Deleted Scenes from IWBYJR and pondering sequels

One of the cruelest lessons that you have to learn early on as a writer is that you will have to kill your darlings. I don’t mean your darling characters (though sometimes you have to kill them, too), I mean those brilliant phrases, scenes, entire chapters that meant so much to you and sometimes felt like the best thing you’ve ever written.

Many darlings were killed in the process of revising I WANNA BE YOUR JOEY RAMONE, which went through eight—count ‘em, eight!—drafts before it reached the bookstore shelves.

The town of Carlisle and the people in it are entirely fictional, so I wrote a lot to get to know them. I wrote scenes that told important back story about my minor characters and I wrote entire chapters from the perspectives of Molly, Michael, and Tom. I kept writing so I could see my entire world three-dimensionally and I also kept writing just because I loved the place and the people, so I wanted to keep spending time with them. As result, the first draft of the book (which was called “The Black Notebooks” at the time) was 151,167 words and 484 manuscript pages long. In comparison, the final version before copyedits was 92,665 words and 312 ms pages and I’m sure we cut out another thousand words or so in copyedits. Obviously that first draft was way, way, way too long.

Of the three years I spent working on IWBYJR, one year of that was spent revising and killing darlings. When MTV Books took the project on, I was up to draft number seven and the book was called “All Roads Lead to Rock ‘n’ Roll.” It was 112,589 words and 365 ms pages long. My editor made it clear that I would be cutting all points of view besides Emily and Louisa’s (only Molly and Michael remained at this point) and that there were parts of Emily’s story, particularly around her music career that I needed to heighten, which meant adding approximately a chapter and a half (the chapter I added was “Songs My Mother Never Taught Me,” another title I pondered for the book). Oh, and even though she wanted me to add stuff, she really didn’t want the manuscript to come in over 90,000 words.

This meant I cut the stuff from Michael and Molly that Louisa or Emily wouldn’t know or tell. Some stuff was probably excessive, but I had to cut one scene that both my editor and I loved about the early years of Molly and Louisa’s friendship. I also cut one Emily scene I loved. The only comfort I took while doing this was that these scenes wouldn’t be lost forever. I knew that after the book came out, I could create an outtakes section on my website and I put that up last night!

There are seven “deleted scenes”/alternate versions up there now for you to check out. However, I strongly advise that you only read these if you’ve already read the book. For one, there are spoilers galore (like I share a story called “Fairytale,” which was the story I first wrote about Louisa and it tells her big secret. It was chapter two in the first draft of the book, but cut almost immediately because it spills too much about her too soon). And then, I don’t want you to judge my writing from this. All this stuff is rough, some of it really rough. I’m at my best when I rewrite. My early drafts can be ugly. I put these sections up not only to share more of the IWBYJR world with you, but also to give you an insight into my process, so please think of them as “demos,” not the polished final song that I really want you to hear (ie. the finished book).

That said, I am really interested to hear your thoughts on these parts as you read them, so please come back here and leave comments if you have them. (It might take you some time to read, ‘cause there are 7 sections and they range from about 7 pages in length to 20 pages.) I’m interested to see if any of these insights into certain people’s back story change or influence your feelings about characters like Molly, Michael, and Louisa. Did you enjoy the extra Emily scenes? Did they show you anything more about her? How do you feel about Johnny after reading his story? Would you have been mad at Emily if she’d listened to him and let it influence her? And how do you feel about the idea of Regan cheating on Tom? Is it true to her character or do you just want them to have their Happily Ever After with little conflict?

It was strange to go back through this again. I cringed at some of my writing of course (seriously, to the new writers out there, sitting on something for even a few months while you work on something else is so helpful and really can help your writing grow by leaps and bounds!), but I also got very nostalgic for my characters. People often ask me if there will be a sequel to the book and I always answer, “Maybe if Emily or Louisa get demanding, but right now even though I know their past, I don’t know their future beyond the end of IWBYJR.” However this past weekend at the library event that I did, the librarian phrased it differently, asking me if I ever thought of telling a story from the perspective of one of the other characters in IWBYJR. Michael was the person who she really wanted to hear from. Honestly, the sections I wrote from Michael’s POV were the hardest, so I’m not sure if I could write a whole book about him. I’d lean toward Regan or maybe Marissa. Or maybe both of them. But again, I’m curious as to what other people are thinking. If I were to revisit the characters from Carlisle, who would you like me to focus on? Continuing with Emily and/or Louisa or is there another character you are dying to know more about. Now please note that I don’t see myself doing this in the near future, but who knows. I’m not ruling it out.

Megan Kelley Hall of the Girlfriend's Cyber Circuit Makes My Monday!

