This weeks unpublished me post comes to you from one of my favourite authors... drum roll please... Danielle Paige!
Danielle lives in NY. Before turning to YA, she worked in television & was nominated for several Daytime Emmy's. Dorothy Must Die was her first novel and since then there have been so many more than have captured the hearts of the YA reader.
Danielle lives in NY. Before turning to YA, she worked in television & was nominated for several Daytime Emmy's. Dorothy Must Die was her first novel and since then there have been so many more than have captured the hearts of the YA reader.
Dear Younger Me,
First of all you should know that you have yet
to get your own national holiday. But you are still young (ish.)
You know that we do not believe in kismet. But
your “Grandmother’s story.” The one that you and your mom and your sister tune
into after school, the one that you once upon a time wrote not one but two fan
letters to. Yes , that one, Guiding light. One day you will write for it. And you know, MTV, that channel that right
now is all music. One day you will write a script for it, too. It won’t
actually get produced but still it is a really big deal for you and it helped
on the door to you writing your very first book.
And speaking of which, you know the Wizard of
Oz, that movie that you have watched so many times that your mother actually
gives you that look that says “again” even though she loves it too, one day you
will write a retelling of it and kids that were your age when you were watching
the movie over and over again will read it.
I think the thing that I need to tell you, even
though you are a really ambitious little thing, is that the future looks
different than the one you are meticulously planning for yourself, but you are
planting the seeds and learning the things that you will need when you are out
in the world.
The biggest thing that we(I) learn is that you
are not one TV script or one book, that you are a writer and that you can
always, always write something else. So when the soap world starts to shrink
you can try the larger TV world, and you can also try the YA world and you can
find a home there. But you should always be thinking and writing new things.
Challenging yourself to try writing outside your comfort zone. Stretching
yourself as a person and a writer.
And when things get tough, which they do, remember
that you are doing exactly what you have dreamed of doing since you are a kid.
And that one setback doesn’t negate all the handwork and successes that you
have had before. Allow yourself to revel in the big moments. Getting your first
script, writing your first book, meeting your first reader.
The Yellow Brick Road is long and windy and you
are in it for the long haul. Keep going, you will find magic and friends and a
home.
STEALING SNOW
by Danielle Paige
Pages: 384
Publisher: Bloomsbury Childrens
Publication Date: 6th October 2016
ISBN: 9781408872932
Summary
Seventeen-year-old Snow lives within the walls of the Whittaker Institute, a high security mental hospital in upstate New York. Deep down, she knows she doesn't belong there, but she has no memory of life outside, except for the strangest dreams. And then a mysterious, handsome man, an orderly in the hospital, opens a door – and Snow knows that she has to leave … She finds herself in icy Algid, her true home, with witches, thieves, and a strangely alluring boy named Kai. As secret after secret is revealed, Snow discovers that she is on the run from a royal lineage she's destined to inherit, a father more powerful and ruthless than she could have imagined, and choices of the heart that could change everything. Heroine or villain, queen or broken girl, frozen heart or true love, Snow must choose her fate …
