CHAPTER FIFTEEN, IN WHICH I AM ALL LIKE, WHAT DOES “EVERY DAY” MEAN?

Happy Black Friday everyone!

If you are in the United States, perhaps you are reading this from the depths of your couch, where you are thinking about How Much You Ate Yesterday. As for today’s shopping extravaganza . . . I am NOT going out there. I live in New York City, where is it a shopping bloodbath on the best of days. I do not want to be killed by a well-meaning tourist wielding a giant stuffed platypus from F.A.O. Schwartz.

No. I am staying here, blogging to you in safety.

I had a very YA Thanksgiving. Scott Westerfeld and Justine Larbalestier came over, as did Australian YA queen Lili Wilkinson. It was also kind of a UK Thanksgiving, as my British friends Oscar Gingersnort and Winchester Grey were there, asking “Wot is this?” a lot, which was fun. When you have four foreigners at your Thanksgiving table, you can make up all kinds of things, and THEY BELIEVE YOU! They don’t know Thanksgiving traditions! You can say, “On Thanksgiving, it is traditional to put on these ski boots and go stand in the hall closet making ghost noises.” AND THEY DO IT!

Or they WOULD have, if I had asked them to. But I was trying to be a good hostess and not burn the turkey or the vegetarian option (for Scott and I).

Before I get to the First Question of the Day, I have an announcement!

I am happy to tell you that the second annual MJ Holiday Signing Workshop is now OPEN! You may remember that last year the workshop produced . While this was fun, I still have glitter in my hair from it. This year, the Workshop Elves have come up with something EVEN COOLER—they are making LIMITED EDITION Suite Scarlett holiday cheer cards.

Wait! It gets better! The cards will be signed both by me and a member of the Martin family—the main characters in Suite Scarlett. Yes! Because the Hopewell Hotel (thhttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gife setting of Suite Scarlett) is here in New York, they have agreed to drop by and sign. Either Spencer, Lola, Marlene, or Scarlett herself will add some holiday cheer to your card!

To get a card, send an e-mail to cheer@maureenjohnsonbooks.com (note the special e-mail address!). Include your name, the name of the person the card is for (if it is not for you), your entire mailing address, and any short messages you would like written in the card.

On that note, I should add that from this point on, I will be giving special consideration to Cheer-related questions. I am a complete expert on all things Holiday, and am ready and waiting to answer any questions you have regarding this festive time!

Okay. First question of the day . . .

DEPARTMENT OF DEFINITIONS

anonymous said...
Dearest Maureen, i've never read one of your books. I'm not quite sure how I ended up on your site - but where the hell are you now?? You promised to post every single day this week!! I've been checking every day!

Maybe the problem is that I didn’t define “every day” clearly. Maybe you think that “every day” means “every day.” I have always taken “every day” to mean “some days with long stretches of days in between during which nothing happens.” Where I come from, “every day” can mean, like, once a month!

Thinking about it now, I can see where I may have gone wrong.

In any case, anonymous, I am sorry! But I am glad you were here “every day”! I hope you will continue coming “every day,” even if I prove to be a bit challenged. I also hope you get a chance to read one of my books, if you feel like it. They are like the blog, but about 200 times longer!

If you will excuse me for just one moment, I have to send a private note, which I hope you do not read. Just skip down the page, past this private note, without looking at it. Please rejoin the blog right below the photo.

[PRIVATE NOTE BEGINS]

[Note to Future MJ—only to be read by Future MJ and no one else: Listen, stupid, don’t promise to post “every day.” You will never do it. And ESPECIALLY don’t promise to post “every day” when you are flying home from the UK with J.K. Rowling (or even without her), then doing a book signing, then going to jury duty, and then cooking Thanksgiving diner. You WILL NOT DO IT. You will end up disappointing the readers you love. Tell the truth. Tell the world that you spend many days of the week fighting crime with the highly-secret YA Flying Squad. They will understand.]

[PRIVATE NOTE ENDS]



Thank you for not reading the private note posted above.