I don’t like Mondays. I often start getting anxious about them on Sunday nights and usually sleep horribly. Fortunately last night was my best friend’s birthday shindig and it involved sampling lots of wine at House Red, our local wine shop. Deliciousness, especially the pink bubbly stuff at the end which I must remind Katie to tell me the name of. The wine helped me sleep, though I did wake up abt 30 min too early and was displeased about that.

I was nervous about today starting badly because Friday was such an awful day. It was like a Monday. It started with me finding one of those horrible, huge millipede things and ended with me cracking the screen of my Crackberry errr Blackberry. The sad thing abt that is I was not even drunk. Totally stone sober, just demonstrating my usual klutziness by walking into a table. Darling boyfriend is taking it to be repaired later this week. I have insurance because I know I’m a klutz though I have never ever broken or lost a phone before now, but I’d have to pay a 50$ deductible and even though it is just this plastic piece that needs replacing, they would insist on giving me a whole new phone, which seems terribly wasteful and also I lose all my settings and ringtones and its very inconvenient, so fortunately the guy had a repair place to recommend. It will cost the same, but far less hassle. Boyfriend takes it, waits 15 min, and it’s fixed. I am only without phone for part of a day, which is good because I am so very addicted to it.

Saturday was better because it started with a great review from ElleGirl (I am holding back from sharing all my reviews, but this one really meant so much to, esp since it’s from a non-music person and I like to see that the book is meaningful to all sorts of people), then there was an awesome library event, followed by a delicious vegan meal with my mom at a restaurant I hardly ever get to go to because it is so far north. Sunday was office cleaning, which I found very satisfying (I love organizing stuff!) and radio interview, (I think I blathered on quite a bit, but take a listen to the 8/10 brodcast and decide for yourself. I’m about 5 min into the show.) and wine. But what would Monday bring?

I tried to think positive Monday thoughts. I know the day will end with sushi so that should be a good thing. On the way to the train I listened to my soundtrack to Ballads of Suburbia and realized how ready I am to get to work on those revisions, but I have to wait a month til my editor is on the same page. I also realized that the last time I wore this dress I got some of the worst news I’ve ever gotten. The Marcel news. I really need a good day to erase this dress’s bad association because I really like the dress. Things did not start out well at work. Problems and complaints as soon as I walked in. Sigh. Then I checked my personal email to get the info on the girlfriend we’re touring this week on Girlfriend’s Cyber Circuit. Her name is Megan Kelley Hall and her book is Sisters of Misery. Then I read the following book description and it made my Monday. Today will be a good day because I found out about this amazing new book. This book is going to be the first thing I buy after figuring out how much I have to spend on the cracked Blackberry. Seriously how good does this sound???

A Modern Day Witch Hunt is Ignited When “Mean Girls” Meets “Practical Magic”. What happens when a hazing prank goes terribly wrong and a young teenage girl goes missing? The debut suspense novel, SISTERS OF MISERY, brings us inside a small, seaside town near Salem, where Maddie Crane, the teen protagonist investigating her eccentric cousin’s disappearance, ignites the wrath of the Sisters of Misery – a powerful high school clique, whose activities mirror the witch hunts of the seventeenth century. Hawthorne is a town filled with secrets and the supernatural. Stories hidden for decades come to light after Cordelia’s tragic disappearance. Cordelia’s mother, Rebecca, descends into madness while internal struggles amongst Maddie’s family members are all consequences of the supernatural “gifts” that they possess. Maddie Crane must choose between the allure and power of the Sisters of Misery and her loyalty to her beloved cousin and her own family. Fans of Alice Hoffman, Jodi Picoult and Stephenie Meyer will be haunted by this story of three generations of women and their struggles against each other and a town ruled by fear.

This is exactly the kind of suspense novel I love where there is a mystery, but the characters are struggling against something that all of us have really dealt with, peer pressure. Not to mention I have been fascinated with the Salem witch trials since I was about thirteen years old. It’s just frightening what they illustrated about the ways we respond to someone who is different and the way women are treated in society. Seeing how that is still reflected in society hundreds of years later makes for an incredibly premise for a book, I think!

But let’s get to know Megan a bit better, shall we?

Megan Kelley Hall, who lives north of Boston with her husband, Edward, and five-year-old daughter Piper, started a literary publicity company, Kelley and Hall, in 2005 with her sister, Jocelyn Kelley, and mother, Gloria Kelley. Her freelance magazine work has been published in Glamour, Elle, American Baby, Working Mother, New England Bride, The Boston Globe, Boston Herald MetroSports, Parents and Kids, and many other magazines. She studied creative writing at Skidmore College under the Pulitzer-Prize winning author Steven Millhauser. Her work can also be seen in the former CNN anchor Daryn Kagan’s anthology entitled, What’s Possible! (Meredith Books, May 2008.) The second in the series, THE LOST SISTER, will be published by Kensington in August 2009.

