Women Who Rock Wednesday: A New Holiday Focus

Welcome to Women Who Rock Wednesday! Let's start things off with the prize I have to announce... the winner of Jessica Brody's LOVE UNDER COVER is MARIAN from Blogger! Marian you didn't leave your email address, so hopefully you are reading this and can send your address to stephanie at stephaniekuehnert dot com so you can get your prize!

So it's Thanksgiving which marks the beginning of the holiday season. I've gotta say, I'm not a fan. Other than the part where we say what we're thankful for (and I'm thankful for all of you, my darling blog readers), to me it is such a gluttonous time and I'm not just talking about all the eating (I do like eating, though as a vegan, I'm not really into the stuff people usually eat). Black Friday and all the crazed consumerism is what really grosses me out.

So I also am trying to change the focus of the holidays to giving back to your community or giving to those in need rather than buying a ton of unnecessary crap.

This means that throughout the holiday season I am going to change up the focus of Women Who Rock Wednesday. I plan to interview and spotlight charities and positive community or earth-friendly efforts that women I know are involved in. Of course, if there are some charities or do-gooder women out there you think I should spotlight, please do let me know as I could use at least one more woman & her organization to spotlight. Contact info/personal references really helps and you can email those to stephanie at stephaniekuehnert dot com.

Today I'm going to talk about the organization I was involved with as a teen. Sarah's Inn is a Domestic Violence agency in Oak Park, Illinois. I started volunteering there when I was sixteen, after getting out of an emotionally abusive relationship myself. I wasn't openly talking about or dealing with what I'd gone through at the time, but volunteering helped me work through my own issues a little bit. I spent my Saturday mornings there working with a bilingual children's support group. These were kids whose fathers were abusive and their mothers were getting out of the relationship. They were amazing kids, so resilient and smart and inspiring.

I also worked a bit on the agency newsletter and did any volunteer office work they needed. Christmas time always makes me think of sitting in a big storage area assembling gift baskets for the women and children Sarah's Inn served, many of whom were in shelters or temporary housing after leaving their abusers.

There are a lot of things I did during my teenage years that I am not particularly proud of, but my work at Sarah's Inn is something I can always look back at with pride, knowing that I helped others and I helped myself heal. Kimberley, the volunteer coordinator, is a woman who I will always be thankful that I had in my life. She was in her early twenties and a writer as well, a journalism student who fell into this job at a non-profit and truly loved it. She's actually the one who inspired me to go to school for sociology because I saw how I could incorporate writing with non-profit work and truly help people... of course I ended up getting sucked in by creative writing instead, but I do write my books in hopes of helping people--not in some holier than thou let me teach you a lesson way of course, but by creating dialogue about important issues. And if this book writing thing doesn't work out, I may go back to school so I can be like Kimberley, that woman who I admired so much at sixteen.

Now I did this volunteering thing completely on my own, but I know a lot of schools encourage it or require some sort of community service now. Have you done any? What kind of impact did it have on your life?

And once again feel free to comment about an organization or woman you think I should highlight over the next few weeks.

New Contest!

I'm changing up the contest now too. Through the end of December, I will run one big WWRW contest that begins now. At the end of our focus on community service, I'll choose one winner from the commentors on all the blog entries (including this one!) and that person will get signed copies of Ballads of Suburbia and I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone, but more importantly, I will donate as much as I can afford (minimum 25$, but hopefully the bar will be busy tonight and I'll have some extra cash) to whichever charity they choose from a list I will compile of my favorite charities and of the organizations you tell me about in the comments of this blog entry.

So get in the *real* holiday spirit and start telling me about those great organizations you love and why you love them!

Oh and as usual, you'll get an extra entry for tweeting, linking to, or blogging about this blog entry. Please note those extra entries along with your email address in your comments.

