One of the things that came up several times in questions and conversations at the KitLit conference was confusion over exactly what it is that lit bloggers and reviewers do. While everyone had the same general idea (write about books) the mechanics of how each blogger works as in contacting publishers, receiving books, emailing authors, etc. was a source of much discussion. Laini Taylor and Jen Robinson did have a "conversation" about this before the group which was quite informative - but also was about how Jen does things at her site (something she explained several times) and not necessarily what Gwenda or Leila or Jackie or Little Willow might do. So in the effort of increasing the knowledge on the subject, here is what today was like for me.

Monday is generally one of the bigger days for books and today I received fourteen of them. The first thing I do is enter the book into an excel spreadsheet I maintain for the year with the title, publisher, date received, date reviewed and where (Bookslut, Guys Lit Wire, etc.) I do this mostly for myself but also as a back-up in case a publisher asks about a book. When I request a book I also enter it into the spreadsheet with the date requested (and add the received, reviewed info to that line as it happens). If a book appears unrequested then it is a new entry.

One of the books was Charles & Emma, a title I already have a copy of (and intend to review in February). So I sent a quick email out to see who might like it and will be mailing it to Erin , who was very excited about it, later this week.

The Kidlit Conference info was a little off on what I do with Booklist - I am just a reviewer there and actually a columnist for Bookslut. So for Booklist I receive books at random times of the year from my editor, Donna Seaman. They always have a hard and fast deadline to comply with that can be anywhere from two weeks to a month away. Today I received a natural history title and a book on Iraq, two subjects I cover a lot for Donna. I also review titles on New Orleans, the polar regions and aviation (go figure). These are all adult titles but sometimes I'm able to recommend them for teens as well. One of these books is due on the 15th and one on the 28th.

There were two books today from Scholastic that I did not request and neither one of them is going to work for me. One is the 15th in a SFF series and really - I have no clue what is going on there. The other is in the same vein as the Gossip Girls/Clique type novels. These are not my thing so both go in the bag for donating to Children's. (I used to donate to a local thrift shop but Lorie Ann and Dia reminded me how much Children's Hospital could use reading material for teens so now we will bring the books along every three months when we are there for the regular appointments.) (I really should have been doing this all along and can't believe I wasn't.)

Milkweed sent me Slant by Laura E Williams. I generally receive all the Milkweed titles for teens and some of them click for me and some don't. This one sounds amazing:

Thirteen-year-old Lauren, a Korean American adoptee, is best friends with the prettiest (and tallest) girl in the school, Julie, who has an endless amount of confidence. Lauren, on the other hand, has been saving for years to pay for a special eye surgery that will deepen the crease of her eyelids. It's not that she wants to look like everyone else in her suburban Connecticut school; she'd just be happy if kids stopped calling her "slant" and "gook." Up until now she's been able to ignore the insults, but when the cutest boy in her class calls her "slant," she realizes she needs to do something about her "nickname."

When she convinces her father into reluctantly consenting to the eye operation, Lauren suddenly finds herself faced with a challenge: should she get the operation that might make her more confident and well-liked, or can she find that confidence within herself? A moving story about one young girl’s struggle with body image and identity.

I can't resist that description, so Slant goes in the review pile.

From Knopf I received Tender Morsels by Margo Lanagan. I didn't request this one but I thought it would probably come my way as I reviewed Lanagan's collection Red Spikes last year. Jackie and I talked about her over the weekend - she is a very intense and sometimes disturbing author. But the thing about Lanagan is she is significant and important and pushing boundaries in how stories are told. I will read Tender Morsels but I don't know if I will like it - what might happen though is that I am moved by it, and sometimes that is even more important.

Delacorte sent me The Devil's Breath by David Gilman. This is an adventure story about a teenage boy. I didn't request it but rather than put it in the donate pile I've sent an email out to the Guys Lit Wire crew to see if someone there would like to review it. It sounds like possibly a good thriller for the teenage boys that site is aimed at.

Another unrequested title was The Dust of 100 Dogs by A.S. King from Flux. I have exchanged emails with Brian Ferry, the Sr Publicist with Flux for a couple of years. (He actually just moved to an editorial position last week but I'm sure we'll still email on books.) Brian has done a great job of reaching out to bloggers and he has taken the time to see what books fit for individual sites. Dust came to me with a specific recommendation from him that he thinks I will like it. That means it gets a second look.

I somehow missed Emily Wing Smith at the conference which is a shame because her book, The Way He Lived, is another one Brian called to my attention when he sent it out a couple of months ago. It is blurbed by Sara Zarr (!) and at the conference she brought Jackie over to meet Emily and get her an ARC. We looked at the first chapter on the train on the way home and it had both of us interested from the beginning. So kudos to Flux and Brian (and Sara Zarr) for getting to know us and letting us know about some great books we might have missed otherwise. (I was planning to read Emily's book for my January column and just hadn't gotten to it yet.)

