Friday, November 28, 2008
Pie Making Disasters -- Or were they?
For Thanksgiving this year, I was in charge of pies. This year, the pumpkins did very well, so after Halloween, I set aside two likely pumpkins from our harvest and made pumpkin pie from scratch. Years ago, before I owned a blender and before there was such a thing as a food processor, I made pumpkin pie from scratch. I had to use a wire strainer for the pumpkin and about six hours later, I swore that the best pie in the world did not justify that kind of labor. Fast forward many years. Cooked the pumpkin about 1.5 hours. Worked on The Next Historical while it cooked. Scraped off the pulp, pureed it in the FP: 20 min tops. Made the pie filling, including an unauthorized addition of molasses because I was feeling frisky. Whoo hoo!
Oops. No lard for the pie crust. I made another unauthorized substitution of butter for lard. Tip: Do not do this. The pies smelled great, but the crust looked gross and disgusting. I did not have high hopes for my pies. Sob.
My sister and son were making diet Key Lime pie, for which, I proudly said, I had bought all the ingredients for them, wasn't I great?!
Oops. I neglected to buy a lime. But hey! No problem! We have a lime tree out back. The son gets sent outside with a flashlight and a description of a lime. He comes back with nothing. The sole lime on the tree was not lime-like in appearance. We agreed it probably wasn't ripe. Or possibly it was dead or something. Son gets sent out with the flashlight and instructions to get a lemon. This he does.
Also, no one put diet whipped topping on the list so I didn't buy that. NOT my fault.
But still, oops. So we decide to substitute some non-diet frozen whipped topping.
On two separate shopping trips, I'd bought gelatin and lime green sugar-free jell-o. One of them was for the pie. My sister grabbed, reasonably, the gelatin. I wasn't in charge of the Key Lime Pie so I didn't think about it at all. The box contains 8 total oz of gelatin in 32 packets. The recipe calls for 1/16th of an ounce of gelatin.
Argh!! Arithmetic required. Hilarity ensures until the calculations are made. At least one person ended up with a headache. Now, I am making pumpkin pie and dealing with my pie crust disaster and while I noted that my sister had a recipe in her hand and that my son had his iPhone in his hand with a recipe, I did not think of the implications.
At the end of the key lime pie stuff, there were ingredients that didn't make it into the Key Lime Pie. Typically with recipes there aren't leftovers so early in the process. Turns out my sister and son had two different recipes.
Oops. We shrug and put a very very pale looking pie in the fridge because, hey, maybe it won't taste like poison. The pumpkin pies are cooking but the crust is turning dark at a rate the does not bode well given the amount of time the pies are supposed to cook.
On to the Mud Pie, for which yours truly had also bought all the ingredients. Mom totally rocks! Son crushes the Oreos until he gets sent to fetch the required vanilla pudding. Only for some reason, the box says Banana Cream Pie pudding. Soccer Boy was not willing to make the obvious substitution. (Lemon in the Key Lime Pie, sure! Banana Cream Pie pudding in the Mud Pie -- Nooo!)
Oops. Sister drives son to grocery store and they very nearly purchase Banana Cream Pie pudding again because of how close it is to the vanilla. (See? That could have happened to anybody!) But they did get vanilla. I was then still stressing over my blackening pie crusts and didn't think to tell my sister that the mixer never gets all the stuff in the bottom of the bowl. So when they're ready to pour the layer of vanilla pudding over the layer of crushed Oreos we all think it's kind of odd that the pudding is so very unlike actual pudding, which is, you know, thick and pudding like. Alternating layers of crushed Oreos and pudding wasn't happening. It was more like a melange of ingredients. But we pretended.
Then we got to the bottom of the mixing bowl and it was lumpy and not mixed at all. About then I remembered the thing about the mixer not mixing too well.
Oops. So we just pour the rest of the stuff into the bowl of "Mud Pie" and put it in the fridge to hope for the best.
My pie crusts are freaking black. Like charcoal. I went to bed depressed about pie disasters.
The following morning, which is Thanksgiving, I pack everything up and my son and I drive to my brother's house. The Mud Pie, which we thought had solidified overnight leaked all over my car. This, I say to my son, is Sludge Pie, and we're not going to be able to fake our way out of this like we can with the pumpkin pies and the Key Lemon/Lime Pie. So we admit the problem and put the Sludge pie in the freezer in the hopes that anything with Oreos as a main ingredient can't be all bad.
We have a very nice meal and a brief break and then the pies come out. Uh oh. I dash into the kitchen and successfully cut away all the black pie crust before anyone can think the better of requesting pumpkin pie.
I was kind, though, and taste tested it first in case I needed to prevent hospital visits later by throwing away the pies. And guess what?
The pumpkin pie was freaking awesome. Even the un-burned crust was at least decent.
I also taste-tested the Key Lemon/Lime pie, and guess what?
It was pretty good.
Then we brought out the Sludge pie. Warnings were duly made. But the kids were all hot to try Sludge Pie. It wasn't exactly frozen, but it was really really thick. And guess what?
The Sludge Pie was gone, entirely consumed in a very short time. It was actually kind of tasty, particularly if you like sugar.
Now, I don't necessarily recommend winging it like we did, especially with pie crusts which as everyone knows proves one's cooking chops and later confers the ability to smile smugly while people ask how on earth you did that like you're a cooking goddess or something. But we did and we came out OK.
Try at your own risk.
Oops. No lard for the pie crust. I made another unauthorized substitution of butter for lard. Tip: Do not do this. The pies smelled great, but the crust looked gross and disgusting. I did not have high hopes for my pies. Sob.
My sister and son were making diet Key Lime pie, for which, I proudly said, I had bought all the ingredients for them, wasn't I great?!
Oops. I neglected to buy a lime. But hey! No problem! We have a lime tree out back. The son gets sent outside with a flashlight and a description of a lime. He comes back with nothing. The sole lime on the tree was not lime-like in appearance. We agreed it probably wasn't ripe. Or possibly it was dead or something. Son gets sent out with the flashlight and instructions to get a lemon. This he does.
Also, no one put diet whipped topping on the list so I didn't buy that. NOT my fault.
But still, oops. So we decide to substitute some non-diet frozen whipped topping.
On two separate shopping trips, I'd bought gelatin and lime green sugar-free jell-o. One of them was for the pie. My sister grabbed, reasonably, the gelatin. I wasn't in charge of the Key Lime Pie so I didn't think about it at all. The box contains 8 total oz of gelatin in 32 packets. The recipe calls for 1/16th of an ounce of gelatin.
Argh!! Arithmetic required. Hilarity ensures until the calculations are made. At least one person ended up with a headache. Now, I am making pumpkin pie and dealing with my pie crust disaster and while I noted that my sister had a recipe in her hand and that my son had his iPhone in his hand with a recipe, I did not think of the implications.
At the end of the key lime pie stuff, there were ingredients that didn't make it into the Key Lime Pie. Typically with recipes there aren't leftovers so early in the process. Turns out my sister and son had two different recipes.
Oops. We shrug and put a very very pale looking pie in the fridge because, hey, maybe it won't taste like poison. The pumpkin pies are cooking but the crust is turning dark at a rate the does not bode well given the amount of time the pies are supposed to cook.
On to the Mud Pie, for which yours truly had also bought all the ingredients. Mom totally rocks! Son crushes the Oreos until he gets sent to fetch the required vanilla pudding. Only for some reason, the box says Banana Cream Pie pudding. Soccer Boy was not willing to make the obvious substitution. (Lemon in the Key Lime Pie, sure! Banana Cream Pie pudding in the Mud Pie -- Nooo!)
Oops. Sister drives son to grocery store and they very nearly purchase Banana Cream Pie pudding again because of how close it is to the vanilla. (See? That could have happened to anybody!) But they did get vanilla. I was then still stressing over my blackening pie crusts and didn't think to tell my sister that the mixer never gets all the stuff in the bottom of the bowl. So when they're ready to pour the layer of vanilla pudding over the layer of crushed Oreos we all think it's kind of odd that the pudding is so very unlike actual pudding, which is, you know, thick and pudding like. Alternating layers of crushed Oreos and pudding wasn't happening. It was more like a melange of ingredients. But we pretended.
Then we got to the bottom of the mixing bowl and it was lumpy and not mixed at all. About then I remembered the thing about the mixer not mixing too well.
Oops. So we just pour the rest of the stuff into the bowl of "Mud Pie" and put it in the fridge to hope for the best.
My pie crusts are freaking black. Like charcoal. I went to bed depressed about pie disasters.
The following morning, which is Thanksgiving, I pack everything up and my son and I drive to my brother's house. The Mud Pie, which we thought had solidified overnight leaked all over my car. This, I say to my son, is Sludge Pie, and we're not going to be able to fake our way out of this like we can with the pumpkin pies and the Key Lemon/Lime Pie. So we admit the problem and put the Sludge pie in the freezer in the hopes that anything with Oreos as a main ingredient can't be all bad.
We have a very nice meal and a brief break and then the pies come out. Uh oh. I dash into the kitchen and successfully cut away all the black pie crust before anyone can think the better of requesting pumpkin pie.
I was kind, though, and taste tested it first in case I needed to prevent hospital visits later by throwing away the pies. And guess what?
The pumpkin pie was freaking awesome. Even the un-burned crust was at least decent.
I also taste-tested the Key Lemon/Lime pie, and guess what?
It was pretty good.
Then we brought out the Sludge pie. Warnings were duly made. But the kids were all hot to try Sludge Pie. It wasn't exactly frozen, but it was really really thick. And guess what?
The Sludge Pie was gone, entirely consumed in a very short time. It was actually kind of tasty, particularly if you like sugar.
Now, I don't necessarily recommend winging it like we did, especially with pie crusts which as everyone knows proves one's cooking chops and later confers the ability to smile smugly while people ask how on earth you did that like you're a cooking goddess or something. But we did and we came out OK.
Try at your own risk.
Labels: Pies, winging it
posted by Carolyn @ 11/28/2008 10:29:00 PM Permalink
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Interview with Jessica Brody
I have another author interview for you all; the tremendously talented Jessica Brody
Jessica Brody graduated from Smith College with degrees in economics and French. A full-time writer and producer, she lives in Los Angeles where she is currently working on her next novel.
A gripping story of one woman's quest to come to terms with her past, find her future, and-most of all-rediscover her faith in love, THE FIDELITY FILES was chosen as one of USA Today's hottest summer reads and has recently been optioned for television. St. Martin's Press and Random House UK have already purchased the sequel (yet untitled) to be published in the fall of 2009 and Jessica has recently sold two young adult novels to Farrar, Straus, Giroux.
Tell us about your latest release and the inspiration behind it.
The Fidelity Files is the story of a beautiful L.A. woman who works as an undercover "fidelity inspector," hired by suspicious wives and girlfriends to test the faithfulness of the men in their lives. Except no one in her life knows what she does. Her friends and family all think she works for an investment bank.
Before I became a full-time writer, I worked in a very corporate environment. And like all corporate jobs, there were a certain number of "alcohol-related" events that I was expected to attend. I would often find myself at work happy hour functions in nearby bars, observing the interactions between single and non-single co-workers as their behaviors gradually declined from professional to something else entirely. Something hardly capable of being described as "appropriate."
Witnessing these "indiscretions" upset me on a profound level. I secretly wished that someone would tell the "conveniently" absent significant others about what their husbands/wives/boyfriends/ girlfriends/fiancés really did while attending these "obligatory" and supposedly "uneventful" work functions. But I certainly wasn't going to be the one to do it. I was brave enough to think it...but not exactly brave enough to go knocking on people's doors with bad news. You know what people tend to do to "the messenger."
So instead I created a character whose job and purpose in life was to do just that. To reveal the truth to anyone who wanted to know. To knock on all the doors that I never had the courage to knock on. An invincible superhero-esque woman whose quest is to fight against the evils of infidelity. But of course, she soon finds out... she's not as invincible as she once thought.
Do you put your friends in your books? Names, incidents, characteristics? Have any of them recognized themselves in a not-so-good way?
My friends are definitely in my books. There's one in particular that stands out. One of Jen's friends, Zo, has a bad case of road rage. And she tends to talk on the phone while she drives, so Jen often finds herself on the phone with Zo while she's cursing out another driver. I have a friend who does that and that's where I got the idea. This friend has read the book but I'm not sure how she feels about the similarities. She acts like she's fine with it, but I guess you never know. She could secretly be totally offended.
Which craft book has inspired or helped you the most throughout your writing career?
