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Houston International Jazz Festival
Music fans might not think of Houston as a jazz town – local monsters like Woody Witt, Denis Dotson and others notwithstanding — but every August all that changes at the Houston International Jazz Festival. This year's weekend-long celebration kicks off Friday with a preview by Theresa Grason at Red Cat Jazz Café (make reservations at www.redcatjazzcafe.com) before the music moves on to Discovery Green and groundbreaking Saturday headliners Hiroshima. Together for more than 30 years, the fusion band is best known for combining Japanese and world music into something accessible for the masses; in other words, you don't have to be an expert in obscure rhythms to understand their sound. The group's latest release, Legacy, garnered a 2010 Grammy nomination for Best Pop Instrumental Album. Supporting Hiroshima Saturday are Rachelle Ferrell and the Texas Brass Band with Kyle Turner. On Sunday it's Tito Puente Jr., son of the late percussion legend, who will share the stage with M.F. Productions' Latin Jazz All-Stars.
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The product designs by Gabriela Chicherio (*1980) are functional, elegant and always have an appealing little catch. A funnel, a modular cabinet, a valet stand, as well as several chairs, stools and lamps show her stylish design. The funnel YPSI, a cylinder turned upside-down, does not fall off the bottle. The modular cabinet BABEL consists of stackable, rotating segments with different materials. And the valet stand TANGO is something like a grown-up hanger.
Already during her studies at ECAL Lausanne, Gabriela designed the funnel YPSI, which was subsequently produced by Ligne Roset in 2004, the year of her graduation. This was the beginning of a successful collaboration with the renowned manufacturer: both the modular cabinet BABEL (2006) and the lamp AMIS DE JEAN (2012) have been incorporated in Ligne Roset's product range.
After graduation, she joined the industrial design team of Beat Karrer to hone her talent to experiment with design ideas, materials and shapes. In the following six years, Gabriela developed projects with and for the designer. In parallel, she was teaching as an assistant in industrial design at the ZHdK. Gabriela Chicherio opened her own design studio in 2011.
Combining established principles and almost-forgotten solutions in a new and different way: this best describes the formula for Gabriela's success. She boils it down to: "I interpret existing things, change their context, give them new meanings – that's the essence of my designs". She perfects her method through extensive studies, which may lead her to thrift shops and flea markets. With good luck, Gabriela finds here old-time objects to inspire her for her contemporary design.

subset: commoncrawl


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Books to Look Out For: February 2016
Here are my picks for what you must read in February 2016: 1. Glass Sword (Red Queen #2) by Victoria Aveyard - February 11th 2016 by Orion Goodreads ||...
SpecFic 101: Spine-tingling Stories
Welcome to another SpecFic 101! I'm getting on the Halloween band-wagon and recommending some spooky stories to celebrate this time of year :) • A...
Early Bird Preview: Nevernight
You'll Love This Because ... "Never flinch. Never fear. Never forget." That first chapter! Clever, Jay, clever. It's set on a planet with three...
Those Above by Daniel Polansky
Firstly, isn't that cover gorgeous? It's what drew me to Those Above in the first place, that beautiful cover with a giant sword that screamed Read Me. And I...
Glass Sword by Victoria Aveyard
I liked Red Queen but I'll be the first to admit that I found it a derivative. Whether that's because I usually read more than 100 books a year, most of them...
Marked by Sue Tingey
I feel oddly duped by Marked. I was expecting a paranormal-urban fantasy with some detective/crime vibes, and what I got was a paranormal romance that reminded...
Early Bird Preview: Nevernight
Nevernight comes out in August, and I think you'll love it.
Cruel Crown by Victoria Aveyard
Cruel Crown is a bind of two novellas set in the world of Red Queen. These novellas open up the world and allow us a glimpse into two fascinating characters – Queen Coriane (Cal's mother) and Farley.
Make Me Read It Read-a-Thon
I'm taking part in the Make Me Read It Read-A-Thon! You get to choose which books I read!
Blog Tour: The Alex Caine trilogy by Alan Baxter
To celebrate the release of the Alex Caine trilogy in paperback, author extraordinaire Alan Baxter is stopping by to speak about Dark Fiction.
Thorne by Charlotte McConaghy
I loved Thorne. This story world has grown on me and I've come to respect McConaghy's storytelling. I love her characters and her prose, and am looking forward to reading Isadora in August.
Waer by Meg Caddy
Waer by Meg Caddy is an accomplished début that takes readers into a fantasy land where legends roam alongside humans and werewolves. A rarity of its kind – a standalone – Waer is an great example of a well-crafted YA fantasy.
A Tangle of Gold by Jaclyn Moriarty
Coming to the end of any series is a bittersweet experience, but reading A Tangle of Gold – the concluding volume in the spellbinding The Colours of Madeleine series – was especially emotional for me. It's hard to believe that my adventure with Madeleine and Elliot, and my time in Cello and Cambridge, is over.
The Sin Eater's Daughter by Melinda Salisbury
I really enjoyed The Sin Eater's Daughter! It combines a few refreshingly unique concepts with a cool fantasy world and some interesting characters. It has its flaws, but I could overlook them because of its conceptual brilliance and lush storytelling.
Interview with L. A. Weatherly
The lovely L. A. Weatherly hops by to celebrate the release of her novel, Broken Sky.
City of Blades by Robert Jackson Bennett
Is there more? There's more right? There are at least … fifteen sounds like a reasonable number … novels planned in this world, right. Right!?


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Please click on the image for information regarding our NES Open House
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Dear NES Families,
It isn't unusual for students to loose some reading motivation over the summer. To help your child to be a super reader, please encourage your child to participate in our NES Summer Reading Challenge, I'm a Super Reader. Please click on the image below, for your child's grade level and intro letter.
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Anthidium manicatum
|Anthidium manicatum
|Scientific classification
|A. manicatum
|Binomial name
|Anthidium manicatum
(Linnaeus, 1758)
Anthidium manicatum, commonly called the European wool carder bee,[1] is a species of bee in the family Megachilidae, the leaf-cutter bees or mason bees.[2]
They get the name 'carder' from their behaviour of scraping hair from leaves[3] such as lamb's ears (Stachys byzantina). They carry this hair bundled beneath their bodies to be used as a nest lining.[4] Like other members of the tribe Anthidiini, these bees do not cut leaves or petals as is typical for megachilids.[5]
This bee is endemic to Europe, Asia and North Africa. It has recently been seen in regions of South America and the Canary islands. It was accidentally introduced into North America from Europe sometime in the mid 20th century. They are generalists, and do not seem to prefer any plant genera for foraging.
- 1 Taxonomy and phylogeny
- 2 Description and identification
- 3 Distribution and habitat
- 4 Nesting
- 5 Behavior
- 6 Sexual dimorphism
- 7 Diet and foraging behavior
- 8 Subspecies [1]
- 9 Synonyms [2]
- 10 See also
- 11 References
- 12 Further reading
- 13 External links
Taxonomy and phylogeny[edit]
This species belongs to the family Megachilidae and the order Hymenoptera, which consists of organisms such as ants, bees and wasps, and the superfamily Apoidea, which is more specific to bees and wasps.[6]
Description and identification[edit]
Anthidium manicatum is originally an Old World bee. It has a wingspan of approximately 20 millimetres (0.79 in), with a body length of about 11–13 mm (0.43–0.51 in) for females, and 14–17 mm (0.55–0.67 in) for males.[7] The males are substantially larger than females.[1]
A. manictum are black and covered with yellow-grey hairs. Their faces and abdomen are covered in yellow spots. Male A. manicatum have a black head and thorax, coated with short yellowish brown hairs. The cheeks below the antennae, a small spot behind each eye, a bilobate spot on the clypeus, and the mandibles (except the apex) are yellow. The wings are dusky in color. The abdomen is black with grey hairs, with a band of brown hairs at each segment's apex as well as along their lateral margins.[8] This feature distinguishes male A. manicatum from native Anthidium species.[9] There is a yellow spot on each side of the segments except the 7th. A second pair of spots is often seen on the disks of the 4th and 5th segments. There is a spine on each side of the 6th and 7th segments at the apex, the 7th having a third thin spine in the middle. The legs exhibit variegation of yellow and are covered with grey hairs. Female A. manicatum are smaller in size than the males, but have a similar color pattern. The abdominal spots are smaller and the apex is rounded. Female legs are almost completely black, with very small yellow spots.[8] The anterior sides of the tarsal segments of each leg of female A. manicatum have fine, soft and small white-colored hairs. This pilosity occurs in most species of Anthidium in the Western Palearctic region.[10]
Male A. manicatum resemble A. maculosum in appearance. The two species have similar spiniform pygidia, as well as largely rounded sixth sterna (although that of A. manicatum is more so).[9]
Distribution and habitat[edit]
Anthidium manicatum is found in parts of Europe, Asia, North Africa, and North America. It has also recently been documented in the Canary Islands, and South American countries such as Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay.[11][12] This species is now present in New Zealand.
