Girlfriends Cyber Circuit, Novel Spaces and Writer Unboxed

My gal pals with the Girlfriends Cyber Circuit are touring me. Please check out the many interesting questions they threw at me.

I'm guest blogging on Novel Spaces today about writing and knowing when to listen to your critique group and when to listen to yourself.

Writer Unboxed ran Part I of an interview with me last Friday. Part II is up tomorrow.

Sangria from leftovers

After the book party, I had some leftover red wine and ginger ale. Today I made sangria. Here's the recipe:

1/2 large bottle of red wine (mine were dry wines, but a sweeter one would do)

1 can ginger ale

1/2 cup of lemonade

slices of 1/2 lime, 1/2 orange and 1/2 a green apple

a few bing cherries

It's good, but not very sweet*. You could also add a shot of brandy and/or a shot of triple sec and/or some orange juice and/or a little sugar, depending on your tastes.

Pour over ice and enjoy!

*Actually as the fruit mellowed in the liquid it got pretty sweet. If you're not going to drink it right away (say let it stand in the fridge a few hours), I'd recommend tasting it before adding sugar.

Origin of a title

Children of the Waters is the title of my latest. It's the English definition of a Japanese word mizuko. And relates to the idea that life is a continuum; mizuko are beings that die in the womb either to abortion or miscarriage. For many in Japan, the idea is that fetuses aren't babies yet but they're also more than simply "a clump of cells." Jizo is the protector of mizuko, sort of their patron saint. Some Japanese make memorials to their lost children at Jizo shrines.

I learned about this tradition in an article in the New York Times by Peggy Orenstein years ago. It comforted me after I had a miscarriage (I've had two.).

While I was writing the book, I did more research on mizuko and Jizo and found this dealer who sells hand-carved Jizo statues. I had to have one. So now I have Jizo in my office.

I believe we're all on a continuum. None of us is ever done and we're always in a state of becoming. So it fit my story since Billie, Trish and Will are all struggling with the questions Who am I? We all ask ourselves that question from time to time and the answer changes throughout our lives.

The first question the Mixed Chicks ask on their chats is "What are you?" You can listen to my answer here. How would you answer either question-Who are you? Or what are you?

Lights, camera....

ACTION! Lifetime Movie Network is going into production on the movie version of Orange Mint and Honey (which will likely have a different title). Filming could begin as early as this fall, and hell yes I will be visiting the set! (If they let me, which I think they will.) I'll keep you posted on casting and such.

In other news please listen in to our discussion about Children of the Waters on Mixed Chicks Chat (you have to sign up with Talk Shoe first) Friday afternoon at 3 p.m. Mountain time and join me in a salon in Second Life on Sunday at 3:30 Mountain time at the Story Mountain Center for Writers. Author Connie Briscoe is arranging it and has more deets at her blog (those this salon won't be in Virtual Harlem).

My book party for CHILDREN OF THE WATERS

Racial reconciliation in the family

Great post by Los Angelista on her family's reactions to her black mother's and white father's marriage, past & present.

Pictures from American Library Association

The amazing authors Marlon James (THE BOOK OF NIGHT WOMEN) and Bich Minh Nguyen (SHORT GIRLS) and I after our panel discussion. More pictures here.

Happenings

Heading to ALA to hang out with librarians in Chicago this weekend. Yay librarians! Hopefully, I'll remember to take pictures. Following are some of my upcoming events:

Thursday, July 16th

Local peeps, don't forget: we're partying at LoDo Tattered Cover to celebrate the release of Children of the Waters.

Friday, July 17th

4-5 p.m. EDT, I'll be hosting a discussion about faith and mysticism in fiction on Litchat (via Twitter). Please join in.

Friday, July 24

5-5:30 p.m. EDT, I'll be yakking with the girls on Mixed Chicks Chat (scroll down a little for instructions on how to listen live; requires registration with TalkShoe).

Sunday, July 26

3:30 will be doing an interview with Connie Briscoe in Second Life. More details to come.

Contest on my website

I'm sorry to say if you entered the contest to win a free, signed copy of Children of the Waters on my website before 7/8, I did not get your email. I apologize and ask you to re-enter. It's working now.

