Orange ya glad

When I was a lad, my favorite color was orange. It was close. Green was in second and threatened to overcome orange, as did red. But orange won out.

This might have been because orange is the color of fire. Or because the carpet in my room was orange. Or my hair. It's irrelevant.

The point is this: My bike is orange. It's one of my prized possessions. My blog is orange, as you can quickly see by shifting your eyes slightly up. YA MS the Third (soon to be titled; watch this space) has always been orange in my mind. (The Absolute Value of -1 has always been black and red, for what it's worth; it's a happy coincidence, perhaps, that it was black and red for the cover designers, too.)

With all that in mind, I present you with these:I coveteth them.

Furthermore, they represent a burgeoning movement in YA literature borne of Heidi R. Kling's debut novel, the beautifully written and achingly romantic Sea.

So buy a pair of orange chucks--or yellow ones, sure--and don them proudly. And when you see another person out in public, particularly at the Jacob Javits Center May 25 to 27, wearing cool-ass Chucks in orange or yellow, you'll know why.