Music For The Muse

I promised you a more interesting/special blog post today and here it is. Ronna (aka RR Smythe, who writes YA Fantasy and then other books under other names) came up with this cool idea for a bunch of different authors to write about how music is their muse all on the same day. Obviously, I was psyched about the idea. So read on to find out about how music is my muse and then I'll be linking you to six other authors' blogs so you can find out how music inspires them.

I think music is up there with the essentials for me: food, water, shelter. I can't live without those or music either. Music has inspired my writing since I started writing angsty poetry in junior high. It all started with Nirvana. Something about seeing this scrawny, dirty-blond guy screaming his lungs out and people listened. He was a freak/weirdo/outcast/misfit like me, but people listened. And his screams felt like I felt inside. He inspired me to unleash those feelings on the page. Well he did and so did his wife, Courtney Love. If you read any of my teenage poetry (which, um, you won't unless you search super hard and find the couple of poems I submitted to what would become poetry.com as a teen), you'll see that it basically sounds like a bad version of Hole or Babes In Toyland or Sleater-Kinney lyrics.

Eventually, I realized I could never lyrically live up to the punk rock ladies who inspired me and I definitely didn't have their musical talents, so I started to explore fiction and eventually I wrote my little rock n roll fantasy--of women like Courtney and Kat and Corin totally ruling the rock world--and it became my first book, I WANNA BE YOUR JOEY RAMONE.

My second book, BALLADS OF SUBURBIA, was inspired by the Man in Black himself, Johnny Cash. After a discussion in a grad school class about ballads, true ones like the one Johnny sung about life and love and our tendency to fuck up, I came up with the structure of the book--a notebook where my characters write their ballad or confession of the moment their life changed.

The two books I'm working on now are both musically-driven in some way. I can't help it. Music changed my life, so I usually find myself writing about characters who are changed by music in someway.

But lets talk about how music fits into my writing process and feeds my muse (and I'll include links to YouTube so if you are not familiar with a song or artist, you can check them out). I don't write to music, not usually, not unless I am so deep into the zone that I don't even have to think. During the first draft of BALLADS, I got to that point. I was on a ten-day writing retreat and since there were other writers in the house making some sounds, I blocked it out with my headphones. The bands I listened to then were Screaming Trees, PJ Harvey and Johnny Cash. I think the atmosphere of that music definitely makes its way into BALLADS. Both Johnny and Mark Lanegan, the singer of the Screaming Trees have these deep, throaty baritones that makes the music feel dark and moody and PJ Harvey is just... wow I don't even have words, but it fits.

Usually though I build a playlist as I'm writing and I get stuck on a few songs and always find myself listening to them to get into the mode of the book. I listen to them either while I am brainstorming or right before I write. With IWBYJR, it was all about the song "Don't Take Me For Granted" by Social Distortion. I felt like the story of Emily and her best friend Regan in a small town forming a punk band was the female version of Mike Ness's song about forming Social D with his best friend. Of course, the song the book is named after, "I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone" by Sleater-Kinney was also one I'd listen to. I remember playing it every night before I delved into my revisions on that book.

With BALLADS, each character had their own ballad or theme, but an overarching theme song for the book was "Bastards of Young" by the Replacements. However, I also had music for the mindsets of my characters. The book deals with heroin addiction, which was hard to write so I went to the music, listening to "Mr. Brownstone" by Guns N Roses and "Heroin" by The Velvet Underground, but also the entire Dirt album by Alice in Chains.

While I'm refining a book, I'm also refining a playlist for it. It's part procrastination tool, but it's also really part necessity. The finished playlists are posted as "soundtracks" on my website. You can find IWBYJR's here and BALLADS' here.

The book I'm working on right now was actually born from listening to a song. I was heading to the gym to work out and had my iPod on of course. "Radio" by Alkaline Trio was on as I walked up the stairs, passed the glass enclosed fire alarm. I thought about how I'd always been tempted to pull the fire alarm. Then a character came to me who would pull the fire alarm. I saw two girls, one of whom would pull it despite the other girl's pleas not to and I knew that these girls would really relate to the song I was listening to, particularly the lines "While you're taking your time with apologies, I'm planning out my revenge. Red eyes on orange horizons, if Columbus was wrong I'll go straight off the edge."