This insect was accidentally introduced into the United States from Europe sometime prior to 1963, when it was discovered in New York State.[13] It has since spread from the northeastern U.S. and southeastern Canada across the United States to California, where it was first collected in 2007.[14] This species' tendency to occupy ready-made nesting sites, usually movable objects, allows it to spread to new locations easily.[9]
In Europe, this species is normally found in gardens, fields, and meadows in the southern part of Wales and England, but is localized in other places within the United Kingdom,[4] where they can be seen from May to September.[4] A. manicatum is the only species of the genus Anthidium that can be found in England.[15]
Being a member of the Anthidiini tribe of megachilid bees, A. manicatum engages in highly elaborate nesting behavior. These bees construct their nests in preexisting cavities, using the trichomes of wooly plants. Female A. manicatum use their mandibles, which are sharply toothed, to remove trichomes from the stems and leaves of various plants. They then roll up the trichomes into a ball and bring them to a preexisting cavity. Inside the cavity, the bees fashion the trichome ball into cells, where they deposit an egg as well as a provisioning mass consisting of nectar and pollen. The female creates several cells in a cavity. Once finished, she seals the entrance to the cavity with a terminal plug, which consists of inorganic and organic materials that she brings to the nest.[16]
Females collect "down" from such plants as lamb's ears (Stachys byzantina). They scrape the hairs from the leaves and carry them back to their nests bundled beneath their bodies. There it is used as a lining for their nest cavities.[1][17]
Females tend to build their nests at high locations. This may be in order to minimize the nest's exposure to parasites and predators. This may also be to avoid nest usurpation by other female A. manicatum.[16]
Besides trichomes, other materials used by female A. manicatum for building brood cells include mud, stones, resin, and leaves. Some of the plant materials that are collected are hydrophobic, a feature that may serve an anti-microbial function for the nest. Females smear a plant substrate, plant extrafloral trichome secretions, on brood cells. The primary material used to build the cells are plant hairs, or "wool" (hence the name "wool carder bee"), that is collected from the stems and leaves of plants. Females largely use the hairs of Lamiaceae, especially those of the genus Betonica or Stachys. Additionally, females use specialized hair-like structures on the exterior of their tarsi to absorb the secretions of the plant hairs to apply onto the brood cells. These secretions are obtained from different species, such as Anthirrinum, Crepis, and Pelargonium.[18]
Mating behavior[edit]
The mating system of A. manicatum is unlike those of most other bees. Females exhibit polyandry and continuously mate throughout their reproductive life.[19] The interval of time between copulations amongst different males can be as short as 35 seconds in length.[20] Males exhibit resource defense polygyny. A. manicatum display extreme polyandry, which is linked to male territoriality and resource defense of flowering plants. Males claim patches of floral plants, ward off conspecific males and other resource competitors, and mate with the females who forage in their territories. Copulations occur repeatedly and regularly in both sexes. Males that are unable to defend their own territory (usually because of their relatively small size) utilize an alternative 'sneaking' tactic. These unfit males receive fewer copulation opportunities than females.[19]
Such mating and territorial behavior in bees has also been observed in Anthidiellum notatum, Anthidiellum perplexum, and Anthidium banningense. However, males of the genus Anthidiellum chase away intruders rather than physically attacking them, so their aggressive behavior differs significantly.[21]
Resource defense[edit]
The territorial mating behavior of male A. manicatum occurs when foraging resources are amassed, allowing for monopolization and defense of territories by individual males.[19] Resource defense, as exhibited by male A. manicatum, has been thought to benefit females by reducing foraging competition for pollen and nectar.[19] The rate a female visits a territory is highly correlated with the number of flowers in that area.[20] If females forage in sites that are being defended by males and the cost of additional matings is low for female members, then male resource defense and female polyandry may coevolve.[19]
Male aggression[edit]
Male A. manicatum display highly aggressive behavior.[22] Males are highly aggressive towards each other as well as other visitors to the flowers in its territory.[1] In the process of obtaining and defending flowering plant territories, they frequently attack conspecific males and heterospecific pollinators. A. manicatum sometimes lethally injure the pollinators as a result of their aggressiveness.[16] The territorial behavior of males develops after a period of flight without any localization.[22] They will also defend Anthidium manicatum females,[12] although they do harass them by holding them immobile and repeatedly attempting to mate.[2]
Late male sperm precedence[edit]
Studies show that there appears to be no selection pressure on male A. manicatum to be the first to copulate, and hence no (or very little) selection pressure to emerge before females.[23] This is due to the females' polyandrous behavior, and can also be attributed to a phenomenon called "'Late' male sperm precedence".
Patterns of sperm use by the females determine the benefits of resource defense for males. If the female uses only the sperm from her first copulation in a breeding season, then selection will not favor the 'sit-and-wait' strategy of resource defense for the males over strategies that are pre-emptive, such as patrolling nest sites. However, if delayed mating can still ensure a high probability of procreating, then the resource defense strategy will be favored.[19]
'Late male sperm precedence', or LMSP, is an experimental situation in which two males mate in sequence with a female and the second male will hold paternity of over 50% of the female's offspring. Although females do have a spermatheca for long-term sperm storage, more recent mates tend to father the brood she produces. This phenomenon might be caused by a variety of mechanisms, including sperm digestion or removal by the female, removal by the next male, or stratification of sperm from different males in the sperm storage organ of the female (i.e. the last sperm in is the first to come out). Studies have shown that A. manicatum males that copulate late in a sequence have a greater than average chance of paternity of the female's eggs. Late male sperm precedence may have fostered the evolution of resource defense in A. manicatum males.[19]
Sexual dimorphism[edit]
Unlike most other species of Hymenoptera, male A. manicatum are larger than females in size, displays male-biased sexual dimorphism. The selection for larger size in males may have resulted due to their aggressive territorial behavior and subsequent differential mating success. Although it does not tear other males apart, the abdominal armature of a male A. manicatum may have been developed due to territorial aggression, rather than for mating purposes.[22] Male size has been found to correlate with mating success. Smaller males will implement alternative mating tactics if they cannot defeat larger males for territory.[16]
The mating behavior of male A. manicatum can be determined by relative body size to other conspecific males. Territory owners are larger in size than wanderers, and copulate with females more frequently as well. The number of copulations a male territory owner can achieve varies based on the size of the territory – males with larger territories generally achieve more copulations than those with smaller territories. This difference may be due to the energy expenditure of smaller bees to defend their territory from larger males, the inability of small males to mate on their territory, or female choice of larger males (regardless of territory size).[24] Hence the number of copulations a male obtains is positively correlated with territory quality as well as male size.[19]
Diet and foraging behavior[edit]
Anthidium manicatum consumes the pollen from flowers of varying families. They are thus considered to be generalists. They visit garden flowers and weeds preferring blue flowers that have long throats[1] with Old World origins.[1] Both males and females hover near flowers similar to flies in the family Syrphidae.[25]
Subspecies [1][edit]
- Anthidium manicatum manicatum (Linnaeus, 1758)
- Anthidium manicatum barbarum Lepeletier, 1841
- Anthidium manicatum gribodoi Schwarz and Gusenleitner, 2003
Synonyms [2][edit]
- Apis manicata Linnaeus, 1758
- Apis pervigil Harris, 1776
- Apis maculata Fabricius, 1781
- Apis fulvipes de Villers, 1789 (homonym)
- Apis modesta Christ, 1791
- Apis amoenita Christ, 1791
- Apis uncata Schrank, 1802
- Anthidium maculatum Latreille, 1806 (homonym)
- Anthidium marginatum Latreille, 1809
- Anthidium obtusatum Lepeletier, 1841
- Anthidium productum Lepeletier, 1841
- Anthidium manicatum var. nigrithorax Dalla Torre, 1877
- Anthidium manicatum var. fasciatum Schirmer, 1915
- Anthidium manicatum var. nasicolle Friese, 1917
- Anthidium manicatum var. luteus Gribodo, 1924 (homonym)
- Anthidium manicatum subcrenulata Alfken, 1930
- Anthidium manicatum cyrenaica van der Zanden, 1992 (homonym)
See also[edit]
- ^ a b c d e f Species Anthidium manicatum – European Wool Carder Bee – BugGuide.Net
- ^ a b Wool Carder Bee / Leafcutting Bee – Anthidium manicatum
- ^ Anthidium manicatum – Wool Carder Bee, Bees, Wasps & Ants Recording Society
- ^ a b c Wool Carder Bees – Anthidium manicatum – UK Safari
- ^ Michener, C.D. (2000). The Bees of the World. Johns Hopkins University Press. 913 pp.
- ^ "Anthidium Manicatum". Integrated Taxonomic Information System on-line database. Retrieved 14 October 2015.
- ^ Anthidium manicatum (Linnaeus, 1758), Discover Life
- ^ a b Saunders, Edward (1884). The Transactions of the Entomological Society of London for the Year 1884 (PDF). The Society., 1884. p. 218. Retrieved 8 October 2015.
- ^ a b c Jaycox, Elbert R. (January 1967). "An Adventive Anthidium in New York State (Hymenoptera: Megachilidae)". Journal of the Kansas Entomological Society 40: 124–126. JSTOR 25083603.
- ^ Müller, A.; Töpfl, W.; Amiet, F. (1996). "Collection of Extrafloral Trichome Secretions for Nest Wool Impregnation in the Solitary Bee Anthidium manicatum" (PDF). Naturwissenschaften 83: 230–232. doi:10.1007/BF01143331.
- ^ "Anthidium manicatum (Linnaeus, 1758)". Moure's Bee Catalogue. Retrieved 6 May 2016.
- ^ a b L. L. Pechuman (1967). "Observations on the behavior of the bee Anthidium manicatum (L.)". Journal of the New York Entomological Society 75 (2): 68–73. JSTOR 25006048.
- ^ http://entomology.ucdavis.edu/news/woolcarderbee.html
- ^ Anthidium manicatum – Definition and Scientific Information – Page 1
- ^ Pechuman, L. L. (June 1967). "Observations on the Behavior of the Bee Anthidium manicatum (L.)" (PDF). Journal of the New York Entomological Society 75: 68.