DEPARTMENT OF UNLIKELY OCCURRENCES

marlena said...
So, MJ, if it came down to you, Free Monkey, Scott Westerfeld and John Green being cornered in a room with with a zombie guarding the only door and a tank full of jellyfish blocking the window,would you
a.) smash the tank and make a run for it with the guys
b.)fight off the zombie and once again run
c.)use the shield and glow of Scott and John that you mentioned in your blog about BEA to escape unscathed
d.)have Free Monkey take care of it with his ninja powers
e.)[other]

This is a tough scenario, Marlena. Tough, but completely possible. In fact, I’m surprised this hasn’t already happened. I mean, the jellyfish are getting closer every day. Just today, I read that millions of them have been spotted off of the coast of Scotland—AFTER they wiped out Northern Ireland’s only salmon farm. According to the reports, BILLIONS of small jellyfish attacked and killed over 150,000 fish.When the jellyfish are looming off the Scottish coast and invading Ireland, you know things are bad. Thanks for nothing, Global Warming. (For this reason alone, please turn off one unnecessary appliance today!)

I also don’t like the sound of these sea anemones that walk along the sea floor. I don’t like ANY of this sea-related news I’m reading today. It’s like all the Sea Scientists got together and said, “What do we have that will completely freak mj out?” What is next? Sponges who blog? Lobsters with little tiny cars? Stingrays playing the piano?

I DON’T LIKE IT!

Where did that tank of jellyfish come from? Did someone put it by the window, or did They install it there?

I’m sorry. I am getting too freaked out to answer the question.

DEPARTMENT OF J.K. ROWLING

Gia said...
Do you agree with the people that say Dumbledore can't be gay because it wasn't in the books?

The thing is . . . it’s not, not in the books, either. J.K. doesn’t say much about the romantic lives of many of the teachers—they aren’t usually relevant to the story. So we don’t really know either way. I don’t think you can assume someone is straight until you are explicitly told otherwise. And Grindelwald, Dumbledore’s true love, does appear in the books. Whatever happens between J.K. and me on a personal basis . . . I stand by her on this one.

[Note to J.K., if she is reading this: This is not an invitation to climb up my fire escape and break into my apartment in your never-ending quest for snacks.]

Okay . . . Free Monkey is putting on his Santa hat and laying out the pens. We have to get this Workshop open! I hope to hear from all you cheer-seekers out there, either in card requests or questions!

ACCIO, STEWARDESS!

I know what you are thinking. You are thinking, “She promises to post every single day, and she gets to day three and fumbles.”

But when you hear WHY, you will stop shaking your heads, as I know you must be. And in the process, I can answer today’s ASK MJ question.

shausto-la said...
Did you hear about J.K Rowling being list of 100 Top Living Geniuses? Really makes you think twice about all those visits she made to you in the past..

Funny you should ask this . . .

So there I am, sitting on the nice Virgin Atlantic plane yesterday, all buckled in like a good passenger. The plane was pretty crowded, but I had gotten lucky—the seat next to me was empty. So I was all ready to sit back for a nice flight. A little reading, a movie or two, and some writing--including my promised blog--until my laptop ran out of power. I had a plan.

When the cabin lights were dimmed for takeoff. I was looking out the window when another passenger approached me from behind—I have no idea where from—and plopped down in the empty seat.

“Fancy meeting you here,” J.K. said.

She was in disguise again, this time wearing a pair of baggy sweatpants, a sweatshirt from EuroDisney, and a cowboy hat. There was a suspicious-looking bulge around her stomach area.

“Why I do feel this isn’t a coincidence?” I asked her, as we sped down the runway. “And don’t you have your own plane? The one you use to chase Alan Rickman?”

“I often fly commercial. It’s better for the environment. And Alan has stopped going outside as much. He’s even gotten very good blackout curtains, the cheeky minx, so I can’t even spy on him from across the garden.”

I felt the wheels of the plane leave the ground. I illegally unhooked my seat belt and stood to scan for more empty seats, but there were none.

“Don’t bother trying to move,” she said. “I made sure these seats were full. I wanted to make sure we were together. Here. I got us some snacks.”

She unzipped her sweatshirt, revealing what had to be the plane’s entire supply of mini pretzels and nuts. Even though she had offered them, and even though I didn’t want them . . . I did note that she didn’t look like she was really going to share her stash.

