A BLOG FOR READERS AND AUTHORS OF MTV BOOKS

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Thursday, January 31, 2008

Here Comes Moby!



Okay, so while Moby Clique doesn't actually hit stores until March 4, the early reviews are in, and it might just be "the best book ever written."

So, I admit, maybe that's not a direct quote from the review.

I *might* be paraphrasing a bit, but they said something similar, I swear. Check out the new review at www.teensreadtoo.com.

In other Moby news, as it turns out, you can currently buy advanced copies of the newest addition to the Bard Academy series on Amazon.

I don't know how long you could've been ordering the third Bard book. You think they might tell us, or inform us in some official capacity, but I am always the last to know. I only just found it recently, and that's because I semi-regularly stalk myself on Amazon to see what people are saying about me. Yes, this means I could be a pathetic narcissist, but I prefer to think of it as "market research."

Thankfully, I didn't find any new negative reviews on the old Bard books (I've got my eye on you, ANONYMOUS!) and a couple of new positive ones, which is always nice.

And, by the way, before I forget, Happy Birthday, Jenny!

Sunday, January 27, 2008

I have a bunch of things I'm excited about, and these are two of them. Last Friday night I opened my email and discovered the covers for LOCAL GIRLS and RICH BOYS. I opened up the cover for RICH BOYS first, for no particular reason, I didn't even know which one I was opening at the time. And all of a sudden I came face-to-full-screen with six pack abs. I can honestly say I actually muttered, "Whoa" out load. I was totally not expecting guys on the cover. Sure, the word boys is in the name, but the main character is a girl. I really didn't know what to think. Then the more I looked at it, I was like, "Sure, I could live with these hot guys on my cover." I love the GIRLS cover as well, but for entirely different reasons (although I must question how the hell those girls could possibly ride bikes in skirts that short). The funny thing is, totally by coincidence, there's a scene in the book where Kendra is actually wearing a skirt very much like that, so I guess it was meant to be.

Other things to be excited about: last weekend I also had my new web site posted (http://www.jennyoconnell.com/), which I love.

And then Friday my new voice recognition software arrived so I can actually speak my chapters instead of typing them. Who knows if it will actually make things go faster, as I'm hoping, but I thought it might be fun to try. Of course BOYS is due to my editor on Friday so I don't have enough time to learn to use the software before this book is done, but maybe for the next one.

And then, finally, my birthday is coming up!!! Yeah! I love birthdays, don't mind getting old at all. Every year I have more fun and I can only assume that's because as I get older I get better (and not just because I invest heavily in moisturizer). This year I turn 40 on Super Tuesday - coincidence? I don't think so.









Friday, January 25, 2008

We interrupt this blog to bring you an example of high-tech diamond-shine brilliance


If you're more of a LiveJournaly person than a Blogspotty person, boy have I just made your life easier. At Little Willow's suggestion, I've created a syndicated feed for this blog on LiveJournal. Just add us as a friend here.

The Odd Man Out

Like Justine, I missed the first round. It would've been on Christmas, so I hope you'll forgive me. Aside from the holidays, I was buried in various deadlines. (Still am, but can't let it slide by a second time.) Fortuitously, I'm currently revising the manuscript for my first novel for MTV Books--SOULLESS--and plan to deliver the new draft on Monday.

So, here I am...Odd Man Out. What am I talking about? Well, let me put it this way...SOULLESS is a dark, gruesome novel about the walking dead and the deterioration of human society. A superficial look at the array of talent and titles in the MTV Books lineup might make some people wonder what I'm doing here. But SOULLESS isn't just a zombie novel. It's also a story about 21st century teens making hard decisions, and the lines you might be willing to cross to save yourself and the people you love.

And I've never minded being the odd man out. In college, my group of friends were people who didn't have a group of their own. As an adult, I'm the answer to the old Sesame Street song "One of These Things is Not Like the Others." A curiosity. An oddity. Growing up, I was often one of the only guys (and often enough, the ONLY guy) in the mix. It's still common. I've never been that comfortable with the kind of back-thumping, beer-chugging "guyness" of certain guys, always gotten along better with women. Maybe that's because my parents were divorced when I was young and I was raised by my mother. Or maybe it's because, with my mother working 70 hours a week, my brother and I were often looked after by my older sister and all of her girlfriends.