You can find Megan at http://www.megankelleyhall.com/ , but today I’ve got her answering my usual questions for the GCC!

Q: Please list five songs that would be on the soundtrack to your book and explain how they relate to your story or characters.

Megan: A lot of the times that I write or I’m working on a book, I’ll play the same songs over and over that capture the essence of the book I’m trying to write or the character I’m trying to create. Sometimes I imagine a trailer for the book with certain songs playing in the background of a particular scene. The main song for SISTERS OF MISERY was Fear by Sarah McLachlan. Other songs that related to my debut novel and the characters of Maddie and Cordelia are Natalie Merchant’s My Skin and Sarah McLachlan’s Building a Mystery, Can’t Find My Way Home by Blind Faith, and Evanescence’s Bring Me to Life.

Q: Name some of your main character's favorite musicians or bands.

Megan: Cordelia listens to ethereal music like Sarah McLachlan, Natalie Merchant and The Cranberries, but she also likes older music from Joni Mitchell, Fleetwood Mac and Cowboy Junkies.

Q: Who are some of your favorite musicians or bands?

Megan: Pink, Lemonheads, Avril Lavigne (I listen to her endlessly because she’s my daughter’s favorite singer), Madonna, Rihanna, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Radiohead, and a new group that I just heard on the Old Navy commercials called Lights.

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?

Megan: If it’s one of the songs that I’ve listened to again and again to get into the right frame of mind, I can hear it without letting it distract from my writing. If it’s a new song or something that just pops up on the radio, I can’t really concentrate. Some of my best plot points and ideas for scenes actually come to me when I’m driving and listening to a particular song. I’ve been known to pull over to the side of the road to write it down before I lose the scene. Needless to say, I keep a notebook and pen with me at all times.

Q: While music is my muse, I know other writers find their muse in theater, sports, art, the great outdoors, etc. What is your main muse?

Megan: Spending time with my daughter at the ocean (I live across the street from it) I actually prefer off-season, because we go “treasure-hunting” for seaglass, driftwood, porcelain pieces. I get my best ideas with the sound of the surf in my ears, watching my daughter run around the secluded beach. Those are my ideal “muse” times.

Sigh, I am so jealous of Megan living by the beach. That would be my main muse, too, though like her, I also have those scenes popping into my head spurred by a particular song.

But anyway, go check out Sisters of Misery! It made my Monday and hopefully it will make yours too, esp if you’re fascinated with the witch trials. If you’re so inclined, please let me know what you have been fascinated with since a young age. For me (aside from music of course) it’s pirates (my mom often tells the story of her desperate search for pirate books appropriate for a four year-old girl, since that is when my pirate fixation began), Ancient Egypt, and the Salem Witch Trials.

One month of IWBYJR, Excitement, and Contest News!

One Month

So IWBYJR has officially been out for exactly a month today (though it did come out like a week early, so really…) and I figured I should ponder that a little bit. One month has always seemed like a significant period of time to me for some reason. I decided to lose my virginity to one of my high school boyfriends after dating him for precisely one month. *Shakes head* Should have thought on that one a little longer. But in high school, it seemed that if a relationship made it to one month, it was a big deal, the person was seriously imprinted on my soul. I had two three-week relationships. It seemed like when “one month” loomed, people began to evaluate and reconsider. In one case, I did, in the other case, he did. Both were the kind of relationships where you date someone because you think that they are really cool and they are of the opposite sex so you think that to be close to them, you must date, but then you realize that you really just wanted to be friends. I remained friends with the guy that broke up with me. He let me down gently with a metaphor about birds that made no sense. The guy that I broke up with… it was a little more complicated. Our friendship was never the same, but at least we didn’t end up hating each other.

Anyway that was a total tangent that had nothing to do with IWBYJR except for that it has been a month and apparently this is my natural evaluation period. Not that I could break up with IWBYJR. Not that I want to. Ugh, this is an awkward metaphor, but unfortunately I’m in no position to evaluate IWBYJR in terms of it being a product like some people seem to want me to. I get asked things like “How is it doing?” and sometimes more blatantly, “How many copies has it sold so far?” I don’t know the answers to these questions. I shrug and tell people, “I’m really the last person to know.” Which is true as far as I can tell. I can check the ever fluctuating Amazon ranking, but that is about all. I’m sure there are people at Simon & Schuster who know and then they tell my editor and perhaps she tells me directly or perhaps I hear via my agent. So far I’ve been given some numbers that seem random to me with nothing to compare them to and been told it’s doing “pretty good,” which I immediately wondered if she meant like “okay, but not as good as we expected” or “surprisingly it is doing pretty good and we are impressed.” *Shrugs* If I worry about this I will drive myself batty, though, so fuck how many units have been moved or whatever, I’m interested in people’s relationship with the book.

