OCD, The Dude, and Me Blog Tour & Review

OCD, The Dude, and Me
Author: Lauren Roedy Vaughn
Published: March 21, 2013

 Seventeen-year-old Danielle Levine is your typical high school teen-ager - if you count havingOCD and ADHD as typical.  

Danielle's "special" conditions lead her to a school for students with learning disabilities, and, even here, she struggles to fit in.

How Danielle navigates her status as a "learning-challenged" teen pariah is told, with equal parts pain and hilarity, in Lauren Roedy Vaughn's debut Young Adult novel, OCD, THE DUDE, AND ME, which Kirkus Review has hailed as a "must-read."

Told through a mélange of Danielle's class assignments, journal entries, emails, texts, and letters to the school psychiatrist, OCD, THE DUDE, AND ME chronicles Danielle's efforts to fit into a world that, to her, can be as alien as a distant planet. Yet, Danielle will be recognizable to her readers, with her body-image issues, her crush on an unattainable boy, and her feelings of insecurity over the rigid social code of high school life.

Just as things seemingly couldn't get worse for her, Danielle meets a new friend, Daniel, who turns her on to the Coen Brothers' classic cult film THE BIG LEBOWSKI and its indelible main character, the ever-cool, ever abiding Dude. Daniel and Danielle end up going to the prom together and to Lebowski Fest, an annual event celebrating the Dudeand his Buddha-like philosophy, which says that things will work out if you "abide."

Vaughn is especially equipped to write Danielle's story. She has been a special education teacher and a writer for nearly 20 years. She understands that each student with a learning challenge has a unique profile that requires specialized intervention strategies. Danielle benefits from the guidance of charismatic adults to learn how to socialize and accept herself. She is also able to leverage her affinities-reading and writing-in order to shift her perspective and grow.

Vaughn's students "live with the stigma" of being called "lazy" and "different," Vaughn explains. "It is my love for them, my understanding of their diversity that compelled me to write a fictionalized account of one of them and their world. I wanted them to see their value within the context of a story."

The major reason for the presence of THE BIG LEBOWSKI and theDude, Vaughn says, is that the Dude is "an iconic character who lived through a dramatic situation and kept abiding. He is a model for dealing with life's difficult situations. There are other 'dudes' in my story who also affect Danielle."

Vaughn herself says she is a "huge fan" of THE BIG LEBOWSKI. "When I was asking the story Gods to help me come up with what could help Danielle, that film popped into my mind. When Danielle witnesses the film, she realizes that life is unpredictable and often ridiculous ... abiding is a saner choice."

What critics are saying:

Publisher's Weekly:  Pick of the Week

Kirkus Review:  "A must-read." (Starred review)

Star Library Journal: "This one is sure to find an appreciative audience." (Starred review)

Seventeen magazine online:  "The book's fun format of traditional long-form, texts, letters, and emails make this book easy and fun to read."

OCD, The Dude, and Me

Publisher:  Dial Books, March  21, 2013

234 pages,  ISBN-13: 978-0803738430, Amazon Kindle edition, ISBN:  0803738439

Available at Amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com and book stores nationwide

About the Author: 

Lauren Roedy Vaughn is an award-winning educator who has spent nearly 20 years teaching English to high school students with language-based learning disabilities. She lives with her husband in Los Angeles.

You can visit her website at www.laurenroedyvaughn.com. 

My Review

I wasn't really sure what to expect when I started OCD, The Dude, and Me but I honestly wasn't expecting to like it as much as I did. Written as a series of Essay's, journal entries, emails and letters OCD, The Dude, and Me chronicles Danielle's life through out her senior year. Danielle doesn't see herself as other people see her. She sees a fat, messed up "freak". She often wonders if her parents are sorry they adopted her thinking that they couldn't have possibly bargained for a daughter with so many problems. 

During Danielle's senior life she grows by leaps and bounds. She finds love, the real kind. Makes surprising new friends. Realizes a talent that she wasn't aware of and finally starts healing from a tragedy in her past. 

In the beginning of reading OCD, The Dude, and Me I was having a bit of trouble connecting with Danielle. Once I started figuring her out a little I really got into this story and have already started recommending it to my daughters and will definitely be telling others I know to give this one a try as well. Reading this makes me want to watch The Big Lebowski again, read more Shakespeare and Rumi, and once again start a journal and fill my fridge with my favorite quotes. A wonderful Young Adult read!

One of my favorite saying from the book, though I actually have many. 

"Little things, little things, are much more important than big things. Big things hit you in the face with their bigness and obscure the little, more important things that really define a life and provide it with delicacy. 

