Ask the Author: Julie Satow
Answered Questions (3)
Julie Satow
I write best first thing in the morning, when my mind is fresh. Usually I make a large pot of coffee and sit in a quiet room, and just put words down on the page. Then I print out what I've written and revise it, then I write more, revise more, and so on and so on, often reshaping and reediting what I've written countless times. The hardest part is when the page is blank and you have to just plunge in. The beginning of each chapter of the book was the trickiest part, when I had to force myself to just start writing, even if I knew what I was writing wasn't great.
Julie Satow
The thing I loved most about writing a book was the ability to lose myself in the research. I spent hours at the New York Public Library reading old, out-of-print books and combing through thousands of newspaper articles. The highlight was when I rediscovered stories about the hotel that had been largely forgotten, or learned about new characters who had lived there.
Julie Satow
I attended a panel on book writing at the Newswomen's Club of New York, and afterward was speaking with one of the panelists. I told her that I covered real estate for the New York Times and was searching for a book idea. She suggested that I write a book on the Plaza Hotel. When I got home, I began researching what had been previously written about the hotel, and was surprised to learn that the last nonfiction book on the building was written back in 1967, when Eve Brown wrote a wonderful, breezy history of the Plaza. Since so much had happened since then, including the condoization of much of the building, it felt like the time was ripe to revisit the topic.
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