Image plus song equaled book idea... well not so much an idea but a feeling, a feeling that these girls were hurting, a feeling that pulling a fire alarm would be involved, and a feeling that the book was about revenge.

Another song would add to the book idea later. I'd already written a draft of the first fifty pages of it, but something was wrong with it. Then I was in the car on a rainy day and the song "Gone Away" by The Offspring came on. I was still raw with grief for a friend that died almost a year before and the song hurt in such a way that I needed to pull over and just let it hurt. Purging pain through a sad song is very similar to how I purge pain through writing. And I knew then that I needed to write through my grief. I knew then that the sister/best friend of the fire alarm girls was dead. This was going to be my grief book, I was going to mourn with my characters. So now I listen to "Gone Away" and also "The 59 Sound" by The Gaslight Anthem before I write because it brings up those feelings of mourning for me. They aren't good feelings, but the process is healing.

So yeah now this is my revenge/grief book, but there is one last song that is really influencing it right now and I believe a line from it is the true theme of the book. The line is "How we survive is what makes us who we are" by the band Rise Against from the song "Survive."

That's how music serves as a muse for me. It inspires my characters, my themes, the mood or atmosphere of my books. Without it, I wouldn't be writing.

Now, you should go check out these 6 blogs and see how music inspires some of my fellow writers. Also please comment away and tell me how music feeds your muse!

http://jenniferlinforth.blogspot.com/
http://www.jerismithready.com/blog/
http://chapmansmythe.livejournal.com/
http://bryanbliss.blogspot.com/
http://marleydelaroseauthor.blogspot.com/
http://thetaratracks.com/blog

Some Random Odds & Ends

*Warning: today's blog is in no way cohesive!*

I've been having trouble keeping up with random things... I've been having trouble keeping up with everything in general. Honestly, I'm in a place where I just want to write and ignore the world, but unfortunately I can't. I'm probably the only person not thrilled about the holiday this week because it's cutting into my writing time, but anyway....

First of all, thank you so much for all the honeymoon suggestions last week. Our budget was really insanely limited, so Miami was definitely the way to go, but the other suggestions have been noted for the future... hopefully one day we will have money for travel. We couldn't even afford to get all the way to Key West (it's a four hour drive from Miami, so would necessitate flying back from Key West instead of spending so much of our time driving, and flights from Key West cost 100$ more than flights from Miami), but we are going to stay two nights in Key Largo as we found an insanely good deal on a four-star resort so that is our one splurge. Suggestions for beaches, bars, restaurants (with vegan options please), or other must-sees in the Miami and Key Largo area are definitely appreciated. Hubby is trying to convince me to go snorkeling, but I've had this fear of swimming with fish since I was 19 or 20 and drunkenly swam halfway across a lake in Wisconsin in the middle of the night only to become paralyzed with fear about very large fish lurking around my legs, perhaps ready to pull me under. (I think I blame Kevin for this. I'm guessing while we were swimming he mentioned the large fish in that lake. It just seems like a Kevin thing to do...) But I suppose if I can see the fish, I can swim away from them... Anyway, we leave on our honeymoon on January 10 and are in Miami on Sunday (very late), Monday, and Tuesday. Then drive to Key Largo on Wednesday, stay there Thursday and return home in the evening on Friday. So yeah, suggest away.

On to the other randomness. I did some cool interviews recently, so please check them out if you have time. I did an interview with Oak Park 365/the Oak Leaves about Ballads and my relationship with Oak Park, the town where I grew up and the novel is set. It has some cool pics of me in Scoville Park, so you can check it out here.

I also did an interview with Diana of Stop, Drop, and Read where I talk about the piercings I've always wanted to get among other things. That is here.