I can't sing enough praise for Save the Cat by Blake Snyder. It has "saved" so many manuscripts of mine. It's meant for screenwriters but it works flawlessly for novels as well. It's just a very intuitive way to write stories and make sure the audience isn't bored to tears because nothing is happening for fifty pages. Now, I consult the book before I even start writing and I use his "beat sheet" to help me outline the major story points. It saves me so much time later on!
If you were in charge of casting the movie adaptation of your book, who gets the call?
I've always struggled with this question because I've never really had one person in mind for the role of Jennifer/Ashlyn. She would have to be beautiful and sexy so that the men in the movie would fall for her but she would also has to come off as sympathetic and a little vulnerable so that audience would relate to her. I would love to see Rachel McAdams in the role because I think she could pull it off. Also Natalie Portman, Jessica Biel, Scarlett Johansson or Keira Knightley would be great casts.
As for Jamie, the love interest, Patrick Dempsey is an obvious cast for me. I think he has that distinguished mature look that's described in the book and he also comes off as very sweet and genuine. That's the kind of guy Jamie is in my head.
Do you have a sample chapter posted?
Read an excerpt.
What's been your biggest surprise about getting published?
How LONG it takes for a book to hit the shelves! Holy cow! I was a young woman when I sold that thing. I really wasn't expecting it to take that long. I thought six months maybe, nine tops. But from the time I got the publishing deal to the time it was actually available in stores was 19 months! And I recently sold a YA novel to another publisher and that one is going to take 24 months to release. I'm still not entirely sure why it takes so long but that was definitely an unpleasant surprise. Especially for someone like me who get frustrated when it takes longer than ten seconds for music to download.
Do you write from a character or from a plot idea?
I'm definitely more driven by character. I like thinking up interesting characters with intriguing back stories and then forming a world around them. Like, "Wouldn't it be cool if there was a story about a woman who tests men's fidelity for a living?" Then I go forward from there. "What would her life be like?" And "What kind of interesting things would happen to someone like that?"
Tell us about your writing process. Do you outline or are you more organic?
The writing process is very random for me. It all depends on the day. Because I tend to be equally right and left brained, sometimes I feel as though the writing process is just a constant struggle (or sometimes clash) between the two sides of my brain to come up with a consistent way to write a novel. I write outlines, because my analytical side tells me it's the right thing to do, but then halfway through the story, I come to the conclusion that I only write outlines so that I'll have something to deviate from. I create complicated spreadsheets (a nod back to my days as a strategic analyst) for my storylines and page counts and pacing only to abandon them halfway through. And yet, despite this seemingly random chaos, it all feels perfectly natural to me. As if it was designed specifically for a purpose. So I suppose, my lack of a defined process is a process in itself.
What's your Writer Fantasy--i.e., to see your book make into a feature film, to be on the New York Times bestseller list for 40 consecutive weeks, etc.?
Of course I have all the regular fantasies like Oprah, Movie deal with an opening the size of Twilight, NYT Bestseller list, etc. But honestly, the one fantasy that I would really like to see fulfilled is just seeing someone reading my book in a public place. Like on an airplane or in the gym. I think that would be such an amazing feeling. Now, I just have to decide whether or not I would approach them and tell them I wrote it. Or better yet, ask them what they think without telling them who I am. I might not want to hear the answer to that though!
Do you have a favorite character in this book? If so, why?
My favorite character is definitely Jen's gay friend, John. Every scene he's in was always the most fun to write. And the easiest. He's definitely the comic relief of the book. I don't know where some of his lines come from. They just kind of emerge as if I'm channeling a flamboyant and sometimes annoying gay man from another dimension. I would be writing a scene with him and he'd respond with a line that was so him and I would just stare back at it on the page, laugh and say, "Where did that come from?" Needless to say, he was one of my favorite characters to return to in the sequel.
What's next for you? Is there a new book in the pipeline?
Oh, gosh, I have so many things going on right now, it's hard to keep track! Although, this question may help me get my head around everything. I just finished the first draft of the sequel to The Fidelity Files which St. Martin's is publishing in Fall of 2009 and is yet untitled. That'll also be out in the UK around the same time. I'm waiting to get my revision notes back on that so I can go for round two. Also, I just finished revising the manuscript for my new young adult book, THE KARMA CLUB, which FSG is publishing in spring of 2010. And I recently started a new YA series that I'm super excited about and will hopefully try to sell early next year. AND. . . one of the screenplays I co-wrote just got financed for a feature film so we hope to start shooting that in April. Yes, I know, I'm a masochist. What can I say, idleness is my only enemy.
What advice would you give to other writers trying to get published?
Take criticism. Believe in your work and stand behind it, but don't be afraid to make changes. Try to be as objective as possible when it comes to your writing (I know how impossible that sounds) but it will only help you in the long run. Use rejections to evolve yourself as a writer, not just to line your waste basket. When someone rejects your work and offers a reason, don't just blow it off and claim that they "didn't get it" or that they clearly didn't read it closely enough, dissect it and try to figure out if what they're saying makes sense and if it will inevitably help your work. There a lot of people in this industryagents, editors, other writers, etc.who know what they're talking about and know what it takes to make a book work. After all, that's what they get paid for! Listen to them with open ears and grateful hearts. There's a fine balance between staying true to your art and being open for suggestions, try to stay somewhere in the middle. If they "didn't get it," chances are, readers won't get it either. And you won't be there to explain it to them in the middle of Barnes and Noble.
What is your favorite part of the writing process?
My favorite part of writing is definitely the beginning of the story. There's nothing more exciting and inspiring than a fresh new idea and a blank piece of paper. The possibilities are endless, the promise is huge and the character is brand new. It's like that first four-hour long conversation with a new guy. So much hope for where it could go!
What do you write on (type of computer, or notebook, etc.) and where do you write?
I am a PC girl through and through (an ongoing bloody battle I've been having with my "Mac" friends since the dawn of timeor the dawn of the computer age anyway). I'm actually kind of a techie dork. I LOVE gadgets and so I have a lot of them. Right now I have two computers. A desktop in my office and a laptop I use when I travel. I spend most of the time writing in my office. Although I've found that when my editors ask me to cut pages (it's a request I get a lotapparently, I'm a overwriter), I prefer to do that in my living room, on my laptop. Don't know why, just one of those quirky writer things, I guess.
Have you had a "rock star" moment regarding your writing career? If so, what was it?
Well, I have a rock star moment EVERY single time I pick up my plastic Guitar Hero guitar and start jamming on it. But that's not what you meant, I know. But really, I feel like the whole published author thing has been so surreal from the moment my agent called and told me we had a deal. Like I've been living in a state of denial this entire time. I see my book in the store and I'm like, "I didn't write that! Someone else named Jessica Brody wrote thatsomeone who looks disturbingly like me." Even if someone did come up to me and say, "You wrote that novel, The Fidelity Files, didn't you?" I'd probably just convince myself that my boyfriend paid them to do it.
What other art form inspires you as much as writing?
Before I started writing full time, I actually dabbled a bit in songwriting. One of my songs even won a songwriting competition. But I soon realized that I could only write song lyrics after I'd had my heart totally stomped on and destroyed by some dumb, stupid boy. Apparently, that was the outlet for my pain. And so once I found myself in a good relationship, the song lyrics stopped coming. I have to say, though, I don't really miss them!
Now that you are published, what (if anything) have you changed about your writing routine?
I hate to say it, but I tend to procrastinate a lot more now than I ever did before I got published. I think there's something about that desperation for a book deal that keeps you on track. Now, I just find so many other things to do. It's really bad! In terms of actual writing, I think I've definitely grown as a writer since I got published and I'm learning to trust my instincts more when it comes to what is working and what isn't. I used to fight that voice inside that says, "This scene really sucks," convinced that I wasn't experienced to know what I was talking about. Now, when I hear that voice, I listen and start pounding on that delete key.
What is the most interesting thing that's happened to you since becoming a published author?
Seeing your work translated into other languages is pretty bizarre. I saw a sneak peak at the German translation for my book and I was like, "Holy cow, I have no idea what I wrote!" That's pretty surreal.
Jessica Brody
Jessica Brody graduated from Smith College with degrees in economics and French. A full-time writer and producer, she lives in Los Angeles where she is currently working on her next novel. About the Book and The Author
A gripping story of one woman's quest to come to terms with her past, find her future, and-most of all-rediscover her faith in love, THE FIDELITY FILES was chosen as one of USA Today's hottest summer reads and has recently been optioned for television. St. Martin's Press and Random House UK have already purchased the sequel (yet untitled) to be published in the fall of 2009 and Jessica has recently sold two young adult novels to Farrar, Straus, Giroux.
Praise for The Fidelity Files
"A smart, funny and sexy debut"
--Cosmopolitan UK
"A sexy plot with a main character every woman would like to have on speed dial."
--Rocky Mountain News
"You'll be hooked!"
--Minneapolis Star Tribune
"Sisters unite! This is a total revenge fantasy for anyone really tired of men with overactive zippers."
--USA Today
"Deliciously out there and impossible to put down."
--5280 Magazine
Interview
Tell us about your latest release and the inspiration behind it.
The Fidelity Files is the story of a beautiful L.A. woman who works as an undercover "fidelity inspector," hired by suspicious wives and girlfriends to test the faithfulness of the men in their lives. Except no one in her life knows what she does. Her friends and family all think she works for an investment bank.
Before I became a full-time writer, I worked in a very corporate environment. And like all corporate jobs, there were a certain number of "alcohol-related" events that I was expected to attend. I would often find myself at work happy hour functions in nearby bars, observing the interactions between single and non-single co-workers as their behaviors gradually declined from professional to something else entirely. Something hardly capable of being described as "appropriate."
Witnessing these "indiscretions" upset me on a profound level. I secretly wished that someone would tell the "conveniently" absent significant others about what their husbands/wives/boyfriends/ girlfriends/fiancés really did while attending these "obligatory" and supposedly "uneventful" work functions. But I certainly wasn't going to be the one to do it. I was brave enough to think it...but not exactly brave enough to go knocking on people's doors with bad news. You know what people tend to do to "the messenger."
So instead I created a character whose job and purpose in life was to do just that. To reveal the truth to anyone who wanted to know. To knock on all the doors that I never had the courage to knock on. An invincible superhero-esque woman whose quest is to fight against the evils of infidelity. But of course, she soon finds out... she's not as invincible as she once thought.
Do you put your friends in your books? Names, incidents, characteristics? Have any of them recognized themselves in a not-so-good way?
My friends are definitely in my books. There's one in particular that stands out. One of Jen's friends, Zo, has a bad case of road rage. And she tends to talk on the phone while she drives, so Jen often finds herself on the phone with Zo while she's cursing out another driver. I have a friend who does that and that's where I got the idea. This friend has read the book but I'm not sure how she feels about the similarities. She acts like she's fine with it, but I guess you never know. She could secretly be totally offended.
Which craft book has inspired or helped you the most throughout your writing career?
I can't sing enough praise for Save the Cat by Blake Snyder. It has "saved" so many manuscripts of mine. It's meant for screenwriters but it works flawlessly for novels as well. It's just a very intuitive way to write stories and make sure the audience isn't bored to tears because nothing is happening for fifty pages. Now, I consult the book before I even start writing and I use his "beat sheet" to help me outline the major story points. It saves me so much time later on!
If you were in charge of casting the movie adaptation of your book, who gets the call?
I've always struggled with this question because I've never really had one person in mind for the role of Jennifer/Ashlyn. She would have to be beautiful and sexy so that the men in the movie would fall for her but she would also has to come off as sympathetic and a little vulnerable so that audience would relate to her. I would love to see Rachel McAdams in the role because I think she could pull it off. Also Natalie Portman, Jessica Biel, Scarlett Johansson or Keira Knightley would be great casts.
As for Jamie, the love interest, Patrick Dempsey is an obvious cast for me. I think he has that distinguished mature look that's described in the book and he also comes off as very sweet and genuine. That's the kind of guy Jamie is in my head.
Do you have a sample chapter posted?
Read an excerpt.
What's been your biggest surprise about getting published?
How LONG it takes for a book to hit the shelves! Holy cow! I was a young woman when I sold that thing. I really wasn't expecting it to take that long. I thought six months maybe, nine tops. But from the time I got the publishing deal to the time it was actually available in stores was 19 months! And I recently sold a YA novel to another publisher and that one is going to take 24 months to release. I'm still not entirely sure why it takes so long but that was definitely an unpleasant surprise. Especially for someone like me who get frustrated when it takes longer than ten seconds for music to download.
Do you write from a character or from a plot idea?
