When I first moved to New York City, the noises overwhelmed me, the constant clatter of voices and horns and sirens and engines and high heels and exclamations. I’d grown up in the suburbs with the sound of cicadas and thunderstorms and the Frigidaire humming and doors slamming when my parents fought. But the New York City air was thick with steaming hot dogs and roasting chestnuts and exhaust and…
I would say that the main thing that publishing has taught me is how to meet my deadlines and then make a joke about the fact that it’s 4:23 on Saturday where I am and I’ve officially thus missed my deadline for this post. Missing deadlines is atypical for me — I’m actually the opposite, the virtual equivalent of the kid who sat in the front row and raised her…
Well, Kristy Kiernan‘s brainchild has made a seemingly seamless transition into its latest incarnation. And, after only a year, we founders — I feel like a bit of a fraud even calling myself a founder, as my big contribution to the group was a MySpace page that has been ever so sadly neglected (new Debs: please ask me for log-in information for it so I can pass that duty onto…
Yikes, here I go writing off topic again. I’m winding up a week in New York that I spent publicizing my book. I was tempted to write that I’m winding up my New York book tour, but the fact is, I got myself here (using mileage, but still), paid for my hotel room and booked most of my own media appearances. Just a few tiny words can change the meaning,…
Well, I haven’t gone off topic for a while and given that I’m leaving for New York in just a few hours and my usual pre-flight did-I-pack-right-will-my-cats-go-on-hunger-strikes-with-me-gone-and-what-if-I-get-strip-searched-at-the-airport level of anxiety making me draw a complete blank on the topic of wind, I figured I’d write a bit about the way my life has changed since my book came out. In short, it hasn’t. I don’t mean this to sound remotely…
DEB DEBUT! It’s Party time! Please join us in congratulating Debutante Anna David, whose novel Party Girl now has its very own debut page on The Ball. Stop over, learn more about Anna and the book, and snap one up for yourself. Congratulations, Anna! Viral Video Alert! Be sure to check out the viral video for Deb Anna’s PARTY GIRL. You are then both strongly encouraged to feel the nearly…
Since I am pop-culturally-illiterate, it’s a good thing I have something off-topic I want to post about. Then again, music, the 80s, and Showtime are all mentioned, so maybe it does qualify? Anyway…. On May 21 at 6 pm, I’m going to be at Mo Pitkin’s in NYC for a reading and reception with two other Harper debut authors, Amy Bryant and Heather McElhatton (rhymes with tackle-latin, if you were…
It seems a rather optimistic and extreme move to make — downright ballsy, as a matter of fact — but I’m going to go ahead and pick the protagonist of the book I’m currently reading as my favorite literary character. Is it because I’m positive he’s the ultimate, be-all, end-all character, filled with nuances and quirks and thoughts that none I’ve encountered before has possessed? No. But after just a…
I found my agent like I’ve found a lot of things in my life; through a bizarre series of odd coincidences and happy accidents. First off, let me state for the record that I had no connections in the publishing industry. I have no MFA. In fact, I don’t have any higher degree at all. I had no relatives, friends, friends of friends, kind of/sort of connections, period. I was…
Anna might have had it tough being the first Debutante to grace our pages with her brilliance, but surely I am to be pitied for having to follow FIVE brilliant introductions? I shall do my best. I am actually rather bewildered by the fact that I am blogging. Many things that I’m doing these days seem to bewilder me. I always wanted to write for a living, there was never…
