What if death wasn’t the end for teenagers? If you died in your teen years, you got a second chance. You got to ‘live’ as an undead person. You were able to go home, to go to school, and spend time with your friends.

What if your friends and family didn’t want to let you back into their lives?
What if an undead guy wanted to join the school gridiron team?
What if an undead guy asked you to the homecoming dance?

These questions and quite a few more are put into the spotlight in Daniel Waters’ novel Generation Dead.

Oakville High has the highest populace of ‘differently biotic’ teens in the states, and not too many of the ‘traditionally biotic’ students are sympathetic to their situation. The first book in this series is set in and around Oakville High’s community. We get to spy on the hotbed of political correctness gone crazy as living and dead students alike try to get on with their ‘lives’ as best they can.
Mainly we’re following Adam, Phoebe and Tommy as they figure out what is going on with each other and what is wrong with society.
I have an incredibly biased opinion of men writing female characters and make no secret of it. Daniel blew my expectations out of the water, and wrote a gripping, well thought out, emotionally charged and entertaining book, spending a good part of the book in the heads of his female characters.

The book travels in so many different directions that you would think you’d be easily lost. However the character viewpoints are easily followed as we head hop through our cast. Each character’s voice is very individual; there is no mistaking who you’re with. There is definite character development and plot lines are tight.

I can only imagine how our own communities would be shaken up if something like this actually happened in real life. I hope I would have the intestinal fortitude to have an open mind and the patience to get to know the differently biotic kids in my area.

Daniel keeps a pretty cool blog or two online as well; including one that is mentioned in the book, written by one of the undead characters.

http://watersdan.blogspot.com/ and http://mysocalledundeath.blogspot.com/
I recommend them both.

There’s the Generation Dead series website, which also looks like a bit of fun.

Daniel Waters – Generation Dead

Published 4 July, 2009 by Hyperion Press
Series: Generation Dead Ser.
Paperback, 416 pages
ISBN: 9781423109228

Hey Dolls (and Dudes)!

Last week, if you follow Life with Lisa (of course we do Lisa, your AWESOME!) than you should know, I was talking about first days of school, and first days of going into High School. I know I’m already in High School, but I figured why not just tell you guys how my first two days went? My class schedule is divided into two days, a blue and a orange day (our school colors). Each day I have four different classes, with different teachers and different classmates.

Our school was recently totally rebuilt and cost our city over 14 million dollars, that’s really expensive, but you should have seen the pile of trash it was before. Since we’ve had this renovation, many kids for other High Schools nearby want to go to the “new” school, and plus there were over 500 new Freshmen; soooo it’s a tad bit over crowded. I noticed this a few different times; when I was trying to get into the school parking lot, when I was trying to find an actual parking space, going from class to class in the hallway without having to shove someone out of my way, and each one of my classes has over 35 students!

This is crazy! We just had our school rebuilt, and now it’s too small! Great.

My first day wasn’t too bad; besides a minor headache. I had two classes and lunch with my boyfriend (Josh), I had a class with my best friends (Joyce and Shawnee) and I didn’t have any teachers that I don’t like. Everything was really great, but I guess I spoke too soon!

Today was horrible…

I had one class with Josh and Joyce (which isn’t the horrible part). But I did wake up late, forget my lunch, was hungry all day, ripped my pants (and you guessed it, right in between my legs) and had homework for two classes, along with tons of blogging to do! So today was a bit stressful (to say the least). But I’ll get on a regular schedule again soon, and become more efficient (:

Even though I didn’t want summer to end, I was glad to be back. I get to see my friends more often, I won’t be on the computer too much (but just enough!), and I get to meet new people. I hope the rest of the school year goes smoother than today did, and hopefully no more ripped pants!

Thanks for stopping by, here at Life with Lisa! Leave me a comment, I would love to know how your first day of school or just how your day of work went! Remember, the weekend’s only a day away(:

1. It’s impossible to surprise him.

2. He already knows the parental meeting is going to be a nightmare. Don’t be surprised if he tries to avoid the situation. It may be for the best.