And last but certainly not least, yaReads.com is featuring me as their author of the month! This means two lucky people will win signed copies of Ballads and you can enter that contest here. You can also read their amazing review of Ballads here. It's a review I am super proud of. And they did an in depth interview with me about Ballads (but be warned there are some major spoiler questions, so do yourself a favor and skip those if you haven't read the book), which you can check out here. In it I also choose the ballad that best suits my life. I'll be posting a guest review later this week over there about a book that is coming out next year that I am so crazy excited for, Harmonic Feedback by Tara Kelly. If you are a fan of my work, you will definitely adore this book. I'll post a link when I get it, so you can learn more.

Oh and I do want to pimp the reading I'm doing on Friday. I really, really hope that if you are in the area, you can make it out. Hometown events are always kind of nerve wracking for me. And I'm extra anxious now because this past Friday I had my first author event where *absolutely no one* showed up. I felt like such a jackass because I'd arranged the event and invited four super cool YA writers (Jessica Hopper, James Kennedy, Daniel Kraus, and Adam Selzer), but I guess no one realized that it was on New Moon release weekend. Apparently there is no completing with Twilight. *sigh* I was majorly bummed.

So anyway, now I'm nervous as hell that I'll be 0 for 2. So please come see me read at Barbara's in Oak Park this Friday if you can. Here is the facebook invite and the sweet flyer they made for me is posted below. Feel free to share them.

Okay, off to get some writing done. Tomorrow's blog will be more cohesive and interesting. Though I'm not making big promises for the rest of the week. I'm starting to get cranky about my lack of time to write.

GCC Presents: Laurie Faria Stolarz

I'm a part of a fun blog touring group called the Girlfriends Cyber Circuit. When my fellow girlfriends have new books out, I bring them by to tell you about their new releases. Today I've got Laurie Faria Stolarz here to talk about her two new books, BLACK IS FOR BEGINNINGS and DEADLY LITTLE LIES. First, let's hear about the books (which sound incredible!), then Laurie will answer some interview questions!

ABOUT BLACK IS FOR BEGINNNINGS:

The BLUE IS FOR NIGHTMARES series that put a spell on more than half a million readers continues – in graphic novel format! Prophetic nightmares. Near-brushes with death. Killers pursuing her and her friends. Stacey Brown knows that being a hereditary witch isn’t all it's cracked up to be.

All she really wants to do is work things out with Jacob and figure out what to do with the rest of her life. But before Stacey and Jacob can have a future, they must face their pasts. BLACK IS FOR BEGINNINGS reveals the never-before-seen backstory - and what lies ahead - for the young, spellcasting lovers.

BLACK continues the harrowing adventures of Stacey and Jacob in the wake of Jacob's brush with death. Ever since he lost his memory, Jacob hasn't been able to remember Stacey - his own soul mate. He leaves Massachusetts, returning to his childhood home in Colorado, hoping to jog his memory. What he remembers is Kira, his ex-girlfriend. As Jacob works to piece together his past, will there be room for Stacey in his future?

REVIEWS:

"The half-million readers of Laurie Faria Stolarz’s paranormal mystery series will be happy with this shift to graphic style, offering as it does the pleasure of putting faces on characters, its visualized eeriness and vibrant displays of emotion...The graphic style allows Stolarz to distill the story while simultaneously dropping hints about Stacey and Jacob’s supernatural talents, luring new readers to the series." - Kirkus Reviews

"Taking Stolarz’s Blue Is for Nightmares series into the graphic-novel realm is a bold idea, and it pays off in this morbidly entertaining and surprisingly romantic page-turner." - Booklist

“This scary and romantic story, with its larger-than-life emotions and darkly twisting plot, lends itself well to the graphic novel format. The teenage characters, their dialogue, and their interactions are well imagined and ably captured. And when you are not enjoying the great dialogue or fantastic artwork, it is fun to pore over the little details…BLACK IS FOR BEGINNINGS serves both to draw new teen readers to the series and to supply existing fans with interesting additional background and never-before-seen details. A winning formula!” – TeenReads

