Featured Title: HATE LIST, by Jennifer Brown

Hate List is a book that dares you not to be drawn into it, and I'm pleased to report that I was most definitely NOT up for the challenge of ignoring this amazingly powerful story.

I bought Hate List on a whim after seeing it on the shelf in my local bookstore. The strong cover image of the original hardcover jacket called out to me, and after reading the flap copy, I knew the story would be right up my alley. Here's what "School Library Journal" had to say about it:


At the end of their junior year, Valerie Leftman's boyfriend pulls a gun in the Commons, leaving six students and a teacher dead and many others wounded. Valerie is hit by a bullet in the leg trying to stop him, just before he ends his own life. Until that point, Valerie had no idea that the "hate list" that she and Nick created would be used to target victims in a vengeful shooting spree. For her, the list of tormentors was a way to ease the pain of being bullied and an outlet against the constant fighting between her parents. Although the police investigation reveals that Valerie had nothing to do with the actual shootings, many people in her community, including her parents, have a hard time believing that she is not at fault, too. With the help of a patient and insightful therapist, Valerie bravely returns to school after the summer to face the challenges before her. This is a startling, powerful, and poignant account of the incidents leading up to, immediately following, and continuing through the teen's senior year of realization and recovery. Valerie is stronger than she knows—a beautifully drawn character who has suffered pain, guilt, and incredible stress as she heals from the shooting, the loss of a troubled boyfriend she deeply loved, and difficult family circumstances. Readers will snap this novel up.


I can attest to that - I raced home from the bookstore and finished the book in one night. Jennifer does an incredible job of making Valerie as complicated as she is sympathetic, and the pacing of book is airtight. We're so happy to have Jennifer here at the blog today! Here are her thoughts on this month's theme, "resilience:"

Resilience isn’t in and of itself anything terribly noble. We’re all born with the capacity for it. We all have an ability to shrug off the hurtful, to pick ourselves up off the floor after the tragic, to bounce back after the shock. It’s innate in humanity, I believe, to keep searching for the sun, even in the darkest times, much like a flower will do its best to grow away from a shadow if it can.

I don’t know if I always felt this way. I’m not sure if, at 13, 14, and 15 years old, I was resilient on purpose. I was bullied. Called names, picked on, humiliated. I was tripped in the cafeteria and laughed at when I fell. I was the subject of rumors and gossip, and the recipient of nasty late-night phone calls and threats. All of this at a time of personal struggle at home as well. God, it would’ve been so easy to not be resilient. So tempting! But easy or not, resiliency won out. I kept waking up in the morning and somehow shoring up enough courage to walk into those unfriendly school hallways and face another day. Resiliently.

Maybe down deep I knew that my story of resilience might be the story some other teen would need to hear someday in order to pick herself up off the cafeteria floor and just keep walking toward the sun. I don’t know. Probably it was just that innate thing going on.

But if I didn’t know then that my story of personal resilience had a purpose, I certainly know now. The fact that the main character of Hate List, Valerie, goes back to school to face her tormentors and her doubters—and yeah…herself—in an impossible, frightening, and at times threatening situation is no accident. Valerie needed to not only have resilience to get through her tragedy, but she needed to do something with it to make an improvement. She needed to show herself that she was capable, and that sometimes if you try hard enough things can get better—truly better!—and she needed to come out the other end of her tragedy whole and changed…and resilient with a purpose. Resilient so that others might be inspired to hang onto their resiliency tightly, and trust that it will get them through to the other side of their dark time.

What makes resilience noble isn’t that we have it; it’s what we do with it. If we just bounce back, but then flounder around being all bouncy and dithery, our resilience is wasted. If we pick ourselves up, only to fling ourselves back into ugliness time and again, our resilience has failed us. But if we crane our necks toward the sun…and then really see it when our faces are lit, really make an effort to use that sunlight to warm ourselves…well, then that’s where magnificence lies!

That’s where resiliency turns something that you just lived through to something that made you great.

Well said, Jennifer! In the wake of so many recent bullying incidents, the message of Hate List feels more resonant than ever. Hopefully those who've suffered through being the target of hate are able to move beyond resilience to a place of forgiveness, ultimately planting seeds for a more compassionate world.

If you haven't read Hate List, grab a copy of the recently-released paperback. Pretty new cover!

And in the meantime, let us know - has resilience ever helped you in the face of hate?