3. He’ll know if you’re feeling sad and he’ll know the best way to cheer you up. Think big!

4. He’ll know if you’re looking at other guys; avoid at all costs, unless you accompany the glances with a compliment on his looks, prowess or intelligence.

5. Avoid wearing aluminium foil over your head. It’s the most obvious sign of a guilty conscience, not to mention it looks stupid and only works on alien telepathy.

6. He may sometimes forget you’re not also telepathic, so keep the communication to speech as much as you can. It’ll prevent you falling behind on the goings on of his life.

7. Expect to be paying more for your mobile phone bill than he will. After all, all he has to do is ring ring and he’s on the line.

8. Don’t forget to keep things verbal in public. Thinking at him all the time should only be for when you’re alone. Things could get … ahem … embarrassing otherwise.

9. Be careful what you think about his friends; they may be stupid, they may be gross, but he doesn’t need to know you think that.

10. Enjoy your time together. He’s the only boyfriend you’ll ever have who will know you inside and out.

Foz Meadows is a bipedal mammal with delusions of immortality. The Key to Starveldt is her second novel. She currently lives in St Andrews, Scotland, with not enough books and her very own philosopher. Surprisingly, this is a good thing.

1. Congratulations on the release of your second novel, The Key to Starveldt (sequel to the popular Solace and Grief). Your central character, Solace Morgan, is a 17-year-old vampire with some pretty impressive supernatural powers. With the resurgence in vamp fiction, is it difficult to remain true to vamp lore, while also finding a fresh spin on the theme?

Thank you! I’m really excited to see what people think of The Key to Starveldt; it was a hard book to write, but it takes Solace and her friends in some interesting directions. It might seem paradoxical, but I think the popularity of vamp fiction has actually made it easier to write about new and different types of vampire. So many readers now are familiar with folklore and mythology that, rather than having to establish the Default Vampire in order to explain why yours is different, it’s possible to rely on a basic comprehension of all different types of vampire and instead get straight to the meat of a new interpretation. Perhaps more importantly, the style of vampire story has changed along with the lore, too. Not only is it now accepted practice to have vampires who run the gamut from funny to sexy, gothic to modern, sadistic to benevolent, but the habit of writing about them in isolation – as either the only supernatural race, or   as the binary antithesis of werewolves – has given way to a richer kind of magic. Now, vampires are happily rubbing shoulders with angels, faeries, shapeshifters, psychics, ghosts and maenads – and that’s just for starters!

2. I’ve read that you are partial to cheese, geekery, writing, webcomics and general weirdness. What’s a weird story you can share with us about your time writing your first two novels?

When I first started work on Solace and Grief, it took me almost 40,000 words to realise that it was, in fact, a novel rather than a short story. At the time, I’d just finished work on the unpublished epic I wrote throughout high school and university, so the idea of purposefully starting a new project just didn’t occur to me. Solace came about almost by accident, a random ambush idea that pounced in the middle of a slow day at work. But even once I’d realised it was an actual book, I still didn’t think it was any good – so imagine my surprise when, on submitting Solace and the epic simultaneously, it was Solace that people wanted to see! But even though the old version of the epic is now permanently resigned to the top drawer, I’ve been doing some serious worldbuilding for a new, better version – some of the characters remain the same, but otherwise, it’s a whole different plot and concept. Which, to me, is gloriously weird: that despite all the years of working on that one failed project, it was something totally unexpected that eventually earned me a contract – but that all these years later, I’d still find something worth saving in the original.

3. Foz, I read an interesting post from your blog about ‘romance, strength and femininity.’ Clearly these are important themes to you, as they will be for a number of your readers. Can you tell us who some of your favourite fictional female characters are, and why?

As a kid, I loved Jocelyn Osgood from Geoffrey McSkimming’s Cairo Jim and Jocelyn Osgood series. A fully-qualified pilot who worked as a flight attendant only because of the chauvinist policies at Valkyrian Airlines (which – ironically, given the name –  refused to let women pilot), Jocelyn went from being a bit-player in Jim’s stories to having many independent adventures of her own. As a character, she was competent, clever and compassionate, cool in a crisis and always willing to help her friends. And even though she couldn’t fly for Valkyrian, she always flew for herself.