- ^ a b c d Payne, Ansel; Schildroth, Dustin A.; Starks, Philip T. (12 May 2010). "Nest site selection in the European wool-carder bee, Anthidium manicatum, with methods for an emerging model species" (PDF). Apidologie 42: 1–9. doi:10.1051/apido/2010050. Retrieved 10 October 2015.
- ^ Anthidium manicatum – Wool Carder Bee
- ^ Eltz, Thomas; Küttner, Jennifer; Lunau, Klaus; Tollrian, Ralph (6 January 2015). "Plant secretions prevent wasp parasitism in nests of wool-carder bees, with implications for the diversification of nesting materials in Megachilidae". Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution 2. doi:10.3389/fevo.2014.00086.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Lampert, Kathrin P.; Pasternak, Vanessa; Brand, Philipp; Tollrian, Ralph; Leese, Florian (9 January 2014). "'Late' male sperm precedence in polyandrous wool-carder bees and the evolution of male resource defence in Hymenoptera" (PDF). Animal Behavior 90: 211–217. doi:10.1016/j.anbehav.2014.01.034. Retrieved 9 October 2015.
- ^ a b Severinghaus, Lucia L.; Kurtak, Barbara H.; Eickwort, George C. (27 March 1981). "The Reproductive Behavior of Anthidium manicatum (Hymenoptera: Megachilidae) and the Significance of Size for Territorial Males" (PDF). Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 9: 51–58. doi:10.1007/BF00299853. Retrieved 11 October 2015.
- ^ Turell, Michael J. (March 1976). "Observations on the Mating Behavior of Anthidiellum notatum and Anthidiellum perplexum". The Florida Entomologist 59: 55–61. doi:10.2307/3493170. JSTOR 3493170.
- ^ a b c Jaycox, Elbert R. (October 1967). "Territorial Behavior Among Males of Anthidium Bamngense". Journal of the Kansas Entomological Society 40 (4): 565–570. JSTOR 25083662.
- ^ Wirtz, P.; Kopka, S.; Schmoll, G. (1991). "Phenology of two territorial solitary bees, Anthidium manicatum and A. florentinum (Hymenoptera: Megachilidae)". Journal of Zoology 228: 641–651. doi:10.1111/j.1469-7998.1992.tb04461.x.
- ^ Starks, P. T.; Reeve, H. K. (1999). "Condition-based alternative reproductive tactics in the wool-carder bee, Anthidium manicatum". Ethology Ecology & Evolution 11: 71–75. doi:10.1080/08927014.1999.9522843. Retrieved 11 October 2015.
- ^ "Wool Carder Bee - Anthidium manicatum Family Megachilidae". North American Insects and Spiders. Red Planet, Inc. Retrieved October 22, 2015.
Further reading[edit]
- Ascher, John S. (2001). "Hylaeus hyalinatus Smith, a European bee new to North America, with notes on other adventive bees (Hymenoptera: Apoidea)". Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington 103: 184–190.
- Donovan, B. J. (2007). "Apoidea (Insecta: Hymenoptera)". Fauna of New Zealand 57.
- Donovan, B. J.; G. Burnip, B. McCarthy (2006). "The wool-carder bee, Anthidium manicatum, from the Old World, is newly established in New Zealand". New Zealand Beekeeper 14 (5): 11–12, 25–26.
- Hoebeke, E. R.; A. G. Wheeler, Jr. (1999). "Anthidium oblongatum (Illiger): an Old World bee (Hymenoptera: Megachilidae) new to North America, and new North American records for another adventive species, A. manicatum (L.)". Special Publication (University of Kansas Natural History Museum) 24: 21–24.
- Payette, A. (2001). "Première mention de l'abeille adventice Anthidium manicatum (Linné) (Hymenoptera : Megachilidae) pour le Québec.". Fabreries 26: 87–97.
- Severinghaus Lucia Liu; Barbara Harris Kurtak; George C. Eickwort (1981). "The reproductive behavior of Anthidium manicatum (Hymenoptera: Megachilidae) and the significance of size for territorial males". Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 9 (1): 51–58. doi:10.1007/BF00299853. JSTOR 4599410.
- Smith, I. (1991). "Anthidium manicatum (Hymenoptera: Megachilidae), an interesting new Canadian record". Proceeding of Entomological Society of Ontario 122: 105–108.
- Starks, P. T.; H. K. Reeve (1999). "Condition-based alternative reproductive tactics in the wool-carder bee, Anthidium manicatum" (PDF). Ethology Ecology & Evolution 11: 71–75. doi:10.1080/08927014.1999.9522843.
- Wirtz, Peter, Michael Szabados, Horst Pethig & John Plant (1988). "An extreme case of interspecific territoriality: male Anthidium manicatum (Hymenoptera: Megachilidae) wound and kill intruders". Ethology 78 (2): 159–167. doi:10.1111/j.1439-0310.1988.tb00227.x.
- Zavortink, T. J.; S. S. Shanks (2008). "Anthidium manicatum (Linnaeus) (Hymenoptera: Megachilidae) in California". Pan-Pacific Entomologist 84 (3): 238–241. doi:10.3956/2007-47.1.
External links[edit]
|Wikimedia Commons has media related to Anthidium manicatum.


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This limited season of Daniel Evans' five star Sheffield Crucible production of Show Boat will now play its final West End performance on 27 August 2016. The production was previously announced to be booking to 7 January 2017. (more...)
?The evening of Sunday 15th May sees the 2016 return of WestEndFest to The Actors Church in Covent Garden, for the first time raising funds for The Make A Difference Trust (MAD Trust). (more...)
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SHOW BOAT will be sailing from Sheffield to London when the Crucible's hit production transfers to the West End this spring. The Daily Mail writes that stars Gina Beck, Emmanuel Kojo and Rebecca Trehearn will move with Daniel Evans' production of the classic musical from April 9 at the New London Theatre. (more...)
The trio of leading stars announced for the third in the intimate West End Switched Off concert series are Evelyn Hoskins (Sound of Music Live, Carrie, Spring Awakening), Tyrone Huntley (Memphis, The Book of Mormon, Sister Act), and Jodie Steele (Jesus Christ Superstar, Fame). (more...)
This December, Sheffield Theatres will bring to life one of the most romantic musicals of all time, when their lavish new production of Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II's epic musical, Show Boat, opens on the Crucible stage from Thursday 10 December until Saturday 23 January. (more...)
Sheffield Theatres' Artistic Director Daniel Evans today announces, due to popular demand, a one-week extension for his new production of Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II's musical Show Boat. The production which opens on 16 December 2015, with previews from 10 December, will now run until 23 January 2016. (more...)
American composer Jonathan Reid Gealt is back in London to launch his third studio album WHATEVER I WANT IT TO BE on Sunday 11th October at St James Studio before its official worldwide release on 29th November. (more...)
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Artistic Director Daniel Evans today announces the company for his new production of Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II's musical Show Boat. (more...)
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text:
Here's the description:
A gift from the gods, its mystical light and energy powers and protects the land of Nevyana, but it also divides her people into three distinct groups. In the wrong hands, it becomes a formidable weapon. When sacred objects for channelling Blue Fire are stolen, sworn enemies Petra, Amlinn, and Jin set out to find them, and their paths converge on a collision course with the truth. Can they bridge the centuries old division between their communities? Or will their search for the truth and the explosive power of Blue Fire signal the end of Nevyana?
Remember, you can read the first two chapters online now!
The metal City towers at the center of the mountain-ringed Heartland, squatting like a four-legged beast above the deep chasm of the Canyon. Within it dwells a stratified society ruled with an iron fist by the Officers and Crew. In the City, social standing is everything, signalled by the Tier on which one lives, from the hellish First and Second Tiers at the bottom of the City to the elevated Twelfth near the top, home of the highest-ranking Officers. Lording over all others is the Captain, who has dwelt in the inaccessible Thirteenth Tier for hundreds of years.
The young woman Alania, ward of First Officer Beruthi, lives on the Twelfth Tier, one of the City's elite. The young man Danlyk, ward of the mysterious scavenger named Erl, lives in the vast garbage heap beneath the City, where the dregs of society scrabble and fight for whatever they can find in the City's rubbish, which has filled the Canyon to the brim over the centuries. Their two very different worlds collide when Alania is plunged from the Twelfth Tier into the rubbish heaps beneath the City, and both of them find themselves pursued by the City Crew, for reasons they cannot fathom—but which they must discover if they are to survive. The secrets they uncover, as they flee the trash-filled Canyon and crisscross the Heartland from the City's farmlands to the mountains of the north and back again, will determine not only their fate, but the fate of the City…and everyone who lives there.
Here's the publisher's blurb:
A gift from the gods, its mystical light and energy powers and protects the land of Nevyana, but it also divides her people into three distinct groups. In the wrong hands, it becomes a formidable weapon. When sacred objects for channelling Blue Fire are stolen, sworn enemies Petra, Amlinn, and Jin set out to find them, and their paths converge on a collision course with the truth. Can they bridge the centuries old division between their communities? Or will their search for the truth and the explosive power of Blue Fire signal the end of Nevyana?
And another cool thing…
As a teenager, I was confused about what made a fantasy novel an "epic fantasy," as opposed to just an ordinary fantasy. After exhaustive research and deep, deep thought, I concluded that what makes a fantasy "epic" has nothing to do with the writing style, quality, length, or creativity of the book. Nope: what makes a fantasy "epic" is the presence of a map. I put a map in my Grade 12 novel Slavers of Thok for that very reason. It's taken 40 years…but now I have another novel with a map. Behold the map of Nevyana:
I can't wait to see the book in print and to hear readers' reactions.