I don't usually reread book but I can see myself reading this one again and again. 

Quickie Review: Blind Spot by Laura Ellen

Blind Spot
Author: Laura Ellen
Release Date: October 23, 2012
Genre: YA fiction, mystery, thriller
Published by: Harcourt Children's Books

Summary from Goodreads:
There’s none so blind as they that won’t see.

Seventeen-year-old Tricia Farni’s body floated to the surface of Alaska’s Birch River six months after the night she disappeared. The night Roz Hart had a fight with her. The night Roz can’t remember. Roz, who struggles with macular degeneration, is used to assembling fragments to make sense of the world around her. But this time it’s her memory that needs piecing together—to clear her name . . . to find a murderer.

This unflinchingly emotional novel is written in the powerful first-person voice of a legally blind teen who just wants to be like everyone else.

My Thoughts:

Roz's character is unlike any other that I have ever read. She wants to be "normal" so badly and is beyond angry that the school has decided to put her in a class of kids that she deems definitely not "normal". Little does she know that these kids have a lot more to offer than she ever thought.

The mystery surrounding Tricia's murder is full of plot twists right up until the moment that I had that unmistakable "ah ha" moment. 

An interesting, captivating YA mystery. Totally worth the read.

Blog Tour & Giveaway: Blind Spot by Laura Ellen

Welcome to the next stop on the Blind Spot blog tour. Thanks so much for hosting, Shari.

What? I am so thrilled to have you here on my blog! Thank you so much for including me in this tour.

Readers, I've got to tell you Blind Spot is a great book, and I will be posting my thoughts of it here on My Neurotic Book Affair tomorrow as soon as my life calms down and my routine is somewhat returned to normal.

In honor of Halloween, we are interviewing Blind Spot's main character, Roz today -- only these

aren't your typical interview questions! If you've been over to the Winter Haven Books blog site

today, you've seen the Halloween-themed questions they are asking authors (including me!) so

we thought we'd do something similar here. We even borrowed a few questions from Winter

Haven Books (with their permission, of course.)

First a little about the book:

In Blind Spot, Roswell ‘Roz’ Hart is a 16-year-old with a visual impairment who is desperate to

prove she is ‘normal’. But when her desperation leads to stupid choices, she finds herself in the

middle of a murder investigation. Roz must figure out what happened that fatal night – a night

she can’t remember – to find the truth, even if that truth means she was involved.

Well we know from the synopsis that Roz is 16 and has a visual impairment. Who else is she?

Let’s find out:

Roz, you have a strange collection of photos on your bedroom ceiling. Can you tell the

readers what they are?

My dad is an ufologist and travels all over the place investigating UFO sightings. He sends

me copies of the alleged sightings sometimes. I like the way my vision blends all those photos

together in a blurred black and grey mass on my ceiling. To me, they sort of look like a sky full of

stars.

Ufologist? Wow! So does that mean you believe aliens exist?

I don't know really. It’s more about the pursuit to find the truth, the proof one way or another for

me and I think for my dad too. But also keeping my mind open to the idea seems a lot less scary

than not believing. If I think there is no way they exist, and then one day they arrive to take over

the planet, I’ll be standing there dumbfounded and frozen, rather than ready to mobilize and kick

some alien butt.

Does that mean you believe in other strange things too, like ghosts and werewolves?

Ghosts, yes. My favorite shows are when ghost hunters go into haunted places to either find

proof or debunk the rumors. Werewolves, no - that whole shape-shifter thing makes for good

stories, but I know enough about anatomy to know it isn't possible to switch forms like that.

Doesn’t mean there isn’t some strange species of man-wolf out there we haven’t discovered yet

– I just don’t think there are people living among us by day and then shape-shifting at night. But

I do believe in the possibility of things like Big Foot or other creatures and species we just don’t

have proof exist yet. Look at the oceans, scientists are discovering tons of new species every day

that no one knew existed.

Ghost hunting, huh? Have you ever been? And if you were to go ghost hunting, which

would you rather investigate a graveyard or haunted mansion?

Oh, I've never been but would love to. Both would be fun, but if I had to choose, I’d say haunted

mansion. According to all the ghost hunting shows I've seen, ghosts who haunt houses have

unresolved issues, that's why they’re still there. As freaky as it would be, I think I’d have more

paranormal experience in a haunted house.

While we are talking freaky experiences, which would you rather hug: a zombie or

vampire?

I'd hug a zombie, Rob Zombie! :) Love him! But seriously, zombie for sure, as long as I had

something sharp in my hand.

Which of these is the scariest sound to you...owl hooting, wolf howling, or Psycho theme

music?

