The Book Scoop: Behind the Pages
It's all about the Elise Back East this week on the blog! Yesterday I posted about my appearance at the wonderful Children's Book World in Haverford, and today it's all about flying to Boston to appear on Diane Goshgarian's Behind the Pages.
I first met Diane many years ago, when she interviewed me about my marathon guide book. I was thrilled when she offered to have me on the show for Populazzi, and even more thrilled when she told me how much she enjoyed the book. I highly respect Diane's opinion — not only is she a voracious and insightful reader, but she is also an author. Her book The Arbitrary Sword is a gut-wrenching work of historical fiction, set around the Armenian genocide. It's a period I knew nothing about before I read the book, and Diane brought it to life both brutally and beautifully.
Getting to and from Boston from Philly in a single day meant flying.
The Good: My dad is a pilot by hobby, has access to a plane, and was happy to zip me up to Boston for the show.
The Bad: I am both aviophobic and claustrophobic, so flying in a small plane…
…yeah, that about sums it up.
But hey, I'm all about facing my fears. I even climbed into the cockpit for takeoff, and only gritted the top layer of enamel from my teeth as we left solid ground.
Speaking of teeth, turns out the short Philly-Boston hop is the perfect length for a tooth whitening session.
Can you see the clear mouth guard? It kinda blends in, but it made me talk like Daffy Duck for the entire trip, which Miss M thought was hysterical.
The coolest part of the flight? Manhattan from above. It was just three days after the NYC Marathon, and looking down at the whole expanse of my run was incredible.
Once we landed in Boston, I scrubbed the whitening goo from my teeth and zipped off to the studio… where I tried to tamp down another fear of mine, appearing on camera.
Have we discussed my one line on the show California Dreams? Me on camera is not always a good thing. Unscripted, I do somewhat better — I had a lot of great TV spots when The Traveling Marathoner came out — but I always get nervous beforehand. There's a reason I'm a writer — I'm much better when I can corral my thoughts on paper, nip and tuck them until they sing. In conversation my brain zooms along even faster than my babbling mouth, and there's real danger I'll repeat myself, talk in circles, and pepper my speech with brilliant "and I'm like"s, "I mean"s, and "um"s.
Happily, Diane's spectacular, and I felt completely comfortable talking to her, even on camera. She asked brilliant questions about many of Populazzi's characters, and in no time at all the twenty-nine minute interview was over. Now, I've yet to see it, so there's certainly the chance I indeed came off like Tom Cruise jumping on Oprah's couch. I'll post the interview when I get a copy and you can let me know.
Your turn — have you ever been interviewed on camera for anything? If so, were you nervous, or perfectly comfortable? Did you like how you came off in the finished product? What if anything would you do differently next time?