I'm not the only guy in the MTV Books lineup, of course. (Hi Alex.) But SOULLESS is a departure for the line, I think. The Odd Book Out. On the other hand, anyone who has read my Jenna Blake (Body of Evidence) books, or the Prowlers quartet, probably already knows this, but SOULLESS might not be as big a departure as it appears at first glance. The situations are more extreme, but the dynamics remain, and are all too real.

I should probably have introduced myself earlier. :) My name is Christopher Golden. I've been a full-time writer for more than fifteen years, writing novels, short stories, comics, video games, non-fiction books, and now screenplays. (Well, not RIGHT now...the Writers Guild of America is on strike, and needs your support!) I read constantly, when I'm not watching movies or (way, way, way too much) television. I'm sure I'll talk later about what I'm watching and reading. Meanwhile, come visit: www.christophergolden.com or http://www.myspace.com/christophergoldenbooks


So there you go. A little about me, and a little about SOULLESS. Next time, I suspect I'll talk a little about the state of the world, the cult of celebrity, and the dread that lurks at the back of all of our minds in the 21st century--all themes that play a major role in the novel.

Monday, January 21, 2008

Coming soon!

COMING IN JULY 2008

I WANNA BE YOUR JOEY RAMONE
by Stephanie Kuehnert

A raw, edgy, emotional novel about growing up punk and living to tell.

The Clash. Social Distortion. Dead Kennedys. Patti Smith. The Ramones. Punk rock is in Emily Black’s blood. Her mother, Louisa, hit the road to follow the incendiary music scene when Emily was four months old and never came back.

Now Emily’s all grown up with a punk band of her own, determined to find the tune that will bring her mother home. Because if Louisa really is following the music, shouldn’t it lead her right back to Emily?

COMING IN JULY 2008

LOCAL GIRLS
by Jenny O'Connell

Kendra and Mona are best friends, local girls who spend their summers catering to rich tourists and the rest of the year chafing against small-town life. Then Mona's mom marries one of the island's rich summer visitors, and Mona joins the world of the Boston elite, leaving Kendra and Martha's Vineyard behind. When Mona returns the following summer, everything is different. Now Mona spends her days sunbathing with her private school friends, while Kendra works at The Willow Inn--a job she and Mona once hoped to do together.

Unlike his sister, Mona's twin brother Henry hasn't changed. He's spending his summer the way he always has: with long, quiet hours fishing. Early mornings before work become special for Kendra as she starts sharing them with Henry, hoping he can help her figure Mona out. Then Kendra hatches a plan to prove she's Mona's one true friend: uncover the identity of the twins' birth father, a question that has always obsessed Mona. And so she begins to unravel the seventeen-year-old mystery of the summer boy who charmed Mona's mother. But it may prove to be a puzzle better left unsolved--as what she is about to discover will change their lives forever...

COMING IN JULY 2008

RICH BOYS
by Jenny O'Connell

For seventeen-year-old Winnie, summer can't arrive fast enough--anything to get out of the house and escape the cold war brewing between her parents. With her older sister Shelby spending the summer in Boston, Winnie's left to deal with the situation all by herself. Which is why she's happy to spend all day away from home at a cushy job--camp counselor at the prestigious Oceanview Inn.

When the Barclays, a wealthy summer family, offer Winnie an additional babysitting job in the evenings after work, she jumps at the opportunity. Little Cassie Barclay is fun to take care of, and hanging out in the gorgeous Barclay mansion overlooking the harbor is far more pleasant than being on the front lines of the battle between her parents.

Then Cassie's older and devastatingly attractive stepbrother Jay arrives on the island after a disastrous first year at college, and he seems to want nothing more than to wreak havoc for his stepmother and the rest of his family. Winnie soon discovers that life in the Barclay home isn't so perfect after all, and what was supposed to be a carefree summer escapade is quickly becoming more complicated than she ever thought possible...

Sunday, January 20, 2008

A Few of My Favorite Things (that might surprise you)


The first ever article about me as an author came out last week in my local paper, the Forest Park Review (for some reason direct links to the article don't seem to work so to read it just go to www.forestparkreview.com, then in the menu on the left click on "Hometown" and the article about me is called "Writing Her Own Soundtrack" and dated 1/15/08).

I enjoyed talking to the reporter, he was very nice (though he did make me older by a year in the article which as we all know women don't like very much and my agent's name was misspelled), and I do enjoy the article, but it did give me my first taste as to how I may be portrayed by the media. Part way through the interview, the reporter told me that I'd shattered any stereotypes he'd had coming in. From my website he'd expected a rebellious goth girl, but instead found me very articulate and friendly. I kind of wanted to say that I am a writer with a master's degree so of course I'm articulate and to correct that I'm a punk girl who had a goth phase, but hey, I just thought it was cool of him to admit to that and there is a bit about it in his article, too.