It seems that a lot of people are having good relationships with her. This means more to me than anything. It’s weird, people send me an email or a message on myspace, telling me how much the book matters to them and then they seemed shocked when I write them back. I will always do my damndest to write you back. It may take some time, but I try really hard to write people back and the reason is, what you said to me is as meaningful to me as the book was to you. Seriously. I poured my heart and soul into this thing with the hope that it would stir something inside of someone, but as a chick with horribly low self-esteem who knows that writing is what she does best, but still doesn’t feel it is good enough, I worried that it wouldn’t matter to anyone. So when I’m told it did, I get so unbelievably excited and I thank the person profusely. Without a doubt, hearing from and especially meeting people that enjoyed the book has been the best part of this month.

On the flipside, you can’t please everyone. I haven’t seen too many negative things about my book, but of course there are some out there. My boyfriend has long joked that he needs to toughen me because sometimes I can’t tell when he’s joking and I get overly sensitive about something. It’s been almost three years, he still hasn’t toughened me. What can I say? I’m such a Cancer. I’m as sensitive as they come. I was made fun of a lot as a kid and teen and never learned not to let words hurt me. I also exist on much less sleep than I should (and not on purpose, mind you), which makes things worse. Oh and I’m a perfectionist. Even though I know it is impossible to please everyone, I want to. So I take the negative stuff hard especially when it is not constructive. If it’s constructive, I make mental notes to examine things in the next one.

In the end though, there has been a lot more positive than negative and the positive stuff has been so meaningful, esp from teen girls, that it outweighs everything. The negative stuff, the exhaustion from long hours trying to be a writer and work full time, all the self doubt, all of my own teenage pain--it has all been worth it just for those letters and meetings and hugs. There is a point to my existence. I didn’t waste my limited time here. I helped someone or several someones with my words. So outcome of one month evaluation of my life with IWBYJR: it’s one of the most meaningful relationships I’ve ever had.

Excitement

Okay, I promised you exciting things in the blog title and I promised you more exciting news earlier this week. I can deliver some excitement, but it is not the news I planned to deliver. The one big announcement that I’m totally dying to blog about has to stay under wraps for a few more days. (I’m squawking by this time next week no matter what!) And then of course, the other big news, which my MySpace friends already know about, is that my tattoo is finished. But I’m not gonna take pics and blog about it til it’s healed, so that will be sometime next week too. If you want to see it before then, well I guess you’ll have to come to the Glenview Public Library at 2 pm on Saturday where I will be reading, signing, and discussing. We’ll mostly discuss books and writing stuff, but we can discuss the tattoo, too!

The Glenview Public Library thing is one of my exciting things (my first library visit! I owe so much to libraries and librarians so it is very meaningful), but I have more that are accessible to an even larger audience. I hate that I can’t visit and talk to you all, but here are two opportunities to hear me blather or have a discussion with me about my book that everyone can join in.

First, I’m going to be on the Black Oak Media internet radio show this weekend. We’ll be talking about book-related things and it’s live so you’ll get to experience all of my “umms” and how I say “like” too much and all of that. Terrifying for me, but hopefully it will be enjoyable for you. You can listen live at 3:30 pm CST on Sunday at http://www. blogtalkradio. com/Black-Oak-Media/2008/08/10/Black-Oak-Media-Radio or if you can’t catch that, it will be on the player at http://www.myspace.com/blackoakpresents (look under general interests at blog talk radio) after 5 PM CST on Sunday, so everyone who wants to will have a chance to hear me blather.

That is not interactive though. The Panic at the Disco Book Club message board is! They are discussing IWBYJR (right now part one, next week, part two, then part three and a general conversation) and looking for more people who have read or are reading it to join in the conversation. Why should you do this? Because I’ll be visiting the board during the general discussion to talk about the book, writing, and whatever other questions you want to ask. So go join in and I’ll be there soon!

Contests

Lastly I have contest news. I’m extending the Tour Contest to the end of August because I still haven’t received very many entries (and I’m not going to be sensitive about it and will just assume it is because it’s summer and people travel!) and I have some very good (signed) books for people to win so I want as many people to have the opportunity to enter as possible.

All you do to enter is send a picture of your copy of IWBYJR to stephanie at stephaniekuehnert dot com (you don’t spell out at or dot nor use any spaces of course). You’ll wanna get creative with your picture (pose the book with your musical equipment, your adorable kid or pet, or in some other way that expresses you or your feelings about the book) because the five most creative photos will win a signed copy of one of these great books: Frenemies by Alexa Young, Songs of a Teenage Nomad by Kim Culbertson, King Dork by Frank Portman, O Street by Corrina Wycoff, and best of all an ARC (advanced review copy) of Invisible Touch by Kelly Parra. You can let me know your preferences on prize and all winners will win some extra swag, too!

