Young Adult Fiction

by Francine Puckly

Padma Venkatraman’s “A Time to Dance” is a young adult novel-in-verse which carries your heart to emotional highs and lows as you journey with a young Bharatanatyam dancer, Veda, through the joys and triumphs of her dance competition to the despair of a heart-wrenching physical setback and into the recovery of her dreams. Because the book is written as novel-in-verse, the author is able to impart the story through flashes of emotion, action and character, giving the reader a deep emotional link to each scene in very few words and lines. It is with these well-chosen words and sparse but conscious writing that Venkatraman carries the reader through the tale of holding and developing new goals and aspirations, as well as growing into a more conscious human being. Each chapter reads as its own beautiful poem, and these poems are threaded together into a captivating story of hope and renewal. I was eager to turn the pages, entranced by the characters and plot, but I also look forward to revisiting the book to savor each poem for its simplicity, beauty and poignancy.

On Writing:
For those of us who have little experience reading or writing novels-in-verse or who might be exploring different formats to express the stories we’re bringing to the page, Venkatraman’s novel is a wonderful study in how to use sparse, well-chosen words and create individual poems that lift and carry the reader through their very own emotional arcs, while at the same time pulling the reader poem-by-poem through a greater story arc of character, plot and emotion.

For more information on Venkatraman’s process in writing this bold cultural and spiritual book for teens, visit http://nancytandon.com/2014/11/11/a-time-to-dance-interview-with-author-padma-venkatraman/. And for three additional writers’ perspectives writing-in-verse, check out http://www.axonjournal.com.au/issue-4/writing-young-adult-verse-novel. 


- Francine

Picture Book

 - by Amanda Smith

True confession: I am a mama of boys. Hence, very few pink, “girly”, sparkly books make it home in our library bag. But I could not leave I Had a Favorite Dress on the library shelf. The little girl in me was totally wooed by the self assured girl in the the spring blossom, salmon pink dress on the cover; the candy wrapper pink end pages; and the fabulous multi-media illustrations by Julia Denos.

The main character in I Had a Favorite Dress is a spunky, active girl. She outgrows her “favoritest dress ever” and her creative Mama turns her dress into a series of new, ever shrinking articles of clothing and accessories. However, when her puppy chews Mama’s last creation into the “tiniest scraps of fabric” she’s ever seen, she comes up with her own creative solution to wear her “favoritest dress every day of every season of every year”.

I love how uplifting this book is. The main character is never pouty, but always ready for a new solution. My son loved following the transformation of the dress and the creativity that oozes out of this book captured his imagination. The internal rhyme, colorful illustrations and “Snip,Snip, Sew, Sew” chorus throughout makes this a happy, read- aloud book.

On Writing:

I Had a Favorite Dress has a tight foundational structure. Ashburn uses days of the week as well as seasons to lead the reader through the story.

It is also a beautiful example of the importance of “show, don’t tell”. The main character’s solution to her problem is never put into words. Boni Ashburn allowed her illustrator to tell the high point of the story in pictures. And Julia Denos does this masterfully with a collage of a collage. Individually the text and the illustrations carry the same message of creativity. Combined, they make each page call out “Go make something!”