The Life of a "Rock Star" YA Fantasy Fiction Author

I've written previously about YA, or Young Adult, fiction because it is about the only genre currently showing good growth in terms of sales. You can find my earlier posts by clicking on  "young adult fiction" in the list of labels on the right, or at the bottom of this post.

Over the weekend, The New York Times  led its "Sunday Styles" section with a lengthy feature on Cassandra Clare, one of the most successful YA authors. According to the article, she's "an alternative world builder" who sets her supernatural plots in urban settings.

A Familiar Device and a Trope: "For the Best?" You Decide

Ann Beattie's story "For the Best" in the March 14, 2016 New Yorker opens with a familiar device: there will be a meeting of possible consequence later in the story and, of course, we are immediately curious as to what's going to happen even though we know little more about anything at this point. It's a part of human nature that writers regularly prey upon and most of the time, we're hooked.

Gerald, a well-off elderly Manhattanite is, as usual, invited to a friend's annual Christmas party, but this time a "heads-up" email sent just before the invite arrives tells him his former wife, who he hasn't seen in 31 years, has been invited as well. Just to make sure readers understand the portent of this development, we are told the email contains not just one but two exclamation points.