And again…
Whenever I lead a workshop about writing science fiction, I say it's important to read widely and deeply in the field: that science fiction is like a long ongoing argumentative conversation, and jumping into it without being aware of what has already been said will irritate people at best and derail the conversation at worst.
Admittedly, it's far harder to be keep up with the field now than when I was a kid. Back then, a dedicated fan could reasonably hope to read everything of note published every year. Today, there is far more science fiction and fantasy around, and the audience for it has fragmented. People are fans less of the field in general and more fans of specific books (or, more likely, movies or TV shows). They discover they like this kind of stuff stuff without knowing much about its history.
This may have contributed to the bizarre notion, expressed by the kind of people who Twitter and Tumblr about this kind of thing, that until they and their like-minded friends came along and began writing and talking about science fiction, science fiction was a bastion of maleness from which women were excluded from contributing.
A valuable corrective to this ahistorical perspective is coming out this September from well-known editor and writer Kristine Kathryn Rusch. Women of Futures Past, published by Baen Books, will showcase some of the amazing science fiction stories women have written throughout the multi-decade history of the genre.
Rusch set up a website, "Women in Science Fiction: An Exploration" (www.womeninsciencefiction.com), to chronicle the project, and in her first post wrote, "I've been told repeatedly by young female writers in the SF genre that women never did anything in SF until the year 2000 or so. Our history is being lost and, as someone with a B.A. in History, I find that offensive in the extreme."
Women of Futures Past is a first step to reaffirming the historical role of women in science fiction. Rusch writes, "I want to compile a volume of excellent science fiction stories by women, including some classics, that could have been published today. I don't want this volume to look like something you have to read in a college literature class. I want it to be something you'll grab off the shelf immediately, thinking you're in for some marvelous reading—and I want that impression to be right. I want stories impossible to put down, stories with heart. They don't have to be 'by women about women'…I want these stories to be by women, yes, but about anything. And I want them to be riproaring good reads.'
The list of writers mentioned on the website includes many names I remember from my own early reading. Andre Norton, for example, whose first science fiction novel, Star Man's Son, was published in 1952, was a huge influence on me. I read everything I could find by her, and yes, I always knew she was a woman (Alice Mary Norton): "Andre" was a sop to publishers who felt boys wouldn't read stories written by a woman. (Let me just say, as one of those boys publishers thought wouldn't read stories by women, that in fact it never crossed my to care whether a writer was male or female, or for that matter what their race or ethnic or religious background might be: all I cared about was whether or not they wrote a good story.)
Others: Leigh Brackett, "The Queen of Space Opera"…Zenna Henderson, whose stories of the gentle aliens known as The People I read and re-read…Alice Sheldon (who wrote as James Tiptree, Jr.)…Madeleine L'Engle (A Wrinkle in Time)…Ursula K. Le Guin, of course…Octavia Butler…Anne McCaffrey (The Dragonriders of Pern)…the list goes on and on.
And those are just the women writers: of editors and publishers there were (and are) many more. Toni Weisskopf, editor of Baen Books, makes note of this in an essay on the "Women in Science Fiction' website entitled, "Women and Science Fiction—So What Am I, Chopped Liver?"
When she came into the field in the 1980s, she notes, there were many women "in positions of power," and she lists a few: Judy-Lynn Del Rey, Betsy Mitchell, Shawna McCarthy, Beth Meacham, Susan Allison, Ellen Datlow, Betty Ballantine, Ellen Asher. (She doesn't mention, but could have, Betsy Wollheim and Sheila Gilbert, who have owned DAW Books, my publishers, for more than 30 years.) She adds, "So I never experienced this mythical time of science fiction being an old boys club, with the Man oppressing women, keeping us down. What do these people imagine all the women in field before them did?"
I look forward to reading Women of Futures Past when it comes out, as a reminder to myself, and I hope to a good many other people, that science fiction is not now, and never has been, "an old boys club"…
…although, as an old boy myself, I'm glad there's still room in it for us, too.]]>
How to Write Young Adult Fantasy
by Edward Willett
t didn't start out as a writer. Like most writers, I started out as a reader.
My parents loved to read, and I had two older brothers who also read a lot, so our house was always full of books. I remember practicing my reading with my mother by reading out loud to her. Since it was the King James Version of the Bible, I didn't always have a clue what I was reading, but at least I was figuring out how to sound out words.
What really captured my interest, though, was science fiction and fantasy. Again, I blame my brothers. That was what they read, and of course I wanted to be like them, so that was what I read. One of the earliest novels I can remember reading was Revolt on Alpha C, by Robert Silverberg. It had starships and ray guns and all kinds of other science fictional goodness. I was a nine-year-old boy. How could I not be hooked? (It wasn't until years later I discovered that was Silverberg's first novel, written when he was only 19.)
But I didn't just read science fiction and fantasy. I read everything, voraciously. History books and adventure books, horse books and dog books, classics and not-so-classics. In school I was the kid who was always raising his hand in class and then saying, "I read somewhere …"
Because I read, I occasionally knew more about a subject than my teachers. (Sorry, teachers, but that is a hazard of teaching kids to read.) For example, I loved a series of English children books called Swallows and Amazons, by Arthur Ransome, which are all about kids sailing. I knew from those books that the "sheet" on a sailing boat is actually a rope that controls the angle of the sail. I had a teacher who told the class that the "sheet" was the sail. Naturally, I couldn't let that stand, and the discussion grew…a little heated. But I'm sure that once, upon reflection, she realized she was wrong and I was right, she appreciated my ten-year-old self for setting her straight. Although I admit she didn't say so at the time.
Books transported me to places I could never have gone: real places, imaginary places, might-have-been places and might-yet-be places. They taught me about airplanes, aardvarks, auto racing, astronauts and apples–and that was just the A's.
I was always drawn to science fiction and fantasy, because my older brothers read that stuff and so it was in the house. The books of Robert A. Heinlein and Andre Norton were too of my biggest influences; later, of course, I read Tolkien and Lewis, but I hadn't even gotten to them yet when I decided I wanted to write my own stories.
One reason was that I sometimes couldn't find the kinds of stories I really enjoyed reading. (Today's fortunate children live in the Golden Age of YA fantasy and science fiction; in my day such books were few and far between.) I thought, well, maybe I should just create my own. But I didn't want to write just for myself. I wanted to write for readers: I wanted to tell stories that readers would enjoy as much as I enjoyed the books I loved.
And so, when I was 11 years old, I wrote my first short story, "Kastra Glazz: Hypership Test Pilot." And my Grade 7 English teacher in Weyburn, Tony Tunbridge, did me the great courtesy of taking it seriously: he critiqued it, and didn't just tell me that it was wonderful (which, in retrospect, it really wasn't), he told me how I could make it better. That lit a fire in me: my next story would be better.
I've been writing stories ever since. I wrote three novels in high school (and passed them around for my classmates to read: rather brave of me, I think now, but extremely valuable—I learned that I could, in fact, write stories that people enjoyed, even if the girls made fun of my love scenes), and kept on writing novels, year after year, until, finally, I started getting them published.
And although that first short story and first longer piece (The Pirate Dilemma! Starring Roy B. Savexxy and Samuel Domms! Double consonants proves it's science fiction!) were SF, my first novel, written in my Grade 10 English "writing book" (we were required to write one page a day of something—anything) at age 14, was a fantasy entitled The Golden Sword (rewritten as The Silver Sword in Grade 12 when I realized you could barely lift a sword made out of solid gold, much less fight with it.) I wrote an adventure story next, Ship from the Unknown (about an entire nation powerful enough to take on the U.S. and the USSR combined, which somehow had escaped detection deep in the Amazon rainforest…hey, I was 15) then went back to fantasy with Slavers of Thok, my high school magnum opus, which you could tell was epic because it had a map and everything.
Viva la difference
A quick side note to answer the common question, "What's the difference between science fiction and fantasy?"
According to Orson Scott Card, "science fiction has rivets, fantasy has trees." According to the most persnickety hard science fiction writers, fantasy is "writing with the net down," because you don't have to make your fictional world obey natural law as we understand it. I usually say the difference is that the fantastical things that happen in the SF novel are at least given a scientific explanation, even if it ultimately ends up being so much hand-waving, while you don't need much more explanation than "magic" for a fantasy novel. Although it's always worth remembering Clarke's Law: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic," and there are certainly science fiction novels that read exactly like high fantasy novels: Gene Wolfe's series The Book of the Long Sun or Robert Silverberg's Lord Valentine's Castle to name just a couple.
I always thought of myself more as a science fiction writer than a fantasy writer, but my first two published novels, Soulworm and The Dark Unicorn, were fantasy—one modern-day fantasy, one high fantasy. Both were young adult, and there's no doubt that on the YA side I've definitely written more fantasy than science fiction: Spirit Singer, The Shards of Excalibur series, The Haunted Horn, The Masks of Aygrima trilogy (though not published as YA, it has a 15-year-old protagonist and is essentially YA), and the upcoming Flames of Nevyana.
Writing for me is all about telling stories. I find a lot of writers are way too pretentious about what it is they do. Very few books change society and become lasting literature that is taught for generations, and while that's a fine thing to aspire to, I suppose, the truth is there's no way for anyone to know what will last and what won't. This year's "important new novel" is next year's stack of ignored books on the bargain shelves at Chapters. All that stuff in reviews about "shines a light on" and "shatters our illusions" and "carries an important message" I find silly, like a lot of the descriptors used in wine writing or the overwrought artspeak used in those descriptive panels hung next to works in galleries. As far as I'm concerned, a book succeeds or fails based on a single criteria: does it tell a good story?