Little Willow's Book Bag

This Week's Picks
Family by Micol Ostow
What Would My Cell Phone Do? by Micol Ostow
Underfoot in Show Business by Helen Hanff (non-fiction)

For Your Younger Siblings
Alvin Ho: Allergic to Girls, School, and Other Scary Things by Lenore Look, illustrated by LeUyen Pham
Alvin Ho: Allergic to Camping, Hiking, and Other Natural Disasters by Lenore Look, illustrated by LeUyen Pham

Read the latest issue of readergirlz.

Take Action Against Hunger!

Action Against Hunger has launched a new online student contest titled Meanings of Hunger. They're asking students 18 and under to get involved in exploring an aspect of hunger that interests them. The contest is simple but has room for a lot of creativity: use the definition of hunger as inspiration to explore an aspect of hunger that interests you, with possible projects ranging from a poem or essay about hunger to a diorama of a refugee camp in Darfur. You can get more details here, and "like" them on Facebook for updates!

The contest is open until December 3rd, 2010 and will be judged on clarity of information, creativity and connection to the topic. While everyone can participate, the three highest-scoring submissions will be profiled on the ACF website and will receive a Student Activist package.

Good luck, readergirlz!

Say It Again: Nina LaCour

"We struggle and grieve, and then we pull ourselves together, and the parts of life we once took for granted we come to recognize as beautiful and important."  Nina LaCour

November Playlist

Hey readergirlz! We asked you to suggest songs suitable for this month's theme, Resilience, and here's what you came up with:

(If you can't see the playlist above, you need Flash.)

Note: Not all of the recommended songs were available at the Project Playlist website. Here's the full list of tracks suggested by readergirlz:

Promise To Try by Madonna
Unprofessional by Katy Rose
Got Dynamite by Demi Lovato
Dark Carnival by Vanessa Carlton
Nobody by Amy Studt
Change by Taylor Swift
So What by Pink
Voldemort is Going Down from the soundtrack of A Very Potter Musical
Breakaway by Kelly Clarkson
Superwoman by Alicia Keys
Stronger by Britney Spears
Fighter by Christina Aguilera

Story Secrets: FREEFALL by Anna Levine

Today I'm welcoming Anna Levine, author of FREEFALL, to Story Secrets to share some of the secrets of her second YA novel. Her first, RUNNING ON EGGS, was a NYPL Best Book, and FREEFALL was chosen as a Sydney Taylor Honor book.


I found FREEFALL fascinating, as an in-depth look at a completely different way of life than mine as well as a portrait of a strong girl who faces her fears with wit and courage.


Welcome, Anna!


*****


Freefall (Greenwillow/HarperCollins) is about an eighteen-year old girl, Abigail Jacobs, who has reached the age when all Israelis are drafted into the military. Aggie decides she wants to be a combat soldier. She’s under weight, but that doesn’t hold her back. She gains the weight and faces the grueling physical, emotional and mental challenges of pre-army training. Her family, her friends and her then boyfriend think she’s out of her mind. She proves them wrong.

I came to Israel on my own when I was eighteen. It was right before the First Lebanon war. I know what it is to feel alone, frightened and forced to find the strength within yourself to push forward. Running to bomb shelters, hitching rides across the country (now the bus system is more efficient) to visit my sister, giving aerobics lessons in a bomb shelter in Jerusalem while wearing a gas mask (at the time when Saddam Hussein was firing Scud missiles into Israel) are just a few of my experiences living here...


Read more of Anna's secrets here...

~Holly Cupala

rgz Newsflash: The Final Web Issue!

Hey all,

We posted one last issue at the readergirlz website for now. It's a holding card for all things future. Be sure to check it out. The playlist you helped create is running, along with Things to Know About the Divas, party ideas, and community service.

Hope you like it! And dig back into the archives. They are all accessible as well.

Read, reflect, and reach out!

Hold Still: Balancing Grief With Hope

This week's focus is on Nina LaCour's Hold Still, and Nina talked about how it was difficult to portray main character Caitlin's grief at the suicide of her best friend Ingrid without having the whole story filled with angst, which would be hard for a reader to bear.

For discussion: If you've read Hold Still, did you stay with Caitlin in her dark moments, and follow her into the times where she found light? How did you think the balance worked? Did it feel true?

And, in general, have you read other books where the narrator was grieving? How did the author do with the balance of despair and hope?