“I’ve been busy since I last saw you,” she said, ripping open a bag of sour cream and chive pretzels (yes, they exist). “I bought a dolphin. I keep it in a tank on my roof. Ask me what I named it. Go on. Ask me. Ask me.”

“What did you call it?” I asked dully.

“Fatso.”

“You named your dolphin Fatso?”

“It’s a family name.”

“Is it?” I said, gripping my armrests.

“That’s not what I came to tell you about, though,” she said.

“No?”

“No. As I know you know, because you mentioned it on your blog, I revealed that Dumbledore is gay.”

“Yes,” I said. “I am always glad to hear about positive gay and lesbian characters. Well played, J.K.”

She nodded.

“Of course,” she said, “I have more to tell the world. That’s why I’ve arranged this meeting.”

“Oh no,” I said. “Oh no, no, no. You always lie to me. I’m not going to be your little instrument of falsehood anymore. Go tell it to Fatso. He can go tell the dolphins. I’m done, J.K. Do you hear me? Done!”

I put in my earphones and turned my full attention to my movie screen, which wasn’t even on yet, because we had just taken off. I stared at it anyway.

“Obviously,” she began, ignoring my attempts to ignore her, “Dumbledore is not the only gay character in the books. The magic world is comprised in much the same way as the muggle world, population-wise, so there are many gay citizens.”

I took off my headphones and looked over slowly. This made perfect sense—unlike pretty much every other exchange I’d ever had with J.K.. So you can understand my concern.

“Right,” I said, guardedly.

“So I thought I’d tell you about a few more. For example: Helga Hufflepuff, Kingsley Shacklebot, Amelia Bones, Lee Jordan, Dolores Umbridge . . .”

“Umbridge?”

“The gay guys are not always the good guys,” JK said, again, making a fair point. I was beginning to think I had misjudged her severely.

“You’re right,” I said. “Please continue.”

“Sirius Black, Crookshanks . . .”

“Crookshanks, Hermione’s cat?”

“Do you know another Crookshanks? Where was I? Oh yes. Katie Bell, Professor Flitwick, the Goblet of Fire . . .”

“Now wait a minute,” I said. “Look, I appreciate the fact that you’ve stepped up and given the world such a shining example of a gay parental figure—I do. But the Goblet of Fire is a goblet, and there is no such thing as a gay goblet. And if you make any remarks about ‘flaming goblets’ I am going to call the pilot. Not the cabin crew. The PILOT.”

“You really can’t take a joke, can you?” she said smugly. “That’s why I like you. You are very, very literal.”

I didn’t speak to her again until the stewardess brought me my vegetarian meal. Since it was food, J.K. was extremely interested. Her hand was midway to my salad dressing when I gave her a very dangerous look.

“Don’t even think about it,” I said.

She retracted her hand and did the “I was doing nothing, what are you even talking about?” look. She tried to distract me by playing with the contrast control on my video screen and making my seat go back, but I never diverted my eyes from my food. This, I could tell, was getting to her. She almost broke the stewardess’s wrist when they finally rolled up with her tray.

“Let’s stop wasting time,” she said, eating a pat of butter right out of the foil. “Let’s get right to the Curse of Ravenclaw.”

THE CURSE OF RAVENCLAW

“Everyone in Ravenclaw has a very serious nut allergy,” she said.

“What?”

“All incoming students with pre-existing nut allergies are sorted into Ravenclaw, but the majority of students are actually given a nut allergy right after the arrival night banquet. This is why you will never see a Ravenclaw eating a peanut butter sandwich.”

“Do you ever see anyone at Hogwarts eating a peanut butter sandwich?” I asked.

“Not a Ravenclaw.”

“Or anyone.”

“Anyone who is a Ravenclaw.”

“What I’m saying,” I said, “is that I have never seen a peanut butter sandwich at Hogwarts, ever.”

“Especially not when Ravenclaws are involved,” she said, knowingly.

“I’m saying that there are no peanut butter sandwiches,” I said, growing annoyed. “Not just in Ravenclaw House . . .”

“Exactly!”

“No . . . let me finish. Not just in Ravenclaw, but . . .”