The other stuff—the "shining a light on" and "shattering illusions" and most of all, that "important message" stuff, well, it's nice if it happens, but none of it will happen unless, first and foremost, there's a good story.
But why do I write fantasy?
I don't have a particularly good answer except that that's the way my mind bends, and has since childhood. I do not want to limit myself to the here-and-now, the world as we know it, to modern-day concerns and conceits.
Tolkien's concept of "sub-creation" has always spoken to me: "Though all the crannies of the world we filled with elves and dragons, 'twas our right, used or misused; that right has not decayed: we make still by the law in which we're made."
Whether you're religious or atheistic, there's no doubt God or evolution has made us creative, given us brains that we can use to imagine…anything. Imagination is the thing that has taken human beings from the plains of Africa to the moon and will someday take us beyond. The ability to make stuff up, and make it sound real, is useful not just for storytellers, of course, but also for politicians and liars—if that's not redundant—but "used or misused," as Tolkien put it, it is a central part of our human nature, and the purest expression of it is the creation of fantastical stories, stories that seem real but in fact take place in a world that is not our own, where magic is real, where anything can happen.
And as I like to point out, even people who claim they are not writing fantasy, who claim to be setting their stories in the "real world," are incorrect. No book contains the real world. Every story, no matter how down-to-earth and realistic it seems, is really a fantasy, a made-up world that may mimic the real world but is not the real world: it is that author's simulacrum of the world, as fantastical in its own way as Narnia or Middle Earth or Prydain. Looked at that way, all fiction is fantasy.
Why YA?
Which may explain my choice of subject matter, but doesn't say anything about my choice to write YA: and although I've written several adult SF novels (and one adult fantasy) at this point, I've always thought of myself as more of a YA writer. To be honest, even my adult novels can be read as YA—they almost always have, among their cast of characters, someone who is either a teen or a new adult.
I think there are a couple of reasons. One is that I started writing as a teen. I grew up, my characters didn't. I'm still writing for the teen I was, who couldn't find the kinds of stories he wanted in the abundance which he required.
Another reason? Because my focus is telling a good story with interesting characters, and just like me, young readers are interested, first and foremost, in story and characters. My daughter is about to turn 15 and she is passionate about the books she loves, the stories they tell, and especially the characters. She goes on amazing rants about characters and plots and stories. That's what she's focused on, and that's what I want to focus on in my stories, too, because I want readers who are as passionate about my work as shevis about her favorite books (and as I was at her age about mine).
What if?
So, how do I go about beginning a new fantasy project?
The basic question that gives rise to all fantasy (all fiction, really, but as I've already demonstrated, there's really no difference) is "What if?"
The best way I can illustrate this is with my own books.
Soulworm, my first published novel, began with me looking up at Signal Hill in Weyburn and thinking, "You know what would really look cool up there? A castle!" Then I began asking questions. "What if there were a parallel fantasy world with the same topography in which there is a castle on that hill? What if there were a connection between that world and this? What if something or someone came through it?" There were a million ways to go from that beginning, but that was the kernel.
Spirit Singer, which won a Saskatchewan Book Award, began with, "What if, when people died, someone who was still alive had to guide their souls through a kind of 'between world' to the gates of the afterlife? What if something went wrong with the process?"
Song of the Sword, and the whole Shards of Excalibur series, began when I was walking around Wascana Lake on a foggy day and thought, "Anything could be out in that water. It could go on forever, since you can't see the other side." And then, "What if the Lady of the Lake from King Arthur were out there?"
The Masks of Aygrima began with a masquerade mask we had kicking around the house. I looked at it and thought, "What if there were a society in which people didn't wear masks just for fancy balls, but were required to wear them every day?"
Flames of Nevyana, my upcoming YA fantasy for Rebelight Publishing, began with the question, "What if you could control electricity using magic?"
All fiction, as I noted, begins with a "What if," even contemporary fiction; but in fantasy, the "What if?" is far less constrained. After many, many years of reading and writing, the "What ifs?" come to me fast and furious. Writers are always asked "Where do you get your ideas?" and of course the big "secret" is that there is no secret: ideas are everywhere, all the time. It's not a challenge to get ideas, it's a challenge to decide which ones to turn into full-fledged stories or novels.
So how do I decide?
Well, to be perfectly accurate, sometimes I don't. I proceeded to write a trilogy based on my "What if?" about a masked society because my agent looked at that and another half-dozen ideas and thought the masks idea was the one with the most commercial possibility. I could write a novel or series of novels on every other one of the ideas I presented to him, and if only I had unlimited time and an unlimited lifespan, I darn well would.
But if it's entirely up to me, then I write the ones that lend themselves to the most interesting characters and situations: in other words, once again, it comes back to story. Which of these ideas holds the promise of a gripping story that will entertain readers, and entertain me while I write it? To go back to my complaint about pretentiousness among writers, I see myself, unpretentiously (I hope), primarily as an entertainer, competing with a thousand other types of entertainment. The better the story I tell, the more likely it is to be read.
"Dammit, Jim, I'm a writer, not a social worker!"
This is probably as good a place as any, since I'm mentioning pretentiousness, to talk about something the YA field that rubs me the wrong way: a tendency to talk about YA fiction as if it were primarily a kind of cod liver oil, good for what ails these darn kids today.
A few years ago at the World Fantasy Convention in Toronto, I attended a panel entitled "The Changing Face of YA Fantasy," described this way: "Fantasy works for young adult readers have changed over the years, perhaps even more than their counterparts for adults. The themes tackled are more cutting-edge; a wider variety of cultures is explored; locations are often more realistic, more gritty and urban, than in the past; a more diverse cast of characters is brought into play; and the heroines and heroes are perhaps more realistic than their predecessors. Our panel will discuss the popularity of YA fantasy, its changing face, and its future."
The panelists were well-known authors and one editor. They began with a discussion of whether YA fantasy is getting "too dark." The counter to that concern seemed to be that a) the "darkness" in young adult fiction is simply a reflection of the darkness of the real world and b) anyway, the darkness is good for YA readers.
"Any genre has to look at what's happening outside us," said one of the writers. "It's been a scary time, and the literature is going to reflect that…these books are teaching kids it's okay to be afraid."
The editor said, "The fear always seems to they're not ready to handle this, they don't have the tools. My argument is always that the book is the tool…most fantasy is proactive even in the worst-case scenario; it helps them deal with the reality outside. Even if they're not succeeding they're doing something."
The panel continued in that mode: the ways in which swearing, sex, race and other hot-button topics are dealt with in YA fiction were all discussed in terms of being good for the readers.
It's not that I disagree with that. It's true, I'm sure, that books help young readers deal with problems and I know it's true more for some readers than others, and I'm really glad it's true, and it's an important function of YA books, and blah, blah, blah…but what I kept hearing, underneath all that, was "Swallow your medicine like a good little boy."
Why did I feel like pushing back against this oh-so-worthwhile discussion of how oh-so-worthwhile YA books are? I think it goes back to a lecture one of my junior high teachers gave me when I couldn't remember the author of a book I'd enjoyed: it was important to remember the author's name, he (or possibly she; I don't remember the teacher, just the lecture!) said, because otherwise I was "just reading for escape."
As if that were a bad thing! C.S. Lewis once said that he never understood why "escapism" was flung at fantasy readers as an insult until his friend Tolkien asked him a simple question, "'What class of men would you expect to be most preoccupied with, and most hostile to, the idea of escape?' and gave the obvious answer: jailers."
Even the panelists in Toronto would probably say "escape" is a good thing, a doorway into a better world than the oh-so-terrible real world. But you know what? Escape is a good thing even if you don't really have anything you need to escape from. Entertainment is a worthwhile goal in its own right.
I'm as good as any author at talking about the oh-so-important issues in my books. But that's mostly just because that's the sort of thing you're expected to say. The truth is, I'm not writing novels to help readers deal with their problems, I'm writing to entertain them, and out of the sheer joy I get from creating worlds, characters, and stories.
It's very nice if readers put down one of my books and think, "I feel so much better about my own problems now that I've seen that character deal with theirs," but all I really want them to think is, "What a terrific story."
I am not a pharmacist, a counselor, a psychologist or a social worker. I am a storyteller. I tell stories set in the past, present and future, in worlds that exist, could exist, and can and do exist only in my mind. I welcome readers along for the ride.
As far as I'm concerned, that's a high enough calling right there.
Engaging the reader
So, how do you as a writer go about crafting a fantasy story young readers will latch on to?
Here are some things to think about, drawn not only from my own experience but from research into what other YA authors have to say about thesethings (although honestly, ask any three YA authors what makes a good YA story and you'll probably get four different answers).
I will number them, because then it looks more official.
The most popular viewpoint in YA right now (although I haven't used it myself yet) is first-person present-tense (as in The Hunger Games). You're right inside the head of the main character, and you're along for the ride. Even if you're using third person—as I do in The Shards of Excalibur and in The Masks of Aygrima—it's typically a very close-in viewpoint. I've got three point-of-view characters in Shards. One is an adult, two are teens, and when it's their POV I'm right inside their heads, showing you what they're thinking and feeling moment by moment. This is even more true of Masks and its sequels: the entire 300,000-word trilogy is told, except for a prologue in the first book, from the very close-in third-person POV of a 15-year-old girl. That immediacy is a hallmark of YA fiction.
This is a corollary to that close-in narrative viewpoint. If you're going to be inside the head of teenagers, you'd better be able to think like a teenager. "I think everyone's got a little teenager inside of them still, and you just have to work to help yourself access that teenager," says Veronica Roth, the author of the Divergent trilogy. "Every now and then I find myself having a character make a decision that feels very adult without having them earn it, and I have to go back and make sure I'm letting the characters make mistakes they would in real life at that age, like a parent."
