Blog Hop - Jump Right In!
I’ve been asked by fellow author, Nancy Agabian, to participate in a Blog Hop in order to introduce authors to new readers. This is an opportunity for you to get know something about the next novel I have been working on and to check out some writers who might be new to you (links posted at the end of this post.) These are some excellent writers whose work I highly recommend. Again, special thanks to Nancy Agabian for asking me to participate – here is her link so you can travel backwards as well as forwards. Happy Hopping!
http://nancyagabian.com/?p=483
Q: What is the working title of your new book?
A: The In Between.
Q: Where did the idea come from for the book?
A: The events in this book are VERY roughly based on an actual experience. When a very close friend of mine (who had named me power of attorney and medical advocate when she first got breast cancer) discovered her cancer had metastasized to her brain, her somewhat and intermittently estranged parents showed up in the guise of ‘support.’ It gradually became clear that their motives were a lot more complicated than that and not necessarily focused on my friend’s well-being. A group of friends tried to rally around and found themselves pitted against the legal rights, pure venom and crazy shenanigans of my friend’s very abusive family.
Q: What genre does your book fall under?
A: It is young adult fiction with cross-over appeal.
Q: Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
A: I love movies but I’m kind of terrible at celebrity stuff. I can provide some casting guidelines, though.
Chelsea – beautiful, popular, ethnically ambiguous, might remind me a bit of Santana Lopez (Naya Rivera) from Glee, personality-wise. Imagine Santana if she discovered she had bone cancer.
Natalie – narrator for the story, Chelsea’s best friend. She’s a little short, frizzy hair, Jewish, intelligent, musical, excellent athlete, yet thinks of herself as barely average in the shadow of Chelsea’s star-light. (I Googled ‘female teen actors’ and thought maybe Selena Gomez could pass for Jewish though I don’t know anything about her acting.)
Elena – Natalie’s soccer teammate and new friend, of Palestinian descent. Google search same as above: Parker McKenna Posey? Though, again, I know nothing about her acting.
Jake – Natalie’s slightly younger brother, autistic (think toward the Asberger’s end of the spectrum.) Okay, I know he’s probably too old but Joseph Gordon Levitt would be great.
Various adults though I think Meryl Streep definitely needs to play Chelsea’s nasty mother.
Q. What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
A: Told through the sympathetic voice of Chelsea’s best friend Natalie, a young woman who takes on the troubles of others like some people collect stuffed animals, it is really Natalie’s struggle with the concepts of friendship, loyalty, commitment to an ideal, and self-worth that fully illuminates a story where no one is what they seem, teenagers are forced to carry the responsibility of adults, and the ‘in-between’ world of imminent mortality can reveal what is really most important in life.
Q: Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
A: I have a wonderful agent and my first book was published by Viking/Penguin. It is unclear at this time whether I will be continuing to work with the same publisher on future projects but my hope is to develop and maintain a long-term (professional) relationship with either my present editor or another one just as good.
Q: How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
A: Probably about three or four months. I write fast and then go back and flesh everything out, toss the junk, address plot problems, etc. in revision. Total time between six and eight months.
Q: What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
A: I was a tiny bit miffed when John Green’s newest book The Fault in Our Stars came out since both main characters in his novel have cancer AND my manuscript had actually been written several years before his book’s release (I wrote it while waiting through the publishing process for my first book Getting Somewhere, probably about 2009, though still revising.) Of course, despite the cancer similarities, the stories are each very unique in their own way. It’s not a YA book but there might be some similarities with Jodi Picoult’s My Sister’s Keeper as a kind of ‘medical thriller’ with lots of family dynamics thrown in (great book, terrible movie.)
Q: Who or What inspired you to write this book?
A: My interest is in relationships – all the ways that they manifest themselves, how they are defined within and influenced by the social framework, their impact on the formation of identity. In particular, I am fascinated with the intersection between an individual and her social environment, and the experience of marginalization, especially for girls and women. While critical issues of race, ethnicity, gender, class, sexual orientation, etc. all have a marginalizing influence, things like disease and abuse can offer similar challenges and often stimulate parallel psychological and emotional responses. This story gave me a chance to explore that further as well as the often over-looked but essential connections between mental and physical health.
Q: What else about your book might piqué the reader’s interest?
A: I kind of fall in love with all my characters but none so much as Natalie in The In Between. She is so alive for me that I can forget she’s not a real person, someone I wish I actually knew. Sometimes I almost feel bad for making things so hard on her, for raising the dramatic stakes again and again to the point where she is nearly crushed. Yet, it’s truly the confidence I have in her (and that I want to instill in her) that drives the story. My only hope, really, is that this novel will be as enjoyable (though occasionally heartbreaking) to read as it has been to write.