Lisa Fuller Designs and End the Backlog

Please feel free to link to this blog post at your own blog or social network page like Twitter or Facebook. Shine light on this great cause. Thank you!

My favorite jewelry designer, Lisa Fuller, is supporting the efforts of End the Backlog and has created some beautiful (and inexpensive!) pendant necklaces with 100% of the sales going to the charity. Please help spread the word!

http://www.lisafullerdesigns.com/backlog.html

The federal government estimates that hundreds of thousands of rape kits sit untested in the United States. The Joyful Heart Foundation, along with president and founder, actress Mariska Hargitay, have started a movement at www.endthebacklog.org to shed light on this horrible epidemic.

Lisa Fuller Designs is offering one-of-a-kind pendant necklaces to help raise awareness. 100% of the sales of these necklaces will benefit The Joyful Heart Foundation and their efforts to END THE BACKLOG!

# Hand crafted
# Recycled denim
# Beaded accents
# Wide color selection

Browse our ETSY shop for the current selection of necklaces.

Lisa has a variety of pieces available, and creates all sorts of beautiful lines. She also takes custom orders. Contact her with custom design requests.

Thanks for your support!

Cover Stories: Mostly Good Girls by Leila Sales

The cover of Mostly Good Girls by Leila Sales is one of my fall favorites, and not just because I'm obsessed with tights. The book also sounds super-good.

Here's Leila to tell the tale:

"I'm not a visual thinker, so I didn't have a specific vision for the cover. I told my editor that I like covers with a lot of white space and that I like covers with silhouettes (for example Maureen Johnson's THE KEY TO THE GOLDEN FIREBIRD or Natasha Friend's PERFECT). I also had an image in my mind of two girls running away from a school building together. But I had no real idea... There's a reason why I'm a writer and NOT a designer!

"I talked about what Violet and Katie would be wearing, if they were pictured on the cover. It was important to me that they not be wearing high heels because, as anyone at an all-girls school could tell you, students there just don't get that dressed up. Girls-school fashion is a lot of J.Crew jeans and Northface fleeces.

"So, actually, when S&S did the cover shoot, they used Kate Spade shoes with like three-inch heels--and then they photoshopped the heels out to make the shoes look like flats. I was going to buy a pair of to wear to book signings, but when I found out that a) they would cost me a few hundred dollars and b) I wouldn't be able to walk in them because I have no talent for heels, I decided against it..."

Read the rest of Leila's Cover Story at melissacwalker.com.

Featured Title: HOLD STILL, by Nina LaCour

This week, our featured title is one that deals with how we move forward in the face of grief. HOLD STILL, just out in paperback, would be a beautiful, worthy pick no matter what, but we think it particularly dovetails with this month's theme of resilience.

The book has received rave reviews from trade journals and readers alike, and with good reason - steady pacing, authenticity, and wonderfully-rounded characters make for a compelling read. Don't believe me? Here's what School Library Journal had to say:

After losing her best friend, Ingrid, to suicide, Caitlin is completely immobilized. Unable to function, and refusing to visit a therapist, she begins the long journey to wellness alone. During this year of heart-wrenching, raw emotion, Caitlin finds Ingrid's journal, which not only reveals her descent into irreversible depression, but also serves as Caitlin's vehicle for renewed hope in the future. The book is written with honesty, revealing one's pain after the loss of a loved one. Caitlin learns, with the help of new friends and her parents, that there is life after Ingrid.

I'm thrilled to welcome Nina LaCour to readergirlz!

Recently I did a Q&A on my blog, and a woman named Melissa wrote in to ask if I found it difficult to write about grief. This is what I told her:

"Yes, Melissa, it was really hard. On one hand, it was difficult because I wanted Caitlin’s emotional state to be believable–I wanted her to be appropriately stunned and confused and sad–but I also had to keep in mind that people would (hopefully) be reading this, and that most readers (myself included) can only take so much angst. Angst is a good thing, but it can only take you so far."

My novel, Hold Still, is about a 16-year-old girl named Caitlin who has to face life—and high school—after her best friend’s suicide. It wasn’t easy to put myself in that situation and imagine what it would feel like to be her. But the novel isn’t as sad as you might think, and the joyful parts, when Caitlin is discovering the wonders of life again, feeling things she hadn’t felt before and gaining strength—those scenes were exhilarating to write.