Now, Veronica Roth is only in her 20s, so her inner teenager is perhaps a little closer to the surface than mine, and yet…we all remember what it was like to be a teenager, even me. I've been told by people who should know that my 15-year-old female protagonist seems like a very realistic 15-year-old girl, so I guess I didn't do too bad a job of thinking like a teen (not just a teen, but a teen girl. Go figure.)
If you start to sound like an adult observing the events rather than a teenager experiencing them, you'll turn off readers—not to mention editors.
Part of thinking like a teenager is to find the "emotional truth" of the teenage experience. Katniss rings true in The Hunger Games because her decisions make emotional sense, even if they're clearly bad decisions. My own Mara, one reviewer (who liked the books) called "the queen of bad decisions." But those decisions make emotional sense: maybe not for a grown-up, but for a teen girl.
And to return specifically to writing young adult fantasy, what makes the fantastical experiences and situations work is the fact that the teen characters involved in them still seem like real, flawed, emotional, inexperienced, passionate, sometimes silly, and still immature human beings, not stiff teenage-shaped puppets manipulated by an obviously adult writer. Fantasy is about the willing suspension of disbelief, and it's a lot easier to suspend disbelief from a solid structure of emotional truth.
As YA editor Kristen Petti puts it, "When you're in that time in your life, the trials and tribulations of friendships, romantic relationships, it's all very crucial and vital. That is one way the author presents themselves as authentic to the YA community, by nailing that keenness of feeling and emotion and high-stakes nature of the interactions they have with people every day."
Some of this may be easier with contemporary fantasy, where your YA characters, while possibly involved in saving the world or battling supernatural monsters, are still part of the same world as your readers. This gives you some new tools, such as pop-culture references. My character Wally is basically a modern-day version of me: he knows Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars and all these other fantastical pop culture touchstones, and I think that gives an extra layer of fun to the story as he compares his own experiences as a character in a fantasy novel to what characters in other fantasies have gone through.
Although a word of warning: pop culture references can date your story very fast. I suspect that's already true of several of the references I've made. But I made them anyway. Because they're fun. So sue me.
A lot of YA books are read by adults, and one reason is that as a rule YA novels are not as weighed down by the aforementioned literary pretentiousness as some modern adult fiction is. As Pettit puts it, "So much of adult literature has become so precious that sometimes what you just want is the ride. I think YA authors are freer to take you on a ride instead of constructing overwrought sentences and impressing you with their skill."
None of this means that YA is dumbed down, or that it can't get dark. It can get very dark: as my daughter notes whenever she reads something about adults worrying that something might be scary for teens, "Have they read any YA books recently?" There's literally nothing off-limits in YA these days.
But…and it's an important but…something you will almost always find in YA is a kernel of hope.
Sure things are dark, things are terrible, there's risk of death or worse, but at the end…there's always the sense that tomorrow is another day, that the characters have come through these terrible things and there is at least a hope that things will get better in the future.
And that, too, is true to the adolescent experience. Most people do make it through their teenage years, overcome the challenges and the mistakes and the terrors, and move into the new world of being an adult.
Thinking of it that way, every teen is on a quest to find the truth about him or her self, no matter how many mountains have to be scaled, depths that have to be plumbed, or demons that have to be fought along the way…just like the characters they love in the fantasies you and I write.]]>
Flames of Nevyana began life as Blue Fire, and was the last novel (for the moment) I've written "on spec": that is, I wrote the whole thing and then tried to sell it. It's been rewritten a lot since that first draft and is much stronger for it. I'm excited for readers to have a chance to discover it.
Release date will be sometime this summer: I'm hoping it will work out to do a book launch of some sort in Winnipeg in mid-July, when I'll be there anyway on a family trip. I'll keep you posted.
Great cover, huh?
In Cave Beneath the Sea, Edward Willett has created as exciting a read as the earlier books in the series, continuing to develop his characters and their relationships while the action-filled plot carries the reader to intriguing national and international locales. Both Ariane and Wally feel the power of the sword, drawing them to its shards but also compelling their anger in those who have hurt them: parents, siblings, bullies, enemies. And while they struggle with those yearnings, they are finding their way to a hitherto-unknown girlfriend-boyfriend relationship that provides them the family they both crave. It's hard for me to decide which is the stronger foundation for the story, the characters or the plot, as both are substantial and intricate. Regardless, Cave Beneath the Sea takes The Shards of Excalibur a fast-moving step closer to the Door to Faerie, the magical entity and Book 5 in the series.
Read the whole thing!
All the other poems: I Tumble Through the Diamond Dust; Virtuality; This is the Way the World Ends; The Last Thing Your Lips Touched; Facing the Silence; The Telling; Saint Billy; I Remember His Eyes; His Body Knows; Emily Alison Atkinson Finds God; I Will Ride Off the Horizon; There's Nothing Artificial About Love; He Really Should Have Written; Saving My Brother's Life; Dammit, I'm a Doctor, Not an Entree; Slime is Thicker Than Blood; The Maharajah of Mossbank; The Gathering of Stones; The Only Child; The Labyrinth of Regret.
Today: you've heard of Cowboy Poetry? This is Space Cowboy Poetry!
The lines are really long and so there are a number of odd line breaks due to the restrictions on length within the blog post, just so you know.
The provided first lines:
Bill wrangled in the early years, bustin broncos every fall,
a legend from the Cactus Hills, the wrangler Gomersall.
– Ken Mitchell, "Spook" from Rhyming Wranglers: Cowboy Poets of the Canadian West
isHisSince he stood at the edge
of dark valleys before
– Doris Bircham, "Valley of Shadows" from Where the Blue Grama Grows
The Tale of Old Bill from the Ship Cactus Hills
By Edward Willett
This is a tale from back in the day when the startrails were wild and free,
when the men and the women who sailed the skies were braver than you, or than me.
Now, life in the colonies out 'mongst the stars ain't no doubt could be pretty rough,
And those who could scrape out a living out there were more than just averagely tough.
Like most anybody who lives a rough life, time came when they wanted some fun,
And so 'fore you knew it the show-business ships started making a regular run.
"Planetfall," that's what starship folk call it when they come a-howlin' right down to the ground,
Though they mostly just dock the word clear down to "'fall," I think 'cause they just like the sound.
There were theatre ships, there were musical ships, there were burley-cue ships by the score,
But the ships that the colonists longed for the most were the rodeo ships, and what's more,
Them colonists found that the old cowboy code served them better than aught else they knew,
So before very many more years had passed by, all of them started cowboying, too.
Bill was born in a starship they'd dubbed Cactus Hills, out in deep space where there ain't no law.
He grew up real fast and he grew up real strong, and as tough as a diamond-edged saw.
Bill wrangled in the early years, bustin "broncos" every 'fall,
a legend from the Cactus Hills, the wrangler Gomersall.
He'd never been near an Earthly horse or seen an Earthly steer,
but he'd ride a six-legged horror or wrestle a gray slimy snake without fear.
Still, as years followed years Bill just had to face facts: he wasn't a kid anymore,
and wrangling "broncos" or wrestling "steers" left him limping a bit, and quite sore.
He spent a few years as a rodeo clown, 'til a thing with a poisonous sting
Got him good in the leg. They replaced it, of course, but he weren't no more good in the ring.
Still by then he had been on the circuit so long he was able to buy out the ship,
And as new Captain Bill of the old Cactus Hills started out on his very first trip.
They hit Formalhaut Four and old Alpha C Prime and a new place that ain't got no name,
And the new eager wranglers in their fancy duds started making their own claims to fame.
But then they got lost in the back of beyond when a cosmic string cut through their shield,
And the captain set down on the first world at hand, in a shiny green rock-covered field.
The engineer thought he could get the ship fixed, but it might be a month or a week.
"Do your best," Captain Bill said. "I'll get saddled up and go out on in the field for a peek."
He got on his "horse," an old robot named Pete, and rode it out into the field,
Where the things he'd thought rocks heaped up into a wall and a voice in his head told him, "Yield!"
Well, what could he do? He surrendered, of course, and they hustled him off to their queen,
A rather small boulder as blue as the sky, but her voice in his head sounded mean.
Seemed he'd squashed half her council beneath the ship's weight: hadn't killed them, but that was just luck.
She demanded he take off and he had to say that he couldn't, the ship was pure stuck.
Then a new kind of wrangling Bill had to do, as he wrestled with all of his might
To save Cactus Hills and the brave souls aboard from the wrath of the queen—what a fight!
It went on all day and it went on all night, and on that planet that's really long,
But when it was over old Bill had a deal. She'd let Cactus Hills move along.
But not Bill. He'd stay back, and would serve the blue queen, as a punishment fit for his crime,
And the weirdest thing was that he didn't much mind, and looked forward to serving his time.
Now, if you think that's strange, then you aren't like old Bill, or maybe a cowboy at all,
'Cause it really ain't strange that a cowboy like Bill heard the wide-open spaces' clear call.
He'd discovered he hadn't quite took to the way being Captain had kept him pent up.
This planet had wide-open spaces galore, and as he and the blue queen went up
To the top of a hill to watch his ship take off, he looked far and wide and felt fine:
He liked the tall mountains, and the way that the sun gave their snowcaps a sparkling shine.
So now Bill don't wrangle the alien broncs, or wrestle the tentacled steers,
You won't find him in some Martian rodeo town, in a cowboy bar downing some beers.
