BORDERLINE: RAVES AND MEOWS!

Okay, I've been very good about writing about fun travel adventures. But my new book BORDERLINE comes out March 9, so please forgive the forthcoming writer's ego. (Hey, it's my birthday today, too, so gimme a break, eh? I am too damn old for complaints, okay? :))

Anyway, BORDERLINE HAS HAD FANTASTIC REVIEWS AND BLURBS. I've posted them below -- BUT -- between each one is a picture of my kitty-kids. So have a good scroll. And please know that Daniel and I have bought our tickets to Vietnam/Cambodia for a trip the end of this month -- and I'll be posting on writing in Cuba before then -- so please bear with me cuz there'll be lots of travel soon. :)


INTERNATIONAL PRAISE FOR BORDERLINE

“A powerful story and excellent resource for teaching tolerance, with a message that extends well beyond the timely subject matter.”
-PUBLISHERS WEEKLY, STARRED REVIEW



“A tautly paced thriller with well-crafted characters and realistic dialogue. It is the plausibility of the plotline that makes it, ultimately, so disturbing... A great fast-paced read... also notable for its characterization of a strong male Muslim who is true to his faith and struggles to do the right thing throughout.”
-SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL, STARRED REVIEW



“Tense and compelling... Stratton’s grasp of daily Muslim life breaths life into this story... A fast, exciting read with weighty underpinnings.”
-BOOKLIST



“Explodes with political relevance... The curtailing of civil rights, the explicit targeting of young Muslim men and the manic, dangerously unchecked power of U.S. and Canadian anti-terrorism forces are deathly realistic dangers in this vitally educational page-turner.
-KIRKUS REVIEWS



"Intelligent... Entertaining... The novel examines with genuine care what it must feel like to be a teenage boy living in an environment in which people of Middle Eastern heritage are suspect by virtue of their looks and religion... Family loyalty, justice, and the shifting nature of truth are all examined in Borderline, and Stratton leads us through Sami's tribulations with a graceful hand that makes this thought-provoking novel a pleasure to read." -QUILL AND QUIRE, FEATURED REVIEW

"Absorbing. An eye-opening mystery and adventure story."
-RICHIE'S PICKS



"A compelling coming-of age-novel about acceptance, The Other, and fear, wrapped in a fascinating adventure/thriller/mystery. All these elements are shaken mightily in Allan's Stratton's latest -- as are we."
-GARY SCHMIDT, New York Times bestselling and Printz and Newbery Honor Author





"Allan Stratton spins these otherwise ordinary lives on a dime and a secret. Borderline is as astonishing as it is all quite possible."
-RITA WILLIAMS-GARCIA, National Book Award finalist for Jumped



"Smart, meticulously plotted, and thrilling. The scariest thing about Borderline is how utterly believable it is."
TIM WYNNE-JONES, author of The Uninvited


"I'm Pooped!"

MY NEW BOOK: BORDERLINE

Well... Last post I asked what people would like to read about -- and I got emails and comments at livejournal and elsewhere that a number of you want to hear about my new book -- BORDERLINE. So okay. For the next week that's what you'll get, because, hey BORDERLINE is coming out March 9, so if I don't talk it up a little now what's the point of having a blog, eh? :)



(Above: Me talking stuff up.)

First though -- and very connected to BORDERLINE: Holly Cupala, one of the readergirlz divas is posting an interview with me -- and also doing a BORDERLINE book giveaway -- on March 11 at her site www.hollycupala.com . You should visit her site anyway, because, like the readergirlz site, it's really good. Anyway, today I'll be giving a sneak preview of the interview, by letting you know what I told Holly when asked what the book's about and why I wrote it. I'll also be tossing in a few pictures of me working because, hey, just hearing writers puff their books is a bit, well... pushy? One kind of wants a writer's ego to be broken up with, uh, their ego, eh?



STRATTON, HEY -- I hear you say -- GET ON WITH IT! WHAT'S BORDERLINE ABOUT?

Okay. BORDERLINE is a coming-of-age mystery/suspense/thriller. The hero is Sami 'Sammy' Sabiri, a funny, gutsy, Muslim American. Sami has problems with a bully at the private boy’s school where he’s been stuck by his over-controlling father. But these problems are nothing compared to what happens when the FBI and Homeland Security swoop in and arrest his dad, claiming he’s part of an international terrorist plot. Aided by his best friends Andy and Marty, Sami risks everything in his struggle to discover the truth about his dad and save his family. It’s a roller coaster ride in which nothing is ever what it seems.

AND WHAT MADE YOU WANT TO WRITE IT?