“Exactly!” she shouted.

She made a second attempt for the salad dressing. I smacked her hand.

“Why?” I asked. “What is the point of giving everyone in Ravenclaw a nut allergy? Is this relevant?”

“I wanted to illustrate the fragility of the human experience. The humble nut taking down a powerful wizard. You see?”

“But you never used any humble nuts in the books.”

“That’s what makes this such an exciting revelation,” she said. “Only I knew about the curse!”

“It’s not a curse if they give students a nut allergy on purpose. What you’re describing is a tradition. A highly insane tradition.”

“If you think that’s bad,” she said, “you should see what they do to the students in Quabblecrack.”

“What in the #&*(@ is Quabblecrack?”

“The fifth house,” she said, with a smile.

With that, we hit a patch of turbulence and the plane began to shake.

THE FIFTH HOUSE

“It didn’t seem worth mentioning at the time,” J.K. said, as we gripped our armrests and the flight crew went running down the aisle to secure the duty free cart.

“You didn’t think it was worth mentioning that there are FIVE houses, not four?” I said.

“I wrote up a description, if you want to see it.”

She produced a folded piece of paper from the pocket of her sweatpants. It read as follows:

The house of Quabblecrack was founded by Quentin Quabblecrack. He was a great believer in bureaucracy, and he invented many behind-the-scenes elements of Hogwarts, such as the complex magical spreadsheets that explain the pay scale for the staff, the impenetrable filing system, and the truly astonishing vendor approval process for all Hogwarts maintenance work.

The house symbol is the platypus. With its furry body, webbed feet, duck-like bill, pouch for young, and one poisonous spur, the platypus truly encapsulates Quabblecrack’s motto: “I am moved not by beauty, nor elegant design, nor simplicity . . . bring to me your forms, your procedures, and your systems of law, and I will make them complete in all ways. But print these things in block letters in number #2 quill, and make no mistakes. Also, please provide copies (in person, not by owl) and expect two weeks for processing.” The house colors are steel and smoke, which is pretty much just grey and a slightly lighter shade of grey.

Entry to the Quabblecrack common room is gained by a picture called “In the mail room at Gringotts.” Students must answer a long series of seemingly unrelated questions, and it is known to take up to three days to get inside. (The longest recorded wait was four and a half weeks, but that was due to a technical error inside of the painting.) As such, Quabblecrack students are frequently late to class due to exhaustion and confusion. Also, every student in Quabblecrack has a serious nut allergy . . .



The duck-billed platypus, symbol of the House of Quabblecrack

I put the paper down.

“You see,” J.K. said, “I created a lot of characters in my head. Certainly more than you ever have. I’ve read your books, you know, and with the exception of 101 Dalmatians, they’re pretty sparsely populated. And I don’t even think dogs count.”



101 Dalmatians by Dodie Smith was published in 1956.

“Unlike you,” she said pointedly, “and many lazy writers like you, I have a cast of hundreds! But I made up far more characters than I needed, and frankly, a lot of them were boring and unusable. They had to go somewhere. So I put them in Quabblecrack. Lavingia Root, for example, is your classic Quabblecrack student. I never wrote Lavingia because she was so awfully, awfully dull and served no purpose. So I put her in Quabblecrack, where she is a prefect.”

“You mean that you made an imaginary house for imaginary students?” I asked.

J.K. made a sudden and successful lunge for my cheese as we hit an air pocket.

“Hogwarts is entirely imaginary,” she said with a chuckle. “Magic isn’t real, you know. There’s no such thing as Diagon Alley, or Hogsmeade, or the Hogwarts Express, or King’s Cross railway station.


King’s Cross Railway Station is a major junction of both the London Tube and the rail service. It does not have a nut allergy.

“That’s not the point,” I said. “You can’t just keep adding stuff you didn’t write. You can’t make an unwritten home for unwritten characters who were too boring to live.”

“Who says?” she asked, eating my piece of cheddar in triumph.

“Everyone knows that!”

“Someone,” she said, pointing at me with a food-stained finger, “makes a lot of dangerous assumptions. Now if you’ll excuse me, the pilot is going to give me some flying lessons. I think I can talk him into letting me land the plane if I let him have an hour in the tank with Fatso. People love dolphins.”