He don't have a ship, and he don't have a herd, but a whole wild planet is his,
Since he stood at the edge of dark valleys before the blue Rock Queen and heard her say this:
"Well, Wild Bill Gomersall, you've served me well for twenty long turns round the star.
"You've honored your word and you polished my sides and you've rolled me around near and far.
"Now most of this world doesn't suit us at all, but it seems to suit you a-okay,
"And I've talked to my council and we took a vote, and here's what they told me to say:
"Except for the parts of the world that are mine—just this hill-top, and that valley there,
"The rest of the planet is yours to explore: you can go where you like. Just beware:
"No more of your kind will be welcome down here: we'll crush any humans who try it.
"So if you want to leave, you must summon a robot ship down, and then you'll have to fly it."
But Old Bill looked around at that beautiful world, and he grinned, and he took off his hat,
And he swiped the sweat out of his eyes with his arm, then he turned and said, "Sure," just like that.
"Old cowboys don't like to be cooped up at all," he told the blue Queen with a grin.
"Just me all alone on a planet like this? In my book I'd count that a win."
Then he turned to the drone that he'd kept by his side when the Cactus Hills left him behind,
Told it the story that I've just told you, sent it up for the next ship to find.
That world is off-limits to everyone now, but by every space cowboy it's known:
That's the range of Old Bill ftom the ship Cactus Hills, and he happily rides it alone.
All the other poems: I Tumble Through the Diamond Dust; Virtuality; This is the Way the World Ends; The Last Thing Your Lips Touched; Facing the Silence; The Telling; Saint Billy; I Remember His Eyes; His Body Knows; Emily Alison Atkinson Finds God; I Will Ride Off the Horizon; There's Nothing Artificial About Love; He Really Should Have Written; Saving My Brother's Life; Dammit, I'm a Doctor, Not an Entree; Slime is Thicker Than Blood; The Maharajah of Mossbank; The Gathering of Stones; The Only Child; The Tale of Old Bill from the Ship Cactus Hills.
The first lines:
have you met the poet
who tried to stop writing
– Veryl Coghill, "The Space Too Small" from Make Me
I leave my shoes
to mark my place
– Anne Campbell, "I Leave My Shoes to Mark My Place" from Angel Wings All Over
My poem:
The Labyrinth of Regret
By Edward Willett
The labyrinth is endless, a maze
no Theseus could conquer,
no Minotaur could rule.
Souls from a thousand millennia
flit through the halls, frustrated,
frightened, frozen in the moment
when their lives went wrong
and their deaths began.
My guide is enthralled by the
suffering souls, a fan of their
tragic backstories.
"Have you met the poet
who tried to stop writing?"
he says, with a nudge
to point my gaze
toward a gaunt-eyed figure
trudging down
an endless winding stair.
He points at another,
sitting alone,
his head in his hands.
"That one," he says,
with a delighted chuckle,
"devoted his life to a
theory that foundered
on the hard rocks of facts,
while that one, the one
who's just sitting and rocking,
found the man that she loved
loved himself even more."
No matter the tale,
no matter their pasts,
the ghosts look the same:
longing and lost,
sallow and silent,
grieving and gray.
I do not remember
how I came to be here,
I do not remember
how I lived before.
I know I was going
to be a somebody,
make a big difference,
make myself a name.
But now I am nobody.
I made no difference.
I have no name.
My guide has left me,
or never was here.
I leave my shoes
to mark my place,
and barefoot began
my search for the exit
I already know
I will never find.


text:
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You've got to check out one of Distinctive Design's decoration stores if you're looking for Theme Design for that bachelor party you're planning.
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When looking for dazzling Theme Design or other event supplies in the Buena Park area, you'll see that White Wedding dba Too Cute has the best selection and service found anywhere.
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Check out Orange County Linens if you need to get some Arches for your wedding. Our decoration stores have lots to choose from.
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XL Entertainment prosound Lighting ...
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Air Born Creations decoration stores are a very good place to find the Balloon Decorations that you need—head there today for low prices and high quality.
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Consider A Touch of Pltnum as your source for creative Ribbons / Bows and other complete party design needs whenever planning an important event in Buena Park.
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Come on over to the A Perfect Aisle decoration store to find the perfect Props for your parents' anniversary party that you're throwing.
At CharmandHappy, there's all of the Arches you could ever hope for—our decoration stores have a very wide and diverse selection to choose from.
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You've got to check out one of A Fairytale Wedding's decoration stores if you're looking for Candles for that birthday party you're planning.
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text:
...I have a California multiple subjects credential.
(Multiple Subject SB 2042 credential)
I am a current long term substitute teacher in a fourth grade class until the end of the school year. I have taught a variety of grade levels across elementary schools in Marin, Novato, and Sonoma counties. I have been playing the piano for the past 15 years.
8 Subjects: including Japanese, reading, piano, ESL/ESOL
Corte Madera, CA
...I am also fluent in Japanese with extensive experience in editing and rewriting as well as some translation. As an ESL educator I have taught in a wide variety of situations from private tutoring to language schools to university teaching and have worked with students from many different countri...
17 Subjects: including Japanese, reading, English, SAT reading
El Cerrito, CA
...I lived in China, Japan, Taiwan, and Canada. And I worked in different industries for years. I studied Japanese at Fukushima Kennedy International College, I got Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT) N1 Level (Advanced). I used Japanese professionally for years and finished my high school education in Japan.
3 Subjects: including Japanese, elementary (k-6th), elementary math
Cotati, CA
...I taught for more than three years in Japan and Korea as an English teacher. Making connections with language learners, especially those who are not native English speakers, is very important to me. I teach speaking skills, writing, reading, and can adjust my lessons based on whether you're learning for a grade or for pleasure.
5 Subjects: including Japanese, English, ESL/ESOL, literature
Berkeley, CA


text:
|30 Reviews
|Property type
|Minimum Stay
|2 nights
When you book through the HomeAway checkout, your booking is backed by our Book with Confidence Guarantee™ offering comprehensive payment protection.Learn more
*** Call us at (801) 592-8081 for last-minute specials!! ***
For your next trip to sunny St. George, Utah, forget the hotel and be our guests in our recently remodeled spacious 2-level 1840 sq. ft. condo. Perfect for one family or bring another family along and share the cost! Great for a ladies retreat or scrapbooking getaway! Sleeps 6-10 easily. Also great for a romantic getaway for two!
Rates starting at $130/night, higher during high season and peak weekends. Please ask about last minute promotions and discounts!
*** NOTE: We also have a recently updated 1 BR CONDO (VRBO #363334) right next door. Sleeps 2-4 with rates starting at $70 per night, up to $90 during peak weekends ***
Conveniently located within minutes of the best golfing that St. George has to offer, as well as numerous mountain bike and running trails, Tuacahn Amphitheatre, Snow Canyon, Sand Hollow Aquatic Center, and more. Zions National Park and Sand Hollow State Park are also less than an hours drive away.
Our guests are entitled to make use of any of the countless amenities that have made Sports Village a favorite getaway spot for both families and retirees alike.
Whether you are looking to relax, or enjoy an active lifestyle, Sports Village has it all. Besides the main pool and Jacuzzi, our 18-and-over guests can enjoy the adults-only pool and Jacuzzi.
Other amenities provided by Sports Village include fitness center, tennis, racquetball, basketball, volleyball, shuffleboard, table tennis, air-hockey, mini-golf, playground and walk/jog path. We are happy to provide racquets, balls, etc. free of charge to our guests.
Wi-fi internet access is also available in the clubhouse. As an added benefit for our guests we provide complimentary in-condo wi-fi internet access.
Click 'Like' on our facebook page and become eligible for exclusive Pleasant Palms offers and discounts! Search for 'Pleasant Palms St George Vacation Condo Rental'
**Note: Condo is located on the top floor and is not handicap accessible.
Keywords: St. George, Zion National Park, Las Vegas, Pleasant Palms
For many years our extended Lee family had a cozy cabin in Fish Lake, UT. Built in 1950 under the direction of my late Grandfather (and namesake) Thomas Wilson Lee, it became an endeared part of the lives of Grandpa and Grandma Lee, their children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren. Nestled and hidden within a grove of pine trees, the cabin was given the very appropriate name of 'Pleasant Pines'. Unfortunately some years ago for a variety of reasons, my Dad, Uncles and Aunt had to make the difficult decision to sell the cabin. Since then our family has had to begin new traditions, but in the process we've had the opportunity in our travels to see and explore more of what our great state of Utah has to offer. One destination we found ourselves returning to time and time again was St. George. Whether to run the marathon or other races, visit nearby national and state parks, or just as a midway point on our way to Southern California, we enjoyed making visits to Utah's Dixie multiple times throughout the year. So when the opportunity came for us to purchase a condo at Sports Village, we jumped at the chance and have since been thoroughly enjoying our frequent getaway excursions to sunny St. George and our home-away-from-home. In hindsight, the name 'Pleasant Palms' is the perfect and maybe obvious choice for our new family retreat. However to give credit where it is due I must give my brother Steven the kudos for first suggesting the name. As much as we enjoy going to the condo, life in the real world means we can't go as often as we would like. But we figured our loss might as well be someone else's gain, so we made the decision to rent out the condo during those times when we aren't there. We look forward to many years of enjoyment and memories with family and friends at Pleasant Palms. We also look forward to making new friends among our guests and will do all that we can to make your stay at Pleasant Palms a wonderful experience!
