Twilight is back! (This week in books)

This week! Books!

Twilight is back! Stephenie Meyer revealed that there will indeed be a new Twilight novel on August 4, Midnight Sun, which will retell the series from vampire Edward Cullen’s perspective. I for one am quite curious how he felt attending high school when he was over one hundred years old.

I have to say I’m pretty excited we now have new Twilight and Hunger Games books to look forward to. 2000s book series FTW!

Congrats to the winners of the Pulitzer Prize (not to be confused with the Noble Prize), including two-time winner Colson Whitehead!

Apple is making moves in the self-publishing realm and launched Apple Books for Authors, which includes access for PC users. David Gaughran has a great roundup on what this means for self-publishers.

As you know I’m big big big on making sure you know your protagonist’s motivations, and over at DIYMFA, Sara Letourneau has a solid post on motivation and how it intersects with the inciting incident. (Here’s my advice on motivation and inciting incidents).

A great reminder from Dan Blank for people wondering about whether their voice matters in this time: Don’t give away your creative power.

And while it feels like this time is without precedent, humanity has obviously been through this before. The Guardian took a look at what plague literature tells us about our future.

This week in bestsellers

Here are the top five NY Times bestsellers in a few key categories. (All links are affiliate links):

Adult print and e-book fiction:

1. Camino Winds by John Grisham
2. If It Bleeds by Stephen King
3. Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng
4. Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
5. Walk the Wire by David Baldacci

Adult print and e-book nonfiction:

1. Untamed by Glennon Doyle
2. The Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larson
3. Hidden Valley Road by Robert Kolker
4. Educated by Tara Westover
5. The Great Influenza by John M. Barry

Young adult hardcover:

1. One of Us is Lying by Karen M. McManus
2. Chain of Gold by Cassandra Clare
3. Five Feet Apart by Rachael Lippincott with Mikki Daughtry and Tobias Iaconis
4. The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
5. The Children of Virtue and Vengeance by Tomi Adeyemi

Middle grade hardcover:

1. The Complete Cookbook for Young Chefs by America’s Test Kitchen Kids
2. Wonder by R.J Palacio
3. The Complete Baking Book for Young Chefs by America’s Test Kitchen Kids
4. Diary of an Awesome Friendly Kid by Jeff Kinney
5. Ali Cross by James Patterson

This week on the blog

Don’t forget that you can nominate your first page and query for a free critique on the blog:

• Nominate Your First Page for a Critique on the Blog
• Nominate Your Query for a Critique on the Blog

In case you missed them, here are this week’s posts:

• Weave exposition naturally into the story
• Give your protagonist a mini-quest before the main plot kicks off
• Be careful starting a novel with dialogue (page critique)

And keep up with the discussion in all the places!

• Follow me on Twitter
• Follow my page on Facebook
• Join the Facebook Group
• Check out the Bransforums

Comment! of! the! week! goes to Ken Hughes (again!) for some follow-up thoughts on weaving exposition into the story:

You mentioned “how unicorns were invented.” A Ready Player One approach would be to explain them only when the character hears “we have to deal with unicorns next,” or even only when they see one. But Harry Potter is famous for making its decidedly whimsical world flow better by making a thing come up separately first. Harry, Ron, and Hermione would have a scene that touched on the history of unicorn-making, and it might be just one clue as they’re trying to solve the next puzzle ahead — or it might be a “random” class, that interests us in itself because it continues whatever interpersonal conflict they’ve got at the moment, and because we know Snape or Malfoy will cause trouble in the middle of it. The whole scene would be there so we’re ready for unicorns later, but at the time it’s just the Next Fun Thing.

Who’s going to knock Ken off his perch for next week?

And finally, a message from Allen Iverson:

Have a great weekend!

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Art: Prospect Park, Brooklyn. Photo by me. Follow me on Instagram!