Featuring two best friends and one wild day out, Extreme Kissing is a story about friendship, love, risks and secrets. It's set on a day the girls call "Extreme Saturday" - the day the clocks go forward and British Summer Time begins - which just happens to be this Saturday, 28th March.

In honour of this, Luisa Plaja will be signing copies of Extreme Kissing at the Torbay Bookshop, Devon on Extreme Saturday 28th March from 10.30am.

But if that's too far for you to travel, then please enter our giveaway!

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Chicklish is delighted to interview Vanessa Curtis, author of Zelah Green, Queen of Clean (reviewed by us here).

Hi Vanessa. Please could you tell our readers a little about Zelah, the character? And what inspired her unusual first name?
Zelah's name came from a signpost as I was driving down to Cornwall. I'd seen it many times before, but on this occasion I decided to tuck it away in my head and use it for the name of a character later on. Zelah is as unusual as her name, because she has Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, a condition that has pretty much taken over her entire life. She's also a very feisty and self-effacing sort of character with a dry sense of humour.

Your book touches on OCD, depression and anorexia, among other disorders, in teenagers. What inspired you to write about this topic, and can you tell us anything about the research you did for your characters?

I watched a documentary some years ago about adults who suffered from OCD and it really affected me. There was a woman who was frightened of touching anything glittery and another who could only touch other people if she wrapped her hand in a tissue first. When I came to write Zelah I still had these images in my head, so I decided to explore what it might be like for a far younger person to do battle with the condition. I researched Zelah in various ways - by reading personal stories on internet forums and also by reading a memoir written by a sixteen-year-old boy who suffers from OCD and had similar rituals to Zelah - touching things a certain number of times, checking obsessively and tapping certain objects in a certain way. I also researched some of the other conditions explored in the book (anorexia, self-harm etc) in similar ways, but I think it's important to say that this isn't a novel about issues, it's a book about an unusual character (Zelah) and how she finds her way in life.

Do you have a website where readers can contact you?
My website address is vanessacurtis.com ...

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Queen of Teen beats the Best of the Booker!

News just in... the Queen of Teen award has registered more votes than the Best of Booker poll!

Just to remind you, the authors running for the award are Meg Cabot, Cathy Cassidy, Lisa Clark, Grace Dent, Cathy Hopkins, Sarra Manning, Karen McCombie, Joanna Nadin, Louise Rennison, and Jacqueline Wilson. The organisers reveal that the competition is fierce, with no clear leader at this stage.

Vote now on the Queen of teen site. Voting closes on 28th September, and the crowning ceremony will be held on the 29th, and I will be there! Hurray! I'll report back on the shiny tiara action.

In the meantime, if anyone has questions they would like us to put to the shorlisted authors, please let us know in the comments, or email us.

And now... announcing the Chicklish Queen of Teen spotlight posts! We will be running a series of posts focusing on each shortlisted author in turn. The first one is below...

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Chicklish interviews Kate Cann, author of many excellent novels for teenagers.

Your books feel very current and contemporary. How do you stay so in touch with teenage culture and slang?

I love this question because it means I’ve Brought it Off! In actual fact my books aren’t really current in terms of culture and slang. I deliberately avoid all that because it shifts and changes so quickly. What your question suggests to me is that my books feel current because the things I write about – loathing and longing, love and hate, jealousy, friendship – never go out of date.

How do you decide which topics you want to write about in your books? Do you come up with characters or situations first?

A bit of both. Things will mesh in my brain. I’ll be thinking about a theme – and then I’ll meet someone at a party – and it will all evolve. Also - I do a lot of eavesdropping on public transport. That’s great for characters and ideas.

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Breaking news for Surrey residents! The long-awaited adaptation of Louise Rennison's novel, Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging (well, we've been long-awaiting it, that's for sure!), directed by the fabulous Gurinder Chadha and due for general release in the UK from 25th July 2008, is having an extra-special screening.

See it first on Sunday 13 July 2008 at 2pm at the Empire Cinema, St Nicholas Centre, St Nicholas Way, Sutton SM1 1AZ. Sutton station is only 7 minutes' walk away. Tickets are £10 and all proceeds are in aid of The Mayor of Sutton's charity: The Royal Marsden Hospital, Children's and Adolescent Unit, Sutton.

