The Fear of Writing Diversity

My sister has Down Syndrome. She has a hilarious personality, gets grumpy when she watches too much TV, and says funny things like, "[Bro], I have some advice for your driver's test. Cut your hair." She's a big and special part of my life, and I always sort of had the intent to write either a book about her or a book about a character with Down Syndrome.

But I couldn't, because I was sure I would get it wrong.

I was worried that I wouldn't be able to represent her properly as a character in a book. My thought always went along the lines of "I am not someone with Down Syndrome, therefore I can never accurately portray someone with Down Syndrome in a book, therefore I will not write them."

And I didn't.

But then I realized a few things.

1. People with Down Syndrome are still people.
2. Everyone is different.
3. I am a person.

I know writing a character with Down Syndrome would require some amount of research just because of the way a life is affected by that, but what I realized in realizing these things is that I'm not writing "Person with Down Syndrome", I'm writing "Person".

And I can do that.

I became unstuck from the thought of "what if I can't get my sister exactly right?" because I realized that yeah, my sister has Down Syndrome but she isn't THE representation of everyone with Down Syndrome, just like I'm not THE representation of 18-year-old white Canadians with curly hair. 

My sister is not a representation; she's a person. And if I chose to write a character with Down Syndrome, that character isn't a representation either. They are a person who is different than others with Down Syndrome and that's OK because people are different from each other.

The #yalitchat on Twitter the other day was about diversity in YA. And I think part of the reason why there is so few books with POC (Person of Colour) MCs or anything other than Caucasian MCs is because of this weird fear writers have (including me) that they're going to get it wrong or they're going to misrepresent someone along the way.

We have this mindset of "I'm not that, so I can't write that."

But I think that we need to stop worrying about that because people aren't just lumped into one huge group of White Canadian Females with Curly Hair that all have the same personality and charateristics and likes and dislikes, or one huge group of People With Down Syndrome who are all clones of each other and we've got to get our character-clone exactly right.

Stop being so afraid, and just write people who are different, because every person is different.

Because really, that's exactly what diversity means.



What do you think? 
(Also check out this awesome post by @ravenamo on writing POCs!)
(Also just so you know I did eventually succesfully write a short story that featured a character with Down Syndrome. ;) )

My Family is Weirder Than Yours (and More of My Life in Stick Figures)

So, this is the return of the stick figures of my family. In the past week (actually, it hasn't even been an entire week) I have observed my family and their oddities (er, our oddities) so I can prove to you that my family is weirder than yours. All of my cartoons are pretty much recreations of what was actually said, except, y'know, my family members wear clothes and have... flesh...

Oh, and for the record, my dad doesn't actually have blue hair, that was just the colour of the marker (stupid markers that LOOK black but aren't!)

Exhibit A

We spent all of last week analyzing my brother because he was sick, and came up with the conclusion that he needs to express his feelings more.

Exhibit B

My parents and I had a late-night discussion last week about... Star Wars.

Exhibit C

...and then my dad and I discussed and researched the difference between a "nerd" and a "geek". (Yes, I ask a lot of weird questions...)

Exhibit D

I was watching my brother the other day when he was looking for the ketchup in our pantry closet, and then all of a sudden he steps inside the pantry and closes the door behind him!



Exhibit E

Sometimes we burst into song randomly. (Okay, mostly my dad and I, but the rest of my family has done it, too.)

Exhibit F

This just... doesn't make sense.

Well, I had recently told my dad a story about a relay race where kids had to put petroleum jelly on their  noses and use it to get cotton balls out of a bowl, but normal people just don't say these things suddenly in other conversations which have nothing to do with the topic, which is what my dad did.

Exhibit G

My dad thinks this lame calculus joke is the most hilarious thing in the world. You can read the joke here. If you've taken calculus and you think it's funny, well... maybe you and my dad can be friends.