As a parting shot, she took my pillow. I think she ate it.

I hope this answers your question, Shausto-la. And I hope you have all assumed that when I said “every day for a week,” I didn’t mean weekends. I have a lot of mental damage to recover from, and I have to sign books tomorrow and talk to English teachers.

Please continue to send your questions, and I will continue to do my little all in providing answers.

COVERS, TEA, AND ISSUES OF PERSONALITY

Day two of my “posting every day” week, and already I’m groaning. But this is partially because I drove halfway across England today, and now I have to pack to get on a flight tomorrow.

So, let’s see how may questions I can get through before I have to go ask Oscar if he’s seen my passport. Oh, and I have Free Monkeys and the Wee Free Monkeys bags to pack!

DEPARTMENT OF INSTRUCTION

anonymous said...
I am insanely jealous of my English teacher, who is going to said English conference. Would you be totally terrified if a lady in her sixties came up to you and asked for a book signing for one of her seniors?

No! Nothing scares me, except the many, many things I have listed on my official Lists of Fears. I am happy to see EVERYONE who comes to a signing! Please have her stop by! Visitors are good! Otherwise I get bored and start playing “fort” under the skirts of the signing table.

laura said...
I have a Very Important Question to ask of you. My English teacher is very disapproving of YA literature. He saw I was reading Dramarama by E. Lockhart (and I'm sure you know full well how amazing E. Lockhart is) and actually scoffed at it. How can I convince him that all YA isn't bad? That's it's actually quite a wonderful genre for teens, not just fluffy, mindless, dumbed down crap that he seems to think it is and that it's not a waste of my time and intelligence?

Is this still going on? Really? Part of me (the part that isn’t done her laundry) wants Justine Larbalestier to answer this question, because she is a force of nature and the best advocate of YA literature I’ve ever met. This question needs a good answer. But let me have a quick crack at it.

First of all, it annoys me to no end that someone scoffed at Dramarama. He obviously hasn’t read it. I am glad YOU have.

I think people who object to YA . . . or THINK they object to YA, largely because they haven’t read much of it . . . do so because they have a problem with books that are a.) not specifically targeted at adults (though they can be read by adults), and b.) because they weren’t written over fifty years ago.

The first objection is crazy because some of the most acclaimed works of literature out there would technically fall under the category of YA if they were published now. Catcher in the Rye, for example, squarely hits the YA mark . . . as do Huckleberry Finn, Lord of the Flies, To Kill a Mockingbird, Alice in Wonderland, Little Women, Great Expectations, Oliver Twist . . . most of Jane Austen, when you think about it . . .

So, let’s not worry about that. We’re left with the problem of the books being new, and that’s just as stupid. Great new books are written all the time, and EVERY book is a new book at some point.

Are there trashy YA books out there? Of course there are. But to say YA is a vast land of trash is an act of profound ignorance. Did he say WHY he thought this? Was it the covers? If it IS the covers . . . see my comments later on that subject!

kayli said...
I would like to know whether you've ever gotten lost while drinking tea.

Yes. It was in high school. I remember I had a cup of tea while I was riding in the back of a van with my insane sophomore year religion teacher, who was a 23 year-old ex-seminary student. I will call him Mr. Noodles.

Mr. Noodles wore huge red glasses and bright red sweaters. He was the kind of person who likes to tell you how smart they are—which is usually a pretty sure sign that they’re missing a critical chip somewhere in the personality sector. He liked to be very “progressive” by having us analyze U2 lyrics in class while he played the guitar. (Guitars in church or class are pretty much always the sign of doom.) And instead of our regulation religion textbook, we had to read Hidden Victory: A Novel of Christ. (All I remember about Hidden Victory was that I borrowed a copy from everyone in my homeroom one day, and then broke into my best friend’s locker, stole all the contents, and entirely replaced them with Hidden Victories . . . which she did NOT find funny because she’d been up until 3 AM doing a pre-Christmas shift and re-stocking session at her job at the Gap and she had to cram for a Spanish exam in the morning. So my little joke did not go down as well as I had hoped.)