Next he asked me to tell him something about me that people wouldn't expect from a rebellious punk rock writer type. Honestly I thought it was the most fun question he asked, so I want to name a few of my favorite things that might surprise you here:

1. As I told him, I love soap operas. One Life to Live, in particular. I've been watching it for almost 15 years. I got hooked the summer before my freshman year of high school. I tape it every day (because I'm not high tech enough to have a Tivo or actually I'm too cheap. I figure I have a functioning VCR so why bother?) and I watch it while I eat dinner to unwind from my day job and get into writing mode. I love that soap operas have outrageous plot lines that I could never get away with. Watching them gets the creative juices flowing. And I actually have learned a lot about how to push the plot line forward through dialog or how to slow the plot down using evasive characters.

2. Greek mythology. I've loved Greek myths since I was a little girl. I've especially loved the Persephone story (and the image of her I used above), maybe because I think the name Persephone sounds like a cooler version of Stephanie. But seriously, I want to do a modern retelling of it or use it as an overarching metaphor in a book. I tried in the one I am working on now, but it didn't work, so it's going to have to stew a little bit longer.

3. Exercise. I'm kind of a freak, but I actually enjoy working out. Pilates relaxes me, kickboxing makes me feel both bad-ass and silly at the same time, and just going on the elliptical with my iPod and some trashy VH1 programming on the TV at the gym (preferably Rock of Love--because I'm a punk rocker with a soft spot for 80s hair metal) during my lunch break helps me get through the day.

What about you? What are some things you love that people probably never would have guessed about you? Or if you are a writer, what about your characters? Do you have a prom queen who is a secret chess-whiz? A goth girl who loves romance novels? Let's talk about what makes us or our characters unique because that is the best way to breakdown stereotypes and that's one of my favorite things about art/writing, it's universal and it forces us to look past our preconceived notions.

Thursday, January 17, 2008

Flotsam & Jetsam


I'm going to take a page out of Alex's book (blog?) and just talk about random stuff.

Blank page-itis- Just started a new project last week.  In some ways, there's nothing more simultaneously exhilarating and terrifying than that blank page is there?  All of the possibilities are there—the story just waiting to be told.  But... it's also a blank page meaning you eventually have to start.  And then once you do, the possibilities immediately narrow—the characters, the story, they start taking shape and in some cases, taking over.  The minute you put that first word down, that's it—you're cooked, one way or another.  But is it going to be perfectly sautéed or burned to a crisp?

Trends and timelessness- I read earlier this week where the Broadway musical Rent was going to be closing in June after a twelve-year run.  I've never seen the show on stage although I'm familiar with the music and the general premise (modern reinterpretation of La Bohéme) and I've seen the movie, which oddly, didn't do a lot for me, mostly because it felt dated and not in a good way.  I think it was a case of we're not quite far enough removed from the era in which it's supposed to take place to feel nostalgic about it, so it simply comes off a bit stale.  Which made me think about publishing and YA.  Other than the heyday of chick lit, I can't think of another genre that can be so much a product of the time in which it's written.  I know I've picked up some YA titles and they toss around brand names and slang and reference music and movies that were very of the moment when the book was written, but given the glacial speed at which publishing moves, by the time the book actually makes it to a shelf, might already be dated.  I know for some types of books it doesn't really matter, but that's a personal pet peeve of mine.  I want, in so much as it's possible, for my stories to have a timeless feel to them.  So I try to either use slang that's stood the test of time or make up my own—I might reference a current musician, but I try to balance it out with musicians who've been around forever.  It's not completely foolproof, even for the best of books.  I mean, you read Judy Blume's Forever and there's no denying it was written in the 1970s—however, it still maintains a timelessness.  What about you guys?  Any particular tricks you use?

Title stasis- I'm in the same boat as Jenn, sort of.  I need a new title for my '09 release.  We haven't gotten to the list-making stage, but I'm fairly sure it's not that far off.  It's a modern reinterpretation of the Carmen story and its original working title was A Thin Line, truncating the phrase, "a thin line between love and hate."  Problem is, it doesn't really evoke the Carmen feel very much.  Right now, my favorite title possibility is Roses in My Hands which plays into the performance aspect of the story and also evokes an important plot point.  To me, too, it also gives the visual imagery of a fiery gypsy with a rose tucked behind her ear.  But maybe not so much with the Carmen thing, however.  We'll see.