I’m so honored to have my novel selected as a recommended read, and even more excited to know that it was chosen for the theme of resilience. Now, with a war that seems never ending, with the recent bullying and suicides, with the daily hardships so many people are facing, what better than a reminder than we can make it through tough times? We struggle and grieve, and then we pull ourselves together, and the parts of life we once took for granted we come to recognize as beautiful and important.

Thank you, Readergirlz!

Thank you, Nina, for joining us and for sharing your thoughts. If there is anything to be gained from grief, it's certainly the reminder not to take our happier times for granted, and coming out the other side of a traumatic experience is, as you say, a testament to our own inner strength.

So what about you, readers? Can you think of a time when grief or trauma forced you to call upon your own inner reserves, and maybe reminded you that you're stronger than you think? We all deserve to be reminded of that now and then - in good times as well as bad!

Cover Stories: Nightshade by Andrea Cremer

Everyone is raving about Andrea Cremer's Nightshade! The cover is enchanting, and we've got the scoop on that. Here's Andrea:

"I had a couple of ideas for the cover--one involved wolves, shadows, and blood; the other was that it would feature the Elemental Cross, an image that plays an important role in the series. I envisioned a more abstract cover than the image we ended up with.
"My publisher did ask for input and at first we were going for the wolves, shadows, blood thing, but then they found Suza Scalora's art--she's the photographer who shot the cover--and we all loved it so we switched gears and focused on finding a model who could be transformed into Calla for the cover.

"I gasped when I saw the cover, as it was so, so beautiful. It was different then anything I'd imagined, but I couldn't love it more. To be honest I wasn't sure how I'dfeel about having a face on the cover, but Suza and the art director at Penguin, Linda, absolutely nailed it. Plus I adore the bloody calla lilies. My editor got to drip the blood on the flowers herself..."

Read the rest of Andrea's Cover Story at melissacwalker.com.

November Community Service Spotlight

Want to give back to the world by making a donation to a reputable charity and a good cause, but not sure where to start? Check out http://www.globalgiving.org Their mission statement:

"GlobalGiving connects you to the causes and countries you care about. You select projects you want to support, make a tax-deductible contribution, and get regular progress updates - so you can see how your gift is making a difference."

Learn more at their website: http://www.globalgiving.org

Rgz Street Team: Priya Reviews The Dragons of Noor by Janet Lee Carey

The rgz Street Team is a group of teens who bring YA reviews to our blog, led by Postergirl Miss Erin. Find out more.

Today, Priya reviews The Dragons of Noor by one of the original readergirlz founders, Janet Lee Carey!

"The old and ancient trees of Noor are dying, and the worlds of Noor and Oth are slowly tearing apart. Magic has started to disappear from Noor, and a mysterious and fierce wind has been picking up young children and carrying them away. Miles, his sister Hanna, and his friend Taunier, determined to find out what's going on and save Noor and Oth, travel to the forests of Jarrosh. There, they find the exiled dragons, who aid them in their quest to preserve the trees and 'break beyond the boundaries of self to discover the ancient magic joining all to all.'

"The Dragons of Noor was one of the best books I've read this year. What I love about Janet Lee Carey's writing, and this series in particular, are the imaginative and fantastical worlds that the reader is introduced to. In this book, we get to see more of Noor and Oth as well as explore the ancient history between the two. The scenes are so magically and culturally rich, with original creatures and foreign words, songs, and customs..."

Read the rest of this review on Priya's blog.

Little Willow's Book Bag

This Week's Picks
Dash & Lily's Book of Dares by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan
The Good Neighbors #3: Kind by Holly Black and Ted Naifeh

For Your Younger Sibs
Cinderella Cleaners #5: Scheme Spirit by Maya Gold
Now You See Me... by Jane B. Mason, Sarah Hines Stephens

Read the latest issue of readergirlz.

Love Your Body Day - The Artwork

We shouted out Love Your Body Day last month, and we wanted to show all the gorgeous posters they chose from this year (the top one is the winner). Which is your favorite?

Story Secrets: HOLD ME TIGHT by rgz co-founder Lorie Ann Grover

What a great pleasure it is to chat with rgz co-founder Lorie Ann Grover today about her verse novel, HOLD ME TIGHT.

Readers, this is a *wonderful* book, and an excellent compliment to this week's spotlighted title over at readergirlz, Lauren Oliver's BEFORE I FALL. It's thematically very different, but if you love intense stories with well drawn characters and true emotions, then you will absolutely adore HOLD ME TIGHT.