I'm definitely more driven by character. I like thinking up interesting characters with intriguing back stories and then forming a world around them. Like, "Wouldn't it be cool if there was a story about a woman who tests men's fidelity for a living?" Then I go forward from there. "What would her life be like?" And "What kind of interesting things would happen to someone like that?"
Tell us about your writing process. Do you outline or are you more organic?
The writing process is very random for me. It all depends on the day. Because I tend to be equally right and left brained, sometimes I feel as though the writing process is just a constant struggle (or sometimes clash) between the two sides of my brain to come up with a consistent way to write a novel. I write outlines, because my analytical side tells me it's the right thing to do, but then halfway through the story, I come to the conclusion that I only write outlines so that I'll have something to deviate from. I create complicated spreadsheets (a nod back to my days as a strategic analyst) for my storylines and page counts and pacing only to abandon them halfway through. And yet, despite this seemingly random chaos, it all feels perfectly natural to me. As if it was designed specifically for a purpose. So I suppose, my lack of a defined process is a process in itself.
What's your Writer Fantasy--i.e., to see your book make into a feature film, to be on the New York Times bestseller list for 40 consecutive weeks, etc.?
Of course I have all the regular fantasies like Oprah, Movie deal with an opening the size of Twilight, NYT Bestseller list, etc. But honestly, the one fantasy that I would really like to see fulfilled is just seeing someone reading my book in a public place. Like on an airplane or in the gym. I think that would be such an amazing feeling. Now, I just have to decide whether or not I would approach them and tell them I wrote it. Or better yet, ask them what they think without telling them who I am. I might not want to hear the answer to that though!
Do you have a favorite character in this book? If so, why?
My favorite character is definitely Jen's gay friend, John. Every scene he's in was always the most fun to write. And the easiest. He's definitely the comic relief of the book. I don't know where some of his lines come from. They just kind of emerge as if I'm channeling a flamboyant and sometimes annoying gay man from another dimension. I would be writing a scene with him and he'd respond with a line that was so him and I would just stare back at it on the page, laugh and say, "Where did that come from?" Needless to say, he was one of my favorite characters to return to in the sequel.
What's next for you? Is there a new book in the pipeline?
Oh, gosh, I have so many things going on right now, it's hard to keep track! Although, this question may help me get my head around everything. I just finished the first draft of the sequel to The Fidelity Files which St. Martin's is publishing in Fall of 2009 and is yet untitled. That'll also be out in the UK around the same time. I'm waiting to get my revision notes back on that so I can go for round two. Also, I just finished revising the manuscript for my new young adult book, THE KARMA CLUB, which FSG is publishing in spring of 2010. And I recently started a new YA series that I'm super excited about and will hopefully try to sell early next year. AND. . . one of the screenplays I co-wrote just got financed for a feature film so we hope to start shooting that in April. Yes, I know, I'm a masochist. What can I say, idleness is my only enemy.
What advice would you give to other writers trying to get published?
Take criticism. Believe in your work and stand behind it, but don't be afraid to make changes. Try to be as objective as possible when it comes to your writing (I know how impossible that sounds) but it will only help you in the long run. Use rejections to evolve yourself as a writer, not just to line your waste basket. When someone rejects your work and offers a reason, don't just blow it off and claim that they "didn't get it" or that they clearly didn't read it closely enough, dissect it and try to figure out if what they're saying makes sense and if it will inevitably help your work. There a lot of people in this industryagents, editors, other writers, etc.who know what they're talking about and know what it takes to make a book work. After all, that's what they get paid for! Listen to them with open ears and grateful hearts. There's a fine balance between staying true to your art and being open for suggestions, try to stay somewhere in the middle. If they "didn't get it," chances are, readers won't get it either. And you won't be there to explain it to them in the middle of Barnes and Noble.
What is your favorite part of the writing process?
My favorite part of writing is definitely the beginning of the story. There's nothing more exciting and inspiring than a fresh new idea and a blank piece of paper. The possibilities are endless, the promise is huge and the character is brand new. It's like that first four-hour long conversation with a new guy. So much hope for where it could go!
What do you write on (type of computer, or notebook, etc.) and where do you write?
I am a PC girl through and through (an ongoing bloody battle I've been having with my "Mac" friends since the dawn of timeor the dawn of the computer age anyway). I'm actually kind of a techie dork. I LOVE gadgets and so I have a lot of them. Right now I have two computers. A desktop in my office and a laptop I use when I travel. I spend most of the time writing in my office. Although I've found that when my editors ask me to cut pages (it's a request I get a lotapparently, I'm a overwriter), I prefer to do that in my living room, on my laptop. Don't know why, just one of those quirky writer things, I guess.
Have you had a "rock star" moment regarding your writing career? If so, what was it?
Well, I have a rock star moment EVERY single time I pick up my plastic Guitar Hero guitar and start jamming on it. But that's not what you meant, I know. But really, I feel like the whole published author thing has been so surreal from the moment my agent called and told me we had a deal. Like I've been living in a state of denial this entire time. I see my book in the store and I'm like, "I didn't write that! Someone else named Jessica Brody wrote thatsomeone who looks disturbingly like me." Even if someone did come up to me and say, "You wrote that novel, The Fidelity Files, didn't you?" I'd probably just convince myself that my boyfriend paid them to do it.
What other art form inspires you as much as writing?
Before I started writing full time, I actually dabbled a bit in songwriting. One of my songs even won a songwriting competition. But I soon realized that I could only write song lyrics after I'd had my heart totally stomped on and destroyed by some dumb, stupid boy. Apparently, that was the outlet for my pain. And so once I found myself in a good relationship, the song lyrics stopped coming. I have to say, though, I don't really miss them!
Now that you are published, what (if anything) have you changed about your writing routine?
I hate to say it, but I tend to procrastinate a lot more now than I ever did before I got published. I think there's something about that desperation for a book deal that keeps you on track. Now, I just find so many other things to do. It's really bad! In terms of actual writing, I think I've definitely grown as a writer since I got published and I'm learning to trust my instincts more when it comes to what is working and what isn't. I used to fight that voice inside that says, "This scene really sucks," convinced that I wasn't experienced to know what I was talking about. Now, when I hear that voice, I listen and start pounding on that delete key.
What is the most interesting thing that's happened to you since becoming a published author?
Seeing your work translated into other languages is pretty bizarre. I saw a sneak peak at the German translation for my book and I was like, "Holy cow, I have no idea what I wrote!" That's pretty surreal.
Labels: Interview Books
posted by Carolyn @ 11/26/2008 05:44:00 PM Permalink
Sunday, November 23, 2008
Update with Zombies
Just a quick update. The Next Historical is going along. I've reached a part where I need to do some fixes of chronology and/or geography or risk a ripping massive hole in the time-space continuum. I'm not quite sure what to do, but suspect a very simple solution is out there, just out of reach and if I push too hard, it will blow up. But if I don't push hard enough, well, there goes the universe! You see my dilemma.
If you-all were on Twitter you'd already know about the Regency Zombies storming Almack's and having tea.
No. I am NOT procrastinating. I think I need to make cinnamon rolls today. Back to saving the world!
Oh. I think I thought of the solution. And the crowd goes wild!! Yes, it was simple. I'm still going to make cinnamon rolls though.
If you-all were on Twitter you'd already know about the Regency Zombies storming Almack's and having tea.
No. I am NOT procrastinating. I think I need to make cinnamon rolls today. Back to saving the world!
Oh. I think I thought of the solution. And the crowd goes wild!! Yes, it was simple. I'm still going to make cinnamon rolls though.
Labels: editing, The Next Historical, writing freaking writing
posted by Carolyn @ 11/23/2008 10:12:00 AM Permalink
Friday, November 21, 2008
Progress Report and Automotive Excellence
The Next Historical which is going to need a title pretty darn soon, is inching along. Today I deleted a fair amount but managed to break 75K anyway. Yay for Carolyn! I still have to write the last chapter, but I'm pretty sure what that will be. I think. It's slotted for October 2009, by the way, pushed up from November. No pressure! Anyway, I will get something out to readers this weekend. ::shrug:: I'm going to have to take a week off from work the week prior to the due date, so here's praying I can get the time off. Will ask tomorrow.
Title ideas gladly accepted. Right now I'm calling it Ransomed cuz the hero at one point is going to pay one for the heroine. But the other day I thought of something better and then yesterday I forgot it.
If the post options work correctly this entry will post 11/21 at 1:00pm Pacific, at which time I will very likely be sitting in my car working on the dang book.
Friday, I am going to see Twilight. Sorry. But that's a must do, figured into my deadline calculations. I'll get two hours in the car on Saturday because Soccer Boy has a scrimmage. Hopefully it's not too cold. And then after that, more ignoring of laundry, kitchen child family dog and everything else too. I'd ignore the cats too, but they sit on my lap and I pet them from time to time.
Wish me luck.
Be prepared for Blog Silence.
Title ideas gladly accepted. Right now I'm calling it Ransomed cuz the hero at one point is going to pay one for the heroine. But the other day I thought of something better and then yesterday I forgot it.
If the post options work correctly this entry will post 11/21 at 1:00pm Pacific, at which time I will very likely be sitting in my car working on the dang book.
Friday, I am going to see Twilight. Sorry. But that's a must do, figured into my deadline calculations. I'll get two hours in the car on Saturday because Soccer Boy has a scrimmage. Hopefully it's not too cold. And then after that, more ignoring of laundry, kitchen child family dog and everything else too. I'd ignore the cats too, but they sit on my lap and I pet them from time to time.
Wish me luck.
Be prepared for Blog Silence.
Labels: The Next Historical, writing freaking writing
posted by Carolyn @ 11/21/2008 01:00:00 PM Permalink
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Interview with Saralee Rosenberg!
Hopefully I'll be able to do these interviews from time to time. Today, I have Saralee Rosenberg on tap talking about her latest release Dear Neighbor, Drop Dead.
New York, November 17, 2008
A "For Sale" sign on your lawn is fine, unless you’re not the one who put it there. In DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD, Saralee Rosenberg’s fourth hit-home novel on Long Island, Mindy Sherman and Beth Diamond are warring next door neighbors who have zero in common, but no place to hide. Housewives have never been this desperate, or this funny.
The story begins on move-in day when Mindy notices that her new neighbor's shed is bigger than her mother's condo, and the vanity plate on Beth's Lexus reads FSHNCRZY. It hardly bodes well for meaningful friendship as the Shermans are broke and Mindy's favorite designer makes Mets t-shirts. Still, her husband, Artie, predicts that Mindy and Beth will become the next Lucy and Ethel. "In real life they hated each other," Mindy cried. "In real life they laughed all the way to the bank," he pointed out. "Which bank?" she asks.
Now, eight miserable years later, Mindy is still trying to compete, squeezing into jaws-of-life jeans, for in her neighborhood, thirty is the new wife. Even Artie isn’t immune. "Someone called us Shrek and Fiona!"
That someone is Beth, the ivy-league blonde next door who as resident sancti-mommy, makes Ann Coulter seem civil. It's another day, another dilemma until Beth's marriage becomes fodder on Facebook. Suddenly she needs to be "friended" and Mindy is the last mom standing.
For two women who have never shared a meal, it's a hilarious balancing act as they join forces in order to keep their messy plates spinning thanks to overbearing in-laws, errant husbands, a troubled step-son, a failing business, an unplanned pregnancy and a possible relocation that would leave one of them very far from Bloomingdales.
Then, Mindy and Beth's reality check nearly bounces on a harrowing flight when they discover a startling secret that they pray they are not too late to share.
DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD is a highly emotional, spot-on romp through bedrooms, boardrooms and backyards, making unlikely heroines out of two moms who never imagined themselves as survivors, let alone as best friends.
Publisher’s Weekly says, "Rosenberg’s novel is full of edgy wit and chicken-soup-for the soul warmth. If you enjoy giddy diversions, this bumpy suburban ride is well worth the trip."
DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD was published on August 1, 2008 by Avon A+, an imprint of HarperCollins publishers. Ms. Rosenberg is the author of other Avon novels, A LITTLE HELP FROM ABOVE, CLAIRE VOYANT and FATE AND MS. FORTUNE. She lives on Long Island with her husband. They have three children and a big mortgage.
