Buzz Worthy News 28th May 2012

Another note on YA books rating systems Look, we already know that YA is highly erased when it comes to GBLT characters. This won't help. Censorship and ratings bodies across the world routinely consider any GBLT content, no matter how mild, to be obscene (or more obscene that straight equivalents). Just check how many netguards and the like block gay websites - no matter what their content. Or how often the words "gay" and "lesbian" are censored in safe searches. Just check the innumerable number of people who complain every time there is a kiss between 2 people of the same gender on television before watershed. A ratings system will hit GBLT books

I'm probably going to catch a lot of hate for this, but I would like to see some kind of rating on YA. Or at a minimum, start seeing YA broken into sub-categories. I have a 5th grader who reads on an 8th-9th grade level. While most of her friends are picking up middlegrade, Monk is going for YA now. Some YA does have some pretty "grown up" activities going on. It would be nice if everyone upset about this topic would not just assume that if they are reading YA they are 16+. My girl is only 11. It is so hard finding age appropriate reading material for her that is ALSO on her reading level. Something like a ratings system or sub-genres would help me - the parent - in finding appropriate stuff for her to read. Me wanting this has nothing to do with trying to control a YA Authors freedom of speech, or "judge" or anything like that. I would just like someway to know, as a parent, if a book is appropriate without having to sit down and read the thing myself first. ETA: I do read some YA, don't think I am saying I shouldn't have to read YA... but my DD and myself are NOT into the same type books and I would like to not have to read "her kind" to see if its appropriate. haha...

A ratings system for books? That's just ridiculous. Also redundant. Bookshops and libraries pretty much already tell parents what's age-appropriate and what's not by splitting up the children/teen book sections by age band. Mind you peoople saying parents should vet every book their kid reads are being just as ridiculous (and I realise no one here is saying that but I've seen it said in plenty of other places and it pisses me off just as much as the 'books should be rated' nonsense). No way could my mother have found the time to keep up with either my big sister or my reading habits, let alone both of ours together. And we wouldn't have wanted her to, especially once we hit 'YA' age-range; it would have been creepy and controlling.

I'm falling all over myself -- you guys rock as usual. The YA rating thing is just two steps towards total stupidity. Only holding them back because they at least have some kind of good intentions no matter how misguided it is. Well I hope their intentions go towards protecting those "innocent" teens and not just about more restrictions and censorship. I'm clapping all over the place about the X-Men wedding - how fun is that? But, they have always been cool with the social issues, I still can't figure out why this is a big deal...but that is just me. Then the video of the Newspaper that plagiarized was awesome. Maybe everyone at BEA should follow a certain Scandalous blogger around and ask her for a real apology. But, I think she might have nailed her coffin with this badly implemented plagiarism week. Talk about two steps from total stupidity. I think if she would have just kept a low-profile for a few months she might have rebounded, this again, was a testament of how NOT to handle your blog after being accused of plagiarism. And why people have PR people and don't listen to dumb ideas that their "friends" come up with. *sigh* The LKH thing is just ridiculous. I stopped following her on twitter after this fiasco. Mental. And she should get a PR person also, at least she can afford one. Thank you so much for the shout-out too...the chick hasn't entered my latest giveaways, that makes me suspect she did see the post. We'll have to see. XOX)

Guys, guys! I just chose winners for one of my giveaways, and I've clearly made it to the big times, because I found that IP too! She didn't win anyway, but I know her name now, so she won't be winning anything unless she changes her cheating ways. LOL.

So much fun stuff here! I was watching all the LKH drama unfold and all I could was "She's at it again!" and then laugh because as loopy as she is, she provides quite a bit of entertainment. I cannot believe that someone's actually defending Cassandra Clare. I write fanfiction, and when writing it, you acknowledge and understand that the characters and worlds you're working with aren't your own. That is not comparable to copy and pasting huge chunks of other people's prose and attempting to pass it off as your own dialogue and way of using language. I can't believe that they're trying to paint her in a sympathetic light on that issue. And yeah, the YA ratings thing? Parents, if you are that concerned, read the damn books with your kids. It's what my parents did, and trust me, it is actually a worthwhile to spend time. The parents who seem to want ratings for the YA books seem to want to enforce rules without actually involving themselves in what their kids are reading. It sounds lazy to me.