Welcome, Lorie Ann!

*****

Psst. Holly, here are few secrets from HOLD ME TIGHT.

HOLD ME TIGHT is based on my own life experiences. When I was ten, my father left our family, and the boy who sat in front of me was kidnapped. Thirty years later, I decided to incorporate both events into a novel. Here's my trailer:

And now a few facts not found in the work... (spoiler alert)

Find out Lorie Ann's secrets and more about HOLD ME TIGHT here...

~Holly Cupala

Before I Fall: The Narrator Question

This week's focus is on Lauren Oliver's Before I Fall, and while the book is beloved by many, there has been some debate about the main character, Sam. She starts out pretty unaware of her flaws, and she grows to have a wider, more empathetic view of her world.

For discussion: If you've read Before I Fall, did you love Sam instantly? Did she grow on you as the story continued? Or did you never grow to like her? How did Sam as the narrator shape your view of the book?

And, in general, have you read books where the narrator was the make-or-break aspect of the title?

Rgz Salon: What Momma Left Me by Renee Watson, Reviewed by Lyn Miller-Lachmann

Rgz SALON member Lyn Miller-Lachmann has been the Editor-in-Chief of MultiCultural Review; the author of the award-winning multicultural bibliography Our Family, Our Friends, Our World; the editor of Once Upon a Cuento, a collection of short stories by Latino authors; and most recently, the author of Gringolandia, a young adult novel about a refugee family living with the aftermath of the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile. The book has now sold out half of its second print run and is available for order! (Don't forget to read the fascinating Cover Story for Gringolandia.)

We're honored to have Lyn here as part of the rgz SALON, a feature where four of the top kidlit experts clue us in to the best YA novels they've read recently. Today, she reviews What Momma Left Me by Renée Watson (Bloomsbury, 2010).

"The Cybils nominations are in, and committee members are at work, picking out the lists of finalists. Checking the list of nominees a few days ago, I noticed my friend Ari from Reading in Color added Watson’s debut young adult novel. Great choice, and here’s my review:

"Thirteen-year-old Serenity’s father has just killed her mother after years of physical abuse, and Serenity and her 12-year-old brother, Danny, have gone to live across town with their maternal grandparents. Grandpa is the minister of an African-American Baptist church, and he and Grandma find solace in their faith, but Serenity questions how a benevolent God would have allowed her mother to die, her father to disappear (we later find out he has committed suicide), and her little family to be destroyed. Grandma and Grandpa enroll Serenity and Danny in a strict private school and require their attendance at Sunday school. A new school means a fresh start—Serenity makes friends and Danny becomes the middle school heartthrob. However, Danny starts to make poor choices, and he, Serenity, and Serenity’s new best friend are drawn into a circle of violence that brings her into conflict with her grandparents and challenges her faith even further.

"Read together, the chapter titles are the Lord’s Prayer! This seemingly small touch enriches Watson’s exploration of Christian and African-American traditions (with recipes) in the life of a young teenager struggling to recover from a horrific tragedy. Watson’s writing is vivid and tangible right from the beginning, when she describes what it’s like for Serenity to come back to the apartment where her mother died in order to pick up her things and move away forever. As Grandma and Grandpa try to give structure to the lives of children robbed of their childhood by family dysfunction and violence, readers see Serenity and Danny’s very realistic ambivalence, as they chafe against expectations but find comfort in them. Journal entries from Serenity’s first period poetry class lead off each chapter and give the reader a glimpse of the soul of this courageous young teenager." -Lyn Miller-Lachmann

Cover Stories: Girl's Best Friend by Leslie Margolis

The Maggie Brooklyn Mystery series is set in my neighborhood, where author Leslie Margolis also lives! I used to adore mysteries when I was a Middle Grade reader, and the first book in the series -- which was just released this month -- is so adorable that I had to ask her how it happened (I love illustrated middle-grade covers). Here's Leslie:

"Girl's Best Friend is the first book in the Maggie Brooklyn Mystery series, which revolves around a twelve-year-old, dog-walking detective. And I must confess - I've been obsessing over what the cover would look like ever since I came up with the idea.