CONTACT: Saralee Rosenberg
www.saraleerosenberg.com
saralee@saraleerosenberg.com
DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD
AVONA BOOKS, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
USA $13.95 (Canada $14.95)
ISBN 978-0-06-125377-5
Q. What was the inspiration for your new novel?
A. Of my four novels, DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD is the only one that was inspired by, well, me! This story is based on my first novel, ALL IN THE CARDS, which was never published, but did take a very exciting journey to Hollywood. Back in 1997, Bette Midler optioned it for a feature film (she was looking for a follow up comedy to "First Wives Club"). Exactly! Wow! First time out and it’s a home run. Sadly, the reason you never heard of it is because ultimately, Bette and her partner couldn't get financing or find the right screenwriter to adapt it. Bye bye Bette... Now fast forward to a few years ago. My novels, A LITTLE HELP FROM ABOVE, CLAIRE VOYANT and FATE & MS. FORTUNE had done very well but were about single women looking for love in all the wrong places. I wanted to write about my "peeps" in the suburbs and pitched my editor on letting me rewrite ALL IN THE CARDS. She was hesitant because she wasn’t sure Avon was the right publisher for a suburban/soccer mom story with bickering neighbors. Then came "Desperate Housewives" and suddenly it was, get me suburban/soccer mom stories with bickering neighbors. Timing is everything.... So although DEAR NEIGHBOR is an incarnation of my earliest novel, it is a much richer, deeper, funnier story and is resonating with readers of all ages.
Q. When you got that first phone call announcing you had sold a novel, how did you react? How did you celebrate?
A. Phew. You can't imagine the relief. I had given up a successful career writing non-fiction, which had sent me on two national book tours, including an appearance on Oprah (heaven!!!!), only to have my writing life come to a screeching halt when I switched to working on a novel. It took me three years to write A LITTLE HELP FROM ABOVE, another year to find an agent, and the agent a year and a half to make the sale to Lyssa Keusch at Avon. In theory, the sale should have been one of the greatest events of my life, if not for the timing. I got word that the deal was done exactly two days after 9-11, and because I live in the New York area, the grief and shock was all I or anyone could think about. I let family and friends know, of course, but run out and buy diamonds or book a cruise? Didn’t happen. And interestingly enough, all of my book celebrations since then have been, not subdued as much as put in perspective. I'm sure that my joy and satisfaction will always be tempered with the memory that life is so full of yin and yang. And maybe that's for the best.
Q. Which scene or scenes in your novel did you love writing?
A. I am crazy about writing dialogue and would spend days working on a scene between Mindy and Beth to make sure that I got the tone, the phrasing, the timing and the subtle nuances just right. There was so much that they wanted to say to each other after eight years of making each other crazy, I just had to let it out a little at a time, like air coming out of a balloon. But the scene I loved writing the most was the one where they are in a hotel room and Beth confronts the fact that she might be pregnant. It is a funny, poignant moment where both characters reveal their greatest joys and misgivings of motherhood and I remember when I sat at my computer, the words just poured out and I had to sit still to hear every last word coming through. I realized at the end that they had just broadcast my own conflicts and vulnerabilities about being a mom and it was whoa... where did that come from?
Q. Is there a scene you cut from the book that you kind of wish you could put back in?
A. Funny you should ask. Originally, I wanted to title the book Same S--T, Different Zip because the story was very much about that no matter where you live, you have to put up with so much petty neighbor crap and competition. For obvious reasons, I wasn't allowed to have a curse in the title but in keeping with the theme, I incorporated a funny blog in the story titled, "You Say You Want A Revelation". It was "written" by a mom in Georgia and Mindy was so hooked on it, she couldn't wait for the next post. Unfortunately, the blog, which appeared every few chapters, took up a lot of space and got cut on the editing room floor. Bummer. It had some very funny commentary, but I did get to include one out-take in the back of the book.
Q. When and where do you write? Is it cluttered or minimalist heaven?
A. I’m a crack-of- dawn morning writer maybe because my muses are busy all night and can't wait to have me pour out what they sunk in (at least they let me go to the bathroom first). That being said, when I'm in the zone, I write morning, noon and night. I know I'm done, however, when I look up at the computer screen and I see this, "She said, hjkljkl;uiop." Then it’s time to shut the lights. As for where I write, the majority of my work is written while chained to my computer table which is situated right smack in the middle of my master bedroom... I never thought this would be my workspace. I always fantasized about having the kind of home office that "playwright" Diane Keaton got in "Something's Gotta Give." - this huge, white, ocean-facing office that was stocked with floral bouquets and a breathtaking view. Perhaps one day, but for now it's fine. I look out at my beautiful backyard and at least my commute is a breeze. Not to mention I can make it to the fridge in under thirty seconds.
Q. When deadlines hit, what happens in your house?
A. Let me put it this way. Please don't ring my bell unless you’re bringing fresh baked cookies because I don't want you to see that the dining room looks like a mini landfill. And that's before you reach the piles on the stairs (I swear there is one that has been there since Clinton was President). The clothes in the dryer go round and round for days because I keep hitting wrinkle remove, we run out of milk, the shows saved on Tivo go unwatched, calls from my kids get answered with, "Make it quick and NO CRISIS today". Also I look like hell and probably need of a touch up. As for dinner? The family is on their own... although they would tell you I say that every day. Basically it's every man/child for himself and don't give me a hard time about anything... This is why I write all the time, otherwise I'd lose my privileges, lol.
Q. Do you put friends in books? Have any of them recognized themselves?
A. I get asked all the time by family and friends to be in one of my novels, but I tend not to go there unless they're willing to buy several dozen books in appreciation for being immortalized (if Girl Scout Moms can bribe, so can I). Once I did give in and named a character after a friend, only to describe the character as a philandering shoplifter. She was horrified and wanted to know how I knew? I didn't know, I made it up, but boy did that make things interesting afterwards... Also, my husband's business partner had been prodding me for years, to which I would say that a character who sold insurance, played golf and visited his grandkids in Florida would not exactly be memorable. But finally, in Dear Neighbor, to get him to stop bugging me, I did name a minor character Steven Hoffman. I made him a lawyer in Portland, and it really made Steve's day... then he asked why he wasn't a major character and could I feature him again in the next book? Men!!!!
Q. Do you think about writing series or do you prefer stand alone titles?
A. Readers often ask if I can turn my novels into a series because they like the characters so much and want to revisit them, which is great. I have thought about it, but the bottom line is, the high drama, intrigue and craziness that unfolds in the novel is pretty much a once in a lifetime event for the characters. I wouldn't know how to replicate the same level of intensity and sea changes and I'd be afraid that readers would post this on Amazon: "The first book was so much better!" That being said, I have thought about writing a novel where my previous characters make token appearances so readers could learn what was new in their lives. I might call it WHINED AND DINED, and it would take place at a spa weekend so that there would be a chance for lots of characters to mingle and to get to know one another. And I do like the idea of having tough-as-nails Shelby Lazarus fighting over a massage therapist named Ivan with get-out-of-way Beth. Stay tuned.
Q. What comes first? The title or the idea?
A. For DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD, the title came to me only a few months before publication and trust me, by then I was in a total panic. The original title, based on the very earliest draft, was ALL IN THE CARDS, but everyone agreed that was kind of boring. Then I submitted a list of twenty titles, some interesting, some wacky, some that would never fly because they involved curse words. Here is a sampling: Hot, Hungry and Hormonal; Ask Your Doctor if Stress Is Right for You; Same SH-T, Different Zip; If Lucy Hated Ethel; and one of my personal favorites, The Bitch Next Door. No, no, no, my editor said to all of those. Then I came up with Dear Neighbor, Drop Dead and she smiled. We have a winner!!! And I must admit, it's a beauty. Everyone gets it. No need for an explanation. As for my novel, CLAIRE VOYANT, that title came to me years ago and it took me a while to create an entire story based on the premise that a girl named Claire would have super natural abilities.
Q. What is up next for you?
A. I am very excited about my next novel because the focus is about a child leaving for college and this is hitting very close to home as our youngest is now a senior in high school. But in this story, Jackie, a twice-divorced mom, has one son, 17-year old Daniel and she is in a panic thinking that when he leaves for college in the fall, she'll be left alone with her ornery, widowed father. Thus, when she sets off on the campus tour circuit, she decides to throw caution and her underwear to the wind and boy does she have one hell of a good time. It's worse senioritis than even Daniel has and their adventures visiting the Ivies is one for the books. In the end, she rediscovers the smart, ambitious girl she left behind at Yale Law and pledges to get her life back on track. The title of the book is EARLY DECISION and I think it's going to be my best yet. No publication date as of yet.
Q. If Oprah invited you on her show, what would the theme of that show be?
A. Sigh. I've actually had the distinct privilege of appearing on Oprah to discuss my non-fiction book, 50 FABULOUS PLACES TO RAISE A FAMILY, and I gotta tell you, it was awesome. She was soooo nice and I and my husband/co-author were treated like royalty. We got the limousine, the fancy hotel, the nice dinner out, hair and make-up and a souvenir coffee cup that still sits on my desk as a pen holder. And Steadman was there, too (he smelled so good!) Would I love to be a guest again? Are you kidding me? It would be a dream come true to be invited back as a best selling novelist. In fact, I had a dream scene in DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD that involved my character Mindy being on the show to talk about what it was like to live next door to Beth, the bitch. It had to be cut because of space limitations, but trust me, Oprah is always on my mind. Nobody sells a book like her.
Q. What is one of your strangest/most quirky author experiences?
A. My first three novels are a trilogy in that they all deal with the super natural. All of my main characters have funny and intriguing encounters with the other side, the after life, and/or a ghost. But never did I expect that I would personally have a strange encounter with the spirit world while I was hard at work. And yet... I had been writing my debut novel, A LITTLE HELP FROM ABOVE over a three year period, and as you can imagine, was very very tired. All I wanted to do was cross the finish line, have a good cry and eat a box of Mallomars... One night, I was working on the final pages and was so bleary eyed I convinced myself that the ending was terrible but maybe my editor wouldn't notice, or would say to me, no, this is great, don't change a word. But just as I was fixing the last page, we had a power outage and the whole house went dark. It was so strange. There was no storm, no reason to lose power. But when the lights came back on a minute later, I had lost the latest version of the ending. It literally disappeared and I freaked out and cried. How could this happen? On a whim I called my neighbors to see if their power had gone out but it turned out ours was the only house that did... Clearly it was a sign from above. The next morning I started over on the ending, and when I finished, it was so much better, so much more rewarding. This time I cried from joy. I had finished and it was great.
Q. Tell us about your writing process. Do you outline or are you more organic?
A. I know that every author has a different approach and there is no right or wrong way to go about writing a novel. For me, the most important thing is to have a steady handle on my protagonist because I believe that the question readers should ask is not what is your book about but who? If the main character is multi-dimensional and in a serious bind, that is the recipe for a great story. The way that I develop a compelling character is to write their back story- pages and pages of how their life unfolded, what frustrates them, the things they desire that have eluded them, etc. Then I put on my Katie Couric hat and interview them and out of that, comes tons of possible story lines. In the end, I liken the process of writing a novel to driving with a man. I know where I want to go but damned if I'm going to stop for directions. Sure I'll get lost but eventually I'll arrive at my destination and tell everyone I knew where I was going from the get go. And one other thing. I do not outline because I find it too confining. No surprise for the writer? None for the reader, either.
Q. What is your writer fantasy?
A. I can only have one? I have several. I want to make it to the New York Times Best Seller List and stay there for at least a year. No wait. I want to have two books on the list at the same time, just like Jodi Piccoult. I also want to have Oprah tell me that she couldn’t put my book down and why am I wasting time talking to her, I should be busy writing the next one. I also want a feature film or TV show to be developed based on my book and it should star Jennifer Aniston and John Mayer (and their maybe babies). Finally, I would like my kids to say to me, "Mom. You Rock!"
Q. Would your high school friends be surprised to discover you'd become a novelist?
A. Funny question. When I attended my 20th high school reunion in Munster, Indiana, I had been living in New York since graduating college and had lost contact with most of my classmates. One of the first people I ran into was Mary Ann Jugovic, the class valedictorian and the sweetest girl ever. The first thing I said to her is, "please tell me that you went to med school and became a pediatrician." To which she said, "only if you tell me that you moved to New York and became a writer." And the verdict was? She was a pediatrician with a beautiful family and I was an author with a beautiful family. Dreams do come true.
Q. If you could ask one author for one piece of advice, who would you ask and what would you want to know?
A. I'm very lucky because I actually had that opportunity. One of my favorite authors in the world is the novelist, Sol Stein, who wrote THE MAGICIAN and THE LIVING ROOM, among many others. I discovered him in college and feel in some ways, he was an influence in my secretly aspiring to be a writer. Recently, I was curious to see if he was still writing (or even still alive) and discovered he had a website and an email address. I wrote him this long, flowery message, never expecting a response. But the next day he sent me a lovely note back and we exchanged several emails. In one of them I asked his advice on whether I should change my name and use a pseudonym for my next book. This is something that my editor and agent had been discussing and I was torn. He wrote back and said, don't you dare. Saralee Rosenberg is a wonderful name and quite memorable.... now you know why I loved this guy, and so far, I've followed his advice.
