April 15, 2010

I Rocked Operation Book Drop

What is Operation TBD?

Operation Teen Book Drop is the combined efforts of readergirlz, Guys Lit Wire, YALSA, and If I Can Read I Can Do Anything. They will be dropping over 10,000 new YA books, donated by publishers,
into the hands of teens on Native American tribal lands. Nationwide,
librarians, over 100 YA authors, and teens will drop YA books in their
own communities.

More information on the drop, from ReaderGirlz Blog.

I decided to "drop" a signed copy of BEAUTIFUL CREATURES at the Starbucks where I buy my coffee most mornings. I don't like to attract attention, so I knew this would be tough because the place is always packed.

I stealthy (so I thought) positioned BC in a chair, in the reading area. I was about to take a pic, when this guy in the chair next to me, takes out his ear buds and says (really loud), "What are you doing?"

So now, everyone was interested in what I was doing.

My solution? I fled.

You can find my book here, at Starbucks on Montana Avenue (1426), in Santa Monica, CA.

1426 Montana Ave.

April 5, 2010

My Angsty Teen Poetry

I've been getting a lot of e-mails lately asking what I was like as a teen. What a terrifying question. Mostly, because I remember exactly what I was like & how I felt back then. So the short answer? I was weird.

The long answer is more complicated:

dark

moody

volatile

wore lots of black, but wasn't goth (style indescribable)

smart, but hid it

eclectic musical taste = the smiths, the cure, black sabbath, u2, pink floyd, led zeppelin…

short (when i graduated high school, i wasn't even 5 feet tall

wrote poetry in spiral notebooks all the time

(some of my actual notebooks)

And even more embarrassing…

(me at 16)

This was actually my favorite picture because: a) you couldn't see my face and b) I was sitting in front of my favorite window in my bedroom.

(me at 15)

If you weren't reading me blog last year, which let's admit it, you weren't (no one was), these are some older posts that include actual poetry from the pages of my teen poetry journals. Lots of angst.

In the Stacks

Digging in the Dirt

The Solitude of My Silent Suffering

A Great Poem

From the Pages of My Journal

I am a huge believer in journaling,for writers & non-writers. This is my favorite journaling book, which is actually one of Sabrina Ward Harrison's art/poetry journals.

More on this book in this post here: Spilling Open and my angsty teen poetry here: If You Spill, I Will.

I hope you start a journal of your own. Send me a link to your pages or, even better, a twitpic on twitter to @kamigarcia.