"My editor did not ask for my input directly quite possibly because I never gave her the chance to. When she asked for physical descriptions of my main character and the dogs she walks, I sent those along with this additional note:

"'Brownstone Brooklyn features prominently in the

book and it would be excellent to have that represented somehow... I don't want to be difficult at all, but I've been thinking about the look of the book a lot and wanted to send some links to some covers I really like. Here's hoping you find this helpful rather than annoying!'

Harriet the Spy, When You Reach Me and Knuffle Bunny.

"Reading this again -- over a year later, I'm sure my email was annoying rather than helpful. And maybe I was difficult, too. But oh well. I had to get it out there.

"Harriet the Spy, Knuffle Bunny, and When You Reach Me are three of my favorite books. They are all city stories and they all have striking covers. And Knuffle Bunny act

ually takes place in Park Slope, Brooklyn, where Maggie lives.

"Maybe this technique worked, or maybe Bloomsbury was thinking along the same lines, anyway. All I know is that a few months passed with no word about the cover. And then one day my editor told me they were looking at an illustrator named Tuesday Mourning.

"I Googled 'Tuesday Morning' and found a website dedicated to discounted gifts and home accessories based in Dallas, Texas.

"I panicked..."

Read the rest of Leslie's Cover Story, and see early drafts, at melissacwalker.com.

NOVEMBER Featured Title: BEFORE I FALL, by Lauren Oliver

Hello! Welcome to November at readergirlz!

The new month brings with it a new format for all of our amazing featured titles; with this new approach, we'll be able to spotlight more books than ever. So please help me celebrate our first title - which was one of my absolute favorites of last year: BEFORE I FALL, by Lauren Oliver!

Here's what School Library Journal had to say about this breathtaking book: 

Samantha Kingston has worked her way up the popularity ladder; now a senior, she and her three best friends rule their school. On Cupid Day, Sam expects to receive Valentine roses, to party with her friends, and to finally (maybe) have sex with her equally popular boyfriend. The last thing she expects is that she will die, but in the final moments of her life, as she hears "a horrible, screeching sound—metal on metal, glass shattering, a car folding in two," everything turns to nothing. Only, it is not the end for Sam. She wakes up to start the same day over again, and again; in fact, she relives it seven times....Moving and cathartic.

Just reading the book description gives me the chills! 

Lauren was kind enough to offer up some thoughts on this month's theme, "resilience." Here's Lauren: 

Hey hey! Lauren Oliver here, author of BEFORE I FALL and the forthcoming DELIRIUM. I’m so psyched to be featured on the awesomeness that is readergirlz. I’m particularly honored to have been selected to participate during a month in which resilience is being celebrated. Resilience—the ability to recover from being wounded, to pick yourself up after stumbling, and to strive constantly for betterment and happiness, no matter how often you are confronted by difficulty and pain—is such a critical quality to cultivate, both in a general Life-Sense and, in particular, for a writer.

Writers, of course, need to be tremendously resilient. So much of the life of a writer is unfortunately about rejection and frustration. Almost every writer can tell you stories about failed novel attempts (I, for example, am now on my FOURTH ATTEMPT to write a particular middle-grade that keeps devolving into nonsense at about word 15,000); and rejected manuscripts; and unhelpful or critical teachers, peers, and sometimes parents. There is the infamous (perhaps apocryphal) story of the Harry Potter books, which were allegedly rejected some insane quantity of times before finding a home and changing the landscape of children’s books forever.

You must be resilient as a writer, because as a writer, you will be confronted every day with at least five or six excellent reasons to give up.

More specifically, the theme of resilience plays a big part in Before I Fall. One of the messages I most wanted to convey in my first novel, particularly in the character of Juliet and her developing relationship with Sam, is that it’s important never to give up: not on other people, and certainly not on yourself. No matter how much bleakness and difficulty there is in your life or in the world you are confronting, change is possible, hope is out there, and help will come. As Sam discovers in the book, it is never too late.

So well-put, Lauren, and definitely something I personally responded to when reading BEFORE I FALL. And I can't wait for DELIRIUM!

I love, too, that Lauren mentions resilience as it pertains to the writer's life - I'm sure most of us writer-types would agree that without resilience, very few books would ever see the light of day!

Thanks for joining us, Lauren! And now, we want to hear from you - how has resilience helped you in your life? Maybe like Sam, you've reached out to a friend even after a fight or fallout that seemed hopeless? Or maybe it's simply a case of pursuing your passion in the face of lousy odds, heavy competition, or the fear of rejection? Resilience is what keeps us moving forward!