Exhibit H

According to my mom, my dad cries "at the drop of a bucket". :)

...and if that's not enough proof that my family is weirder than yours, well... I don't even know. Anyway, if you DO want to prove that your family is weirder than mine, give me proof in your own blog post or in the comments. I know my sister wasn't in any of these cartoons, but trust me, she's weird too.

How is your family weird??



Reading Interview with My Superwoman Mother on Books

Guess what time it is? Yup, that's right... time for another reading interview!! Woohoo!! So, now you've met all the members of my family including my brother, my dad and my sister. But... there is someone missing. Now, it's time to meet my amazing mother, aka Superwoman!! She is the one who is largely responsible for my love of reading and, consequently, writing.

The interview begins with an interupption by my father...

Me: So let's start with the basic questions.

Dad (in background): Your name
Me: Sure...
Mom: I feel a little nervous.
Me: Why?
Mom: I don't know...
Dad (laughing): Because you might uncover something she doesn't want to reveal...
Mom: No, that you're going to argue with me or something....

Thankfully, there was no uncovering of deep dark secrets or arguments. :) Now, to the interview!

What kinds of books do you like?

Well, I like suspense, because lots of times I can't predict what's going to happen. But I like a lot of things. Family stories, historical fiction. Probably my favourite are suspenseful things. Things that are sort of fast-paced. I like some sorts of science fiction.

The best books are books that you just keep thinking about after you put them down, because you want to know what's going to happen. Not knowing what's going to happen in a book is important to me, unless you just want something really easy to read once in a while. I like books that aren't predictable.

What genres do you stay away from?

Westerns. And your typical romance story. It just seems like such a low level of reading. Well, maybe it's not a low level of reading but it's just like... they have a formula and whatever romance novel you read it all happens the same, it's just a different place and different person. You always know what's going to happen.

What are some of your favourite authors or books?

Francine Rivers, Ted Dekker... and they're totally opposite which is funny. One book I read lately that was really good was Sarah's Key. It sort of haunted me afterwards, same with that book The Boy With the Striped Pajamas.

How do you pick out books for me and my brother?

For you, I can think of what I liked at that age and also if it's a YA book that I'm interested in, then you would probably be interested in it. Although of course there are some YA books that I would read but you wouldn't, but I know those ones. And with your brother... the authors that he's read before and liked, and I basically go off the books he's read before and books he's read very quickly. Also, his interests like math or soccer. And with your sister, it's easy, because of her interest in movies.

Do you think reading is important? Why?

Yes, because it gives you a different perspective on things. I mean, I guess you can get a different perspective watching TV but with reading a book... it's almost like with watching TV it's someone else's perspective, while with reading a book it's your own perspective. With books, you learn about other people's perspectives but you also put your on perspective on those perspectives... haha. And reading's fun... it can take you to a different place in your head. And it also puts me to sleep. All I have to do at night is read a book and then I fall asleep.

When we were little, were you determined to have us read?

I remember Dad and I talked about the values we wanted to instill in you and one of them was that you would love reading. And you do that by reading yourself and reading to your kids. I love reading kid's books as well as the other books I read. I'm known as "The Book Lady" at work.

Where do you think your love of reading comes from?

My mom. My mom read to me, and she was a reader. My dad wasn't really a reader, but my mom was. We'd read all the time before bed. I can still remember my favourite book... There's A Mouse in the House. I can even remember the cover, it had like an older, three-story house on it with a mouse in the top.

And just having books around. There's actually some statistic that if you have a certain number of books in your house then your kids will be readers. Although it's only, like, twenty books.

How would you have felt if even after you did all that, we still weren't into reading?

I would probably just... keep reading to you. It wasn't just me reading to you, it was Dad reading to you... and just us reading ourselves. All those things instill a love of reading.

You read YA sometimes. Why?

I don't read all Young Adult stuff. But I think sometimes because... I don't know if this is true or not... but I think YA writers actually have to write better in some cases because  if you want to get teenagers to read then it has to be written well. Because most aren't going to put the effort into reading a book unless it peaks their interest. So it has to be written well. Although I don't know if that's really true.

