I'm a bit behind due to jet lag and other post-vacation woes, but I definitely wanted to mention the Old School Middle Grade Roundtable I participated in last week over @ the Book Smugglers. Ana and Thea took one of their weekly Old School Wednesdays (happily inspired by our very own Retro Fridays) and made it a special edition post, inviting five bloggers to sit down and discuss their top five old school middle grade books. I was there, along with Heidi @ Bunbury in the Stacks, Charlotte @ Charlotte's Library, Liz @ A Chair, a Fireplace and a Tea Cozy, and Ana @ Things Mean a Lot. So basically the stellarest of stellar company. As Liz points out, no titles overlap! Which was completely unplanned and which makes the whole thing sort of that much more awesome. I went with two historicals, two contemporaries, and one high fantasy. Stop in and see which ones I chose and check out the whole fabulous list.
I fell in love with the cover of Alexandra Bracken 's debut novel-- Brightly Woven --last fall and the scant synopses I could find at the time certainly piqued my interest. After managing to get my hands on an ARC, I found myself surprised and pleased with this unique fantasy. You can read my review here . As the release date approached, I invited Alex to participate in an interview and giveaway here on the site and, despite her crazy busy schedule, she kindly accepted. Enjoy! First things first: When did the idea for Brightly Woven first hit you and what (if anything) did you know right off the bat? I remember the exact moment it hit me—what I was doing, who I was talking to, what song was playing on iTunes. :) I had just come back from Winter Break my sophomore year in college and was sitting on my bed chatting with my mom. Sophomore year was pretty remarkable in terms of the insane weather that we had in Virginia (where I was in school) but it had also been a bizar...
I saw it last week due to Charlotte - such an amazing list, with so many things I now need to read.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I jotted down several titles! It was lots of fun.
Delete