TEASER TUESDAY: FIRST BOOK FIRST - JOHN GREEN

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along:

• Grab your current read

• Open to a random page

• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page

• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)

• Share the title and the author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Last week, I went out and bought The Fault in Our Stars but I didn’t want to read it. I wanted to savour preparing to read it: it’s on the shelf facing outwards so I can look at it.

I had seen and heard interviews of John Green talking about his work, and – for me – there’s nothing like an interview to send a reader out to track down a book.

Typically me, when I became fascinated by the new book, I went out to find the first.

Looking for Alaska? I didn’t know what I was expecting. What I found was more than it anyway.

I started reading all about Miles. Miles and boarding school. It was different, not the kind of boarding school story I was used to reading. Probably because this was a male writer, I thought.

All totally absorbed, I was page turning and having a wonderful time up to the point where my jaw dropped. I went back to check… but no, I hadn’t got it wrong I’d tripped up over the plot twist. I turned back and back. I re-read the whole book again up to the (can’t spoil it for you) plot turn. 

Amazingly, I hadn’t seen it coming. For the rest of the book I was wrung through the wringer, ending up as puddle.

I loved the characters, loved the writing.

LOOKING FOR ALASKA by John Green

But I lacked the courage and she had a boyfriend and I was gawky and she was gorgeous and I was hopelessly boring and she was endlessly fascinating. So I walked back to my room and collapsed on the bottom bunk, thinking that if people were rain, I was drizzle and she was hurricane.

I need to recover from “Alaska” before I read “The Fault in Our Stars” I’ve only got one heart and I need it.

WHY DO WE KEEP ASKING WHY?

TEASER, TWIST AND TIP-TOEING TOWARDS THE UNEXPECTED

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along:

• Grab your current read

• Open to a random page

• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page

• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)

I got all anti-frey on this book
Then I remembered it was
 written by Pittacus Lore ;)

• Share the title and the author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

THE POWER OF SIX

I wish the author was Pittacus Lore, Lorien's ruling elder. I have no trouble picturing him struggling to surviving on Earth while preparing for the war that will decide the fate of the last handful of free Loriens, and the fate of the people of Earth.

pg 11

We still share that secret, but somewhere along the way Adelina has stopped acknowledging it. Somewhere along the way the plan to bide our time until we felt strong enough and safe enough to leave has been replaced with Adelina's desire to simply stay - or her fear to leave.

As I'm sure you can all appreciate, I've been busy with work and life and writing.

Write-essential 2 - the twist in the plot - has been syphoning off my time lately.

Plot twists are essential. After vibrantly-real characters, the plot twist is the element of the story everyone remembers.

In my wip there’s a boy whose life changes unexpectedly. As one of a group, he learns new skills and gets embroiled in adventures.

There is tension in the group: animosity.

I wanted to hint that among the usual rivalries something was at play - something more extreme.

But I didn’t want to give the reader the plot twist painted in sky-high lettering at some point after chapter 3.

Rachelle Gardner, on her blog, said: "When you foreshadow, the reader usually doesn’t notice it when they initially read it. But later they might have an “aha” moment, remember it, and put two and two together.” A delicate touch is necessary if the reader isn’t consciously pick up on at first. “Often foreshadowing can’t even be detected until someone reads your novel for a second time. It’s that subtle."

My favourite plot twist came in a film. The plot twist at the end of The Sixth Sense - I didn't see it coming.

WHAT WAS YOUR FAVOURITE TWIST IN FICTION OR IN FILMS?