About The Book
New York, November 17, 2008
A "For Sale" sign on your lawn is fine, unless you’re not the one who put it there. In DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD, Saralee Rosenberg’s fourth hit-home novel on Long Island, Mindy Sherman and Beth Diamond are warring next door neighbors who have zero in common, but no place to hide. Housewives have never been this desperate, or this funny.
The story begins on move-in day when Mindy notices that her new neighbor's shed is bigger than her mother's condo, and the vanity plate on Beth's Lexus reads FSHNCRZY. It hardly bodes well for meaningful friendship as the Shermans are broke and Mindy's favorite designer makes Mets t-shirts. Still, her husband, Artie, predicts that Mindy and Beth will become the next Lucy and Ethel. "In real life they hated each other," Mindy cried. "In real life they laughed all the way to the bank," he pointed out. "Which bank?" she asks.
Now, eight miserable years later, Mindy is still trying to compete, squeezing into jaws-of-life jeans, for in her neighborhood, thirty is the new wife. Even Artie isn’t immune. "Someone called us Shrek and Fiona!"
That someone is Beth, the ivy-league blonde next door who as resident sancti-mommy, makes Ann Coulter seem civil. It's another day, another dilemma until Beth's marriage becomes fodder on Facebook. Suddenly she needs to be "friended" and Mindy is the last mom standing.
For two women who have never shared a meal, it's a hilarious balancing act as they join forces in order to keep their messy plates spinning thanks to overbearing in-laws, errant husbands, a troubled step-son, a failing business, an unplanned pregnancy and a possible relocation that would leave one of them very far from Bloomingdales.
Then, Mindy and Beth's reality check nearly bounces on a harrowing flight when they discover a startling secret that they pray they are not too late to share.
DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD is a highly emotional, spot-on romp through bedrooms, boardrooms and backyards, making unlikely heroines out of two moms who never imagined themselves as survivors, let alone as best friends.
Publisher’s Weekly says, "Rosenberg’s novel is full of edgy wit and chicken-soup-for the soul warmth. If you enjoy giddy diversions, this bumpy suburban ride is well worth the trip."
DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD was published on August 1, 2008 by Avon A+, an imprint of HarperCollins publishers. Ms. Rosenberg is the author of other Avon novels, A LITTLE HELP FROM ABOVE, CLAIRE VOYANT and FATE AND MS. FORTUNE. She lives on Long Island with her husband. They have three children and a big mortgage.
CONTACT: Saralee Rosenberg
www.saraleerosenberg.com
saralee@saraleerosenberg.com
DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD
AVONA BOOKS, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
USA $13.95 (Canada $14.95)
ISBN 978-0-06-125377-5
Praise for Dear Neighbor, Drop Dead
Through a winning blend of hip and humble humor, Rosenberg simultaneously skerwers and celebrates the institution of suburban sisterhood.
- Booklist
Great read. Hilarious and heartwarming!
- Good Housekeeping Quick and Simple Magazine’s Book Pick of the Week (July 22, 2008)
Saralee Rosenberg's latest novel is zany and will have you laughing out loud. But under all the hilarity is a wonderfully touching story that grabs you at page one and doesn't let go until the end.
- Debbi Honorof, Book Columnist, Long Island Woman
Mindy Sherman is as loveable and funny a hero as any I've read in years... I laughed, I cried, and loved every minute!
- Valerie Frankel, author of Thin Is The New Happy
Heartfelt, wildly funny, and pitch perfect. Rosenberg knows her turf like a Sherpa.
- Leslie Carroll, author of Choosing Sophie
Filled with belly laughs and a great big heart! I loved this smart, saucy take on suburban angst. Every page is a gem!
- Ellen Meister, author of The Smart One
Lucy had Ethel living next door but I want to borrow my sugar from Mindy Sherman. I loved Mindy! Part "Dear Abby," part "Mr Rogers," part Bette Midler, what's not to love? If Mindy was YOUR neighbor, you'd never leave home again.
- Christine O'Hagan, author of The Book of Kehls.
I just had to send you an e-mail concerning your book, Dear Neighbor, Drop Dead. I'm on vacation and finished it late last night. I have never laughed and cried so much while reading a book. Bravo!
- Jennifer Vido, reviewer and columnist www.freshfiction.com
Interview
Q. What was the inspiration for your new novel?
A. Of my four novels, DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD is the only one that was inspired by, well, me! This story is based on my first novel, ALL IN THE CARDS, which was never published, but did take a very exciting journey to Hollywood. Back in 1997, Bette Midler optioned it for a feature film (she was looking for a follow up comedy to "First Wives Club"). Exactly! Wow! First time out and it’s a home run. Sadly, the reason you never heard of it is because ultimately, Bette and her partner couldn't get financing or find the right screenwriter to adapt it. Bye bye Bette... Now fast forward to a few years ago. My novels, A LITTLE HELP FROM ABOVE, CLAIRE VOYANT and FATE & MS. FORTUNE had done very well but were about single women looking for love in all the wrong places. I wanted to write about my "peeps" in the suburbs and pitched my editor on letting me rewrite ALL IN THE CARDS. She was hesitant because she wasn’t sure Avon was the right publisher for a suburban/soccer mom story with bickering neighbors. Then came "Desperate Housewives" and suddenly it was, get me suburban/soccer mom stories with bickering neighbors. Timing is everything.... So although DEAR NEIGHBOR is an incarnation of my earliest novel, it is a much richer, deeper, funnier story and is resonating with readers of all ages.
Q. When you got that first phone call announcing you had sold a novel, how did you react? How did you celebrate?
A. Phew. You can't imagine the relief. I had given up a successful career writing non-fiction, which had sent me on two national book tours, including an appearance on Oprah (heaven!!!!), only to have my writing life come to a screeching halt when I switched to working on a novel. It took me three years to write A LITTLE HELP FROM ABOVE, another year to find an agent, and the agent a year and a half to make the sale to Lyssa Keusch at Avon. In theory, the sale should have been one of the greatest events of my life, if not for the timing. I got word that the deal was done exactly two days after 9-11, and because I live in the New York area, the grief and shock was all I or anyone could think about. I let family and friends know, of course, but run out and buy diamonds or book a cruise? Didn’t happen. And interestingly enough, all of my book celebrations since then have been, not subdued as much as put in perspective. I'm sure that my joy and satisfaction will always be tempered with the memory that life is so full of yin and yang. And maybe that's for the best.
Q. Which scene or scenes in your novel did you love writing?
A. I am crazy about writing dialogue and would spend days working on a scene between Mindy and Beth to make sure that I got the tone, the phrasing, the timing and the subtle nuances just right. There was so much that they wanted to say to each other after eight years of making each other crazy, I just had to let it out a little at a time, like air coming out of a balloon. But the scene I loved writing the most was the one where they are in a hotel room and Beth confronts the fact that she might be pregnant. It is a funny, poignant moment where both characters reveal their greatest joys and misgivings of motherhood and I remember when I sat at my computer, the words just poured out and I had to sit still to hear every last word coming through. I realized at the end that they had just broadcast my own conflicts and vulnerabilities about being a mom and it was whoa... where did that come from?
Q. Is there a scene you cut from the book that you kind of wish you could put back in?
A. Funny you should ask. Originally, I wanted to title the book Same S--T, Different Zip because the story was very much about that no matter where you live, you have to put up with so much petty neighbor crap and competition. For obvious reasons, I wasn't allowed to have a curse in the title but in keeping with the theme, I incorporated a funny blog in the story titled, "You Say You Want A Revelation". It was "written" by a mom in Georgia and Mindy was so hooked on it, she couldn't wait for the next post. Unfortunately, the blog, which appeared every few chapters, took up a lot of space and got cut on the editing room floor. Bummer. It had some very funny commentary, but I did get to include one out-take in the back of the book.
Q. When and where do you write? Is it cluttered or minimalist heaven?
A. I’m a crack-of- dawn morning writer maybe because my muses are busy all night and can't wait to have me pour out what they sunk in (at least they let me go to the bathroom first). That being said, when I'm in the zone, I write morning, noon and night. I know I'm done, however, when I look up at the computer screen and I see this, "She said, hjkljkl;uiop." Then it’s time to shut the lights. As for where I write, the majority of my work is written while chained to my computer table which is situated right smack in the middle of my master bedroom... I never thought this would be my workspace. I always fantasized about having the kind of home office that "playwright" Diane Keaton got in "Something's Gotta Give." - this huge, white, ocean-facing office that was stocked with floral bouquets and a breathtaking view. Perhaps one day, but for now it's fine. I look out at my beautiful backyard and at least my commute is a breeze. Not to mention I can make it to the fridge in under thirty seconds.
Q. When deadlines hit, what happens in your house?
A. Let me put it this way. Please don't ring my bell unless you’re bringing fresh baked cookies because I don't want you to see that the dining room looks like a mini landfill. And that's before you reach the piles on the stairs (I swear there is one that has been there since Clinton was President). The clothes in the dryer go round and round for days because I keep hitting wrinkle remove, we run out of milk, the shows saved on Tivo go unwatched, calls from my kids get answered with, "Make it quick and NO CRISIS today". Also I look like hell and probably need of a touch up. As for dinner? The family is on their own... although they would tell you I say that every day. Basically it's every man/child for himself and don't give me a hard time about anything... This is why I write all the time, otherwise I'd lose my privileges, lol.
Q. Do you put friends in books? Have any of them recognized themselves?
A. I get asked all the time by family and friends to be in one of my novels, but I tend not to go there unless they're willing to buy several dozen books in appreciation for being immortalized (if Girl Scout Moms can bribe, so can I). Once I did give in and named a character after a friend, only to describe the character as a philandering shoplifter. She was horrified and wanted to know how I knew? I didn't know, I made it up, but boy did that make things interesting afterwards... Also, my husband's business partner had been prodding me for years, to which I would say that a character who sold insurance, played golf and visited his grandkids in Florida would not exactly be memorable. But finally, in Dear Neighbor, to get him to stop bugging me, I did name a minor character Steven Hoffman. I made him a lawyer in Portland, and it really made Steve's day... then he asked why he wasn't a major character and could I feature him again in the next book? Men!!!!
Q. Do you think about writing series or do you prefer stand alone titles?
A. Readers often ask if I can turn my novels into a series because they like the characters so much and want to revisit them, which is great. I have thought about it, but the bottom line is, the high drama, intrigue and craziness that unfolds in the novel is pretty much a once in a lifetime event for the characters. I wouldn't know how to replicate the same level of intensity and sea changes and I'd be afraid that readers would post this on Amazon: "The first book was so much better!" That being said, I have thought about writing a novel where my previous characters make token appearances so readers could learn what was new in their lives. I might call it WHINED AND DINED, and it would take place at a spa weekend so that there would be a chance for lots of characters to mingle and to get to know one another. And I do like the idea of having tough-as-nails Shelby Lazarus fighting over a massage therapist named Ivan with get-out-of-way Beth. Stay tuned.
Q. What comes first? The title or the idea?
A. For DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD, the title came to me only a few months before publication and trust me, by then I was in a total panic. The original title, based on the very earliest draft, was ALL IN THE CARDS, but everyone agreed that was kind of boring. Then I submitted a list of twenty titles, some interesting, some wacky, some that would never fly because they involved curse words. Here is a sampling: Hot, Hungry and Hormonal; Ask Your Doctor if Stress Is Right for You; Same SH-T, Different Zip; If Lucy Hated Ethel; and one of my personal favorites, The Bitch Next Door. No, no, no, my editor said to all of those. Then I came up with Dear Neighbor, Drop Dead and she smiled. We have a winner!!! And I must admit, it's a beauty. Everyone gets it. No need for an explanation. As for my novel, CLAIRE VOYANT, that title came to me years ago and it took me a while to create an entire story based on the premise that a girl named Claire would have super natural abilities.
Q. What is up next for you?
A. I am very excited about my next novel because the focus is about a child leaving for college and this is hitting very close to home as our youngest is now a senior in high school. But in this story, Jackie, a twice-divorced mom, has one son, 17-year old Daniel and she is in a panic thinking that when he leaves for college in the fall, she'll be left alone with her ornery, widowed father. Thus, when she sets off on the campus tour circuit, she decides to throw caution and her underwear to the wind and boy does she have one hell of a good time. It's worse senioritis than even Daniel has and their adventures visiting the Ivies is one for the books. In the end, she rediscovers the smart, ambitious girl she left behind at Yale Law and pledges to get her life back on track. The title of the book is EARLY DECISION and I think it's going to be my best yet. No publication date as of yet.