Welcome Samantha Wilde

So, as y'all know my new novel is out and I'll be doing a tour of the Girlfriends Cyber Circuit the week of July 20th. In the meantime, allow me to introduce you to another GCCer, a new member, Samantha Wilde. Samantha is the author of THIS LITTLE MOMMY STAYED HOME, which was released the same day as my book. I'm excited about her book because she got a blurb from one of my favorite authors: Elinor Lipman, who says: “Here’s a talent: when a narrator’s doldrums make a reader laugh out loud. Samantha Wilde’s inkwell must be filled with truth-serum because this brave and funny book gets the postpartum peaks and valleys so very, winningly right.”

Any mommy writers or mommy bloggers out there? You might get a kick out of this one!

THIS LITTLE MOMMY STAYED HOME introduces Joy McGuire who has gone from being skinny and able to speak in complete sentences to someone who hasn’t changed her sweatpants in weeks. But now with a new baby to care for, she feels like a woman on the brink and as she scrambles to recapture the person she used to be she takes another look at the woman she is: a stay-at-home mom in love with her son, if a bit addled about everything else. As a new mom herself, Wilde, a graduate of Yale Divinity School, wrote THIS LITTLE MOMMY STAYED HOME after the birth of her son when she was experiencing the ups and downs of new motherhood. According to Samantha, “I wrote the book because I couldn’t not write it. I took my lap top to my bed during my son’s naps and wrote and wrote. I wrote the book I wanted to read. The book takes a hard look at the effects of new motherhood on a woman and on a marriage through the eyes of one stressed but insightful woman. It’s a story that will keep mothers going when they think they can’t go any further.”

Check out what Samantha has to say about writing, and balancing kids and her writing life:

Q: When deadlines hit, what happens in your house?

A: I get more tired. The toilet bowl has to wait until late at night to be cleaned. I “stay-at-home” with my kids, so that’s my real job. If anything suffers during deadlines, it’s the house, which is not so tidy to begin with. No, that’s not true. It’s me who suffers. I won’t nap, and I’ll stay up later. I’ll forego a shower or a walk. So I guess I’m saying that I get stinky and fat. That doesn’t sound very good, does it?

Q: Um, I don't have kids and that sounds like my house! If you weren't writing, what would you be doing instead?

A: I’d teach yoga, which I do once a week anyway. And be with my kids more, though it hardly seems possible. Or maybe I’d just be lying in bed reading and eating chocolate. That would be nice. But then you didn’t mean if I wasn’t writing AND was wealthy, did you?

Q: Which scene (or scenes) in your novel did you love writing? Why?

A: I loved writing the fights between Joy and her husband. It was more fun than fighting and used up all my crankiness. Actually, I enjoyed writing most of it. Joy is so sassy and funny, I looked forward to what she might say or do.

Q: What would you change about your life if you became the next Sophie Kinsella?

A: Oooh, good one. That’s such a good one. I’d do what I’m doing on a bigger scale. I’d have more children. I’ve always wanted more children. I’d adopt some children. I’d have more friends for dinner, and more dates with my husband, and spend more time with family. I’d use the money for our children’s education and I’d buy as many books as I wanted. And it wouldn’t be bad to have a kitchen from this century. Or a house with a entry way for dirty shoes!

Q: Any tried and true tricks for beating procrastination?

A: Who has time to procrastinate? Have some young kids. You will not have the privilege of indulging it.

Q: What has brought you the greatest joy since you were published, and what has caused you the greatest angst?

A: Publicity has been difficult. I find self-promotion challenging on many levels. I don’t know what I’m doing, but I know I need to do something. My greatest joy? Probably realizing that my happiness has nothing to do with my book. I know that’s counterintuitive, but here’s the thing. When you long to be a published writer your whole life, you imagine when it happens, something will change—fireworks, lottery-style money, fame, etc. Getting the book published has put my dreams into perspective. I feel so blessed to have the book out there, but I am also relieved to find that my life is rich enough to sustain the possibility that it is—simply—a book. My treasure is in my children and my family. Strange kind of joy, isn’t it?

No, it makes total sense to me! One of the things I've also learned. If you make publishing your whole life, you will be sorely disappointed.