On the TV side of things, there was a cartoon show called Daria that ran from 1996 to 2002, spanning five seasons and two movies. The two protagonists, Daria Morgendorffer and Jane Lane, were a pair of cynical high school girls, respectively a writer and an artist, whose adventures consisted largely of surviving teenage life until they could get to college. Clever, outspoken, flawed and faithful, Daria and Jane are two of my favourite role models, not only because of how strongly I identified with them at the time, but because they remain two of the best and most believable teenage girls in fiction. Their deadpan humour and sharp observations helped to get me through school, and even now, their politics are still ahead of the curve.

There’s dozens of others I’d love to mention – Princess Nausicaa from Nausicaa and the Valley of the Winds, Jill from Katharine Kerr’s Deverry series, September from Catherynne Valente’s The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making – but we’d be here forever. I’ll just have to blog about them separately instead!

4. Which of your fictional characters Burns Brightest in your mind and why?

Something I really wanted to achieve with The Key to Starveldt was an exploration of Solace’s friends: their relationships, histories and motives, and how those things affect them now. Throughout the writing process, some of their stories changed drastically between drafts, while others remained the same. With the book now written, I feel like I know them all much better than before, but even though it would be impossible to play favourites, I have a special soft spot for Paige and Laine. When they first appeared in Solace and Grief, I’d planned for Paige to be a cheerful, mischievous girl, with Laine in the role of sulky antagonist. But no sooner had I started writing them than my planned personalities warped and bled together: both girls were much more complex than I’d envisaged, and their relationship was anything but simple. Looking back on my original notes, Laine’s projected arc has changed the most out of any character, but Paige has still surprised me utterly. The Key to Starveldt has more than a few twists in store – I only hope they’re as much fun to read about as they were to write.

Check out Foz’s blog here!

Walking through the book section at your local store there are so many covers that are eye catching and intriguing, it’s difficult to pick a stand out easily. Blood Song is slightly different with splashes of gold and rich scarlet to make you take that second glance.

At the moment, you can safely take the risk of judging YA books by their covers; and trust me, if you bothered to take that second glance at Rhiannon Hart’s debut novel and picked it up, you will now be nodding along with me when I say, aren’t you glad you bought it?

Zeraphina has a craving for blood, and travelling North. When her sister, Lilith, loses her betrothed and is asked to consider visiting a prince from the northern city of Xallentaria (who may take her hand in marriage and her mind off her deceased love), she leaps at the opportunity to go. Upon arrival to the city, Zeraphina meets Rodden, and her entire perspective on life is irretrievably altered.

She hears voices, and knows that Rodden is keeping secrets from her. There is more to the North than just an innate sense of wanderlust. Nobody will tell her why it is so wrong to want to know more about Lharmell. But what really is the big deal?

I found this this book to have quite a few unexpected twists and turns, but not enough to give you whiplash. There isn’t too much foretelling and some of the surprises are certainly brow lifters. I loved the connection Zeraphina had with her animal companions; Griffin, an eagle, and Leap, a Verapinian drain-cat (page 64 had me giggling).

Lilith and her mother Renata are not ashamed to be social climbers, but when you take into account their own homeland is suffering from unknown forces, the gold digging attitude is a little more palatable.

About the only elephant in the room I objected to even slightly here is the fact that there are so many Vampiric markers and telltale signs, and yet the word Vampire is never uttered.  Perhaps with the Vampire fad hitting saturation point at least six months ago, this may not be a bad thing for everyone.

If you are looking for a book to take you away from it all, look no further than Blood Song. Definitely a must read for the school holidays.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsbYhfu–m0

http://rhiannon-hart.blogspot.com/

ISBN: 9781742750965

Format: Paperback

Imprint: Random House Australia

Published: 01/09/11