Shooting Stars Magazine and their fellow bloggers have also extended their IWBYJR contest in which you send a photo of your copy of the book (could be the same one! We don’t care if you double dip, in fact we encourage it) or the receipt showing you purchased it to Lauren51990 at aol dot com by August 22 and you could be eligible to win 130$ in gift cards. That’s a lot of books and CDs. I’m gonna be jealous if you win.

Finally Tera Lynn Childs, author of the amazing book Oh.My.Gods. is running a Contest of Olympic Proportions throughout the Summer Olympics, which start today. One of the many books she is giving away is IWBYJR. She’ll be running a contest for it (signed and personalized by me of course!) later today when the opening ceremonies kick off (we thought IWBYJR belonged on the big party day!), so you will want to visit her blog today and for the next 17 days to enter to win IWBYJR and a bunch of other amazing books!

So that is my excitement for the week. More next week, when I finally reveal my tattoo and my other news and most important, the inaugural Women Who Rock Wednesday!

Women Who Rock Wednesdays and Aussie distribution!

This morning I found out via my editor that IWBYJR will be released in Australia on August 25! Much like the UK release (September 15!), this will just be Simon & Schuster distributing the US edition of the book, so no new covers to share or anything like that. But this is good news for my readers in the UK and Aus, as you will be able to get the book without importing it via Amazon!

My big, girl power oriented announcement for day is that I thought the theme of my release week, “Women Who Rock,” was so much fun that I decided that every Wednesday should be “Women Who Rock” Wednesday! This means that every week on Wednesday you’ll want to be sure to visit me here because I’ll be introducing you to a woman who rocks my world. Could be a musician, an author, an artist, actress, filmmaker or just an all-around smart, talented lady that I think you should know about. Whenever possible, I will have these folks on the blog, doing an interview and a giveaway if they are super generous. I plan to do at least two interview/giveaways a month (one at the bare, bare minimum) and on the other days you’ll at least get my gleeful ramblings about one of my many idols or some creative expression of my adoration of a Woman Who Rocks. Sound cool? I hope you think so because I do.

It’s going to start next Wednesday, August 13, with Carrie Borzillo-Vrenna, the author of the brand new book, Cherry Bomb: The Ultimate Guide to Becoming a Better Flirt, a Tougher Chick, and a Hotter Girlfriend—and to Living Life Like a Rock Star, which I expressed my excitement over yesterday when it was released.

Here’s what the book is about:

Not for the faint of heart, Cherry Bomb is an A-to-Z reference for everything awesome a girl needs to know, including the obvious (style, beauty, dating, and sex tips) and the not-so-obvious (instructions for preparing absinthe, how to hit on a celebrity). It's a girl's guide with a difference: one that shows readers how to identify, go after, and get whatever they want in life -- be it a hot guy, a great job, a mind-blowing orgasm, or a sexy new look -- all while marching to her own (rock) beat.
Bona fide rock chick Carrie Borzillo-Vrenna's tips are smart, funny, edgy, and will empower women to veer away from the pack, work every situation to their advantage, and look cool while doing it. She's also recruited a rocking list of contributors who offer advice on all things cool, including:

• Betsey Johnson on personal style
• A step-by-step guide to performing a striptease by Dita Von Teese
• Tips on getting inked by Kat Von D.
• Fashion inspiration from Anna Sui
• Lisa Loeb on how to be the perfect hostess
• Life lessons from Tori Amos
• A drum lesson from Samantha Maloney of Peaches
• Dating advice from Terri Nunn of Berlin

The perfect guide for the female who prefers black nail polish to French manicures, who would only be caught in pearls if they were paired with a cool black tank top, and who prefers Vivienne Westwood and Jean Paul Gaultier to any Klein (Calvin or Anne), Coach, or Kate Spade, Cherry Bomb will have readers taking chances and daring to be different.

You can read more about it including some of the tips in this excellent feature from LA Weekly. But next Wednesday, Carrie will be RIGHT HERE answering some fun interview questions and giving away a signed copy of Cherry Bomb, so you’ll want to be here to meet her in person.
Of course, if you happen to be in LA this weekend, you’ll have the opportunity to meet her in person. I wish I could go to this fabulous event, so if you can, go for me! Carrie is fabulous, I met her when she came to my Book Soup event!

(Click to Make Bigger)

I’ve also got a guest lined up for the end of the month, who performed with me at Rock ‘n’ Read: Rebecca Woolf! She’s the author of Rockabye: From Wild to Child and the fabulous blog, Girl’s Gone Child, where I’m guestblogging today, so be sure to check that out. (ETA: It is up now, go read it and enter the contest here!) It’s a very music focused post and there is an opportunity to win a signed copy of IWBYJR!