Okay, I'm sure I could blather on forever—haven't even talked about how jazzed I am that Mad Men took the Golden Globe for Best Series, Drama and Best Actor, Drama (Jon Hamm), but I've got people coming to replace carpet in my house.  Carpet that they should have put down right the first time, but didn't.  Feel my joy.  No, really, feel it.

Monday, January 14, 2008

I need a new title

Last week my editor let me know I need to think of a new title for BOY IN BLUE, which will be published by MTV Books in March 2009. It’s about a 17-year-old who avoids prosecution for a high school stunt by spending spring break on night patrol with the 19-year-old rookie cop who arrested her.

I’ve actually had good luck with inventing titles lately. I named my critique partner’s two latest books, and both titles have been accepted by her publisher. But I haven’t named my own published books. My editor at Simon Pulse came up with the title of my latest book, THE BOYS NEXT DOOR, while we were still discussing the proposal, before I ever wrote a word of Chapter 1. I named my first book QUEEN GEEK because the heroine was the first female drum major of her high school marching band. (This was before I’d ever heard of Frank Portman’s KING DORK, I promise.) But another book named QUEEN GEEK was purchased by a publisher a few weeks before mine. So a chick in the marketing department at Simon Pulse came up with the title MAJOR CRUSH. I absolutely love this title, and at my editor’s request, I renamed a character in the book after the marketing chick as a thank-you. (Hint: This character’s boyfriend in the book is named Gator after a kid my son was in kindergarten with. The marketing chick should consider herself lucky that I was not feeling more mischievous. I went to high school with a boy named Booger.)

And I can’t say I’m surprised my editor wants me to change the title of BOY IN BLUE. It’s extremely common for editors to ask authors to come up with new titles for their books--or to simply rename the books without consulting the author at all. My friend Kelley St. John was consulted, but her editor turned down 84 of her titles (read them here!) before renaming her first book GOOD GIRLS DON’T.

In this spirit, I’ve forwarded my editor a list of 40 or so titles invented by me, my critique partners, and my writing buddies. I didn’t include two by my six-year-old: RED WHITE AND BLUE LIGHTS (which makes sense--he knows what a police car looks like) and ROCKET BLAST (which makes no sense whatsoever unless you are six-year-old boy who lives for seeing things crash and explode. No rocket blasts in the book? Doesn’t matter. ROCKET BLAST will sell sell sell!).

But I fully expect my editor to say no to every one of my new titles. None of them are really jumping out at me. And I do have a bit of anxiety while waiting. The title may help determine the cover, and the cover is the most important component of a book that sells well, other than the book itself. Which will look most appealing to a reader: the cop angle? I'm guessing my editor thinks not. The night angle? The crime angle? The romance angle? (I love the cover of NICK & NORAH’s INFINITE PLAYLIST--the black and white blurry photograph of them kissing on the hardback edition, not the purple paperback.) The fact that the heroine is missing out on her dream of spring break at the beach? The titles I sent consider these possibilities and more.

But with wonderful MTV titles coming out soon like I WANNA BE YOUR JOEY RAMONE and WHAT HAPPENS HERE, I have confidence that mine will be just as provocative and creative, whether I thought of it or not.

What are some titles you love--for your books or someone else’s? And where do your titles come from?

When is a book ready to be written?

This is my first, introductory post I should have written over a month ago.

Let’s just say, I am late. Very late. Sorry about that. Part of the reason I’m late has to do with a much bigger and much less forgiving deadline: the one for my book LORD OF BONES, the sequel to my first novel BLOODANGEL. BONES comes out July 1, and was a true bitch to write, mostly because I sold it on the basis of a proposal and fifty pages when the rest of it just wasn’t ready to be born yet. Before I could write the story, I had to find the story, and finding the damn thing took me two drafts and many months before I scrapped it all and had to start over again. So what was supposed to be a ‘revision’ basically became ‘writing a whole new book’ and…I got it in late. Way late. But at least I got it in, and, well, lessons were learned.

So when is a book ready to be written? Part of becoming a published novelist isn’t just learning how to write a publishable novel – a difficult enough feat in itself – but also about how you work as a writer; how the writing process works for you. With BONES – and also with UNINVITED, my supernatural thriller with MTV Books – I learned that so much of writing takes place in my head away from the keyboard. I need the time and space to mull things over, let them steep, find their own ways of relating to each other, to deepen and grow. The ideas, images, stories and characters that knit up into a particular novel live with me for years.

