My Next Big Thing
Last Wednesday, I was tagged by my friend and talented author Sylvia Massara to answer questions about my next release Mags and the AARP Gang. To read about Sylvia’s Next Big Thing, The Soul Bearers, you can visit her blog which is very entertaining and worth reading, anyway!
Now here are some questions from Sylvia about my own "Next Big Thing" that I'd like to share with you:
What is the working title of your book?
It’s more than a working title. Mags and the AARP Gang will be released in mid November.
Where did the idea come from for the book?
I’ve written four mysteries in the Regan McHenry Real Estate Mysteries series and realized that my favorite characters in the books are Mrs. Rosemont, who is an eighty-six year old world traveler, and Olive, also an older woman. Both characters think about the world a bit differently from most people. They were fun for me to write. When I decided to take a break from mystery and third person, it seemed like a great idea to combine them and write from the newly formed character’s perspective.
What genre does your book fall under?
That’s a difficult thing for me to decide. Can a book where most characters are over eighty be called a coming of age book? There’s madcap comedy, but also danger and a complicated sting in the book. Is there a genre for old-chick lit? Wait, I know, perhaps feel-good action-adventure would work.
Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
Now that’s an easy question. Eighty-year-old Harvey thinks he does a great Clint Eastwood imitation. The cover Mags is a real person, but unfortunately she’s not an actress or I’d suggest her. At least my cover girl and actress Helen Mirren share a first name, though, so I’d pick her. For Batty Betty, there’s no other choice: Betty White.
What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
A group of renegade octogenarians rob the bank that holds the mortgage on their mobile home park to pay off the loan and forestall impending foreclosure, but things don’t go as planned. Scratch “things don’t go as planned” and substitute “nothing goes as planned.”
How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
This book took more than a year to write. Family health issues kept making me have to put it aside, and though people say writing in first person is easier than writing in third person, it’s not for me. My natural style is to be a fly on the wall and write what I see. It’s hard for me to be the narrator from the inside out.
What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
Can I get away with saying The Help …only with more comedy and on a smaller scale?
What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
There’s a scene in the book where Mags causes a diversion to keep bank customers and most of the bank employee’s attention away from the robbery that’s happening at the teller windows. I’d like to think I wrote that part of the book, but I didn’t exactly. I was in my bank trying to figure out how Mags might pull focus toward her, when a woman walked in and did exactly what Mags does in the book. I watched people in the bank; I was the only one paying attention to anything but what the woman was doing. She manipulated the people in the bank so successfully that I half expected a robbery was about to happen. I went to my car and wrote a detailed outline of what I observed to use in the book. Who says art doesn’t imitate life?
Next Wednesday, November 7th, my fellow authors Yolanda Renee and Amy Corwin will tell you about their "Next Big Thing" - make sure to check out their fascinating next books.
Yolanda Renee http://yolandarenee.blogspot.com/
Amy Corwin http://amycorwin.blogspot
Now here are some questions from Sylvia about my own "Next Big Thing" that I'd like to share with you:
What is the working title of your book?
It’s more than a working title. Mags and the AARP Gang will be released in mid November.
Where did the idea come from for the book?
I’ve written four mysteries in the Regan McHenry Real Estate Mysteries series and realized that my favorite characters in the books are Mrs. Rosemont, who is an eighty-six year old world traveler, and Olive, also an older woman. Both characters think about the world a bit differently from most people. They were fun for me to write. When I decided to take a break from mystery and third person, it seemed like a great idea to combine them and write from the newly formed character’s perspective.
What genre does your book fall under?
That’s a difficult thing for me to decide. Can a book where most characters are over eighty be called a coming of age book? There’s madcap comedy, but also danger and a complicated sting in the book. Is there a genre for old-chick lit? Wait, I know, perhaps feel-good action-adventure would work.
Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
Now that’s an easy question. Eighty-year-old Harvey thinks he does a great Clint Eastwood imitation. The cover Mags is a real person, but unfortunately she’s not an actress or I’d suggest her. At least my cover girl and actress Helen Mirren share a first name, though, so I’d pick her. For Batty Betty, there’s no other choice: Betty White.
What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
A group of renegade octogenarians rob the bank that holds the mortgage on their mobile home park to pay off the loan and forestall impending foreclosure, but things don’t go as planned. Scratch “things don’t go as planned” and substitute “nothing goes as planned.”
How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
This book took more than a year to write. Family health issues kept making me have to put it aside, and though people say writing in first person is easier than writing in third person, it’s not for me. My natural style is to be a fly on the wall and write what I see. It’s hard for me to be the narrator from the inside out.
What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
Can I get away with saying The Help …only with more comedy and on a smaller scale?
What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
There’s a scene in the book where Mags causes a diversion to keep bank customers and most of the bank employee’s attention away from the robbery that’s happening at the teller windows. I’d like to think I wrote that part of the book, but I didn’t exactly. I was in my bank trying to figure out how Mags might pull focus toward her, when a woman walked in and did exactly what Mags does in the book. I watched people in the bank; I was the only one paying attention to anything but what the woman was doing. She manipulated the people in the bank so successfully that I half expected a robbery was about to happen. I went to my car and wrote a detailed outline of what I observed to use in the book. Who says art doesn’t imitate life?
Next Wednesday, November 7th, my fellow authors Yolanda Renee and Amy Corwin will tell you about their "Next Big Thing" - make sure to check out their fascinating next books.
Yolanda Renee http://yolandarenee.blogspot.com/
Amy Corwin http://amycorwin.blogspot
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message 1:
by
Lilo
(new)
Jun 01, 2013 01:51PM
Sounds like a fun read. -- This reminds me. A few decades ago, I witnessed a hilarious chat of people talking about a funeral. All I had to do was go home and write it down. It made a great story. And I didn't have to change a word. Reality sometimes writes the best stories, and some of them are comedies.
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