Welcome to
the next stop on the UKYA Extravaganza blog tour - and we're doing things a
little differently in this one, as author Lou Morgan turns the tables and
interviews your host, Laura from Bookish Treasures!
No, we
haven't lost the plot - not entirely, anyway. But we thought, as we get closer
to the UKYA Extravaganza event itself, what better way to celebrate the spirit
of the UKYA community than to turn the spotlight on the bloggers who are such
an important part of it. Readers, cheerleaders and friends: these guys know
their books. So let's find out a little bit more about what makes our host
Laura tick…
1. Hi Laura,
and thanks for being part of the blog tour! To start off, tell us a little bit
about yourself, and about your site. How did you get into blogging?
My journey
to blogging started with me discovering how great twitter was as a place
to connect with both authors and people who loved books just as much as I
did. From their I discovered book bloggers and reviewers and during
"Cheer Week" in my first year of University (a week over the Easter
holidays when everyone on the cheerleading team would stay at
University even though everyone else had gone home to do long practices
every day) I had a lot of spare time on my hands and so started reviewing for a
site called Readers Favourite.
Getting
experience reviewing and having started to develop friendships with bloggers
made me want to create my own blog where I could post reviews written how I
wanted alongside other posts to help spread the word of books I loved. With
some encouragement and help from the lovely Faye @ A Daydreamers Thoughts,
Bookish Treasures was born in December 2012.
My blog was
set up with intention with it being a YA blog but it also has quite a heavy
focus on NA simply as I was a strong supporter of it as the category was
finding its feet and growing and so I would get lots of requests for those
types of books (I still do but accept much less now). I expect that the types
of books featured on Bookish Treasures will always change slightly as my
reading habits change but YA is something people will always be able to expect
to see as that is one thing I like that never changes. The variety that the
category provides means that there is always a book to suit my current tastes.
2. Let's dig
into your reading history: what's the first book you can remember reading, and
what was your favourite book as a child? I can remember being very attached to
books like Gobbolino, The Witch's Cat
by Ursula Moray Williams when I was little, and then things like Brian
Jacques's Redwall series. I still
have my copy of The Dark is Rising,
too, which has to be one of my childhood favourites. What about you?
Many of my
childhood memories are incredibly hazy but one of my clearest revolves around
books. Shortly after starting primary school we were instructed to read out
loud to our parents to practice our reading. Much to the despair of my mother I
forced her to listen to me read the entirety of Fantastic Mr. Fox over a two hour period as I didn't want to stop
only part way through. The next night I brought home George's Marvellous Medicine and she had to deal with listening to
me read that also. When the third night saw me bring home The Twits my mum wrote a strongly worded letter for me to take to
school about how she's rather I was encouraged to read on my own in the future.
I still have that letter in a memory box. It is pretty funny.
Pretty much
ever since then I have been just as crazy about books and often get hooked
on a particular author. I had a childhood jam packed with activities and yet I
still somehow found a lot of time to read. I would always carry around a book
to read between ballet class, gymnastics, swimming etc. and would often stay
awake long past my bedtime to finish off my current read. I haven't changed
much to be honest.
As for my
favourite reads, that is something I always struggle with as I read so many
fantastic books in my childhood. One that has to be acknowledged is Varjack Paw by UK author S.F. Said as it
is one of the only age 8 - 12 books that I still have on my bookshelves as I
couldn't bear to get rid of it. I also still have The Confessions Of Georgia Nicholson series by Louise Rennison -
those books guided me through my pre-teen and teen years and are just so laugh
out loud hilarious.
3. This
interview is part of the UKYA Extravaganza blog tour. What do you think defines
a UKYA book (apart from the obvious!), and what do you think sets it apart from
other YA?
What I love
most about UKYA is the culture matching my own so I find it easier to put
myself in the characters shoes. I love books by US authors but I often cannot
relate to the characters experiences - especially in contemporary fiction. UKYA
is always a refreshing change as everything feels more real, I like recognising
the locations and slang terms and I LOVE that everything is spelt properly :P
In my
experience UKYA is often grittier and battles more serious topics. I think
in the UK we are a little more lax than the US about hiding issues such as sex,
mental illness etc. from teenagers. I love books that are not afraid to tackle
serious issues and think that they are very important for teenagers to read.