Speaking of opportunities to win signed copies of IWBYJR. Five lucky winners will get a copy of IWBYJR from teensreadtoo.com this month. You just have to enter their August contest here. Even if you already have IWBYJR, you should enter because there are opportunities to win a bunch of other awesome YA books.

Is that enough excitement for you for one day? I hope so. I will have more exciting news to share this week though, so stay tuned!

Rainy days, Good books, Nepalese food, and Political action

When I woke up yesterday it was so dark outside, I thought (wished! hoped!) that my alarm had gone off early. Um, no. Major storm clouds. Then right before I was supposed to walk to the train, major storm. So I went to wake up Scott (a.k.a the Best Boyfriend Ever) to beg him to drive me the L. He ended up driving me all the way to work at 8 am on his day off. What can I say, that’s why he’s the BBE, and I tend to be really whiny especially on Monday mornings…

I really like storms when I know I don’t have to be outside in them or when they aren’t coming in on me… Unfortunately my house hates me. My mom’s house was old and creaky and some days you really expected that it would just crash down. (Like our garage did on Valentine’s Day one year. That sucked. Poor mom was at work and I heard this loud crash and went outside to find the garage roof on the garage floor thanks to the ton of snow that had been piling up for months. Reason #53 why I hate Chicago winters…) But Mom’s house only leaked on two occasions that I can recall. One was a strange flash flood of water that came in under that basement door. One involved a leak in the roof and this particularly sucked because I was awakened by thick, rust-colored droplets falling on my face through my ceiling. It ruined some of the magazine clippings that I had up on my wall as a collage and left a stain on my ceiling in the shape of my evil ex-boyfriend’s initial. But that was two occasions out of the nearly thirteen years that I lived there. I’ve lived in my house for four years now and every storm I have an anxiety attack about what might be leaking because so far there have been three cracks in the foundation (none of which were disclosed by the asshole that owned the house before us, fortunately my lawyer was savvy so we got him to pay for the first one) and inexplicable flash flood (may have been the most recently discovered foundation leak) and now ever since we put a new front window in, if the rain blows sideways that leaked.

Well supposedly that was fixed last week, so I was not unnerved at all during the storm that descended last night during my writer’s group. The tornado sirens went off and I even played that cool at first even though those usually send me into a panic of finding the cats (very difficult during a storm, particularly extracting Sid from beneath the bed upstairs). When I was a little girl, apparently every time the sky even got dark, I’d gather my most valuable belongings like my favorite books and my hamster in his hamster ball and put them in this baby carriage I had for my dolls and pushed them around the house waiting to bring it all with me down to the basement. But now I’ve gotten used to the thunder and lightning setting off the tornado sirens by my mom’s old house and convinced myself that it is highly unlikely that a tornado will ever touch down in Chicago. Then, the rain started blowing sideways and sure enough came in through the supposedly fixed window. Apparently it’s really a siding issue. Grrr. While I was trying to protect the new wood floors from the onslaught of wet, one of my writing group members got a text that Chicago really was under a tornado warning. Cats were gathered and we all moved down to the basement. In my case, my writing wasn’t up to its usual level because I was so distracted by the damn window. I’m so sick of leaks ruining a perfectly good storm. *Sigh*

Speaking of things I usually like to do while enjoying a good storm, the main thing being reading. Two books that I am highly excited about were released today: Violet in Private by Melissa Walker and Cherry Bomb: The Ultimate Guide to Becoming a Better Flirt, a Tougher Chick, and a Hotter Girlfriend—and to Living Life Like a Rock Star by Carrie Borzillo-Vrenna. I am going to have an exciting announcement relating to Cherry Bomb tomorrow and an exciting announcement about something that will hopefully allow me more time to read these books later this week.

I suppose instead of just teasing about exciting announcements, I should make at least one exciting announcement today. I am officially coming to do an event in the state that inspired IWBYJR: Wisconsin!!! I’m thrilled to be a part of the Wisconsin Book Festival and even more excited that the event will take place at A Room of One’s Own Feminist Bookstore, my favorite bookstore in Madison on Saturday, October 18 at 4 pm. This is right by Himul Chuli, the best Nepalese restaurant ever! So, if you’re stalking me, you will likely find me having dinner there after my reading.

Okay, I hate to end on a depressing note, but this is something I read today that highly disturbed and upset me and I feel that as a feminist, I can’t not share it because this woman’s story needs to be told and the military needs to be held responsible for this atrocity. Private LaVena Lynn Johnson was raped and murdered and the Army has been covering it up as a suicide attempt since 2005. The story is sad and awful, so if you read it, go in prepared to be upset, but also possibly moved as I was to call and demand justice (though it never seems all that satisfactory because they basically just go, mmhmm, I’ve written it down, but if enough people call….) and also to bring it to light.

I’ll have a happy, exciting feminist thing for you tomorrow, so stay tuned for that. Changing the world involves both laughter and tears.