ABOUT DEADLY LITTLE LIES

Last fall, sixteen-year-old Camelia fell for Ben, a new boy at school who had a very mysterious gift – psychometry, the ability to sense the future through touch. But just as Camelia and Ben's romance began to heat up, he abruptly left town. Brokenhearted, Camelia has spent the last few months studying everything she can about psychometry and experiencing strange brushes with premonition. Camelia wonders if Ben's abilities have somehow been transferred to her.

Ben returns to school, but he remains aloof, and Camelia can't get close enough to share her secret with him. Camelia makes the painful decision to let him go and move on. Adam, the hot new guy at Knead, seems good for her in ways Ben wasn't. But when Camelia and Adam start dating, a surprising love triangle results. A chilling sequence of events uncovers secrets from Ben’s past – and Adam's. Someone is lying, and it's up to Camelia to figure out who – before it's too late.

View the Book Trailer for Deadly Little Secret here.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Laurie Faria Stolarz is the author of several popular young adult novels, including Deadly Little Secret, Deadly Little Lies, Project 17, Bleed, and the bestselling BLUE IS FOR NIGHTMARES series, which has sold over 500,000 copies worldwide. Stolarz's titles have been part of the Quick Pick for Reluctant Readers list, the Top Ten Teen Pick list, and YALSA's Popular Paperback list, all through the American Library Association. Born and raised in Salem, Massachusetts, Stolarz attended Merrimack College and received an MFA in creative writing from Emerson College in Boston. For more information, visit Laurie's website at www.lauriestolarz.com

INTERVIEW:

Q: Please tell us what your new series is about and what inspired you to write it.

Laurie: I wanted to write a story where the main character has to struggle with the idea of falling in love with someone who could potentially be dangerous. I tinkered with this concept in the first three books of my Blue is for Nightmares Series [(Blue is for Nightmares (Llewellyn 2003), White is for Magic (Llewellyn 2004), and Silver is for Secrets (Llewellyn 2005), as well as in Bleed (Hyperion 2006)]. In Bleed, in particular, there’s a young male character who was convicted for the murder of his girlfriend. His next relationship consists of pen pal letters he exchanges with a young girl while he’s in prison. Without giving too much away, the relationship is briefly pursued once he is released, but I wanted to bring this concept to another level.

Additionally, I wanted to continue experimenting with the supernatural (which I also use in my Blue is for Nightmares Series as well as in Project 17), showing how we all have our own inner senses and intuition, and how with work we can tap into those senses and make them stronger.

I started researching different types of supernatural powers and discovered the power of psychometry (the ability to sense things through touch). The concept fascinated me, and so I wanted to bring it out in a character, showing how sometimes even the most extraordinary powers can also be a curse.

Lastly, I wanted to apply these concepts to be part of a series. I love the idea of growing a main character over the course of several books.

Q: If there was a soundtrack for your book what are five songs that would be on it and how do they relate the story? (and if you have a playlist, feel free to share a link!)

Laurie: I actually have a contest going on that involves this very question. In celebration of the release of DEADLY LITTLE LIES, the second book in the TOUCH SERIES, I’m launching a very exciting contest, the winner of which will have a minor character in DEADLY LITTLE GAME, the third book in the TOUCH SERIES, named after him or her. Please see the official rules here. I had a similar contest for the release of BLACK IS FOR BEGINNINGS. See the winning entry here.

Q: Who were some of your inspirations to become a writer or the inspirations that keep you writing? Feel free to include other authors, teachers, parents, or people in other creative fields, whoever is an inspiration to you!

