Pursuing the Lioness Guest Post: Rhiannon Ryder

Today’s fantastic guest post is courtesy of Rhiannon, who made my day by offering to write one for this challenge.

I read this and smiled my way through the whole thing. And check out the picture of her books at the end of the post – Awesome! Thanks, Rhiannon!

Enjoy!
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When I was twelve, I went to the small bookshop in Saskatoon that specialized in Children’s and Young Adult books, and I picked up a book called Alanna: the First Adventure.  It was 1990, and I was already a prolific reader; I would spend the week saving change so that on Saturday I could either walk to the local Coles or get a ride to children’s bookstore (that I no longer remember the name of) and buy one book.  The sticker, still on my first Lioness book, reads 4.50$, which doesn’t sound like much now, but was a big deal on a dollar a week allowance (yes sad but true, 1$ per week!).I had just finished reading a series my best friend of the time had lent me, for the life of me I can’t remember the name of it, about a girl that ends up traveling out of her time and world into a world where she meets up with a band of warriors and has to learn to fight.  I really enjoyed it, and I can still remember picking up the Alanna: the first Adventure and reading the back and being sold right there on the spot.

Alanna of Trebond has always yearned to become a warrior maiden, and she’s not about to let little things like the wrong gender or her mysterious, magical power known as the Gift get in her way.  She manages to disguise herself as a boy so thoroughly that she gains admittance to the palace military academy and quickly establishes herself as the most talented of the new knights-in-training.  What she doesn’t count on, however, is just how hard it can be to maintain her secret over time-

I no longer remember how long it took me to collect all four of the books, if my mom felt sorry for me and stepped in to help buy them quicker, or how long it was before I lent them to my best friend.  I can remember how completely in love I was almost from the first line. It was my first kick ass girly figure and I loved it!  She eventually accomplished anything she put her mind to, despite being a scrawny, petite girl.  And even while getting her first period! Ugh, I distinctly remember the horror of joining her in that particular girly hell.  How did she manage?!

For years I waited and watched, hoping desperately for more of Tamora Pierce’s books.  But none ever trickled into the bookstores or the library, so I just re-read my Alanna books over and over and assumed that was the end.  There was no Internet, at least not as we know it today, so how was I to know that she was continuing to write books I would love?

In 2008, I went with my husband to the New York Comic Con, he was pitching a comic to various publishers and I thought I’d check out the fun for one day.  As he was talking someone up I wandered up to a Random house table and started perusing the Books.  There was a book, Beka Cooper: Terrier, by Tamora Pierce sitting there, and I picked it up wondering if after all these years it could truly be another of my beloved authors books.  “It’s signed if you’re interested”, was she kidding?  17 years later and here she was.  As I looked at her list of other published works I was amazed, there were ten other Tortall Legend books, two of them being about Alanna’s daughter Aly.

That summer was my Tamora Pierce summer.  At 29, the books were pretty much double what I was paying for them when I was twelve, but on the upside I had a job and could afford to buy a lot more at a time! I scoured every one of my beloved Toronto used bookstores and then used indigo’s buy three get one free sale to collect the 10 other Tortall books.  I spent that summer sitting outside and reading, I ate those books up like candy, loving every minute.  I eventually started her other series as well the Circle of Magic quartet, which I also loved, but I’m waiting for my next Indigo buy three get one free sales to get the final five books in that series.

That was also the summer that re-introduced me to the YA and 9-12 sections in the bookstore.  Sure I’d read Harry Potter, but what about all the other amazing teen and children’s authors that had popped up over the long years?  Since then I’ve developed a heavily overburdened bookshelf of Children’s and YA fiction, and although I’m a huge history buff and love just the widest assortment of genres, I find I just keep coming back to my beloved YA and Children’s lit.

But what particularly amazes me about Tamora Pierce, is that after all these years I still love her books.  Despite being first published in 1983, The Lioness Quartet has never lost it’s magic for me, and her new books (especially the Beka Cooper series and the to Trickster books) are absolutely just as outstanding.  I strongly believe that Tamora laid the groundwork for people like Kristin Cashore, Cassandra Clare and Holly Black to write the strong female Hero fiction they write today.  And what a fine thing that is, because every girl should know that they can be the Hero of their own story.

If you haven’t read any yet, pick yourself up some Tamora Pierce fiction today, treat yourself, you won’t be disappointed!

(Click to make gloriously larger)