To Chicago, With Love

Well, over the last week, I managed to sum up my entire tour complete with photos. Hopefully I didn't bore you guys to tears! It was definitely an extremely fun adventure. The West Coast is such a beautiful place (even smoggy Los Angeles is gorgeous in her own way) and it was good to see friends that I don't see very often and to meet amazing fans and booksellers.

Now, as some of you know and some may not, that trip came entirely out of my own pocket. Generally publishers don't do a book tour for debut novelists. MTV Books was very supportive in other ways, like I told them which book stores I would like to go to and they contacted the stores and they also sent press releases to local media, but I paid my own way and it wasn't cheap. Even my agent thought it was kind of silly of me to spend my own money this way and that I should just focus on reading locally and in the Midwest (which I will be in Madison and St Louis this fall and possibly Minneapolis/St Paul or Detroit/Ann Arbor), but I wanted to try this. Partly because I wanted the opportunity to see some of my dearests who live across the country. Partly because I wanted Scott to see some of my favorite places that he hasn't been to before. Partly because I'm a wanna-be rock star and wanted to see how tour felt. And then I just crossed my fingers and hoped it would be worth it in the end.

I'm writing a blog for my agent that will go up sometime this month about evaluating "worth it" from a writer's perspective (and I'll be sure to post the link when it is up for all my fellow writers to read about), but on a personal level, I can tell you right now that it was worth it. Just to see old friends. Just to have the experience. Just to meet street team members and MySpace friends in L.A. and Seattle and amazing book club girls in San Francisco. Just to connect with booksellers who really enjoyed the book. Just to have two weeks in some of my favorite cities.

And how did it feel coming home? Well, to be honest at first it kinda sucked. Home meant responsibilities and day job and overwhelming amounts of email that I am still going through. And there is this constant battle inside me between Chicago and Seattle and which I love more and where I really want to be. But home is also where I know I have my greatest support.

Last Saturday, after being home for roughly 38 hours, I did an event at the Borders in my hometown of Oak Park. Of course I'd done two events in the Chicago area before I left. One in the city and one in Forest Park, the town where I currently live and the place in the Chicago area where I feel most at home and happy. Both were hugely successful, the only places so far where they sold out of books during the event. I have kind of a love/hate thing with Oak Park. I hated growing up there. I never felt as comfortable as I do in Forest Park. But it's home. It's where I'm from. It's the place that has had the biggest impact on me and the streets that are most familiar and that's why I put it into my next book. So I went into the event with kind of mixed feelings. But those feelings evaporated as soon as I got into the store.

Like every other store I've been to so far, my first impression was of awesome the booksellers are! All the ones I talked to at that Borders really enjoyed my book and were excited to meet someone local who had a book out. The general manager, Steve, immediately started playing Ramones music throughout the store when I arrived and making announcements that I would be reading downstairs by the music section, which he'd determined (and I concurred) was the perfect place for me. I got there about 20 minutes early and slowly people started trickling in. My neighbors from my old neighborhood showed up, people whose kids I used to babysit (and those kids are all in high school now and one of them is in fact becoming the art teacher of our old elementary school! Crazy!). As always I was most excited and impressed to meet the teens that had discovered my book. I spotted two with my book in their hands and went over to talk to them. I don't know if I am supposed to do that (no one tells you what you are supposed to do as an author, but I don't generally do what I'm supposed to anyway, so I guess it hardly matters.) One of them, Mary Rose, told me that she played guitar and was going to band camp soon, which I thought was really cool. She also signed my journal later when I was signing books and wrote in there that I'm an awesome role model and possibly the coolest OPRF (my old high school) graduates ever. I can't even begin to tell you how much that meant to me (and it also amused me because I'm sure my dean at OPRF never thought I would become a good role model, ha ha!).

The only awkward thing about the event was that they had me read behind a podium which came up nearly to my chin so I could hardly see over it and I felt like I was giving a speech.
But other than me being too short for the podium, it was a nice set up for me and afterwards, Steve brought me one of the event posters to sign so they could use and gave me the others, "so you have them for your scrapbook," he told me, which was incredibly nice. Like I said, the Borders people were just awesome and made me feel at home in my hometown that sometimes never felt like home.

My mom took some pictures of me signing and of me posing in the dress that Eryn had made for me by her friend Alyse for my birthday. You can't really tell, but the bottom is red fishnet. It's a great dress:

So I left Borders quite happy and feeling good about my hometown of Oak Park, which sometimes takes some doing.