Laurie: I was inspired by one of my college professors. I was a business major as an undergrad, so I didn’t have a lot of room for English courses. But I filled one of my open electives with a creative writing course, taught by MaryKay Mahoney at Merrimack College (MA). Even though I loved to write, I never imagined that I could actually become an author as a profession. She really believed in my work, and told me that I owed it to myself to pursue my passion for writing. Nobody had ever said that to me before, and I honestly feel it made all the difference. I’m also continuously inspired by other authors, filmmakers, and screenwriters.

Q: Even though music plays in so heavily into my storytelling, I rarely can actually listen to it while I'm writing. Can you? How does music fit into your writing process?

Laurie: I use music to help when I need to get into a particular mood to write a scene, but otherwise I find it too distracting. Once the scene is done, I need to shut the music off.

Q: What is next for you? What are you working on now?

Laurie: I’m currently working on DEADLY LITTLE GAME, the third book in the TOUCH series.

Women Who Rock Wednesday: Jessica Brody!

Welcome to Women Who Rock Wednesday! Today we're going to get to know the fabulous author and rockin' lady Jessica Brody, who has a new novel out called Love Under Cover. Let's meet her, shall we?



Q: Your new book is called Love Under Cover and it's the sequel to the Fidelity Files. For those who haven't read the Fidelity Files can you tell us a bit what that is about and then tell us what Love Under Cover is about?

Jessica: Although Love Under Cover is technically a “sequel” I wrote it to stand on its own. You don’t have to have read The Fidelity Files to read Love Under Cover. In The Fidelity Files, my main character, Jennifer Hunter, works as an undercover “Fidelity Inspector,” hired by suspicious wives and girlfriends to test the faithfulness of the men in their lives. Then in the second book, Love Under Cover, she branches out to open her own agency and employs five full-time fidelity inspectors (and one of them is a man!) Meanwhile, at home, she’s trying to a balance a committed relationship of her own…which proves more difficult than she ever would have imagined.

Here's the book trailer:



Q: The concept behind the books is so fun and unique, can you talk about how you thought of it or what the inspiration behind it was?

Jessica: 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.

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.

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.

Q: If there was a soundtrack for Love Under Cover what are five songs that would be on it and how do they relate the story?

Jessica: Suspense by Carla Holden. It’s the song that’s playing in the background of my book trailer and I think I chose it for the trailer because it really represents my main character’s struggle with love and relationships. The chorus says, “Can you save me from the lack of belief and the suspense that I may never find anyone?”

Battlefield by Jordin Sparks because for Jennifer Hunter, love (and life) always feels like a battlefield.

Poker Face by Lady Gaga. As a fidelity inspector, my main character has a GREAT poker face!

Circus by Britney Spears. Jennifer Hunter is always juggling a million things at once.

Apologize by One Republic. You’ll have to read the book to find out how this one fits!

Q: I've heard Fidelity Files is in development for a TV show, can you tell us a bit about that?

Jessica: Of course! The Fidelity Files was optioned by Marina Grasic of Curious Pictures. She was an executive producer on the Academy Award winning film, CRASH! She optioned the book for 6 months and then just recently re-optioned for another six months which is an excellent sign! It means they still have faith in the project and aren’t giving up. The production company has attached an awesome TV writer who has really brought the concept to the next level and now they’re trying to get a television network to take on the show. We’ve all got our fingers very tightly crossed that it works out!

Q: Who were some of your inspirations to become a writer or the inspirations that keep you writing? Since it is Women Who Rock Wednesday, we love learning about the women especially, but feel free to tell us about the men too.

Jessica: Hands down, Helen Fielding is the reason I’m writing today. When I read Bridget Jones’ Diary back in college, my life changed. It was the first book I’d read for “pleasure” (rather than for a school assignment) in a long time and I’d forgotten how entertaining and fun books could be. I knew right then and there that I wanted to write to entertain people. Just as Helen Fielding had entertained me.

Q: I have two questions that I always ask my Women Who Rock, the first is a two-parter. What was the first album you bought and the first concert you attended? Be honest, we don't judge, we like to see the roots of our women who rock!