In Regards to Give­away cheater post: Thank you so much for this post. Erin and I are new bloggers so this was very educational to us, as we just ended our very first giveaway on our site. It's great to keep in touch with the blogger community for this reason; to be exposed to certain things that as a new blogger, we may not have encountered and figured out yet. We will definitely take the advice and check those IPs going forward to ensure that we do our best to have a fair giveaway!! THANK YOU Lily & Erin Bookluvrs Haven

LOL. Your gifs always make my morning. That is fantastic. Wow. That person had SO MANY ENTRIES. I would have been SO TEMPTED to call them out, but definitely best that you didn't. So much scandal up in the book world. It's cray-cray. Also, I'm still gobsmacked by Kristi's event. It makes no damn sense.

Seriously, there is so much here to comment on that my brain stopped working! Okay, it could be because it's almost midnight and I am up way too late when I should be getting sleep before work tomorrow... but I can't just go to bed without ranting about a rating system for YA books! What the hell, America? I get it, kids have fragile minds that too often leads to bad decision making. It's called puberty, and we've all been there. But putting rating on books just makes helicopter parents and their need to protect their precious offspring from the reality that is life all that much easier. Who would decide the ratings? Tipper Gore? Just set the YA book down, and step away or I swear I'll send Fifty Shades of Grey to every kid in America. And the Story Siren, sigh. Still missing the damn point. But whatever, I didn't follow her before and I'm sure she's not suffering from lack of sycophants. I will say that I wouldn't have known about the Cassandra Clare plagerism if it weren't for TSS, and I just don't know what to do with that info. I can't unread the books I've read (the first 3 Immortal Instruments), and while I always meant to continue with the series, now I don't know. As for the Anita Blake series, I used to read it but I am a bit prudish and I didn't like the character having multiple partners, that's just not a turn on for me. I know, I promised to send out copies of Fifty Shades of Grey, but I guess I'm okay with spanking and bondage as long as it's monogamous. That said, I fully support LKH writing about orgies with supernatural creatures and all the readers out there who want to read about it. Maybe I'll send out A Lick of Frost to the every uptight douchebag that tries to get a YA rating system in place. Because how much longer after that would it be before we see rating systems on all books, and then we'll have our reading habits followed by the government and they'll decide I reached my Smut Quota and force me to read War and Peace. I'm rambling, so off to bed!

Regarding the rating system for YA, that's . . . ridiculous. I think anything related to book censorship is preposterous, but this is particularly laughable because they wish to rate them by curse words. As if curse words make something dark, or dirty, or unreadable. I could write a happy, pleasant children's book where "fuck" was every other word. I could write a dark, deeply disturbing novel without the use of one swear word. Curse words don't inherently make a novel "mature," or "dirty." How could you rate novels based off of something as silly as that? As for the scandals, the Story Siren thing . . . bothers me, as it does many people. I don't think it would have bothered me nearly so much if a few things were different: if her explanation had gone up BEFORE the Sarah Cross post; if she would actually admit, in simple words, that what she did was intentional and wrong; and if she would legitimately apologize to those she plagiarized from. Since none of that has happened, I think it's troubling and insensitive. And finally, the giveaway cheater . . . bothers me. As you mentioned, we do these giveaways as a thank you, a kindness to our readers. Oftentimes, bloggers put their own money into it. While I understand how badly you may want to win a certain prize, gaming the system is just a huge insult to those who made this giveaway in the first place. I'll be sure to look for that IP in the future.

I would not want a ratings system on YA books. Like, at all. That's actually one of the things I love most about books - that there aren't any rating or restrictions, because the fact of the matter is, if the people doing the ratings system are biased, teenagers'll end up with a very skewed view of what's right and what's wrong. Ever seen the film "This Film Is Not Yet Rated"? Part of the reason American society is so tolerant of violence and yet disgusted by female sexuality is because the persnickety folks at the MPAA give PG13 ratings to bullet-riddled action films but threaten to slap a film with an NC17 rating because a female character's orgasm "went on too long." There cannot be a rating system because a ratings system cannot be objective, because people cannot be objective. As for giveaway cheaters - yikes. Although I don't think I've reached that level yet. I hosted my first giveaway on my blog and got only one entry. Not a lot of cheating there. :S

Several random thoughts: #50ShadesofShit study- INTERESTING. I love data studies like this. No joke. Plagarizing Revenge- AWESOME. Cheating at Giveaways- DISHEARTENING. We made sure it wasn't the Plagarism Siren, right? (Just kidding...although..I'm not. lol). LKH- Well, I've read her books- I quit Anita Blake after #5, I think(it's been a wild, my memory's rusty) her comparing book critics to racists? WHAT? The very word critic(it really does NOT sound like a welcoming word to begin with. I mean, really- say it...CRITIC..it truly does not bring about a vision of wine and roses.) means you're going to hear good or bad. If she can't take the heat, take that menu of books to someone else's kitchen. I thought writers had a natural born capacity to weather those stormy seas....the critics, like book bloggers, booksellers, etc...have a job to do. Such as Ms. Hamilton has her job to do writing these books, we also have a job to sell them, critique them, or love them up if they're awesome. The language in that post sounds a bit selfish, to me. Again, I could well be insane. Thanks for the great update, Kat.

ratings on YA books I don't think so and totally subjective to the reader. The story siren week ..UGH I thought the big ironic things that she was the candor team leader and wasn't being honest when the crap hit the fan. Cheaters never win and I do moderate the links through rafflecopter to make sure that its not the same person.