On Wednesday I had another homecoming reading. It took place at Columbia College Chicago, a place that has always always felt like home. My friend Rob (who has awesome blog called the Chicago Literary Examiner that anyone interested in the Chicago Lit scene should be subscribed to) arranged the reading because he was teaching a High School Summer Institute class and wanted me to speak to his students, all of them teenage writers. So that was my primary audience, plus another teen writer, Madelynn from my street team who was in town visiting family. I've been corresponding with Madelynn online for a long time so I was really psyched to meet her. She and several others in the audience asked some great questions. Usually the Q&A discussion part of my events is really awkward because everyone is too shy to ask me things, but these teens had lots of questions about writing and it rocked. It really did.

So yeah, Chicago, I love you, too. I know sometimes I pine for other places with better climates and more beautiful landscapes, but you're my home and the place where I get the most support.

The Chicago Tribune has been amazing to me and they printed another article about IWBYJR today in the Books section, it's a review/short interview and the print version has a cool picture of me in my messy office. And then there are all the reading series/lit groups that have been so kind to include me in their events this month. Like this upcoming Wednesday the 6th at 7 pm, I'll be reading at RUI: Reading Under the Influence Reading Series at Sheffields, 3258 N. Sheffield Ave in Chicago. Then Saturday, August 16th at 7 pm, I'll be at the best reading series/open mic in the 'burbs, the Tamale Hut Cafe Presents Reading Series at Tamale Hut Cafe, 8300 W. Cermak, in North Riverside. And on Tuesday, August 19th at 7 pm, The Literary Writer's Network is hosting an event for me at Quimby's Bookstore, 1854 W. North Ave in Chicago. The local libraries are hosting stuff, too. In a week, on Saturday, August 9th at 2 pm, I'll be at Glenview Public Library, 1930 Glenview Rd in Glenview. And then, my hometown library is being really good to me because not only do I have an event with the Oak Park Public Library in September, their 20 and 30-sometimes book club, Genre X, has been reading my book and invited me to have a discussion with them on August 26th at 8 pm at Molly Malone's in Forest Park. It looks as though this may be open to the public, too. Check out their blog entry about it. Trust the librarians in my hometown to be the ones to make me finally feel at home!

Bartending Saturday/Sleep Deprivation/Janet Jackson/Rock of Love/Contest

I didn’t sleep last night because I started taking ambien again when sad things happened in June and then kept taking it on tour and am now trying to stop again, so the homecoming/summed-up-feelings-about-tour blog will happen tomorrow. Hopefully. If I get the long overdue cleaning done before I have to go to work. Yes, work on a Saturday night. Why? Because I’m bartending at the Beacon (101 Circle in Forest Park). Wanna see the Beacon’s new beer garden? Wanna hang out and hear more about my vacation or just catch up in general? Wanna get your book signed? Wanna say hello and introduce yourself? Wanna commiserate that, like me, you were too poor to afford Lollapalooza tickets and are missing Rage Against the Machine who you never got to see back in the day either and please please let them come back to Chicago on their own? Or wanna come after Lollapalooza and tell me all the cool stuff I missed? Come to the Beacon between 7:30 and 3! Crap, 3 am. I better sleep tonight…

Anyway, I have three thoughts in my sleep-deprived brain right now besides “come to the Beacon on Saturday.”

1. Go check out my blog at Teen Fiction Café. I know, you are probably thinking, “Stephanie, I’m still catching up on your tour blogs.” Well, dear reader, I’m trying to make up for those two weeks of not blogging, so just try to enjoy it. Besides I’m confessing to an embarrassing secret about a Janet Jackson concert. You’ll want to know about it.

2. Everyone else probably already knows about this as the press release came out while I was traveling, but there is going to be a Rock of Love 3! I knew it would never work out with that Ambre chick. Not that I wanted him with Daisy, but Ambre was just too…cerebral?... for him. He needs to find his Heather. I don’t know why he didn’t just hook up with Heather after Jes didn’t work out on Season 1, but who cares because now we get Season 3! And dude, it is on a bus! It’s going to be like a traveling carnival of melodrama and plastic surgery. I know, as a feminist, I should despise this show. It’s wrong on so many levels, I tell myself that I hate reality TV, and the women are encouraged to be so catty and pathetic. But I can’t help it. It’s my guilty pleasure and I can’t get enough of it. I really hope it’s on Sundays again. I will explain why next week, but for now we’ll just say if it is, it would be really freakin’ cool.

3. I have a contest. It’s supposed to end next week. No one is entering the contest and it’s making me sad. You can win one of several amazing books (Frenemies by Alexa Young, Songs of a Teenage Nomad by Kim Culbertson, King Dork by Frank Portman, O Street by Corrina Wycoff, and best of all an ARC of Invisible Touch by Kelly Parra), all signed, plus some other cool swag from me. So please enter my contest. It’s easy. You just email me a photo of your copy of my book, preferably staged in some fun, creative way. Please?

Okay, I’ll stop now. I get whiny when I’m tired. I really need to sleep tonight.