Jessica: Oh Gosh…are you sure you don’t judge!? Well, I don’t remember the first album I bought, but I definitely remember the first CD. I got a CD player for my 10th birthday and a gift certificate to Sam Goody. (Remember those?) Anyway, I went out that very night and bought Paula Abdul’s Forever Your Girl and I was definitely forever her girl…well, for about two years anyway.

And the first concert I ever attended was also Paula Abdul! What can I say, I was a HUGE fan! I had all her videos on tape!

Go ahead, judge away…I would if I were you. :)

Q: Tell us about your biggest rock star moment, perhaps it's a moment of real success in your career, a time when you met someone super cool and had that Wayne's World "I'm not worthy" moment, or just a time where you felt like you got the rock star treatment. I get a huge variety of answers for the questions, so it's pretty much whatever "rock star moment" means to you!

Jessica: Okay, rock star moment. Here it is. When my first book, The Fidelity Files, came out in France last year, my French publisher actually flew me out to Paris to promote it! It was a dream come true! I speak French almost fluently so I was able to conduct all my interviews in French, which was both nerve wrecking and exciting at the same time. Paris has always held a special place in my heart. I was a French major in college and I lived in Paris my junior abroad. Plus, I spent a month in Paris in 2005 finishing the novel so it was all very magical and kismet to be back there to see it in French book stores!

WOW!!! Talk about a rock star moment. And Jessica, I'm not judging you. I had that Paula Abdul album too, but on tape! And, Readers, if you are judging Jessica, you'll want to stop because she has a contest for you...

Today's Contest:

Jessica's putting a signed copy of Love Under Cover up for grabs for one lucky winner! As usual, all you have to do to enter is leave a comment and there are additional entries to be accrued:

+1 for blogging/tweeting/linking to this interview
+1 for blogging/tweeting about Jessica and Love Under Cover
+1 for blogging/tweeting/linking to the Love Under Cover trailer

Note your additional entries in your comment as well as your email address and I will draw the winner next Wednesday!

Last (desperate!) call for honeymoon suggestions

The dream honeymoon just isn't happening. Not now. Not unless by some miracle, flights from Chicago to Hawaii in January drop to 500$ or less this week.

As I've blogged before, Hawaii has always been my dream honeymoon locale since I was 11 and my aunt Amy went. I'm not a big tropics person. I had a phase when I was 10 where I'd go swimming every day and lay out in the sun during those annoying adult swim breaks and read my book and I got really tan by default, but since then I've been pale. I like being pale. I have my moments. During my brief stint in L.A., I indulged in reading by the pool. But honestly Hawaii is not just about fun & sun, there is something about the place that just fascinates me. The culture, the volcanoes, the natural beauty of the place. I can't really explain it. I'm just drawn to it.

My husband was not particularly; he just wanted to go some place warm. That was his only requirement. Winter in Chicago sucks (yes, it does, husband and this is why we should move to the Pacific Northwest as soon as it is financially feasible though obviously that is far from the case since we can't even afford vacation.), so his philosophy was lets go lay out in the sun and drink and be lazy and in love. And I need that. I so need that. And I will especially need that in January when Chicago winter will have me in the most miserable of all moods.

After we saw that Hawaii was out of our range, he started looking at all-inclusive resorts in warm places-- Jamaica, the Bahamas, Mexico. He found some cool ones and I was almost sold, but then I started to waiver. I never had any interest in visiting these places. Well, I mean, maybe if I had lots of money to spend on travel I would--Jamaica in particular, but there are so many more places that are higher on the list. Hawaii, obviously. And Europe, particularly Scotland and Ireland. And hell, even an Alaskan cruise (which I pondered suggesting, but the idea of going somewhere *colder* than Chicago in winter is just...no.). Did I really want to blow two grand of our savings to go to an all inclusive resort in a place that's not high on the list when our savings are so meager and our sources of income are so shaky? How long would it take to save up the two grand again in order to go to Hawaii (though clearly Hawaii is going to require more like 2500$ or three grand) or to Europe for that matter?