Do you have anything else to say about books?

Um... they can be a friend, when no one else is around...

Uh, I think you got that out of a book.

No, I didn't! They are like your best friends when no one else is around. And they're very quiet, actually.

Yeah, but they leave you after 200 pages...

But there's always another book. And I love the library. It's like a free bookstore.

Thanks, Mom! Isn't she great? :)

Kreativ Blogger Award

Hey... so Anna Waggener recently awarded me with the Kreativ Blogger award. Er... a couple weeks ago, I guess. I'm supposed to link back to the blogger who gave me the award, say 10 facts about myself, and then pass it on to six new bloggers.

Anna's blog is here, and you should definitely check it out because it is BEAUTIFUL. She also has a book coming out... no idea when but the cover is amazing.

Isn't it gorgeous?? I love how completely unique, yet kind of scary, yet kind of simple it is. She has a contest going on as well to win a copy of GRIM and you can find the info for that here.

OK, anyway. 10 facts... I don't know, I always feel like it's kind of boring just talking about myself so I asked my sister to say 10 facts about me instead. This is what she came up with, and not everything is necessarily true because she likes to be silly:

1. I'm silly.
2. I love to draw.
3. I love to read my Bible.
4. I do crafts.
5. I go to school.
6. I'm graduating.
7. I'm moving to the Phillippines.
8. I take pictures.
9. I'm goofy.
10. I'm nice to my cats.

Now the 6 bloggers, and I'm going to give them to the 6 awesome bloggers who commented on my last post.

1. Angela Brown
2. Nhim
3. Natalie Aguirre
4. Nick Hight
5. Brittany Clarke

and... last but not least, 6. Laura Wise, who I have to say is an amazing commenter. She always has funny or insightful things to say, it seems! :)

Pass it on and thanks for the award, Anna! :)

Interview With My Awesome Sister On Books (and Movies)

I like learning about people's reading habits, because I find it fascinating how different they can be from person to person. So far I've interviewed my best friend, my brother, and my dad. Today, I will be interviewing my sister.

My sister is 19 years old, and she has Down Syndrome which means she learns slower than other kids her age, but also that she has an awesome personality. She loves movies and loves to make us laugh. She is also quite short compared to the rest of my family, and I like to tease her by calling her "Shortbread Cookie". :) She also likes to be a chatterbox, although she wasn't so much in this interview because we weren't talking about movies.

Anyway... onto the interview!

Me: So, what kinds of books do you like?


Sis: Wizard of Oz, Anne of Green Gables, Flat Stanley.


Me: So why do you like those books?


Sis: 'Cause... interesting?


Me: Why are they interesting?


Sis: They’re based on a movie.


Me: Oh, so you like books based off movies.


Sis: Yeah.


Me: How come you don’t read more?


Sis: I don’t know! I always read before bed.


Me: What’s your favourite book?


Sis: Wizard of Oz


Me: Do you like reading?


Sis: Yes.


Me: Why?


Sis: ‘Cause... everything.


Me: Yeah, but why?


Sis: (groans) I enjoy reading.


Me: Why?


Sis: I enjoy reading!


Me: Yeah, but why? Is it fun, or...?


Sis: It’s fun!


Me: Would you read a book that I wrote?

Sis: No.


Me: No! Why not?


Sis: Cause... not fun.


Me: Why not?


Sis: It’s not based on a movie.


Me: (laughing) Oh... well, thanks. So if I got a movie made, and then I wrote a book...?


Sis: Yup.


Me: You’re silly. What books do you not like?


Sis: Your books.


Me: What? Oh, like the books I read?


Sis: Yeah.


Me: Why not?

Sis: Cause kind of bit boring.


Me: Why are they boring?


Sis: Cause not based on a movie. I like Wizard of Oz, because it’s based on a movie.


Me: So how do you pick a book to read?


Sis: Just pick one book, and read it.


