I just got to see copies of The Unidentified, Australian-style. It’ll be released by Text Publishing on January 31. I’m really excited about this, guys.

Harpy newt ear, everyone.

I’m going to be doing a lot of traveling this year and my New Year resolution is to ENJOY IT.

Otherwise, the goal is to finish up revisions on the Untitled Mudbook in time for its 2012 pub date. It’s a family saga set in the creepily realistic aftermath of climatic catastrophe in the Pacific Northwest. I can’t wait to be done with this book and get it out to readers before it’s too late . . . duh duh duuum.

Here’s to a happy and productive 2011!

*clink*

The Game in the Unidentified relies on the players’ natural inclination to want to figure stuff out and complete the task. I’ll be posting some of my favorite games here, the kind that offer no instruction on how to get started, you just figure it out by playing.

PLAY IT

I saw this video after the Unidentified was already out of copyedits. Have to say, I was crazy surprised to see how Jesse Schell‘s vision of the future of games and consumerism was eerily similar to what I described in the UnID. (“the games will be tricking you to pay more attention to ads…”) His ideas are even creepier though because his areas of expertise probably give him a better idea about the whole thing whereas I was just making stuff up.

I really like this article in the Huffington Post defending the “Net Generation.” Instead of blaming young peoples’ daily digital interactions for poor results in schools, it explores how skillfully they can navigate and synthesize information and that maybe teaching styles ought to change to engage their ways of thinking.

Even though the world of the Unidentified has been described as a creepy tech dystopia, the characters are still creative and intelligent kids. There’s a reason for that.

Via my friends at Skate Like A Girl, this video by Dr. Tae eerily advocates just the kind of radical active education proposed in The Unidentified (especially the Park, for those of you who’ve read the book.) The video isn’t super engaging in the beginning, but the content is spot on. At 14:30 when he illustrates the learning process by attempting a new skateboard trick is super entertaining. Definitely worth watching.

Hey. Stuff’s been happening, I’m just so bad at keeping people updated. I’m working feverishly on the follow-up book to the Unidentified (not a sequel, though after hearing from readers I’m starting to consider other stories set in that world now too) and also I had a baby a month ago without telling the internet.

Since I’m naturally secretive about personal events and works-in-progress (and also think that just writing buy-my-book promo stuff is super boring), I’m going to try a new approach and use this space to point at things on the internet that refer to the themes and things in the books I write. So check here for interesting and weird links to social media trends, alternate education practices, and game design and psychology. Wee!

I’m also somewhat active on twitter if you want to follow me there. Facebook, not so much.

See you around the interwebs.

I had a lot of fun chatting with the teen writers at inkpop the other day. The conversation about writing dystopian novels is still available there, but if you want a cheat sheet there’s a condensed version with five tips for writing the world as we know it, but worse.

Thanks everyone for giving the Unidentified a fantastic Book Release Day. The book feels good and welcomed into the world.

Don’t forget that I’m answering questions over at inkpop tonight 5pm EST. There’s already a bunch of really great questions lined up and waiting…

Enter to win a copy of the Unidentified over at goodreads. They’ve got ten copies and you’ve got three more days to enter!

update: oop! it’s closed now. Congrats to the winners!