucifer-and-or-save-the-city stuff in a grimy, gaudy LA.

Brown Girls in Bright Red Lipstick, Courtney Sina Meredith. Holy shit. Incredible volume of poetry, I can't even, so many feels. Read it, preferably out loud.

A Stranger in Olondria, Sofia Samatar. Nnnngh, pretty words about words. I love books about the pleasure of reading, particularly ones that also have fascinating magic and spooky spirits and awesome mysticism and politics and omg it's also a travelogue? And a bibliography for works that don't exist? Anyway, recommended reading for people who love reading.

Reading:

The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There, Catherynne Valente. September! I missed you! You're a delight! Valente's adult prose, while lush and gorgeous, is occasionally so ornate it throws me out of the story. This isn't a problem with her more accessible fables, which are incredibly charming.

Acquired:

Oh, Auckland Writers' and Readers' Festival. Thanks for hosting me! Damn you for having so many books there. I managed to limit myself to three:

Ancestry, Albert Wendt. (I accidentally walked into the wrong green room and found myself face to face with a total legend. I made noises with my mouth! Some of them were sentences!)
When Water Burns, Lani Wendt Young.
Brown Girls in Bright Red Lipstick, Courtney Sina Meredith.

From Auckland bookstores:

Auto Da Fay, Fay Weldon's autobio.
Extra-curricular, a magazine thingy about creative types in New Zealand that I bought at random from a shop that was so cute I couldn't walk out without something. It's a sickness.
The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There, Catherynne Valente.

From Book Depository:

The Chaos, Nalo Hopkinson.

I start my next teaching placement tomorrow. I have determined that Sundays are going to be devoted to a) laundry b) reading all the things.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/990353.html

How it goes.

What does my learning how to be a teacher entail? It looks like this:

Weeks 1-3: Center block!

Seminars (behaviour management, planning and assessment prep, collaborative learning workshops, etc etc - practical teacher knowledge)

Academic bids (we research in pairs or groups and then present our findings in order to demonstrate understanding - academic teacher knowledge we can put into practice)

Weeks 4-9: Teaching placement!

We're in a school, teaching. I was teaching a full class on my second day in my last school. It was awesome. And terrifying. But also awesome.

"Teaching" involves planning, assessment, resource preparation, involvement in school life, professional conduct and contributions with your senior colleagues, meeting attendance, club activities, and the part where you actually have a classroom with a bunch of students in it who need to learn something.

While teaching, we get observation, feedback and consultation.

Observation and feedback happen whether we want it or not - tutors come in and watch us work, note down the things we're doing great and the things we need to work on, and then tell us. It's up to us whether we listen. You can bet I listen.

Consultation is us actively seeking help or advice - "Homg what is a unit plan and how do I use pre-assessment to help create one?" "I need some literacy activities for my Year 9s; resource tips?" "How do I differentiate learning in a class where I have high achievers and kids with a lot of learning needs?" And so on. Different questions, depending on our classes and our experiences.

Week 10: Bidding week!

All that teaching we just did? We reflect on it. For pages and pages and pages, assessing whether we hit the criteria, what we'll need to do next time to get them, etc etc. Word count isn't actually important, but just to give you an indicator of the amount of labour involved: In the last bidding week I wrote ~14 000 words in five days. (Actually, I wrote 14k in four days and then my hands stopped working, thanks RSI). This was on the low side - some people did closer to 30k.

Week 11-12: SLEEP.

Or in my case, line edits. BUT ALSO LOTS OF SLEEP and also lots of pleasure reading and baking and Mass Effect. Shep/Garrus, all the way.

Right now we're in the center block, doing academic work. So when Roomie Matt comes home, it's usually to this:

Me: *slightly glazed* Matt! Do you want me to teach you about the social, educational and political development of Maori since 1840 in terms of the Treaty of Waitangi?

Matt: Not... right now.