For example: UNINVITED. The basic premise came to me over ten years ago, when I was still in high school. I wanted to write about a runaway teen who unexpectedly returns home one day, completely out of the blue, after an absence of at least a year or more. No one really knows why he left, and no one really knows why he came back.

But he’s not the same. And maybe he’s brought something else with him – some kind of menace, some threat. Because I read stuff like Stephen King and Dean Koontz and Clive Barker and Anne Rice and Christopher Pike, I knew that that ‘menace’ would be darkly supernatural in nature. And because my favorite movie at the time – one of my favorite movies – was LOST BOYS, partly because its theme song ‘Cry Little Sister’ kicks such ass (and was also a big inspiration for my novel) -- I thought maybe that menace would be vampires. (This turned out not to be the case.) And I figured that the story would be more interesting told not from that runaway’s point of view, but a younger sibling, someone who could see those strange changes in a way no one else could.

So that was the idea at the center of the book. But that was all I had – just that idea – nothing else around it, no reason that compelled me to write it. Not yet. Years passed, and more years passed, and I came back to that idea from time to time and still never did anything with it. I got deep into the writing of what would be my first published novel, BLOODANGEL. (By the way, even though BLOODANGEL is not an MTV Book, it was acquired by the same editor who would later change publishers and buy UNINVITED for MTV.)

And then…well, BLOODANGEL is written for adults, but part of the story is told from a supernaturally gifted teenager named Ramsey, who turned out to be the most popular character in the novel, judging by reader emails (most of them from adults). And I realized that I really like writing younger characters, and wanted to write a novel solely in that teenage perspective. Which made me think again of my mysterious runaway, and the threat that follows him back to his hometown. This time, though, images and characters began to weave themselves into that central premise. A moonlight rave in a valley that ends in tragedy. Lean, glittering-eyed, wraith-like figures who form a motorcycle tribe like no other. A beautiful blond man standing in the mist below your window….unfurling wings dark and lush as midnight. An intricate tattoo that wards off evil. There was even a ‘talking’ coyote. In fact, it was the coyote who kicked things off, who got me writing the novel that had finally decided to be written.

Justine Musk

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Florida?!?! Really?!?!?


Last night I booked a trip to Florida for March--the husband, baby, and I will be visiting my inlaws, and I never thought I'd EVER be excited about such a thing. Going to Florida to see my inlaws? I mean, COME ON! I'm more of an Italy, Ireland kind of gal. Which is why it was so much fun for me to write the parts of WHAT HAPPENS HERE that are set in Europe.

Chloe, the main character, goes to Europe with her family at the beginning of the book, visiting London, Paris, Rome and Venice. I was about Chloe's age--she's 16, i was closer to 14--when I went to Europe for the first time so it was neat to think back to my first impressions and to try to capture the wonder of travel. Back then, the last thing I wanted to do was be seen with my parents so that was sort of tricky since I wasn't exactly old enough to run around the streets of Paris by myself. But I was still grateful for the opportunity and thankful that my parents, neither of whom had ever been abroad before, had the drive to save up money and take us to Europe at a relatively young age. I really think it fostered my love of travel and my life has been richer for it. I even lived abroad--in Dublin--for about a year and a half after college.

A lot of the experiences Chloe has in Europe closely resemble my own: she visits a lot of the same tourist attractions (Buckingham Palace, Versailles, the restaurant in Rome that claims to have invented Fettucini Alfredo, Piazza San Marco in Venice, many many more); she has her portrait drawn by a sketch artist in Paris; she gets lost in Venice; she takes a boat ride on the Seine in France and has one of the best meals of her life to date in a tiny restaurant on a cobblestone street in Paris. Just thinking about it all makes me want to hop on a plane.

In the last few years I've taken some of the best trips in my life—my honeymoon in Belize, a sort of second honeymoon to Hawaii (a free week in a hotel there was one of our wedding gifts, if you can believe it!) and an amazing trip to Italy (for fun) and Ireland (for a wedding, also fun). I think the trip to Italy was probably the best trip I've ever taken (the food, the food!) but then again Hawaii was arguably the most relaxing week of my life ever.

Most of What Happens Here is set in Vegas, of course, but Vegas, well...Vegas requires its own blog posting. More on that aspect of the book and my long and storied relationship with Vegas next time. In the meantime, what's the best trip you've ever taken and why?!??!