I completely
agree about the settings and culture: I devoured Point Horror and Sweet Valley
High when I was 12 or so, and while I loved them, I always felt a little
sad that there was nothing like that set somewhere I recognised. While on the
one hand it made everything seem more glamorous and exciting, it also made it
harder to identify with the characters' lives.
4. Pick up
the book closest to you right now, open it to a random page and tell us the
first full sentence written there. (No cheating!)
Mine, by the
way, is a collection of F. Scott Fitzgerald's writing, so we get this:
Of course all
life is a process of breaking down, but the blows that do the dramatic side of
the work - the big sudden blows that come, or seem to come, from outside - the
ones you remember and blame things on and, in moments of weakness, tell your
friends about, don't show their effect all at once.
Which is
cheery, but I rather like it anyway. Yours?
Ok so the first time I sat down to answer the questions I was pinned under a cat (evidence) and so unable to go and get a book. The second time, I was pinned under a cat AGAIN so I sent my mum to grab a book at random from my room. And so having set the scene -
"Always keep your sword in the ready position"
Just to give this quote context (though it is much funnier without), this is from The Worst Case Scenario Survival Handbook in the chapter How To Win A Sword Fight.
5. Why do you
think UKYA has developed into such a community? Where would you like to see it
go from here? I can't wait to see how it changes and grows over the next year…
I think it
helps that the UK is much smaller than other places such as the US and so
it is easier for everyone to get to know one another, attend similar events
etc. People like Lucy Powrie who runs UKYAchat and Project UKYA have been
a major part of developing the community in recent years and also in terms of
bloggers many of the top reviewers of UKYA (you can see many of them
shortlisted for the UKYA Blogger Awards) are incredibly friendly and welcoming
to new people in the community.
My hopes for
the future are simply that the community continues to grow whilst
simultaneously becoming even more tight knit.
6. What's the
last book you finished reading, and what's next on your TBR pile?
I have just
finished The Rithmatist by Brandon Sanderson
(not UKYA sorry!) and I am about to start reading Seven Days by Eve Ainsworth.
The
Rithmatist was an unbelievably incredible YA Fantasy novel with
in depth and complex world building and from what I have heard about Seven Days it tackles the issue of
bullying in a really unique and fascinating way, telling the story from the
perspectives of both the bully and the victim.
Seven Days is the first
of several UKYA novels at the top of my TBR pile. UK authors appear to be
pulling out all the stops to make 2015 the best year of UKYA yet!
Good choices:
I've heard some very good things about Seven
Days too! I've not long finished reading Wolf Hall (I'm so ahead of the curve I'm a couple of years behind
it…) which was incredible, and I'm partway through Mal Peet's Life: An Exploded Diagram. After that,
I've been thinking about a re-read of Possession
by AS Byatt. It's one of my favourite books, and it's been a while since I read
it, but it's been on my mind lately.
7. You're
about to be exiled to a deserted tropical island. You have time to grab five
things to take with you. I guess mine would be a bag (which I'd fill with
books), a notebook and pen, a blanket and a big Crocodile Dundee-ish knife.
What are yours, and why?
I always go
silly with these questions :P
Solar Panels
and a generator so I have access to electricity
A satellite
device so I can get onto the internet
My kindle so
that I can read books
My laptop so
that I can go on twitter, goodreads and my blog
My cats Lily
and Neo for companionship
Even if I am on a desert island I need to be able to
read and blog!
Thank you Laura, for all your
answers! And don't forget to head over to YAYeahYeah tomorrow for the next stop
on the tour, with Emma Haughton.
Also don't forget to check out Lou's YA novel Sleepless which is available online and in any bookstore worth its salt!
Young, rich and good-looking, Izzy and her friends lead seemingly perfect lives. But exams are looming � and at a school like Clerkenwell, failure is not an option. Luckily, Tigs has a solution. A small pill that will make revision a breeze and help them get the results they need. Desperate to succeed, the group begin taking the study drug. It doesn’t take long before they realize there are far worse things than failing a few exams.
Lou
Morgan is the author of YA study pill horror Sleepless, part of the Red Eye series from Stripes, as well as two
adult urban fantasy novels: Blood and
Feathers and Blood and Feathers:
Rebellion, both available from Solaris Books. She lives in Bath with her
family, and has long submitted to the rule of her two cats.
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