Me: I MADE A TIMELINE. Also, if you would like to learn about how tikanga can be practiced in the classroom, I found some great resources!

Matt: Good for you!

Me: How about the rationale for including Classical Studies as a social science?

Matt: How about, instead of that, you take a nap?

Me: GOOD IDEA. YOU ARE RESPONDING TO MY OBSERVED BEHAVIOURAL STATE AND SUGGESTING MODIFICATION THAT ADDRESSES MY SPECIFIC NEED; IE, TO GAIN RESILIENCE.

It is an intense course. It is a great course. I am really happy I'm doing it, and I'm learning so much, all the time.

But that's why I'm not blogging much this year.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/990130.html

Karen At Conversation In The Bookstore, Frequently With Herself.

"So many white dudes. I want the new Karen Lord, L, L, no. Um, I wonder if… no, this is sci-fi, where's YA. Sherri Smith, I think? Yeah, Flygirl, Smith. S, s, s, no! What do I have to do get Orleans? Or the new Seanan McGuire?*"

"Lili! Gotta read Lili. Oh, and the Steampunk anthology! Dylan's in that, he sent me his story, I haven't read it yet, I suck, what else is in it? Oh, this looks fun. Holly, and Libba, and ooh, comics! Look, Matt, look! Comics! Yeah, I'm getting this. Lili's Love-Shy, and Dylan's steampunk."

"Oh, Among Others! This book is about how reading makes life bearable even when it's not. It's about a girl who - her twin died, and she's in a boarding school and becoming a sexual being and she reads a lot of science fiction and fantasy I think it's the sixties? Also, fairies. Different fairies, it's good."

*stabs viciously at author's name on spine* "This guy… this guy, okay, no, I was at a thing with him once, no, no way, no."

"Hello! I would like to buy these books, and also I wrote this one, would it be all right with you if I signed it? Thank you! I like your nail polish."

*points to Villette* "Matt, this book is amazing. You read it, and at the end you're like, why is everything? That's my review. Don't read it, though."

* Turns out I had to hit up the Book Depository. I still love you, Book Depository.

Crossposts: http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/989840.html

Captains.

My first teaching placement is OVER!

... and now I have a week of full-on assessment. But before that begins, I get a glorious weekend, during which I shall BLOG. Like the WIND. If the wind liked to BLOG.

In the meantime, here is a question I answered on my tumblr, and am pleased enough with to submit to wider dissemination in a more permanent form.

"Out of curiosity, if you were creating a Captain New Zealand for the Marvel Universe, who would they be?" by franzferdinand2

OOOOH.

Okay, so I am a traditionalist - I think the Captain characters should have military backgrounds, and be patriots, though not tools for patriotism. They should in some way encapsulate (insofar as possible!) the public perception of the “ideal” of their country, and they should be widely adored by the public.

So, I’d go with someone fictional, but inspired by Corporal Bill Henry Apiata, VC, the most trusted man in New Zealand. Willie Apiata is the only recipient of the Victoria Cross for New Zealand, the highest military commentation we have. It was awarded when he carried a severely wounded comrade over broken ground, while exposed to heavy enemy fire.

He was also awarded the Presidential Unit Citation, which means his bravery has been recognised by two nations - not a bad start for a Captain figure. And having left the military, he now teaches adventure skills to young people. I think we all know I have a lot of respect for teachers!

So that’s what I’d do - someone with a fairly normal background (I’m just a kid from Brooklyn/Te Kaha) who pursues a career in the army and exhibits extraordinary valour and care for his colleagues.

I’d leap into fiction with the return - perhaps he pursues a teaching role in a school, and while the school goes on a field trip to a science laboratory, he surprises some saboteurs who are trying to steal some work NZ chemo-geneticists have been doing on the super serum. They fail to obtain the secrets, but in the process, my character is accidentally exposed to the serum and OH MY GOD now he has superpowers.

So yeah. That’s what I’d do.