Me: Yeah but is it the title or the cover?


Sis: The cover.


Me: Or...


Sis: The cover!!


Me: What do you like about the cover?


Sis: The pictures.


Me: Do you have anything else to say about reading and books?


Sis: Nope. Bye.

So, in case you didn't catch that... she likes movies. And the Wizard of Oz. Haha. Isn't she cute? :)

What's your favourite movie based on a book?

My Brother's Self-Esteem Issues

I've decided it's time for another "bro convo", where my brother says really funny things without realizing it and I embarrass him on the Internet. Except he's too apathetic, so it doesn't actually embarrass him. (Although he probably doesn't know what apathetic means).

The context is that my brother is forever playing this video game, Little Big Planet 2. There's an aspect of it that you can make levels, and some website is holding a level-making contest. My brother is making a level to the enter the contest. He and I are talking about his level that he is making.

Picture him playing a video game.

Bro: I think I can win if I can do this one part that I hope I can do but I don't think I can.

Me: Well, (making up random melody on the spot) just believe in yourself! Wait... there has to be an actual song like that...

Bro: What about that... Don't Stop Believin'?

Me: (singing) Don't stop! Believing! Hold on to that fe-e-eling... no, but I thought of another song... now you made me forget it...

Later

Me: I remembered the song! (sings "Who Says" by Selena Gomez) Who says... who says you're not perfect...

Bro: What's that supposed to be?

Me: Telling you to believe in yourself. For your level thing.

Bro: No, it's telling you you're not perfect.

Pause.

Bro: Wait, WHAT did the song say?

Yup. And the moral of the story is... DO NOT PLAY VIDEO GAMES WHILE YOUR SISTER IS TALKING TO YOU.

And obviously, I am singing so many uplifting self-esteem songs to my brother because it's an issue of his. I mean, just take a look at the evidence:

Me: Bro, do you have self-esteem issues?

Bro: What's that?

HAHA I love you, bro. ;)

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In other news... I finished the second draft of my current WIP!!!

**Also, I still have my draw for prizes/ask-the-teens project going on! Check that out HERE and spread the word, please!**

Interview With Someone Slightly Nerdy On What They Think About Books

My father's look-alike. Ha!

Awhile ago, I did an interview with my brother on his reading habits here. I've thought about continuing this theme of interviewing people on their reading habits, but never got around to it... until now!!

I've decided to call these similarly-themed blog posts a "blog series" called Ask The Reader.

Today, we'll be going into the head of someone who, like my brother, is slightly obsessed with soccer... along with car racing, astronomy, science, and organization. He also thinks of relationships in terms of graphs and talks a lot. Which is why I ended up having to compress a 28-minute interview recorded on my Olympus digital recorder (you're welcome, Olympus) into a blog post that would be short enough to keep you short attention span, internet-loving bugs' interest. (It's okay. I'm one too.) He doesn't have a blog, or a twitter, but he does have one link here. 

Now, I present to you... my dad! Oh, and, by the way... my dad does not actually emphasize every second word. I just bolded some words so you could skim (if you so please) the interview and still get the most interesting/important parts. I know, paragraphs are daunting, aren't they? :) Enjoy!

Me: What types/genres/topics of books do you enjoy the most?

Dad: Well the last year or couple years, I’ve been reading a lot of biographies... biographies of astronauts, motorsports things, like Murray Walker.  I also enjoy reading things about science, science history. History of certain development of ideas, like how they determine the expansion and size of the universe... or just history... I’ve read books on history of mathematics by different mathematicians... Natural history, like palaeontology all that sort of thing I’ve always found that kind of interesting. And.... there’s probably a few others as well, but... it tends to be nonfiction. Oh, and I also read adventure things... like I read The Adventures of Marco Polo (that was nonfiction too).

I hope that from all that, you at least get that he mostly reads nonfiction. But read on, my friends!

Me: How do you go about picking books out to read?

