Guest Post: Adèle Geras on silent snow, secret snow

Today, I'm honoured to have Adèle Geras stop by my blog to talk about her YA novel silent snow, secret snow for LGBTQ YA Month!

silent snow secret snow.... by Adèle Geras

When I wrote this novel in 1997 (it was first published in 1998 by Penguin and is now out of print) the original idea was to see what would happen to my characters if they were brought together in some way and unable to get away from one another. The ancient Greeks were very sensible about a lot of things concerning drama and one of their best ideas was the one that advised UNITY OF PLACE. From the point of view of a writer, it means not having to travel between locations, not having to keep describing different landscapes, interiors, cityscapes etc. It means you can bed down in one spot and make that your world.

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Review: silent snow, secret snow by Adèle Geras

silent snow, secret snow by Adèle Geras - An atmospheric tale of family secrets, betrayals and desire from an acclaimed storyteller. The Golden family has congregated for Christmas in their large, old family home. Laurie has invited his friend Carlo. He hopes for a chance to tell him his deepest feelings, but Carlo wants to spend time with Laurie's sister, the beautiful yet aloof Marianne. Meanwhile, their cousin, Ellie, is struggling to cope with her miserable mother and the fact that her father is absent. Outside the house the air is soft with snow; inside it crackles with tension as another family tradition becomes evident - that of keeping secrets. Some are tragic, some selfish and some embarrassing. Cut off from the outside world, will anything in the family ever be the same again? From Amazon UK

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Guest Post: Adele Geras - Why YA?

I am delighted to share with you today a guest post from Adele Geras, author of Dido, which was released in paperback from Random House on 29th April.

WHY YA?

I've now written and published four novels for adults. The first one, FACING THE LIGHT, came out in 2003 but before that date, the one question everyone always asked me was (in more or less these terms, too!) "Will you write a Real Book when you've had the practice?" That's to say, everyone assumed that books written for children were somehow not quite proper books. It was almost as though you didn't have to be quite so gifted, or clever or creative, because the assumption was: children are younger than adults, they don't know as much, therefore you can fob them off with cut-down fiction and they'll be fine.

The exact opposite is true. The younger the child and the fewer the words, the HARDER it is to write excellent texts for them to read. Part of this is: you're reading aloud quite often to very young children and the whole experience can become very boring indeed if the words are not up to scratch, however beautiful the illustrations may be.

When it comes to Young Adults, or 'teenagers', other questions arise. As we all know, YA covers everyone from the non-reading 13- year- old to the reading 16- year- old. The reading 14 year old is reading adult novels for much of the time, I'd guess. The reading child has more in common with the reading adult than she has with another non-reading child. The phenomenon of 'crossover' fiction demonstrates that the borders between adult fiction and YA fiction are very fluid and you can come and go between the two at your will.

What matters is: how is the book published? TROY appeared on a children's list and ITHAKA and DIDO followed the same pattern. They are genuine YA books in that the main protagonists are teenagers and the stories are told from their point of view. That's not to say that adults can't enjoy them. I hope very much that they can and do, but the emphasis is a YA one.

I've been wondering why the market for adult novels about myths, Greek gods etc is a small one and I don't really have an answer. Marie Phillips published a wonderful book called Gods Behaving Badly some time ago, and John Banville, the Booker prize- winning novelist has written a Greek gods- themed novel called The Infinities, but both of these are set in modern times, in a world that's recognizably our own as though grown-ups are a bit wary of venturing completely into fantasy of this kind and have to dilute it with a bit of real life. The popularity of myth-based movies means I think that they're quite happy to suspend their disbelief in the cinema but the written word is a bit different. Why, I have no idea.

In my own novels, I travel back to the ancient world and the gods appear there as characters in their own right. I'm not quite sure whether a publisher would take on a book such as mine for the adult lists, but I do know that I don't write any differently for the YA audience than I would for the adult one. It's simply that my perspective is a younger one. I could have written Dido from the point of view of the Carthaginian queen and I chose not to. I chose to concentrate on Elissa and tell my story mainly through her eyes.
I hope this doesn't stop proper grown from reading and enjoying it, too.

Thank you, Adele, for such a great guest post! Make sure you check out Adele's website. Also, check out The Bookette from 31st May - 6th June for Becky's Adele Geras week!

You can buy Dido from The Book Depository - free international shipping.

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Contest: Win a Copy of Dido by Adele Geras!

Dido by Adele Geras, a steamy YA novel based on Greek myths, was released by David Fickling Books in paperback on 29th April.

Dido by Adele Geras - While she was still trembling with the complete unexpectedness of what Aeneas had just said and done, he leaned forward a little and kissed her on the mouth. Just one swift, soft touch of his lips on hers and then he turned and walked away.

Love can be deadly. Especially when two girls fall for the same man - one a queen, the other her serving girl. Elissa knows she is playing with fire, but she can't resist. Queen Dido suspects nothing, until one fateful night ...Secrets are revealed, hearts are broken and as dawn breaks, a terrible tragedy unfolds. This is a passionate tale of love, betrayal and revenge. From Amazon UK

Thanks to Random House, three people will be lucky enough to win a copy of Dido!

Rules & info:

• Enter by filling in the form below.
• One entry per person.
• Open internationally.
• Contest closes 14th May 2010 and winners will be chosen with Randomizer.org.
• Winners' details will be passed on to my contact at Random House.
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