Anyway . . . it was with this teacher that I went from being a little scared of telling anyone at my Catholic school that I wasn’t Catholic to advertising the fact every fourteen seconds, usually by prefacing my every remark with, “Well, I probably don’t understand this because I’m not Catholic, but . . .”

He was just one of those people who . . . I don’t know . . . PROVOKES you. You know what I mean? Makes you kind of . . . obnoxious? And you know you’re being obnoxious, but you JUST CAN’T STOP. I was pretty docile otherwise, as I remember it. But he just brought it out of me.

To be fair to teenage mj, this was a guy who claimed to have a mathematical formula that proved the existence of God. I asked to see it, and he said it was too complicated, and I said, “Well, I probably don’t understand this because I’m not Catholic, but . . . if you really have that . . . shouldn’t it be the only thing we ever learn, ever? I mean, shouldn’t we take every single math class under the sun to be able to understand it? Shouldn’t we put aside our copies of Hidden Victory: A Novel of Christ? And shouldn’t we be let out of gym FOR SURE?”

So, he hated me. Every time I raised my hand, I saw him lose minutes off his lifespan. What made me feel justified was that I could tell that he really thought I was some kind of lesser being for not being Catholic, and therefore, he needed to be taught tolerance. By me.

To get to the tea . . .

So we were going on retreat, which was a very long and tedious day spent off at the retired nuns’ home, watching videos with engaging titles like “Waiting for Love is Beautiful” and doing “sharing exercises” that were mostly just opportunities for our teachers to yell at us about our slouching knee socks in a woodland setting. He drove about seven of us. How I ended up in his van, I seriously have no idea. But, being progressive, he allowed us to have BEVERAGES. (Honestly, this is the kind of thing that passed for a HUGE DEAL in our school.) He got totally lost while driving along. It was clear that he had completely botched the instructions and we had no idea where we were—and he was starting to freak out when it appeared that we were heading towards the other side of the state.

Do you know that delivery company, Guaranteed Overnight Delivery? The one who have the G.O.D. logo on the side of their trucks? One of those drove past. And I leaned forward and said, “Hey, Mr. Noodles . . . there goes God. Why don’t you follow him?”

To his credit, he didn’t punch me in the face.

DEPARTMENT OF COVER STORIES

liz said...
MJ, I'm sorry, but that cover is AWFUL. The girl looks like she ducked her head in peroxide and proceeded attempt to put her hair in curls.
Do you have a lot of say in the covers of your books?

I see what you’re saying, Liz . . . but let me tell you some background, and that might make it clear why I like this so much. While people might have varying opinions on the model and pose, a lot of work went into getting the basic facts straight. Scarlett is blonde, has curly hair of exactly the length described, and both that black dress and red lipstick play a part in the story. It may not look exactly as it does in my head, or how it might in yours . . . but it’s RIGHT!

What excited me more (and which you can’t really this see very well, sadly), was that the art team went to the trouble of finding an Art Deco hotel in New York like the Hopewell Hotel (the story’s setting). That’s where the photo shoot took place. Even cooler . . . there’s Hopewell Hotel stationary on the back cover. When I saw that, I got a little crazy and called Daphne in excitement.

But you know what? Obviously, I want a nice cover, but the truth is . . . the cover has very little to do with what’s inside. In fact, it has nothing to do with what’s inside. I get annoyed by some covers too. Honestly, I just take them off. Feel free to replace them with the cover of another book. Or, even better, feel free to make your own!

I hope you like the story. I really think you will.

Okay. Oscar says he can’t find my passport, and the Wee Free Monkeys are flinging my socks around the room. I’ll be back tomorrow, probably from a plane. I won’t let you down!

COMING OUT OF THE DARK

WOW.

I didn’t mean for almost two weeks to go by without reporting. There is an explanation, as always, but this explanation is made more exciting by the fact that IT IS A SECRET.

Yes. A secret. So secret that I had to sign a document promising that I wouldn’t talk about what I was doing . . . but I may be able to tell you in March or so. (I wish I could tell you. I really do. But don’t bother asking an ASK MJ question about it, because I won’t answer it—and I hate letting you down.)