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Teen Book Review is running a series of guest posts by YA writers.

So far, you can read some thoughts by Melissa Walker, author of Violet on the Runway and Violet by Design, as she blogs about using her real life hometown in fiction.

And Luisa Plaja, author of Split by a Kiss, blogs about pants, trousers and knickers - well, teen fiction titles that feature them.


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We have two copies of Tommy Sullivan is a Freak by Meg Cabot to give away!

For a chance of winning one, please email us at chicklish @ googlemail.com (take out the spaces) with TOMMY in the subject line. We'll contact you in two weeks' time (23rd April 2008) if you're a winner.

"Katie Ellison can't believe it. Just when she's having the most outstanding summer of her life, Tommy Sullivan arrives back in town. Why's that so bad? Because just about everyone hates Tommy for what he did four years ago. And Katie's boyfriend, Seth, has the biggest reason of all to hate him. Even being seen around Tom Sullivan would make Katie a social pariah - so falling in love with him would be the like the kiss of death."

You can read an extract here.

This giveaway is only open to UK residents, but don't worry if you live in another country. There will definitely be more giveaways open to all! We're aiming for a different prize book every two weeks now on Chicklish.

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Alexandra interviews Leila Rasheed, author of Chips, Beans and Limousines: The Fantastic Diary of Bathsheba Clarice de Trop, reviewed by us here

Hello! How did you get the inspiration for Chips, Beans and Limousines?

Well, lots of different places, but I think sometimes the world just irritates me and one thing that annoys me is that we live in a culture where getting the next expensive gadget or glamorous jeans or whatever is supposed to make you happy. And, hey, guess what, it doesn't. So I wanted to start from the point of view of a girl who has everything, and is not happy at all, because she lacks some very simple things that everyone takes for granted - like a dad, friends, someone to love her and pay attention to her. I wrote it really quickly, and I think perhaps in reaction to a phase of feeling low in self-confidence (probably I'd been rejected by an agent or something!). I just wanted to imagine someone who was totally self-confident, to the point of arrogance, and just was convinced she was the best and didn't need anyone else's approval. That's where the voice came from, and the character - who in fact turns out to be far more vulnerable underneath - developed from the voice.

Do you sympathize with Bathsheba?

Yes, definitely. My mum was always working when I was a teenager, I mean, she had to, but sometimes one would hardly see her for days. And my dad was working abroad. So in that sense I do know how she feels.

How did you come up with the name: Bathsheba Clarice de Trop? It comes across as perfect!

Do you know, it almost had to be changed in the editing process - but thankfully it wasn't in the end! I love it, I think it works perfectly. I was just looking for the most over the top name I could think of, I probably looked in the Bible or something for a melodramatic name and found Bathsheba, then I wanted something to keep the rhythm so that's where Clarice fitted in, and then de Trop finished it off nicely, and also means "over the top". I think the rhythms of names are really important - look at Roald Dahl's character names, they all sound so good! Charlie Bucket and Harry Potter have the same rhythm and bounce - I think that's significant.

Have you always been a writer?

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Makeeda, a Londoner of Ghanaian descent, has great friends and a fun life, even if her parents are a bit strict and she's sometimes jealous of her cousin Tanisha. But when she meets and falls for fit DJ Nelson and Tanisha encourages her not to tell her parents, things begin to change for Makeeda.

I found this book a complete delight from start to finish. Makeeda is a sweet, lovable character (though she does make mistakes), and her actions were always completely believable. When she starts to get in touch with her roots, it provides lots of laughs as well as being fascinating. I loved her good friends, too, especially Bharti. Her little sister was priceless, and her not-so-good friends (Laura and Afua) were three-dimensional and in some ways not that bad, although you could completely see Makeeda's point of view about them. The best thing about this book for me was the description of everyday life and love in Northwest London. A brilliantly entertaining read.

And you can win your own copy if you enter our giveaway! Details here.

Chicklish


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