Three things, probably.
My mom left my dad when I was a baby. Growing up, I was soon aware that the father I knew was very different from the father my half-brother knew, and even more different than the father my half-sister knew. As a teenager I thought, “If I can’t really know my dad, how can I know anyone? How can anyone know anyone?”
Also, one day when I was eight I was hiding under the picnic table and eavesdropping on a conversation Dad was having with my grandparents about capital punishment. I remember breaking into a cold sweat, overcome with the certainty that one day I’d be executed for a crime I didn't commit. The idea that life isn’t fair has stuck with me ever since -- and that horrible sense of how helpless we are in the face of rumor, gossip and fear.
Finally, I was a gay kid in the 1950s and 60s. Unable to be open even to the parents and friends who loved me, I instinctively learned to hide who I was in order to survive. I learned about the borders that keep us from each other, about the lines that separate and shape us. And I learned that ‘The Truth’ and ‘The Whole Truth’ are very different things.
In fact, come to think of it, these three experiences connect to the thematic core in all my work: my obsession with secrets, loyalty, betrayal, justice, and the absolute importance of living with truth.



Next post, if you can bear it -- some GREAT REVIEWS!!! Broken up with very cute pictures of my kitties. :)

A BLOG VIRGIN NO MORE!

I swore I’d never do this. That I’d stay pure. That I’d save my writing for my books.
“Everyone’s doing it,” my editor coaxed.
“But once I’ve done it, I’ll have to keep on doing it,” I said. “My friends who blog do it two or three times a week. They’ve addicts.”
“But it’s fun,” my web mistress winked. “You’ll like it,” (Her name is Christine, but I call her Madame and she calls me Sir, and she helps me with everything to do with technology, because I’m basically terrified of anything with strange initials like URL or pdf or RSS. I’m also a very old friend of her sister, Louise, who goes by the name of Blinky.)
Anyway, Madame me set up with this blog pad, and she’s decorated it all nice for visitors and all, so what can I say? I’ve been seduced! I’m a blog virgin no more!
AND I WANT ALL THE WORLD TO KNOW!
So tell your friends! Tell your relatives. Tell complete strangers, like the people at the checkout counter, or half the people on your Facebook page. (That is if your Facebook page is anything like mine.)

“Great,” I hear you say. “Just what the world needs. Another writer with a blog. So tell us, oh Great One, who thinks he’s so important people should actually spend time reading his Blah Blah Blah -- what’ll we get if we come to your blog?”
Well, okay, yeah, I’m a writer, so some days I’ll probably blog about stuff that comes up in my work. For instance, my novel Chanda’s Secrets is being made into a movie in South Africa and I’ll be flying over on Friday to be on set. It’s a German/South African co-production set to open in Berlin in the fall. The shoot is in Elandsdoorn, a town of about thirty-thousand people, a two-hour drive north-east of Johannesburg. It’s the first time I’ve had a book turned into a film, and the chance to be back in Africa is wonderful, especially with all the local actors and the rich cultural mix. So, yeah, I’ll probably blog about that.

And in January, I’ll be on a private writer’s retreat in Cayo Largo, Cuba, for a couple of weeks, working on the first draft of the first book in a new series for HarperCollins: The Grave Robber’s Apprentice. I write for a couple of hours before breakfast, then hit the beach, swim out half a mile to the reef and relax with the corals and barracuda, then write a few hours before and after supper. It’s kinda perfect, and there’s always lots of interesting and/or weird tourist encounters, so hey, that should be good for a few entries.

Then in February my coming-of-age/ mystery/ thriller Borderline comes out in Canada (March in the U.S.) from Harper, so I’m sure there’ll be some self-indulgent commentary on that front. And stuff about researching with a guy from the ACLU, and a hostage from the Iran hostage taking in the 1970s, yadda yadda.

And in March, I’m taking a break with Daniel to either Vietnam and Cambodia or northern India for two weeks. (We haven’t decided. If you’ve been to either, please let us know what you think we should pick.)

April is my The Grave Robber’s Apprentice deadline, which should be fun if you like reading about nervous breakdowns. (Blogging is also the perfect writer’s tool at deadline time, actually, because it gives writers another reason not to be doing what they should be doing -- like, uh, writing the damn book -- which only adds to the incredible pressure that is so essential to getting things done.)

Then in May, Daniel and I are off to Italy -- Venice and Florence, mostly -- to do research (ha ha) for The G.R.A. sequel, The Necromancer’s Revenge. And face it, if I can’t write something interesting about hopping onto gondolas and seeing reliquaries with the severed limbs and organs of medieval saints, then I really ought to give up writing and sell tacks.

In between the above, I’ll write about things that pop into my head -- or if I’m blocked, maybe toss in a short series on recent trips, like my time this fall in Argentina, doing hairpin turns in the Andes, skinny dipping at Iguazu Falls, and checking out the crypts in Buenos Aires.

Oh, and I’ll always try to include a picture -- except for stuff like skinny dipping and such: The world has enough horror.
More important, I’ll be answering any questions you may have about writing or whatever. So come on, feel free -- what have you always wanted to ask a writer? Or this writer? Don’t be shy. Just ask. I’m an open book -- even if some of my pages are torn.

UPDATE: The film adaptation of CHANDA'S SECRETS is called LIFE, ABOVE ALL and will premiere as an Official Selection at the 2010 Cannes International Film Festival.