I can tell you I am in ENGLAND, I am working on something that is not one of my books. It is sort of book related, and it is VERY COOL. It’s also what’s kept me busy since last Monday.

So I’ve basically just crawled out from under a pile. To make it up to you (and because I’ve missed you something terrible), I am going to try to post EVERY DAY THIS WEEK.

YES!

A small bit of business first: if you are going to the National Council of Teachers of English conference in New York City this weekend, please come by and visit me! I will be signing at the HarperCollins booth from noon to one, and then will be visiting the Scholastic booth after that.

So . . . now I have a DELUGE of questions. There were so many zombie questions that I had to put them all to the side. If I answered them all, I would have come right up in a zombie Google sweep . . . so we have to lay low for a while on those, then I’ll get to them all. Fortunately, there are loads of others to get to.

DEPARTMENT OF UNLIKELY OCCURRENCES

nuwon wearspants said...
If you met a talking dolphin, and he was pretty but only one man could control him - and you understood the dolphin, but couldn't control him - and that one man was a hobo with a bottle of Lysol for a hand, would you befriend him?

Who has the Lysol hand? The hobo or the dolphin? (Ooooh. The Hobo or the Dolphin. That’s a good title. I want that for my autobiography. Or as the name of the imaginary restaurant I keep thinking I want to open.)

I guess it’s the hobo, right? Dolphins don’t have hands. I follow. I gotcha.

Okay, I understand the dolphin, but the Lysol-handed hobo (I want that title too) . . . he controls the dolphin, and . . . . wait . . . what’s the question? Would I befriend the Lysol-handed hobo or the dolphin?

I think my answer would be yes to both. I want nothing more than to meet a talking dolphin, and I really like Lysol. It’s sort of how I love vacuum cleaners—especially ones with those clear containers where you can see the dirt being collected! Oh, that’s the best. It’s SO SATISFYING. I just bought this little Dyson handheld, and it’s light and it sort of like a big yellow tazer, except it CLEANS. Nothing can escape it! I ran all around my apartment, hand-vacuuming everything that wasn’t moving (or was moving too slowly to escape me). And Swifter . . . don’t even get me started on Swifter. Those things changed my life . . .

Wait . . . what was the question?

the perilous t said...
So, you're walking down the street one day, and everything appears to be normal. Suddenly, a delivery truck swerves to a halt in front of you and a beautiful cakes comes tumbling out. The truck driver (who just happens to be Zac Efron) and the entire High School Musical cast get out of the truck and gape at the cake in shock before asking you to assist them in lifting the thing back into the truck. You oblige, and have successfully placed the ruined cake where it should be when Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes come bursting out of the nearest building, screaming that their daughter Suri is choking on an anthrax-spiked bagel. They shove her into your arms and beg for your help, only to be silenced by a white grand piano falling off of the roof of a nearby apartment. 
The Cruises are now dead, except for Suri, who's still choking on the poisonous bagel while Zac starts singing a chorus of 'What Time Is It?". What do you do?

I guess my first question is . . . why is Zac Efron driving a cake truck?

Out of everything that happens here, and A LOT happens here, this is the element that concerns me the most—probably because that cake truck is aimed at me. And how big is this cake that the ENTIRE CAST OF HIGH SCHOOL MUSCIAL CAN’T LIFT IT without my help? And why do they think that I am the secret weapon here? What am I, the Hulk?

It’s not a cake at all, is it, Perilous T? You can’t fool me. I’m the Einstein of personal dangers. I’m not touching that thing. I don’t know what it is, but I know that the cast of High School Musical wants me to touch because it will ASSIMLIATE ME into their world where everyone is trapped in Sisyphean rounds of auditions that never turn into shows. I’ll probably end up like that kid who never puts down the basketball.

It really can’t be a coincidence that the Swiss Family Cruise is in a nearby building, feeding bagels to their small child—bagels that turn out to be poisoned with anthrax. They have obviously angered the cast of High School Musical.

As for what to do for poor Suri . . . I am reminded of my favorite Deep Thought by Jack Handy: “If you're being chased by an angry bull, and then you notice you're also being chased by a swarm of bees, it doesn't really change things. Just keep on running.” Does it really matter, Perilous, whether or not you are poisoned as you choke?