Kim Lee purchased this condo in 2009
5/18/2013: Happy Spring Fling! Thank you for letting us have a relaxing girl's weekend. This is a beautiful condo with so many different activities to do. We have been able to enjoy it all. Thank you! 5/28/2013: We were in St George for a family reunion and decided to try renting a condo instead of 2 hotel rooms. Definitely the right decision. Your place was wonderful! Lots of room for our family and plenty of fun things to do at the clubhouse. We will be back - THANKS! 6/1/2013: You have a lovely condo and it met all of our needs. It's so nice to spend a vacation where we can enjoy all the comforts of home! Thank you- we hope to make this place a vacation destination again. 6/8/2013: Thank you so much for letting us stay at this beautiful condo of yours. This will be a "Priest trip" the boys will be talking about for a while. This place was perfect for 5 rambunctious young men and us leaders as well. I am pretty sure we did and touched everything there was to do and see here at Sports Village. Very fun condo. I will be coming back with the family next time. 6/15/2013: What an amazing trip this was! Your place is beautiful I especially loved the upstairs area. My boyfriend proposed to me on the top of Angel's Landing! This nice vacation will be one I'll never forget. We definitely want to come back soon! 7/1/2013: We have been coming to St George for a week every year for about 10 years now. We love it. We've stayed here 3 or 4 times and it's great. Nice job on the upgrade the carpet is nice. Thanks!
This was our 2nd time using your condo and we were just as pleased this time. Very well stocked for fun and convenience. Loved it !
The Condo's were beautiful and clean. We had a great time , would definitely return for another visit.Thanks Tom and Kim
The condo was clean, lots of room and fun activities on the property.
We thought this was a really great place to stay. The owners were really nice. There was a few hiccups along the way, but Kim was really awesome! We would love to stay here again. We wish they had a gas grill on the porch. Other than that we really loved everything!
Start to finish, the whole experience of renting this condo was easy and wonderful. I am an attorney who was in town for a conference and I decided to bring my wife and four kids along to enjoy the sun. My wife and I loved having our room on its own floor. And, the 2nd floor loft was a great place to use to give the kids separate space when needed. There is a ton to do at the Sports Village--the pool was great and my older sons loved the tennis courts. But, what really makes THIS condo the place to stay is the space inside. One of the four days that we stayed at the condo was cooler than the others and swimming wasn't an option. I was gone, but my wife had no problem keeping the kids entertained inside. No risk of cabin fever. Not only is there lots of room, but there are also games in the cabinet and separate areas to watch a show. We considered several other condos at Sports Village, but decided to spend just a bit more for this one. We were very glad we did. The place was immaculate and stocked with everything we needed. There were dryer sheets and band-aids, not to mention a small bottle of cinnamon just where we hoped it might be. We treated the condo gently, but with four boys there's only so much you can do. The damage deposit is not insignificant, but you should not lose sleep over getting it back. We were not asked to give it the white glove treatment and were not nickel-and-dimed for merely treating it with the same regard we do our own home. Lest you think I am a hired gun reviewer, I will add what little feedback I can: (1) it should be made more clear that to get into the pool you have to go through the clubhouse, there is no way to enter the pool without going through the clubhouse attendant; (2) the playground was great fun for our smaller boys, but needs just a bit of repair work. Note that none of that has anything to do with the condo itself, which we loved and plan to return to. The owners were a breeze to work with, helpful without being overbearing in the slightest. I can honestly say that we enjoyed this condo more than we would have a $400 a night hotel. And, make sure to grab some great pizza at Bella Marie's just down the hill.
Las Vegas is 1 Hr 45 Min Away, Zion National Park 40 Min.
|Rate Period
|Weekend Night
May 9 2016 - Sep 30 2016
2 night minimum stay
Oct 1 - Oct 30
2 night minimum stay
Nov 1 2016 - Jan 31 2017
2 night minimum stay
Feb 1 2017 - May 7 2017
2 night minimum stay
My Standard Rate
2 night minimum stay
|Refundable damage deposit
|Cleaning Fee
|$80 + Tax
|Tax Rate
Rates are subject to change until reservation is confirmed. Rates typically higher ($170-$190) for special events and peak weekends. Three-night minimum may apply for some weekends. Cleaning fees may be assessed based on length of stay as well as applicable state & local taxes.


text:
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text:
Patience is a virtue, and it also makes a beautiful name for a baby girl. Virtue baby names for boys and girls, like Hope, Mercy and Constance, may have gotten their start with the early American Puritans, but they're making a big comeback for parents in the new millennium.
Although more popular with girl names than boy names, virtue names are both spiritual and unique. With celebrities like Jessica Alba getting in on the virtue name trend (her daughters are named Honor and Haven), you are sure to see some of these names climb the charts. They are distinct enough, however, to help your child stand out in a crowd.
More: This printable guide is about to solve all your baby-naming squabbles
The following names are unique and beautiful — and perfect for your baby girl. The name Heaven peaked in 2005 at number 245 on the Social Security Administration's top baby name list (currently at number 317), while Neveah (heaven spelled backwards) has been moving up the chart since 2006 (currently at 893). Here are more virtue names for baby girls:
Boy virtue names are not as popular as girl virtue names. Many of the names would make a great middle name or unique first name for baby boys — just keep in mind that you don't want a name that sounds too pretentious. However, if you want a future sports star, many of these boy virtue names would look great on the back of a jersey!
More: Pregnant women went underwater for a mermaid photo shoot that's out of this world
Next Up: Celebrity virtue names
And you'll see personalized content just for you whenever you click the My Feed .
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text:
Healthcare Is What We Know!
Healthcare Is What
We Know!
Improving efficiency and reducing costs for hospitals, is what we breathe day in and day out.
Improving efficiency and reducing costs
for hospitals, is what we
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A Managed Print Services Program that has everything covered. A benefit your hospital can not live without.
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Learn how we've re-defined the meaning of what a Managed Print Services program is for hospitals and health systems.
An evaluative review that brings visibility to spend and uncovers inefficiencies – at no cost.
News & Events
To watch the video of Realizing True Savings Through Managed Print Services click here.
Photizo Group selects Auxilio to participate in the 2015 Leaders Index for MPS.
Together with Redspin's IT Security Service, Auxilio helps hospitals with the increasing demand of preventing and remediating security attacks.
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Time is of the essence in hospital care when minutes can make the difference in the experience of the public and the perceived quality care of each patient. Auxilio's workflow efficiency solutions and high performance standards significantly improved the hospital's processes.


text:
Buying Guide for Inline Skates
The North Face Accessories
Showing 1 - 4 items
The versatile Brolapse Hoodie is so much more than meets the eye. With a longer fit and two secure-zip pockets, this water-resistant hoodie is a stellar midlayer for powder days or taking laps in the park when the sun is shining. Four-way stretch fabri... Read More
{boxId:"compareda76d71c7dc1707223be5b9036", id:"434045P"}
A new take on a classic from The North Face, the Surgent Half Dome Hoodie features a three-piece, jersey-lined hood with contrasting pop colors. Made of polyester jersey faced fleece for warmth and engineered with mechanical stretch for unrestricted mo... Read More
{boxId:"compare25760e4a4a79dfff4f477304b6", id:"432878P"}
Reg. $45.00
Show off your love for your favorite National Park with this North Face Hoodie. Made with cotton and polyester this hoodie is super cozy. Kangaroo hand pocket keeps your fingers nice and warm during cool nights. Featuring ribbed cuffs and a ribbed wai... Read More
{boxId:"compare43fc1f9fedd88b5a9df57769b3", id:"418475P"}
Get physical in The Graphic Play Hard Tank from North Face. This lightweight, screen-printed racerback tank is moisture wicking and incredibly breathable. Its longer length, shaped hem and loose fit give you great mobility for intense training days; w... Read More
{boxId:"compare24b9ffb54bdd02ed416808ad0e", id:"428351P"}


text:
Energy, Raw Material Prices Top CEO Concerns, PwC Says
Fifty-three percent of CEOs say energy and raw materials costs are the biggest threats to business growth prospects, according to a PricewaterhouseCoopers survey.
The results from PwC's Global Annual CEO Survey, which will be released in January, show a seven percent increase over corporate leaders' concerns last year about energy and raw material costs. The issue has now topped consumer spending and behavior as a top threat, PwC says.
The survey includes 795 respondents from across North and South America, Europe, Asia Pacific, the Middle East and Africa.
The survey also found:
- 24 percent of Western European CEOs are concerned or extremely concerned about energy and natural resources costs.
- 47 percent of CEOs will increase their focus on reducing their environmental footprint in the next year, while 41 percent said there would be no change.
- One in four CEOs plan to increase investment in securing natural resources critical to business and addressing the risks of climate change/protecting biodiversity.
- When asked about their businesses' ability to cope with extreme events, more than a third say natural disasters threatening major trading or manufacturing hubs would have a negative impact on them.
With politicians at last week's UN climate talks in Doha failing to deliver a long-term agreement on climate change, the responsibility falls on business leaders to address environmental risk, PwC says. On Saturday, nations agreed to extend pollution limits under the Kyoto Protocol to 2020, but the talks were regarded largely as a chance to tie up loose ends and start focusing on a longer-term treaty to be agreed by 2015.
More than one third (38 percent) of corporate sustainability leaders say their CEOs take a long-term perspective on sustainability, according to a Verdantix report published in November. The study also found 12 percent of sustainability leaders say sustainability is a new concept for their CEOs, while 21 percent of CEOs believe sustainability affects quarterly performance, according to executives surveyed.
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- BuildingIQ Makes 2 Moves
- Constellation Acquiring Retail Electricity, Natural Gas Businesses from ConEdison Solutions
- Peninsula Clean Energy Authority Chooses Direct Energy as Supplier
- Energy Efficiency is Growing on Farms
- DC Pushes Renewables