Q. If Oprah invited you on her show, what would the theme of that show be?
A. Sigh. I've actually had the distinct privilege of appearing on Oprah to discuss my non-fiction book, 50 FABULOUS PLACES TO RAISE A FAMILY, and I gotta tell you, it was awesome. She was soooo nice and I and my husband/co-author were treated like royalty. We got the limousine, the fancy hotel, the nice dinner out, hair and make-up and a souvenir coffee cup that still sits on my desk as a pen holder. And Steadman was there, too (he smelled so good!) Would I love to be a guest again? Are you kidding me? It would be a dream come true to be invited back as a best selling novelist. In fact, I had a dream scene in DEAR NEIGHBOR, DROP DEAD that involved my character Mindy being on the show to talk about what it was like to live next door to Beth, the bitch. It had to be cut because of space limitations, but trust me, Oprah is always on my mind. Nobody sells a book like her.
Q. What is one of your strangest/most quirky author experiences?
A. My first three novels are a trilogy in that they all deal with the super natural. All of my main characters have funny and intriguing encounters with the other side, the after life, and/or a ghost. But never did I expect that I would personally have a strange encounter with the spirit world while I was hard at work. And yet... I had been writing my debut novel, A LITTLE HELP FROM ABOVE over a three year period, and as you can imagine, was very very tired. All I wanted to do was cross the finish line, have a good cry and eat a box of Mallomars... One night, I was working on the final pages and was so bleary eyed I convinced myself that the ending was terrible but maybe my editor wouldn't notice, or would say to me, no, this is great, don't change a word. But just as I was fixing the last page, we had a power outage and the whole house went dark. It was so strange. There was no storm, no reason to lose power. But when the lights came back on a minute later, I had lost the latest version of the ending. It literally disappeared and I freaked out and cried. How could this happen? On a whim I called my neighbors to see if their power had gone out but it turned out ours was the only house that did... Clearly it was a sign from above. The next morning I started over on the ending, and when I finished, it was so much better, so much more rewarding. This time I cried from joy. I had finished and it was great.
Q. Tell us about your writing process. Do you outline or are you more organic?
A. I know that every author has a different approach and there is no right or wrong way to go about writing a novel. For me, the most important thing is to have a steady handle on my protagonist because I believe that the question readers should ask is not what is your book about but who? If the main character is multi-dimensional and in a serious bind, that is the recipe for a great story. The way that I develop a compelling character is to write their back story- pages and pages of how their life unfolded, what frustrates them, the things they desire that have eluded them, etc. Then I put on my Katie Couric hat and interview them and out of that, comes tons of possible story lines. In the end, I liken the process of writing a novel to driving with a man. I know where I want to go but damned if I'm going to stop for directions. Sure I'll get lost but eventually I'll arrive at my destination and tell everyone I knew where I was going from the get go. And one other thing. I do not outline because I find it too confining. No surprise for the writer? None for the reader, either.
Q. What is your writer fantasy?
A. I can only have one? I have several. I want to make it to the New York Times Best Seller List and stay there for at least a year. No wait. I want to have two books on the list at the same time, just like Jodi Piccoult. I also want to have Oprah tell me that she couldn’t put my book down and why am I wasting time talking to her, I should be busy writing the next one. I also want a feature film or TV show to be developed based on my book and it should star Jennifer Aniston and John Mayer (and their maybe babies). Finally, I would like my kids to say to me, "Mom. You Rock!"
Q. Would your high school friends be surprised to discover you'd become a novelist?
A. Funny question. When I attended my 20th high school reunion in Munster, Indiana, I had been living in New York since graduating college and had lost contact with most of my classmates. One of the first people I ran into was Mary Ann Jugovic, the class valedictorian and the sweetest girl ever. The first thing I said to her is, "please tell me that you went to med school and became a pediatrician." To which she said, "only if you tell me that you moved to New York and became a writer." And the verdict was? She was a pediatrician with a beautiful family and I was an author with a beautiful family. Dreams do come true.
Q. If you could ask one author for one piece of advice, who would you ask and what would you want to know?
A. I'm very lucky because I actually had that opportunity. One of my favorite authors in the world is the novelist, Sol Stein, who wrote THE MAGICIAN and THE LIVING ROOM, among many others. I discovered him in college and feel in some ways, he was an influence in my secretly aspiring to be a writer. Recently, I was curious to see if he was still writing (or even still alive) and discovered he had a website and an email address. I wrote him this long, flowery message, never expecting a response. But the next day he sent me a lovely note back and we exchanged several emails. In one of them I asked his advice on whether I should change my name and use a pseudonym for my next book. This is something that my editor and agent had been discussing and I was torn. He wrote back and said, don't you dare. Saralee Rosenberg is a wonderful name and quite memorable.... now you know why I loved this guy, and so far, I've followed his advice.
Labels: Interview
posted by Carolyn @ 11/20/2008 04:50:00 PM Permalink
Monday, November 17, 2008
My Forbidden Desire - June 2009
My Forbidden Desire, Xia's story, will be out June 2009. Here's a look at the pretty much final cover. The tag line is from My Wicked Enemy, that will be replaced for the final cover. They just needed a place holder.) Is this cover fantastic or what?
Labels: Book Covers, My Forbidden Desire
posted by Carolyn @ 11/17/2008 08:09:00 PM Permalink
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Book Review: Through The Storm by Lynn Spears
Lynne Spears with Lorilee Craker
Through the Storm
Thomas Nelson, Inc.
Nashville, 2008
ISBN: 978-1-59555-156-6
Memoir 206 pages.
I should start off by admitting that I don't pay much attention to pop stars. If the radio is on, it's usually tuned to NPR so I rarely hear popular music. I also don't watch T.V. Therefore, my exposure to the phenomenon of Britney Spears has been fairly limited. I do not, however, live under a rock. I know who she is, and like just about everyone else, I've heard the stories reported about Britney's troubles and triumphs. Yes, also I heard about the Jamie Lynn's pregnancy and recall the ironic and/or sarcastic connections made between this upcoming book and the parenting skills, or lack thereof, of Lynne Spears.
One thing Through The Storm is not is a book on parenting, so get off that dead horse right now. It's more a mother’s explanation of her family, albeit her very notable family. Mrs. Spears recounts her life and marriage and, as you might imagine, the birth and raising of her children. She touches on the large moments in their lives, but keeps the focus on her perceptions and reactions to the events. To its credit, Through the Storm is not a Tell-All in disguise, and it does offer a perspective of events that I suspect is absent from the frantic reporting on the Spears family. And yet, the book is still very much about Britney Spears and, to a lesser extent, Jamie Lynn.
The story is, in essence, both inspiring and tragic. A young woman from very humble beginnings ends up with a daughter whose talent changes all their lives, and not always for the better. There is indeed a dark side to what was a fairy-tale rise to fame. As to any claims that Mrs. Spears pushed Britney into her career, I can only say that long before Mrs. Spears attempts to address the issue, it was plain to me that Britney Spears was one of those children who did not need to be pushed. There are simply kids who are like that. From an early age, they burn with passion, whether it be for writing, football, science, or, even, singing. Given what she had on her hands, Mrs. Spears did a remarkable job.
That said, I had a lot of trouble getting through this book. It was often painfully difficult to read. Thankfully, it's not very long (206 pages). This book offers no personal insight whatsoever, no sense that its author has thought deeply about anything. It's written in such a simplistic manner that by the end of chapter one I wanted to tear out my eyeballs. That didn't change until the final two chapters, which were quite riveting despite there being massive logical gaps in the narrative.
There's no meat to this story. It's vapidly written and even more vapidly told. If Mrs. Spears has anything but superficial insight into herself or her children, it's not presented in these pages. Both girls are held up as idealized, sparkly and numbingly saccharine Stepford-esque daughters. You'd think her children were nothing but sweetness and light during their entire childhoods. And how could that be? They grew up in a house with an alcoholic father, where money was tight and their mother was doing whatever it took to keep them together financially and spiritually. Everyone involved in such a family pays a price, fame or no fame. And that's without the incredible stress of Britney's notoriety.
Through the Storm offers a perspective missing from the sensationalized reports of the Spears family, but unless you don't mind reading a book written at a fourth-grade level, this is a pass.
Labels: Book Review
posted by Carolyn @ 11/16/2008 11:21:00 AM Permalink
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Carolyn is NOT Procrastinating
Labels: not procrastinating, procrastination
posted by Carolyn @ 11/15/2008 06:56:00 PM Permalink
Friday, November 14, 2008
Interview with Kelly Parra
Today, the awesome Kelly Parra submits to an interview from yours truly. Grace under pressure, folks. Kelly writes one of my all time fav genres, YA. Here we go!
Kelly Parra is the author of Graffiti Girl, a double RITA nominee and a Latinidad Top Pick, and the contemporary paranormal, Invisible Touch. When not pulling her hair while writing her current novel, she likes to play with her abundance of websites and feed a serious television addiction. For excerpts visit, www.kellyparra.com or follow the Secret Fates blog at secretfates.blogspot.com.
1. Tell me a little bit about the book.
K: Hi Carolyn, thank you for having me on your blog! Here is the cover copy for Invisible Touch:
2. If your protagonist were to wake up one day with a super power, what would that super power be? Alternatively (or both!) if your protagonist were to wake up one day with an intense craving for something, what would the craving be?
K: I guess you could say, seeing signs of the future is a super power! LOL. My character's intense craving in Invisible Touch is flavored coffee so I believe that's what she'd wake up wanting.
3. Would your villain prefer to be Emperor Ming The Merciless or Darth Vader? Why?
K: The villain in Invisible Touch is a mystery, so I can't tell you who it might be, but I'll compare the person to Darth Vader because the villain likes to take control.
4. What do you consider the heart of your story? That is, what is the
issue or emotion that propels things forward? Spill your guts on this one.
K: Kara lost her father tragically in an accident she was involved in and also received the gift of signs in order to save others from unfortunate fates. I think she tries to save others because she couldn't save her father. As the mystery unfolds, Kara is trying keep her family together and deal with her grief. It's an emotional journey for her and her family.
5. If you were in charge of casting the movie adaptation of your book, who gets the call?
K: Most of my favorite actors are too old for my characters but here's the make-believe scenario: Kara would be possibly be Vanessa Hudgens. Anthony would be a younger Milo Ventimiglia.
Carolyn: Wowza! I'm now a Milo fan!
6. Is there a scene you cut from the book that you kind of wish you could put back in?
K: I had another best friend in the first draft of the book, and she was going to be a red herring. You wouldn't know who was leaving Kara secrets, but it became a little confusing so I pulled her. But I think I might have been able to make it work eventually.
7. Do you have a sample chapter posted?
K: There is a sample excerpt on my website here: http://www.kellyparra.com/invisible.php
8. Tell us why your editor is the best editor ever in the universe.
K: My editor is super cool because she knows just how to pump up my stories without trying to change my voice.
Thanks for having me on your blog, Carolyn!
And thank you, Kelly.
P.S. As of this posting, 5 Amazon reviews, all 5-stars. I'm guessing this book rocks! No guessing involved, check the out trailer and the review blurbs below.
Amazon
Barnes & Noble
"A magical blending of mystery, romance, and deep and dangerous secrets. Kelly Parra's Invisible Touch is an action-packed coming-of-age novel, sure to keep readers turning pages and begging for a sequel." --Laurie Faria Stolarz, Bestselling author of Blue is for Nightmares and Deadly Little Secret
"Readers are going to delight in this fast-paced, gripping story, and be kept spellbound until its surprising finish." --Tina Ferraro, author of How To Hook A Hottie
"The Gold Award of Excellence! An amazing, touching novel that deals with big issues in an original context." --TeensReadToo
"Five out of five gold pens for Invisible Touch." --The Salinas Californian
About Kelly Parra
Kelly Parra is the author of Graffiti Girl, a double RITA nominee and a Latinidad Top Pick, and the contemporary paranormal, Invisible Touch. When not pulling her hair while writing her current novel, she likes to play with her abundance of websites and feed a serious television addiction. For excerpts visit, www.kellyparra.com or follow the Secret Fates blog at secretfates.blogspot.com.
The Interview
1. Tell me a little bit about the book.
K: Hi Carolyn, thank you for having me on your blog! Here is the cover copy for Invisible Touch:
Kara Martinez has been trying to be "normal" ever since the accident that took her father's life when she was eleven years old. She's buried the caliente side of her Mexican heritage with her father and tried to be the girl her rigid mother wants her to be--compliant and dressed in pink, and certainly not acting out like her older brother Jason. Not even Danielle, her best friend at Valdez High, has seen the real Kara; only those who read her anonymous blog know the deepest secrets of the sign seer.