I received a box from Houghton Mifflin which is one of the best publishers I work with when it comes to obtaining specific titles. I had requested all five of these books and I look forward to each of them. Four are nonfiction titles, including the new entry in their "Scientists in the Field" series. I'm most excited about Bodies From the Ice: Melting Glaciers and the Recovery of the Past by James M. Deem. I see a lot of teen appeal for this unusual title and will likely post about it on Guys Lit Wire.

HMCO also sent me Ruby's Imagine by Kim Aniteau which is set in New Orleans before and after Katrina. I try to review a NOLA book every month at the Voices of NOLA site. We blog there mostly about news stories concerning the city but try to mix it up with music and books so it's not all article links and excerpts. I have never visited New Orleans but after having my essay included in the Chin Music collection on the city, it became important to me to stay with it. I write about books for all ages over there - in September I highlighted the wonderful Two Bobbies by Kirby Larson and Mary Nethery. (Go read this picture book now!)

Other than the books, today was kind of busy because I received two more responses for my WBBT interviews. On Friday Ellen Datlow emailed me her answers and today found Mayra Lazara Dole and Lewis Buzbee in my inbox. I read Mayra's and sent her a few follow-up questions. I still have to read Ellen's and Lewis's tomorrow. Each of them are interesting examples in how authors are chosen for the tour. Ellen is actually an anthology editor whose work I have been a fan of for a long time. We have emailed from time to time and commented on each others sites. We have a lot of friends in common and I reviewed Coyote Road (edited with Terri Windling) last April. (I HIGHLY recommend this YA collection.) I've been wanting to ask Ellen some more indepth questions about anthologies and short stories and the WBBT was a perfect opportunity.

I reviewed Mayra's book, Down to the Bone in my August column. This book (from Harper's - sigh) was very hard to get. I mentioned it in my blog when I saw it in the HC catalog but was unable to obtain an ARC. Mayra emailed me to ask if the book arrived after google alerts let her know about my mention. When I explained it had not she contacted the publisher to have it shipped. She contacted me again about 3 weeks later and I let her know the book still was not here. She contacted the publisher again and this time the book was sent to me. For her few minutes work of emailing, Mayra saw her book positively reviewed in Bookslut (I really liked it) and I was intrigued enough by it to want to interview her as well. I also let Lee know about it last weekend as it fits into his GBLTQ booklist for teens and I passed along some info on it to the Readergirlz in case they are interested. If Mayra had not emailed me in the first place, none of this would have happened.

Lewis Buzbee contacted me after I wrote about seeing his book in the Feiwel and Friends catalog. Feiwel is a great pub to work with and Steinbeck's Ghost easily came my way. Lewis and I emailed back and forth about Ray Bradbury and other things we have in common over the past couple of months. I wrote about Steinbeck's Ghost here in August and my review of it will be up at Bookslut next month. In his case, the story was very compelling and he had already shown an interest in talking about books and authors so it made him a natural choice for the WBBT. (I plan to nominate Steinbeck's Ghost for the CYBILS in MG fiction.) (Unless it turns out ghost stories belong in fantasy in which case I'll nominate it over there.) (I forgot to mention I'm nominating Two Bobbies for the NF picture book category as well.)

Other than all of this I received word of a negative response from an editor on my manuscript (She was impressed by the book and sorry she could not obtain it. Neither my agent nor I know what to make of that.) I'm okay though as this is only #2 and there are still several editors reading it. (I'll panic in November.) I also realized that tomorrow I'm covering Guys Lit Wire as we ran into a 5th week this month and schedule only for four (Little Willow is the 5th week floater but she covered today.) That added more blogging work to the day but is not typical.

And then there was the real job and the loan we are trying to get to rebuild engines on one of the planes (engines time out on a schedule for commercial aircraft so we knew this was coming - we did not expect the credit crisis to be happening however). I had to call our congressman's office in AK and go on the record that some of us do want this whole mess dealt with yesterday because if we can't rebuild those engines we end up with a really expensive lawn ornament that we don't need. (Seriously - it is insane how difficult it is for a small business with impeccable credit to get a loan now. The new hoops we have to jump through are very annoying.) Our congressman voted against the bail-out package today and I wanted to make sure he knew not all of his constituents were happy about that.

Sorry to diverge into politics, but that was part of the day.

Tonight I go back to Chapter 1 of the AK flying novel which needs some serious work. Oh, and I'm doing laundry but that's not too exciting.

I hope this all provides some insight into how books come to me and what I do with them. If anyone has any questions about all this, send them my way.