Dad: You know, I see books in some of my astronomical magazines or the journal I get from the RASC [Royal Astronomical Society of Canada]. Occasionally someone mentions a book in some of the car magazines I read or motorsports things that I read or science things that I read and then I always make a note of it and then I’ll go and look up reviews and if it seems reasonable I’ll save a link to Amazon reviews or something and I have a whole folder with probably several hundred books listed and whenever I want to buy some books or whatever and then I look at that folder by date... usually the most recent things...

Kind of crazy, huh? I just have a small notebook with a cat picture on the front... what is your TBR list like?

Me: Have you ever not finished a book?

Dad: I know there was one... uh-oh, you’re not going to like to hear this... it was a huge book that I thought “this will be good” on the Incas (an ancient civilization in South America). Fascinating things, but when I started to read it, I realized quickly it was not a history but a sort of fictionalized account, with people and characters. Like historical fiction. If that’s what you’re after that’s fine, but if it’s not then...  There was another book by creationists that I had so little respect for and his ideas were so easy to dismiss... and since then, he has abandoned those ideas. I read all of that book, but skipped over some of the appendices.

Me: What do you think makes a book a bad book?

Dad: The books that I read, those type of books, it’s very easy to write something on history or science and make it extremely boring –reciting facts, and too much of that sort of thing and someone has to be a very gifted writer to make it interesting. So a book like that that has good possibility, good material but it’s just... poorly presented. There’s also the attitude of the writer. There was one book I read, Time Among the Maya or something, and it was kind of like it’s kind of fun to be with this guy for the first week or two, but by the end you just want to strangle him and just want to get away from him.

Read that, nonfiction writers? You've got to have a good personality in order for your book to be appealing.

Me: What are some of your favourite books or authors?

Dad: William Sheehan, who has written books on Mars and Venus and articles in Sky & Telescope... and Owen Gingrich, who I've heard speak at the university. He is a Christian but also one of the foremost astronomical historians.

Me: Have you ever read fiction?

Dad: I used to read a lot of science fiction. I read Lord of the Rings of course, and this book Dune by Frank Herbert, and A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. I think I also read Moby Dick... and for awhile I was reading Sherlock Holmes (by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle). I tend to gravitate towards classics, just because they’ve stood the test of time and so on.

Me: What is so appealing to you about nonfiction? 

Dad: I just have an insatiable curiosity about the world around me and about history and I love to sort of see my place in where we are now in relation to time going back. And to me, it seems so sad when people are so focused on now and even their own history they couldn’t care what happened yesterday. There's just so many fascinating stories about the past.

What say you about nonfiction? Fiction?

Me: When you read nonfiction, how much of what you learn while reading do you retain?

Dad: It depends... but I like to work fairly hard at understanding when I’m reading. I don’t like to sort of gloss over things. Sometimes when I read books with math in them or formulas, or discussions that are a bit more in-depth like that then I don’t want to just skip over it. Because I know you benefit from [going more in-depth]. Certainly as time goes by it fades, but I think in general I remember a bunch of stuff.

Me: How long does it take you to get through a book usually?

Dad: I don’t like to rush through books. With the books I read, I wouldn’t want to read them all in one sitting even if I could. I usually read for ten or fifteen minutes to a couple of hours at the most but then anymore than that and I feel the stuff I’ve learned is already fading and I’d rather have it sort of sink in a bit... savour it a little bit. On average it takes me a month to get through a book. If I’m reading regularly, then at least several weeks.

So if you're amazed at those people that read a gajillion books per year... then just know that they aren't getting any soak time.

Me: That's all my questions! Thanks! You did better than bro did.

Dad: Well, when it comes to talking, you can count on me... for quantity, anyway.

That's for sure!

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Do YOU want to be part of the Ask The Readers series? Just e-mail me (kazuntai101[at]gmail[dot]com) and I'll send you some questions specific to your reading habits/routines/personality. Then the interview will appear up on the blog so other people can learn about your unique reading habits!