Because Kara has a gift--one that often feels like a curse. She sees signs, visions that are clues to a person's fate, if she can put together the pieces of the puzzle in time. So far, she's been able to solve the clues and avert disaster for those she's been warned about--until she sees the flash of a gun on a fellow classmate, and the stakes are raised higher than ever before. Kara does her best to follow the signs, but it's her heart that wanders into new territory when she falls for a mysterious guy from the wrong side of town, taking her closer to answers she may not be able to handle. Will her forbidden romance help her solve the deadly puzzle before it's too late...or lead her even further into danger?
2. If your protagonist were to wake up one day with a super power, what would that super power be? Alternatively (or both!) if your protagonist were to wake up one day with an intense craving for something, what would the craving be?
K: I guess you could say, seeing signs of the future is a super power! LOL. My character's intense craving in Invisible Touch is flavored coffee so I believe that's what she'd wake up wanting.
3. Would your villain prefer to be Emperor Ming The Merciless or Darth Vader? Why?
K: The villain in Invisible Touch is a mystery, so I can't tell you who it might be, but I'll compare the person to Darth Vader because the villain likes to take control.
4. What do you consider the heart of your story? That is, what is the
issue or emotion that propels things forward? Spill your guts on this one.
K: Kara lost her father tragically in an accident she was involved in and also received the gift of signs in order to save others from unfortunate fates. I think she tries to save others because she couldn't save her father. As the mystery unfolds, Kara is trying keep her family together and deal with her grief. It's an emotional journey for her and her family.
5. If you were in charge of casting the movie adaptation of your book, who gets the call?
K: Most of my favorite actors are too old for my characters but here's the make-believe scenario: Kara would be possibly be Vanessa Hudgens. Anthony would be a younger Milo Ventimiglia.
Carolyn: Wowza! I'm now a Milo fan!
6. Is there a scene you cut from the book that you kind of wish you could put back in?
K: I had another best friend in the first draft of the book, and she was going to be a red herring. You wouldn't know who was leaving Kara secrets, but it became a little confusing so I pulled her. But I think I might have been able to make it work eventually.
7. Do you have a sample chapter posted?
K: There is a sample excerpt on my website here: http://www.kellyparra.com/invisible.php
8. Tell us why your editor is the best editor ever in the universe.
K: My editor is super cool because she knows just how to pump up my stories without trying to change my voice.
Thanks for having me on your blog, Carolyn!
And thank you, Kelly.
P.S. As of this posting, 5 Amazon reviews, all 5-stars. I'm guessing this book rocks! No guessing involved, check the out trailer and the review blurbs below.
Extras!
Where to Buy
Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Praise for Invisible Touch
"A magical blending of mystery, romance, and deep and dangerous secrets. Kelly Parra's Invisible Touch is an action-packed coming-of-age novel, sure to keep readers turning pages and begging for a sequel." --Laurie Faria Stolarz, Bestselling author of Blue is for Nightmares and Deadly Little Secret
"Readers are going to delight in this fast-paced, gripping story, and be kept spellbound until its surprising finish." --Tina Ferraro, author of How To Hook A Hottie
"The Gold Award of Excellence! An amazing, touching novel that deals with big issues in an original context." --TeensReadToo
"Five out of five gold pens for Invisible Touch." --The Salinas Californian
posted by Carolyn @ 11/14/2008 07:44:00 PM Permalink
Reporting In on Stuff in General
The Next Historical is picking up steam, which is awesomeness in the nick of time. I'm liking my hero a lot. League play for my son's soccer team is over (they won league!) which means I have my weekends free again. Less sitting in the car to write. I need them. Now it's just practices and the occasional scrimmage until the big tournament in January.
Scandal is officially on sale February 3, 2009. And I've seem some preliminary indications of good opinions. ARCs arrived Thursday and I've started reading through to make sure there's nothing terribly amiss with the copy. Wow. I was surprised by how strong the story seemed. Lord Ruin has a special place in my heart for being the book where I learned how important it is for me to write from a state of instinct. I am, I've come to realize, almost frighteningly analytical. (Stop laughing!!) But I cannot analyze myself into the kind of emotion a story requires. Lord Ruin was the book where I learned to let go.
Interestingly enough, there have been other times in my life when I have been under enormous pressure -- the kind where there was not time to analyze. I could only let go. The first time involved geometry. I needed under some rather dire circumstances to calculate an angle so as to end up with a precisely drawn triangle of a certain shape. And I stared at this bit poster board (this was for a court hearing the next day -- if I failed I'd probably be fired) and for a moment thought Carolyn, you got a D in geometry in High School. (The only grade I ever got below a B) How in heck are you going to get this triangle correctly drawn? I took a breath and had to let go of my fear and doubt and I swear that I suddenly knew EXACTLY how the formula worked. I got to work and holy heck if it didn't come out exactly and precisely the way Pythagoras said it did.
The second time also involved a court hearing, with the added bonus that the messenger was waiting for the exhibits which the copy service had just brought to the office incorrectly bound. Miss your filing and you notify the company's malpractice carrier, and of course we were right at the edge of maybe not enough time for the messenger to get to the courthouse. I looked at the copy guy and said, that's not how I asked for them to be bound. (All the exhibits had to be bound in one HUGE insanely thick stack, and they had divided them up according to the height of the two-hope top prongs.) And he says I didn't know how! Well heck, me neither because that was his job. A legal copy service is supposed to know all the tricks. So with my job and the company's future flashing before my eyes, I let go of the panic, looked at the exhibits and the little fasteners and just knew how to fix it. And did. In the nick of time.
The same thing happened with Lord Ruin I was sitting there knowing that the book currently had spots that were just dry and boring, and I was feeling kind of panicky about that. So I just let go. I just started writing, without caring about what was coming next. I fixed what I was looking at right then.
Oh, long digression there. I need to get cracking! Off to work.
Scandal is officially on sale February 3, 2009. And I've seem some preliminary indications of good opinions. ARCs arrived Thursday and I've started reading through to make sure there's nothing terribly amiss with the copy. Wow. I was surprised by how strong the story seemed. Lord Ruin has a special place in my heart for being the book where I learned how important it is for me to write from a state of instinct. I am, I've come to realize, almost frighteningly analytical. (Stop laughing!!) But I cannot analyze myself into the kind of emotion a story requires. Lord Ruin was the book where I learned to let go.
Interestingly enough, there have been other times in my life when I have been under enormous pressure -- the kind where there was not time to analyze. I could only let go. The first time involved geometry. I needed under some rather dire circumstances to calculate an angle so as to end up with a precisely drawn triangle of a certain shape. And I stared at this bit poster board (this was for a court hearing the next day -- if I failed I'd probably be fired) and for a moment thought Carolyn, you got a D in geometry in High School. (The only grade I ever got below a B) How in heck are you going to get this triangle correctly drawn? I took a breath and had to let go of my fear and doubt and I swear that I suddenly knew EXACTLY how the formula worked. I got to work and holy heck if it didn't come out exactly and precisely the way Pythagoras said it did.
The second time also involved a court hearing, with the added bonus that the messenger was waiting for the exhibits which the copy service had just brought to the office incorrectly bound. Miss your filing and you notify the company's malpractice carrier, and of course we were right at the edge of maybe not enough time for the messenger to get to the courthouse. I looked at the copy guy and said, that's not how I asked for them to be bound. (All the exhibits had to be bound in one HUGE insanely thick stack, and they had divided them up according to the height of the two-hope top prongs.) And he says I didn't know how! Well heck, me neither because that was his job. A legal copy service is supposed to know all the tricks. So with my job and the company's future flashing before my eyes, I let go of the panic, looked at the exhibits and the little fasteners and just knew how to fix it. And did. In the nick of time.
The same thing happened with Lord Ruin I was sitting there knowing that the book currently had spots that were just dry and boring, and I was feeling kind of panicky about that. So I just let go. I just started writing, without caring about what was coming next. I fixed what I was looking at right then.
Oh, long digression there. I need to get cracking! Off to work.
Labels: inspiration, Scandal, The Next Historical, writing
posted by Carolyn @ 11/14/2008 06:47:00 PM Permalink
Monday, November 10, 2008
Three Funny things!!
But you have to read about them over at the The Grand Central Cafe
You will laugh. I swear.
You will laugh. I swear.
Labels: Grand Central Cafe, humor
posted by Carolyn @ 11/10/2008 10:32:00 PM Permalink
Saturday, November 08, 2008
The cookie diet tip, NaNoWriMo, flowers and other stuff about writing
As you may know, I'm doing NaNoWriMo and so far I am -21,000 words or so. Yeah. That's negative words. Cough Cough. That would be for The Next Historical.
The good news is it's never all bad news when you cut crap from your novel. Plus last night I was able to get myself above 60,000 again. I think I need to add one more chapter, but I have to spend some time thinking about exactly what needs to happen in it. In the meantime I'm reading through and editing as I go. I'm feeling a lot better now that I've removed all of the chapters that needed to go stay in the Trash Files, an all expenses paid vacation for Words That Are Not Right. Or maybe it's a Rest Home. Yeah, more like that. Or maybe it's more like an orphanage. Without the big pathetic please take me home with you eyes. They try, sure, the pathetic whiners. But it's important not to listen.
What else? Today was the last league game for the son's soccer season. They won league with a 2-2 tie. I wrote in the car before the game started, which is always good for lack of distraction. It was an awesome game, too. Both teams played good soccer. From now until January they practice for the big state-wide tournament. This means I have my weekends back.
Today I ate mostly cookies. I said I'd bring cookies to the End Of Season soccer party so I made the dough last night and cooked the cookies when we got home from the game. I'm afraid I did too much taste testing, though I can at least report that each and every one of the cookies I ate were excellent. I couldn't eat anything at the party because I was too full from the cookies. Which is a great diet tip only I think you're supposed to fill up on carrots and celery, not cookies. Whatever. It worked, didn't it?
Here's a random picture I took yesterday:
OK, off to write a few more words then I'm going to bed.
The good news is it's never all bad news when you cut crap from your novel. Plus last night I was able to get myself above 60,000 again. I think I need to add one more chapter, but I have to spend some time thinking about exactly what needs to happen in it. In the meantime I'm reading through and editing as I go. I'm feeling a lot better now that I've removed all of the chapters that needed to go stay in the Trash Files, an all expenses paid vacation for Words That Are Not Right. Or maybe it's a Rest Home. Yeah, more like that. Or maybe it's more like an orphanage. Without the big pathetic please take me home with you eyes. They try, sure, the pathetic whiners. But it's important not to listen.
What else? Today was the last league game for the son's soccer season. They won league with a 2-2 tie. I wrote in the car before the game started, which is always good for lack of distraction. It was an awesome game, too. Both teams played good soccer. From now until January they practice for the big state-wide tournament. This means I have my weekends back.
Today I ate mostly cookies. I said I'd bring cookies to the End Of Season soccer party so I made the dough last night and cooked the cookies when we got home from the game. I'm afraid I did too much taste testing, though I can at least report that each and every one of the cookies I ate were excellent. I couldn't eat anything at the party because I was too full from the cookies. Which is a great diet tip only I think you're supposed to fill up on carrots and celery, not cookies. Whatever. It worked, didn't it?
Here's a random picture I took yesterday:
OK, off to write a few more words then I'm going to bed.
Labels: diet tips, editing, flowers, NaNoWriMo, Revising, writing
posted by Carolyn @ 11/08/2008 07:05:00 PM Permalink
Sunday, November 02, 2008
What Does Whiskers Think of The New Kitty?
I uploaded my first video to YouTube today. It's only 30 seconds and it's kind of lame but you'll find out what The Black Cat, aka, Nightmare, aka Insane Cat thinks of my son's kitten, Tiger.
In writing news, I have have been writing The Next Historical. Trying to write more than I delete. So, like if I write 2000 words today, I can delete 2000 words of crap. Works for me!
Also, at a gathering, my hero just discovered something kind of upsetting about the heroine. Ooooh.
By my friend on NaNoWriMo My user name is cjewel. Won't you be my buddy?
In writing news, I have have been writing The Next Historical. Trying to write more than I delete. So, like if I write 2000 words today, I can delete 2000 words of crap. Works for me!
Also, at a gathering, my hero just discovered something kind of upsetting about the heroine. Ooooh.
By my friend on NaNoWriMo My user name is cjewel. Won't you be my buddy?