I got all panicky and upset about it as I am prone to do. I worried and stressed and pointed out that we had to decide soon soon soon because we don't have passports and they're expensive enough to get without having to expedite them. And as usual hubby remained calm and unfazed. This is why he is so good for me.

He said, "Well what do you want to do on this trip? I mean is this about sight-seeing or relaxing?Because I just wanted to relax."

Uhhhh.... This was where I got stuck because I always travel to sight-see and experience (not to mention I totally suck at relaxing. I need pills for that.). I don't just lay around on beaches or poolside. There are so many places I want to see in the world and such limiting funding to see them. But obviously this trip should be about relaxing. It should be about just hanging out with him and laying next to a pool or on a beach or whatever. I am definitely all for just relaxing with him.... But I absolutely cannot justify spending the money that I want to save for actual sightseeing travels that I want to take with him (because I do want to go to Hawaii and do a combination of sightseeing and relaxing and I do want to be able to get to Europe, I dunno, sometime in the next five years? Not to mention, he hasn't been to New Orleans and we must do that.) If our income vastly increases or at least becomes reliable in the next few years, I'll be happy to go laze around at an all-inclusive resort at some point, but honestly, I just don't think it's worth it right now. (Plus as a vegan, will I even be able to eat???)

So we need a new plan because we definitely need to get away from Chicago in January. Preferably to somewhere warmish (though most places are warmer than Chicago in January). I don't know if there is anywhere in the US (because getting passports is not affordable anymore as they'd have to be expedited) where we can comfortably lay poolside in January, but maybe?

Right now the plan is Miami. Not a place I've particularly wanted to check out because the only place I've liked in Florida so far is Naples and I was not fond of Tampa or Orlando, but I have a friend who has very generously offered use of their condo so it's a free place to stay, plus they have told us good stories about Miami, so I imagine we'll have a good time there. And it should be decently warm, right?

But before we go about booking our flights, I thought I'd put a last call for suggestions out there in case someone has stayed somewhere totally relaxing and yet cheap that would be good to go in January. Preferably someplace that Southwest flies because we have 120$ credit with them.

I don't know, feel free to tell me that you think I'm crazy and I should spend money on one of those all-inclusive tropical dealies, but I think I'm going to be pretty hard to convince on that front. However, if there is a good deal at a nice hotel with a spa or a good pool or something and at least a little bit of sightseeing around (and veggie food options), I could probably be talked into spending a little money, just not a couple grand. Scott and I need to save for other adventures. But please, suggest away!

Glamour Shots

The photos below are outtakes from a photo session I did for this article in DEMO Magazine. It was my first real photo shoot (probably my only ever photo shoot. I can't imagine photo shoots are a common thing for authors.) and I felt like I was on America's Next Top Model, mainly because it was freezing out (despite being early June) and I was incredibly sick and I still had to try to look fierce or pretty or something.

But the photographer, Chad McGavock was super cool and incredibly talented. He had excellent "visions" as my friend Eryn would call them, for how and where to pose me. And we did the shoot at night at the real Scoville Park. I think it captured the kind of doomed, dark feeling of Ballads of Suburbia, and the same look as the cover of the book even though the cover is not a picture of the real park. So I asked Chad to send me the outtakes so I could share them.

So here they are and I'm posting them because I really admire his photography. I feel really weird posting more pictures of me actually. I feel like I've been doing that a lot lately and it actually triggered an interesting blog entry that I wrote over on the MTV Books blog about self-esteem--mine through the years and the self-esteem of my characters. So yeah, go read that if you get a chance. I think it remains an important topic to talk about because all teens and probably *everyone* struggles with it.

But here are Chad's amazing photos, please click on them so you can see them larger and get the full effect: