434th Friday Blog Roundup

I paid the Wolvog $5 to build me a pretty new website for all of my books.  He subsidizes me because I pay for his computer classes and give him our old technology.  Click on the picture below to go to the site:

Isn’t it lovely? I’ll be uploading teasers and release information and book club questions over there now that the release date for Measure of Love is closer. As well as thoughts on constructing sideways sequels (harder than I thought), or perhaps a what-not-to-do about giving characters lives that you know nothing about. So far, in taking two side characters and making them main characters in the sequel — obviously something I hadn’t considered when I gave them careers and such in the first book — I have had to pick the brains of a producer at the Daily Show, the atelier designer for a fashion house, and two doctors in order to construct something believable.  Damn it’s been a lot of work.

And I also feel a little odd whenever I call someone to talk about a character as if they’re a real person.  I mean, all these people are cognizant that they are helping me with a novel, but it’s still embarrassing to talk about your characters as if they’re living.  It makes me want to constantly remind people that I’m speaking to that I know it’s make-believe.  Plus, it’s also a little embarrassing to be sitting and talking to two doctors knowing their job is to save people’s lives and my job is to make up stuff.

Isn’t that a weird job?  Hi, I’m Melissa.  I’m a professional maker-upper.

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As a side note, I ended up buying all of John Green’s books when I went to the bookstore last weekend.  I shortlisted everything by Cathleen Schine because she definitely fit the bill (but I was already buying three books at the time so she will have to wait a bit).  Later in the week, I added Daniel Handler to the to-read list because he also seemed sufficiently unfussy.  I put on Enders Game and a bunch of others… the list started to get very long, which is a good thing.  I also started looking down the Printz list, noticing that a lot of books that fit into this category also seemed to win the Printz prize (though not all books that win the Printz prize I would ever describe as YA, so that is interesting).  Just wanted to give you an update on my reading list just in case… you know… you also had been looking for unfussy, straightforward storytelling books.

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And now the blogs…

But first, second helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week.  In order to read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• “We Found Our Son in the Subway” (NY Times)
• “I’m More Than Just a Uterus” (The Road Less Travelled)
• “A Dawning” (It Is What It Is (Or Is It?)
• “Taking Charge of My Infertility” (An Embarrassment of Good Fortune)
• “Book Stoppage” (Stirrup Queens) — thank you, Mina!
• “On Being Pretty” (A Really Good Idea)
• “Not With a Whimper” (The Smartness)

Okay, now my choices this week.

What They Never Tell You has a post about gaining perspective while on a hiatus from her blog.  She writes, “I’ve come to realize how different the world looks after IVF, after three failed attempts, after finding out that a loved one has cancer.  It would be easy to get down and allow myself to wallow in all of what has taken place.”  It’s about finding those quiet moments of goodness amongst all the hard ones, and then sitting in those moments to catch your breath.

By the Brooke has a post about how people believe that yes, babies may be born still, but they’ll be born to other people.  She writes of our optimism bias: “But once something happens to you that knocks your whole world off-kilter, once you witness how quickly your carefully laid plans can crumble into nothing, once you come home to an empty crib and you have no baby to put in it, well.  Your expectations are different.”  It’s a truthful, thought-provoking post.

Finding My New Normal has a post about reconnecting with a friend who left before the loss of her child and has returned still expecting the same person.  As she describes the person she used to know, friends who have only known the author since her loss were confused.  She writes, “As she was walking down memory lane, sharing stories about fun times and crazy moments I could see looks of wonder on the faces of my newer friends. I could tell that they didn’t recognize the ‘me’ that was being described in the stories. In a way, neither did I. That person seems so far away now.”  The loss of her son divides her life into a time before and a time after, and it’s a gorgeous post about what happens when those two sides meet.

Lastly, Serenity Now has a post about gratitude for the child she has instead of focusing on the child she doesn’t.  She says something very profound: “I’ve been so focused on how much it hurts that we just got lucky that I’ve ignored the fact we got really, really lucky in the first place.”  Isn’t that amazing?  I love her focus as well as the image she presents at the end of the post.

The roundup to the Roundup: New author site.  These are the books I got last week.  And lots of great posts to read.  So what did you find this week?  Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between March 1st and March 8th) and not the blog’s main url. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week?  Read the original open thread post here.