Cover Stories: The Julian Game

Adele Griffin's The Julian Game was released in 2010 with a raucous cover that I always meant to share here. Much belatedly (my fault!), she's showing some early cover options for that book and a bit about the story.

Also, I'm psyched that she's got another book out this month (All You Never Wanted)!

Here's Adele:

"I had no cover ideas at all. For one thing, the original title of the book was MELLEN IN SPRING which gives me such big shivers of Terrible Title-ness. What was I thinking? It sounds like a strange, Little House on the Prairie story. That early draft was so different. Mellen was short for Mary Ellen, who then became Ella. And the story was more like a 'bad influence' type, with Mellen getting Raye to do awful stuff for her. So, no cover had jelled. Maybe: two girls in a red convertible? More shivers!

 "My publisher went into the bat cave slash think tank, and came up with a lot of options. I loved so many of them. It was during the summer, and my family was on vacation in Fire Island, so we printed them up and put them on the kitchen table. And people would walk by and say--'I love that one! No, that one!'

 

 "Penguin's art department is, in my mind, very 'mad genius in the lab'-- and my last cover with them was for my middle grade 'Vampire Island' series. I'd been over the moon for their choices there. All I'd said on VI was 'What do you think about making the vamps sweet but streetwise?' and they came back with pure gothy delicious. So I was prepared to be bowled over...."

To read the rest of Adele's story, and see even more cover options, go to melissacwalker.com.

The Julian Game: Ever Had a Toxic "Friend"?

Our Featured Title is The Julian Game by Adele Griffin, and she gave us a fantastic post on risk-taking in writing on Monday. (Key quote: "Fear the risk, then risk it, anyway—and land that story with plenty of punch, no apologies, and no regrets.")

In The Julian Game, which packs plenty of punch, Raye is seduced into a revenge scheme by the queen bee of the school.

Have you ever had a friend who talked you into doing things you knew weren't right? How did you deal with it?

Featured Title: THE JULIAN GAME, by Adele Griffin

Hello, readergirlz!
This month we're talking Risk-taking on the blog, and today we're lucky enough to have Adele Griffin, author of the amazing Julian Game, with us.

(*Side note - that blue wig Raye wears is amazing - I'm thinking future Halloween costume, for sure.)
If you haven't read this book yet, move it to the top of your pile! Don't believe me? Here's what Booklist has to say about Julian: 


"Raye Archer is warily thrilled when Ella, queen bee at her tony new school, enlists her to seek revenge against gorgeous heartbreaker Julian. With pictures of Raye in a blue wig and slinky top, they create a fictitious online profile (so different from Raye’s low-key, real-life persona); lure Julian into a relationship; and act out Ella’s vindictive schemes. The results are predictable: in online chats, Raye falls for Julian, confesses their deceit, and faces Ella’s full-force campaign of vitriolic harassment. Griffin elevates the mean-girl plot with spot-on insights into teen social politics and quirky, multidimensional characters, including troubled, OCD Ella... [Her] timely cautionary messages about online communication, including its permanence (“One stupid picture could swing back around and punch me when I’m 30 years old”), are never too heavy-handed, and her themes about the appeal of reinventing oneself, the frightening power of manipulation, the futility of revenge, and the true meaning of friendship are timeless."


I'm so excited to have Adele blogging with us today!


Forgive Me Not: Confessions of a Semi-Apologist

 I’ve got a problem with sorry. I use it too much. If someone elbows me in the CVS: “Oh, gosh—sorry!” If I need directions: “I’m sorry to ask, but which way is Brooklyn?” If there’s a problem with my entrée: “So sorry, there seems to be a dead rat in this Bolognese.”

“Sorry” is a bad habit, and an old one. So I guess I’ll blame my childhood. Anyone raised by a single, working parent knows that the excuses start early. Like not enough cash: “Sorry, I’ll bring in my field trip money next week.” Or one car-one-driver: “Sorry I’m late, my brother needed his headgear refitted.” And, of course, the absent father: “Sorry, can I borrow your Dad to (fill in the blank ten thousand times)?”

Yet that same childhood is why I took risks. If my presence was an inconvenience, then it also needed to matter. From grade school on, I was a compulsive contest-contender, queued up for the spelling bee or bug-eyed for the essay competition. Show me the plaque, the prize, or the spot for my name, and I was probably scheming to grab it.

Some novelists are obvious risk-takers; others don’t wear it on the outside. But who cares how you get there? What counts is the plunge, the air beneath your feet as you leap into the unknown. I still get knee-jerk guilt each time I force life into a nasty character or make an unsettling plot choice. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned in my writing life, it’s that the apology can’t lead the way. In fiction, I know that to risk wisely is also to chart a direction toward my most creative possibilities. My advice? Fear the risk, then risk it, anyway—and land that story with plenty of punch, no apologies, and no regrets.

Adele Griffin

March, 2011

Well-said! Writers need to take risks in order to create fiction that matters, and Griffin does so to great effect with The Julian Game!

(*That pic above is Adele at the Standard Hotel in NYC - a backdrop ripe for risk-taking. But she's  saving her best vacation stories for her next visit to the blog...)

What I love best about Julian is that Raye takes a risk - but ultimately finds the strength to face the consequences of her behavior, too. 

Thanks again for joining us, Adele! Now, tell us, readergirlz - who are some of your favorite risk-takers in YA lit?