I think my main hope would be that my hero Rupert Grint would come and rescue me in his ice cream truck. Did you know that Rupert Grint owns an ice cream truck? That is a true fact.

DEPARTMENT OF ACCEPTANCE

[comment on a Bartlesville book banning update post]
Anonymous said...
HA HA HA HA HA HA
Bartlesville has no place for such dribble.
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA
Silly, silly homo.

Oh, you crazy homophobes! I guess you have finished eating all your crayons and have come to search the Interwebs! Hello! Welcome to my blog!

I find homophobia to be terrible affliction, but I have great hopes that it will be overcome someday. In the meantime, if you want to drop by and leave your thoughts and further the discussion, you are welcome to do so!

Bonus points for writing something that sounds like a little Japanese poem! I hope you don't mind, but I changed your comment around so that it is in haiku format.

HA HA HA HA HA
Silly, silly homo-phobe
HA HA HA HA HA

And my reply . . .

Free Monkey says, "Oh!
Homophobia soon will go!"
Happy days will come.

I invite you to come back again!



Everyone is welcome!

DEPARTMENT OF MYSELF

reese said...
It has come to my attention by the book club people at Joseph-Beth in Cincinnati that you refuse to come to our store. That you only do "regional stuff." But Maureen, we NEED you to educate the people in ways of good literature. We need you in Cincinnati! Why won't you come to save us?

What? Who told you that? I never heard of this. I guess someone was making a decision on my behalf. I promise you . . . it wasn’t me. That’s ANNOYING.

It was probably the %@#$&^% cast of High School Musical intercepting my messages.

I’ll be honest with you—part of the problem is that I have three publishers, and not everyone who fields these questions really knows me, so they may just say I won’t do something because they’re overloaded with work. But I can tell you I never heard about your store, and I don’t have any kind of “regional” policy.

I’m working on refining my system of dealing with requests. The best thing right now is to send them to me—or rather, to Free Monkey, who handles all of this. I consider every request I get! It all comes down to a matter of what’s practical and possible, schedule-wise. Sometimes it’s not really feasible for the publisher to send me somewhere to do one event. What I’m trying to do now is gather up all these requests to package them together for the release of Suite Scarlett. So it might be possible! Please drop me an e-mail and Free Monkey will enter you into his system.



I consider all requests!

jez said...
Hey Maureen, guess what I did today! I created a LiveJournal community devoted to you & your books.

WOW! Thank you, Jez!

rebekah ruth said...
I'd like to inquire as to how many words, on average, you write per book. For example, how many thousands words were put into the final copy of Devilish (which if my favorite of all your books).

Free Monkey is looking in the files right now and is shouting numbers at me . . .

The Key to the Golden Firebird is 71,216 words. The Bermudez Triangle is 75,131 words. 13 Little Blue Envelopes is 63,614 words. Devilish is 56,438 words. Girl At Sea is 80,592 words. And at the moment, Suite Scarlett is 88,371 words. But don’t be surprised if you get it and it’s 88, 247 words or something. Please send no letters of complaint. I’m still doing some tweaks.

becky said...
I was just in a show, and our cast was just so unbelievably close... It was amazing. And now the show is over. I'm majorly depressed. How can I get over my post-show depression?

I have the solution! You can read SUITE SCARLETT, which will give you a WHOLE NEW SHOW! Hamlet . . . on unicycles! Unlike High School Musical, which doesn’t even HAVE a musical in it . . . SUITE SCARLETT delivers, and you can just read it again when you need another hit of show!

Maybe this is why the cast of High School Musical is after me . . .

anonymous said...
Can you show us the cover of Suite Scarlett?

I couldn’t before, but it wasn’t done, done. But now it is!

Friends, I present to you . . . Suite Scarlett, the cover.



Behold! EYES!

I sort of found this out through the ever-awesome Little Willow who saw that it can be pre-ordered on Amazon. Feel free to start discussing it on that little forum at the bottom. If you put something amusing down there, maybe I will send you a PRIZE.

Until TOMORROW! Since I’m in the UK right now, I am especially interested in answering questions about the American experience in England. What do YOU want to know?