LINKS:
Miguel Morales – http://www.facebook.com/l/tAQFVCmVzAQ...
Barbara Shoup - barbarashoup.blogspot.com
http://nancyagabian.com/?p=483
Q: What is the working title of your new book?
A: The In Between.
Q: Where did the idea come from for the book?
A: The events in this book are VERY roughly based on an actual experience. When a very close friend of mine (who had named me power of attorney and medical advocate when she first got breast cancer) discovered her cancer had metastasized to her brain, her somewhat and intermittently estranged parents showed up in the guise of ‘support.’ It gradually became clear that their motives were a lot more complicated than that and not necessarily focused on my friend’s well-being. A group of friends tried to rally around and found themselves pitted against the legal rights, pure venom and crazy shenanigans of my friend’s very abusive family.
Q: What genre does your book fall under?
A: It is young adult fiction with cross-over appeal.
Q: Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
A: I love movies but I’m kind of terrible at celebrity stuff. I can provide some casting guidelines, though.
Chelsea – beautiful, popular, ethnically ambiguous, might remind me a bit of Santana Lopez (Naya Rivera) from Glee, personality-wise. Imagine Santana if she discovered she had bone cancer.
Natalie – narrator for the story, Chelsea’s best friend. She’s a little short, frizzy hair, Jewish, intelligent, musical, excellent athlete, yet thinks of herself as barely average in the shadow of Chelsea’s star-light. (I Googled ‘female teen actors’ and thought maybe Selena Gomez could pass for Jewish though I don’t know anything about her acting.)
Elena – Natalie’s soccer teammate and new friend, of Palestinian descent. Google search same as above: Parker McKenna Posey? Though, again, I know nothing about her acting.
Jake – Natalie’s slightly younger brother, autistic (think toward the Asberger’s end of the spectrum.) Okay, I know he’s probably too old but Joseph Gordon Levitt would be great.
Various adults though I think Meryl Streep definitely needs to play Chelsea’s nasty mother.
Q. What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
A: Told through the sympathetic voice of Chelsea’s best friend Natalie, a young woman who takes on the troubles of others like some people collect stuffed animals, it is really Natalie’s struggle with the concepts of friendship, loyalty, commitment to an ideal, and self-worth that fully illuminates a story where no one is what they seem, teenagers are forced to carry the responsibility of adults, and the ‘in-between’ world of imminent mortality can reveal what is really most important in life.
Q: Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
A: I have a wonderful agent and my first book was published by Viking/Penguin. It is unclear at this time whether I will be continuing to work with the same publisher on future projects but my hope is to develop and maintain a long-term (professional) relationship with either my present editor or another one just as good.
Q: How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
A: Probably about three or four months. I write fast and then go back and flesh everything out, toss the junk, address plot problems, etc. in revision. Total time between six and eight months.
Q: What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
A: I was a tiny bit miffed when John Green’s newest book The Fault in Our Stars came out since both main characters in his novel have cancer AND my manuscript had actually been written several years before his book’s release (I wrote it while waiting through the publishing process for my first book Getting Somewhere, probably about 2009, though still revising.) Of course, despite the cancer similarities, the stories are each very unique in their own way. It’s not a YA book but there might be some similarities with Jodi Picoult’s My Sister’s Keeper as a kind of ‘medical thriller’ with lots of family dynamics thrown in (great book, terrible movie.)
Q: Who or What inspired you to write this book?
A: My interest is in relationships – all the ways that they manifest themselves, how they are defined within and influenced by the social framework, their impact on the formation of identity. In particular, I am fascinated with the intersection between an individual and her social environment, and the experience of marginalization, especially for girls and women. While critical issues of race, ethnicity, gender, class, sexual orientation, etc. all have a marginalizing influence, things like disease and abuse can offer similar challenges and often stimulate parallel psychological and emotional responses. This story gave me a chance to explore that further as well as the often over-looked but essential connections between mental and physical health.
Q: What else about your book might piqué the reader’s interest?
A: I kind of fall in love with all my characters but none so much as Natalie in The In Between. She is so alive for me that I can forget she’s not a real person, someone I wish I actually knew. Sometimes I almost feel bad for making things so hard on her, for raising the dramatic stakes again and again to the point where she is nearly crushed. Yet, it’s truly the confidence I have in her (and that I want to instill in her) that drives the story. My only hope, really, is that this novel will be as enjoyable (though occasionally heartbreaking) to read as it has been to write.
LINKS:
Miguel Morales – http://www.facebook.com/l/tAQFVCmVzAQ...
Barbara Shoup - barbarashoup.blogspot.com
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