Guest Post + Giveaway with Jenny E. Miller
June Foster’s summer is limping along. Her life on a 1950′s farm in eastern Washington is boring–full of milking cows, picking apricots and tending to the chicken coops. Her only friends are her record player and her books. But when gorgeous, turquoise-eyed Frank falls into her world, her life becomes anything but ordinary.
June falls for Frank hard and fast–he’s beautiful, impossibly strong, and capable of things ordinary humans are not. But she’s wary about his father Jonas, a creepy man with an agenda. She should be. Suddenly June is deathly ill, falling in and out of consciousness. When she recovers, June and Frank discover Jonas’s deadly plans for her–and June takes revenge.
Convicted of murder, declared insane and sentenced to life at Washington Pines Sanitarium, June is stuck. Jonas’s plans are reaching her beyond the grave, and she suspects that there’s a lot more going on in the sanitarium than group therapy and electric shocks. Something evil has followed her here, or maybe it was waiting for her all along. If Frank doesn’t break her out soon, she’ll lose her mind–and her life.
Enjoy it below, and then scroll down for your chance to win a copy of Asylum for your very own.
to write? By Jenny E. Miller
asking myself what I could and could not write about. Without giving too much
away, the book deals with murder (though not gruesomely), teen pregnancy,
blossoming relationships and unstable families. Was I pushing the envelope with
a sixteen year-old pregnant character? Could I say the f-word? Could a young
girl commit murder?
my book, and I can write about whatever I want. But the subjects I’ve chosen
aren’t usually discussed in young adult writing, unless they’re taking place in
an alternate universe (and therefore not exactly taboo). Take the TWILIGHT
saga, for example. Sex? Yep. Pregnancy? Yep. Teen marriage? Uh huh. But it’s
all with a vampire, and not realistic to our world, so it doesn’t exactly push
the envelope. The HUNGER GAMES series contains murder by the main character,
but it’s in self-defense, and part of a game in a dystopian world.
realistic than TWILIGHT and the HUNGER GAMES. But still, the question is, what
subjects do authors use and which do they shy away from in teen books?
exceptions) that young adult novels that are set in this world, in present
time, tend to shy away from sex, violence, drugs, and language. But once they
move to an alternate world, everything is fair game. A dystopian or fantasy
world lets you break all the rules and create your own.
should they steer away from? In all honesty, my answers are everything, and nothing.
self-aware than we give them credit for. Bella Swan didn’t spawn a thousand
teen marriages, and Katniss Everdeen didn’t cause a band of young girls to pick
up bows and arrows and start shooting. I truly think that we can write about
whatever we want (as long as it’s intriguing, smart and well-told) and there
are very few subjects that should be taboo.
It’s all about how you handle it. As long as you’re not blatantly
encouraging murder, teen pregnancy, drug abuse, etc., go for it. Chances are
kids have been exposed to these subjects long before they read it in your book.
content is appropriate for their age and personality. Just because they can
read beyond their grade level does not mean they should. Books at higher reading levels are more mature in grammar
and in content. And unless you’re prepared to answer questions and discuss the
subject matter with them, don’t let them read the book.
Jenny Miller grew up in Seattle, writing sappy
(illustrated!) novels for her obliging parents. She studied creative writing at
the University of Washington and holds a Masters in Teaching from Seattle
University. She still lives in the Emerald City with her husband, two kids, and
a dog who thinks he’s a cat. ASYLUM is her first novel, debuting on Amazon March 25th.
You can find more of her at JennyEMiller.com, on Facebook and Twitter.
