advice – The Debutante Ball

Interview with Kelly Duran, author of CAN’T TAKE IT BACK

Wednesday, October 28, 2020

This week’s interview is with Kelly Duran, whose book CAN’T TAKE IT BACK tells the interconnected stories of four women over the course of a kindergarten school year. Read below about Kelly’s transformative trip through Europe, her hope for connecting with readers through her books, and her recognition of writing as an integral and necessary part of her life that enhances all her other roles. ABOUT KELLY Kelly Duran…

The 3Ps of my Publishing Journey: Partners, Polishing, and Patience

Thursday, September 17, 2020

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Thanks so much for stopping by the Deb Ball! This time we’re talking about our paths to publication. Join in the conversation by sharing where you’re at on your own path. Do you have dreams of writing but are having trouble putting pen to paper? Do you already have several full novels written but are struggling to find an agent? Are you somewhere in between? We hope you’ll find some…

My path to publication: A comedy of failures

Thursday, September 10, 2020

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I wrote last week about how I hadn’t planned on becoming a writer, and how writing was something I came to after being unemployed for a long time. So already my path to publication was a little longer and had more forking paths than some people. I completed the rough draft of my novel in about six months in 2011, and I spent the next four years first learning how…

The end of the line, the beginning of everything.

Wednesday, August 19, 2020

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So, here we are. The end of the line. The beginning of everything. This has been a great year. It’s not the year I thought I would get on the tin, but it’s taught me a lot of lessons and kept me on my toes. I’m sure next year will be as… eventful. (I’m giving you the side-eye, next year. You’d better behave.) We’re supposed to finish off our tenure…

Learning all the things you never thought you had to learn, or debuting in a pandemic.

Wednesday, August 12, 2020

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I simply can’t believe it’s been a whole year. This week, we’re talking about what we learned as a Debutante. To be honest, this entry was hard to write, because my expectations about what I thought would happen this year debuting Architects of Memory and what actually did happen were so incredibly different. Like Pluto-versus-the-Sun different. When I applied to be a Deb, my release date was January. I was…

Novels arrive precisely when they mean to.

Wednesday, May 6, 2020

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I’m turning forty this year. And when you’re a middle-aged mom writing science fiction at four in the morning, it’s hard to look at all the startling young ingenues in their adorable city apartments, writing life-changing novels, getting MFAs, doing interviews with Lithub— —Let’s just say that I’ve been there. I understand. I thought my life was over in my early thirties when I turned out a truly awful epic…

What Wine to Drink With? Guest Author Alice Feiring Tells Us

Saturday, April 18, 2020

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Alice Feiring is an outspoken author, journalist, and spitfire wine industry participant. Formerly the wine/travel columnist for Time and the Wall Street Journal Magazine, Feiring also writes for prestigious publications of every stripe, from The New York Times, The World of Fine Wine, to Afar. Over the course of her career her contributions to the world of wine journalism have earned her such major industry nods as a James Beard Foundation Award, a Louis Roederer International Wine Writer, Born…

Interview with Author Sarah DiGregorio (and Book Giveaway!)

As someone who dealt with many complications getting pregnant, I was excited to talk to Sarah DiGregorio, who writes about premature birth in her book EARLY: An Intimate History of Premature Birth and What It Teaches Us About Being Human (Harper). In this reported memoir, the freelance journalist, who covers both healthcare and food for many publications (including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Slate, The Wall Street Journal, and Catapult)…

Saturday, March 21, 2020

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My Most Perfect Day (Not).

My most perfect day was any day before the Coronavirus hit. I woke up, took my daughter to school, then spent the day writing (or procrastinating on writing which I hope is the same thing. #goals). Then I thought about what I would write next, to whom I would sell it, and working on my book marketing plan. And setting up book promotion events. And calling the press. It was…

Friday, March 20, 2020

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No longer such a perfect day

Wednesday, March 18, 2020

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Back in August, we Debutantes got together over video-conferencing to work on the list of topics we wanted to talk about this year. Some of these topics were developed in previous years by other Debs. Some, we came up with on our own. None of them were developed with a global pandemic in mind. This week’s topic is “A Perfect Day,” which I’m finding hard to talk about now that…

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