I am a shameless Better World Books promoter. I LOVE them so much! Free shipping, cheap books, AND donations to charity? Does it get any better? Lol.

I live in South Carolina and I try to warn people against 50 Shades of Grey. I warn them it is about Sadomasochism and of the gory details. I don't know how seriously people take me cause most are fans of Nora Roberts/Danielle Steele.

I don't believe in a formal rating system, but I don't mind the idea of content advisories on YA books. Not because of parental control or not allowing teens to read certain books, but because tonally and content-wise, there is a wide range between the stories that are geared to younger readers to those for older ones. And sometimes, as a YA reader, I'd like to specifically read something geared to older teens and this way, I'd know what that is. I can't always tell from the book description. So, you know, for selfish and lazy reasons... :)

I know close to nothing about computers so I will not be surprised if I'm wrong but what if two different people living in the same household share a computer and they both enter the giveaway. Wouldn't that show up as two different email, twitter, facebook, accounts from the same IP address? Don't get me wrong, I'm very glad that you and other bloggers like you are working hard to make sure that your giveaways are fair and disqualifying any cheaters you see. Is there a way to tell the difference? I know you guys know what you're doing, this is more out of curiosity than anything else.

Oh, LKH. Never change. You are a pretty terrible person sometimes, but you're so unintentionally funny. I haven't been able to do a giveaway in a while because money eludes me, but I definitely won't be using Google Docs for my next one. Cheaters suck! There is a woman at the local bookstore who sells Fifty Shades of Grey to couple by saying, "I read this series about nine months ago and look where I am now." She then rubs her eight-and-a-half months pregnant belly. Booksellers like her may by why Floridians both buy the book a lot and rate it highly. Ashleigh recently posted..Review: The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny Han

Ratings systems for YA books? yeah that'll work - aside from anything else, it'd have to apply to ALL books not just 1 genre - or people will just change the genre label (assuming YA is even a genre rather than a category). And I've never read a YA book that was oh-so-shocking for teenagers - it's paternalism (notice most YA books are aimed at girls, after all)and has a ridiculous idea about the "innocence" of children Wait the story siren plagiarist week is including DEFENCE of plagiarism and plagiarists? Ugh, apology, you're DOING IT WRONG! Ah Laurell K Hamilton, competing with Ann Rice for author most likely to beat her critics with a sock full of nails. I love this constant assumption that anyone who dislikes how Anita Blake ended up is prudish. Y'know, except for the vast weretiger orgies, Anita Blake isn't that edgy. It's just sex. lots and lots and lots of sex. Pretty boring sex as well. It's not prudishness, we're not shocked and appalled by all the sex - it's boredom. Because when a book just has sex scene after sex scene with little plot linking them it's generally considered dull And people probably wouldn't complain if the EARLY BOOKS WEREN'T SO GOOD. People aren't upset because it's a series of poorly written porn - they're upset because a story with a great protagonists, interesting side characters, a fascinating world and compelling stories was turned into a series of poorly written porn. People are angry because you are BETTER than this, Ms. Hamilton. But comparing book critics disliking your work to racists and homophobes? No. Really, no, that's out of line.

Thanks for leaving the info about cheating on rafflecopter, I never used to check the entries properly. But now since both Rachel and Stephanie have come across it I will definitely be checking out my entries more carefully now! Thanks again for this brilliant post! It's an awesome way to start off my Mondays! :)

Amazing post, girls!!! I can't wrap my head around the idea that people actually want to put ratings on YA books. That's ridiculous. Seriously, if you want to know exactly what your kids are reading, read it WITH them. You read stories to them when they are little, so why stop? Get involved in what they're reading, so you can make sure they understand what they're reading. If they have questions, at least you'd know what you're talking about. Seriously, I'm disgusted by people who cheat during giveaways. There are so many generous and lovely bloggers out there who pay out of there own pocket to give books and joy to others. Why do some feel the need to cheat and lie? I just don't get it. Despicable!!!