-Tara

Sunday, January 6, 2008

"My Brain is Tired" by Alex McAulay

Okay, so this will be a pretty random assortment of tidbits--it's basically just what's on my mind as I sit down and write this at 3AM! Anyway, I'm up late because that's when I always write (my wife Lisa is a total morning person, so it's amusing when we negotiate our schedules). I thought I'd make a list of some of the things that have been on my mind recently... and bear with me, because when I said this would be random, I really wasn't kidding! Oh yeah, and the list is pretty shallow too, because I've spent most of the last month watching movies, playing guitar, and hanging out with Lisa. I heard there was a political something-or-other in Iowa last week? Who cares! I'll vote for whichever candidate has the nicest hairdo (just kidding!)

HERE ARE MY RANDOM THOUGHTS, ETC:
1. There Will Be Blood is one of the best films I've ever seen. The plot initially sounded boring (a guy looks for oil in the early 1900's?) but the film is amazing. I kind of want to see it again, even though I just saw it. It's fascinating and bizarre, like Citizen Kane as if directed by Stanley Kubrick.
2. Not all famous people are mean! Tonight Lisa and I went to a screening and Rosanna Arquette was there with her teenage daughter. They were so sweet! The movie was Baby It's You, an obscure early-80's teen drama/comedy starring Rosanna, and every time she had a kissing scene in the movie, her daughter in the audience covered her eyes in disgust! (they were sitting right in front of us, so we weren't stalking them or anything... really... I, er, promise.....) But it was so funny--her daughter was clearly freaked out at seeing her mom kiss some guy onscreen.
3. Watching Twin Peaks on DVD is fun, even though the second season is really awful. Anyone remember Twin Peaks? What a great show.
4. My laziness. Really, I can't even think of a single New Years resolution. I just don't care enough to try to change anything about myself. But I'm afraid I'm going to get stuck in my ways, like my grandpa who once shoved a computer off a library counter and broke it because, "Computers don't belong in libraries!" My mom and I told the librarians he had mental problems, so in the end he didn't have to pay for fixing it (of course he didn't have any mental problems--he was just grumpy and eccentric, but he'd always been that way). So maybe my resolution should just be not to attack any computers? I think I can handle that.... maybe.
5. Someone sent me a copy of that YA book The Luxe. I haven't looked at it yet, although the cover art is cool. Has anyone read it? And what's up with so many YA books being "Alloy" productions these days? From what I understand, Alloy is some sort of book packager. Does this strike anyone else as weird? I think our government should break up that monopoly! (And if Alloy is, like, really cool and I just have no clue what I'm rambling on about, then forgive me, and Alloy rocks!)
6. Pizza. I really like it. Why is there no decent pizza in LA? I want dripping, oily, greasy, nasty New York style pizza like you can find on every corner in NYC. I don't want "chive and cauliflower" pizza with lemon sauce. Please! If someone can FedEx me a greasy pizza then I'll vote for you for President if you ever run for President, okay???

Saturday, January 5, 2008

"Back To The Old Seasons"

Happy New Year, MTV authors & Friends. :)

Recently, I’ve turned over my draft of INVISIBLE TOUCH to my agent. Yes, I’ve lost perspective after staring at it for the past two months, and once I get her thoughts back, it’ll be a rush to get the book to our editor by deadline. (Don’t we all have the same editor?)

I’m taking a couple of days of downtime to rejuvenate the writer mind. The way I do that is by catching up on shows.

Ever since signing up with a DVD mail program, I’ve been hooked on renting television series. Shows that may have gotten lots of buzz, but not the ratings or old seasons of my favorite shows that I’ve never seen.

Here are the television series I’ve worked my way through over the past year:
Veronica Mars Season 1, 2, & 3

Seriously hooked. Interesting characters and fun, mysterious plots. I wish they hadn’t rushed VM to the FBI for Season 4. I would have kept watching her and Logan through college.

Gilmore Girls Seasons 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 (Season 7 still to go)

I take breaks in between GG seasons, otherwise I have GG overload. So I’ll get to Season 7 eventually. But really great, heart-warming characters.

Dark Angel Season 1 (Currently watching Season 2)

I was pretty much hooked on DA when it aired, and now I’m going back through all the action and the conspiracy of genetic engineering.

And next up will likely be Las Vegas Season 1.

Love the humor, characters, and action of the show, so I’d like to see how it all began.
How about anyone else? Do you rent the DVDs for old shows or are you just not into television?