Labels: NaNoWriMo, The Next Historical, Video, writing
posted by Carolyn @ 11/02/2008 07:04:00 PM Permalink
Saturday, November 01, 2008
Rant Alert! Authors Gone Mad
First, check out this review by the SciFi Guy 1: Some of you didn't so here's the low down. He reviewed this book and had some well thought out reactions and then mentioned that the author states on her website that blogs and internet users are prohibited from quoting from her books. I went off and looked at her website because, wow, can she really have said that? More about that later because it turns out her website is hard to find.
Yes, she did say that. And it's actually worse than SciFi Guy makes out.
A few things. SciFi Guy is in Canada, which has certainly had some different intellectual property case law than the US lately. But IANAL2 so I'll leave the whole mess about whose IP laws would apply to someone who is. For the purposes of this rant, that actually doesn't matter. I'm pretty sure, though, that an author doesn't get to pick how she'd like the law to be applied.
Now, I totally understand about spoilers. But spoilers happen in regular conversations, too. Really. People stand around and talk about Harry Potter in front of people who haven't read it and WTF! Cedric dies? And what do you mean Dumbledore's gay? If your mission in life is to prevent spoilers, I feel sorry for you because number effing one is that most authors think stuff is a spoiler when any reasonably smart person is going to see it coming anyway. And if your book is really good, no one's going to care. Seriously. I laughed, really, I did when I read that she justified the policy as a means of preventing spoilers. Let's apply some intellectual rigor to that.
What does a fair use (or not) quotation have to do with a spoiler? Spoilers can happen even in reviews (professional or not) that do not quote a single word of text. Most reviews don't contain quotes anyway. And how likely is it that an included quotation is going to have the spoiler. Not bloody likely. Watch me do it right before your eyes:
See? Woe to anyone who hasn't read this book yet. And I did it without quoting a single word from the text. Any discussion of a book, oral, written, via email, in the newspaper, in a magazine or on the internet can contain spoilers. Want to see a lot of spoilers? Go check Amazon reviews. They abound and with no quoted excerpts. If you want to stop spoilers, you're better off refusing to have your book reviewed. That would stop the spoilers for sure.
Therefore, I think we can safely say that prohibiting quotations will have little to no effect on the possibly worthy goal of preventing spoilers.
And then there's the part about copying. My brain hurts from trying to make sense of that. People quote from a book and place that quote on the internet. That quote (fair use or not) may be copied by others and placed on their site(s). Suddenly, people all over the internet may be seeing this quote. OK. And? That's bad because? Some people go too far and somehow place a larger quote from her book on their unprofessional cheesy site and that goes viral too. Oh noes! Remember, she's talking about quotes, not pirating the whole damn book like Google did without asking me first. 3
The You can't quote from my books if you're an internet nobody has an even bigger peril in it besides just being silly and ineffectual. And that is, print reviews are disappearing faster than those dinosaurs smoking behind the boulder. Print reviews do not reach the masses of people the internet can and will reach. Today's nobody internet reviewer is tomorrow's Dear Author. Many of the big review services are behind paywalls. (Publishers Weekly, are you listening?) Or they have their internet sites structured in such a way that they lose a massive number of eyeballs. In fact, these Professional review sites can be exceedingly hard to find if you happen to be average Jo The Reader just looking for a good book to read.
Genre books appeal to an incredibly wide audience, from PhD wielding academicians to hourly wage workers like Jo the Reader. As an author, it behooves me not to forget that the individual fan who reads my book and LOVED it so much she posted about it on her blog or MySpace or some personal review site is probably one of those social hub types followed socially (pick any sense of the word you like) by other book readers. And even if there are only five people who visit her site, she may well persuade those 5 people to read my book.
SciFi Guy also complained about this author's website being structured in such a way that it was difficult, it not impossible, to deep link. To my mind, this may actually be the most damaging this author is doing to herself. Linking is the life and breath of the internet. More to the point it is the key to Google page rank. Making it hard to link to a website is going to hurt you more than just about anything. And don't think that a link to the home page is sufficient for all incoming links. It's not. People who click a link expect to end up on a page relevant to the reason for their click. When that doesn't happen, they will NOT BOTHER to search beyond the home page. They will click away.
But let me provide some damning proof of why no author should build her website this way:
I Googled the author in question to see for myself if she said that stuff. I gave up clicking the results after page 4. As far as Google is concerned this author's website probably exists somewhere deep in the search results. As far as readers looking for her, her website DOES NOT EXIST. I ended up going back to SciFi Guy and finding her website that way.
Now Google me. Carolyn Jewel. My website is the coveted number one result. People looking for me find me right away. But I also know that most people don't start at my home page. The most viewed section of my website is my section on tips for writers. Lots of people read my excerpt chapters, too. But people who are looking for writing tips google things like How to write a query letter and my website comes up on their google search. And they head directly there. To one of the pages about query letters. In fact, you are foolish indeed if you think people start at your home page and explore from there. That idea flies in the face of ALL research done on web surfing habits. I also know that people have bought my books after finding my website for non-book buying purposes. I get email about it from time to time (and I love you all, madly!)
I got a little fancier. I Googled the title of her totally awesome first book. On the first page of results is there any link to her website? Answer: No. Though you would at least find out who wrote it, and go buy it, but you sure wouldn't find her website.
Now Google my 2002 historical Lord Ruin. A link to my website is 3rd. I'd probably be number one but for the two words being so common. Her first book title you would expect to be highly selective for a search. (That is, the word is unusual and should return extremely relevant results, which it does. Just not to the author's website.) Despite the far lower selectivity of my book title, you not only find buy links to my book, you find my website. And let's face it, this author and this book are way more famous than any of my books or me, for that matter. I am (alas) not at all famous and cannot afford to have my website unfindable by Google.
Herewith:
1. If you review one of my books, please do include quotes you feel are relevant to the point you're making, even if you hated the book (rats!) Please give me a link back (I'm easy to find via Google!) That would be pretty decent of you. Try to spell my name right, too. There's only one L in Jewel. C A R O L Y N J E W E L
Also double check the book title.
Post your review anywhere you want to.
Thank you and Happy Reviewing!
1. Disclosure, SciFi Guy wrote a really nice review of My Wicked Enemy and ended with a comment on my heroine that was dead on. I wondered about writing to him to say thank you for making me see that, but I didn't. Maybe I should.
2. I Am Not A Lawyer
3. But that's OK, the Author's Guild came to my rescue. Maybe. I don't know. But actually I'm not so worried about this. That's a whole 'nother post.
Yes, she did say that. And it's actually worse than SciFi Guy makes out.
A few things. SciFi Guy is in Canada, which has certainly had some different intellectual property case law than the US lately. But IANAL2 so I'll leave the whole mess about whose IP laws would apply to someone who is. For the purposes of this rant, that actually doesn't matter. I'm pretty sure, though, that an author doesn't get to pick how she'd like the law to be applied.
Now, I totally understand about spoilers. But spoilers happen in regular conversations, too. Really. People stand around and talk about Harry Potter in front of people who haven't read it and WTF! Cedric dies? And what do you mean Dumbledore's gay? If your mission in life is to prevent spoilers, I feel sorry for you because number effing one is that most authors think stuff is a spoiler when any reasonably smart person is going to see it coming anyway. And if your book is really good, no one's going to care. Seriously. I laughed, really, I did when I read that she justified the policy as a means of preventing spoilers. Let's apply some intellectual rigor to that.
What does a fair use (or not) quotation have to do with a spoiler? Spoilers can happen even in reviews (professional or not) that do not quote a single word of text. Most reviews don't contain quotes anyway. And how likely is it that an included quotation is going to have the spoiler. Not bloody likely. Watch me do it right before your eyes:
Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire is a long, wonderful addition to Rowland's saga of the boy wizard. The death of Cedric Diggory is the point at which we realize that the Wizarding world is taking a dark turn.
See? Woe to anyone who hasn't read this book yet. And I did it without quoting a single word from the text. Any discussion of a book, oral, written, via email, in the newspaper, in a magazine or on the internet can contain spoilers. Want to see a lot of spoilers? Go check Amazon reviews. They abound and with no quoted excerpts. If you want to stop spoilers, you're better off refusing to have your book reviewed. That would stop the spoilers for sure.
Therefore, I think we can safely say that prohibiting quotations will have little to no effect on the possibly worthy goal of preventing spoilers.
And then there's the part about copying. My brain hurts from trying to make sense of that. People quote from a book and place that quote on the internet. That quote (fair use or not) may be copied by others and placed on their site(s). Suddenly, people all over the internet may be seeing this quote. OK. And? That's bad because? Some people go too far and somehow place a larger quote from her book on their unprofessional cheesy site and that goes viral too. Oh noes! Remember, she's talking about quotes, not pirating the whole damn book like Google did without asking me first. 3
The You can't quote from my books if you're an internet nobody has an even bigger peril in it besides just being silly and ineffectual. And that is, print reviews are disappearing faster than those dinosaurs smoking behind the boulder. Print reviews do not reach the masses of people the internet can and will reach. Today's nobody internet reviewer is tomorrow's Dear Author. Many of the big review services are behind paywalls. (Publishers Weekly, are you listening?) Or they have their internet sites structured in such a way that they lose a massive number of eyeballs. In fact, these Professional review sites can be exceedingly hard to find if you happen to be average Jo The Reader just looking for a good book to read.
Genre books appeal to an incredibly wide audience, from PhD wielding academicians to hourly wage workers like Jo the Reader. As an author, it behooves me not to forget that the individual fan who reads my book and LOVED it so much she posted about it on her blog or MySpace or some personal review site is probably one of those social hub types followed socially (pick any sense of the word you like) by other book readers. And even if there are only five people who visit her site, she may well persuade those 5 people to read my book.
SciFi Guy also complained about this author's website being structured in such a way that it was difficult, it not impossible, to deep link. To my mind, this may actually be the most damaging this author is doing to herself. Linking is the life and breath of the internet. More to the point it is the key to Google page rank. Making it hard to link to a website is going to hurt you more than just about anything. And don't think that a link to the home page is sufficient for all incoming links. It's not. People who click a link expect to end up on a page relevant to the reason for their click. When that doesn't happen, they will NOT BOTHER to search beyond the home page. They will click away.
But let me provide some damning proof of why no author should build her website this way:
I Googled the author in question to see for myself if she said that stuff. I gave up clicking the results after page 4. As far as Google is concerned this author's website probably exists somewhere deep in the search results. As far as readers looking for her, her website DOES NOT EXIST. I ended up going back to SciFi Guy and finding her website that way.
Now Google me. Carolyn Jewel. My website is the coveted number one result. People looking for me find me right away. But I also know that most people don't start at my home page. The most viewed section of my website is my section on tips for writers. Lots of people read my excerpt chapters, too. But people who are looking for writing tips google things like How to write a query letter and my website comes up on their google search. And they head directly there. To one of the pages about query letters. In fact, you are foolish indeed if you think people start at your home page and explore from there. That idea flies in the face of ALL research done on web surfing habits. I also know that people have bought my books after finding my website for non-book buying purposes. I get email about it from time to time (and I love you all, madly!)
I got a little fancier. I Googled the title of her totally awesome first book. On the first page of results is there any link to her website? Answer: No. Though you would at least find out who wrote it, and go buy it, but you sure wouldn't find her website.
Now Google my 2002 historical Lord Ruin. A link to my website is 3rd. I'd probably be number one but for the two words being so common. Her first book title you would expect to be highly selective for a search. (That is, the word is unusual and should return extremely relevant results, which it does. Just not to the author's website.) Despite the far lower selectivity of my book title, you not only find buy links to my book, you find my website. And let's face it, this author and this book are way more famous than any of my books or me, for that matter. I am (alas) not at all famous and cannot afford to have my website unfindable by Google.
Herewith:
Carolyn's Review and Quotation Rules
1. If you review one of my books, please do include quotes you feel are relevant to the point you're making, even if you hated the book (rats!) Please give me a link back (I'm easy to find via Google!) That would be pretty decent of you. Try to spell my name right, too. There's only one L in Jewel. C A R O L Y N J E W E L
Also double check the book title.
Post your review anywhere you want to.
Thank you and Happy Reviewing!
Notes
1. Disclosure, SciFi Guy wrote a really nice review of My Wicked Enemy and ended with a comment on my heroine that was dead on. I wondered about writing to him to say thank you for making me see that, but I didn't. Maybe I should.
2. I Am Not A Lawyer
3. But that's OK, the Author's Guild came to my rescue. Maybe. I don't know. But actually I'm not so worried about this. That's a whole 'nother post.
Labels: Rant
posted by Carolyn @ 11/01/2008 05:21:00 PM Permalink
