Excerpts Versus Preview Chapters

Three new and super thrilling kids books:

1. The Battle for Wondla by Tony DiTerlizzi
It's HERE! Read it. Be excited. Find Clarissa when you're here and gush about it.

2. Rules of Summer by Shaun Tan
Guys. Shaun Tan. This book is quirky and wonderful and despite being totally outlandish reminds me of being a little kid again.

3. Nancy Drew: The Secret of the Old Clock by Carolyn Keene
Why am I excited by yet another set of Nancy Drew? Because they just rereleased the first four and they're BEAUTIFUL.

Sometimes in the months leading up to the release of a new a book authors and publishers will offer sneak peaks. I am all for misleading, potentially soul destroying snippets of books. I love teaser scenes. I love when they're scenes that make me think I know what's going on and then I read the book and I'm totally blown away by how wrong I was. I love seeing how important context is.

The other day I ripped through the scenes Leigh Bardugo released from Ruin and Rising, the final book in the Grisha trilogy. They were good length scenes and some of them ended on cliffhangers.

What I can never bring myself to do though, is read preview chapters. Sometimes the whole prologue or first couple of chapters are released. I just can't do it. I can't read it. It's too much.

This is fresh in my head because yesterday Stephanie Perkins released the first two chapters of Isla and the Happily Ever After. I cannot tell you how happy I will be when this book is finally in my hands. I might die. Not really, that would be tragic if I died without reading it. I squealed in utter delight when I saw her tweet about the excerpt.

And then I read the blog post and saw the words "first two chapters."  I just couldn't. And I wondered about it, especially so soon after devouring the scenes from Ruin and Rising.

There's something about getting full chapters that's too much. It's just enough to get really into and then have your hopes and dreams dashed because there's no more. It's not teasing it's torturing. I can't do it.

Instead I skimmed the chapters, reading pieces of them at random. And I was delighted, giggling already just from the couple of sentences I had. I finished with a sigh of wonderment. The book is real and it's coming.

I know some people dive into preview chapters. I just can't do it. But give me snippets galore and I will be happy.

-Amy