"On Wednesday's, we bleed PINK."

I just read The Merciless by Danielle Vega. It's like the Plastics meet the Christian Jewels and the Bitches of Eastwick.

I don't mean this as a joke, or as a dig at the author. I enjoyed the book. I read it in one day.

It has the same feel of Mean Girls, in its discussion of boys, Burn Books, and well, girls who are mean. With its hot pink cover, it even looks like a Burn Book.

It has the born-again Christian bent of Saved, with the group of girls attempting to perform an exorcism on a schoolmate.

 But when the stunt gets out of hand, they begin to turn on each other with the power of four pissed off witches.

These three movies were popular with teen girls (and are probably still watched by some 30 something women) because they depict various aspects of female friendship, or rather, frenemy relations.

In each story, there is a girl who's Other. Maybe not in the beginning, maybe not the entire time, but at some point she grows uncomfortable with the actions of the other girls, which precedes the crumbling of their power structure. 

Obviously this book won't satisfy hard core horror fans, but for readers who enjoy the kind of horror akin to Pretty Little Liars, it's a good fit. And just like any good horror story- there IS a twist at the end. 

It's so fetch.

Jason Segel AGAIN!

In one of my Throwback Thursday posts, I wrote about meeting actor Jason Segel, who is also dabbling in writing middle-grade books.

I was very excited when I found out (after months and months of Googling) to find out that he would be returning to Boston to promote the second book in the Nightmares! trilogy.

So again we (myself, my husband, a friend) trekked out to Boston, this time with nine month old J in tow, and listened to him read a chapter and answer questions from the audience.

My husband and I were a bit nervous about having our baby with us; we didn't want him to get cranky and become disruptive, but he did pretty good. And he was in good company, because another couple brought their three month old son with them.

It worked to our advantage too; since the event was on a school night, the audience members with children were shepherded to the front of the line. I think we only waited about 10 minutes before we got to see Mr. Segel.

Not the best photo- we were rushed through since

 there alot more people in line behind us.

I know that he has become incredibly popular and successful, but he seems like a very down-to-Earth guy- like he still can't believe he's famous. We brought our deluxe edition of the Freaks and Geeks series on DVD, which looks like a yearbook in the off-chance that he'd be willing to sign it. His assistant (during the signing anyways- not sure if she's actually affiliated with him) said that he was only to sign books, but when we showed him, he was glad we'd brought it, and actually asked "Do you want me to sign this?" and he did so happily.

I'm crossing my fingers that he'll visit again for the final installment of the Nightmares! trilogy.

Lastly, I read an article recently regarding celebrity authors. The article lambasted this category of books, claiming that because actors already have an established fan base, that publishing houses eagerly take these projects because of the dollar signs, rather than eschewing them in favor of books by 'real' authors, who spend years crafting their manuscripts and refining the art of writing.

But just because someone is an actor doesn't mean he doesn't have any ideas worth writing about, right? Kristen Miller co-authors these books with him, and he openly states that she helps him translate his ideas into novel form since he's used to writing screenplays. I think it'd be wrong if he didn't acknowledge this fact, but since he does, isn't that confirming that creating children's stories is an art?

He mentioned that he's hoping to write a YA book next and I know I'd read it.