This is M. Apostolina, the author of "Hazing Meri Sugarman." In response to your comments and the response, Booklist may not have liked elements of my novel, but Publishers Weekly and TeensRead and many others were very favorable.
I'm not going to argue with your review - some people like fun, over-the-top comedy, some don't - except for one thing. Why on earth does the use of my initial M. bug you so much? I'm not hiding my gender. Far from it. My picture is there for all to see at SimonSays. I chose a first initial because, frankly, I've always been perhaps over aware about how loooooooooooong my name is. Michael Andrew Apostolina or M. Apostolina. The later seems better (to me). Why does nobody make a stink about J.K. Rowling? or k.d. land? Men aren't allowed to use initials?? That seems awfully silly and punitive.
As for me milking $$ by doing a series, ha, I wish (you must have an inflated sense of what YA authors are paid). I had never in my life read a YA novel before writing "Hazing Meri Sugarman." I designed my story as a trilogy from the start, and assumed my audience would be primarily women and college students out for a nostalgic broad laugh. It was the publisher who decided to slot it in YA, something I'm not unhappy with (though I also wish there was an adult edition, because older women seem to get a kick out of if they happen to read it) (I get just as many letters from the moms of teen girls who bought the book as I do from teen girls). So...nothing diabolical going on here.
Again, everyone's entitled to their opinion - however much I disagree with it ;) - but I hope my responses above have cleared up some of the questions and concerns you had.
MICHAEL Apostolina! info@mapostolina.com
Hi Michael,
I actually don't think I read any reviews of the book before I bought it. I knew from the cover and subject matter that your book would be hugely popular with the teens in my city, so I bought multiple copies of it for our library system before any reviews were available. I then read it because I like chick lit and I had the reaction to it that I posted. Afterwards, I did read the review at TeenReads that you refer to and it was fairly positive, though she took issue with your portrayal of sorority life. I don't claim to be a professional reviewer, but that's the joy of the Internet, any fool with an opinion can have a blog.
I stand by the first initial thing, it did bug me. :-) It's not a big deal and it's just my opinion, but here's why - it's pretty hard to write about someone and not use pronouns. I didn't look you up at SimonSays because I wasn't doing an exhaustive study, I was just momentarily curious. But on the Meri site listed on the book (which of course I now can't find), in the blurb at the back of the book, and a couple of other places I Googled, you're referred to only as M, over and over again. "M has done this, M has been involved in that..." Come on, isn't that awkwardly written and a bit odd? Try this one:
Jane is a librarian. Jane works in the children's department at the library in Jane's town. Jane enjoys origami and German poetry. Jane is planning to travel to Germany for Jane's upcoming 40th birthday.
Not to use one "she" the entire time? It's weird. And when it was combined with the initial-only thing, it just seemed gimmicky to me, like there was some reason we couldn't know your gender. Honestly, all there had to be was a couple of "he's" in there and I wouldn't have cared. If I'd read the same blurb with "JK lives here and JK does that" in the first Harry book, I'd have been annoyed, too. I don't know why it was written that way (and perhaps you had nothing at all to do with it), but it caught my attention and I found it odd, that's all.
The series thing wasn't meant specifically for you, although I confess I just wanted Meri dead or in jail. I like closure. :-) I know writing is a tough business and I respect authors and think they should be paid well for their work. I certainly couldn't write a book. I'm just finding it a bit sad these days when I read a really special book (from picture books up) and then discover that it's going to be rehashed again in 6 months. I've adored some series in my life and have been known to eagerly await sequels, but it just seems like sequels and spinoffs are par for the course now (in movies and TV, as well) rather than waiting to see whether the audience response will warrant one. I'm probably old fashioned and a snob, but it just seems so very commercialized now. I can only think of a handful of teen and children's novels I've read in the past few years that don't have at least one sequel. I'd just like there to still be some stellar stand-alone books out there, too. I also find that many series outstay their welcome - the quality of the writing goes down and you lose some of the joy that the original brought you. Or something that would make a great trilogy ends up being a bloated 10-volume series. To use the JK Rowling example again, I'm really glad there's only one more Harry book - as enjoyable as it's been, I've had enough of the boy wizard and I get the impression that she has, too. I've started reading quite a few YA series over the years and by about the 3rd or 4th one, I just didn't care any more.
Knowing that you intended Meri for an older audience makes the book make a bit more sense to me. It's too bad they wouldn't let you go with that. Not that teens wouldn't have still read and enjoyed it, but the adult nostalgia angle fits.
So, there it is. Your book wasn't exactly my cup of tea, I have every right to say so, I made sure I mentioned that there were a couple of really funny parts, I have a need for people to use pronouns and, as I expected, it's doing a brisk business in my library system and I'll surely be buying the next two for my patrons.