I'd have to say the wind blowing. I live in Alaska and in the winter there's nothing scarier than

standing alone in the dark, snow-covered woods and hearing the wind whispering and rattling

through the sharp, naked branches.

Which scares you more...scary book or scary movie?

The print is too small in books and I hate listening to them on tape, so I prefer movies anyway -

- but I'd still say movies. Sounds can be so creepy, and I love the way movies up the scare-factor

with the music too. Eew, once I was watching this old movie called The Fly and the guy turning

into a fly was puking on his food – I shut my eyes to take the visual part away, but that sound.

Yuck! Way worse than the visual!

Sounds pretty gross! How about clowns...hug'em, kick'em, or run away?

Oh definitely not hug. Clowns are SO creepy. I mean they wear masks – painted on masks –

hello, only bad guys wear masks! I'd say kick'em though, right in the you-know-what and then

run away!

(my son is super creeped out by clowns too)

What’s your costume going to be this year?

I don't really like dressing up. My mom does - she lives for Halloween parties and stuff like that.

But I get too embarrassed and hate anything that calls attention to me. Missy, my ex-best friend

and I used to always dress up the same, and that was cool because we were doing it together,

but we don't talk anymore. I'm too old anyway for dressing up. I'll probably just hand out candy

since Mom will be out. But I do think it’d be fun to dress up like a zombie – you know if someone

else was dressing up with me.

I hear you are a bit of an academic, so here’s a fun one for our last question. Pumpkins…is

it a fruit or vegetable?

Hmmm. My friend Greg is much smarter. He’d not only know this, but he'd probably also rattle

off the entire history of pumpkins in America and have some quote from TS Elliot to go along

with it! I think I remember learning somewhere that fruits have seeds, though, so I will guess

fruit?

There you have it - a little Halloween-style peek into the life and mind of Roz Hart, main

character of Blind Spot.

Wait!

Yes, Roz?

Which is it? Fruit or vegetable?

I’ll let you google that while people enter to win the bag of Blind Spot swag in the rafflecopter

below. Also be sure to enter to win one of two signed hardcover copies of Blind Spot at

www.lauraellenbooks.com.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

One last thing: the Blogger Love giveaway winner!

Congratulations! Lizzy of www.read-a-holicz.blogspot.com , you've won a huge bag of swag from a bunch of debut authors and your choice

of either a blog button/badge designed exclusively for you by Giselle at Xpresso Design ($15

value) or a book of your choice ($15 value)! I’ll be contacting you shortly.

Thanks again Shari for hosting this stop of the Blind Spot blog tour Tomorrow, come by

Alluring Reads to view the reader nominees for a Blind Spot Dream Cast.
Anytime Laura!!!!

  

Review: The Future of Us

The Future Of Us
Author: Jay Asher & Carolyn Mackler
Publisher: Razorbill
Release Date: November 21, 2011
Genre: YA Fiction
Pages: 356 (hardcover edition)
Source: Local Public Library
Summary from Goodreads:


It's 1996, and Josh and Emma have been neighbors their whole lives. They've been best friends almost as long - at least, up until last November, when Josh did something that changed everything. Things have been weird between them ever since, but when Josh's family gets a free AOL CD in the mail,his mom makes him bring it over so that Emma can install it on her new computer. When they sign on, they're automatically logged onto their Facebook pages. But Facebook hasn't been invented yet. And they're looking at themselves fifteen years in the future.

By refreshing their pages, they learn that making different decisions now will affect the outcome of their lives later. And as they grapple with the ups and downs of what their futures hold, they're forced to confront what they're doing right - and wrong - in the present.

My Thoughts:
This was a great trip in the way back machine for me. I graduated high school in 1992 so this novel really brought back some great memories, it was so easy to relate to these characters. 


I really enjoyed how the point of view switched back and forth between Emma and Josh. This really enabled the reader to get to know both characters and what they thought and how they felt and reacted to the situations. I was very impressed that this books was written by two separate authors it flows seamlessly from one chapter to the next.

I was really drawn into the how Emma kept changing her future with just a thought. Just knowing what was going to happen she was able to change things by vowing not to marry someone or knowing to refuse a job down the road. My favorite part of the book though has to be the lesson that that this book left me with. You'll have to read it for yourself to find out exactly what I'm talking about here. 


Plot: Original, Interesting, and Adorable at times
Characters: So realistic and fun. I even fell in love with the main character's best friends Kellan and Tyson
Writing: East to read and flowed perfectly
Ending: Just what I was hoping for
Kid Friendly: Yes
Overall: A fun book especially if you were a teen in the 90's with the added benefit that it makes you think
Recommend: Definitely