Isn’t that lovely? It’s the Dutch cover for The Celestial Globe, published by Lemniscaat. And hopefully I’ll be able to show you David Frankland’s cover for The Jewel of the Kalderash soon! I love it.

Classes have begun, and I have a new crop of students, new things to teach…very fun. One of the things I always do at the beginning of my Fiction Writing for Children and Young Adults class is distribute the first pages of about 20 books. No titles or authors’ names show on these pages. I try to choose a variety of genres, age groups, gender, point of view, etc. The pages are distributed, read at home by the students, and during the next class we talk about what we, as readers, are able to know about a book only from its first page. I got this idea from a blog post Scott Westerfeld wrote several years ago, in which he did a “first page test” judging the quality and personality of a book from its first few lines (and his first page of Uglies was included in my students’ packet: “The early summer sky was the color of cat vomit”). Sorry, wish I had a link to that original post, but my foggy memory will have to do.

I have some issues with my own class exercise. It’s disheartening to think that readers would read a first page with a mental ax hanging in midair, ready to chop off the book’s head and set it aside for more gripping fare, or to spare the book, let that ax hang, and keep reading. And I kind of promote that attitude with this exercise, because at the end of class I have my students vote for the book they’d most like to keep reading (I then distribute the first 20-30 pages of it). But I still do this exercise, if only because I think it’s valuable for my student writers to feel that their first pages matter greatly, and to think carefully about the information they can convey in a first page (about character, setting, time, conflict, etc.). Oh, and also? It is fun, and I’m always curious to see which book will win. This year, it was The Book Thief, by Markus Zuzak. The year before, Before I Die, by Jenny Downham (who was a close second this year). The year before that, Twilight (I have since taken that one out of the packet, since it is too recognizable. In spring 2008, when I first taught this class, it wasn’t so well known; perhaps one of my students had read it. Students seemed really drawn in by the immediate life-or-death quality of the prologue).

Can you think of any great first pages?

I just finished rereading one of my favorite books from my teenage years: Robin McKinley’s The Outlaws of Sherwood. Here’s the book cover from my youth:

I kind of prefer the classy edition of more recent years, which shows a bronze notched arrow, but for nostalgia’s sake let’s let this woodsy one stand.

I have many, many McKinley favorites: The Hero and the Crown (a seminal read for me!), Sunshine, Deerskin, Beauty, and this one, whose slow pace I adore. Honestly? It was so nice to read a book that did NOT try to grab me by the throat with the first page. I’m tired of being grabbed (despite the class exercise. It’s still good pedagogy to do the exercise, though it causes me some ambivalence). Also? McKinley is just such a good writer in the old school kind of way—meaning, not only can she write beautifully, but also masterfully, showing excellent control of complicated structures. When was the last time you saw a semi-colon used in YA lit? Not recently, I bet. Well, hey, if you want to sample some of her stuff—and, God, you should—I see she’s got an esampler up on her website. Go forth and read good things.

Soon: news about the NYC Teen Author Festival! I’ll be reading and signing.

Oh, and check out this exchange I had with the delightful Meg Pickert, a 4th grade teacher in Houston, TX, about a mysterious autographed copy of The Celestial Globe. I love hearing from students and teachers! Thanks, Meg, for getting in touch and for letting me post this.