A few months ago my music aficionado husband made a mixed CD for me and every time I listen to it stories pop into my head without me even trying. Whether or not I am able to do anything with these stories is yet to be determined, but I must admit that it is a strange and satisfying phenomenon.

I remember reading an interview with Stephanie Meyer about how the inspiration for the Twilight series came to her in a dream and Kate and I recently discussed the fact that she was inspired to write a book while taking a class in college. The variety of forms inspiration can take are fascinating.

So what inspires you to write? Is it music, a dream, an interesting historical figure? And after you find your inspiration how do you create an entire novel out of it?

In additional to just the normal stuff of getting caught up after a week away, I’m also prepping for my trip to the Bologna Book Fair later this month, where I’ll be meeting with dozens of foreign editors and talking about my authors and my books. Things are going to be busy busy busy around here for the next few weeks! I’m thinking of another round of guest posts while I’m in Italy — what do you think? Do you want to hear more from my authors (and maybe a few additional guest bloggers) or do you want me to just set up some scheduled posts of my own? Let me know in the comments!

And speaking of European trips, have you seen the gorgeous cover to Stephanie Perkins’ debut novel Anna and the French Kiss? Love!

In the last few months I’ve noticed an influx of books about mermaids, pirates, and especially guardians. There have been guardian angels, otherworldly creatures, animals, and even normal people. The word guardian shows up in a surprising number of titles. There are also an awful lot of characters with dead or missing parents, and I mean a whole lot. I would go so far as to say that 80% or more of the YA queries I read begin with dead parents. As you might imagine, many of these orphaned characters discover that they have a guardian of some sort. This isn’t necessarily something new; it’s just interesting how prevalent it continues to be.

Another shockingly high number that might be of interest, is the amount of stories that begin with a prologue, a character waking up from a dream, or both. Kate has mentioned on several occasions that this gets really old, really fast and I agree. We see this so much that it becomes difficult to get past. Even if the rest of the story is phenomenal, the redundancy of it puts a damper on the whole thing.

Two little details that have stood out to me lately are the popularity of the name Emma and the description of overly glossed lips. The latter sounds strange, I know, but I’ve seen it so many times recently that (obviously) it really stuck in my memory.

Of course, this is just my opinion. I’m curious to hear what redundancies you have found while reading, or even writing, recently. I can’t imagine how hard it must be to come up with a truly unique idea, let alone doing it while avoiding common pitfalls. How do you brilliant writers do it? I must know.

Intern Jenny is an invaluable help around here. She tweets at @internjenny1, and loves your books as much as I do.

All of your cover designs were so great that it was hard to choose just one. Ultimately I had to envision myself perusing the YA section of the book store, not tough since it’s one of my favorite past times, and ask myself which cover would inspire me to pick the book off of the shelf. The winner of our contest looks like a bona fide YA novel straight from Barnes and Noble. And the winner is…

talshannon (aka Xarles Boivin) for PALE! I actually really liked both of the covers. Each one stirs up a completely different concept of what the story might be, which just goes to show how important the right cover is.

Of course there were some very close runners up. HWPetty’s cover for FORCE was compelling and MarcyKate’s TRAVERSE had me giggling.

Thanks to everyone for participating and congrats to talshannon for winning a copy of Alyson Noel’s best-selling novel BLUE MOON! Please send us an email with your mailing address so we can get your prize to you.

Today, we have a special treat, as Intern Jenny is also going to add her thoughts to Tami’s query, which follows:

Dear Daphne,

Life for eighteen-year old Pence McCree is a little off key. A musician struggling with schizophrenia, Pence finds himself jobless, penniless and stuck in Limerick, a strange town obsessed with Irish-themed clichés. In desperation, Pence applies to the local theme park, expecting to land a music gig to see him through the summer. Instead, he’s offered the job of the theme park’s mascot, Luke, the Lucky Leprechaun.

What Pence didn’t expect to find was a love for Madison, setting Pence’s life on a new course. Madison is a girl just trying to get out of the shadow of her outgoing best friend and get through the summer working her first job. She is Pence’s melody. She makes him feel normal, so much so, that he decides to go off his meds. Madison must help Pence before he sinks deeper into the imaginary voices in his head, dragging her down with him.

Lost and Found is a contemporary young adult 80,000-word novel. It is the story of two teens that find true love in the most unlikely situation. It narrates the life of a mentally unstable young man and the strength a young woman must find to save them both. The manuscript is complete and available upon request.

I am co-creator of , a blog that believes there should be truth in teen fiction. I also belong to several young adult writing groups.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,
Tami

There’s parts of this that I really like, and other parts that I think need some improvement. First of all, is Pence Irish? I assume so, but you could also be talking about a town in America named after Ireland’s Limerick. You might want to make that clearer. I also think the musical metaphors need to go — like your Limerick, they’re a little cliched. (Side note: I once did get stuck in Limerick, waiting for a flight out of Shannon Airport, in a dingy hotel with a burgeoning cold and a dwindling supply of reading materials. Not my favorite Irish city.)

Also, does Pence really “expect” to get a music gig at the theme park? My understanding of life as a working musician offers much less certainty. Perhaps you could go with “hoping” instead of “expecting.” The following line, “What Pence didn’t expect to find was a love for Madison, setting Pence’s life on a new course,” is drowning in cliche. Beyond that “a love for Madison” is especially awkward. How can you make this feel more active? Maybe introduce Madison first, then tell us how Pence falls for her? When I read “Madison is a girl just…”, I see “Madison is just a girl.” But she’s more than that, at least for Pence, right? Tell me how. Tell me why.

I also wonder how you sink into voices. On a whole, some of your word choices feel forced. The plot is good, intriguing, but as it’s written now, I think I’d pass it over, despite your blog, and even assuming fantastic credentials.

Those are my thoughts. Jenny?

I do appreciate that the letter jumps right into the overview of the story. However, I don’t feel that there is enough information here to grab my interest. Now, that doesn’t mean that the query should be exhaustive, just that a little more meat on these bones would be helpful for me to make an informed decision. The concept of Pence’s schizophrenia seems like a nice twist on the love story and I would be interested in learning about how Madison deals with this situation. Also, I would like to know (from the query) whether the whole book is based on the characters’ romantic relationship, which is what it seems like, or if there is a great deal of emphasis on Pence’s relationship with his music as well. In other words, is this a story about the power of music, love, a combination? I’m very much on the fence about whether or not I would ask for a partial of this. Of course, normally we would have the first three pages to judge by and I think that’s what it would come down to for me…the quality of the sample and writing style.

Thanks, Jenny! What do you guys think?

CREATE YOUR DEBUT YA COVER

1 – Go to Fake Name Generator. The name that appears is your author name.

2 – Go to Random Word Generator. The word listed under “Random Verb” is your title.

3 – Go to FlickrCC. Type your title into the search box. The first photo that contains a person is your cover.

4 – Use Photoshop, Picnik, or similar (I use Snagit Editor) to put it all together. Be sure to crop and/or zoom in, as desired.

5 – Post it to your site along with this text.

Mine’s above. What’s yours? Link to it in the comments. And just to make it interesting, Intern Jenny will pick her favorite cover to win a copy of Alyson Noel’s #1 New York Times bestseller Blue Moon.

Let your inner artist shine forth!