Book journey interview for Love Made Me More @kathytemean blog
Please read about the book journey for Love Made Me More at Kathy Temean's blog
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Inspiration
People often ask me how I come up with my stories. What was my inspiration? So, I looked back on my recent projects and tried to remember the original spark that ignited each story. I love learning about history and also the paranormal. In my YA and MG stories I usually try to meld the two together. A Promise Stitched in Time is the story of a girl looking for inspiration for a painting she needs to complete in order to win a scholarship to a prestigious art school. She goes to her local thrift shop and is drawn to a tweed coat. She brings the coat home and strange things begin to happen. Is the coat haunted or is something else at work? I remember walking around a thrift store myself, looking at vintage coats and hats and wondering what were the chances of someone being reincarnated and happening upon an object they'd owned in a previous life. Would the object trigger past memories? Wouldn't it be cool if it did—or would it be too much to handle? What if the object was lost under dire circumstances--perhaps stolen. Then I remembered reading about two girls who were held prisoner in the attic of the Commandant of Auschwitz. The girls were forced to make clothing (using fabric from the clothes stolen from their people) for the Nazi family. The identity of the girls was never discovered. What if my reincarnated girl was one of those girls imprisoned in that attic? Cool idea, yes? That's where I started with this story. Tomorrow I'll tell you about my story inspired by a documentary on coma patients. It's a freaky idea, but not totally out of the realms of possibility. For that story I actually did some very interesting hands on research.
The Next Big Thing
I was asked by my talented friend, Lisa Amowitz, to participate in this blog tag event detailing what we are all currently working on. Hope you find it interesting! What is the working title of your book? A Promise Stitched in Time Where did the idea come from for the book? Inspiration for this story is a bit of Holocaust history I discovered in the book, Nazi Chic. In this work of non-fiction the author reports the story of two women imprisoned in Auschwitz, then enslaved in the attic of the commandant Rudolph Hoess' villa. The girls were forced, under severe conditions, to make luxurious garments for his wife, Hedwig Hoess. The identity of the girls is unknown. I started thinking about the clothing confiscated by the Nazis. Where did it go? And, what might happen (allow imagination to go wild) if you found an item that belonged to one of these girls in a second hand shop. What genre does your book fall under? young adult paranormal Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition? This was hard. I guess my protagonist, Maggie McConnell, would be played by an older version of Emma Kenney (from the show Shameless), and Taj Mabbibi would be played by Dev Patel (circa Slumdog Millionaire). What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book? When a young girl is compelled to buy a tweed coat from a thrift shop, hallucinations and odd dreams lead her to believe the coat may be haunted by a ghost who needs to be heard. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency? I am represented by my wonderful agent, Terrie Wolf of AKA Literary. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript? I've been working on and off on this story for a few years. It's been through quite a few revisions. Who or What inspired you to write this book? I've always been fascinated by the paranormal and wondered what happens to us after we die. What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest? It's sweet, sometimes funny, spooky, and leaves the reader with a sense of hope. I'm tagging: Suzi Ryan http://ataleoftwosuzies.blogspot.com/
Library Lovin’ Challenge
Dear Friends, This is a library-loving blog challenge! For every commenter on this post between now and April 14th (my birthday!) at 12 pm, I will donate $1 to The Cherry Hill Public Library http://www.chplnj.org, up to an amount of $ 50 total. How easy could it be? You comment, I cough up the money, the libraries get a gift! If you don’t know what to say in your comment, “I love libraries” will do. My pledge is “per commenter”—so if a single person leaves 50 comments, that still only counts once! But you can do more by spreading the word ... please link to this post, tweet about it, mention it on Facebook, etc. You can raise money for additional local libraries by visiting the blogs of others participating in this blog challenge: http://writerjenn.livejournal.com/ Thanks for your support! ~Coll
